_Enter Claudius King of Denmarke. Gertrude the
Queene, Hamlet, Polonius, Laertes, and his Sister
Ophelia, Lords Attendant._[4]
[Sidenote: _Florish. Enter Claudius, King of Denmarke,
Gertrad the Queene, Counsaile: as Polonius, and his
sonne Laertes, Hamelt Cum Abijs._]
_King._ Though yet of _Hamlet_ our deere Brothers death
[Sidenote: _Claud._]
The memory be greene: and that it vs befitted
To beare our hearts in greefe, and our whole Kingdome
To be contracted in one brow of woe:
Yet so farre hath Discretion fought with Nature,
That we with wisest sorrow thinke on him,
[Footnote 1: Does it mean--_carries off any child, leaving a
changeling_? or does it mean--_affect with evil_, as a disease might
infect or _take_?]
[Footnote 2: _1st Q_. 'hie mountaine top,']
[Footnote 3: _In neither Q._]
[Footnote 4: The first court after the marriage.]
[Page 16]
Together with remembrance of our selues.
Therefore our sometimes Sister, now our Queen,
Th'Imperiall Ioyntresse of this warlike State, [Sidenote: to this]
Haue we, as 'twere, with a defeated ioy,
With one Auspicious, and one Dropping eye,
[Sidenote: an auspitious and a]
With mirth in Funerall, and with Dirge in Marriage,
In equall Scale weighing Delight and Dole[1]
Taken to Wife; nor haue we heerein barr'd[2]
Your better Wisedomes, which haue freely gone
With this affaire along, for all our Thankes.
[Sidenote: 8] Now followes, that you know young _Fortinbras_,[3]
Holding a weake supposall of our worth;
Or thinking by our late deere Brothers death,
Our State to be disioynt, and out of Frame,
Colleagued with the dreame of his Aduantage;[4] [Sidenote: this dreame]
He hath not fayl'd to pester vs with Message,
Importing the surrender of those Lands
Lost by his Father: with all Bonds of Law [Sidenote: bands]
To our most valiant Brother. So much for him.
_Enter Voltemand and Cornelius._[5]
Now for our selfe, and for this time of meeting
Thus much the businesse is. We haue heere writ
To Norway, Vncle of young _Fortinbras_,
Who Impotent and Bedrid, scarsely heares
Of this his Nephewes purpose, to suppresse
His further gate[6] heerein. In that the Leuies,
The Lists, and full proportions are all made
Out of his subiect: and we heere dispatch
You good _Cornelius_, and you _Voltemand_,
For bearing of this greeting to old Norway, [Sidenote: bearers]
Giuing to you no further personall power
To businesse with the King, more then the scope
Of these dilated Articles allow:[7] [Sidenote: delated[8]]
Farewell and let your hast commend your duty.[9]
[Footnote 1: weighing out an equal quantity of each.]
[Footnote 2: Like _crossed_.]
[Footnote 3: 'Now follows--that (_which_) you know--young
Fortinbras:--']
[Footnote 4: _Colleagued_ agrees with _supposall_. The preceding two
lines may be regarded as somewhat parenthetical. _Dream of
advantage_--hope of gain.]
[Footnote 5: _Not in Q._]
[Footnote 6: _going; advance._ Note in Norway also, as well as in
Denmark, the succession of the brother.]
[Footnote 7: (_giving them papers_).]
[Footnote 8: Which of these is right, I cannot tell. _Dilated_ means
_expanded_, and would refer to _the scope; _delated_ means
_committed_--to them, to limit them.]
[Footnote 9: idea of duty.]
[Page 18]
_Volt._ In that, and all things, will we shew our duty.
_King._ We doubt it nothing, heartily farewell.
[Sidenote: 74] [1]_Exit Voltemand and Cornelius._
And now _Laertes_, what's the newes with you?
You told vs of some suite. What is't _Laertes_?
You cannot speake of Reason to the Dane,
And loose your voyce. What would'st thou beg _Laertes_,
That shall not be my Offer, not thy Asking?[2]
The Head is not more Natiue to the Heart,
The Hand more Instrumentall to the Mouth,
Then is the Throne of Denmarke to thy Father.[3]
What would'st thou haue _Laertes_?
_Laer._ Dread my Lord, [Sidenote: My dread]
Your leaue and fauour to returne to France,
From whence, though willingly I came to Denmarke
To shew my duty in your Coronation,
Yet now I must confesse, that duty done,
[Sidenote: 22] My thoughts and wishes bend againe towards toward
France,[4]
And bow them to your gracious leaue and pardon.
_King._ Haue you your Fathers leaue?
What sayes _Pollonius_?
[A] _Pol._ He hath my Lord:
I do beseech you giue him leaue to go.
_King._ Take thy faire houre _Laertes_, time be thine,
And thy best graces spend it at thy will:
But now my Cosin _Hamlet_, and my Sonne?
[Footnote A: _In the Quarto_:--
_Polo._ Hath[5] my Lord wroung from me my slowe leaue
By laboursome petition, and at last
Vpon his will I seald my hard consent,[6]
I doe beseech you giue him leaue to goe.]
[Footnote 1: _Not in Q._]
[Footnote 2: 'Before they call, I will answer; and while they are yet
speaking, I will hear.'--_Isaiah_, lxv. 24.]
[Footnote 3: The villain king courts his courtiers.]
[Footnote 4: He had been educated there. Compare 23. But it would seem
rather to the court than the university he desired to return. See his
father's instructions, 38.]
[Footnote 5: _H'ath_--a contraction for _He hath_.]
[Footnote 6: A play upon the act of sealing a will with wax.]
[Page 20]
_Ham._ A little more then kin, and lesse then kinde.[1]
_King._ How is it that the Clouds still hang on you?
_Ham._ Not so my Lord, I am too much i'th'Sun.[2]
[Sidenote: so much my ... in the sonne.]
_Queen._ Good Hamlet cast thy nightly colour off,[4]
[Sidenote: nighted[3]]
And let thine eye looke like a Friend on Denmarke.
Do not for euer with thy veyled[5] lids [Sidenote: vailed]
Seeke for thy Noble Father in the dust;
Thou know'st 'tis common, all that liues must dye,
Passing through Nature, to Eternity.
_Ham._ I Madam, it is common.[6]
_Queen._ If it be;
Why seemes it so particular with thee.
_Ham._ Seemes Madam? Nay, it is: I know not Seemes:[7]
'Tis not alone my Inky Cloake (good Mother)
[Sidenote: cloake coold mother [8]]
Nor Customary suites of solemne Blacke,
Nor windy suspiration of forc'd breath,
No, nor the fruitfull Riuer in the Eye,
Nor the deiected hauiour of the Visage,
Together with all Formes, Moods, shewes of Griefe,
[Sidenote: moodes, chapes of]
That can denote me truly. These indeed Seeme,[9] [Sidenote: deuote]
For they are actions that a man might[10] play:
But I haue that Within, which passeth show; [Sidenote: passes]
These, but the Trappings, and the Suites of woe.
_King._ 'Tis sweet and commendable
In your Nature _Hamlet_,
To giue these mourning duties to your Father:[11]
But you must know, your Father lost a Father,
That Father lost, lost his, and the Suruiuer bound
In filiall Obligation, for some terme
To do obsequious[12] Sorrow. But to perseuer
In obstinate Condolement, is a course
[Footnote 1: An _aside_. Hamlet's first utterance is of dislike to his
uncle. He is more than _kin_ through his unwelcome marriage--less than
_kind_ by the difference in their natures. To be _kind_ is to behave as
one _kinned_ or related. But the word here is the noun, and means
_nature_, or sort by birth.]
[Footnote 2: A word-play may be here intended between _sun_ and _son_:
_a little more than kin--too much i' th' Son_. So George Herbert:
For when he sees my ways, I die;
But I have got his _Son_, and he hath none;
and Dr. Donne:
at my death thy Son
Shall shine, as he shines now and heretofore.]
[Footnote 3: 'Wintred garments'--_As You Like It_, iii. 2.]
[Footnote 4: He is the only one who has not for the wedding put off his
mourning.]
[Footnote 5: _lowered_, or cast down: _Fr. avaler_, to lower.]
[Footnote 6: 'Plainly you treat it as a common matter--a thing of no
significance!' _I_ is constantly used for _ay_, _yes_.]
[Footnote 7: He pounces on the word _seems_.]
[Footnote 8: Not unfrequently the type would appear to have been set up
from dictation.]
[Footnote 9: They are things of the outside, and must _seem_, for they
are capable of being imitated; they are the natural _shows_ of grief.
But he has that in him which cannot _show_ or _seem_, because nothing
can represent it. These are 'the Trappings and the Suites of _woe_;'
they fitly represent woe, but they cannot shadow forth that which is
within him--a something different from woe, far beyond it and worse,
passing all reach of embodiment and manifestation. What this something
is, comes out the moment he is left by himself.]
[Footnote 10: The emphasis is on _might_.]
[Footnote 11: Both his uncle and his mother decline to understand him.
They will have it he mourns the death of his father, though they must at
least suspect another cause for his grief. Note the intellectual mastery
of the hypocrite--which accounts for his success.]
[Footnote 12: belonging to _obsequies_.]
[Page 22]
Of impious stubbornnesse. Tis vnmanly greefe,
It shewes a will most incorrect to Heauen,
A Heart vnfortified, a Minde impatient, [Sidenote: or minde]
An Vnderstanding simple, and vnschool'd:
For, what we know must be, and is as common
As any the most vulgar thing to sence,
Why should we in our peeuish Opposition
Take it to heart? Fye, 'tis a fault to Heauen,
A fault against the Dead, a fault to Nature,
To Reason most absurd, whose common Theame
Is death of Fathers, and who still hath cried,
From the first Coarse,[1] till he that dyed to day, [Sidenote: course]
This must be so. We pray you throw to earth
This vnpreuayling woe, and thinke of vs
As of a Father; For let the world take note,
You are the most immediate to our Throne,[2]
And with no lesse Nobility of Loue,
Then that which deerest Father beares his Sonne,
Do I impart towards you. For your intent [Sidenote: toward]
[Sidenote: 18] In going backe to Schoole in Wittenberg,[3]
It is most retrograde to our desire: [Sidenote: retrogard]
And we beseech you, bend you to remaine
Heere in the cheere and comfort of our eye,
Our cheefest Courtier Cosin, and our Sonne.
_Qu._ Let not thy Mother lose her Prayers _Hamlet_: [Sidenote: loose]
I prythee stay with vs, go not to Wittenberg. [Sidenote: pray thee]
_Ham._ I shall in all my best
Obey you Madam.[4]
_King._ Why 'tis a louing, and a faire Reply,
Be as our selfe in Denmarke. Madam come,
This gentle and vnforc'd accord of _Hamlet_[5]
Sits smiling to my heart; in grace whereof,
No iocond health that Denmarke drinkes to day,
[Sidenote: 44] But the great Cannon to the Clowds shall tell,
[Footnote 1: _Corpse_.]
[Footnote 2: --seeking to propitiate him with the hope that his
succession had been but postponed by his uncle's election.]
[Footnote 3: Note that Hamlet was educated in Germany--at Wittenberg,
the university where in 1508 Luther was appointed professor of
Philosophy. Compare 19. There was love of study as well as disgust with
home in his desire to return to _Schoole_: this from what we know of him
afterwards.]
[Footnote 4: Emphasis on _obey_. A light on the character of Hamlet.]
[Footnote 5: He takes it, or pretends to take it, for far more than it
was. He desires friendly relations with Hamlet.]
[Page 24]
And the Kings Rouce,[1] the Heauens shall bruite againe,
Respeaking earthly Thunder. Come away.
_Exeunt_ [Sidenote: _Florish. Exeunt all but Hamlet._]
_Manet Hamlet._
[2]_Ham._ Oh that this too too solid Flesh, would melt,
[Sidenote: sallied flesh[3]]
Thaw, and resolue it selfe into a Dew:
[Sidenote: 125,247,260] Or that the Euerlasting had not fixt
[Sidenote: 121 _bis_] His Cannon 'gainst Selfe-slaughter. O God, O God!
[Sidenote: seale slaughter, o God, God,]
How weary, stale, flat, and vnprofitable [Sidenote: wary]
Seemes to me all the vses of this world? [Sidenote: seeme]
Fie on't? Oh fie, fie, 'tis an vnweeded Garden [Sidenote: ah fie,]
That growes to Seed: Things rank, and grosse in Nature
Possesse it meerely. That it should come to this:
[Sidenote: meerely that it should come thus]
But two months dead[4]: Nay, not so much; not two,
So excellent a King, that was to this
_Hiperion_ to a Satyre: so louing to my Mother,
That he might not beteene the windes of heauen [Sidenote: beteeme[5]]
Visit her face too roughly. Heauen and Earth
Must I remember: why she would hang on him, [Sidenote: should]
As if encrease of Appetite had growne
By what it fed on; and yet within a month?
Let me not thinke on't: Frailty, thy name is woman.[6]
A little Month, or ere those shooes were old,
With which she followed my poore Fathers body
Like _Niobe_, all teares. Why she, euen she.[7]
(O Heauen! A beast that wants discourse[8] of Reason [Sidenote: O God]
Would haue mourn'd longer) married with mine Vnkle, [Sidenote: my]
[Footnote 1: German _Rausch_, _drunkenness_. 44, 68]
[Footnote 2: A soliloquy is as the drawing called a section of a thing:
it shows the inside of the man. Soliloquy is only rare, not unnatural,
and in art serves to reveal more of nature. In the drama it is the
lifting of a veil through which dialogue passes. The scene is for the
moment shifted into the lonely spiritual world, and here we begin to
know Hamlet. Such is his wretchedness, both in mind and circumstance,
that he could well wish to vanish from the world. The suggestion of
suicide, however, he dismisses at once--with a momentary regret, it is
true--but he dismisses it--as against the will of God to whom he appeals
in his misery. The cause of his misery is now made plain to us--his
trouble that passes show, deprives life of its interest, and renders the
world a disgust to him. There is no lamentation over his father's death,
so dwelt upon by the king; for loving grief does not crush. Far less
could his uncle's sharp practice, in scheming for his own election
during Hamlet's absence, have wrought in a philosopher like him such an
effect. The one makes him sorrowful, the other might well annoy him, but
neither could render him unhappy: his misery lies at his mother's door;
it is her conduct that has put out the light of her son's life. She who
had been to him the type of all excellence, she whom his father had
idolized, has within a month of his death married his uncle, and is
living in habitual incest--for as such, a marriage of the kind was then
unanimously regarded. To Hamlet's condition and behaviour, his mother,
her past and her present, is the only and sufficing key. His very idea
of unity had been rent in twain.]
[Footnote 3: _1st Q_. 'too much grieu'd and sallied flesh.' _Sallied_,
sullied: compare _sallets_, 67, 103. I have a strong suspicion that
_sallied_ and not _solid_ is the true word. It comes nearer the depth of
Hamlet's mood.]
[Footnote 4: Two months at the present moment.]
[Footnote 5: This is the word all the editors take: which is right, I do
not know; I doubt if either is. The word in _A Midsummer Night's Dream_,
act i. sc. 1--
Belike for want of rain; which I could well
Beteem them from the tempest of mine eyes--
I cannot believe the same word. The latter means _produce for_, as from
the place of origin. The word, in the sense necessary to this passage,
is not, so far as I know, to be found anywhere else. I have no
suggestion to make.]
[Footnote 6: From his mother he generalizes to _woman_. After having
believed in such a mother, it may well be hard for a man to believe in
any woman.]
[Footnote 7: _Q._ omits 'euen she.']
[Footnote 8: the going abroad among things.]
[Page 26]
My Fathers Brother: but no more like my Father,
Then I to _Hercules_. Within a Moneth?
Ere yet the salt of most vnrighteous Teares
Had left the flushing of her gauled eyes, [Sidenote: in her]
She married. O most wicked speed, to post[1]
With such dexterity to Incestuous sheets:
It is not, nor it cannot come to good,
But breake my heart, for I must hold my tongue.[2]
_Enter Horatio, Barnard, and Marcellus._
[Sidenote: _Marcellus, and Bernardo._]
_Hor._ Haile to your Lordship.[3]
_Ham._ I am glad to see you well:
_Horatio_, or I do forget my selfe.
_Hor._ The same my Lord,
And your poore Seruant euer.
[Sidenote: 134] _Ham._ [4]Sir my good friend,
Ile change that name with you:[5]
And what make you from Wittenberg _Horatio_?[6]
_Marcellus._[7]
_Mar._ My good Lord.
_Ham._ I am very glad to see you: good euen Sir.[8]
But what in faith make you from _Wittemberge_?
_Hor._ A truant disposition, good my Lord.[9]
_Ham._ I would not haue your Enemy say so;[10] [Sidenote: not heare]
Nor shall you doe mine eare that violence,[11] [Sidenote: my eare]
[Sidenote: 134] To make it truster of your owne report
Against your selfe. I know you are no Truant:
But what is your affaire in _Elsenour_?
Wee'l teach you to drinke deepe, ere you depart.[12]
[Sidenote: you for to drinke ere]
_Hor._ My Lord, I came to see your Fathers Funerall.
_Ham._ I pray thee doe not mock me (fellow Student) [Sidenote: pre thee]
I thinke it was to see my Mothers Wedding. [Sidenote: was to my]
[Footnote 1: I suggest the pointing:
speed! To post ... sheets!]
[Footnote 2: Fit moment for the entrance of his father's messengers.]
[Footnote 3: They do not seem to have been intimate before, though we
know from Hamlet's speech (134) that he had had the greatest respect for
Horatio. The small degree of doubt in Hamlet's recognition of his friend
is due to the darkness, and the unexpectedness of his appearance.]
[Footnote 4: _1st Q._ 'O my good friend, I change, &c.' This would leave
it doubtful whether he wished to exchange servant or friend; but 'Sir,
my _good friend_,' correcting Horatio, makes his intent plain.]
[Footnote 5: Emphasis on _that_: 'I will exchange the name of _friend_
with you.']
[Footnote 6: 'What are you doing from--out of, _away
from_--Wittenberg?']
[Footnote 7: In recognition: the word belongs to Hamlet's speech.]
[Footnote 8: _Point thus_: 'you.--Good even, sir.'--_to Barnardo, whom
he does not know._]
[Footnote 9: An ungrammatical reply. He does not wish to give the real,
painful answer, and so replies confusedly, as if he had been asked,
'What makes you?' instead of, 'What do you make?']
[Footnote 10: '--I should know how to answer him.']
[Footnote 11: Emphasis on _you_.]
[Footnote 12: Said with contempt for his surroundings.]
[Page 28]
_Hor._ Indeed my Lord, it followed hard vpon.
_Ham._ Thrift, thrift _Horatio_: the Funerall Bakt-meats
Did coldly furnish forth the Marriage Tables;
Would I had met my dearest foe in heauen,[1]
Ere I had euer seerie that day _Horatio_.[2] [Sidenote: Or ever I had]
My father, me thinkes I see my father.
_Hor._ Oh where my Lord? [Sidenote: Where my]
_Ham._ In my minds eye (_Horatio_)[3]
_Hor._ I saw him once; he was a goodly King. [Sidenote: once, a was]
_Ham._ He was a man, take him for all in all: [Sidenote: A was a man]
I shall not look vpon his like againe.
_Hor._ My Lord, I thinke I saw him yesternight.
_Ham._ Saw? Who?[4]
_Hor._ My Lord, the King your Father.
_Ham._ The King my Father?[5]
_Hor._ Season[6] your admiration for a while
With an attent eare;[7] till I may deliuer
Vpon the witnesse of these Gentlemen,
This maruell to you.
_Ham._ For Heauens loue let me heare. [Sidenote: God's love]
_Hor._ Two nights together, had these Gentlemen
(_Marcellus_ and _Barnardo_) on their Watch
In the dead wast and middle of the night[8]
Beene thus encountred. A figure like your Father,[9]
Arm'd at all points exactly, _Cap a Pe_,[10] [Sidenote: Armed at poynt]
Appeares before them, and with sollemne march
Goes slow and stately: By them thrice he walkt,
[Sidenote: stately by them; thrice]
By their opprest and feare-surprized eyes,
Within his Truncheons length; whilst they bestil'd
[Sidenote: they distill'd[11]]
Almost to Ielly with the Act of feare,[12]
Stand dumbe and speake not to him. This to me
In dreadfull[13] secrecie impart they did,
And I with them the third Night kept the Watch,
Whereas[14] they had deliuer'd both in time,
[Footnote 1: _Dear_ is not unfrequently used as an intensive; but 'my
dearest foe' is not 'the man who hates me most,' but 'the man whom most
I regard as my foe.']
[Footnote 2: Note Hamlet's trouble: the marriage, not the death, nor the
supplantation.]
[Footnote 3: --with a little surprise at Horatio's question.]
[Footnote 4: Said as if he must have misheard. Astonishment comes only
with the next speech.]
[Footnote 5: _1st Q_. 'Ha, ha, the King my father ke you.']
[Footnote 6: Qualify.]
[Footnote 7: _1st Q_. 'an attentiue eare,'.]
[Footnote 8: Possibly, _dead vast_, as in _1st Q_.; but _waste_ as good,
leaving also room to suppose a play in the word.]
[Footnote 9: Note the careful uncertainty.]
[Footnote 10: _1st Q. 'Capapea_.']
[Footnote 11: Either word would do: the _distilling_ off of the animal
spirits would leave the man a jelly; the cold of fear would _bestil_
them and him to a jelly. _1st Q. distilled_. But I judge _bestil'd_ the
better, as the truer to the operation of fear. Compare _The Winter's
Tale_, act v. sc. 3:--