1    Though yet of Hamlet our dear brother's death
2    The memory be green, and that it us befitted
3    To bear our hearts in grief and our whole kingdom
4    To be contracted in one brow of woe,
5    Yet so far hath discretion fought with nature
6    That we with wisest sorrow think on him,
7    Together with remembrance of ourselves.
8    Therefore our sometime sister, now our queen,
9    The imperial jointress to this warlike state,
10   Have we, as 'twere with a defeated joy,--
11   With an auspicious and a dropping eye,
12   With mirth in funeral and with dirge in marriage,
13   In equal scale weighing delight and dole,--
14   Taken to wife: nor have we herein barr'd
15   Your better wisdoms, which have freely gone
16   With this affair along. For all, our thanks.
17   Now follows, that you know, young Fortinbras,
18   Holding a weak supposal of our worth,
19   Or thinking by our late dear brother's death
20   Our state to be disjoint and out of frame,
21   Colleagued with the dream of his advantage,
22   He hath not fail'd to pester us with message,
23   Importing the surrender of those lands
24   Lost by his father, with all bonds of law,
25   To our most valiant brother. So much for him.
26   Now for ourself and for this time of meeting:
27   Thus much the business is: we have here writ
28   To Norway, uncle of young Fortinbras,--
29   Who, impotent and bed-rid, scarcely hears
30   Of this his nephew's purpose,--to suppress
31   His further gait herein; in that the levies,
32   The lists and full proportions, are all made
33   Out of his subject: and we here dispatch
34   You, good Cornelius, and you, Voltimand,
35   For bearers of this greeting to old Norway;
36   Giving to you no further personal power
37   To business with the king, more than the scope
38   Of these delated articles allow.
39   Farewell, and let your haste commend your duty.

40   In that and all things will we show our duty.

41   We doubt it nothing: heartily farewell.
Exeunt VOLTIMAND and CORNELIUS
42   And now, Laertes, what's the news with you?
43   You told us of some suit; what is't, Laertes?
44   You cannot speak of reason to the Dane,
45   And loose your voice: what wouldst thou beg, Laertes,
46   That shall not be my offer, not thy asking?
47   The head is not more native to the heart,
48   The hand more instrumental to the mouth,
49   Than is the throne of Denmark to thy father.
50   What wouldst thou have, Laertes?

51   My dread lord,
52   Your leave and favour to return to France;
53   From whence though willingly I came to Denmark,
54   To show my duty in your coronation,
55   Yet now, I must confess, that duty done,
56   My thoughts and wishes bend again toward France
57   And bow them to your gracious leave and pardon.

58   Have you your father's leave? What says Polonius?

59   He hath, my lord, wrung from me my slow leave
60   By laboursome petition, and at last
61   Upon his will I seal'd my hard consent:
62   I do beseech you, give him leave to go.

63   Take thy fair hour, Laertes; time be thine,
64   And thy best graces spend it at thy will!
65   But now, my cousin Hamlet, and my son,--

Aside
66    A little more than kin, and less than kind.

67   How is it that the clouds still hang on you?

68   Not so, my lord; I am too much i' the sun.

69   Good Hamlet, cast thy nighted colour off,
70   And let thine eye look like a friend on Denmark.
71   Do not for ever with thy vailed lids
72   Seek for thy noble father in the dust:
73   Thou know'st 'tis common; all that lives must die,
74   Passing through nature to eternity.

75   Ay, madam, it is common.

76   If it be,
77   Why seems it so particular with thee?

78   Seems, madam! nay it is; I know not 'seems.'
79   'Tis not alone my inky cloak, good mother,
80   Nor customary suits of solemn black,
81   Nor windy suspiration of forced breath,
82   No, nor the fruitful river in the eye,
83   Nor the dejected 'havior of the visage,
84   Together with all forms, moods, shapes of grief,
85   That can denote me truly: these indeed seem,
86   For they are actions that a man might play:
87   But I have that within which passeth show;
88   These but the trappings and the suits of woe.

89   'Tis sweet and commendable in your nature, Hamlet,
90   To give these mourning duties to your father:
91   But, you must know, your father lost a father;
92   That father lost, lost his, and the survivor bound
93   In filial obligation for some term
94   To do obsequious sorrow: but to persever
95   In obstinate condolement is a course
96   Of impious stubbornness; 'tis unmanly grief;
97   It shows a will most incorrect to heaven,
98   A heart unfortified, a mind impatient,
99   An understanding simple and unschool'd:
100  For what we know must be and is as common
101  As any the most vulgar thing to sense,
102  Why should we in our peevish opposition
103  Take it to heart? Fie! 'tis a fault to heaven,
104  A fault against the dead, a fault to nature,
105  To reason most absurd: whose common theme
106  Is death of fathers, and who still hath cried,
107  From the first corse till he that died to-day,
108  'This must be so.' We pray you, throw to earth
109  This unprevailing woe, and think of us
110  As of a father: for let the world take note,
111  You are the most immediate to our throne;
112  And with no less nobility of love
113  Than that which dearest father bears his son,
114  Do I impart toward you. For your intent
115  In going back to school in Wittenberg,
116  It is most retrograde to our desire:
117  And we beseech you, bend you to remain
118  Here, in the cheer and comfort of our eye,
119  Our chiefest courtier, cousin, and our son.

120  Let not thy mother lose her prayers, Hamlet:
121  I pray thee, stay with us; go not to Wittenberg.

122  I shall in all my best obey you, madam.

123  Why, 'tis a loving and a fair reply:
124  Be as ourself in Denmark. Madam, come;
125  This gentle and unforced accord of Hamlet
126  Sits smiling to my heart: in grace whereof,
127  No jocund health that Denmark drinks to-day,
128  But the great cannon to the clouds shall tell,
129  And the king's rouse the heavens all bruit again,
130  Re-speaking earthly thunder. Come away.

131  O, that this too too solid flesh would melt
132  Thaw and resolve itself into a dew!
133  Or that the Everlasting had not fix'd
134  His canon 'gainst self-slaughter! O God! God!
135  How weary, stale, flat and unprofitable,
136  Seem to me all the uses of this world!
137  Fie on't! ah fie! 'tis an unweeded garden,
138  That grows to seed; things rank and gross in nature
139  Possess it merely. That it should come to this!
140  But two months dead: nay, not so much, not two:
141  So excellent a king; that was, to this,
142  Hyperion to a satyr; so loving to my mother
143  That he might not beteem the winds of heaven
144  Visit her face too roughly. Heaven and earth!
145  Must I remember? why, she would hang on him,
146  As if increase of appetite had grown
147  By what it fed on: and yet, within a month--
148  Let me not think on't--Frailty, thy name is woman!--
149  A little month, or ere those shoes were old
150  With which she follow'd my poor father's body,
151  Like Niobe, all tears:--why she, even she--
152  O, God! a beast, that wants discourse of reason,
153  Would have mourn'd longer--married with my uncle,
154  My father's brother, but no more like my father
155  Than I to Hercules: within a month:
156  Ere yet the salt of most unrighteous tears
157  Had left the flushing in her galled eyes,
158  She married. O, most wicked speed, to post
159  With such dexterity to incestuous sheets!
160  It is not nor it cannot come to good:
161  But break, my heart; for I must hold my tongue.

162  Hail to your lordship!

163  I am glad to see you well:
164  Horatio,--or I do forget myself.

165  The same, my lord, and your poor servant ever.

166  Sir, my good friend; I'll change that name with you:
167  And what make you from Wittenberg, Horatio? Marcellus?

168  My good lord--

169  I am very glad to see you. Good even, sir.
170  But what, in faith, make you from Wittenberg?

171  A truant disposition, good my lord.

172  I would not hear your enemy say so,
173  Nor shall you do mine ear that violence,
174  To make it truster of your own report
175  Against yourself: I know you are no truant.
176  But what is your affair in Elsinore?
177  We'll teach you to drink deep ere you depart.

178  My lord, I came to see your father's funeral.

179  I pray thee, do not mock me, fellow-student;
180  I think it was to see my mother's wedding.

181  Indeed, my lord, it follow'd hard upon.

182  Thrift, thrift, Horatio! the funeral baked meats
183  Did coldly furnish forth the marriage tables.
184  Would I had met my dearest foe in heaven
185  Or ever I had seen that day, Horatio!
186  My father!--methinks I see my father.

187  Where, my lord?

188  In my mind's eye, Horatio.

189  I saw him once; he was a goodly king.

190  He was a man, take him for all in all,
191  I shall not look upon his like again.

192  My lord, I think I saw him yesternight.

193  Saw? who?

194  My lord, the king your father.

195  The king my father!

196  Season your admiration for awhile
197  With an attent ear, till I may deliver,
198  Upon the witness of these gentlemen,
199  This marvel to you.

200  For God's love, let me hear.

201  Two nights together had these gentlemen,
202  Marcellus and Bernardo, on their watch,
203  In the dead vast and middle of the night,
204  Been thus encounter'd. A figure like your father,
205  Armed at point exactly, cap-a-pe,
206  Appears before them, and with solemn march
207  Goes slow and stately by them: thrice he walk'd
208  By their oppress'd and fear-surprised eyes,
209  Within his truncheon's length; whilst they, distilled
210  Almost to jelly with the act of fear,
211  Stand dumb and speak not to him. This to me
212  In dreadful secrecy impart they did;
213  And I with them the third night kept the watch;
214  Where, as they had deliver'd, both in time,
215  Form of the thing, each word made true and good,
216  The apparition comes: I knew your father;
217  These hands are not more like.

218  But where was this?

219  My lord, upon the platform where we watch'd.

220  Did you not speak to it?

221  My lord, I did;
222  But answer made it none: yet once methought
223  It lifted up its head and did address
224  Itself to motion, like as it would speak;
225  But even then the morning cock crew loud,
226  And at the sound it shrunk in haste away,
227  And vanish'd from our sight.

228  'Tis very strange.

229  As I do live, my honour'd lord, 'tis true;
230  And we did think it writ down in our duty
231  To let you know of it.

232  Indeed, indeed, sirs, but this troubles me.
233  Hold you the watch to-night?

234  We do, my lord.

235  Arm'd, say you?

236  Arm'd, my lord.

237  From top to toe?

238  My lord, from head to foot.

239  Then saw you not his face?

240  O, yes, my lord; he wore his beaver up.

241  What, look'd he frowningly?

242  A countenance more in sorrow than in anger.

243  Pale or red?

244  Nay, very pale.

245  And fix'd his eyes upon you?

246  Most constantly.

247  I would I had been there.

248  It would have much amazed you.

249  Very like, very like. Stay'd it long?

250  While one with moderate haste might tell a hundred.

251  Longer, longer.

252  Not when I saw't.

253  His beard was grizzled--no?

254  It was, as I have seen it in his life,
255  A sable silver'd.

256  I will watch to-night;
257  Perchance 'twill walk again.

258  I warrant it will.

259  If it assume my noble father's person,
260  I'll speak to it, though hell itself should gape
261  And bid me hold my peace. I pray you all,
262  If you have hitherto conceal'd this sight,
263  Let it be tenable in your silence still;
264  And whatsoever else shall hap to-night,
265  Give it an understanding, but no tongue:
266  I will requite your loves. So, fare you well:
267  Upon the platform, 'twixt eleven and twelve,
268  I'll visit you.

269  Our duty to your honour.

270  Your loves, as mine to you: farewell.
Exeunt all but HAMLET
271  My father's spirit in arms! all is not well;
272  I doubt some foul play: would the night were come!
273  Till then sit still, my soul: foul deeds will rise,
274  Though all the earth o'erwhelm them, to men's eyes.