Hamlet (Quarto 2, 1604)
Not Peer Reviewed
The Tragedie of Hamlet
¶And spur my dull reuenge. What is a man
¶If his chiefe good and market of his time
¶Looking before and after, gaue vs not
¶That capabilitie and god-like reason
.35Of thinking too precisely on th'euent,
¶A thought which quarterd hath but one part wisedom,
¶And euer three parts coward, I doe not know
¶Why yet I liue to say this thing's to doe,
¶Led by a delicate and tender Prince,
¶Makes mouthes at the invisible euent,
¶To all that fortune, death, and danger dare,
¶Euen for an Egge-shell. Rightly to be great,
¶Is not to stirre without great argument,
¶But greatly to find quarrell in a straw
¶That haue a father kild, a mother staind,
¶Excytements of my reason, and my blood,
¶The iminent death of twenty thousand men,
.55That for a fantasie and tricke of fame
¶Goe to their graues like beds, fight for a plot
¶Whereon the numbers cannot try the cause,
¶Which is not tombe enough and continent
¶To hide the slaine, ô from this time forth,
.60My thoughts be bloody, or be nothing worth.
Exit.
¶
Enter Horatio, Gertrard,and a Gentleman.
¶Gent. Shee is importunat,
Indeede distract, her moode will needes be pittied.
Quee.