Hamlet (Modern, Based on Quarto 2)

That's an ill phrase, a vile phrase; ¶"beautified" is a vile phrase. But you shall hear. Thus:

¶

"O dear Ophelia, I am ill at these numbers. I have not art to reckon 1180my groans. But that I love thee best, oh, most best, believe it. Adieu. ¶Thine evermore, most dear lady, whilst this machine is to him. Hamlet."

¶Hamlet Well, God-a-mercy.

1210Polonius Do you know me, my lord?

¶Hamlet Excellent well. You are a fishmonger.

¶Polonius Not I, my lord.

¶Hamlet Then I would you were so honest a man.

¶Polonius Honest, my lord?

1215Hamlet Ay, sir, to be honest, as this world goes, ¶is to be one man picked out of ten thousand.

¶Polonius That's very true, my lord.

¶Hamlet For if the sun breed maggots in a dead dog, being a ¶good kissing carrion--Have you a daughter?

¶Polonius I have, my lord.

¶Hamlet Let her not walk i'th'sun. Conception is a blessing, ¶but as your daughter may conceive, friend, look to't.

1225Polonius [Aside] How say you by that? Still harping on my daughter. Yet he ¶knew me not at first. 'A said I was a fishmonger. 'A is far gone, ¶and truly, in my youth I suffered much extremity for love, very ¶near this. I'll speak to him again.--What do you read, my ¶lord?

1230Hamlet Words, words, words.

¶Polonius What is the matter, my lord?

¶Hamlet Between who?

¶Polonius I mean the matter that you read, my lord.

¶Hamlet Slanders sir; for the satirical rogue says here that old 1235men have gray beards, that their faces are wrinkled, their eyes ¶purging thick amber and plumtree gum, and that they have a ¶plentiful lack of wit, together with most weak hams--all which, sir,¶though I most powerfully and potently believe, yet I hold it not 1240honesty to have it thus set down; for yourself, sir, shall grow old ¶as I am, if, like a crab, you could go backward.

¶Polonius [Aside]: Though this be madness, yet there is method in't.--Will you ¶walk out of the air, my lord?

¶Hamlet Into my grave.

¶Polonius [Aside]Indeed, that's out of the air. How pregnant sometimes ¶his replies are! A happiness that often madness hits on, which reason ¶and sanity could not so prosperously be delivered of. I will leave ¶him and my daughter.--My lord, I will take my leave of you.

¶Hamlet You cannot take from me anything that I will not more ¶willingly part withal--except my life, except my life, except my 1260life.

¶Polonius Fare you well, my lord.

¶Hamlet These tedious old fools!

¶Polonius [To Rosencrantz and Guildenstern]You go to seek the Lord Hamlet? There he is.

¶Rosencrantz [To Polonius] God save you, sir.

¶Guildenstern My honored lord!

¶Rosencrantz My most dear lord!

¶Hamlet My excellent good friends! How dost thou, Guildenstern? 1270Ah, Rosencrantz! Good lads, how do you both?

¶Rosencrantz As the indifferent children of the earth.

¶Guildenstern Happy in that we are not ever happy. On Fortune's cap ¶we are not the very button.

1275Hamlet Nor the soles of her shoe?

¶Rosencrantz Neither, my lord.

¶Hamlet Then you live about her waist, or in the middle of her favors.

¶Guildenstern Faith, her privates we.

1280Hamlet In the secret parts of Fortune? Oh, most true, she is a strumpet. ¶What news?

¶Rosencrantz None, my lord, but the world's grown honest.

¶Hamlet Then is doomsday near. But your news is not true. ¶But, in the beaten way of friendship, what make you at Elsinore?

¶Rosencrantz To visit you, my lord, no other occasion.

¶Hamlet Beggar that I am, I am ever poor in thanks, but I thank1320you; and sure, dear friends, my thanks are too dear a halfpenny. ¶Were you not sent for? Is it your own inclining? Is it a free ¶visitation? Come, come, deal justly with me. Come, come, nay, speak.

¶Guildenstern What should we say, my lord?

1325Hamlet Anything but to th'purpose. You were sent for, and there is ¶a kind of confession in your looks, which your modesties have not ¶craft enough to color. I know the good King and Queen have ¶sent for you.

¶Rosencrantz To what end, my lord?

1330Hamlet That you must teach me. But let me conjure you, by the ¶rights of our fellowship, by the consonancy of our youth, by the ¶obligation of our ever-preserved love, and by what more dear a ¶better proposer can charge you withal, be even and direct with ¶me whether you were sent for or no.

¶Rosencrantz [Aside to Guildenstern]What say you?

¶Hamlet [Aside]Nay, then, I have an eye of you.--If you love me, hold not off.

¶Guildenstern My lord, we were sent for.

1340Hamlet I will tell you why; so shall my anticipation prevent your ¶discovery, and your secrecy to the King and Queen molt no ¶feather. I have of late, but wherefore I know not, lost all my mirth, ¶forgone all custom of exercises; and indeed it goes so heavily with ¶my disposition that this goodly frame, the earth, seems to me a 1345sterile promontory. This most excellent canopy the air, look ¶you, this brave o'erhanging firmament, this majestical roof ¶fretted with golden fire, why, it appeareth nothing to me but a foul ¶and pestilent congregation of vapors. What piece of work is a 1350man! How noble in reason, how infinite in faculties, in form and ¶moving, how express and admirable in action, how like an ¶angel in apprehension, how like a god; the beauty of the world; the ¶paragon of animals. And yet to me what is this quintessence of 1355dust? Man delights not me, nor women neither, though by your ¶smiling you seem to say so.

¶Rosencrantz My lord, there was no such stuff in my thoughts.

1360Hamlet Why did ye laugh, then, when I said man delights not me?

¶Rosencrantz To think, my lord, if you delight not in man, what lenten ¶entertainment the players shall receive from you. We coted them ¶on the way, and hither are they coming to offer you service.

¶Hamlet He that plays the King shall be welcome; his majesty shall ¶have tribute on me. The Adventurous Knight shall use his foil and ¶target, the Lover shall not sigh gratis, the Humorous Man shall end ¶his part in peace, and the Lady shall say her mind freely, or the ¶blank verse shall halt for't. What players are they?

¶Rosencrantz Even those you were wont to take such delight in, the 1375tragedians of the city.

¶Hamlet How chances it they travel? Their residence both in ¶reputation and profit was better both ways.

¶Rosencrantz I think their inhibition comes by the means of the late 1380innovation.

¶Hamlet Do they hold the same estimation they did when I was in ¶the city? Are they so followed?

¶Rosencrantz No, indeed, are they not.

¶Hamlet It is not very strange, for my uncle is King of Denmark, and 1410those that would make mouths at him while my father lived give ¶twenty, forty, fifty, a hundred ducats apiece for his picture ¶in little. S'blood, there is something in this more than natural, if ¶philosophy could find it out.

¶Guildenstern There are the players.

¶Hamlet Gentlemen, you are welcome to Elsinore. Your hands, come,¶then. Th'appurtenance of welcome is fashion and ceremony. Let ¶me comply with you in this garb, lest my extent to the players, 1420which, I tell you, must show fairly outwards, should more ¶appear like entertainment than yours. You are welcome. But my ¶uncle-father and aunt-mother are deceived.

¶Guildenstern In what, my dear lord?

1425Hamlet I am but mad north-north-west; when the wind is ¶southerly, I know a hawk from a hand saw.

¶Polonius Well be with you, gentlemen.

¶Hamlet Hark you, Guildenstern, and you too, at each ear a hearer: 1430that great baby you see there is not yet ¶out of his swaddling clouts.

¶Rosencrantz Happily he is the second time come to them, for they say an ¶old man is twice a child.

¶Hamlet I will prophesy he comes to tell me of the players. Mark it.-- 1435You say right, sir, o'Monday morning, 'twas then indeed.

¶Polonius My lord, I have news to tell you.

¶Hamlet My lord, I have news to tell you. When Roscius was an actor ¶in Rome--

1440Polonius The actors are come hither, my lord.

¶Hamlet Buzz, buzz.

¶Polonius Upon my honor.

¶Hamlet Then came each actor on his ass.

¶Polonius The best actors in the world, either for tragedy, comedy, 1445history, pastoral, pastoral-comical, historical-pastoral, scene ¶individable, or poem unlimited. Seneca cannot be too heavy nor ¶Plautus too light for the law of writ and the liberty: these are the 1450only men.

¶Hamlet O Jephthah, judge of Israel, what a treasure hadst thou?

¶Polonius What a treasure had he, my lord?

¶Hamlet Why,

¶Polonius [Aside] Still on my daughter.

¶Hamlet Am I not i'th'right, old Jephthah?

¶Polonius If you call me Jephthah, my lord, I have a daughter that I love passing well.

¶Hamlet Nay, that follows not.

¶Polonius What follows then, my lord?

¶Hamlet Why,

and then you know,

The first row of the pious chanson will ¶show you more, for look where my 1465abridgment comes.

¶Hamlet You are welcome, masters, welcome all.--I am glad to see thee ¶well. Welcome, good friends.--Oh, old friend, why, thy face is ¶valanced since I saw thee last. Com'st thou to beard me in Denmark?-- 1470What, my young lady and mistress! By Lady, your ladyship is ¶nearer to heaven than when I saw you last, by the altitude of a ¶chopine. Pray God your voice, like a piece of uncurrent gold, ¶be not cracked within the ring.--Masters, you are all welcome. ¶We'll e'en to't, like French falconers: fly at anything we see. 1475 We'll have a speech straight. Come, give us a taste of your quality. ¶Come, a passionate speech.

¶Player What speech, my good lord?

¶Hamlet I heard thee speak me a speech once, but it was never acted, 1480or if it was, not above once; for the play, I remember, pleased not ¶the million, 'twas caviary to the general. But it was, as I received ¶it, and others whose judgments in such matters cried in the top ¶of mine, an excellent play, well digested in the scenes, set down 1485with as much modesty as cunning. I remember one said there ¶were no sallets in the lines, to make the matter savory, nor no ¶matter in the phrase that might indict the author of affection, ¶but called it an honest method, as wholesome as sweet, and by very much more handsome than fine. One speech in't I chiefly loved: ¶ 'twas Aeneas' talk to Dido, and thereabout of it especially when he 1490speaks of Priam's slaughter. If it live in your memory, begin at ¶this line--let me see, let me see--

'Tis not so, it begins with Pyrrhus.

So proceed you.

¶Polonius 'Fore God, my Lord, well spoken, with good accent and good discretion.

¶Hamlet It shall to the barber's with your beard.--Prithee, say on. He's 1540for a jig, or a tale of bawdry, or he sleeps. Say on. Come to Hecuba..

¶Hamlet The moblèd queen!

¶Polonius That's good.

1560Polonius Look where he has not turned his color, and has tears in's ¶eyes. Prithee, no more.

¶Hamlet 'Tis well. I'll have thee speak out the rest of this soon. ¶[To Polonius] Good my lord, will you see the players well bestowed? Do you ¶hear, let them be well used, for they are the abstract and brief 1565chronicles of the time. After your death you were better have a ¶bad epitaph than their ill report while you live.

¶Polonius My lord, I will use them according to their desert.

1570Hamlet God's bodkin, man, much better. Use every man after his ¶desert and who shall scape whipping? Use them after your own honor ¶and dignity; the less they deserve, the more merit is in your ¶bounty. Take them in.

1575Polonius Come, sirs.

¶Hamlet Follow him, friends. We'll hear a play tomorrow. [Aside to the First Player] Dost thou ¶hear me, old friend, can you play "The Murder of Gonzago"?

¶[First] Player Ay, my lord.

1580Hamlet We'll ha't tomorrow night. You could for need study ¶a speech of some dozen lines or sixteen lines, which I would set ¶down and insert in't, could you not?

¶[First] Player Ay, my lord.

¶Hamlet Very well. Follow that lord, and look you mock him not. 1585 --My good friends, I'll leave you till night. You are welcome to ¶Elsinore.

¶Rosencrantz Good my lord.