Internet Shakespeare Editions

Author: William Shakespeare
Not Peer Reviewed

Hamlet (Quarto 2, 1604)

Enter Hamlet, Horatio, and Marcellus.
The air bites shrewdly; it is very cold.
605Horatio
It is nipping, and an eager air.
What hour now?
Horatio
I think it lacks of twelve.
Marcellus
No, it is struck.
Horatio
Indeed? I heard it not. It then draws near the season
610Wherein the spirit held his wont to walk.
A flourish of trumpets, and two pieces goes off.
What does this mean, my lord?
The King doth wake tonight and takes his rouse,
Keeps wassail, and the swagg'ring upspring reels;
And as he drains his drafts of Rhenish down
615The kettledrum and trumpet thus bray out
The triumph of his pledge.
Horatio
Is it a custom?
Ay, marry, is't,
But to my mind, though I am native here
620And to the manner born, it is a custom
More honored in the breach than the observance.
621.1This heavy-headed revel east and west
Makes us traduced and taxed of other nations.
They clepe us drunkards, and with swinish phrase
Soil our addition, and indeed it takes
621.5From our achievements, though performed at height,
The pith and marrow of our attribute.
So, oft it chances in particular men,
That, for some vicious mole of nature in them,
As in their birth, wherein they are not guilty
621.10(Since nature cannot choose his origin),
By the o'ergrowth of some complexion,
Oft breaking down the pales and forts of reason,
Or by some habit that too much o'erleavens
The form of plausive manners, that these men,
621.15Carrying, I say, the stamp of one defect
(Being Nature's livery, or Fortune's star),
His virtues else, be they as pure as grace,
As infinite as man may undergo,
Shall in the general censure take corruption
621.20From that particular fault. The dram of eale
Doth all the noble substance often dout
To his own scandal.
Enter Ghost.
Horatio
Look, my lord, it comes!
Angels and ministers of grace defend us!
625Be thou a spirit of health or goblin damned,
Bring with thee airs from heaven or blasts from hell,
Be thy intents wicked or charitable,
Thou com'st in such a questionable shape
That I will speak to thee. I'll call thee Hamlet,
630King, father, royal Dane. Oh, answer me!
Let me not burst in ignorance, but tell
Why thy canonized bones, hearsèd in death,
Have burst their cerements? Why the sepulcher
Wherein we saw thee quietly interred
635Hath oped his ponderous and marble jaws
To cast thee up again? What may this mean
That thou, dead corse, again in compleat steel
Revisits thus the glimpses of the moon,
Making night hideous, and we fools of nature
640So horridly to shake our disposition
With thoughts beyond the reaches of our souls?
Say, why is this? Wherefore? What should we do?
[The Ghost] beckons [Hamlet].
Horatio
It beckons you to go away with it,
645As if it some impartment did desire
To you alone.
Marcellus
Look with what courteous action
It waves you to a more removèd ground.
But do not go with it.
650Horatio
No, by no means.
It will not speak. Then I will follow it.
Horatio
Do not, my lord.
Hamlet
Why, what should be the fear?
I do not set my life at a pin's fee,
655And for my soul, what can it do to that,
Being a thing immortal as itself?
[The Ghost beckons Hamlet.]
It waves me forth again. I'll follow it.
Horatio
What if it tempt you toward the flood, my lord,
Or to the dreadful summit of the cliff
660That beetles o'er his base into the sea,
And there assume some other horrible form
Which might deprive your sovereignty of reason
And draw you into madness? Think of it:
663.1The very place puts toys of desperation,
Without more motive, into every brain
That looks so many fathoms to the sea
And hears it roar beneath.
[The Ghost beckons Hamlet.]
It waves me still.--Go on, I'll follow thee.
665Marcellus
You shall not go, my lord.
[They attempt to restrain him.]
Hamlet
Hold off your hands!
Horatio
Be ruled. You shall not go.
Hamlet
My fate cries out
And makes each petty artery in this body
670As hardy as the Nemean lion's nerve.
[The Ghost beckons Hamlet.]
Still am I called. Unhand me, gentlemen!
By heav'n, I'll make a ghost of him that lets me.
I say, away!--Go on, I'll follow thee.
Exeunt Ghost and Hamlet.
675Horatio
He waxes desperate with imag[inat]ion.
Marcellus
Let's follow. 'Tis not fit thus to obey him.
Horatio
Have after. To what issue will this come?
Marcellus
Something is rotten in the state of Denmark.
Horatio
Heaven will direct it.
680Marcellus
Nay, let's follow him.
Exeunt.