Hamlet

Hamlet

'Tis now the very witching time of night,
When churchyards yawn, and hell itself breaks out
Contagion to this world. Now could I drink hot blood,
And do such bitter business as the day
Would quake to look on. Soft, now to my mother.     
Oh heart, loose not thy nature! Let not ever
The soul of Nero enter this firm bosom.    
Let me be cruel, not unnatural.
I will speak daggers to her, but use none.
My tongue and soul in this be hypocrites.
How in my words somever she be shent,
To give them seals, never my soul consent!
[Exit Hamlet.]

Hamlet

Why, look you now, how unworthy a thing you 
make of me! You would play upon me, you would seem
to know my stops, you would pluck out the heart of my
mystery, you would sound me from my lowest note to the
top of my compass. And there is much music, excellent
voice, in this little compass, yet cannot you make it.
Why, do you think that I am easier to be played on than
a pipe? Call me what instrument you will; though you
fret me, you cannot play upon me.     

Rosencrantz

Good my lord, what is your cause of distemper? 
You do surely bar the door of your own liberty
if you deny your griefs to your friend.

Hamlet   

Sir, I lack advancement.

Rosencrantz

How can that be, when you have the voice of the king
himself for your succession in Denmark?

Hamlet

Ay, sir, but "while the grass grows" — the proverb 
is something musty.

Hamlet

Your wisdom should show itself more richer to
signify this to his doctor; for, for me to put him to his
purgation would perhaps plunge him into far more choler.    

Guildenstern

Good my lord, put your discourse into some
frame, and start not so wildly from my affair.

Hamlet   

I am tame, sir. Pronounce.    

Guildenstern

The queen, your mother, in most great
affliction of spirit, has sent me to you.

Guildenstern   

The king, sir ... 

Hamlet   

Ay, sir, what of him?

Guildenstern

Is in his retirement, marvelous distempered. 

Hamlet   

With drink, sir?

Guildenstern   

No, my lord, rather with choler.

Hamlet

Your wisdom should show itself more richer to
signify this to his doctor; for, for me to put him to his
purgation would perhaps plunge him into far more choler.    

All   

Lights, lights, lights!
[Exit all except Hamlet and Horatio]

Hamlet

[Hamlet merrily sings a few lines from a ballad]
‘Why, let the strucken deer go weep,
 The hart ungalled play.
For some must watch, while some must sleep,
 So runs the world away.’
Would not this, sir, and a forest of feathers (if the rest of
my fortunes turn Turk with me) with two provincial
roses on my razed shoes, get me a fellowship in a cry of
players, sir?

Horatio   

Half a share. 

Hamlet

A whole one, I.

Pages