Queen. I'll warrant you, fear me not. Withdraw, I hear him coming.

[Polonius hides himself behind the Arras.

Enter Hamlet.

Ham. Now, mother, what's the matter?
Queen. Hamlet, thou haft thy father much offended.
Ham. Mother, you have my father much offended.
Queen. Come, come, you answer with an idle tongue.
Ham. Go, go, you queftion with a wicked tongue.
Queen. Why, how now, Hamlet?
Ham. What's the matter now?
Queen. Have you forgot me?
Ham. No, by the rood, not fo;

You are the Queen, your husband's brother's wife,
But, 'would you were not fo!.

You are my mother. Queen. Nay, then I'll fet thofe to you that can speak. Ham. Come, come, and fit you down ; you shall not budge:

You go not, 'till I fet you up a glass

Where you may fee the inmost part of you.

Queen. What wilt thou do? thou wilt not murther me?

Help, ho.

Pol. What ho, help.

[Behind the Arras.

Hamlet kills Polonius.

Ham. How now, a rat? dead for a ducate, dead.

Pol. Oh, I am flain.

Queen. Oh me, what haft thou done?

Ham. Nay, I know not: is it the King?

Queen. Oh, what a rash and bloody deed is this! Ham. A bloody deed; almost as bad, good mother, As kill a King, and marry with his brother. Queen. As kill a King?

Ham. Ay, lady, 'twas my word.

Thou wretched, rafh, intruding fool, farewel,

[To Polonius.

I took thee for thy Betters; take thy fortune;
Thou find'ft, to be too bufy, is fome danger.
Leave wringing of your hands; peace, fit you down,
And let me wring your heart, for fo I fhall,

If it be made of penetrable ftuff:

If damned cuftom have not braz'd it fo,
That it is proof and bulwark against fenfe.

Queen. What have I done, that thou dar'it wag thy tongue

In noife fo rude against me?

Ham. Such an act,

That blurs the grace and blufh of modesty
Calls virtue hypocrite; takes off the rofe
From the fair forehead of an innocent love,
And fets a blifter there; makes marriage-vows
As falfe as dicers' oaths. Oh, fuch a deed,
As from the body of Contraction plucks
The very foul, and fweet Religion makes
A rhapsody of words. Heav'n's face doth glow;
Yea, this folidity and compound mass,
With triftful vifage, as againft the doom,
Is thought-fick at the act.

Queen. Ay me! what act,

That roars fo loud, and thunders in the index ?
Ham. Look here upon this picture, and on this,
The counterfeit prefentment of two brothers:
See, what a grace was feated on this brow;
Hyperion's curles; the front of Jove himself;
An eye, like Mars, to threaten or command;
A ftation, like the herald Mercury
New-lighted on a heaven-kiffing hill;
A combination, and a form indeed,
Where every God did feem to fet his feal,
To give the world affurance of a man.
This was your husband,

lows ;

Look you now, what fol

Here is your husband, like a mildew'd ear,
Blafting his wholesome brother. Have you eyes?
Could you on this fair mountain leave to feed,
And batten on this moore? ha! have you eyes?
You cannot call it Love; for, at your age,
The hey-day in the blood is tame, it's humble,
And waits upon the judgment; and what judgment

Would

Would step from this to this? Senfe, fure, you have, (24)
Elfe could you not have motion: but, fure, that fenfe
Is apoplex'd: for madness would not err;
Nor fenfe to ecstasy was ne'er so thrall'd,
But it referv'd fome quantity of choice

To ferve in fuch a diff'rence.- -What devil was't,
That thus hath cozen'd you at hoodman-blind?
Eyes without feeling, feeling without fight,
Ears without hands or eyes, fmelling fans all,
Or but a fickly part of one true fenfe
Could not fo mope.

O fhame! where is thy blufh? rebellious hell,
If thou canst mutiny in a matron's bones,
To flaming youth let virtue be as wax,

And melt in her own fire.

Proclaim no shame,

When the compulfive ardour gives the charge;
Since froft it felf as actively doth burn,

And Reason panders Will.

Queen. O'Hamlet, speak no more.

Thou turn'ft mine eyes into my very foul,
And there I fee fuch black and grained fpots,
As will not leave their tinct.

Ham. Nay, but to live

In the rank fweat of an incestuous bed,

Stew'd in corruption, honying and making love
Over the nafty sty; -

Queen. Oh, fpeak no more;

These words like daggers enter in mine ears.
No more, fweet Hamlet.

Ham. A murtherer, and a villain!

A flave, that is not twentieth part the tythe
Of your precedent lord.

A Vice of Kings;

(24) Senfe, fure, you have, &c.] Mr. Pope has left out the Quantity of about eight Verfes here, which I have taken care to replace. They are not, indeed, to be found in the two elder Folio's, but they carry the Style, Expreffion, and Cast of Thought, peculiar to our Author; and that they were not an Interpolation from another Hand needs no better Proof, than that they are in all the oldeft Quarto's.

A cut

A cutpurfe of the Empire and the Rule,
That from a fhelf the precious Diadem stole
And put it in his pocket.

Queen. No more.

Enter Ghoft.

Ham. A King of fhreds and patches-
Save me! and hover o'er me with your wings,

[Starting up. You heav'nly guards! what would your gracious figure?

Queen. Alas, he's mad

Ham. Do you not come your tardy fon to chide,
That, laps'd in time and paffion, lets go by
Th' important acting of your dread command ?
O fay!

Ghoft. Do not forget: this vifitation

Is but to whet thy almoft blunted purpose.
But, look! amazement on thy mother fits;
O step between her and her fighting foul:
Conceit in weakest bodies strongest works.
Speak to her, Hamlet.

Ham. How is it with you, lady?
Queen. Alas, how is't with you?
That thus you bend your eye on vacancy,...
And with th' incorporal air do hold discourse
Forth at your eyes your fpirits wildly peep,
And, as the fleeping foldiers in th' alarm,
Your bedded hairs, like life in excrements,
Start up, and ftand on end. O gentle fon,
Upon the heat and flame of thy distemper
Sprinkle cool patience. Whereon do you look ?
Ham. On him! on him! -look you, how pale he
glares!

His form and caufe conjoin'd, preaching to ftones,
Would make them capable. Do not look on me,
Left with this piteous action you convert
My ftern effects; then what I have to do,

Will want true colour; tears, perchance, for blood.
Queen. To whom do you speak this ?

Ham. Do you fee nothing there?

[Pointing to the Ghoft.

Queen. Nothing at all; yet all, that is, I fee.

Ham. Nor did you nothing hear?
Queen. No, nothing but our felves.

Ham. Why, look you there! look, how it steals away! My father in his habit as he lived!

Look, where he goes ev'n now, out at the portal.

[Exit Ghoft Queen. This is the very coinage of your brain, This bodilefs creation Ecstasy

Is very cunning in.

Ham. What Ecstasy?

My pulfe, as yours, doth temp'rately keep time,
And makes as healthful mufick. 'Tis not madness
That I have utter'd; bring me to the teft,

And I the matter will re-word; which madness
Would gambol from. Mother, for love of grace,
Lay not that flattering unction to your foul,
That not your trefpafs, but my madness, speaks:
It will but skin and film the ulcerous place;
Whilft rank corruption, mining all within,
Infects unseen. Confefs your felf to heav'n;
Repent what's past, avoid what is to come;
And do not fpread the compoft on the weeds
To make them ranker. Forgive me this my virtue;
For, in the fatness of these purfy times,
Virtue itself of vice muft pardon beg,

Yea, courb, and wooe, for leave to do it good.

Queen. Oh Hamlet! thou haft cleft my heart in twain.

Ham. O, throw away the worfer part of it,

And live the purer with the other half.

Good night; but go not to mine uncle's bed:
Affume a virtue, if you have it not.

That monster custom, who all fense doth eat (25)

(25) That Monster Custom, who all Sense doth eat,
of Habit's Devil, is Angel yet in this,
That to the Use of Actions fair and good

Of

Ho