To give the world assurance of a man:

This was your husband.-Look you now, what fol

lows:

Here is your husband, like a mildew'd ear,

Blasting his wholesome brother. Have you eyes?
Could you on this fair mountain leave to feed,
And batten on this moor? Ha! have you eyes?
You cannot call it love; for, at your age,

1

The heyday in the blood is tame, it's humble,
And waits upon the judgment; and what judg-

ment

Would step from this to this? Sense, sure, you

have,

Else could you not have motion: but, sure, that

sense

Is apoplex'd; for madness would not err;
Nor sense to ecstasy 3 was ne'er so thrall'd,
But it reserved some quantity of choice,
To serve in such a difference.

What devil was 't,

That thus hath cozen'd you at hoodman-blind? +
Eyes without feeling, feeling without sight,
Ears without hands or eyes, smelling sans 5 all,
Or but a sickly part of one true sense
Could not so mope.6

O shame, where is thy blush? Rebellious hell,
If thou canst mutine in a matron's bones,

To flaming youth let virtue be as wax,

1 Grow fat. Blindman's-buff.

2 Sensation.

3 Alienation of mind. 5 Without.

Could not exhibit so much stupidity.

And melt in her own fire: proclaim no shame,
When the compulsive ardor gives the charge;
Since frost itself as actively doth burn,

And reason panders well.

Queen.

O Hamlet, speak no more:

Thou turn'st mine eyes into my very soul;
And there I see such black and grained spots.
As will not leave their tinct.

Нат.

Nay, but to live

In the rank sweat of an enseamed bed;

Stew'd in corruption; honeying, and making love

Over the nasty sty ;

Queen.

O, speak to me no more:

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

Ham.

A murderer, and a villain:

A slave, that is not twentieth part the tithe
Of your precedent lord :-

:—a vice of kings;

A cutpurse of the empire and the rule;

1

That from a shelf the precious diadem stole,

And put it in his pocket!

Ham. A king of shreds and patches.— Save me, and hover o'er me with your wings, You heavenly guards!-What would your gracious figure?

i. e. a low mimic of kings. The vice was the tool of the old moralities.

Queen. Alas, he's mad.

Ham. Do you not come your tardy son to

chide,

That, lapsed in time and passion, lets go by
The important acting of your dread command?
O, say!

Ghost. Do not forget, this visitation
purpose.
Is but to whet thy almost blunted
But, look! amazement on thy mother sits:
O, step between her and her fighting soul;
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 you do bend your eye on vacancy,

And with the incorporal air do hold discourse?
Forth at your eyes your spirits wildly peep;
And, as the sleeping soldiers in the alarm,
Your bedded hair, like life in excrements,
Starts up, and stands on end.

O gentle son,
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 cause conjoin'd, preaching to stones, Would make them capable.-Do not look

me;

Lest, with this piteous action, you convert

upon

1 Imagination.

2 Endued with understanding,