Hamlet Act 1 Passages

Horatio says ‘tis but our fantasy

And will not let belief take hold of him

Touching this dreaded sight twice seen of us.

Marcellus

As thou art to thyself.

Such was the very armor he had on

When he the ambitious Norway combated.

Horatio

Good now, sit down, and tell me, he that knows,

Why this same strict and most observant watch

So nightly toils the subject of the land,

And [why] such daily [cast] of brazen cannon

And foreign mart for implements of war,

Marcellus

That can I.

At least the whisper goes so: our last king,

Whose image even but now appeared to us,

Was, as you know, by Fortinbras of Norway,

Thereto pricked on by a most emulate pride,

Dared to the combat; in which our valiant Hamlet

Horatio

A mote it is to trouble the mind’s eye.

In the most high and palmy state of Rome,

A little ere the mightiest Julius fell,

The graves stood tenantless, and the sheeted dead

Did squeak and gibber in the Roman streets;

Horatio

If thou has any sound or use of voice,

Speak to me.

If there be any good thing to be done

That may to thee do ease and grace to me,

Speak to me.

Horatio

And then it started like a guilty thing

Upon a fearful summons. I have heard

The c0ck, that is the trumpet to the morn,

Doth with his lofty and shrill-sounding throat

Horatio

It faded on the crowing of the c0ck.

Some say that ever ‘gainst that season comes

Wherein our Savior’s birth is celebrated,

This bird of dawning singeth all night long;

Marcellus

So have I heard and do in part believe it.

But look, the morn in russet mantle clad

Walks o’er the dew of yon eastward hill.

Break we our watch up, and by my advice

Horatio

Though yet of Hamlet our dear brother’s death

The memory be green, and that it us befitted

To bear our hearts in grief, and our whole kingdom

To be contracted in one brow of woe,

King

We doubt it nothing. Heartily farewell.

And now, Laertes, what’s the news with you?

You told us of some suit. What is’t Laertes?

You cannot speak of reason to the Dane

And lose your voice.

King

My dread lord,

Your leave and favor to return to France,

From whence though willingly I came to Denmark

To show my duty in your coronation,

Laertes

Good Hamlet, cast thy nighted color off,

And let thine eye look like a friend on Denmark.

Do not forever with thy vailed lids

Queen

“Seems,” madam? Nay it is. I know not “seems.”

‘Tis not alone my inky cloak, [good] mother,

Nor customary suits of solemn black,

Nor windy suspiration of forced breath,

Hamlet

‘Tis sweet and commendable in your nature,

Hamlet,

To give these mourning duties to your father.

But you must know your father lost a father,

That father lost, lost his, and the survivor bound

In filial obligation for some term

To do obsequious sorrow.

King

Why, ‘tis a loving and a fair reply.

Be as ourself in Denmark,—Madam, come.

This gentle and unforced accord of Hamlet

Sits smiling to my hear, in grace whereof

King

O, that this too, too sullied flesh would melt,

Thaw, and resolve itself into a dew,

Or that the Everlasting had not fixed

His canon ‘gainst [self-slaughter!] O God, God,

How [weary,] stale, flat, and unprofitable

Seem to me all the uses of this world!

Hamlet

I would not hear your enemy say so,

Nor shall you do my ear that violence

To make it truster of your own report

Against yourself.

Hamlet

Two nights together had these gentlemen,

Marcellus and Barnardo, on their watch,

In the dead waste and middle of the night,

Been thus encountered: a figure like your father,

Armed at point exactly, cap-a-pie,

Hamlet

My lord, I did,

But answer made it none. Yet once methought

It lifted up its head and did address

Horatio

If it assume my noble father’s person,

I’ll speak to it, though hell itself should gape

And bid me hold my peace. I pray you all,

If you have hitherto concealed this sight,

Let it be tenable in your silence still;

Hamlet

For Hamlet, and the trifling of his favor,

Hold it a fashion and a toy in blood,

Laertes

Think it no more.

For nature, crescent, does not grow alone

In thews and [bulk,] but, as this temple waxes,

The inward service of the mind and soul

Grows wide withal.

Laertes

I shall the effect of this good lesson keep

As watchman to my heart. But, good my brother,

Do not, some ungracious pastors do,

Show me the steep and thorny way to heaven,

Ophelia

Yet here, Laertes? Aboard, aboard, for shame!

The wind sits in the shoulder of your sail,

And you are stayed for. There, my blessing with

thee,

And these few precepts in thy memory

Polonius

Marry, well bethought.

‘Tis told me he hath very oft of late

Given private time to you, and you yourself

Have of your audience been most free and

bounteous

Polonius

Ay, [springes] to catch woodcocks. I do know,

When the blood burns, how prodigal the soul

Lends the tongue vows. These blazes, daughter,

Giving more light than heat, extinct in both

Even in their promise as it is a-making,

You must not take for fire.

Polonius

Ay, marry, is’t,

But, to my mind, though I am native here

And to the manner born, it is a custom

More honored in the breach than the observance.

[This heavy-headed [revel] east and west

Makes us traduced and taxed of other nations.

Hamlet

Angels and ministers of grace, defend us!

Be thou a spirit of health or goblin damned,

Bring with thee airs from heaven or blasts from

hell,

Be thy intents wicked or charitable,

Hamlet

What if it tempt you toward the flood, my lord?

Or to the dreadful summit of the cliff

That 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 to madness?

Horatio

I am thy father’s spirit,

Doomed for a certain term to walk the night

And for the day confined to fast in fires

Till he foul crimes done in my days of nature

Are burnt and purged away.

Ghost

I find thee apt;

And duller shouldst thou be than the fat weed

That roots itself in ease on Lethe wharf,

Wouldst thou not stir in this. Now, Hamlet, hear.

Ghost

Ay, that incestuous, that adulterate beast,

With witchcraft of his wits, with traitorous gifts—

O wicked wit and gifts, that have the power

So to seduce!—won to his shameful lust

The will of my most seeming-virtuous queen.

Ghost

O all you host of heaven! O Earth! What else?

And shall I couple hell? O fie! Hold, hold, my heart,

And you, my sinews, grow not instant old,

But bear me [stiffly] up. Remember thee?

Ay, thou poor ghost, whiles memory holds a seat

In this distracted globe.

Hamlet

Why, right, you are in the right.

And so, without more circumstance at all,

I hold it fit that we shake hands and part,

Hamlet

Yes, by Saint Patrick, but there is, Horatio,

And much offense, too. Touching this vision here,

It is an honest ghost—that let me tell you.

Hamlet

And therefore as a stranger give it welcome.

There are more things in heaven and earth, Horatio,

Than are dreamt of in your philosophy. But come.

Here, as before, never, so help your mercy

Hamlet

Rest, rest, perturbed spirit.—So, gentlemen,

With all my love I do commend me to you,

And what so poor a man as Hamlet is

May do t’ express his love and friending to you,

Hamlet