SCENE II. A hall in the castle. The Tragedy of Hamlet, Prince of Denmark  Shakespeare homepage  |  Hamlet  | Act 3, Scene 2 

 Previous scene  |  Next scene  SCENE II. A hall in the castle. 

 Enter HAMLET and Players  HAMLET  Speak the speech, I pray you, as I pronounced it to 

 you, trippingly on the tongue: but if you mouth it, 

 as many of your players do, I had as lief the 

 town-crier spoke my lines. Nor do not saw the air 

 too much with your hand, thus, but use all gently; 

 for in the very torrent, tempest, and, as I may say, 

 the whirlwind of passion, you must acquire and beget 

 a temperance that may give it smoothness. O, it 

 offends me to the soul to hear a robustious 

 periwig-pated fellow tear a passion to tatters, to 

 very rags, to split the ears of the groundlings, who 

 for the most part are capable of nothing but 

 inexplicable dumbshows and noise: I would have such 

 a fellow whipped for o'erdoing Termagant; it 

 out-herods Herod: pray you, avoid it. 

 First Player  I warrant your honour. 

 HAMLET  Be not too tame neither, but let your own discretion 

 be your tutor: suit the action to the word, the 

 word to the action; with this special o'erstep not 

 the modesty of nature: for any thing so overdone is 

 from the purpose of playing, whose end, both at the 

 first and now, was and is, to hold, as 'twere, the 

 mirror up to nature; to show virtue her own feature, 

 scorn her own image, and the very age and body of 

 the time his form and pressure. Now this overdone, 

 or come tardy off, though it make the unskilful 

 laugh, cannot but make the judicious grieve; the 

 censure of the which one must in your allowance 

 o'erweigh a whole theatre of others. O, there be 

 players that I have seen play, and heard others 

 praise, and that highly, not to speak it profanely, 

 that, neither having the accent of Christians nor 

 the gait of Christian, pagan, nor man, have so 

 strutted and bellowed that I have thought some of 

 nature's journeymen had made men and not made them 

 well, they imitated humanity so abominably. 

 First Player  I hope we have reformed that indifferently with us, 

 sir. 

 HAMLET  O, reform it altogether. And let those that play 

 your clowns speak no more than is set down for them; 

 for there be of them that will themselves laugh, to 

 set on some quantity of barren spectators to laugh 

 too; though, in the mean time, some necessary 

 question of the play be then to be considered: 

 that's villanous, and shows a most pitiful ambition 

 in the fool that uses it. Go, make you ready. 



 Exeunt Players 

 Enter POLONIUS, ROSENCRANTZ, and GUILDENSTERN  How now, my lord! I will the king hear this piece of work? 

 LORD POLONIUS  And the queen too, and that presently. 

 HAMLET  Bid the players make haste. 



 Exit POLONIUS  Will you two help to hasten them? 

 ROSENCRANTZ  GUILDENSTERN  We will, my lord. 



 Exeunt ROSENCRANTZ and GUILDENSTERN  HAMLET  What ho! Horatio! 



 Enter HORATIO  HORATIO  Here, sweet lord, at your service. 

 HAMLET  Horatio, thou art e'en as just a man 

 As e'er my conversation coped withal. 

 HORATIO  O, my dear lord,-- 

 HAMLET  Nay, do not think I flatter; 

 For what advancement may I hope from thee 

 That no revenue hast but thy good spirits, 

 To feed and clothe thee? Why should the poor be flatter'd? 

 No, let the candied tongue lick absurd pomp, 

 And crook the pregnant hinges of the knee 

 Where thrift may follow fawning. Dost thou hear? 

 Since my dear soul was mistress of her choice 

 And could of men distinguish, her election 

 Hath seal'd thee for herself; for thou hast been 

 As one, in suffering all, that suffers nothing, 

 A man that fortune's buffets and rewards 

 Hast ta'en with equal thanks: and blest are those 

 Whose blood and judgment are so well commingled, 

 That they are not a pipe for fortune's finger 

 To sound what stop she please. Give me that man 

 That is not passion's slave, and I will wear him 

 In my heart's core, ay, in my heart of heart, 

 As I do thee.--Something too much of this.-- 

 There is a play to-night before the king; 

 One scene of it comes near the circumstance 

 Which I have told thee of my father's death: 

 I prithee, when thou seest that act afoot, 

 Even with the very comment of thy soul 

 Observe mine uncle: if his occulted guilt 

 Do not itself unkennel in one speech, 

 It is a damned ghost that we have seen, 

 And my imaginations are as foul 

 As Vulcan's stithy. Give him heedful note; 

 For I mine eyes will rivet to his face, 

 And after we will both our judgments join 

 In censure of his seeming. 

 HORATIO  Well, my lord: 

 If he steal aught the whilst this play is playing, 

 And 'scape detecting, I will pay the theft. 

 HAMLET  They are coming to the play; I must be idle: 

 Get you a place. 



 Danish march. A flourish. Enter KING CLAUDIUS,  QUEEN GERTRUDE, POLONIUS, OPHELIA, ROSENCRANTZ, GUILDENSTERN, and others  KING CLAUDIUS  How fares our cousin Hamlet? 

 HAMLET  Excellent, i' faith; of the chameleon's dish: I eat 

 the air, promise-crammed: you cannot feed capons so. 

 KING CLAUDIUS  I have nothing with this answer, Hamlet; these words 

 are not mine. 

 HAMLET  No, nor mine now. 



 To POLONIUS  My lord, you played once i' the university, you say? 

 LORD POLONIUS  That did I, my lord; and was accounted a good actor. 

 HAMLET  What did you enact? 

 LORD POLONIUS  I did enact Julius Caesar: I was killed i' the 

 Capitol; Brutus killed me. 

 HAMLET  It was a brute part of him to kill so capital a calf 

 there. Be the players ready? 

 ROSENCRANTZ  Ay, my lord; they stay upon your patience. 

 QUEEN GERTRUDE  Come hither, my dear Hamlet, sit by me. 

 HAMLET  No, good mother, here's metal more attractive. 

 LORD POLONIUS  [To KING CLAUDIUS]  O, ho! do you mark that? 

 HAMLET  Lady, shall I lie in your lap? 



 Lying down at OPHELIA's feet  OPHELIA  No, my lord. 

 HAMLET  I mean, my head upon your lap? 

 OPHELIA  Ay, my lord. 

 HAMLET  Do you think I meant country matters? 

 OPHELIA  I think nothing, my lord. 

 HAMLET  That's a fair thought to lie between maids' legs. 

 OPHELIA  What is, my lord? 

 HAMLET  Nothing. 

 OPHELIA  You are merry, my lord. 

 HAMLET  Who, I? 

 OPHELIA  Ay, my lord. 

 HAMLET  O God, your only jig-maker. What should a man do 

 but be merry? for, look you, how cheerfully my 

 mother looks, and my father died within these two hours. 

 OPHELIA  Nay, 'tis twice two months, my lord. 

 HAMLET  So long? Nay then, let the devil wear black, for 

 I'll have a suit of sables. O heavens! die two 

 months ago, and not forgotten yet? Then there's 

 hope a great man's memory may outlive his life half 

 a year: but, by'r lady, he must build churches, 

 then; or else shall he suffer not thinking on, with 

 the hobby-horse, whose epitaph is 'For, O, for, O, 

 the hobby-horse is forgot.' 



 Hautboys play. The dumb-show enters 

 Enter a King and a Queen very lovingly; the Queen  embracing him, and he her. She kneels, and makes  show of protestation unto him. He takes her up,  and declines his head upon her neck: lays him down  upon a bank of flowers: she, seeing him asleep,  leaves him. Anon comes in a fellow, takes off his  crown, kisses it, and pours poison in the King's  ears, and exit. The Queen returns; finds the King  dead, and makes passionate action. The Poisoner,  with some two or three Mutes, comes in again,  seeming to lament with her. The dead body is  carried away. The Poisoner wooes the Queen with  gifts: she seems loath and unwilling awhile, but in the end accepts his love 

 Exeunt  OPHELIA  What means this, my lord? 

 HAMLET  Marry, this is miching mallecho; it means mischief. 

 OPHELIA  Belike this show imports the argument of the play. 



 Enter Prologue  HAMLET  We shall know by this fellow: the players cannot 

 keep counsel; they'll tell all. 

 OPHELIA  Will he tell us what this show meant? 

 HAMLET  Ay, or any show that you'll show him: be not you 

 ashamed to show, he'll not shame to tell you what it means. 

 OPHELIA  You are naught, you are naught: I'll mark the play. 

 Prologue  For us, and for our tragedy, 

 Here stooping to your clemency, 

 We beg your hearing patiently. 



 Exit  HAMLET  Is this a prologue, or the posy of a ring? 

 OPHELIA  'Tis brief, my lord. 

 HAMLET  As woman's love. 



 Enter two Players, King and Queen  Player King  Full thirty times hath Phoebus' cart gone round 

 Neptune's salt wash and Tellus' orbed ground, 

 And thirty dozen moons with borrow'd sheen 

 About the world have times twelve thirties been, 

 Since love our hearts and Hymen did our hands 

 Unite commutual in most sacred bands. 

 Player Queen  So many journeys may the sun and moon 

 Make us again count o'er ere love be done! 

 But, woe is me, you are so sick of late, 

 So far from cheer and from your former state, 

 That I distrust you. Yet, though I distrust, 

 Discomfort you, my lord, it nothing must: 

 For women's fear and love holds quantity; 

 In neither aught, or in extremity. 

 Now, what my love is, proof hath made you know; 

 And as my love is sized, my fear is so: 

 Where love is great, the littlest doubts are fear; 

 Where little fears grow great, great love grows there. 

 Player King  'Faith, I must leave thee, love, and shortly too; 

 My operant powers their functions leave to do: 

 And thou shalt live in this fair world behind, 

 Honour'd, beloved; and haply one as kind 

 For husband shalt thou-- 

 Player Queen  O, confound the rest! 

 Such love must needs be treason in my breast: 

 In second husband let me be accurst! 

 None wed the second but who kill'd the first. 

 HAMLET  [Aside]  Wormwood, wormwood. 

 Player Queen  The instances that second marriage move 

 Are base respects of thrift, but none of love: 

 A second time I kill my husband dead, 

 When second husband kisses me in bed. 

 Player King  I do believe you think what now you speak; 

 But what we do determine oft we break. 

 Purpose is but the slave to memory, 

 Of violent birth, but poor validity; 

 Which now, like fruit unripe, sticks on the tree; 

 But fall, unshaken, when they mellow be. 

 Most necessary 'tis that we forget 

 To pay ourselves what to ourselves is debt: 

 What to ourselves in passion we propose, 

 The passion ending, doth the purpose lose. 

 The violence of either grief or joy 

 Their own enactures with themselves destroy: 

 Where joy most revels, grief doth most lament; 

 Grief joys, joy grieves, on slender accident. 

 This world is not for aye, nor 'tis not strange 

 That even our loves should with our fortunes change; 

 For 'tis a question left us yet to prove, 

 Whether love lead fortune, or else fortune love. 

 The great man down, you mark his favourite flies; 

 The poor advanced makes friends of enemies. 

 And hitherto doth love on fortune tend; 

 For who not needs shall never lack a friend, 

 And who in want a hollow friend doth try, 

 Directly seasons him his enemy. 

 But, orderly to end where I begun, 

 Our wills and fates do so contrary run 

 That our devices still are overthrown; 

 Our thoughts are ours, their ends none of our own: 

 So think thou wilt no second husband wed; 

 But die thy thoughts when thy first lord is dead. 

 Player Queen  Nor earth to me give food, nor heaven light! 

 Sport and repose lock from me day and night! 

 To desperation turn my trust and hope! 

 An anchor's cheer in prison be my scope! 

 Each opposite that blanks the face of joy 

 Meet what I would have well and it destroy! 

 Both here and hence pursue me lasting strife, 

 If, once a widow, ever I be wife! 

 HAMLET  If she should break it now! 

 Player King  'Tis deeply sworn. Sweet, leave me here awhile; 

 My spirits grow dull, and fain I would beguile 

 The tedious day with sleep. 



 Sleeps  Player Queen  Sleep rock thy brain, 

 And never come mischance between us twain! 



 Exit  HAMLET  Madam, how like you this play? 

 QUEEN GERTRUDE  The lady protests too much, methinks. 

 HAMLET  O, but she'll keep her word. 

 KING CLAUDIUS  Have you heard the argument? Is there no offence in 't? 

 HAMLET  No, no, they do but jest, poison in jest; no offence 

 i' the world. 

 KING CLAUDIUS  What do you call the play? 

 HAMLET  The Mouse-trap. Marry, how? Tropically. This play 

 is the image of a murder done in Vienna: Gonzago is 

 the duke's name; his wife, Baptista: you shall see 

 anon; 'tis a knavish piece of work: but what o' 

 that? your majesty and we that have free souls, it 

 touches us not: let the galled jade wince, our 

 withers are unwrung. 



 Enter LUCIANUS  This is one Lucianus, nephew to the king. 

 OPHELIA  You are as good as a chorus, my lord. 

 HAMLET  I could interpret between you and your love, if I 

 could see the puppets dallying. 

 OPHELIA  You are keen, my lord, you are keen. 

 HAMLET  It would cost you a groaning to take off my edge. 

 OPHELIA  Still better, and worse. 

 HAMLET  So you must take your husbands. Begin, murderer; 

 pox, leave thy damnable faces, and begin. Come: 

 'the croaking raven doth bellow for revenge.' 

 LUCIANUS  Thoughts black, hands apt, drugs fit, and time agreeing; 

 Confederate season, else no creature seeing; 

 Thou mixture rank, of midnight weeds collected, 

 With Hecate's ban thrice blasted, thrice infected, 

 Thy natural magic and dire property, 

 On wholesome life usurp immediately. 



 Pours the poison into the sleeper's ears  HAMLET  He poisons him i' the garden for's estate. His 

 name's Gonzago: the story is extant, and writ in 

 choice Italian: you shall see anon how the murderer 

 gets the love of Gonzago's wife. 

 OPHELIA  The king rises. 

 HAMLET  What, frighted with false fire! 

 QUEEN GERTRUDE  How fares my lord? 

 LORD POLONIUS  Give o'er the play. 

 KING CLAUDIUS  Give me some light: away! 

 All  Lights, lights, lights! 



 Exeunt all but HAMLET and HORATIO  HAMLET  Why, let the stricken 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. 

 For thou dost know, O Damon dear, 

 This realm dismantled was 

 Of Jove himself; and now reigns here 

 A very, very--pajock. 

 HORATIO  You might have rhymed. 

 HAMLET  O good Horatio, I'll take the ghost's word for a 

 thousand pound. Didst perceive? 

 HORATIO  Very well, my lord. 

 HAMLET  Upon the talk of the poisoning? 

 HORATIO  I did very well note him. 

 HAMLET  Ah, ha! Come, some music! come, the recorders! 

 For if the king like not the comedy, 

 Why then, belike, he likes it not, perdy. 

 Come, some music! 



 Re-enter ROSENCRANTZ and GUILDENSTERN  GUILDENSTERN  Good my lord, vouchsafe me a word with you. 

 HAMLET  Sir, a whole history. 

 GUILDENSTERN  The king, sir,-- 

 HAMLET  Ay, sir, what of him? 

 GUILDENSTERN  Is in his retirement marvellous 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. 

 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, hath sent me to you. 

 HAMLET  You are welcome. 

 GUILDENSTERN  Nay, good my lord, this courtesy is not of the right 

 breed. If it shall please you to make me a 

 wholesome answer, I will do your mother's 

 commandment: if not, your pardon and my return 

 shall be the end of my business. 

 HAMLET  Sir, I cannot. 

 GUILDENSTERN  What, my lord? 

 HAMLET  Make you a wholesome answer; my wit's diseased: but, 

 sir, such answer as I can make, you shall command; 

 or, rather, as you say, my mother: therefore no 

 more, but to the matter: my mother, you say,-- 

 ROSENCRANTZ  Then thus she says; your behavior hath struck her 

 into amazement and admiration. 

 HAMLET  O wonderful son, that can so astonish a mother! But 

 is there no sequel at the heels of this mother's 

 admiration? Impart. 

 ROSENCRANTZ  She desires to speak with you in her closet, ere you 

 go to bed. 

 HAMLET  We shall obey, were she ten times our mother. Have 

 you any further trade with us? 

 ROSENCRANTZ  My lord, you once did love me. 

 HAMLET  So I do still, by these pickers and stealers. 

 ROSENCRANTZ  Good my lord, what is your cause of distemper? you 

 do, surely, bar the door upon 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, but sir, 'While the grass grows,'--the proverb 

 is something musty. 



 Re-enter Players with recorders  O, the recorders! let me see one. To withdraw with 

 you:--why do you go about to recover the wind of me, 

 as if you would drive me into a toil? 

 GUILDENSTERN  O, my lord, if my duty be too bold, my love is too 

 unmannerly. 

 HAMLET  I do not well understand that. Will you play upon 

 this pipe? 

 GUILDENSTERN  My lord, I cannot. 

 HAMLET  I pray you. 

 GUILDENSTERN  Believe me, I cannot. 

 HAMLET  I do beseech you. 

 GUILDENSTERN  I know no touch of it, my lord. 

 HAMLET  'Tis as easy as lying: govern these ventages with 

 your fingers and thumb, give it breath with your 

 mouth, and it will discourse most eloquent music. 

 Look you, these are the stops. 

 GUILDENSTERN  But these cannot I command to any utterance of 

 harmony; I have not the skill. 

 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 organ; yet cannot 

 you make it speak. 'Sblood, do you think I am 

 easier to be played on than a pipe? Call me what 

 instrument you will, though you can fret me, yet you 

 cannot play upon me. 



 Enter POLONIUS  God bless you, sir! 

 LORD POLONIUS  My lord, the queen would speak with you, and 

 presently. 

 HAMLET  Do you see yonder cloud that's almost in shape of a camel? 

 LORD POLONIUS  By the mass, and 'tis like a camel, indeed. 

 HAMLET  Methinks it is like a weasel. 

 LORD POLONIUS  It is backed like a weasel. 

 HAMLET  Or like a whale? 

 LORD POLONIUS  Very like a whale. 

 HAMLET  Then I will come to my mother by and by. They fool 

 me to the top of my bent. I will come by and by. 

 LORD POLONIUS  I will say so. 

 HAMLET  By and by is easily said. 



 Exit POLONIUS  Leave me, friends. 



 Exeunt all but HAMLET  Tis now the very witching time of night, 

 When churchyards yawn and hell itself breathes 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. 

 O heart, lose 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 soever she be shent, 

 To give them seals never, my soul, consent! 



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