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Grapple them to thy soul with hoops of steel;
But do not dull thy palm with entertainment
Of each new-hatched, unfledged comrade. Be-

ware

Of entrance to a quarrel; but, being in,
Bear it that the opposer may beware of thee.
Give every man thine ear, but few thy voice:
Take each man's censure, but reserve thy judg-

ment.

Costly thy habit as thy purse can buy,

But not expressed in fancy; rich, not gaudy:
For the apparel oft proclaims the man ;
And they in France, of the best rank and station,
Are of a most select and generous chief in that.
Neither a borrower nor a lender be:
For loan oft loses both itself and friend;
And borrowing dulls the edge of husbandry.
This above all,-to thine ownself be true;
And it must follow, as the night the day,
Thou canst not then be false to any man.
Farewell: : my blessing season this in thee!

Laer. Most humbly do I take my leave, my lord. Pol. The time invites you; go, your servants tend.

Laer. Farewell, Ophelia; and remember well What I have said to you.

Oph. "Tis in my memory locked,

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Oph. My lord, he hath impórtuned me with love, In honourable fashion.

Pol. Ay, fashion you may call it; go to, go to. Oph. And hath given countenance to his speech, my lord,

With almost all the holy vows of heaven.

Pol. 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. From this time
Be somewhat scanter of your maiden presence;
Set your entreatments at a higher rate
Than a command to parley. For lord Hamlet,
Believe so much in him, that he is young;
And with a larger tether may he walk
Than may be given you. In few, Ophelia,
Do not believe his vows: for they are brokers;
Not of that dye which their investments shew,
But mere implorators of unholy suits,
Breathing like sanctified and pious bonds,
The better to beguile. This is for all :—

I would not, in plain terms, from this time forth,
Have you so slander any moment's leisure,
As to give words or talk with the lord Hamlet.
Look to 't, I charge you; come your ways.
Oph. I shall obey, my lord.

SCENE IV.-The Platform.

[Exeunt.

Enter HAMLET, HORATIO, and MARCELLUS.
Ham. The air bites shrewdly; it is very cold.
Hor. It is a nipping and an eager air.
Ham. What hour now?

Hor. I think it lacks of twelve.
Mar. No, it is struck.

Hor. Indeed! I heard it not; it then draws near the season

Wherein the spirit held his wont to walk.

[A flourish of trumpets, and ordnance shot off within.

What does this mean, my lord?

Ham. The king doth wake to-night, and takes

his rouse,

Keeps wassel, and the swaggering up-spring reels;
And, as he drains his draughts of Rhenish down,
The kettle-drum and trumpet thus bray out
The triumph of his pledge.

Hor. Is it a custom ? Ham. Ay, marry, is 't:

But to my mind, though I am native here,
And to the manner born,-it is a custom
More honoured in the breach than the observance.

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Wherein we saw thee quietly in-urned,
Hath oped his ponderous and marble jaws,
To cast thee up again! What may this mean,
That thou, dead corse, again, in cómplete steel,
Revisit'st thus the glimpses of the moon,
Making night hideous; and we fools of nature,
So horribly to shake our disposition
With thoughts beyond the reaches of our souls?
Say, why is this? wherefore? what should we do?
Hor. It beckons you to go away with it,
As if it some impartment did desire
Το you alone.

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My fate cries out,

And makes each petty artery in this body
As hardy as the Némean lion's nerve.

[Ghost beckons. Still am I called ;-unhand me, gentlemen: [Breaking from them. By heaven, I'll make a ghost of him that lets me : I say, away!-Go on; I'll follow thee!

[Exeunt Ghost and HAMLET.

Hor. He waxes desperate with imagination. Mar. Let's follow; 'tis not fit thus to obey him.

Hor. Have after. To what issue will this come?

Mar. Something is rotten in the state of Denmark.

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And duller shouldst thou be than the fat weed
That rots itself in ease on Lethe wharf,
Wouldst thou not stir in this. Now, Hamlet, hear;
'Tis given out that, sleeping in mine orchard,
A serpent stung me; so the whole ear of Denmark
Is by a forgéd process of my death
Rankly abused but know, thou noble youth,
The serpent that did sting thy father's life,
Now wears his crown.

Ham. O, my prophetic soul! my uncle! Ghost. Ay, that incestuous, that adulterate beast,

With witchcraft of his wit, 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:
O, Hamlet, what a falling-off was there!
From me, whose love was of that dignity
That it went hand in hand even with the vow
I made to her in marriage; and to decline
Upon a wretch, whose natural gifts were poor
To those of mine!

But virtue, as it never will be moved,
Though lewdness court it in a shape of heaven;
So lust, though to a radiant angel linked,
Will sate itself in a celestial bed,
And prey on garbage.

But, soft! methinks I scent the morning air;
Brief let me be :-Sleeping within mine orchard,
My custom always of the afternoon,
Upon my sécure hour thy uncle stole,
With juice of curséd hebenon in a vial,
And in the porches of mine ears did pour
The leperous distilment; whose effect
Holds such an enmity with blood of man,
That, swift as quicksilver, it courses through
The natural gates and alleys of the body;
And, with a sudden vigour, it doth posset
And curd, like aigre droppings into milk,
The thin and wholesome blood: so did it mine;
And in a most instant tetter barked about,
Most lazar-like, with vile and loathsome crust,
All my smooth body.

Thus was I, sleeping, by a brother's hand,

Of life, of crown, of queen, at once despatched :
Cut off even in the blossoms of my sin,
Unhouselled, disappointed, unanelled;
No reckoning made, but sent to my account
With all my imperfections on my
head:
O, horrible! O, horrible! Most horrible!
If thou hast nature in thee, bear it not;
Let not the royal bed of Denmark be
A couch for luxury and damnéd incest.
But, howsoever thou pursuest this act,
Taint not thy mind, nor let thy soul contrive
Against thy mother aught; leave her to heaven,
And to those thorns that in her bosom lodge,
To prick and sting her. Fare thee well at once!
The glow-worm shews the matin to be near,
And 'gins to pale his uneffectual fire:
Adieu, adieu, adieu! remember me. [Exit.
Ham. 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, while memory holds a seat
In this distracted globe. Remember thee!

Yea, from the table of my memory
I'll wipe away all trivial fond records,
All saws of books, all forms, all pressures past,
That youth and observation copied there;
And thy commandment all alone shall live
Within the book and volume of my brain,
Unmixed with baser matter: yes, by heaven!
O most pernicious woman!

O villain, villain, smiling, damnéd villain!
My tables-meet it is I set it down,
That one may smile, and smile, and be a villain;
At least, I am sure it may be so in Denmark:
[Writing.

So, uncle, there you are. Now, to my word;
It is, "Adieu, adieu! remember me."
I have sworn 't.

Hor. [within]. My lord, my lord,—
Mar. [within]. Lord Hamlet,—
Hor. [within]. Heaven secure him!
Ham. So be it!

Mar. [within]. Hillo, ho, ho, my lord!
Ham. Hillo, ho, ho, boy! come, bird, come.

Enter HORATIO and MARCELLUS.
Mar. How is 't, my noble lord?
Hor.

Ham. O,

Hor.
Ham.

What news, my lord?

wonderful!

Good my lord, tell it. No;

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