Hamlet by William Shakespeare
Act 1 - Scene 4
Elsinore. The platform before the Castle.
Hamlet : The air bites shrewdly; it is very cold.
Horatio : It is a nipping and an eager air.
Hamlet : What hour now?
Horatio : I think it lacks of twelve.
Marcellus : No, it is struck.
Horatio : Indeed? I heard it not. It then draws near the season
[p]Wherein the
spirit held his wont to walk.
[p][A flourish of trumpets, and two
pieces go off.]
[p]What does this mean, my lord?
Hamlet : The King doth wake to-night and takes his rouse,
[p]Keeps wassail, and
the swagg'ring upspring reels,
[p]And, as he drains his draughts of
Rhenish down,
[p]The kettledrum and trumpet thus bray out
[p]The
triumph of his pledge.
Horatio : Is it a custom?
Hamlet : Ay, marry, is't;
[p]But to my mind, though I am native here
[p]And to
the manner born, it is a custom
[p]More honour'd in the breach than
the observance.
[p]This heavy-headed revel east and west
[p]Makes us
traduc'd and tax'd of other nations;
[p]They clip us drunkards and
with swinish phrase
[p]Soil our addition; and indeed it takes
[p]From
our achievements, though perform'd at height,
[p]The pith and marrow
of our attribute.
[p]So oft it chances in particular men
[p]That, for
some vicious mole of nature in them,
[p]As in their birth,- wherein
they are not guilty,
[p]Since nature cannot choose his origin,-
[p]By
the o'ergrowth of some complexion,
[p]Oft breaking down the pales and
forts of reason,
[p]Or by some habit that too much o'erleavens
[p]The
form of plausive manners, that these men
[p]Carrying, I say, the stamp
of one defect,
[p]Being nature's livery, or fortune's star,
[p]Their
virtues else- be they as pure as grace,
[p]As infinite as man may
undergo-
[p]Shall in the general censure take corruption
[p]From that
particular fault. The dram of e'il
[p]Doth all the noble substance
often dout To his own scandal.
Horatio : Look, my lord, it comes!
Hamlet : Angels and ministers of grace defend us!
[p]Be thou a spirit of health
or goblin damn'd,
[p]Bring with thee airs from heaven or blasts from
hell,
[p]Be thy intents wicked or charitable,
[p]Thou com'st in such a
questionable shape
[p]That I will speak to thee. I'll call thee
Hamlet,
[p]King, father, royal Dane. O, answer me?
[p]Let me not burst
in ignorance, but tell
[p]Why thy canoniz'd bones, hearsed in
death,
[p]Have burst their cerements; why the sepulchre
[p]Wherein we
saw thee quietly inurn'd,
[p]Hath op'd his ponderous and marble
jaws
[p]To cast thee up again. What may this mean
[p]That thou, dead
corse, again in complete steel,
[p]Revisits thus the glimpses of the
moon,
[p]Making night hideous, and we fools of nature
[p]So horridly
to shake our disposition
[p]With thoughts beyond the reaches of our
souls?
[p]Say, why is this? wherefore? What should we do?
Horatio : It beckons you to go away with it,
[p]As if it some impartment did
desire
[p]To you alone.
Marcellus : Look with what courteous action
[p]It waves you to a more removed
ground.
[p]But do not go with it!
Horatio : No, by no means!
Hamlet : It will not speak. Then will I follow it.
Horatio : Do not, my lord!
Hamlet : Why, what should be the fear?
[p]I do not set my life at a pin's
fee;
[p]And for my soul, what can it do to that,
[p]Being a thing
immortal as itself?
[p]It waves me forth again. I'll follow it.
Horatio : What if it tempt you toward the flood, my lord,
[p]Or to the dreadful
summit of the cliff
[p]That beetles o'er his base into the sea,
[p]And
there assume some other, horrible form
[p]Which might deprive your
sovereignty of reason
[p]And draw you into madness? Think of
it.
[p]The very place puts toys of desperation,
[p]Without more
motive, into every brain
[p]That looks so many fadoms to the
sea
[p]And hears it roar beneath.
Hamlet : It waves me still.
[p]Go on. I'll follow thee.
Marcellus : You shall not go, my lord.
Hamlet : Hold off your hands!
Horatio : Be rul'd. You shall not go.
Hamlet : My fate cries out
[p]And makes each petty artire in this body
[p]As
hardy as the Nemean lion's nerve.
[p][Ghost beckons.]
[p]Still am I
call'd. Unhand me, gentlemen.
[p]By heaven, I'll make a ghost of him
that lets me!-
[p]I say, away!- Go on. I'll follow thee.
Horatio : He waxes desperate with imagination.
Marcellus : Let's follow. 'Tis not fit thus to obey him.
Horatio : Have after. To what issue will this come?
Marcellus : Something is rotten in the state of Denmark.
Horatio : Heaven will direct it.
Marcellus : Nay, let's follow him.
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Next: Act 1 - Scene 5
