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Or in th' incestuous pleasure of his bed;
At gaming, fwearing, or about fome act
That has no relish of falvation in't;

Then trip him, that his heels may kick at heav'n;
And that his foul may be as damn'd and black
As hell, whereto it goes. My mother stays;
This phyfick but prolongs thy fickly days.

The King rifes, and comes forward.

[Exit.

King. My words fly up, my thoughts remain below; Words, without thoughts, never to heaven go. [Exit.

Pol.

SCENE changes to the Queen's Apartment.

H

And that

Enter Queen and Polonius.

Ewill come ftraight; look, you lay home to him: Tell him, his pranks have been too broad to bear with;

your Grace hath fcreen'd, and ftood between Much heat and him. I'll filence me e'en here; Pray you, be round with him.

Ham. [within.] Mother, Mother, Mother. Queen. I'll warrant you, fear me not.. Withdraw, I hear him coming.

[Polonius hides himself behind the Arras.

Enter Hamlet.

Ham. Now, mother, what's the matter?
Queen. Hamlet, thou haft thy father much offended.
Ham. Mother, you have my father much offended.
Queen. Come, come, you answer with an idle tongue.
Ham. Go, go, you question with a wicked tongue.
Queen. Why, how now, Hamlet ?

Ham. What's the matter now?

that throwing my eye cafually over the fourth folio edition, printed in 1685, I found my correction there anticipated. I think myself obliged to repeat this confeffion, that I may not be accufed of pla giarifm, for an emendation which I had made before ever I faw a fingle page of that book..

Queen

Queen. Have you forgot me?

Ham. No, by the rood, not fo;

You are the Queen, your husband's brother's wife,
But, 'would you were not fo!-You are my mother.
Queen. Nay, then I'll fet thofe to you that can speak.
Ham. Come, come, and fit you down; you fhall not
You go not, 'till I fet you up a glass [budge:

Where you may see the inmoft part of you.

Queen. What wilt thou do? thou wilt not murder me? Help, ho.

Po'. What ho, help.

[Behind the Arras.

[Hamlet kills Polonius.

Ham. How now, a rat? dead for a ducat, dead.

Pol. Oh, I am flain.

Queen. Oh me, what hast thou done?

Ham. Nay, I know not: is it the King?

Queen. Oh, what a rash and bloody deed is this! Ham. A bloody deed; almoft as bad, good mother, As kill a King, and marry with his brother. Queen. As kill a King ?

Ham. Ay, lady, 'twas my word.

Thou wretched, rash, intruding fool, farewel,

[To Polonius.

I took thee for thy betters; take thy fortune;
Thou find'ft, to be too bufy, is fome danger.
Leave wringing of your hands; peace, fit you down,
And let me wring your heart, for so I shall,

If it be made of penetrable stuff:

If damned custom have not braz'd it so,

That it is proof and bulwark against sense.

[tongue

Queen. What have I done, that thou dar'ft wag thy

In noise fo rude against me ?

Ham. Such an act,

That blurs the grace and blush of modesty ;
Calls virtue hypocrite; takes off the rose
From the fair forehead of an innocent love,
And fets a blifter there; makes marriage-vows
As falfe as dicers' oaths. Oh, such a deed,
As from the body of Contraction plucks.
The very foul, and fweet Religion makes

A rhapfody of words. Heav'n's face doth glow;
Yea, this folidity and compound mafs,

With triftful visage, as against the doom,
Is thought-fick at the act.

Queen. Ay me! what act,

That roars fo loud, and thunders in the index ?
Ham. Look here upon this picture, and on this,
The counterfeit prefentment of two brothers:
See, what a grace was seated on this brow ;
Hyperion's curls; the front of Jove himself;
An eye, like Mars, to threaten or command;
A station, like the herald Mercury (49)
New-lighted on a heaven-kiffing hill;
A combination, and a form indeed,
Where every God did feem to fet his feal,
To give the world affurance of a man.

This was your husband, -Look you now, what follows;
Here is your husband, like a mildew'd ear,

Blafting his wholesome brother. Have you eyes?

(49) A station, like the berald Mercury.] The Poet employs this word in a fenfe different from what it is generally us'd to fignify: for it means here an attitude, a filent pofture, fixt demeanour of person, in oppofition to an active behaviour. So, our Poet, before, describing Octavia;

Cleo. What majefty is in her gate? Remember,
If e'er thou look'd'ft on Majefty?

Mel: She creeps:

Her motion and her ftation are as one.

Anto. and Cleop.

And I ought to obferve, (which feems no bad proof of our Author's learning and knowledge) that among the Latines, the word ftatio, in its first and natural fignification, imply'd ftantis actio: i. e. a pofture, or attitude. This Monf. FRESNOY, in his Art of Painting, has chose to express by pofitura:

Quarendafque inter pofituras, luminis, umbræ,

Atque futurorum jàm præfentire colorum

Par crit barmoniam

Which our DRYDEN has thus tranflated; " "Tis the business of a "painter, in his choice of attitudes, to foresee the effect and har << mony of the lights and fhadows, with the colours which are to "enter into the whole." And again, afterwards;

Mutorumque filens Pofitura imitabitur actus,

Which I think may be thus render'd;
Still let the filent attitude betray

What the mate figure fhould in gefture fay.

Could

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,
The hey-day in the blood is tame, it's humble,
And waits upon the judgment; and what judgment
Would step from this to this? Senfe, fure, you have, (50)
Elfe could you not have motion: but, fure, that fenfe
Is apoplex'd: for madness would not err;

Nor fenfe to ecftacy was ne'er fo thrall'd,
But it referv'd fome quantity of choice

To serve in fuch a diff'rence. What devil was't,
That thus had cozen'd you at hoodman blind?
Eyes without feeling, feeling without fight,
Ears without hands or eyes, fmelling fans all,
Or but a fickly part of one true fense
Could not fo mope.

O fhame! where is thy blush? rebellious hell,
If thou canst mutiny in a matron's bones,

To flaming youth let virtue be as wax,

And melt in her own fire. Proclaim no fhame, (51)
When the compulfive ardour gives the charge;
Since froft itself as actively doth burn,
And Reafon panders Will.

Queen.

(50)-Senfe, fure, you bave, &c.] Mr. Pope has left out the quantity of about eight verfes here, which I have taken care to replace. They are not, indeed, to be found in the two elder folio's, but they carry the ftile, expreffion, and caft of thought, peculiar to our Author; and that they were not an interpolation from another hand needs no better proof, than that they are in all the oldest quarto's. The first motive of their being left out, I am perfwaded, was to fhorten Hamlet's fpeech, and confult the exfe of the actor: and the reason, why they find no place in the folio impreffions, is, that they were printed from the playboufe caftrated copies. But, furely, this can be no authority for a modern editor to confpire in. mutilating his author: fuch omiffions, rather, muft betray a want of diligence, in collating; or a want of justice, in the voluntary fifling. -Proclaim no fhame,

(31)

When the compulfive ardour gives the charge;
Since froft itfelf as actively does burn,

And reafon pardons will.] This is, indeed, the reading of Some of the elder copies; and Mr. Pope has a strange fatality, whenever there is a various reading, of elpoufing the wrong one.

The whole

Queen. O Hamlet, speak no more.
Thou turn'ft mine eyes into my very foul,
And there I fee fuch black and grained spots,
As will not leave their tinct.

Ham. Nay, but to live

In the rank fweat of an incestuous bed,
Stew'd in corruption, honying and making love
Over the nafty fty;;

Queen. Oh, fpeak no more;

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

Ham. A murderer, and a villain!

A flave, that is not twentieth part the tythe
Of your precedent Lord. A Vice of Kings ;-(52)
A cutpurfe of the Empire and the Rule,

That from a fhelf the precious Diadem ftole
And put it in his pocket.

Queen. No more.

Enter Ghoft.

Ham. A King of fhreds and patches

Save me! and hover o'er me with your wings,

[Starting up. You heav'nly guards! what would your gracious figure? Queen. Alas, he's mad

Ham. Do you not come your tardy fon to chide,

whole tenour of the context demands the word degraded by that judicious editor;

And reafon panders will.

This is the reflexion which Hamlet is making, "Let us not call it "shame, when heat of blood compells young people to indulge their "appetites; fince froft too can burn, and age, at that feafon when "judgment fhould predominate, yet feels the ftings of inclination, "and fuffers reafon to be the bawd to appetite."

(52A Vice of Kings.] This does not mean, a very vicious king; as, on the other hand, in King Henry V. this Grace of Kings means, this gracious King, this honour to royalty. But here, I take it, a person, and not a quality, is to be understood. By a Vice, (as I have explain'd the word in feveral preceding notes) is meant that buffoon character, which us'd to play the fool in old plays; fo that Hamlet is here defign'd to call his uncle, a ridiculous ape of majesty; but the mimickry of a king.

That,

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