And who in want a hollow friend doth try,
Directly seasons him his enemy.
The constancy of Hamlet’s father is throughout opposed to the inconstancy of his mother. The Ghost on his first appearance dwells on the subject:
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 after all the wrongs he has suffered, whilst enjoining upon Hamlet to change his course, he charges him to contrive nothing against his mother; and when he afterward appears at the interview between Hamlet and the queen, he interposes in her behalf:
But look! amazement on thy mother sits;
O, step between her and her fighting soul.
The queen also, with all her faults, remains constant in her affection for Hamlet, and “lives, almost, by his looks.” Ophelia is constant in her love,—to insanity and a watery grave; and Hamlet makes fine speeches on constancy of purpose. His soliloquy in act first, scene fifth, is in a noble strain: