"Du hast sie zerstört
Die schöne Welt;"
but the new world is built of the same materials—that is, absorbing ideas. The shadow descends till it measures the former brightness; the revulsion is as great as the enthusiasm.
IV.
Why, then, does he accept the mission of the Ghost? To answer this fully we must accompany him to the platform.
In this scene Hamlet exhibits in perfection all the elements of courage—coolness, determination, daring. He is singularly free from excitement; and this is not because he is absorbed in his own thoughts, for he easily falls into conversation, and treats the first subject that comes to hand with his usual felicity and fulness, rising from the private instance to a public law, and applying it to large and larger groups of facts till his father's spirit stands before him. Thrilled and startled he pauses not, "harrowed with fear and wonder like Horatio on the previous night, but at once addresses it, as he said he would, though hell itself should gape." No more dignified rebuke ever shamed terror from the soul than Hamlet administers to his panic-stricken friends, and when they would forcibly withhold him from following the Ghost, the steady determination with which he draws his sword is marked by the play upon words:
"By Heav'n, I'll make a ghost of him that lets me."
In the presence of his father the old life is rekindled within his filial awe and affection, unquestioned obedience, daring resolve. He will "sweep to his revenge,"
"And thy commandment all alone shall live
Within the book and volume of my brain,
Unmixed with baser matter."
And this commandment had forbidden him to taint his mind against his mother.
But what is his first exclamation when he is released from physical horror, and his thoughts regain the living world? It is