GUILDENSTERN.
Which dreams, indeed, are ambition; for the very substance of the ambitious is merely the shadow of a dream.
HAMLET.
A dream itself is but a shadow.
ROSENCRANTZ.
Truly, and I hold ambition of so airy and light a quality that it is but a shadow’s shadow.
HAMLET.
Then are our beggars bodies, and our monarchs and outstretch’d heroes the beggars’ shadows. Shall we to th’ court? For, by my fay, I cannot reason.
ROSENCRANTZ and GUILDENSTERN.
We’ll wait upon you.
HAMLET.
No such matter. I will not sort you with the rest of my servants; for, to speak to you like an honest man, I am most dreadfully attended. But, in the beaten way of friendship, what make you at Elsinore?
ROSENCRANTZ.
To visit you, my lord, no other occasion.
HAMLET.
Beggar that I am, I am even poor in thanks; but I thank you. And sure, dear friends, my thanks are too dear a halfpenny. Were you not sent for? Is it your own inclining? Is it a free visitation? Come, deal justly with me. Come, come; nay, speak.
GUILDENSTERN.
What should we say, my lord?
HAMLET.
Why, anything. But to the purpose. You were sent for; and there is a kind of confession in your looks, which your modesties have not craft enough to colour. I know the good King and Queen have sent for you.