Or by pronouncing of some doubtfull Phrase;
As well, we know, or we could and if we would,
[Sidenote: As well, well, we]
Or if we list to speake; or there be and if there might,
[Sidenote: if they might]
Or such ambiguous giuing out to note, [Sidenote: note]
That you know ought of me; this not to doe:
[Sidenote: me, this doe sweare,]
So grace and mercy at your most neede helpe you:
Sweare.[1]
Ghost. Sweare.[2]
Ham. Rest, rest perturbed Spirit[3]: so Gentlemen,
With all my loue I doe commend me to you;
And what so poore a man as Hamlet is,
May doe t'expresse his loue and friending to you,
God willing shall not lacke: let vs goe in together,
And still your fingers on your lippes I pray,
The time is out of ioynt: Oh cursed spight,[4]
[Sidenote: 126] That euer I was borne to set it right.
Nay, come let's goe together. Exeunt.[5]
* * * * *
SUMMARY OF ACT I.
This much of Hamlet we have now learned: he is a thoughtful man, a genuine student, little acquainted with the world save through books, and a lover of his kind. His university life at Wittenberg is suddenly interrupted by a call to the funeral of his father, whom he dearly loves and honours. Ere he reaches Denmark, his uncle Claudius has contrived, in an election (202, 250, 272) probably hastened and secretly influenced, to gain the voice of the representatives at least of the people, and ascend the throne. Hence his position must have been an irksome one from the first; but, within a month of his father's death, his mother's marriage with his uncle—a relation universally regarded as incestuous—plunges him in the deepest misery. The play introduces him at the first court held after the wedding. He is attired in the mourning of his father's funeral, which he had not laid aside for the wedding. His aspect is of absolute dejection, and he appears in a company for which he is so unfit only for the sake of desiring permission to leave the court, and go back to his studies at Wittenberg.[A] Left to himself, he breaks out in agonized and indignant lamentation over his mother's conduct, dwelling mainly on her disregard of his father's memory. Her conduct and his partial discovery of her character, is the sole cause of his misery. In such his mood, Horatio, a fellow-student, brings him word that his father's spirit walks at night. He watches for the Ghost, and receives from him a frightful report of his present condition, into which, he tells him, he was cast by the murderous hand of his brother, with whom his wife had been guilty of adultery. He enjoins him to put a stop to the crime in which they are now living, by taking vengeance on his uncle. Uncertain at the moment how to act, and dreading the consequences of rousing suspicion by the perturbation which he could not but betray, he grasps at the sudden idea of affecting madness. We have learned also Hamlet's relation to Ophelia, the daughter of the selfish, prating, busy Polonius, who, with his son Laertes, is destined to work out the earthly fate of Hamlet. Of Laertes, as yet, we only know that he prates like his father, is self-confident, and was educated at Paris, whither he has returned. Of Ophelia we know nothing but that she is gentle, and that she is fond of Hamlet, whose attentions she has encouraged, but with whom, upon her father's severe remonstrance, she is ready, outwardly at least, to break.
[Footnote A: Roger Ascham, in his Scholemaster, if I mistake not, sets the age, up to which a man should be under tutors, at twenty-nine.]
[Footnote 1: 'Sweare' not in Quarto.]
[Footnote 2: They do not this time shift their ground, but swear—in dumb show.]
[Footnote 3: —for now they had obeyed his command and sworn secrecy.]