That might your nature, honour, and exception,
Roughly awake, I here proclaim was madness.
Was 't Hamlet wrong'd Laertes? Never Hamlet:
If Hamlet from himself be ta'en away,

And, when he's not himself, does wrong Laertes,
Then Hamlet docs it not; Hamlet denies it.
Who does it then? His madness: if't be so,
Hamlet is of the faction that is wrong'd;
His madness is poor Hamlet's enemy.

Sir, in this audience,

Let my disclaiming from a purposed evil

Free me so far in your most generous thoughts,
That I have shot my arrow o'er the house,
And hurt my brother.

Laer. I am satisfied in nature,

Whose motive, in this case, should stir me most
To my revenge: but in my terms of honour,
I stand aloof; and will no reconcilement,
Till by some elder masters, of known honour,

I have a voice and precedent of peace,

To keep my name ungored. But till that time,

I do receive your offer'd love like love,

And will not wrong it.

Ham. I embrace it freely;

And will this brother's wager frankly play.-
Give us the foils.-Come on.

Laer. Come, one for me.

Ham. I'll be your foil, Laertes; in mine ignorance

Your skill shall, like a star i' the darkest night,

I

Laer. [Aside. And yet it is almost against my

conscience.

Ham. Come, for the third, Laertes: you do but dally;

pray you, pass with your best violence;

I am afeard you make a wanton of me.
Laer. Say you so? come on.

Osr. Nothing neither way.
Laer. Have at you now.

[They play.

[LAERTES wounds HAMLET; then, in scufling, they change rapiers, and HAMLET wounds LAFETES, King. Part them, they are incensed. Ham. Nay, come again.

[The QUEEN falls.

Osr. Look to the queen there, ho!
Hor. They bleed on both sides.-How is it, my lord?
Osr. How is 't, Laertes?

Laer. Why, as a woodcock to my own springe, Osrie; I am justly kill'd with mine own treachery.

Ham. How does the queen?

King. She swoons to see them bleed.

[Hamlet!

Queen. No, no, the drink, the drink,-0 my dear The drink, the drink;-I am poison'd!

Ham. O villany!-Ho! let the door be lock'd: Treachery! seek it out.

[Dies.

[LAERTES falls. Laer. It is here, Hamlet: Hamlet, thou art slain; No medicine in the world can do thee good; In thee there is not half an hour's life; The treacherous instrument is in thy hand, Unbated and envenom'd: the foul practice Hath turn'd itself on me; lo, here I He, Never to rise again: thy mother's poison'd: I can no more; the king, the king's to blame. Ham. The point

Envenom'd too!-Then, venom, to thy work.

Osr, and Lords. Treason! treason!

[Stabs the KING.

Drink off this potion:-is the union here? Follow my mother.

Laer. He is justly served;

[KING dies.

It is a poison temper'd by himself.-
Exchange forgiveness with me, noble Hamlet:
Mine and my father's death come not upon thee;
Nor thine on me!

[Dies.

Ham. Heaven make thee free of it! I follow thee.
I am dead, Horatio.-Wretched queen, adieul-
You that look pale and tremble at this chance,
That are but mutes or audience to this act,
Had I but time, (as this fell sergeant, Death,
Is strict in his arrest,) O, I could tell you,—
But let it be.-Horatio, I am dead;

Thou livest; report me and my cause aright
To the unsatisfied.

Hor. Never believe it:

I am more an antique Roman than a Dane:
Here's yet some liquor left.

Ham. As thou 'rt a man,

Give me the cup: let go, by heaven, I'll have it.O God!-Horatio, what a wounded name,

Things standing thus unknown, shall live behind me! If thou didst ever hold me in thy heart,

Absent thee from felicity a while,

And in this harsh world draw thy breath in pain,

To tell my story.

[March afar off, and shot within.

What warlike noise is this?

The ears are senseless that should give us hearing,
To tell him his commandment is fulfill'd;
That Rosencrantz and Guildenstern are dead:
Where should we have our thanks?

Hor. Not from his mouth,

Had it the ability of life to thank you;

He never gave commandment for their death.
But since, so jump upon this bloody question,
You from the Polack wars, and you from England,
Are here arrived, give order that these bodies
High on a stage be placed to the view;
And let me speak to the yet unknowing world
How these things came about: so shall you hear
Of carnal, bloody, and unnatural acts;

Of accidental judgments, casual slaughters:
Of deaths put on by cunning and forced cause;
And, in this upshot, purposes mistook

Fallen on the inventors' heads: all this can I
Truly deliver.

Fort. Let us haste to hear it,

And call the noblest to the audience.

SCENE I.-A Room of State in KING LEAR's Palace.

Enter KENT, GLOSTER, and EDMUND.

Kent. I thought the king had more affected the duke of Albany, than Cornwall.

Glo. It did always seem so to us: but now, in the division of the kingdom, it appears not which of the dukes he values most; for equalities are so weigh'd, that curiosity in neither can make choice of either's moiety.

Kent. Is not this your son, my lord?

Glo. His breeding, Sir, hath been at my charge: I have so often blushed to acknowledge him, that now I am brazed to it.

Kent. I cannot conceive you.

Glo. Sir, this young fellow's mother could: whereupon she grew round-wombed; and had, indeed, Sir, a son for her cradle ere she had a husband for her bed. Do you smell a fault?

Kent. I cannot wish the fault undone, the issue of it being so proper.

Glo. But I have, Sir, a son by order of law, some year elder than this, who yet is no dearer in my account: though this knave came somewhat saucily into the world before he was sent for, yet was his mother fair; there was good sport at his making, and the whoreson must be acknowledged.-Do you know this noble gentleman, Edmund ?

[Exeunt GLOSTER and EDMUND. Lear. Meantime we shall express our darker purpose. Give me the map there.-Know that we have divided In three our kingdom: and 'tis our fast intent To shake all cares and business from our age; Conferring them on younger strengths, while we Unburden'd crawl toward death.-Our son of Cornwall, And you, our no less loving son of Albany, We have this hour a constant will to publish Our daughters' several dowers, that future strife May be prevented now. The princes, France and BurGreat rivals in our youngest daughter's love, [gundy, Long in our court have made their amorous sojourn, And here are to be answer'd.-Tell me, my daughters, (Since now we will divest us, both of rule, Interest of territory, cares of state,) Which of you, shall we say, doth love us most? That we our largest bounty may extend Where merit doth most challenge it.-Goneril, Our eldest-born, speak first.

Gon. Sir, I

Do love you more than words can wield the matter;
Dearer than eyesight, space, and liberty;
Beyond what can be valued, rich or rare;
No less than life, with grace, health, beauty, honour:
As much as child e'er loved, or father found;
A love that makes breath poor, and speech unable;
Beyond all manner of so much I love you.

[silent.

Cor. [Aside.] What shall Cordelia do? Love, and be
Lear. Of all these bounds, even from this line to this,
With shadowy forests and with champains rich'd,
With plenteous rivers and wide-skirted meads,
We make thee lady: to thine and Albany's issue
Be this perpetual-What says our second daughter,
Our dearest Regan, wife to Cornwall? Speak.

Reg. I am made of that self metal as my sister,
And prize me at her worth. In my true heart
I find she names my very deed of love;
Only she comes too short,-that I profess
Myself an enemy to all other joys,

Which the most precious square of sense possesses;
And find I am alone felicitate

Obey you, love you, and most honour you.

Why have my sisters husbands, if they say

They love you all? Haply, when I shall wed,

That lord, whose hand must take my plight, shall carry

Half my love with him, half my care and duty:

Sure, I shall never marry like my sisters,

To love my father all.

Lear. But goes this with thy heart?

Cor. Ay, good my lord.

Lear. So young, and so untender?

Cor. So young, my lord, and true.

Lear. Let it be so.-Thy truth, then, be thy dower:

For, by the sacred radiance of the sun,

The mysteries of Hecate, and the night;

By all the operations of the orbs

From whom we do exist, and cease to be;
Here I disclaim all my paternal care,

Propinquity and property of blood,

And, as a stranger to my heart and me,

Hold thee from this, for ever. The barbarous Scythian,

Or he that makes his generation messes

To gorge his appetite, shall to my bosom

Be as well neighbour'd, pitied, and relieved,

As thou my sometime daughter.

Kent. Good my liege,

Lear. Peace, Kent!

Come not between the dragon and his wrath.

I loved her most, and thought to set my rest

[sight!

On her kind nursery.-[To CoR.] Hence, and avoid my
So be my grave my peace, as here I give
Her father's heart from her!-Call France;-who stirs ?
Call Burgundy.-Cornwall, and Albany,
With my two daughters' dowers digest this third:
Let pride, which she calls plainness, marry her.

I do invest you jointly with my power,
Pre-eminence, and all the large effects

That troop with majesty. Ourself, by monthly course,
With reservation of a hundred knights,

By you to be sustain'd, shall our abode

Make with you by due turns. Only we still retain
The name, and all the additions to a king;

The sway,

Revenue, execution of the rest,

Kent. Let it fall rather, though the fork invade
The region of my heart: be Kent unmannerly,
When Lear is mad. What wouldst thou do, old man?
Think'st thou that duty shall have dread to speak,
When power to flattery bows? To plainness honour's
bound,

When majesty stoops to folly. Reverse thy doom;
And, in thy best consideration, check

This hideous rashness: answer my life my judgment,
Thy youngest daughter does not love thee least;
Nor are those empty-hearted, whose low sound
Reverbs no hollowness.

Lear. Kent, on thy life, no more.

Kent. My life I never held but as a pawn

To wage against thine enemies; nor fear to lose it,
Thy safety being the motive.

Lear. Out of my sight!

Kent. See better, Lear; and let me still remain The true blank of thine eye.

Lear. Now, by Apollo,Kent. Now, by Apollo, king, Thou swear'st thy gods in vain.

Lear. [Laying his hand on his sword.] O, vassal! Alb. Corn. Dear Sir, forbear.

Kent. Do;

Kill thy physician, and the fee bestow

Upon the foul disease. Revoke thy gift;

[miscreant!

Or, whilst I can vent clamour from my throat,
I'll tell thee thou dost evil.

Lear. Hear me, recreant!

On thine allegiance hear me!

Since thou hast sought to make us break our vow,
(Which we durst never yet,) and, with strain'd pride,
To come betwixt our sentence and our power,
(Which nor our nature nor our place can bear,)
Our potency make good, take thy reward.
Five days we do allot thee, for provision
To shield thee from diseases of the world;
And, on the sixth, to turn thy hated back
Upon our kingdom: if, on the tenth day following,
Thy banish'd trunk be found in our doniinions,
The moment is thy death. Away! By Jupiter,
This shall not be revoked.

Kent. Fare thee well, king: since thus thou wilt apFreedom lives hence, and banishment is here. [pear,

[To COR.] The gods to their dear shelter take thee, maid,
That justly think'st, and hast most rightly said!-
[To REG. and GON.] And your large speeches may your
deeds approve,

That good effects may spring from words of love.
Thus Kent, O princes, bids you all adieu;
He'll shape his old course in a country new.

[Erit

Re-enter GLOSTER, with FRANCE, BURGUNDY, and
Attendants.

Glo. Here's France and Burgundy, my noble lord.
Lear. My lord of Burgundy,

We first address toward you, who with this king
Hath rivall'd for our daughter: what, in the least,
Will you require in present dower with her,
Or cease your quest of love?

Bur. Most royal majesty,

I crave no more than hath your highness offer'd,
Nor will you tender less.

Lear. Right noble Burgundy,

When she was dear to us, we did hold her so;
But now her price is fallen. Sir, there she stands;
If aught within that little seeming substance,
Or all of it, with our displeasure pieced,
And nothing more, may fitly like your grace,
She's there, and she is yours.

Bur. I know no answer.

Lear. Sir,

Will you, with those infirmities she owes,
Unfriended, new-adopted to our hate,

Dower'd with our curse, and stranger'd with our oath,
Take her, or leave her?

Bur. Pardon me, royal Sir;

Election makes not up on such conditions.

Lear. Then leave her, Sir; for by the power that made me,

I tell you all her wealth.-[To FRANCE.] For you, great
I would not from your love make such a stray, (king,
To match you where I hate; therefore beseech you
To avert your liking a more worthier way,
Than on a wretch whom nature is ashamed
Almost to acknowledge hers.

France. This is most strange,

That she, that even but now was your best object,
The argument of your praise, balm of your age,
Most best, most dearest, should in this trice of time
Commit a thing so monstrous, to dismantle
So many folds of favour! Sure, her offence
Must be of such unnatural degree,

That monsters it, or your fore-vouch'd affection
Fall into taint: which to believe of her,
Must be a faith that reason, without miracle,

Could never plant in me.

Cor. I yet beseech your majesty,

(If for I want that glib and oily art,

To speak and purpose not; since what I well intend, I'll do't before I speak,) that you make known

It is no vicious blot, murder, or foulness,

No unchaste action, or dishonour'd step,
That hath deprived me of your grace and favour:
But even for want of that for which I am richer,-

A still-soliciting eye, and such a tongue

Lear. Nothing: I have sworn; I am firm.

Bur. I am sorry then, you have so lost a father,

That you must lose a husband.

Cor. Peace be with Burgundy!

Since that respects of fortune are his love,

I shall not be his wife.

[poor;

France. Fairest Cordelia, that art most rich, being
Most choice, forsaken; and most loved, despised!
Thee and thy virtues here I seize upon :
Be it lawful, I take up what's cast away.

Gods, gods! 'tis strange that from their cold'st neglect
My love should kindle to inflamed respect.-
Thy dowerless daughter, king, thrown to my chance,
Is queen of us, of ours, and our fair France:
Not all the dukes of wat'rish Burgundy
Shall buy this unprized precious maid of me.-
Bid them farewell, Cordelia, though unkind:

Thou losest here, a better where to find.

Lear. Thou hast her, France: let her be thine; for we Have no such daughter, nor shall ever see That face of hers again:-therefore begone Without our grace, our love, our benison.Come, noble Burgundy.

[Flourish. Exeunt LEAR, BURGUNDY, CORNWALL, ALBANY, GLOSTER, and Attendants.

France. Bid farewell to your sisters.

Cor. The jewels of our father, with wash'd eyes Cordelia leaves you: I know you what you are;

And, like a sister, am most loath to call

Your faults, as they are named. Use well our father:

To your professed bosoms I commit him:

But yet, alas! stood I within his grace,

I would prefer him to a better place.

So farewell to you both.

Gon. Prescribe not us our duties.

Reg. Let your study

Be to content your lord, who hath received you
At fortune's alms. You have obedience scanted,
And well are worth the want that you have wanted.
Cor. Time shall unfold what plaited cunning hides;
Who cover faults, at last shame them derides.
Well may you prosper!

France. Come, my fair Cordelia.

[Exeunt FRANCE and CORDELIA. Gon. Sister, it is not a little I have to say of what most nearly appertains to us both. I think our father will hence to-night.

Reg. That's most certain, and with you; next month with us.

Gon. You see how full of changes his age is; the observation we have made of it hath not been little: he always loved our sister most, and with what poor judgment he hath now cast her off, appears too grossly. Reg. 'Tis the infirmity of his age: yet he hath ever but slenderly known himself.

Gon. The best and soundest of his time hath been but rash; then must we look to receive from his age not alone the imperfections of long-engrafted condition, but therewithal, the unruly waywardness that infirm and choleric years bring with them.

Reg. Such unconstant starts are we like to have from him, as this of Kent's banishment.

Gon. There is further compliment of leave-taking between France and him. Pray you, let us hit together: if our father carry authority with such dispositions as he bears, this last surrender of his will but offend us. Reg. We shall further think of it.

Gon. We must do something, and i' the heat.

[Exeunt.

SCENE II.-A Hall in the EARL OF GLOSTER's Castle.

Enter EDMUND, with a letter.

Edm. Thou, nature, art my goddess; to thy law My services are bound. Wherefore should I Stand in the plague of custom, and permit

The curiosity of nations to deprive me,

For that I am some twelve or fourteen moonshines
Lag of a brother? Why bastard? wherefore base?
When my dimensions are as well compact,
My mind as generous, and my shape as true,
As honest madam's issue? Why brand they us
With base? with baseness? bastardy? base, base?
Who, in the lusty stealth of nature, take
More composition and fierce quality,
Than doth, within a dull, stale, tirèd bed,
Go to the creating a whole tribe of fops,
Got 'tween asleep and wake?-Well then,
Legitimate Edgar, I must have your land:
Our father's love is to the bastard Edmund,
As to the legitimate: fine word,-legitimate!
Well, my legitimate, if this letter speed,
And my invention thrive, Edmund the base
Shall top the legitimate. I grow; I prosper :—
Now, gods, stand up for bastards!

And France in choler

Enter GLOSTER. Glo. Kent banish'd thus! parted!

And the king gone to-night! subscribed his power!
Confined to exhibition! All this done
Upon the gad!--Edmund, how now? what news?
Edm. So please your lordship, none.

[Putting up the letter. Glo. Why so earnestly seek you to put up that letter? Edm. I know no news, my lord.

Glo. What paper were you reading?
Edm. Nothing, my lord.

Glo. No? What needed then that terrible despatch of it into your pocket? The quality of nothing hath not such need to hide itself. Let's see: come, if it be nothing, I shall not need spectacles.

Edm. I beseech you, Sir, pardon me: it is a letter from my brother, that I have not all o'er-read; for so much as I have perused, I find it not fit for your overlooking.

Glo. Give me the letter, Sir.

Edm. I shall offend, either to detain or give it. The contents, as in part I understand them, are to blame. Glo. Let's see, let's see.

Edm. I hope, for my brother's justification, he wrote this but as an essay or taste of my virtue.

Glo. [Reads.] This policy and reverence of age

makes the world bitter to the best of our times; keeps our fortunes from us, till our oldness cannot relish them. I begin to find an idle and fond bondage in the oppression of aged tyranny, who sways, not as it hath power, but as it is suffered. Come to me, that of this I may speak more. If our father would sleep till I waked him, you should enjoy half his revenue for ever, and live the beloved of your brother, EDGAR."- Humph!- Conspiracy!"Sleep till I waked him,-you should enjoy half his revenue,"-My son Edgar! Had he a hand to write this? a heart and brain to breed it in?-When came this to you? Who brought it?

Edm. It was not brought me, my lord,-there's the cunning of it; I found it thrown in at the casement of my closet.

Glo. You know the character to be your brother's? Edm. If the matter were good, my lord, I durst swear it were his; but, in respect of that, I would fain think it were not.

Glo. It is his.

Edm. It is his hand, my lord; but I hope his heart is not in the contents.

Glo. Hath he never heretofore sounded you in this business?

Edm. Never, my lord: but I have often heard him maintain it to be fit, that, sons at perfect age and fathers declining, the father should be as ward to the son, and the son manage his revenue.

Glo. O villain, villain!-His very opinion in the letter!-Abhorred villain! Unnatural, detested, brutish villain! worse than brutish-Go, sirrah, seek him; I'll apprehend him:-abominable villain!-Where is he?

Edm. I do not well know, my lord. If it shall please you to suspend your indignation against my brother, till you can derive from him better testimony of his intent, you shall run a certain course; where, if you violently proceed against him, mistaking his purpose, it would make a great gap in your own honour, and shake in pieces the heart of his obedience. 1 dare pawn down my life for him, that he hath writ this to feel my affection to your honour, and to no er pretence of danger.

Glo. Think you so?

Edm. If your honour judge it meet, I will place you where you shall hear us confer of this, and by an auricular assurance have your satisfaction; and that without any further delay than this very evening.

Glo. He cannot be such a monster

Edm. Nor is not, sure.

Glo. To his father, that so tenderly and entirely loves him. Heaven and earth!-Edmund, seek him out; wind me into him, I pray you: frame the business after your own wisdom. I would unstate myself, to be in a

due resolution.

Edm. I will seek him, Sir, presently; convey the business as I shall find means, and acquaint you withal. Glo. These late eclipses in the sun and moon portend no good to us: though the wisdom of nature can reason it thus and thus, yet nature finds itself scourged by the sequent effects: love cools, friendship falls off, brothers divide: in cities, mutinies; in countries, discord; in palaces, treason; and the bond cracked between son and father. This villain of mine comes under the prediction; there's son against father: the king falls from bias of nature; there's father against child. We have seen the best of our time: machinations, hollowness, treachery, and all ruinous disorders, follow us disquietly to our graves!-Find out this villain, Edmund; it shall lose thee nothing; do it carefully. And the noble and true-hearted Kent banish'd! his offence, honesty!-Strange! strange! [Exit.

Edm. This is the excellent foppery of the world, that, when we are sick in fortune, (often the surfeit of our own behaviour,) we make guilty of our disasters, the sun, the moon, and the stars: as if we were villains by necessity; fools by heavenly compulsion; knaves, thieves, and treachers, by spherical predominance; drunkards, liars, and adulterers, by an enforced obedience of planetary influence; and all that we are evil in, by a divine thrusting on: an admirable evasion of whoremaster man, to lay his goatish disposition to the charge of a star! My father compounded with my mother under the dragon's tail; and my nativity was under ursa major; so that it follows I am rough and lecherous. Tut, I should have been that I am, had the maidenliest star in the firmament twinkled on my bastardising. Edgar

Enter EDGAR.

and pat he comes, like the catastrophe of the old comedy my cue is villanous melancholy, with a sigh like Tom o' Bedlam.-O, these eclipses do portend these divisions! Fa, sol, la, mi.

Edg. How new, brother Edmund? contemplation are you in?

What serious

Edm. I am thinking, brother, of a prediction I read this other day, what should follow these eclipses. Edg. Do you busy yourself with that?

Edm. I promise you, the effects he writes of succeed unhappily; as of unnaturalness between the child and the parent; death, dearth, dissolutions of ancient amities; divisions in state, menaces and maledictions against king and nobles; needless diffidences, banishment of friends, dissipation of cohorts, nuptial breaches, and I know not what.

Edg. How long have you been a sectary astronomical?
Edm. Come, come; when saw you my father last?
Edg. Why, the night gone by.
Edm. Spake you with him?
Edg. Ay, two hours together.

Edm. Parted you in good terms? Found you no displeasure in him, by word or countenance?

Edg. None at all.

Edm. Bethink yourself wherein you may have offended him and at my entreaty forbear his presence, till some little time hath qualified the heat of his displeasure; which at this instant so rageth in him, that with the mischief of your person it would scarcely allay.

Edg. Some villain hath done me wrong. Edm. That's my fear. I pray you, have a continent forbearance till the speed of his rage goes slower; and, as I say, retire with me to my lodging, from whence I will fitly bring you to hear my lord speak. Pray you, go; there's my key.-If you do stir abroad, go armed. Edg. Armed, brother?

Edm. Brother, I advise you to the best; go armed; I am no honest man, if there be any good meaning towards you: I have told you what I have seen and heard, but faintly; nothing like the image and horror of it. Pray you, away.

Edg. Shall I hear from you anon?

Edm. I do serve you in this business. [Exit EDGAR. A credulous father and a brother noble, Whose nature is so far from doing harms,

[Horns within.

Gon. Put on what weary negligence you please, You and your fellows; I'd have it come to question: If he dislike it, let him to my sister,

Whose mind and mine, I know, in that are one,
Not to be over-ruled. Idle old man,

That still would manage those authorities
That he hath given away!-Now, by my life,
Old fools are babes again; and must be used
With checks, as flatteries,-when they are seen abused.
Remember what I have said.

SCENE IV.-A Hall in the same.

Enter KENT, disguised.
Kent. If but as well I other accents borrow,
That can my speech diffuse, my good intent
May carry through itself to that full issue

For which I razed my likeness.-Now, banish'd Kent,
If thou canst serve where thou dost stand condemn'd,
(So may it come!) thy master, whom thou lov'st,
Shall find thee full of labours.

Horns within. Enter LEAR, Knights, and Attendants.
Lear. Let me not stay a jot for dinner; go, get it
ready. [Exit an Attendant.] How now! what art thou?
Kent. A man, Sir.

Lear. What dost thou profess? What wouldst thou with us?

Kent. I do profess to be no less than I seem; to serve him truly that will put me in trust; to love him that is honest; to converse with him that is wise, and says little; to fear judgment; to fight, when I cannot choose; and to eat no fish.