GHOST

Mark me. My hour is almost come, When I to sulphurous and tormenting Flames Must render up my self. Pity me not, but lend thy serious hearing To what I shall unfold. So art thou to revenge, when thou shalt hear. I am thy Father's Spirit, Doomed for a certain term to walk the night; And for the day confined to fast in Fierce, Till the foul crimes done in my days of Nature Are burned and purged away? But that I am forbid To tell the secrets of my Prisonhouse; I could a Tale unfold, whose lightest word Would harrow up thy soul; freeze thy young blood, Make thy two eyes Like Stars, start from their Spheres, Thy knotty and combined locks to partly, And each particular hair to stand and end, Like Quills upon the fretful Porpentine: But this eternal blazon must not be To ears of flesh and blood; lift Hamlet, o lift, If thou didst ever thy deer Father love. Revenge his foul and most unnatural Murder. Swear. Swear. Swear. Murder most foul, as in the best it is; But this most foul strange, and unnatural. I find thee apt, And duller shouldst thou be then the fat weed That rots it self in ease, on Lethe Wharf, Wouldst thou not stir in this. Now Hamlet hear: It's given out, that sleeping in mine Orchard, A Serpent stung me: so the whole ear of Denmark, Is by a forged process of my death Rankly abused: But know thou Noble youth, The Serpent that did sting thy Father's life, Now wears his Crown. I that incestuous, that adulterate Beast With witchcraft of his wits, hath Traitorous gifts. O wicked Wit, and Gifts, that have the power So to seduce? Wone to to this shameful Lust The will of my most seeming virtuous Queen: O Hamlet, what a falling off was there, 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 to decline Upon a wretch, whose Natural gifts were poor To those of mine, But Virtue, as it never will be moved, Though Lewdness court it in a shape of Heaven: So Lust, though to a radiant Angel linked, Will sat it self in a Celestiallbed, & prey on Garbage. But soft, me thinks I sent the Morning's Air; Brief let me be: Sleeping within mine Orchard, My custom always in the afternoon; Upon my secure hour thy Uncle stole With juice of cursed Hebenon in a Viol, And in the Porches of mine ears did pour The leaperous Distilment; whose effect Holds such and enmity with blood of Man, That swift as Quicksilver, it courses through The natural Gates and Allies of the Body; And with a sudden vigour it does posset And curd, Like Aygre droppings into Milk, The thin and wholesome blood: so did it mine; And a most instant Tetter baked about. Most Lazar-like, with vile and loathsome crust, All my smooth Body. Thus was I, sleeping, by a Brother's hand, Of Life, of Crown, and Queen at once dispatched; Cut off even in the Blossoms of my Sin, Vnhouzzled, disappointed, vnnaneld, No reckoning made, but sent to my account With all my imperfections on my head; O horrible, O horrible, most horrible: If thou hast nature in thee bear it not; Let not the Royal Bed of Denmark be A Couch for Luxury and damned Incest. But howsoever thou pursuest this Act, Taint not thy mind; nor let thy Soul contrive Against thy Mother ought; leave her to heaven, And to those Thorns that in her bosom lodge, To prick and sting her. Fare thee well at once; The Glowworm shows the Matine to be near, And begins to pale his uneffectual Fire: Adue, adue, Hamlet: remember me. Swear. Do not forget: this Visitation Is but to whet thy almost blunted purpose. But look Amazement on thy Mother fits; Oh step between her, and her fighting Soul, Conceit in weakest bodies, strongest works. Speak to her Hamlet.