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I do not set my life at a pin's fee;

And, for my soul, what can it do to that,

Being a thing immortal as itself?

It waves me forth again;-I'll follow it.

Hor. What, if it tempt you toward the flood, my lord,

Or to the dreadful summit of the cliff,

That beetles o'er his base into the sea?

And there assume some other horrible form
And draw

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Ghost. So art thou to revenge, when thou shalt hear.
Ham. What?

Ghost. I am thy father's spirit;

Doom'd for a certain term to walk the night,

And, for the day confin'd to fast in fires,

Till the foul crimes, done in my days of nature,

Are burnt and purg'd away. But that I am forbid

To tell the secrets of my prison-house,

I could a tale unfold, whose lightest word

Would harrow up thy soul; freeze thy young

Make thy two eyes, like stars, start from their spheres;

Thy knotted and combined locks to part,

And each particular hair to stand on end,

Like quills upon the fretful porcupine

But this eternal blazon must not be

To

ears of flesh and blood :-List, list,
If thou didst ever thy dear father love,—
Ham. O heaven!

Ghost. Revenge his foul and most unnatural murder.
Ham. Murder?

Ghost. Murder most foul, as in the best it is ;
But this most foul, strange, and unnatural.

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And duller should'st thou be than the fat weed

That rots itself in ease on Lethe wharf,

Would'st thou not stir in this. Now, Hamlet, hear:
'Tis 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 abus'd: but know, thou noble youth,
The serpent that did sting thy father's life,
Now wears his crown.

Ham. O, my prophetic soul! my uncle!
Ghost. Ay,-

With witchcraft of his wit, with traitorous gifts,
He won to his shameful love

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, soft! methinks, I scent the morning air;
Brief let me be :-Sleeping within mine orchard,
My custom always of the afternoon,
Upon my secure hour thy uncle stole,
With juice of cursed hebenon in a vial,
And in the porches of mine ears did pour
The leperous distilment; whose effect
Holds such an enmity with blood of man,
That, swift as quicksilver, it courses through
The natural gates and alleys of the body;
And, with a sudden vigor, it doth posset
And curd, like eager droppings into milk,
The thin and wholesome blood : so did it mine;
Thus was I, sleeping, by a brother's hand,
Of life, of crown, of queen, at once dispatch'd:
Cut off even in the blossoms of my sin,
No reckoning made, but sent to my account
With all my imperfections on my head.

Ham. O, horrible! O, horrible! most horrible!
Ghost. If thou hast nature in thee, bear it not;

But, howsoever thou pursu'st this act,
Taint not thy mind, nor let thy soul contrive
Against thy mother aught; leave her to heaven,

And to those thorne that in how L

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You will reveal it.

But you'll be secret,

Hor. Mar.

Ham. There's ne'er a villain, dwelling

But he's an arrant knave.

To tell us this.

Why, right; you are in the right:

And so, without more circumstance at all,

hold it fit that we shake hands, and part :

ou, as your business, and desire, shall point you ;—

or every man hath business, and desire,

uch as it is, and for my own poor part,

ook you, I will go pray.

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