There are more things in heaven and earth, Horatio,
Than are dreamt of in your philosophy. But come,
170
Here, as before, never, so help you mercy,
How strange or odd soe'er I bear myself
(As I perchance hereafter shall think meet
To put an antic disposition on),
That you, at such times seeing me, never shall—
175
With arms encumbered thus, or this headshake,
Or by pronouncing of some doubtful phrase,
As “Well, well, we know,” or “We
could an if we would,”
Or “If we list to speak,” or
“There be an if they might,”
Or such ambiguous giving out—to note
180
That you know aught of me. This not to do,
So grace and mercy at your most need help you,
Swear.
HAMLET
Then give it a nice welcome, as you would give to any stranger.
There are more things in heaven and earth, Horatio, than
you've even dreamed of. But now listen to me. No matter
how strangely I act (since I may find it appropriate to act a little
crazy in the near future), you must never, ever let
on—with a gesture of your hands or a certain expression
on your face—that you know anything about what happened
to me here tonight. You must never say anything like,
“Ah, yes, just as we suspected,” or
“We could tell you a thing or two about him,”
or anything like that. Swear you won't.
GHOST
(beneath) Swear!
GHOST
(from under the stage)
Swear.
HAMLET
Rest, rest, perturbèd spirit!—So, gentlemen,
185
With all my love I do commend me to you,
And what so poor a man as Hamlet is
May do, to express his love and friending to you,
God willing, shall not lack. Let us go in together,
And still your fingers on your lips, I pray.
190
The time is out of joint. O cursèd spite,
That ever I was born to set it right!
Nay, come, let's go together.
HAMLET
Okay, then, unhappy ghost, you can rest now. So, gentlemen, I
thank you heartily and with all my love, and I'll repay
you however I can some day. Let's go back to court
together, but shhh, please. No
talking about this. There is so much out of whack in these times.
And damn the fact that I'm supposed to fix it! Come on,
let's go.
