Original Text |
Translated Text |
| Source: Folger Shakespeare Library |
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Enter Laertes and Ophelia, his sister. LAERTES
My necessaries are embarked. Farewell.
And, sister, as the winds give benefit
And convey is assistant, do not sleep,
But let me hear from you. OPHELIA Do you doubt that? 5 LAERTES
For Hamlet, and the trifling of his favor,
Hold it a fashion and a toy in blood,
A violet in the youth of primy nature,
Forward, not permanent, sweet, not lasting,
The perfume and suppliance of a minute, 10
No more. OPHELIA No more but so? | Laertes, a young lord about to depart for Paris, has some dear parting words with his sister, Ophelia. He tells her she shouldn't take any of Hamlet's flirting seriously. Come again? says Ophelia. |
LAERTES Think it no more.
For nature, crescent, does not grow alone
In thews and bulk, but, as this temple waxes, 15
The inward service of the mind and soul
Grows wide withal. Perhaps he loves you now,
And now no soil nor cautel doth besmirch
The virtue of his will; but you must fear,
His greatness weighed, his will is not his own, 20
For he himself is subject to his birth.
He may not, as unvalued persons do,
Carve for himself, for on his choice depends
The safety and the health of this whole state.
And therefore must his choice be circumscribed 25
Unto the voice and yielding of that body
Whereof he is the head. Then, if he says he loves
you,
It fits your wisdom so far to believe it
As he in his particular act and place 30
May give his saying deed, which is no further
Than the main voice of Denmark goes withal.
Then weigh what loss your honor may sustain
If with too credent ear you list his songs
Or lose your heart or your chaste treasure open 35
To his unmastered importunity.
Fear it, Ophelia; fear it, my dear sister,
And keep you in the rear of your affection,
Out of the shot and danger of desire.
The chariest maid is prodigal enough 40
If she unmask her beauty to the moon.
Virtue itself ’scapes not calumnious strokes.
The canker galls the infants of the spring
Too oft before their buttons be disclosed,
And, in the morn and liquid dew of youth, 45
Contagious blastments are most imminent.
Be wary, then; best safety lies in fear.
Youth to itself rebels, though none else near. | Laertes says that because Hamlet is way above her (in the social status way), he might have to marry someone else for the sake of the state. So, Ophelia needs to make sure she doesn't let Hamlet take advantage of her. He warns her that if she has sex with Hamlet, she'll be damaged goods. |
OPHELIA
I shall the effect of this good lesson keep
As watchman to my heart. But, good my brother, 50
Do not, as some ungracious pastors do,
Show me the steep and thorny way to heaven,
Whiles, like a puffed and reckless libertine,
Himself the primrose path of dalliance treads
And recks not his own rede. 55 LAERTES O, fear me not. Enter Polonius. I stay too long. But here my father comes.
A double blessing is a double grace.
Occasion smiles upon a second leave. | Ophelia thanks her brother for the talk, but she also tells him he better not be a hypocrite, like so many people who are quick to give advice to others. If he's telling her not to sleep around outside of marriage, he'd better be holding himself to the same standard. |
POLONIUS
Yet here, Laertes? Aboard, aboard, for shame! 60
The wind sits in the shoulder of your sail,
And you are stayed for. There, my blessing with
thee.
And these few precepts in thy memory
Look thou character. Give thy thoughts no tongue, 65
Nor any unproportioned thought his act.
Be thou familiar, but by no means vulgar.
Those friends thou hast, and their adoption tried,
Grapple them unto thy soul with hoops of steel,
But do not dull thy palm with entertainment 70
Of each new-hatched, unfledged courage. Beware
Of entrance to a quarrel, but, being in,
Bear ’t that th’ opposèd may beware of thee.
Give every man thy ear, but few thy voice.
Take each man’s censure, but reserve thy judgment. 75
Costly thy habit as thy purse can buy,
But not expressed in fancy (rich, not gaudy),
For the apparel oft proclaims the man,
And they in France of the best rank and station
Are of a most select and generous chief in that. 80
Neither a borrower nor a lender be,
For loan oft loses both itself and friend,
And borrowing dulls the edge of husbandry.
This above all: to thine own self be true,
And it must follow, as the night the day, 85
Thou canst not then be false to any man.
Farewell. My blessing season this in thee. LAERTES
Most humbly do I take my leave, my lord. POLONIUS
The time invests you. Go, your servants tend. LAERTES
Farewell, Ophelia, and remember well 90
What I have said to you. OPHELIA ’Tis in my memory locked,
And you yourself shall keep the key of it. LAERTES Farewell. Laertes exits. | Their dad, Polonius, enters and gives his son a lot of life advice. Mainly, he says Laertes should: listen more than he talks; not borrow or lend money; not bling himself out; and, most famously, be true to himself above all else. It's actually really good advice, if a bit long-winded. |
POLONIUS
What is ’t, Ophelia, he hath said to you? 95 OPHELIA
So please you, something touching the Lord
Hamlet. POLONIUS Marry, well bethought.
’Tis told me he hath very oft of late
Given private time to you, and you yourself 100
Have of your audience been most free and
bounteous.
If it be so (as so ’tis put on me,
And that in way of caution), I must tell you
You do not understand yourself so clearly 105
As it behooves my daughter and your honor.
What is between you? Give me up the truth. | After Laertes leaves, Polonius asks Ophelia what her brother said to her. She says it was about Hamlet, and Polonius asks her what's up with her and Hamlet anyway. It seems like Hamlet's been paying a lot of attention to her lately. |
OPHELIA
He hath, my lord, of late made many tenders
Of his affection to me. POLONIUS
Affection, puh! You speak like a green girl 110
Unsifted in such perilous circumstance.
Do you believe his “tenders,” as you call them? OPHELIA
I do not know, my lord, what I should think. POLONIUS
Marry, I will teach you. Think yourself a baby
That you have ta’en these tenders for true pay, 115
Which are not sterling. Tender yourself more dearly,
Or (not to crack the wind of the poor phrase,
Running it thus) you’ll tender me a fool. OPHELIA
My lord, he hath importuned me with love
In honorable fashion— 120 POLONIUS
Ay, “fashion” you may call it. Go to, go to! OPHELIA
And hath given countenance to his speech, my lord,
With almost all the holy vows of heaven. | Ophelia admits that Hamlet has been spending a lot of time with her. He's written her love letters and made some pretty serious promises, too. |
POLONIUS
Ay, springes to catch woodcocks. I do know,
When the blood burns, how prodigal the soul 125
Lends the tongue vows. These blazes, daughter,
Giving more light than heat, extinct in both
Even in their promise as it is a-making,
You must not take for fire. From this time
Be something scanter of your maiden presence. 130
Set your entreatments at a higher rate
Than a command to parle. For Lord Hamlet,
Believe so much in him that he is young,
And with a larger tether may he walk
Than may be given you. In few, Ophelia, 135
Do not believe his vows, for they are brokers,
Not of that dye which their investments show,
But mere implorators of unholy suits,
Breathing like sanctified and pious bawds
The better to beguile. This is for all: 140
I would not, in plain terms, from this time forth
Have you so slander any moment leisure
As to give words or talk with the Lord Hamlet.
Look to ’t, I charge you. Come your ways. OPHELIA I shall obey, my lord. 145 They exit. | Polonius doesn't beat around the bush. He tells his daughter that Hamlet only wants to sleep with her. He also says she's an idiot if she actually believes any of Hamlet's lines. Polonius orders his daughter to stop seeing Hamelt, and Ophelia agrees to obey her father's wishes. |