William Shakespeare - Sämtliche Werke von Shakespeare in einem Band - Zweisprachige Ausgabe (Deutsch-Englisch)

To let his madness range. Therefore prepare you;

I your commission will forthwith dispatch,

And he to England shall along with you:

The terms of our estate may not endure

Hazard so near us as doth hourly grow

Out of his lunacies.

GUIL.

We will ourselves provide:

Most holy and religious fear it is

To keep those many many bodies safe

That live and feed upon your majesty.

ROS.

The single and peculiar life is bound,

With all the strength and armour of the mind,

To keep itself from ‘noyance; but much more

That spirit upon whose weal depend and rest

The lives of many. The cease of majesty

Dies not alone; but like a gulf doth draw

What’s near it with it: it is a massy wheel,

Fix’d on the summit of the highest mount,

To whose huge spokes ten thousand lesser things

Are mortis’d and adjoin’d; which, when it falls,

Each small annexment, petty consequence,

Attends the boisterous ruin. Never alone

Did the king sigh, but with a general groan.

KING.

Arm you, I pray you, to this speedy voyage;

For we will fetters put upon this fear,

Which now goes too free-footed.

ROS and GUIL.

We will haste us.

[Exeunt Ros. and Guil.]

[Enter Polonius.]

POL.

My lord, he’s going to his mother’s closet:

Behind the arras I’ll convey myself

To hear the process; I’ll warrant she’ll tax him home:

And, as you said, and wisely was it said,

‘Tis meet that some more audience than a mother,

Since nature makes them partial, should o’erhear

The speech, of vantage. Fare you well, my liege:

I’ll call upon you ere you go to bed,

And tell you what I know.

KING.

Thanks, dear my lord.

[Exit Polonius.]

O, my offence is rank, it smells to heaven;

It hath the primal eldest curse upon’t,—

A brother’s murder!—Pray can I not,

Though inclination be as sharp as will:

My stronger guilt defeats my strong intent;

And, like a man to double business bound,

I stand in pause where I shall first begin,

And both neglect. What if this cursed hand

Were thicker than itself with brother’s blood,—

Is there not rain enough in the sweet heavens

To wash it white as snow? Whereto serves mercy

But to confront the visage of offence?

And what’s in prayer but this twofold force,—

To be forestalled ere we come to fall,

Or pardon’d being down? Then I’ll look up;

My fault is past. But, O, what form of prayer

Can serve my turn? Forgive me my foul murder!—

That cannot be; since I am still possess’d

Of those effects for which I did the murder,—

My crown, mine own ambition, and my QUEEN.

May one be pardon’d and retain the offence?

In the corrupted currents of this world

Offence’s gilded hand may shove by justice;

And oft ‘tis seen the wicked prize itself

Buys out the law; but ‘tis not so above;

There is no shuffling;—there the action lies

In his true nature; and we ourselves compell’d,

Even to the teeth and forehead of our faults,

To give in evidence. What then? what rests?

Try what repentance can: what can it not?

Yet what can it when one cannot repent?

O wretched state! O bosom black as death!

O limed soul, that, struggling to be free,

Art more engag’d! Help, angels! Make assay:

Bow, stubborn knees; and, heart, with strings of steel,

Be soft as sinews of the newborn babe!

All may be well.

[Retires and kneels.]

[Enter Hamlet.]

HAM.

Now might I do it pat, now he is praying;

And now I’ll do’t;—and so he goes to heaven;

And so am I reveng’d.—that would be scann’d:

A villain kills my father; and for that,

I, his sole son, do this same villain send

To heaven.

O, this is hire and salary, not revenge.

He took my father grossly, full of bread;

With all his crimes broad blown, as flush as May;

And how his audit stands, who knows save heaven?

But in our circumstance and course of thought,

‘Tis heavy with him: and am I, then, reveng’d,

To take him in the purging of his soul,

When he is fit and season’d for his passage?

No.

Up, sword, and know thou a more horrid hent:

When he is drunk asleep; or in his rage;

Or in the incestuous pleasure of his bed;

At gaming, swearing; or about some act

That has no relish of salvation in’t;—

Then trip him, that his heels may kick at heaven;

And that his soul may be as damn’d and black

As hell, whereto it goes. My mother stays:

This physic but prolongs thy sickly days.

[Exit.]

[The King rises and advances.]

KING.

My words fly up, my thoughts remain below:

Words without thoughts never to heaven go.

[Exit.]

German

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Another room in the castle.

[Enter Queen and Polonius.]

POL.

He will come straight. Look you lay home to him:

Tell him his pranks have been too broad to bear with,

And that your grace hath screen’d and stood between

Much heat and him. I’ll silence me e’en here.

Pray you, be round with him.

HAM.

[Within.] Mother, mother, mother!

QUEEN.

I’ll warrant you:

Fear me not:—withdraw; I hear him coming.

[Polonius goes behind the arras.]

[Enter Hamlet.]

HAM.

Now, mother, what’s the matter?

QUEEN.

Hamlet, thou hast thy father much offended.

HAM.

Mother, you have my father much offended.

QUEEN.

Come, come, you answer with an idle tongue.

HAM.

Go, go, you question with a wicked tongue.

QUEEN.

Why, how now, Hamlet!

HAM.

What’s the matter now?

QUEEN.

Have you forgot me?

HAM.

No, by the rood, not so:

You are the Queen, your husband’s brother’s wife,

And,—would it were not so!—you are my mother.

QUEEN.

Nay, then, I’ll set those to you that can speak.

HAM.

Come, come, and sit you down; you shall not budge;

You go not till I set you up a glass

Where you may see the inmost part of you.

QUEEN.

What wilt thou do? thou wilt not murder me?—

Help, help, ho!

POL.

[Behind.] What, ho! help, help, help!

HAM.

How now? a rat? [Draws.]

Dead for a ducat, dead!

[Makes a pass through the arras.]

POL.

[Behind.] O, I am slain!

[Falls and dies.]

QUEEN.

O me, what hast thou done?

HAM.

Nay, I know not: is it the king?

[Draws forth Polonius.]

QUEEN.

O, what a rash and bloody deed is this!

HAM.

A bloody deed!—almost as bad, good mother,

As kill a king and marry with his brother.

QUEEN.

As kill a king!

HAM.

Ay, lady, ‘twas my word.—

Thou wretched, rash, intruding fool, farewell!

[To Polonius.]

I took thee for thy better: take thy fortune;

Thou find’st to be too busy is some danger.—

Leave wringing of your hands: peace! sit you down,

And let me wring your heart: for so I shall,

If it be made of penetrable stuff;

If damned custom have not braz’d it so

That it is proof and bulwark against sense.

QUEEN.

What have I done, that thou dar’st wag thy tongue

In noise so rude against me?

HAM.

Such an act

That blurs the grace and blush of modesty;

Calls virtue hypocrite; takes off the rose

From the fair forehead of an innocent love,

And sets a blister there; makes marriage-vows