Page:Hamlet (1917) Yale.djvu/99
Scene Three
[A Room in the Castle]
Enter King, Rosencrantz, and Guildenstern.
King. I like him not, nor stands it safe with us
To let his madness range. Therefore prepare you;
I your commission will forthwith dispatch,
And he to England shall along with you. 4
The terms of our estate may not endure
Hazard so dangerous as doth hourly grow
Out of his lunacies.
Guil. We will ourselves provide.
Most holy and religious fear it is 8
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 13
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 16
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, 20
Each small annexment, petty consequence,
Attends the boisterous ruin. Never alone
Did the king sigh, but with a general groan.
2 range: rove, roam
3 forthwith dispatch: prepare at once
5 terms: condition
8 fear: caution
11 single and peculiar: private individual
13 noyance: harm
14 weal: welfare
15 cease: cessation, euphemism for 'death'
16 gulf: whirlpool
21 annexment: appendage
22 Attends: accompanies