"Though yet of Hamlet our dear brother's death, The memory be green, and that it us befitted To bear our hearts in grief and our whole kingdom To be contracted in one brow of woe."

"Therefore our sometime sister, now our Queen. Th' imperial jointress to this warlike state, Have we, as 'twere with a defeated joy, With an auspicious and a dropping eye, With mirth in funeral, and with dirge in marriage, In equal scale weighing delight and dole, Taken to wife."

"The head is not more native to the heart, The hand no more instrumental to the mouth, Than is the throne of Denmark to thy father. What wouldst thou have, Laertes?"

"He hath, my lord, wrung from me my slow leave By laboursome petition, and at last Upon his will, I sealed my hard consent."

"Claudius: But now, my cousin Hamlet, and my son,— Hamlet: [Aside] A little more than kin, and less than kind. Claudius: How is it that the clouds still hang on you? Hamlet: Not so, my lord; I am too much i' the sun."

"Good Hamlet, cast thy nighted color off, And let thine eye look like a friend on Denmark. Do not be forever with thy vailed lids Seek for thy noble father in the dust: Thou know'st tis common; all that lives must die, Passing through nature to eternity."

"Seems, madam! Nay, it is; I know not 'seems.'"

"'Tis not alone my inky cloak, good mother, Nor customary suits of solemn black, Nor windy suspiration of forced breath, No, nor the fruitful river in the eye, Nor the dejected havior of the visage, Together with all forms, moods, shapes of grief, That can denote me truly: these indeed seem, For they are actions that a man might play: But I have that within which passeth show; These but the trappings and the suits of woe."

"O! that this too too solid flesh would melt, Thaw and resolve itself into a dew;"

"How weary, stale, flat, and unprofitable Seem to me all the uses of this world."

"Frailty, thy name is woman!"

"O, God! a beast, that wants discourse of reason, Would have mourned longer----married with my uncle, My father's brother."

"But break, my heart, for I must hold my tongue!"

"O, that this too too solid flesh would melt Thaw and resolve itself into a dew! Or that the Everlasting had not fix'd His canon 'gainst self-slaughter! O God! God! How weary, stale, flat and unprofitable, Seem to me all the uses of this world! Fie on't! ah fie! 'tis an unweeded garden, That grows to seed; things rank and gross in nature Possess it merely. That it should come to this! But two months dead: nay, not so much, not two: So excellent a king; that was, to this, Hyperion to a satyr; so loving to my mother That he might not beteem the winds of heaven Visit her face too roughly. Heaven and earth! Must I remember? why, she would hang on him, As if increase of appetite had grown By what it fed on: and yet, within a month ---- Let me not think on't ---- Frailty, thy name is woman! ---- A little month, or ere those shoes were old With which she follow'd my poor father's body, Like Niobe, all tears:----why she, even she---- O, God! a beast, that wants discourse of reason, Would have mourn'd longer----married with my uncle, My father's brother, but no more like my father Than I to Hercules: within a month: Ere yet the salt of most unrighteous tears Had left the flushing in her galled eyes, She married. O, most wicked speed, to post With such dexterity to incestuous sheets! It is not nor it cannot come to good: But break, my heart; for I must hold my tongue."

"Thrift, thrift, Horatio! the funeral bak'd meats Did coldly furnish forth the marriage tables. Would I had met my dearest foe in heaven Or ever I had seen that day, Horatio!"

"In my mind's eye, Horatio."

"He was a man, take him for all in all, I shall not look upon his like again."

"A countenance more in sorrow than in anger."

"If it assume my noble father's person, I'll speak to it though Hell itself should gape And bid me hold my peace."

"Give it an understanding, but no tongue."

"My father's spirit in arms! all is not well; I doubt some foul play: would the night were come! Till then sit still, my soul: foul deeds will rise, Though all the earth o'erwhelm them, to men's eyes."

"For Hamlet, and the trifling of his favour, 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; No more."

"Do not, as some ungracious pastors do, Show me the steep and thorny way to heaven, Whiles, like a puff'd and reckless libertine, Himself the primrose path of dalliance treads, And recks not his own rede."

"Be thou familiar, but by no means vulgar."

"Give every man thy ear, but few thy voice; Take each man's censure, but reserve thy judgment."

"Costly thy habit as thy purse can buy, But not express'd in fancy; rich, not gaudy; For the apparel oft proclaims the man,"

"Neither a borrower nor a lender be; For loan oft loses both itself and friend,"

"This above all: to thine own self be true, And it must follow, as the night the day, Thou canst not then be false to any man."

"But to my mind, — though I am native here And to the manner born, — it is a custom More honour'd in the breach than the observance."

"Why, what should be the fear? 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?"

"Something is rotten in the state of Denmark."

"My hour is almost come, When I to sulphurous and tormenting flames Must render up myself."

"And each particular hair to stand on end, Like quills upon the fretful porpentine:"

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

"The serpent that did sting thy father's life Now wears his crown."

"Cut off even in the blossoms of my sin."

"O horrible, O horrible! most horrible!"

"O most pernicious woman! O, villain, villain, smiling, damned villain! My tables, — meet it is I set it down, That one may smile, and smile, and be a villain."

"There are more things in heaven and earth, Horatio, Than are dreamt of in your philosophy."

"How strange or odd soe'er I bear myself — As I perchance hereafter shall think meet To put an antic disposition on."

"The time is out of joint; O cursed spite, That ever I was born to set it right!"

"Therefore, since brevity is the soul of wit, And tediousness the limbs and outward flourishes, I will be brief."

"More matter with less art."

"That he is mad, 'tis true; 'tis true 'tis pity; And pity 'tis 'tis true: a foolish figure; But farewell it, for I will use no art."

"Doubt thou the stars are fire; Doubt that the sun doth move; Doubt truth to be a liar; But never doubt I love."

"Polonius: Do you know me, my lord? Hamlet: Excellent well; you're a fishmonger. Polonius: Not I, my lord. Hamlet Then I would you were so honest a man. Polonius: Honest, my lord! Hamlet: Ay, sir; to be honest, as this world goes, is to be one man picked out of ten thousand. Polonius: That's very true, my lord. Hamlet: [Reads] For if the sun breed maggots in a dead dog, being a god kissing carrion, — Have you a daughter? Polonius: I have, my lord. Hamlet: Let her not walk i' the sun: conception is a blessing: but not as your daughter may conceive; — friend, look to 't. Polonius: [Aside] How say you by that? Still harping on my daughter: — yet he knew me not at first; he said I was a fishmonger: he is far gone, far gone: and truly in my youth I suffered much extremity for love; very near this."

"Polonius: What do you read, my lord? Hamlet: Words, words, words."

"Polonius: [Aside] Though this be madness, yet there is method in 't. — Will you walk out of the air, my lord? Hamlet: Into my grave."

"Polonius: My honored lord, I will most humbly take my leave of you. Hamlet: You cannot, sir, take from me anything that I will more willingly part withal — except my life — except my life — except my life."