Some Remarks on the Tragedy of Hamlet, Prince of Denmark, Written by Mr. William Shakespeare (1736)

ACT III.

Page 284.

_How smart a Lash, that Speech doth give my Con­science_, &c.

The Po­et here is great­ly to be com­mend­ed for his Con­duct. As con­sum­mate a Vil­lain as this King of _Den­mark_ is rep­re­sent­ed to be, yet we find him stung with the deep­est Re­morse, up­on the least Sen­tence that can any ways be sup­posed to re­late to his Crime. How In­struc­tive this is to the Au­di­ence, how much it an­swers the End of all pub­lick Rep­re­sen­ta­tions by in­cul­cat­ing a good Moral, I leave to the Con­sid­er­ation of ev­ery Read­er.

Ham­let's Con­ver­sa­tion with _Ophe­lia_, we may ob­serve, is in the Style of Mad­ness; and it was prop­er that the Prince should con­ceal his De­sign from ev­ery one, which had he con­versed with his Mis­tress in his nat­ural Style could not have been.

I am per­swad­ed, that our Au­thor was pleas'd to have an Op­por­tu­ni­ty of rais­ing a Laugh now and then, which he does in sev­er­al Pas­sages of _Ham­let's_ satir­ical Re­flec­tions on Wom­en; but I have the same Ob­jec­tions to this Part of the Prince's Mad­ness, that I have be­fore men­tioned, viz. that it wants Dig­ni­ty. _Ophe­lia's_ melan­choly Re­flec­tions up­on _Ham­let's_ hav­ing lost his Sovereign­ty of Rea­son, is nat­ural and very beau­ti­ful. As to the King's send­ing him to _Eng­land_, See Mr. _Theobald's_ Note. I pur­pose­ly omit tak­ing No­tice of the fa­mous Speech, _To be, or not to be_, &c. ev­ery _En­glish_ Read­er knows its Beau­ties.

The Prince's Di­rec­tions to the Play­ers are ex­ceed­ing good, and are ev­ident­ly brought in as Lessons for the Play­ers, who were _Shake­speare's_ Com­pan­ions, and he thought this a very prop­er Oc­ca­sion to an­imad­vert up­on those Faults which were dis­agree­able to him. Who­ev­er reads these Ob­ser­va­tions of his, if one may prove a Thing by a neg­ative Ar­gu­ment, must be­lieve _Shake­speare_ to have been an ex­cel­lent Ac­tor him­self; for we can hard­ly imag­ine him to have been guilty of the Mis­takes he is point­ing out to his Brethren.

Notwith­stand­ing all this, and that the Op­por­tu­ni­ty seems nat­ural enough to in­tro­duce these Re­marks, yet I can­not think them agree­able in such a Piece as this; they are not suit­able to the Dig­ni­ty of the Whole, and would be bet­ter plac'd in a Com­edy.

Page 292, Act 3d.

Ham­let's Ex­pres­sion of his Friend­ship for _Ho­ra­tio_, has great Beau­ties; it is with Sim­plic­ity and Strength, and the Dic­tion has all the Graces of Po­et­ry. It was well ima­gin'd, that he should let his Friend know the Se­cret of his Fa­ther's Mur­der, be­cause, thus his Re­quest to him, to ob­serve the King's Be­haviour at the Play, is very nat­ural­ly in­tro­duc'd as a pru­dent De­sire of the Prince's. The Friend­ship of _Eneas_ for _Achates_ in the _Eneid_, is found Fault with much for the same Rea­sons that some Cr­it­icks might carp at this of _Ham­let's_ for _Ho­ra­tio_, viz. that nei­ther of them are found to per­form any great Acts of Friend­ship to their re­spec­tive Friends. But, I think, that the Friend­ship of _Ham­let_ and _Ho­ra­tio_ is far su­pe­ri­or to that of _Eneas_ and _Achates_, as ap­pears in the last Scene, where _Ho­ra­tio's_ Be­haviour is ex­ceed­ing Ten­der, and his Af­fec­tion for the Prince like­ly to prove very use­ful to his Mem­ory.

Ham­let's whole Con­duct, dur­ing the Play which is act­ed be­fore the King, has, in my Opin­ion, too much Lev­ity in it. His Mad­ness is of too light a Kind, al­though I know he says, he must be idle; but among oth­er Things, his Pun to _Polo­nius_ is not tol­er­able. I might al­so just­ly find Fault with the want of De­cen­cy in his Dis­cours­es to _Ophe­lia_, with­out be­ing thought too se­vere. The Scene rep­re­sent­ed by the Play­ers is in wretched Verse. This we may, with­out in­cur­ring the De­nom­ina­tion of an ill-​natur'd Cr­it­ick, ven­ture to pro­nounce, that in al­most ev­ery Place where _Shake­speare_ has at­tempt­ed Rhime, ei­ther in the Body of his Plays, or at the Ends of Acts or Scenes, he falls far short of the Beau­ty and Force of his Blank Verse: One would think they were writ­ten by two dif­fer­ent Per­sons. I be­lieve we may just­ly take No­tice, that Rhime nev­er ar­rived at its true Beau­ty, nev­er came to its Per­fec­tion in _Eng­land_, un­til long since _Shake­speare's_ Time.

The King's ris­ing with such Pre­cip­ita­tion, and quit­ting the Play up­on see­ing the Re­sem­blance of his own foul Crime, is very much in Na­ture, and con­firms the Pen­etra­tion of our Au­thor's Hero.

Page 302.

Ham­let's Pleas­antry up­on his be­ing cer­ti­fied that his Un­cle is Guilty, is not a-​pro­pos in my Opin­ion. We are to take No­tice that the Po­et has mix'd a Vein of Hu­mour in the Prince's Char­ac­ter, which is to be seen in many Places of this Play. What was his Rea­son for so do­ing, I can­not say, un­less it was to fol­low his Favourite _Foible_, viz. that of rais­ing a Laugh.

Page 306.

The Prince's Res­olu­tion up­on his go­ing to his Moth­er, is beau­ti­ful­ly ex­press'd, and suit­able to his Char­ac­ter.

Page 306, 307.

What _Ros­in­crantz_ says of the Im­por­tance of the King's Life, is ex­press'd by a very just Im­age.

Page 307.

The King's seem­ing so very much touch'd with a Sense of his Crime, is sup­posed to be ow­ing to the Rep­re­sen­ta­tion he had been present at; but I do not well see how _Ham­let_ is in­tro­duced so as to find him at Prayers. It is not nat­ural, that a King's Pri­va­cy should be so in­trud­ed on, not even by any of his Fam­ily, es­pe­cial­ly, that it should be done with­out his per­ceiv­ing it.

Page 309.

Ham­let's Speech up­on see­ing the King at Prayers, has al­ways giv­en me great Of­fence. There is some­thing so very Bloody in it, so in­hu­man, so un­wor­thy of a Hero, that I wish our Po­et had omit­ted it. To de­sire to de­stroy a Man's Soul, to make him eter­nal­ly mis­er­able, by cut­ting him off from all hopes of Re­pen­tance; this sure­ly, in a Chris­tian Prince, is such a Piece of Re­venge, as no Ten­der­ness for any Par­ent can jus­ti­fy. To put the Usurp­er to Death, to de­prive him of the Fruits of his vile Crime, and to res­cue the Throne of _Den­mark_ from Pol­lu­tion, was high­ly req­ui­site: But there our young Prince's De­sires should have stop'd, nor should he have wished to pur­sue the Crim­inal in the oth­er World, but rather have hoped for his Con­ver­sion, be­fore his putting him to Death; for even with his Re­pen­tance, there was at least Pur­ga­to­ry for him to pass through, as we find even in a vir­tu­ous Prince, the Fa­ther of _Ham­let_.

Page 310.

_En­ter the Queen and_ Polo­nius, _and af­ter­wards_ Ham­let.

We are now come to a Scene, which I have al­ways much ad­mired. I can­not think it pos­si­ble, that such an In­ci­dent could have been man­aged bet­ter, nor more con­formably to Rea­son and Na­ture. The Prince, con­scious of his own good In­ten­tions, and the Just­ness of the Cause he un­der­takes to plead, speaks with that Force and As­sur­ance which Virtue al­ways gives; and yet man­ages his Ex­pres­sions so as not to treat his Moth­er in a dis­re­spect­ful Man­ner. What can be ex­pressed with more Beau­ty and more Dig­ni­ty, than the Dif­fer­ence be­tween his Un­cle and Fa­ther! The Con­trast in the De­scrip­tion of them both, is exquisite­ly fine: And his in­forc­ing the Heinous­ness of his Moth­er's Crime with so much Ve­he­mence, and her guilty half Con­fes­sions of her Wicked­ness, and at last her thor­ough Re­morse, are all Strokes from the Hand of a great Mas­ter in the Im­ita­tion of Na­ture.

His be­ing obliged to break off his Dis­course by the com­ing in of his Fa­ther's Ghost once more, adds a cer­tain Weight and Grav­ity to this Scene, which works up in the Minds of the Au­di­ence all the Pas­sions which do the great­est Hon­our to hu­man Na­ture. Add to this, the au­gust and solemn Man­ner with which the Prince ad­dress­es the Spec­tre af­ter his In­vo­ca­tion of the Ce­les­tial Min­is­ters.

The Ghost's not be­ing seen by the Queen, was very prop­er; for we could hard­ly sup­pose, that a Wom­an, and a guilty one es­pe­cial­ly, could be able to bear so ter­ri­ble a Sight with­out the Loss of her Rea­son. Be­sides that, I be­lieve, the Po­et had al­so some Eye to a vul­gar No­tion, that Spir­its are on­ly seen by those with whom their Busi­ness is, let there be nev­er so many Per­sons in Com­pa­ny. This Com­pli­ance with these pop­ular Fan­cies, still gives an Air of Prob­abil­ity to the Whole. The Prince shews an ex­treme Ten­der­ness for his Fa­ther in these Lines,

_On Him! on Him!_ &c. _His Form and Cause con­join'd_, &c.

and re­al­ly per­forms all the strictest Rules of Fil­ial Piety thro' out the whole Play, both to Fa­ther and Moth­er; and par­tic­ular­ly, to the Lat­ter in this Scene, whilst he en­deav­ours to bring her to Re­pen­tance. In a Word, We have in this im­por­tant Scene, our In­dig­na­tion raised against a vile Mur­der­er, our Com­pas­sion caus'd for the in­hu­man Death of a vir­tu­ous Prince; our Af­fec­tion is height­en'd for the Hero of the Play; and, not to en­ter in­to more Par­tic­ulars, we are moved in the strongest Man­ner, by ev­ery Thing that can gain Ac­cess to our Hearts.

Ham­let's killing _Polo­nius_, was in Con­for­mi­ty to the Plan _Shake­speare_ built his Play up­on; and the Prince be­haves him­self on that Oc­ca­sion, as one who seems to have his Thoughts bent on Things of more Im­por­tance. I wish the Po­et had omit­ted _Ham­let's_ last Re­flec­tion on the Oc­ca­sion, _viz. This Coun­sel­lor, &c._ It has too much Lev­ity in it; and his _tug­ging_ him away in­to an­oth­er Room, is un­be­com­ing the Grav­ity of the rest of the Scene, and is a Cir­cum­stance too much cal­cu­lat­ed to raise a Laugh, which it al­ways does. We must ob­serve, that _Polo­nius_ is far from a good Char­ac­ter, and that his Death is ab­so­lute­ly nec­es­sary to­wards the _De­noüe­ment_ of the whole Piece. And our Hero had not put him to Death, had not he thought it to have been the Usurp­er hid be­hind the _Ar­ras_; so that up­on the Whole, this is no Blem­ish to his Char­ac­ter.

Ham­let's Be­haviour to the King, &c. (Act _fourth_, p 320 and Se­quel,) con­cern­ing _Polo­nius's_ Body, is too jo­cose and triv­ial.

Page 326. _En­ter_ Fort­in­brass _with an Army_.

This is a Con­duct in most of our Au­thor's Tragedies, and in many oth­er of our Tragedy Writ­ers, that is quite un­nat­ural and ab­surd; I mean, in­tro­duc­ing an Army on the Stage. Al­though our Imag­ina­tion will bear a great De­gree of Il­lu­sion, yet we can nev­er so far im­pose on our Knowl­edge, and our Sens­es, as to imag­ine the Stage to con­tain an Army: There­fore in such a Case, the Recital of it, or see­ing the Com­man­der, and an Of­fi­cer or Two of it, is the best Method of con­duct­ing such a Cir­cum­stance. _Fort­in­brass's_ Troops are here brought in, I be­lieve, to give Oc­ca­sion for his ap­pear­ing in the last Scene, and al­so to give Rise to _Ham­let's_ re­flec­tions there­on, (p. 327.) which tend to give some Rea­sons for his de­fer­ring the Pun­ish­ment of the Usurp­er.

Laertes's Char­ac­ter is a very odd one; it is not easy to say, whether it is good or bad; but his con­sent­ing to the vil­lain­ous Con­trivance of the Usurp­er's to mur­der _Ham­let_, (p. 342.) makes him much more a bad Man than a good one. For sure­ly Re­venge for such an ac­ci­den­tal Mur­der as was that of his Fa­ther's (which from the Queen, it is to be sup­posed he was ac­quaint­ed with all the Cir­cum­stances of) could nev­er jus­ti­fy him in any treach­er­ous Prac­tices. It is a very nice Con­duct in the Po­et to make the Usurp­er build his Scheme up­on the gen­er­ous un­sus­pi­cious Tem­per of the Per­son he in­tends to mur­der, and thus to raise the Prince's Char­ac­ter by the Con­fes­sion of his En­emy, to make the Vil­lain ten Times more odi­ous from his own Mouth. The Con­trivance of the Foil un­bat­ed (i.e. with­out a But­ton) is me­thinks too gross a De­ceit to go down even with a Man of the most un­sus­pi­cious Na­ture.

The Scenes of _Ophe­lia's_ Mad­ness are to me very shock­ing, in so no­ble a Piece as this. I am not against her hav­ing been rep­re­sent­ed mad; but sure­ly, it might have been done with less Lev­ity and more De­cen­cy. Mis­takes are less tol­er­able from such a Ge­nius as _Shake­speare's_ and es­pe­cial­ly in the very Pieces which give us such strong Proofs of his ex­alt­ed Ca­pac­ity. Mr. _War­bur­ton's_ Note (in Mr. _Theobalds_) on _Laertes's_ Re­bel­lion, is very ju­di­cious, (as in­deed are all those of that Gen­tle­man) on­ly I can­not think _Laertes_ (for the Rea­sons I have giv­en) a good Char­ac­ter.