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Table of Contents

Act IV

King
’Tis Hamlet’s character. “Naked!”
And in a postscript here, he says “alone.”
Can you advise me?
Laertes
I’m lost in it, my lord. But let him come;
It warms the very sickness in my heart,
That I shall live and tell him to his teeth,
“Thus didest thou.”
King
If it be so, Laertes⁠—
As how should it be so? how otherwise?⁠—
Will you be ruled by me?
Laertes
Ay, my lord;
So you will not o’errule me to a peace.
King
To thine own peace. If he be now return’d,
As checking at his voyage, and that he means
No more to undertake it, I will work him
To an exploit, now ripe in my device,
Under the which he shall not choose but fall:
And for his death no wind of blame shall breathe,
But even his mother shall uncharge the practice
And call it accident.
Laertes
My lord, I will be ruled;
The rather, if you could devise it so
That I might be the organ.
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