Page:Hamlet (1917) Yale.djvu/32

20

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.

Laer. O! fear me not.

I stay too long; but here my father comes.

A double blessing is a double grace;

Occasion smiles upon a second leave.

Pol. Yet here, Laertes! aboard, aboard, for shame!

The wind sits in the shoulder of your sail,

And you are stay'd for. There, my blessing with thee!

And these few precepts in thy memory

Look thou character. Give thy thoughts no tongue,

Nor any unproportion'd thought his act.

Be thou familiar, but by no means vulgar;

The friends thou hast, and their adoption tried,

Grapple them to thy soul with hoops of steel;

But do not dull thy palm with entertainment

Of each new-hatch'd, unfledg'd comrade. Beware

Of entrance to a quarrel, but, being in,

Bear 't that th' opposed may beware of thee.

Give every man thine 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,

 49 puff'd: bloated from excess

50 primrose path: path of pleasure

51 recks: heeds

rede: counsel

53 double; cf. n.

54 Occasion: opportunity

56 wind of; cf. n.

58 precepts; cf. n.

59 character: inscribe

60 unproportion'd: inordinate

61 familiar: friendly

64 dull thy palm: make thy palm less sensitive to true hospitality

65 unfleg'd: immature

69 censure: opinion

71 express'd in fancy: singular in design

