has
sufficing ground and refuses to act is weak; but the ground that will
satisfy the populace, of which the commonplace critic is the fair type,
will not satisfy either the man of conscience or of wisdom. The mass of
world-bepraised action owes its existence to the pressure of
circumstance, not to the will and conscience of the man. Hamlet waits
for light, even with his heart accusing him; Laertes rushes into the
dark, dagger in hand, like a mad Malay: so he kill, he cares not whom.
Such a man is easily tempted to the vilest treachery, for the light that
is in him is darkness; he is not a true man; he is false in himself.
This is what comes of his father's maxim:

To thine own self be true;
And it must follow, _as the night the day_ (!)
Thou canst not then be false to any man.

Like the aphorism 'Honesty is the best policy,' it reveals the
difference between a fact and a truth. Both sayings are correct as
facts, but as guides of conduct devilishly false, leading to dishonesty
and treachery. To be true to the divine self in us, is indeed to be true
to all; but it is only by being true to all, against the ever present
and urging false self, that at length we shall see the divine self rise
above the chaotic waters of our selfishness, and know it so as to be
true to it.

Of Laertes we must note also that it is not all for love of his father
that he is ready to cast allegiance to hell, and kill the king: he has
the voice of the people to succeed him.]

[Page 206]

[Sidenote: 184] It shall as leuell to your Iudgement pierce
[Sidenote: peare']
As day do's to your eye.[1]

_A noise within. [2]Let her come in._

_Enter Ophelia[3]_

_Laer_. How now? what noise is that?[4]
[Sidenote: _Laer_. Let her come in. How now,]
Oh heate drie vp my Braines, teares seuen times salt,
Burne out the Sence and Vertue of mine eye.
By Heauen, thy madnesse shall be payed by waight,
[Sidenote: with weight]
Till our Scale turnes the beame. Oh Rose of May, [Sidenote: turne]
Deere Maid, kinde Sister, sweet _Ophelia_:
Oh Heauens, is't possible, a yong Maids wits,
Should be as mortall as an old mans life?[5] [Sidenote: a poore mans]
Nature is fine[6] in Loue, and where 'tis fine,
It sends some precious instance of it selfe
After the thing it loues.[7]

_Ophe. They bore him bare fac'd on th