DENMARK'S A PRISON

HAMLET

In the secret parts of Fortune? O! most true! she is a strumpet. What news ?

ROSENCRANTZ

None, my lord, but that the world's grown honest.

HAMLET

Then is doomsday near! But your news is not true. Let me question more in particular. What have you, my good friends, deserved at the hands of Fortune that she sends you to prison hither?

GUILDENSTERN

Prison, my lord?

HAMLET

Denmark's a prison.

ROSENCRANTZ

Then is the world one.

HAMLET

A goodly one; in which there are many confines, wards, and dungeons, Denmark being one o' th' worst.

ROSENCRANTZ

We think not so, my lord.

HAMLET

Why, then 'tis none to you; for there is nothing either Good or bad but thinking makes it so. To me it is a prison.

ROSENCRANTZ

Why, then your ambition makes it one. 'Tis too narrow for Your mind.

HAMLET

O God, I could be bounded in a nutshell and count myself a king of infinite space, were it not that I have bad dreams.

GUILDENSTERN

Which dreams indeed are ambition; for the very substance of ambition is merely the shadow of a dream.