“The spirit
that I have seen
May be a devil; and the devil hath power To assume a pleasing shape ; yea, and perhaps,
Out of my weakness, and my melancholy, (As he is very potent with such spirits,) Abuses me to damn me.”
Upon this actual weakness of mind, and suicidal melancholy, combined with native humour and the biting irony into which his view of the world has sharpened it, is added the feigned form of insanity, the antic disposition wilfully put on, the dishevelled habiliments of person and conversation. The characteristics of this feigned form are those of mania, not indeed violent, acute, and demonstrative, but mischievous,
reckless, and wayward, and so mingled with flashes of native wit, and disguised by the ground colour of real melancholy, shewing through the transparency of the feigned state, that Hamlet's character becomes one of the most interesting and complicated subjects of psychological study anywhere to be met with.
He is first introduced to us in his feigning condition with a fine touch to excite pity.
“Queen. But look where sadly the poor wretch comes reading.
Pol. Do you know me, my lord 7 Hamlet. Excellent well; you are a fishmonger.” Coleridge and others remark upon this, that Hamlet's mean ing is, You are sent to fish out this secret. But we are not aware that fishmongers are in the habit of catching their fish. May it not rather be that a fishmonger was referred to as a dealer in perishable goods, and notoriously dishonest; and thus to give point to the wish: “Then I would you were so honest a man.” The writers who insist upon a profound meaning, even in Hamlet's most hurling words, have been mightily puzzled with the lines :
