On Hamlet's Conscience

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  • ハムレットの“conscience”に関する一考察
  • ハムレット ノ conscience ニ カンスル イチ コウサツ

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“[C]conscience does make cowards of us all,” says Hamlet in one of his soliloquies. Knowing that wreaking havoc and revenge on the Danish throne is a sinful act, but unable to resist the Ghost's exhortations, Hamlet desires to tame his imagination and end his vile speculation by committing suicide. This, however, is not done for “conscience” sake. Overall in Hamlet, “conscience” is portrayed as a sacred virtue, whose function is to direct human actions towards the Divine Will. And yet it is equally remarkable that the same “conscience” does not prevent Hamlet from arranging his friends' death. Thus conscience bears at once sacred and sacrilegious aspects. This paper points to this double-sidedness of “conscience” in Hamlet, and discusses it in terms of the context in which Shakespeare sharpened his art of equivocation.

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