Hamlet: #5

            Rosencrantz and Guildenstern report back to King Claudius and admit their failures in finding the cause of Hamlet’s madness. Polonius then informs Ophelia of the plan to secretly observe a meeting between her and Hamlet. Polonius tells Ophelia to pretend that she is reading a prayer book to look natural, but then he has a revelation: People act devoted to God to mask their bad deeds, and this happens all of the time. Claudius hears this and declares to himself, “Oh, ’tis too true!/ How smart a lash that speech doth give my conscience!/ The harlot’s cheek, beautied with plast’ring art,/ Is not more ugly to the thing that helps it/ Than is my deed to my most painted word./ O heavy burden!” (III.i.56-62). The whore’s pockmarked cheek made pretty with make-up is just like the ugly actions Claudius committed, but Claudius is disguising the ugliness with fine words. Polonius’s words makes Claudius realize how guilty he feels. However, in this section of the text there are no clues that to point to what Claudius is referring too. Does his guilt stem from murdering King Hamlet, or from taking the throne from Hamlet, or from marrying Gertrude? One can only infer that Claudius feels guilty of killing King Hamlet because he walks out of the play in the next scene.