Polonius: ‘Tis too much proved that with devotion’s visage and pious action we do sugar o’er the devil himself.
Claudius: O, ’tis too true. (Aside) 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!
How often one hears talk of the difficulty of virtue out of the mouths of villains in Shakespeare! And how much guilt Claudius bears, yet he will not right his wrongs.
Hamlet is too hard a work for me to understand, so filled with condemnation, then suddenly understanding, then pity — and then despair. The only firm point I feel sure one take out of Shakespeare is that there is no hope, that “ripeness is all.”