My Thoughts be Bloody

Until the conclusion of act 4 scene 4, "Hamlet" can be viewed as the struggle of the protagonist to decide whether or not to act. In one of my previous posts, I mentioned how I believed that Hamlet had not yet justified to himself why he should act. Now, at the end of act 4 scene 4, I believe that he has finally reached a conclusion regarding this decision, and the reason is revealed in his closing monologue. The monologue opens with Hamlet acknowledging an obvious contradiction in the humanist view of mankind. Man is held as a creature of create virtue and reason, and yet "his chief good and market of his time be but to sleep and feed." Both the possibility of man as a beast and man as a rational animal work against his taking of action, the former because of its mindlessness and the later because of its cowardice. However, in light of the fact that man acts essentially as a beast discredits the idea that he is the subject of some sort of divine destiny, a notion that gives rise to existential thinking, and perhaps, when coupled with his observation of Fortinbras's army, makes Hamlet realize that he should act. Hamlet captures perfectly the futility and vanity of Fortinbras's enterprise when he says "the imminent death of twenty thousand men that for fantasy and trick of fame go to their graves like beds, fight for a plot whereon the numbers cannot try the cause." However meaningless the plot of land for which he fights may be, Hamlet does not speak of Fortinbras with complete disdain, but rather his reference to the army is used to highlight the vanity of man is general and to juxtapose his own cause. Of his desire to kill Claudius, Hamlet says "I have cause, and will, and strength, and means to do 't," which is much more than can be said of Fortinbras. Consequently, Hamlet realizes that because he does have cause, unlike many others who act without it, he should not take it for granted and go forward with his vengeance. At last, he has overcome the metaphysical barriers to his revenge, and finally is able to confront the King in the physical world.