3549 shriuing] Gildon (apud Rowe , ed. 1709 [1710], 6: Glossary) : “to shriue]] to meet, revel, confess, or hear ones confession. Listed in a Roll."

3549 shriuing time] Johnson (1755, To Shrive): “v.a. [Saxon, scrifan] To hear at confession.”

3549 shriuing time] Johnson (2nd ed. 1760, shrift): “s. [scrift, Saxon] Confession made to a priest. Rowe.”

3549 Not shriuing time alow’d] Rann (ed. 1791-) : “Without even the ceremony of confession.”

3549 Not shriuing time alow’d] Steevens (ed. 1793) : “ i.e. without time for confession of their sins: another proof of Hamlet’s christian-like disposition. See Vol. XIV. p. 508, n. 5. Steevens.”

3549 Not shriuing time alow’d] Steevens (ed. 1793) : “ i.e. without time for confession of their sins: another proof of Hamlet’s christian-like disposition. See [Rom. 4.2.15 (2440)] Steevens.”

3548-9 He . . . alow’d] Seymour (1805, 2:201-2) : <p.201> “Another proof, exclaims Mr. Steevens, of Hamlet’s Christian-like disposition. The injunction, indeed, is not conformable to the principles professed by Christians; but Hamlet is exhibited, not as a pattern of Christian orthodoxy, but as a young man, frail and passionate; and though, in defending the general reprobation with which he ingenious commentator had laboured to brand the character of Hamlet, he is certainly warranted in rejecting any contra evidence unconnected with the drama itself; yet a jury of candid poets, I believe, would acquit the hero of this play, at least in the present instance, upon his own words and conduct. He shews in his first interview</p. 201> <p. 202>with these men, that he considers them as mere spies; and since they do nothing to obviate that imputation, and are at length the ocnvicted agents of the most atrocious treachery, I believe a generous critic will not scruple to give full credit to the prince’s veracity, when he tells his friend, that he knew these men were not only privy to the king’s design, but eager and active in promoting it; and consequently would not violently condemn the stratagem adopted for their destruction.” </p. 202>

3549 Not shriuing time alow’d]

3549 shriuing time] Todd (1818, to shrive): “† v.a. [Saxon, scrifan; skrifta, Su. Goth. from the Lat. scribo , to write; the priests anciently giving to those whom they confessed, a written direction or form of penance. See Ihre, Su. Goth. Lex and Dr. Jamieson in TO SCHRYFF]] To hear at confession. Not in use.”

3549 Not shriuing time alow’d] Caldecott (ed. 1819) : “Mr. Steevens has here [see n. 3503-6] thought proper to say that ‘Shakespeare’s negligence of poetic justice is notorious; nor can we expect that he who was content to sacrifice the pious Ophelia, should have been more scrupulous about the worthless lives of Rosencrantz and Guildenstern. Therefore, I still assert that, in the tragedy before us, their deaths appear both wanton and unprovoked.’

3549 Not shriuing time alow’d]

3549 shriuing] Boswell (ed. 1821, 21:Glossary): “shrive]] to call a person to confession.”

3549 shriuing] Nares (1822; 1906): “Shrift]] s. Confession to a priest, or the absolution consequent upon it, or the act of the preist in hearing and absolving. This word, and the kindred verb to shrive, which are both pure Saxon, naturally became obsolete, by rapid steps, when the practice to which they referred was at an end.

“1. Confession: ‘Make a short shrift; he longs to see your head. [R3 3.4.115(1918)]

“2. Absolution: ‘I will give him a present shrift, and advise him for a better place. [MM. 4.2.207 (2072)]

“3. The priestly act: ‘The ghostly father now hath done his shrift. [3H6 3.2.107(1620)] ‘As nothing was so secret as such confession, we meet with the expression in shrift , for in strict confidence, or secrecy: ‘But sweete, let this be spoke in shrift , so was it spoke to me.’ Warner’s Alb. Engl., xii, p. 291.

“By the aid of Taylor, the water-poet, we learn the priest’s fee for this office. In his margin he says, ‘Twelve pence is a shrift.’ Travels of Twelve Pence.’”

3549 shriuing] Nares (1822; 1906): To Shrive]] See SHRIFT. To confess, &c. ‘Husband, I’ll dine above with you to-day, And shrive you of a thousand idle pranks. [Com. 2.2.207 (603)]’ ‘He will her shrive for all this gere, and give her penaunce strait.’ Gammer Gurton, O. Pl., ii, 46.

“In the license of our early poetry, it was made shrieve, or shreeve, if more convenient for the rhyme. [cites FQ IV.xii.26] ‘But afterwards she ‘gan him soft to shrieve , And wooe with faire intreatie to disclose, Which of the nymphs his heart so sore did meive.’

“Here are two licenses, shrieve for shrive, and meive for move; and thus two words, so remote as shrive and move, are brought together as a rhyme.

“For to absolve, and for the participle, shriven: ‘Since Diccon hath confession made, and is so cleane shreeve’. Gammer Gurt., O.Pl. ii, 74.’

“The preterite was shrove; whence Shrove-Tuesday was named.”

3549 Not shriuing time alow’d] Caldecott (ed. 1832) : “And so Spenser, ‘To that place steps aside, Where Pinabel was shriuen without confession.’”

3549 Not shriuing time] Valpy (ed. 1833): “Without time for confession of their sins.”

3549 shriuing time] Knight (ed. [1839]):: “Shriuing-time is time of shrift, or confession.”

3548-9 Lewes (ms. notes in Knight, ed. 1843): “Is not this eminently the cunning trick of a madman doubling on his keepers? They were his friends—innocent of any plot against him yet he cooly forges the order for their death!

3549 Not shriuing time alow’d] Hunter (1845, 2:265) : <p. 265> “In the last clause there is another outrage on every just and proper feeling, though it is not necessary to suppose with Steevens that Hamlet means without allowing them time for repentance. it was a term in common use for any short period. All he meant was, that they should be put to instant death.” </p. 265>

3549 Not shriuing time alow’d] Schlegel (1808, rpt. 1811, tr. 1846, p. 405): <p. 405> “. . . we evidently perceive in him a malicious joy, when he has succeeded in getting rid of his enemies, more through necessity and accident, which alone are able to impel him to quick and decisive measures, than by the merit of his own courage, as he himself confesses after the murder of Polonius, and with respect to Rosencrantz and Guildenstern.” </p. 405>

3549 shriuing] Collier (ed. 1858, Glossary): “shrive]] to confess, or to take confession.”

3549 shriuing time] Clark & Wright (ed. 1864) : “sb. time for confession.”

3549 shriuing time] Keightley (ed. 1864 [1866]: Glossary):”shriue]] to call to confession.”

3549 Not shriuing time] Clark & Wright (ed. 1872): “no time for making confession and receiving absolution. Compare [R3 3.4.97 (2072)]: ‘Make a short shrift: he longs to see your head.’”

3548-49 Marshall (1875, pp. 68-69): <p. 68> “The malignant mispresentation of Hamlet’s character, for which Steevens is responsible, has drawn forth many able and indignant vindications of Shakespeare’s favourite here; but while unable to agree with any of Steevens’ deductions, I must confess that he seems right in refusing to judge Hamlet by any other evidence than that afforded by the tragedy itself. If we admit any circumstances, found only in the original story of Saxo Grammaticus, as exculpating the dramatist from any blemishes in the delineation of his characters, we would not in justice decline to hold him responsible for other circumstances, derived from the same source, which might tell against him; and thus we should be led into all kinds of errors, and should be utterly unable to form any true estimate of Shakespeare’s work.

“It is useless to deny that in the play of ‘Hamlet there is not one line which can be fairly said to prove that Rosencrantz and Guildenstern knew what were the contents of the packet committed to their care. Hamlet himself does not say they knew it; he expresses his distrust of them in the strongest language to his mother [3.4.202-10 (0000)], but all that he says to Horatio now is—’Why, man, they did make love to this employment ; . . . . their defeat Doth by their own insinuation grow:’ and he seems to justify the terrible punishment he had inflicted on them by the very fact that their conduct throughout had been so underhand, and so cunningly false to him as their friend and prince, that although their treachery was undoubted, they had not been openly guilty of any design against his life. Hamlet declares—’They are not near my conscience;’ because he considers that by laying themselves out to serve the King’s ends from the very first moment they arrived at Court; by their lack of frankness towards him, their old </p. 68> <p. 69>schoolfellow, at their first meeting; by their steadily blinding their eyes to the state of affairs at Court, and by denying to the griefs of their friend any sympathy; by readily accepting the theory of his madness without trying to account for his melancholy and retirement from Court in any other manner; by accepting an embassy which their own common sense must have told them could not mean any good to Hamlet, they had been so false to the duties of friendship and to the honour of gentlemen, that they deserved the death of traitors. . . . he [Hamlet] loved good for its own sake, not for what could be got by it; and in his indignation at the despicable weakness of these two courtiers, in the scorn which helt for their time-serving cowardice, he allowed himself to be burried into the commission of an act of cruelty, because, at the time, it wore an apearance of an exquisitely ironical punishment. It is possible that Shakespeare meant to mark, as strongly as he could, the hatred of a noble, honest nature for that complicity in crime which is the result of wilful blindness and self-interested negligence. The lesson is one which in this age we may all take to heart; and while we shrink from the curelty which is inseparable from all acts of vengeance, while we are pained to see the treachery of Claudius retorted on his agents with such terrible exactness, we cannot help feeling how dangerous it is to side with evil against good, however high the wages; to shut our eyes to the truth, however unpleasant; to do wrong because the world cries out loudly it is right,a nd drowns the voice of conscience in the roar of its applause.” </p. 69>

3549 Not shriuing time alow’d] Strachey (apud Furness, ed. 1877): “Something more than Hamlet’s own preservation is at stake; he is the representative and avenger of the rights of the crown and laws of Denmark, outraged by a murderer and a usurper, (for he was only elected because he contrived to murder the rightful possessor at a moment when his natural heir was absent); and he has to act under those circumstances, which at rare and long intervals in the history of every country, call on some man to maintain the spirit of the laws by disregarding for a moment their letter. It is Hamlet’s duty to avenge the crown and laws of Denmark by putting the tyrant to death; and if as ameans to that end he has to sacrifice also the base instruments of the tyrants’s will, he is justified in doing it."

3549 shriuing time] Neil (ed. 1877, Notes): “opportunity of confession to a priest and getting absolution from him.”

3549 shriuing time] Hudson (ed. 1881): “Shriving-time’ is time for confession and absolution.”

3549 shriuing time] Barnett (1889, p. 62): <p. 62> “time for confessing. A.S. scrifan, to confess, as a priest does. Shrove-tide is the time for confessing.” </p. 62>

3549 Tomlinson (1889, p. 7): “It is true that he expresses no great regret at the death of Rosencranz and Guildenstern, but, on the other hand, he expresses no pleasure.”

3549 Tomlinson (1889, pp. 10-11): <p. 10> “These [the death of R & G] he[ Wilhelm Meister] names external relations, . . . . </p. 10> <p. 11> Goethe remarks that the above events might be fit and proper for the purpose of expanding a novel, that they injue exceedingly such a piece as Hamlet; and seeing that the hero has no plan, they are entirely out of place. Serlo the manager applauds this view, and Wilhelm again refers to these events as errors which must be got rid of.” </p. 11>

3549 shriuing time] Symons (in Irving & Marshall, ed. 1890): “In the Hystorie of Hamblet the ministers of the usurper are represented as aware of the treacherous mission on which they are sent, but there is no intimation in the play that Rosencrantz and Guildenstern knew anything about it. Was, then, Hamlet justified in having them executed, or was he guilty of a piece of merely wanton cruelty? No justified, says Steevens (Var. Ed. vol. vii. p. 485 [see v1821]]; justified, says Strachey (Hamlet, p. 96) [see v1821 above]. F.A. Marshall, in his Study of Hamlet, devotes pp. 63-69 to this question. The language of Hamlet, he says, in his narrative to Horatio, ‘indicates great excitement, and, as I have said before, is characterized by a childish exultation in the success of his strategy. That he should have thus craftily obtained, at the same time, such strong proofs of the King’s treachery, and so ready a means of avenging himself on the two time-serving courtiers who had been so faithless to their professed friendship for him, seems to have produced no other impression on his mind than one of delighted self-satisfaction. . . . Strange, indeed, is the contrast between his endless self-vindications, as far as the King is concerned, and his utter indifference at the sudden and fearful end he has contrived for the two courtiers. . . .

“The malignant mispresentation of Hamlet’s character, for which Steevens is responsible, has drawn forth many able and indignant vindications of Shakespeare’s favourite here; but while unable to agree with any of Steevens’ deductions, I must confess that he seems right in refusing to judge Hamlet by any other evidence than that afforded by the tragedy itself. . . .

“It is useless to deny that in the play of ‘Hamlet there is not one line which can be fairly said to prove that Rosencrantz and Guildenstern knew what were the contents of the packet committed to their care. Hamlet himself does not say they knew it; he expresses his distrust of them in the strongest language to his mother [3.4.202-10 (0000)], but all that he says to Horatio now is—’Why, man, they did make love to this employment ; . . . . their defeat Doth by their own insinuation grow:’ and he seems to justify the terrible punishment he had inflicted on them by the very fact that their conduct throughout had been so underhand, and so cunningly false to him as their friend and prince, that although their treachery was undoubted, they had not been openly guilty of any design against his life. hamlet declares—’They are not near my conscience;’ because he considers that by laying themselves out to serve the King’s ends from the very first moment they arrived at Court; by their lack of frankness towards him, their old schoolfellow, at their first meeting; by their steadily blinding their eyes to the state of affairs at Court, and by denying to the griefs of their friend any sympathy; by readily accepting the theory of his madness without trying to account for his melancholy and retirement from Court in any other manner; by accepting an embassy which their own common sense must have told them could not mean any good to Hamlet, they had been so false to the duties of friendship and to the honour of gentlemen, that they deserved the death of traitors.’”

3549 shriuing] Neilson (ed. 1906, Glossary shrive): “to confess and absolve.”

3549 shriuing]

3549 shriuing time] Kittredge (ed. 1939, Glossary):

3548 suddaine] Kittredge (ed. 1939): “instant, immediate.”

3548 suddaine] Kittredge (ed. 1939, Glossary): “instant.”

3549 shriuing time] Kittredge (ed. 1939): “enough time for confession and absolution. It would be as absurd to take this passage literally, and to infer that the services of a priest were denied to Rosencrantz and Guildenstern, as it would be to suppose that the King’s message contained an order not to grind the axe [3524]. Hamlet merely emphasizes the idea of immediate death—of ‘giving the men short shrift.’”

3549 shriuing time]

3549 shriuing]

3549 shriuing]

3549 shriuing] Sisson (ed. 1954, Glossary, shrive):

3549 shriuing time]

3549 shriuing time]

3549 shriuing]

3548 bearers] Spencer (ed. 1980): “((Rosencrantz and Guildenstern)).”

3549 shriuing time]

3549 shriuing time] Jenkins (ed. 1982): “Cf. [3523-5] above; yet also [3.3.89-95 and LN [Longer Notes], while the lack of opportunity for confession is an aggravation of the killing of Hamlet’s father (([1.5.76-9], 3.3.80-4 (000)])).”

3549 shriuing time]

3549 shriuing time]

3549 shriuing time] Hibbard (ed. 1987): “Hamlet seems to have his father’s fate in mind ((I.5.76-9)) as well as the death Claudius planned to send him to [3523-5].”

3549 shriuing time]

3549 shriuing time]

3549 shriuing time] Andrews (ed. 1989): “without allowing enough time for them to confess their sins and prepare their souls for death. The haste Hamlet calls for parallels that of the commission calling for his own execution ((line 24)). We must remember that at the time Hamlet wrote this death order he was assuming that he would arrive in England with his former schoolmates; he would thus have wanted them silenced before they could say anything that would jeopardize the Prince’s own life. Even so, however, the harshness of Hamlet’s sentence ((going beyond that of even so evil a character as Claudius in its explicit call for what the Prince assumes will be the damnation of his victims)) is surely designed by the playwright to give the audience pause.”

3549 shriuing] OED shrive, v. arch. The action of the verb SHRIVE [4. intr. To confess one’s sins, go to confession,

shrift: a. Confession; b. the hearing of confessions. c. attrib. as shriving time;