Witness this
army of such mass and charge,Led by a delicate and tender
prince,Whose spirit, with divine ambition
puffed,Makes mouths at the invisible
event,Exposing what is mortal and
unsureTo All that fortune, death, and danger
dare,Even for an eggsheel.
(4.4.47)
John's allusion is
from the passage in which Hamlet observes the noble Prince of Norway, Fortinbras, who
has the courage to go into a battle that he may easily lose. Inspired by this
fortitude, Hamlet finally decides to avenge the death of his father by dueling Laertes
and trying, then, to kill Claudius. He declares that he is "Hamlet, the Dane" and
sallies forth. After alluding to this passage, John asks Mond, "Isn't there something
in living dangerously?" in repudiating the new world of soma,
conformity, conditioning--in abolishing "the slings and arrows of
fortune."
The discourse between Mustapha Mond and John in
which John argues for choice and God illustrates the dichotomy of the New World against
the old world of the reservation. Here Huxley poses a choice between freedom and
comfort. Fortinbras in the passage from Hamlet is noble, ready to
sacrifice in the name of freedom; John chooses freedom and God. Mond chooses the
stability and comfort of the New World. The two world views of John and Mond are
obviously incompatible.
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