CLAUDIUS      O, my offence is rank: it smells to heaven;

It hath the primal eldest curse upon’t –

A brother’s murder. Pray can I not:

Though inclination be as sharp as will,

My stronger guilt defeats my strong intent

And like a man to double business bound

I stand in pause where I shall first begin

And both neglect.      (3.3.36-43)

Claudius has barely been holding it together, it seems, and now that he is finally alone—just as happens with his nephew—it all comes pouring out. He’s in a bad, bad way. O, my offence is rank: it smells to heaven. I’m rotten, I reek of my crime, stink of my sin, and that crime hath the primal eldest curse upon’t—a brother’s murder. I’m a marked man, marked with the ultimate, original stigma, fratricide, like Cain. Almost he forces himself to articulate it in those stark terms. I am the killer of my brother. I am lost, and damned. Pray can I not, I can’t, I can’t (and this scene is very often set in a chapel, or imagined to be so)—but I really want to pray, I’m desperate, and I CAN’T, though inclination be as sharp as will. (Macbeth tries and fails to say Amen.) My stronger guilt defeats my strong intent—even though I really want to pray, really mean to pray, honestly, I do, I do—my guilt prevents me, a lump in the throat, dry-mouthed, dumb and numb. I can’t. And like a man to double business bound—caught between wanting to do it and not being able to do it—I stand in pause where I shall first begin and both neglect. I’m paralysed; I can’t DO anything. (Not unlike Hamlet.)