CLAUDIUS      What if this cursed hand

Were thicker than itself with brother’s blood?

Is there not rain enough in the sweet heavens

To wash it white as snow? Whereto serves mercy

But to confront the visage of offence?

And what’s in prayer but this twofold force

– To be forestalled ere we come to fall

Or pardoned, being down? Then I’ll look up:

My fault is past.         (3.3.43-51)

Claudius’s soliloquy becomes vivid and visceral in its agonizing: what if this cursed hand were thicker than itself with brother’s blood? COVERED in it, clotted and foul (there’s an echo of the Pyrrhus speech, where Pyrrhus is described as being so bloodied that he’s like a wall freshly plastered with blood). Even if my hand were so covered—and he stares at it, seeing the blood (which is odd, because the murder was bloodless; it’s the stain, the mark of Cain, indelible and stark)—is there not rain enough in the sweet heavens to wash it white as snow? Hideous red could still become white, the hand could be clean again, because God is merciful, because there is no sin so great that it cannot be forgiven. Surely? Yes? (Seeds of Macbeth in this moment.) Whereto serves mercy but to confront the visage of offence? That’s the whole point of mercy, isn’t it, to look guilt in the eye and even then show clemency? Surely there’s still hope for me? And what’s in prayer but this twofold force—to be forestalled ere we come to fall or pardoned, being down? Come to that, what’s the point of prayer, if it’s not either to prevent us sinning in the first place, or to forgive us when we’ve already sinned? Then I’ll look up, fix my eyes on heaven; my fault is past. I’ve done what I’ve done, and nothing can change that—so I might as well pray for forgiveness. But it’s desperate pleading indeed—and a distraction and a deferral, because, as he’s already said, Claudius cannot pray.