Life expires; mortality is inevitable. This ominous thought lingers in the minds of humanity and is what drives a system of beliefs that coincide with ethical values to help make sense of life. This is known as religion. God, the Holy Spirit, the Divine Being, He controls fate before and after death. He decides between an eternal life of peace or misery, Heaven or Hell. This uncertainty as to what comes after life causes great anguish and despair in the conscious being. This can lead to the brooding contemplation of ethics, the absurdity of life, and the burden of choice. For generations, literary writers have set their characters between the burden of discovering meaning in their lives, and the inevitability of their mortality. William Shakespeare's The Tragedy of Hamlet, The Prince of Denmark, recounts the tragic acts of retribution, and vacillation in the wake of the King of Denmark's murder. The character Hamlet has menacing thoughts while witnessing the deceptive actions of others as they attempt to suppress the justice that, according to Hamlet, has not been served. Bearing this great angst and melancholy, Hamlet wants to die because of all the emotional pain he feels; however, he is afraid of this very prospect. Rather than take his own life, Hamlet's apprehensions about the afterlife coerce him to endure his existential crisis.
Hamlet's fear of the hereafter is what extends his providence. His thoughts and inaction prove to be what keep him alive as his "conscience make[s] [a coward] of [him]"" (3.1.84). The notion of the afterlife and how horrible it might be causes Hamlet to "turn awry and lose the name of action"" (3.1.88-89). For Hamlet, avenging his father's murder is to thrust justice upon the guilty, but in doing so Hamlet believes that he will most likely die. This is why he procrastinates to seek revenge since, "there are more things than heaven and earth than dreamt of in [one's] philosophy"" (1.
