The words of this speech are printed below.
This short clip highlights the amazing parallels between the philosophy and world view expressed by Shakespeare compared to the ancient Vedanta. How did he come up with these ideas about life?
The scene is Richard II is in prison, de-throned, and alone. He is speaking to himself, and says,
I have been studying how I may compare
This prison where I live unto the world:
And for because the world is populous
And here is not a creature but myself,
I cannot do it; yet I'll hammer it out.
My brain I'll prove the female to my soul,
My soul the father; and these two beget
A generation of still-breeding thoughts,
And these same thoughts people this little world,
In humours like the people of this world,
For no thought is contented. The better sort,
As thoughts of things divine, are intermix'd
With scruples and do set the word itself
Against the word:
As thus, 'Come, little ones,' and then again,
'It is as hard to come as for a camel
To thread the postern of a small needle's eye.'
Thoughts tending to ambition, they do plot
Unlikely wonders; how these vain weak nails
May tear a passage through the flinty ribs
Of this hard world, my ragged prison walls,
And, for they cannot, die in their own pride.
Thoughts tending to content flatter themselves
That they are not the first of fortune's slaves,
Nor shall not be the last; like silly beggars
Who sitting in the stocks refuge their shame,
That many have and others must sit there;
And in this thought they find a kind of ease,
Bearing their own misfortunes on the back
Of such as have before endured the like.
Thus play I in one person many people,
And none contented: sometimes am I king;
Then treasons make me wish myself a beggar,
And so I am: then crushing penury
Persuades me I was better when a king;
Then am I king'd again: and by and by
Think that I am unking'd by Bolingbroke,
And straight am nothing: but whate'er I be,
Nor I nor any man that but man is
With nothing shall be pleased, till he be eased
With being nothing.
When Shakespeare says,
For no thought is contented. The better sort,
As thoughts of things divine,
Compare to the Gita which says all desires only lead to more desires, in a never ending search for peace and satisfaction. Better that we think in the direction of the Divine.
And again:
"Thoughts tending to ambition, they do plot
Unlikely wonders; how these vain weak nails
May tear a passage through the flinty ribs
Of this hard world, my ragged prison walls,"
And, finally he says it all:
Nor I nor any man that but man is
With nothing shall be pleased, till he be eased
With being nothing.
Peace will come when the ego gives up it's struggle to be the king of our lives, and surrenders to God.