‘On my first son’ and the ‘to be or not to be’ soliloquy from ‘hamlet’ share the focus of death. Hamlet talks of death when he debates whether or not he should take his own life. Ben Jonson talks of death when he speaks of the death of his son. One of the most noticeable similarities I noticed was when hamlet says ‘ who would bear the whips and scorns of time’ it is followed by a list of things that is wrong with society which indicates his feelings of how people are blessed to leave the cruel and difficult life. In the poem Ben states that he is happy that his son could escape the ‘rage world and flesh’. This would show the Ben also sees the world as cruel and difficult and that there is no wrong in leaving it.