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his nature; and that after supper he took him by the hand, and, holding him fast, (in token of kindness, as his manner was,) told him in Greek-Messala, I protest unto thee, and make thee my witness, that I am compelled against my mind and will (as Pompey the Great was) to jeopard' the liberty of our country to the hazard of a battle. And yet we must be lively and of good courage, considering our good fortune, whom we should wrong too much to mistrust her, although we follow evil counsel. Messala writeth that Cassius having spoken these last words unto him, he bade him farewell, and willed him to come to supper to him the next night following, because it was his birthday. The next morning by break of day the signal of battle was set out in Brutus' and Cassius' camp, which was an arming scarlet coat, and both the chieftains spake together in the midst of their armies. Then Cassius began to speak first, and said—The gods grant us, O Brutus, that this day we may win the field, and ever after to live all the rest of our life quietly, one with another. But sith the gods have so ordained it that the greatest and chiefest things amongst men are most uncertain, and that, if the battle fall out otherwise to-day than we wish or look for, we shall hardly meet again, what art thou then determined to do-to fly, or die? Brutus answered him, Being yet but a young man, and not over-greatly experienced in the world, I trust (I know not how) a certain rule of philosophy, by the which I did greatly blame and reprove Cato for killing of himself, as being no lawful nor godly act touching the gods, nor concerning men valiant, not to give place and yield to Divine Providence, and not constantly and patiently to take whatsoever it pleaseth him to send us, but to draw back and fly: but being now in the midst of the danger, I am of a contrary mind; for if it be not the will of God that this battle fall out fortunate for us, I will look no more for hope, neither seek to make any new supply of war again, but will rid me of this miserable world, and content me with my fortune; for I gave up my life for my country in the Ides of March, for the which I shall live in another more glorious world. Cassius fell a laughing to hear what he said, and, embracing him, Come on then, said he, let us go and charge our enemies with this mind; for either we shall conquer, or we shall not need to fear the conquerors. After this talk they fell to consultation among their friends for the ordering of the battle."-NORTH's Plutarch.

"— on our FORMER ENSIGN"-i. e. The "ensign" in the van; our foremost standard.

"so to PREVENT

The time of life."

"To prevent" is here used for to anticipate-a sense now retained only in the English Liturgy :-" Prevent and follow us by thy continual grace.'

By "time" is meant the full and complete time-the natural period. It has been said that there is an apparent contradiction between the sentiments Brutus expresses in this and in his subsequent speech; but there is no real inconsistency.

Mason well observes, that Brutus had laid down to himself as a principle, to abide every chance and extremity of war; but when Cassius reminds him of the disgrace of being led in triumph through the streets of Rome, he acknowledges that to be a trial which he could not endure. Shakespeare, in the first speech, makes that to be the present opinion of Brutus, which in Plutarch is mentioned only as one he formerly entertained, and that, being now in the midst of danger, he was of a contrary mind.

SCENE V.

"Come, poor remains of friends, rest on this rock." "Now, Brutus having passed a little river, walled in on every side with high rocks, and shadowed with great trees, being then dark night, he went no further, but stayed at the foot of a rock with certain of his captains and friends that followed him: and looking up to the

firmament that was full of stars, sighing, he rehearsed two verses, of the which Volumnius wrote the one, to this effect:

Let not the wight from whom this mischief went (O Jove) escape without due punishment ;and saith that he had forgotten the other. Within a little while after, naming his friends that he had seen slain in battle before his eyes, he fetched a greater sigh than before, specially when he came to name Sabia and Flavius, of the which the one was his lieutenant, and the other captain of the pioneers of his camp. In the mean time one of the company being athirst, and seeing Brutus athirst also, he ran to the river for water, and brought it in his sallet. At the self-same time they heard a noise on the other side of the river. Whereupon Volumnius took Dardanus, Brutus' servant, with him, to see what it was; and returning straight again, asked if there were any water left. Brutus, smiling, gently told them all was drunk, but they shall bring you some more. Thereupon he sent him again that went for water before, who was in great danger of be ing taken by the enemies, and hardly escaped, being sore hurt. Furthermore, Brutus thought that there was no great number of men slain in battle, and to know the truth of it there was one called Statilius that promised to go through his enemies, (for otherwise it was impossible to go see their camp,) and from thence, if all were well, that he should lift up a torchlight in the air, and then return again with speed to him. The torchlight was lift up as he had promised, for Statilius went thither. Now Brutus seeing Statilius tarry long after that, and that he came not again, he said, If Statilius be alive he will come again; but his evil fortune was such, that as he came back he lighted in the enemies' hands and was slain. Now the night being far spent, Brutus, as he sat, bowed towards Clitus, one of his men, and told him somewhat in his ear: the other answered him not, but fell a weeping. Thereupon he proved Dardanus, and said somewhat also to him. At length he came to Volumnius himself, and, speaking to him in Greek, prayed him, for the studies' sake which brought them acquainted together, that he would help him to put his hand to his sword, to thrust it in him to kill him. Volumnius denied his request, and so did many others; and amongst the rest, one of them said there was no tarrying for them there, but that they must needs fly. Then Brutus, rising up, We must fly indeed, said he, but it must be with our hands, not with our feet. Then taking every man by the hand, he said these words unto them with a cheerful countenance: It rejoiceth my heart that not one of my friends hath failed me at my need, and I do not complain of my fortune, but only for my country's sake: for, as for me, I think myself happier than they that have overcome, considering that I have a perpetual fame of our courage and manhood, the which our enemies the conquerors shall never attain unto by force or money; neither can let their posterity to say that they, being naughty and unjust men, have slain good men, to usurp tyrannical power not pertaining to them. Having said so, he prayed every man to shift for themselves, and then he went a little aside with two or three only, among the which Strato was one. with whom he came first acquainted by the study of rhetoric. He came as near to him as he could, and taking his sword by the hilt with both his hands, and falling down upon the point of it, ran himself through. Others say that not he, but Strato, (at his request.) held the sword in his hand, and turned his head aside, and that Brutus fell down upon it, and so ran himself through, and died presently."-NORTH's Plutarch.

"Hold thou my sword-HILTS"—" Hilts" is frequently used where only one weapon is spoken of. Cassins says to Pindarus, in a former scene, "Here, take thou the hilts." And RICHARD III.:-"Take him over the costard with the hills of thy sword." So in the "Mir ror for Magistrates," (1587)—

- A naked sword he had,
That to the hilts was all with blood imbrued.

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"This was the noblest Roman of them all:

All the conspirators, save only he," etc.

So, in the old translation of Plutarch:-"For it was sayd that Antonius spake it openly diuers tymes, that he thought, that of all them that had slayne Caesar, there was none but Brutus only that was moued to do it, as thinking the acte commendable of it selfe: but that all the other conspirators did conspire his death, for some priuate malice or enuy, that they otherwise did bear

vnto him."

The same character of Brutus in reference to another subject-the mutual criticisms and jealousies of the rival orators of his age-is given in the "Dialogus de Oratoribus," ascribed to Tacitus:-"That Calvus, and Asinus, and Cicero himself, often gave way to hatred and envy, and other vices of human infirmity, I must believe. Brutus alone, amongst all these great men, was without malignity or envy, and expressed his honest judgment frankly and plainly; for why should he, who did not, in my judgment, bear hatred even to Cæsar, bear any hate to Cicero ?"

Of this tragedy many particular passages deserve regard, and the contention and reconcilement of Brutus and Cassius is universally celebrated; but I have never been strongly agitated in perusing it, and think it somewhat cold and unaffecting, compared with some other of Shakespeare's plays: his adherence to the real story, and to Roman manners, seem to have impeded the natural vigour of his genius.-JOHNSON.

Gildon observed, that this tragedy ought to have been called Marcus Brutus, Cæsar being a very inconsiderable personage in the scene, and killed in the third act.

"In JULIUS CESAR (says Hallam) the plot wants that historical unity which the romantic drama requires; the third and fourth acts are ill connected; it is deficient in female characters, and in that combination which is generally apparent amidst all the intricacies of his fable. But it abounds in fine scenes and fine passages: the spirit of Plutarch's Brutus is well seized; the predominance of Cæsar himself is judiciously restrained; the characters have that individuality which Shakespeare seldom misses; nor is there, in the whole range of ancient or modern eloquence, a speech more fully realizing that perfection that orators have striven to attain, than that of Antony."

JULIUS CESAR, ANTONY AND CLEOPATRA, and CORIOLANUS, are so consummate, that Shakespeare must be pronounced as much at home in Roman as in romantic

history. Already had he shown, in his allusions to pagan mythology, that he had extracted its sweetest aroma, distilled not by toiling scholarship, but by the fire of genius. But now that he was in the fullest manhood of his mind, he could borrow more from the ancients than the bloom and breath of their mythology. He cast his eyes, both in their quiet and in their kindled inspiration, both as a philosopher and as a poet, on the page of classic history; he discriminated its characters with the light of philosophy; and he irradiated truth, without encroaching on its solid shapes, with the hues of fancy. What is Brutus, the real hero of the tragedy, but the veritable Brutus of Plutarch-unaltered in substance, though by poetry now hallowed to the imagination? What else is Portia? For the picture of that wedded pair, at once august and tender, human nature, and the dignity of conjugal faith, are indebted

Brutus

and Portia have a transient discord. to be sure; but it is like one in perfect music, that heightens harmony. —

T. CAMPBELL.

Almost every one knows by heart Lady Percy's celebrated address to her husband, beginning

O, my good lord, why are you thus alone? And that of Portia to Brutus, in JULIUS CESARYou've ungently, Brutus,

Stol'n from my bed.

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Lady Percy has no character, properly so called; whereas that of Portia is very distinctly and faithfully drawn from the outline furnished by Plutarch. Lady Percy's fond upbraidings, and her half playful, half pouting entreaties, scarcely gain her husband's attention. Portia, with true matronly dignity and tenderness, pleads her right to share her husband's thoughts, and proves it too.

Portia, as Shakespeare has truly felt and represented the character, is but a softened reflection of that of her husband, Brutus: in him we see an excess of natural sensibility, an almost womanish tenderness of heart, repressed by the tenets of his austere philosophy: a stoic by profession, and in reality the reverse-acting deeds against his nature, by the strong force of principle and will. In Portia there is the same profound and passionate feeling, and all her sex's softness and timidity, held in check by that self-discipline, that stately dignity, which she thought became a woman so fathered and so husbanded." The fact of her inflicting on herself a voluntary wound to try her own fortitude, is perhaps the strongest proof of this disposition. Plutarch relates that, on the day on which Cæsar was assassinated, Portia appeared overcome with terror, and even swooned away, but did not in her emotion utter a word which could affect the conspirators. Shakespeare has rendered this circumstance literally.

There is another beautiful incident related by Plutarch, which could not well be dramatized. When Brutus and Portia parted for the last time, in the island of Nisidia, she restrained all expression of grief, that she might not shake his fortitude; but afterwards, in passing through a chamber in which there hung a picture of Hector and Andromache, she stopped, gazed upon it for a time with a settled sorrow, and at length burst into a passion of tears.

If Portia had been a Christian, and lived in later times, she might have been another Lady Russell; but she made a poor stoic. No factitious or external control was sufficient to restrain such an exuberance of sensibility and fancy; and those who praise the philosophy of Portia, and the heroism of her death, certainly mistook the character altogether. It is evident, from the manner of her death, that it was not deliberate selfdestruction, "after the high Roman fashion," but took place in a paroxysm of madness, caused by overwrought and suppressed feeling, grief, terror, and suspense. Shakespeare has thus represented it :—

Bru.

Impatient of my absence,
And grief that young Octavius with Mark Antony
Had made themselves so strong-(for with her death
These tidings came)-with this she fell distract,
And, her attendants absent, swallowed fire.

So much for woman's philosophy -MRS. JAMESON.

As a contrast to the above remarks of great English critics, it would be amusing to the reader to compare the translation and commentary of Voltaire, appended to Cinna, in his edition of P. Corneille. His translation is sometimes false from ignorance, sometimes from malice, and yet sometimes rises almost to the level of his author. His criticism is of the same character. Thus he remarks on the famous speech of Cassius, (in act i. scene 2,) relating the incidents of his swimming with Cæsar, "on a raw and gusty day," and Cæsar's behaviour in the

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"fever he had when he was in Spain:-"All these stories that Cassius tells resemble the talk of a peasant at a fair. It is natural talk to be sure, but it is the nature of a fellow of the populace chatting with his comrades, at a tippling-house. It was not in this style that the great men of the republic conversed."

After allowing that the play contains "beauties to be admired every where, and at all times," he sums up the whole in this manner:-"It is astonishing that a nation, celebrated for its genius and its success in art and science, can still delight in so many monstrous irregularities, and see with pleasure Cæsar, on one side, sometimes expressing himself like a hero, sometimes like a captain in a farce; and on the other, cobblers and even senators talking as people talk in the markets, (les halles.)" The death of Cæsar has been a favourite subject for tragedy. One of the earliest is a tragedy by Jaques Gervais, a learned physician and an elegant Latin poet, of France, which was first acted in the college of Beauvais, at Paris, in 1558-an odd coincidence with the passage in HAMLET, where Polonius, who had " played once at the university, says "That I did was accounted a good action. I did enact Julius Cæsar, and was killed in the Capitol." There was also another Latin academical play, which was probably alluded to by Shakespeare in that passage, written by Dr. Eddes, and acted at Oxford, in 1582. It has lately been ascertained, from Henslowe's Diary, (not long ago discovered in manuscript, and printed under the care of J. P. Collier, 1845,) that Michael Drayton, John Webster, Anthony Munday, Thomas Middleton, and other poets, were all engaged to write a tragedy entitled "Caesar's Fall." This was in May, 1602. They were under contract to Henshaw, who was a dabbler in all sorts of literary and dramatic speculations; publisher, joint proprietor of theatres, dealer in stage-dresses, and carrying on a small usurious banking business, with which actors and authors were the principal dealers. The play has not reached us, nor have we any record of its success, or whether it 52

was ever printed and acted. About the same period. (1604,) Lord Sterline. (the ancestor of the well-known Major-General Lord Stirling, of our revolutionary army,) printed, in Edinburgh, a tragedy of "Julius Caesar," founded on the death of Cæsar, and, like Shakespeare's. closely following Plutarch. He was among the first Scotch authors who threw aside their own native Doric dialect of the language, to cultivate the muse of southern Britain. His first attempt to write in what was to him a sort of foreign tongue, was so unsuccessful, in respect to idiom, that he re-wrote the tragedy, some years after, on this account alone, and republished it. It has cer tainly much merit; but there is no reason to think that Shakespeare was at all indebted to it, as the coinci dences, which are numerous, are precisely and only those where both poets have drawn from and versified North's "Plutarch."

Since Shakespeare's time, there have been various attempts, by eminent authors, to handle the same noble theme; among the most conspicuous of which is the Mort de Casar of Voltaire-a tragedy of which the effective passage, which received the applause of all the continental critics, is a versification of Antony's speech over the body of Cæsar.

It is otherwise a tragedy of the second order of the French classic school. Voltaire adopts, as the main source of interest, a piece of ancient scandal hinted at by Plutarch, that Brutus was the illegitimate son of the usurper. The contest between the duties and affections of the son and the patriot, thus gives rise to the passion and interest of the plot, in which Brutus exhibits far more of the "farouches vertus" of his preceptor, Cato, than of the amiable qualities of the Shakespearian Brutus.

There are several Italian tragedies on the same subject. The latest one is the Bruto Secondo, of Alfieri. It is, in its way, a very noble declamatory drama, and its main defect is the want of those touches of real life, which in Voltaire's eyes degraded the Romans of Shake

speare.

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ANTONY

AND

CLEOPATRA

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