Or else the worla, too saucy with the gods,
Incenses them to send destruction.

Cic. Why, saw you any thing more wonderful?

Casca. A common slave (you know him well by sight,) [burn Held up his left hand, which did flame, and Like twenty torches join'd; and yet his hand, Not sensible of fire, remain'd unscorch'd. Besides, (I have not since put up my sword,) Against the Capitol I met à lion,

Who glar'd upon me, and went surly by, Without annoying me: And there were drawn Upon a heap a hundred ghastly women, Transformed with their fear; who swore they

saw

Men, all in fire, walk up and down the streets.
And, yesterday, the bird of night did sit,
Even at noon-day, upon the market-place,
Hooting, and shrieking. When these prodigies
Do so conjointly meet, let not men say,
These are their reasons,―They are natural;
For, I believe, they are portentous things
Upon the climate that they point upon.

Cic. Indeed, it is a strange-disposed time: But men may construe things after their fashion, Clean from the purpose of the things themselves.

Comes Cesar to the Capitol to-morrow?

Casca. He doth; for he did bid Antonius Send word to you, he would be there to-mor

It is the part of men to fear and tremble, When the most mighty gods, by tokens, send Such dreadful heralds to astonish us.

Cas. You are dull, Casca; and those sparks of life

That should be in a Roman, you do want,
Or else you use not: You look pale, and gaze,
And put on fear, and cast yourself in wonder,
To see the strange impatience of the heavens:
But if you would consider the true cause,
Why all these fires, why all these gliding
ghosts,

Why birds, and beasts, from quality and kind;
Why old men fools, and children calculate;
Why all these things change, from their ordi-

To monstrous quality; why, you shall find,
That heaven hath infus'd them with these
spirits,
[ing,
To make them instruments of fear, and warn-
Unto some monstrous state. Now could I,
Casca,
(night;
Name to thee a man most like this dreadful
That thunders, lightens, opens graves, and
As doth the lion in the Capitol : [roars

A man no mightier than thyself, or me,
In personal action; yet prodigious grown,
And fearful, as these strange eruptions are.
Casca. 'Tis Cesar that you mean: Is it not,
Cassius?

Cas. Let it be who it is: for Romans now Have thewest and limbs like to their ancestors; But, woe the while! our fathers' minds are dead,

And we are govern'd with our mothers' spirits; Our yoke and sufferance show us womanish.

Casca. Indeed, they say, the senators to-morMean to establish Cesar as a king: [row And he shall wear his crown by sea, and land, In every place, save here in Italy.

Cas. I know where I will wear this dagger

then;

Cassius from bondage will deliver Cassius: Therein, ye gods, you make the weak most strong;

Therein, ye gods, you tyrants do defeat:
Nor stony tower, nor walls of beaten brass,
Nor airless dungeon, nor strong links of iron,
Can be retentive to the strength of spirit;
But life, being weary of these worldly bars,
Never lacks power to dismiss itself.

If I know this, know all the world besides,
That part of tyranny, that I do bear,
I can shake off at pleasure.

Casca. So can I

man,

That is no fleering tell-tale. Hold my hand:
Be factious for redress of all these griefs;
And I will set this foot of mine as far,
As who goes farthest.

Cas. There's a bargain made.
Now know you, Casca, I have mov'd already
Some certain of the noblest-minded Romans,
To undergo, with me, an enterprise
Of honourable-dangerous consequence;
And I do know, by this, they stay for me.
In Pompey's porch: for now, this fearful night
There is no stir, or walking in the streets;
And the complexion of the element,
Is favour'd, like the work we have in hand,
Most bloody, fiery, and most terrible.

Is Decius Brutus, and Trebonius, there?

Cin. All but Metellus Cimber; and he's gone To seek you at your house. Well, I will hie, And so bestow these papers as you bade me. Cas. That done, repair to Pompey's theatre. Exit CINNA. Come, Casca, you and I will, yet, ere day, See Brutus at his house: three parts of him Is ours already; and the man entire, Upon the next encounter, yields him ours. Casca. O, he sits high, in all the people's

hearts:

Remorse from power: And, to speak truth of
Cesar,
I have not known when his affections sway'd
More than his reason. But 'tis a common
proof,+

That lowliness is young ambition's ladder,
Whereto the climber-upward turns his face:
But when he once attains the upmost round.
He then unto the ladder turns his back,
Looks in the clouds, scorning the base degrees
By which he did ascend: So Cesar may;
Then, lest he may, prevent. And, since the
quarrel

Will bear no colour for the thing he is,
Fashion it thus; that what he is, augmented,
Would run to these, and these extremities:
And therefore think him as a serpent's egg,
Which, hatch'd, would, as his kind, grow

mischievous;

And kill him in the shell.

Re-enter LUCIUS.

Luc. The taper burneth in your closet, Sir. Searching the window for a flint, I found This paper, thus seal'd up; and, I am sure, It did not lie there, when I went to bed.

Bru. Get you to bed again, it is not day. Is not to-morrow, boy, the ides of March? Late. I know not, Sir.

Bru. Look in the calendar, and bring me word. Luc. I will, Sir.

[Exit. Bru. The exhalations, whizzing in the air, Give so much light, that I may read by them. Brutus, thou sleep'st; awake, and see thyself. [Opens the Letter, and reads, Shall Rome, &c. Speak, strike, redress! Brutus, thou sleep'st; awake.

Such instigations have been often dropp'd
Where I have took them up.

Shall Rome, &c. Thus, must I piece it out;
Shall Rome stand under one man's awe? What!
Rome?

My ancestors did from the streets of Rome
The Tarquin drive, when he was call'd a king.
Speak, strike, redress!-Am I entreated then
To speak, and strike? O Rome! I make thee
promise,

If the redress will follow, thou receivest
Thy full petition at the hand of Brutus!

Re-enter LUCIUS.

Luc. Sir, March is wasted fourteen days. [Knock within.

Bru. 'Tis good. Go to the gate; somebody knocks. [Exit LUCIUS. Since Cassius first did whet me against Cesar, I have not slept.

Between the acting of a dreadful thing
And the first motion, all the interim is
Like a phantasma,|| or a hideous dream:
The genius, and the mortal instruments,
Are then in council; and the state of man
Like to a little kingdom, suffers then
The nature of an insurrection.

And half their faces buried in their cloaks,
That by no means I may discover them
By any mark of favour.
Bru. Let them enter.

[Exit LUCIUS.
They are the faction. O conspiracy! [night,
Sham'st thou to show thy dangerous brow by
When evils are most free! O, then, by day,
Where wilt thou find a cavern dark enough
To mask thy monstrous visage? Seek none,
Hide in it smiles, and affability: [conspiracy;
For if thou path thy native semblancet on,
Not Erebus itself were dim enough
To hide thee from prevention.

Enter CASSIUS, CASCA, DECIUS, CINNA, METELLUS CIMBER, and TREBONIUS.

Cas. I think we are too bold upon your rest: Good morrow, Brutus; Do we trouble you? Bru. I have been up this hour; awake, all night.

Know I these men, that come along with you? Cas. Yes, every man of them; and no man here,

But honours you: and every one doth wish, You had but that opinion of yourself, Which every noble Roman bears of you. This is Trebonius.

Bru. He is welcome hither.

Cas. This Decius Brutus.

Bru. He is welcome too.

Cus. This, Casca; this, Cinna;

And this, Metellus Cimber.

Bru. They are all welcome.

What watchful cares do interpose themselves Betwixt your eyes and night?

Cas. Shall I entreat a word? [They whisper. Dec. Here lies the east: Doth not the day

break here?

Swear priests, and cowards, anu men cautelous,

Old feeble carrions, and such suffering souls
That welcome wrongs; unto bad causes wear
Such creatures as men doubt: but do not stain
The even virtue of our enterprise,
Nor the insuppressive mettle of our spirits,
To think, that, or our cause, or our perform-
ance,

Did need an oath; when every drop of blood,
That every Roman bears, and nobly bears,
Is guilty of a several bastardy.

If he do break the smallest particle
Of any promise that hath pass'd from him.
Cas. But what of Cicero? Shall we sound
him?

I think, he will stand very strong with us.
Casca. Let us not leave him out.

Cin. No, by no means.

Will purchase us a good opinion,t

Met. O let us have him; for his silver hairs

It shall be said, his judgement rul'd our hands; And buy men's voices to commend our deeds: Our youths, and wildness, shall no whit apBut all be buried in his gravity.

[pear,

Bru. O, name him not; let us not breakf with him;

For he will never follow any thing
That other men begin.

Cas. Then leave him out.

Casca. Indeed, he is not fit.

Dec. Shall no man else be touch'd but only Cesar?

Cas. Decius, well urg'd:-I think it is not

meet,

Mark Antony, so well belov'd of Cesar,
Should outlive Cesar: We shall find of him

A shrewd contriver; and, you know, his means,
If he improves them, may well stretch so far,
As to annoy us all which to prevent,
Let Antony, and Cesar, fall together.

Bru. Our course will seem too bloody, Caius
Cassius,

To cut the head off, and then hack the limbs;
Like wrath in death, and envy afterwards:
For Antony is but a limb of Cesar.

Let us be sacrificers, but no butchers, Caius.
We all stand up against the spirit of Cesar;
O, that we then could come by Cesar's spirit,
And in the spirit of men there is no blood:
And not dismember Cesar! But, alas,
Cesar must bleed for it! And, gentle friends,
Let's carve him as a dish fit for the gods,
Let's kill him boldly, but not wrathfully;

Not hew him as a carcass fit for hounds:

And let our hearts, as subtle masters do

Stir up their servants to an act of rage,
This shall
And after seem to chide them.

make

Our purpose necessary, and not envious:
Which so appearing to the common eyes,
We shall be call'd purgers, not murderers.
And for Mark Antony, think not of him;
For he can do no more than Cesar's arm,
When Cesar's head is off.

Cus. Yet I do fear him:

For in the ingrafted love he bears to Cesar,Bru. Alas, good Cassius, do not think of If he love Cesar, all that he can do [him: Is to himself; take thought, and die for

Cesar:

And that were much he should; for he is given To sports, to wildness, and much company. Treb. There is no fear in him; let him not di,

he will live, and laugh at this hereafter.

[Clock strikes.

Bru. Peace, count the clock.
Cas. The clock hath stricken three.
Treb. 'Tis time to part.

Cas. But it is doubtful yet,

Whe'r Cesar will come forth to-day, or no:
For he is superstitious grown of late;
Quite from the main opinion he held once
Of fantasy, of dreams, and ceremonies;†
It may be, these apparent prodigies,
The unaccustom'd terror of this night,
And the persuasion of his augurers,
May hold him from the Capitol to-day.

Dec. Never fear that: If he be so resolv'd,
I can o'ersway him: for he loves to hear,
That unicorns may be betray'd with trees,
And bears with glasses, elephants with holes,
Lions with toils, and men with flatterers:
But, when I tell him, he hates flatterers,
He says, he does; being then most flattered.
Let me work:

For I can give this humour the true bent;
And I will bring him to the Capitol.

Cas. Nay, we will all of us be there to fetch

him.

Bru. By the eighth hour: Is that the utter

most?

Cin. Be that the uttermost, and fail not then. Met. Caius Ligarius doth bear Cesar hard, Who rated him for speaking well of Pompey; I wonder, none of you have thought of him.

Bru. Now, good Metellus, go along by him: He loves me well, and I have given him rea

sons;

Send him but hither, and I'll fashion him.
Cas. The morning comes upon us: We'll
leave you, Brutus:- [member
And, friends, disperse yourselves: but all re-
What you have said, and show yourselves true
Romans.

Bru. Good gentlemen, look fresh and merrily;
Let not our looks put on our purposes:
But bear it as our Roman actors do,
With untir'd spirits, and formal constancy:
And so, good-morrow to you every one.
[Exeunt all but BRUTUS.
Boy! Lucius!-Fast asleep? It is no matter;
Enjoy the honey-heavy dew of slumber:
Thou hast no figures, nor no fantasies,
Which busy care draws in the brains of men ;
Therefore thou sleep'st so sound.

Enter PORTIA.

Por. Brutus, my lord!

Bru. Portia, what mean you? Wherefore rise you now?

It is not for your health, thus to commit
Your weak condition to the raw-cold morning.
Por. Nor for yours neither. You have un-
gently, Brutus,
[per,
Stole from my bed: And yesternight, at sup-
You suddenly arose, and walk'd about,
Musing, and sighing, with your arms across :
And when I ask'd you what the matter was,
You star'd upon me with ungentle looks:
I urg'd you further; then you scratch'd your
head,

And too impatiently stamp'd with your foot:
Yet I insisted, yet you answer'd not;
But, with an angry wafture of your hand,
Gave sign for me to leave you: So I did;
Fearing to strengthen that impatience,

Whether. Omens at sacrifices. Prognosticators.
By his house.
Show our designs.
Shapes created by imagination.

Which seem'd too much enkindled; and, withal,

Hoping it was but an effect of humour, Which sometime hath his hour with every man. It will not let you eat, nor talk, nor sleep; And, could it work so much upon your shape, As it hath much prevail'd on your condition," 1 should not know you, Brutus. Dear my lord,

Make me acquainted with your cause of grief.
Bru. I am not well in health, and that is all.
Por. Brutus is wise, and were he not in
health,

He would embrace the means to come by it.
Bru. Why, so I do :-Good Portia, go to bed.
Por. Is Brutus sick? and is it physical
To walk unbraced, and suck up the humours
Of the dankt morning? What, is Brutus sick;
And will he steal out of his wholesome bed,
To dare the vile contagion of the night?
And tempt the rheumy‡ and unpurged air
To add unto his sickness? No, my Brutus;
You have some sick offence within your mind,
Which, by the right and virtue of my place,
I ought to know of: And, upon my knees,
I charm you, by my once commended beauty,
By all your vows of love, and that great vow
Which did incorporate and make us one,
That you unfold to me, yourself, your half,
Why you are heavy; and what men to-night
Have had resort to you: for there have beer.
Some six or seven, who did hide their faces
Even from darkness.

Bru. Kneel not, gentle Portia.

Por. I should not need, if you were gentle
Brutus.

Within the bond of marriage, tell me, Brutus,
Is it expected, I should know no secrets
That appertain to you? Am I yourself,
But, as it were, in sort, or limitation;
To keep with you at meals, comfort your bed,
And talk to you sometimes? Dwell I but in
the suburbs

Of your good pleasure? If it be no more,
Portia is Brutus' harlot, not his wife.

Bru. You are my true and honourable wife;
As dear to me, as are the ruddy drops
That visit my sad heart.

Por. If this were true, then should I know
this secret.

1 grant, I am a woman; but, withal,
A woman that lord Brutus took to wife:
I grant, I am a woman; but, withal,
A woman well-reputed'; Cato's daughter.
Think you, I am no stronger than my sex,
Being so father'd, and so husbanded?
Tell me your counsels, I will not disclose them
I have made strong proof of my constancy,
Giving myself a voluntary wound [tience,
Here, in the thigh: Can I bear that with pa
And not my husband's secrets?
Bru. O ye gods,

Render me worthy of this noble wife!

[Knocking within. Hark, hark! one knocks: Portia, go in a while; And by and by thy bosom shall partake The secrets of my heart.

All my engagements I will construe to thee, All the charactery|| of my sad brows:Leave me with haste.

[Exit PORTIA

Luc Here is a sick man, that would speak with you.

Bru. Caius Ligarius, that Metellus spake of.

Boy, stand aside.-Caius Ligarius! how?
Lig. Vouchsafe good morrow from a feeble

tongue.

Bru. O, what a time have you chose out, brave Caius, [sick! To wear a kerchief? 'Would you were not Lig. I am not sick, if Brutus have in hand Any exploit worthy the name of honour. Bru. Such an exploit have I in hand, Ligarius,

Had you a healthful ear to hear of it.

Lig. By all the gods that Romans bow before,

I here discard my sickness. Soul of Rome!
Brave son, deriv'd from honourable loins!
Thou, like an exorcist, hast conjur'd up
My mortified spirit. Now bid me run,
And I will strive with things impossible;
Yea, get the better of them. What's to do?
Bru. A piece of work that will make sick

men whole.

Lig. But are not some whole, that we must make sick?

Bru. That must we also. What it is, my
Caius,

I shall unfold to thee, as we are going,
To whom it must be done.

Lig. Set on your foot;

And, with a heart new-fir'd, I follow you,
To do I know not what: but it sufficeth,
That Brutus leads me on.

Bru. Follow me then.

[Exeunt.

Re-enter a SERVANT.

What say the augurers?

Serv. They will not have you to stir forth to-day.

They could not find a heart within the beast.
Plucking the entrails of an offering forth,

Cesar should be a beast without a heart,
Ces. The gods do this in shame of cowardice:
No, Cesar shall not: Danger knows full well,
If he should stay at home to-day for fear.
That Cesar is more dangerous than he.
We were two lions litter'd in one day,
And I the elder and more terrible;
And Cesar shall go forth.

Cal. Alas, my lord,

Your wisdom is consum'd in confidence.
Do not go forth to-day: Call it my fear,
That keeps you in the house, and not your

own.

We'll send Mark Antony to the senate-house; And he shall say, you are not well to-day: Let me upon my knee, prevail in this.

Ces. Mark Antony shall say, I am not well; And, for thy humour, I will stay at home.

Enter DECIUS.

Here's Decius Brutus, he shall tell them so. Dec. Cesar, all hail! Good morrow,

Cesar:

worthy

I come to fetch you to the senate-house.
Ces. And you are come in very happy time
To bear my greeting to the senators,
And tell them, that I will not come to-day:
Cannot, is false; and that I dare not, falser;
I will not come to-day: Tell them so, Decius.
Cal. Say, he is sick.

Ces. Shall Cesar send a lie?

Have I in conquest stretch'd mine arm so far
To be afeard to tell grey-beards the truth?
Decius, go tell them, Cesar will not come.
Dec. Most mighty Cesar, let me know some

cause,

Lest I be laugh'd at, when I tell them so.

Ces. The cause is in my will, I will not come; That is enough to satisfy the senate. But, for your private satisfaction, Because I love you, I will let you know. She dreamt to-night she saw my statue, Calphurnia here, my wife, stays me at home: Which like a fountain, with a hundred spouts, Came smiling, and did bathe their hands in it. Did run pure blood; and many lusty Romans And these does she apply for warnings, por

tents,

And evils imminent; and on her knee
Hath begg'd, that I will stay at home to-day.
Dec. This dream is all amiss interpreted.
It was a vision, fair and fortunate:
Your statue spouting blood in many pipes,