ACT IV.] Enter the Ghost of CESAR. JULIUS CAESAR. How ill this taper burns!-Ha! who comes here? I think it is the weakness of mine eyes That shapes this monstrous apparition. It comes upon me!-Art thou anything? Art thou some god, some angel, or some devil, GHOST. Thy evil spirit, Brutus. Why com'st thou ? GHOST. To tell thee, thou shalt see me at Philippi. BRU. Well then I shall see thee again? (3) Ay, at Philippi. GHOST. BRU. Why, I will see thee at Philippi then.— [Ghost vanishes. Now I have taken heart thou vanishest: Ill spirit, I would hold more talk with thee.— Boy! Lucius!-Varro! Claudius!-Sirs, awake!— Claudius! Luc. The strings, my lord, are false. BRU. He thinks he still is at his instrument.Lucius, awake! BRU. Didst thou dream, Lucius, that thou so criedst out? Luc. My lord, I do not know that I did cry. BRU. Yes, that thou didst: didst thou see anything? Luc. Nothing, my lord. BRU. Sleep again, Lucius.-Sirrah, Claudius! Fellow thou! awake! VAR. My lord? CLAU. My lord? BRU. Why did you so cry out, sirs, in your sleep? VAR., CLAU. Did we, my lord? BRU. Ay; saw you anything? VAR. No, my lord, I saw nothing. CLAU. Nor I, my lord. BRU. Go and commend me to my brother Bid him set on his powers betimes before, VAR., CLAU. It shall be done, my lord. [Exeunt. Enter OCTAVIUS, ANTONY, and their Army. OCT. Now, Antony, our hopes are answered: You said the enemy would not come down, But keep the hills and upper regions; It proves not so: their battles are at hand; They mean to warn us at Philippi here, Answering before we do demand of them. ANT. Tut, I am in their bosoms, and I know Wherefore they do it: they could be content To visit other places; and come down With fearful bravery," thinking, by this face," To fasten in our thoughts that they have courage; But 't is not so. Enter a Messenger. MESS. Prepare you, generals: The enemy comes on in gallant show; Their bloody sign of battle is hung out, And something to be done immediately. a They mean to warn us-] That is, to summon us. So in "Richard III." Act I. Sc. 3, "And sent to warn them to his royal presence;" and again in "Romeo and Juliet," Act V. Sc. 3, ANT. Octavius, lead your battle softly on, Upon the left hand of the even field. OCT. Upon the right hand I; keep thou the left. ANT. Why do you cross me in this exigent? OCT. I do not cross you; but I will do so. [March. Drum. Enter BRUTUS, CASSIUS, and their Army; LUCILIUS, TITINIUS, MESSALA, and others. BRU. They stand, and would have parley. ANT. No, Cæsar, we will answer on their charge. Make forth; the generals would have some words. OCT. Stir not until the signal. BRU. Words before blows:-is it so, countrymen? is as a bell That warns my old age to a sepulchre." b With fearful bravery,-] With alarming ostentation. Though some critics conjecture that "fearful" is not used here in its active sense, but with the ordinary meaning, full of fear. by this face,-] By this bravado, or brag. hounds, This tongue had not offended so to-day, OCT. Come, come, the cause: if arguing make The proof of it will turn to redder drops. Unless thou bring'st them with thee. Ост. So I hope; I was not born to die on Brutus' sword. BRU. O, if thou wert the noblest of thy strain, Young man, thou couldst not die more honourable. b CAS. A peevish schoolboy, worthless of such honour, Join'd with a masker and a reveller! ANT. Old Cassius still! Messala, This is my birthday; as this very day This morning are they fled away and gone; (1) Our army lies, ready to give up the ghost. I but believe it partly; [Advancing. For I am fresh of spirit, and resolv'd BRU. Even by the rule of that philosophy Come, Antony; away! But I do find it cowardly and vile, a The posture of your blows are yet unknown;] The commentators have all something to say on the grammatical irregularity in this line, but are mute upon what is of far more importance, the exceptional use of "posture." Elsewhere Shakespeare always employs the word in its ordinary sense of attitude, position, &c.; but here, if not a misprint, it must be taken to mean quality or composition. b A peevish schoolboy,-] Although there are one or two passages in these plays where "peevish" implies foolish, childish, &c., the editors are certainly not justified in attributing this signification to the word in every instance where it occurs. In nine cases out of ten, indeed, the poet uses it, as here, in the sense of headstrong, stubborn, wilful, the meaning which it usually carried in his time. For example, "A peevish, self-will'd harlotry it is." Romeo and Juliet, Act IV. Sc. 2. "And when she's froward, peevish, sullen, sour," &c. Taming of the Shrew, Act V. Sc. 2. "Being wrong'd, as we are, by this peevish town," &c. King John, Act II. Sc. 2. con our former ensign-] "Former" meant foremost or fore. In proof of this, Ritson quotes the following from Adlyngton's translation of Apuleius, 1596-"First hee instructed me to sit at the table upon my taile, and howe I should leape and daunce, holding up my former feete. For fear of what might fall, so to prevent CAS. BRU. No, Cassius, no: think not, thou noble That ever Brutus will go bound to Rome; : CAS. For ever, and for ever, farewell, Brutus ! If we do meet again, we'll smile indeed ; If not, 't is true this parting was well made. BRU. Why then, lead on.-O, that a man might know The end of this day's business ere it come! The ex That is, to anticipate the natural period of existence. pression, time of life, for duration of life, occurs again in "Henry IV." Part II. Act V. Sc. 2, "O, gentlemen, the time of life is short; " a fact Mr. Craik must have forgotten when he adopted the specious modernization, "term of life," from Capell. b This ensign here of mine was turning back ;] "Here the term ensign may almost be said to be used with the double meaning of PIN. Fly further off, my lord, fly further off! Mark Antony is in your tents, my lord! Fly therefore, noble Cassius, fly far off! CAS. This hill is far enough. Look, look, Are those my tents where I perceive the fire? CAS. Go, Pindarus, get higher on that hill; CAS. What news? It would not be difficult to find persons even now, perhaps, who indulge the visionary notion that their life will terminate on the same day of the week or month or at the same place that it began. Shakespeare seems to have been impressed by this superstition, for he has twice or thrice adverted to it. Curiously enough, too, he might have said of his own existence, "The wheel is come full circle," for he died on the same day of the same month in which he was born, and at the same place. |