Bu. O, what a time have you chofe out, brave Caius,

To wear a kerchief? Would you were not fick!

Cai. I am not fick, if Brutus have in hand Any exploit worthy the name of honour.

Bru. Such an exploit have I in hand, Ligarius, Had you an healthful ear to hear of it.

Cai. By all the Gods the Romans bow before,
I here difcard my ficknefs. Soul of Rome!
Brave fon, deriv'd from honourable loins!
Thou, like an exorcift, haft conjur'd up
My mortified fpirit. Now bid me run,
And I will ftrive with things impoffible;
Yea, get the better of them. What's to do?

Bru. A piece of work, that will make fick men

whole.

Cai. But are not fome whole, that we must make

fick?

Bru. That we must alfo.

What it is, my Caius, I fhall unfold to thee, as we are going, To whom it must be done.

Cai. Set on your foot;

And with a heart new-fir'd, I follow you,

To do I know not what: but it fufficeth,

That Brutus leads me on.

Bru. Follow me then.

Caf

SCENE II.

Changes to Cafar's Palace,

[Exeunt.

Thunder and lightning. Enter Julius Cæfar.

OR heaven, nor earth, have been at peace

CelN to-night:
NOR

Thrice hath Calphurnia in her fleep cry'd out,

Help, ho! they murder Cæfar." Who's within?

Enter

Enter a Servant.

Serv. My Lord ?

Caf. Go bid the priests do prefent facrifice, And bring me their opinions of fuccefs.

Serv. I will, my lord.

Enter Calpburnia.

[Exit.

Cal. What mean you, Cæfar? Think you to walk forth?

You fhall not stir out of your houfe to-day.

Caf. Cæfar fhall forth. The things, that threatened me,

Ne'er lookt but on my back; when they fhall fee The face of Cæfar, they are vanished.

I

Cal. Cæfar, I never ftood on ceremonies, Yet now they fright me. There is one within, Be fides the things that we have heard and feen, Recounts moft horrid fights feen by the watch. A lionefs hath whelped in the streets;

And graves have yawn'd, and yielded up their dead: Fierce fiery warriors fight upon the clouds,

In ranks, and fquadrons, and right form of war,
Which drizzled blood upon the Capitol :

The noise of battle hurtled in the air;
Horfes did neigh, and dying men did groan;
And ghofts did fhrick, and fqueal about the streets.
O Cæfar these things are beyond all ufe,

And I do fear them.

1 Cæfar, I never flood on ceremonies.] i. e. I never paid a ceremonious regard to prodigies or omens.

The adjective is ufed in the fame fenfe in the Devil's Charter, 1607.

"The devil hath provided in his covenant,
"I fhould not crofs myself at any time :-
"I never was fo ceremonious.”

STEEVENS.

Caf.

Caf. What can be avoided,

Whofe end is purpos'd by the mighty Gods?
Yet Cæfar fhall go forth for these predictions
Are to the world in general, as to Cæfar.

Cal. When beggars die, there are no comets feen: The heavens themselves blaze forth the death of

princes.

Caf. Cowards die many times before their deaths; The valiant never tafte of death but once.

2

Of all the wonders that I yet have heard,
It seems to me most strange that men fhould fear;
Seeing that death, a neceffary end,

Will come, when it will come.

Enter a Servant.

What say the augurers?

Serv. They would not have you to ftir forth to-day. Plucking the entrails of an offering forth,

They could not find a heart within the beaft.

[Exit Servant.

Caf. The Gods do this in fhame of cowardice:

Cæfar fhould be a beaft without a heart,

If he should stay at home to-day for fear.

No, Cæfar fhall not: Danger knows full well,
That Cæfar is more dangerous than he.

2 This fentiment appears to have been imitated by Dr. Young in his tragedy of Bufiris king of Egypt.

3-death, a neceffary end, &c.] This is a fentence derived from the Stoical doctrine of predeftination, and is therefore improper in the mouth of Cæfar.

4

JOHNSON.

in fhame of cowardice:] The ancients did not place courage but wisdom in the heart.

JOHNSON,

We

"We were two lions litter'd in one day, And I the elder and more terrible; And Cæfar fhall go forth.

Cal. Alas, my lord,

Your wisdom is confum'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 fend Mark Antony to the fenate-house;
And he will fay, you are not well to-day:
Let me, upon my knee, prevail in this.
Caf. Mark Antony fhall fay, I am not well
And, for thy humour, I will ftay at home.

Enter Decius.

Here's Decius Brutus, he fhall tell them fo.
Dec Cæfar, all hail! Good morrow, worthy Cæfar:
I come to fetch you to the fenate-house.

Caf. And you are come in very happy time,
To bear my greeting to the fenators,

And tell them, that I will not come to-day:
Cannot is falfe; and that I dare not, falfer;
I will not come to-day. Tell them fo, Decius.
Cal. Say, he is fick.

Caf. Shall Cæfar fend a lye?

Have I in conqueft ftretcht mine arm so far,
To be afraid to tell grey-beards the truth?
Decius, go tell them, Cæfar will not come; -

Dec. Moft mighty Cæfar, let me know fome cause, Left I be laugh'd at, when I tell them fo.

The copies have been all corrupt, and the paffage, of course, unintelligible. But the flight alteration, I have made, restores fenfe to the whole; and the fentiment will neither be unworthy of Shakespeare, nor the boat too extravagant for Cæfar in a vein of vanity to utter: that he and Danger were two twin-whelps of a lion, and he the elder, and more terrible of the two. THEOB.

Caf.

Caf. The caufe is in my will, I will not come;
That is enough to fatisfy the fenate.
But for your private fatisfaction,

Because I love you, I will let you know.
Calphurnia here, my wife, ftays me at home:
She dreamt laft night the faw my ftatue,
Which, like a fountain with an hundred spouts,
Did run pure blood; and many lufty Romans
Came fmiling, and did bathe their hands in it.
And these she does apply for warnings and portents,
And evils imminent; and on her knee
Hath begg'd, that I will stay at home to-day.
Dec. This dream is all amifs interpreted;

It was a vifion, fair, and fortunate :

Your ftatue, spouting blood in many pipes,
In which so many smiling Romans bath'd,
Signifies, that from you great Rome fhall fuck
Reviving blood; and that great men fhall prefs

7

• Thefe fhe does apply for warnings and portents,

And evils imminent.

The late Mr. Edwards was of opinion that we should read

For

STEEVENS.

7 and that great min fhall prefs

For tinctures, ftains, relicks, and cognizance.]

That this dream of the ftatue's fpouting blood fhould fignify, the increase of power and empire to Rome from the influence of Cafar's arts and arms, and wealth and honour to the noble Romans through his beneficence, expreffed by the words, From you great Rome fhall fuck reviving blood, is intelligible enough. But how thefe great men fhould literally prefs for tinctures, ftains, relicks, and cognisance, when the fpouting blood was only a fymbolical vifion, I am at a lofs to apprehend. Here the circumftances of the dream, and the interpretation of it, are confounded with one another. This line therefore,

For tinctures, fains, relicks, and cognisance,

must needs be in way of fimilitude only; and if fo, it appears that fome lines are wanting between this and the preceding; which

want