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Cassius Instigating Brutus to Oppose Cæsar. 399
Kind souls, what, weep you when you but behold
Our Cæsar's vesture wounded? Look you here,
Here is himself, marred, as you see, with traitors.
Good friends, sweet friends, let me not stir you up
To such a sudden flood of mutiny.

...

They that have done this deed are honourable;
What private griefs they have, alas! I know not,
That made them do it; they are wise and honourable,
And will, no doubt, with reasons answer you.

I come not, friends, to steal away your hearts;
I am no orator as Brutus is;

But as you know me all, a plain blunt man,
That love my friend; and that they know full well
That gave me public leave to speak of him.
For I have neither wit, nor words, nor worth,
Action, nor utterance, nor the power of speech,
To stir men's blood: I only speak right on:
I tell you that which you yourselves do know;

Show you sweet Cæsar's wounds, poor, poor dumb mouths,
And bid them speak for me: but, were I Brutus,

And Brutus Antony, there were an Antony
Would ruffle up your spirits, and put a tongue
In every wound of Cæsar, that should move
The stones of Rome to rise and mutiny.
Yet, hear me, countrymen; yet hear me speak..
Why, friends, you go to do you know not what:
Wherein hath Cæsar thus deserved your loves?
Alas! you know not-I must tell you then :-
You have forgot the will I told you of.
Here is the will, and under Cæsar's seal.
To every Roman citizen he gives,

To every several man, seventy-five drachmas.
Moreover, he hath left you all his walks,
His private arbours, and new-planted orchards.
On this side Tiber; he hath left them you,
And to your heirs for ever; common pleasures,
To walk abroad, and recreate yourselves.

Here was a Cæsar! When comes such another?

...

7.-CASSIUS INSTIGATING BRUTUS TO OPPOSE

CÆSAR.
SHAKSPEARE.

[See page 314.]

HONOUR is the subject of my story:
I cannot tell what you and other men
Think of this life, but for my single self,
I'd rather not be, as live to be

In awe of such a thing as I myself.

I was born free as Cæsar. So were you.
We both have fed as well, and we can both
Endure the winter's cold as well as he.
For once upon a raw and gusty day,
The troubled Tiber chafing with his shores,
Cæsar says to me, "Dar'st thou, Cassius, now
Leap in with me into this angry flood,

And swim to yonder point?". Upon the word,
Accoutred as I was, I plunged in,

And bade him follow; so indeed he did.
The torrent roar'd, and we did buffet it
With lusty sinews, throwing it aside,
And stemming it with hearts of controversy.
But ere we could arrive the point propos'd,
Cæsar cry'd "Help me, Cassius, or I sink."
Then as Æneas, our great ancestor,

Did from the flames of Troy upon his shoulders
The old Anchises bear, so, from the waves of Tiber
Did I the tired Cæsar: and this man

Is now become a god, and Cassius is

A wretched creature, and must bend his body
If Cæsar carelessly but nod on him.

He had a fever when he was in Spain,

And when the fit was on him, I did mark

How he did shake: 'tis true, this god did shake:
His coward lips did from their colour fly,

And that same eye, whose bend doth awe the world,
Did lose its lustre: I did hear him groan:
Ay, and that tongue of his, that bade the Romans
Mark him, and write his speeches in their books,
Alas! it cry'd, "Give me some drink, Titinius "-
As a sick girl. Ye gods, it doth amaze me,
A man of such a feeble temper should
So get the start of the majestic world,

And bear the palm alone!

Why, man, he doth bestride the narrow world,

Like a Colossus, and we sorry dwarfs

Walk under his huge legs, and peep about,

To find ourselves dishonourable graves.

Men sometimes have been masters of their fates;
The fault, dear Brutus, is not in our stars,

But in ourselves, that we are underlings.

Brutus and Cæsar! What should be in that Cæsar ?
Why should that name be sounded more than yours?
Write them together, yours is as fair a name;
Sound them, it doth become the mouth as weil;
Weigh them, it is as heavy: conjure with them,
Brutus will start a spirit as soon as Cæsar.
Now, in the name of all the gods at once,

On the Immortality of the Soul.

Upon what meats doth this our Cæsar feed,
That he is grown so great? Age, thou art sham'd;
Rome, thou hast lost the breed of noble bloods!
When went there by an age, since the Great Flood,
But it was fam'd with more than with one man?
When could they say, till now, who talk'd of Rome,
That her wide walls encompass'd but one man ?
and I have heard our fathers say,

Oh! you

There was a Brutus once, that would have brook'd
The eternal devil to keep his state in Rome,
As easily as a king!

401

8.—HAMLET'S SOLILOQUY ON THE IMMORTALITY

OF THE SOUL.

SHAKSPEARE.

[See p. 314.]

To be or not to be ?-that is the question.-
Whether 'tis nobler in the mind, to suffer
The stings and arrows of outrageous fortune,
Or to take arms against a sea of troubles,
And, by opposing, end them ?-to die—to sleep-
No more and, by a sleep, to say we end

The heart-ache, and the thousand natural shocks
That flesh is heir to 'tis a consummation
Devoutly to be wish'd. To die—to sleep—

To sleep?-perchance to dream-ay, there's the rub!
For, in that sleep of death, what dreams may come,
When we have shuffled off this mortal coil,

Must give us pause.-There's the respect,
That makes calamity of so long life.

For who would bear the whips and scorns of Time,
The oppressor's wrong, the proud man's contumely,
The pangs of despised love, the law's delay,

The insolence of office, and the spurns

That patient merit of the unworthy takes-
When he himself might his quietus make,
With a bare bodkin? Who would fardels bear,
groan and sweat under a weary life,

To
But that the dread of something after death-
That undiscover'd country from whose bourne
No traveller returns!-puzzles the will;
And makes us rather bear those ills we have,
Than fly to others that we know not of!
Thus conscience does make cowards of us all;
And thus the native hue of resolution

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Is sicklied o'er with the pale cast of thought;
And enterprises of great pith and moment,
With this regard their currents turn awry,
And lose the name of action!

9.-SPEECH OF HENRY THE FIFTH,

BEFORE THE BATTLE OF AGINCOURT.
SHAKSPEARE.

[See page 314.]

WHAT'S he that wishes more men from England?
My cousin Westmoreland P-No, my fair cousin!
If we are mark'd to die, we are enow

To do our country loss; and, if to live,
The fewer men the greater share of honour.

No, no, my lord!-wish not a man from England:
Rather proclaim it, Westmoreland! throughout my host,
That he who hath no stomach to this fight,
May straight depart; his passport shall be made,
And crowns, for convoy, put into his purse:
We would not die in that man's company!
This day is called the feast of Crispian :
He that outlives this day, and comes safe home,
Will stand a-tiptoe when this day is named,
And rouse him at the name of Crispian ;-
He that outlives this day, and sees old age,
Will yearly on the vigil feast his neighbours,
And say, To-morrow is St. Crispian!

Then will he strip his sleeve, and show his scars.
Old men forget, yet shall not all forget,

But they'll remember, with advantages,

What feats they did that day. Then shall our names,
Familiar in their mouths as household words,

Harry the King, Bedford and Exeter,
Warwick and Talbot, Salisbury and Glo'ster,
Be, in their flowing cups, freshly remembered.
This story shall the good man teach his son;
And Crispian's day shall ne'er go by,
From this time to the ending of the world,
But we in it shall be remember'd;

We few, we happy few, we band of brothers!
For, he to-day that sheds his blood with me,
Shall be my brother: be he e'er so vile,
This day shall gentle his condition;

And gentlemen in England, now a-bed,

Shall think themselves accursed they were not here,
And hold their manhoods cheap, while any speaks
That fought with us upon St. Crispian's day.

10.-MILTON'S SOLILOQUY ON HIS BLINDNESS.

HAIL, holy Light! offspring of heaven first-born,
Or of the Eternal coeternal beam,

May I express thee unblamed? since God is light,
And never but in unapproached light
Dwelt from eternity, dwelt then in thee,
Bright effluence of bright essence increate!
Or hear'st thou rather, pure ethereal stream,
Whose fountain who shall tell? Before the sun,
Before the heavens thou wert, and at the voice
Of God, as with a mantle, didst invest
The rising world of waters dark and deep,
Won from the void and formless infinite.
Thee I revisit now with bolder wing,

Escaped the Stygian pool, though long detain'd
In that obscure sojourn, while in my flight
Through utter and through middle darkness borne,
With other notes than to the Orphean lyre,
I sung of Chaos and eternal Night;

Taught by the heavenly Muse to venture down
The dark ascent, and up to reascend,
Though hard and rare: thee I revisit safe,
And feel thy sovereign vital lamp; but thou
Revisit'st not these eyes, that roll in vain
To find thy piercing ray, and find no dawn;
So thick a drop serene hath quench'd their orbs,
Or dim suffusion veil'd. Yet not the more
Cease I to wander where the Muses haunt,
Clear spring, or shady grove, or sunny hill,
Smit with the love of sacred song; but chief,
Thee, Sion, and the flowery brooks beneath,
That wash thy hallow'd feet, and warbling flow,
Nightly I visit: nor sometimes forget,
Those other two equall'd with me in fate,
So were I equall'd with them in renown,
Blind Thamyris, and blind Mæonides,
And Tiresias, and Phineas, prophets old:
Then feed on thoughts that voluntary move,
Harmonious numbers; as the wakeful bird
Sings darkling, and in shadiest covert hid,
Tunes her nocturnal note. Thus with the year
Seasons return; but not to me returns
Day, or the sweet approach of ev'n or morn,
Or sight of vernal bloom or summer's rose,
Or flocks or herds, or human face divine;
But cloud instead, and ever-during dark
Surrounds me, from the cheerful ways of men

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