Is now become a god; and Caffius is
A wretched creature, and must bend his body,
If Cæfar carelefly 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,

groan:

And that fame eye, whofe bend doth awe the world,
Did lofe its luftre; I did hear him
Aye, and that tongue of his, that bad the Romans
Mark him, and write his speeches in their books,
Alas! it cry'd-" give me some drink, Titinius-
As a fick girl. Ye gods, it doth amaze me,
A man of fuch a feeble temper should
(3) So get the start of the majestic world,
And bear the palm alone.

[Shout. flourish

Bru. Another general shout!
I do believe that these applauses are

For fome new honours that are heap'd on Cæfar.
Caf. Why, man, he doth bestride the narrow world

Like a Coloffus; and we petty men
Walk under his huge legs, and peep about
To find ourselves difhonourable graves.

""

Though that does

(3) So get, &c.] Mr. Warburton tells us "the image is extremely noble: it is taken from the Olympic games.' not appear fo certain or neceffary, fince the allufion to any publick games will do full as well; yet what he says afterwards is more to the purpose: "The majestic world is a fine periphrafis for the Roman empire: their citizens fet themselves on a footing with kings, and they called their dominion, Orbis Romanus.” lar allufion feems to be to the known story of Cæfar's great pattern, Alexander, who, being asked whether he would run the courfe at the Olympic games, replied, yes, if the racers were kings. For this allufion alfo, there does not feem the least hint in the page; rather the contrary: Caffius wonders how fuch a feeble man fhould fo get the start of all the Romans, the majestic world, as to bear the palm alone? How he, feebler than the reft, fhould in the courfe outArip 'em all, and carry off the prize ?

"C

""

Men

en went there b was fam'd wi could they f at her wide wa

SCENE IV

Would he were

my name w not know t

on as that fp a great ob through th

ou doft, Ar

Som he fmile

But the particu- the mock'd

He bears, & atrivial obl afus was no mperament A2tures, fo

ed on this fer The man th

Men at some times are mafters of their fates:
The fault, dear Brutus, is not in our stars
But in our felves, that we are underlings.
Brutus and Cæfar! what should be in that Cæfar?
Why should that name be founded more than yours?
Write them together; yours is as fair a name:
Sound them, it doth become the mouth as well;
Weigh them, it is as heavy; conjure with 'em,
Brutus will start a spirit, as soon as Cæsar.
Now in the names of all the gods at once,
Upon what meat doth this our Cæfar feed,
That he is grown fo great? Age, thou art sham'd;
Rome, thou haft loft the breed of noble bloods.
When went there by an age, fince the great flood,
But it was fam'd with more than with one man?
When could they say, till now, that talk'd of Rome,
That her wide walls encompass'd but one man ?

SCENE IV. Cæfar's Diflike of Caffius.

Would he were fatter; but I fear him not: Yet if my name were liable to fear,

I do not know the man I should avoid,

So foon as that spare Caffius. He reads much;
He is a great obferver; and he looks
Quite through the deeds of men.
He loves no plays,
As thou doft, Antony; (4) he hears no musick :
Seldom he fmiles; and fmiles in such a fort,
As if he mock'd himself, and scorn'd his spirit,

(4) He bears, &c.] Mr. Theobald obferves well here: "This is not a trivial obfervation, nor does our poet mean barely by it, that Caffius was not a merry, sprightly man, but that he had not a due temperament of harmony in his compofition: and that, therefore, natures, fo uncorrected, are dangerous." He hath finely dilated on this fentiment, in his Merchant of Venice.

The man that hath no mufick, &..

See vol. i p.71.

That

That could be mov'd to fmile at any thing.
Such men as he be never at heart's ease,
Whilft they behold a greater than themselves;
And therefore are they very dangerous.
I rather tell thee what is to be fear'd,
'Than what I fear; for always I am Cæfar.

SCENE VII. Spirit of Liberty.

I know, where I will wear this dagger then:
Caffius from bondage will deliver Caffius.
Therein, ye gods, you make the weak moft ftrong;
Therein, ye gods, you tyrants do defeat:
Nor ftony tower, nor walls of beaten brass,
Nor airless dungeon, nor ftrong links of iron,
Can be retentive to the ftrength of spirit :
But life, being weary of these worldly bars,
Never lacks power to difmifs itself.

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

ACT II. SCENE I.

Ambition, cover'd with fpecious Humility.
But 'tis a common proof,

That lowlinefs is young ambition's ladder,
Whereto the climber upward turns his face;
But when he once attains the upmoft round,
He then unto the ladder turns his back,
Looks in the cloud, fcorning the base degrees
By which he did afcend.

Confpiracy

Confpiracy, dreadful till executed.

(5) 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 inftruments
Are then in council; and the state of man,
Like to a little kingdom, fuffers then
The nature of an infurrection.

Confpiracy

(5) Between, &c] Mr, Addifon has paraphrafed this inimitable paffage, in his Cato, which always ferves to remind me of that excellent diftinction, made by Mr. Guthrie, in his Effay on Tragedy, betwixt a poet and a genius: See p. 18, &c. and p. 237. vol. 1.

O think, what anxious moments pafs between
The birth of plots, and their last fatal periods.

Oh 'tis a dreadful interval of time,

Fill'd up with horror all, and big with death.

CATO Either Mr Theobald, or Mr. Warburton (which who can pronounce, fince the one prints the fame words in his preface, which the other ufes as his own in his notes? See Theobald's preface vol. 1. p. 25, and Warburton on the passage) either the one or the other of them, have obferved," that nice critic, Dionyfius, of Halicarnaffus, confeffes, that he could not find those great ftrokes, which he calls the terrible graces, any where fo frequent as in Homer. I believe the fuccefs would be the fame, likewife, if we fought for them in any other of our authors befides our British Homer, Shakespear. This defcription of the condition of confpirators has a pomp and terror in it, that perfectly aftonishes; our excellent Mr. Addifon, whofe modefty made him fometimes diffident in his own genius, but whofe exquifite judgment always led him to the safest guides, has paraphrafed this fine defcription: but we are no longer to expect thofe terrible graces, which he could not hinder from evaporating in the transfufion. We may obferve two things on-his imitation: first, that the fubjects of thefe two confpiracies being fo very different, (the fortune of Cæfar and the Roman empire being concern'd in the firft, and that of only a few auxiliary troops in the other) Mr. Addifon could not with that propriety bring in that magnificent circumftance, which gives the terrible grace to Shakespear's defcription:

The genius and the mortal inftruments

Are then in council.

VOL. II.

F

For

CONSPIRACY.

O confpiracy!

Sham'ft thou to fhew thy dang'rous brow by night,
When evils are most free? O then, by day

Where wilt thou find a cavern dark enough,
To mask thy monftrous vifage? Seek none, confpiracy;

Hide it in. (miles and affability:

For if thou (6) path, thy nativé semblance on,
Not Erebus itself were dim enough
To hide thee from prevention.

Against Cruelty.

Gentle friends,

Let's kill him boldly, but not wrathfully;

For kingdoms, in the poetical theology befides their good, have their evil genius's likewife, reprefented here with the moft daring ftretch of fancy, as fitting in council with the confpirators, whom he calls the mortal inftruments. But this would have been too great an apparatus to the rape and defertion of Syphaxand Sempronius. Secondly, the other thing very obferveable is, that Mr. Addifen was fo warm'd and affected with the fire of shakespear's defcription, that instead of copying his author's fentiments, he has, before he was aware, given us only the image of his own expreffions, on the reading his great original. For

Oh, 'tis a dreadful interval of time

Fill'd up with horror all, and big with death,

Are but the affections rais'd by fuch forcible images as thefe,

All the interim is

Like a phantafma, or a hideous dream.

The ftate of man,

Like to a little kingdom, fuffers then
'The nature of an infurrection.

Comparing the mind of a confpirator to an anarchy, is just and beautiful: but the interim to a hideous dream, has fomething in it fo wonderfully natural, and lays the human foul fo open, that one cannot but be furpriz'd, that any poet, who had not himself been fome time or other engaged in a confpiracy, could ever have given fuch force of colouring to truth and nature.'

(6) Path,] i. e. walk; he makes a verb of the substantive, which is very common with him.

Not

"