away his own uncle, to glut his revenge with the blood of Cicero; though even here his revenge was less hideous than the cold-blooded policy of young Octavius. Yet Antony has in the play, as he had in fact, some right-noble streaks in him; for his character was a very mixed one; and there was to the last a fierce war of good and evil within him. Especially he had an eye to see, a heart to feel, and a soul to honour the superb structure of manhood which Rome possessed in Julius Cæsar, who stood to him indeed as a kind of superior nature, to raise him above himself. He "fear'd Cæsar, honour'd him, and loved him"; and this religious gravitation towards him was honourable to them both. Antony's usual style of oratory is said to have been rather of the bloated and gassy sort; yet, with the murdered Cæsar for his theme, he was for once inspired and kindled to a rapture of the truest, noblest, most overwhelming eloquence; his actual performance being hardly exaggerated by the oration. Shakespeare puts in his mouth. Nor must I omit the grateful remembrance at last of his obligations to Brutus for having saved him from the daggers of the conspirators. The People. That many-headed, but withal big-souled creature, the multitude, is charmingly characterized in these scenes. It is true, they are rather easily swayed hither and thither by the contagion of sympathy and of persuasive speech; yet their feelings are in the main right, and even their judgment in the long run is better than that of the pampered Roman aristocracy, inasmuch as it proceeds more from the instincts of manhood. Shakespeare evidently loved to play with the natural, unsophisticated, though somewhat childish heart of the people; but his playing is always genial and human hearted, with a certain angelic humour in it that seldom fails to warm us towards the subject. On the whole, he understood the people well, and they have well repaid him in understanding him better, I suspect, than the critics have done. The cobbler's droll humour, at the opening of this play, followed as it is by a strain of the loftiest poetry, is aptly noted by Campbell as showing that the Poet, "even in dealing with classical subjects, laughed at the classic fear of putting the ludicrous and sublime into juxtaposition." General Remarks. As a whole, this play is several degrees inferior to Coriolanus. Admirable as is the characterization, regarded individually, still, in respect of dramatic composition, the play does not, to my mind, stand among the Poet's masterpieces. But it abounds in particular scenes and passages fraught with the highest virtue of his genius. Among these may be specially mentioned the second scene of the first Act, where Cassius lays the egg of the conspiracy in Brutus's mind, warmed with such a wrappage of instigation as to assure its being quickly hatched. Also, the first scene of the second Act, unfolding the birth of the conspiracy, and winding up with the interview, so charged with domestic glory, of Brutus and Portia. The oration of Antony in Cæsar's funeral is such an interfusion of art and passion as realizes the very perfection of its kind. Adapted at once to the comprehension of the lowest mind and to the delectation of the highest, and running its pathos into the very quick of them that hear it, it tells with terrible effect on the people; and when it is done we feel that Cæsar's bleeding wounds are mightier than ever his genius and fortune were. The quarrel of Brutus and Cassius is deservedly celebrated. Dr. Johnson thought it "somewhat cold and unaffecting." Coleridge thought otherwise. "I know," says he, "no part of Shakespeare that more impresses on me the belief of his genius being superhuman than this scene." I am content to err with Coleridge here, if it be an error. But there is nothing in the play that seems to me more divinely touched than the brief scene, already noticed, of Brutus and his boy Lucius. And what a dear little fellow Lucius is! so gentle, so dutiful, so loving, so thoughtful and careful for his master; and yet himself no more conscious of his virtue than a flower of its fragrance. His falling asleep in the midst of his song, and his exclaiming on being aroused, "The strings, my lord, are false," are so good that I cannot speak of them. JULIUS CÆSAR. JULIUS CÆSAR. PERSONS REPRESENTED. Triumvirs, after his Death. FLAVIUS and MARULLUS, Tribunes. CINNA, a Poet. Another Poet. CICERO, PUBLIUS, POPILIUS LENA, LUCILIUS, TITINIUS, MESSALA, young Senators, Citizens, Guards, Attendants, &c. SCENE, during a great part of the Play, at Rome; afterwards at Sardis; and near Philippi. ACT I. SCENE I. Rome. A Street. Enter FLAVIUS, MARULLUS, and a Throng of Citizens. Flav. Hence! home, you idle creatures, get you home! Is this a holiday? What! know you not, 39 Being mechanical,1 you ought not walk? Of your profession ?3-Speak, what trade art thou? Mar. Where is thy leather apron and thy rule? You, sir; what trade are you? 2 Cit. Truly, sir, in respect of a fine workman, I am but, as you would say, a cobbler. Mar. But what trade art thou? Answer me directly.5 2 Cit. A trade, sir, that I hope I may use with a safe conscience; which is indeed, sir, a mender of bad soles. Mar. What trade, thou knave? thou naughty knave, what trade? if 2 Cit. Nay, I beseech you, sir, be not out with me: yet, you be out, sir, I can mend you.6 1 Shakespeare often uses adjectives with the sense of plural substantives; as mechanical here for mechanics or artizans. So in Hamlet, i. 1: “Tell me why this same strict and most observant watch so nightly toils the subject of the land." The sense in the text is, "Know you not that, being mechanics, you ought not," &c. 2 "Ought not to walk," of course. This omission of to is not unfrequent. So in The Merchant, i. 3: "Whose own hard dealing teaches them suspect the thoughts of others." 3 The Poet here transfers to Rome the English customs and usages of his own time; representing men in the several mechanic trades as having their guilds, with appropriate regulations and badges. 4 Here, as often, in respect of is equivalent to in comparison with. So in the 39th Psalm of The Psalter: "Thou hast made my days as it were a span long, and mine age is even as nothing in respect of Thee." See, also, Hamlet, page 219, note 29. 5 Cobbler, it seems, was used of a coarse workman, or a botcher, in any mechanical trade. So that the Cobbler's answer does not give the information required.— Directly here has the sense of the Latin directus; in a straightforward manner, or without evasion. 6 Of course there is a play upon the two senses of out here. To be out |