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 Eneas, 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
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,
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?
Oh! you and I have heard our fathers say,
There was a Brutus once, that would have brook'd
The eternal devil to keep his state in Rome,
HAMLET'S SOLILOQUY ON THE IMMORTALITY OF THE
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,
To groan and sweat under a weary life,
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
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!
SHAKSPEARE.
[See p. 312.]
Brakenbury. Why looks your grace so heavily to-day ?
Clarence. O, I have passed a miserable night,
So full of fearful dreams, of ugly sights,
That, as I am a Christian faithful man,
I would not spend another such a night,
Though 'twere to buy a world of happy days;
So full of dismal terror was the time.
Brak. What was your dream, my lord? I pray you tell me.
Clar. Methought, that I had broken from the Tower,
And was embark'd to cross to Burgundy,
And, in my company, my brother Gloster:
Who, from my cabin, tempted me to walk
Upon the hatches; thence we look'd toward England,
And cited up a thousand heavy times,
During the wars of York and Lancaster
That had befallen us. As we paced along
Upon the giddy footing of the hatches,
Methought that Gloster stumbled; and, in falling,
Struck me, that thought to stay him, overboard,
Into the tumbling billows of the main.
O Lord! methought, what pain it was to drown!
What fearful noise of waters in mine ears!
What sights of ugly death within mine eyes!
Methought, I saw a thousand fearful wrecks;
A thousand men, that fishes gnaw'd upon;
Wedges of gold, great anchors, heaps of pearl,
Inestimable stones, unvalued jewels,
All scattered in the bottom of the sea.
Some lay in dead men's skulls; and in those holes
Where eyes did once inhabit, there were crept
(As 'twere in scorn of eyes) reflecting gems,
That woo'd the slimy bottom of the deep,
And mock'd the dead bones that lay scattered by.
Brak. Had you such leisure in the time of death
To gaze upon the secrets of the deep?
Clar. Methought I had, and often did I strive
To yield the ghost; but still the envious flood
Kept in my soul, and would not let it forth
To seek the empty, vast, and wand'ring air,
But smother'd it within my panting bulk,
Which almost burst to cast it in the sea.
Brak. Awaked you not with this sore agony?
Clar. O, no, my dream was lengthen'd after life;
O, then began the tempest to my soul!
I pass'd, methought, the melancholy flood,
With that grim ferryman which poets write of,
Unto the kingdom of perpetual night;
The first that there did greet my stranger soul,
Was my great father-in-law, renowned Warwick;
Who cried aloud,-what scourge for perjury
Can this dark monarchy afford false Clarence?
And so he vanish'd: Then came wand'ring by
A shadow like an angel, with bright hair
Dabbled in blood: and he shriek'd out aloud-
Clarence is come, false, fleeting, perjured Clarence,
That stabb'd me in the field of Tewkesbury;-
Seize on him, furies, take him to your torments!
With that, methought, a legion of foul fiends
Environ'd me, and howlèd in mine ears
Such hideous cries, that, with the very noise,
I trembling waked, and, for a season after,
Could not believe but that I was in hell;
Such terrible impression made my dream.
Brak. No marvel, lord, though it affrighted you;
I am afraid, methinks, to hear you tell it.
Clar. O, Brakenbury, I have done these things,-
That now give evidence against my soul,-
For Edward's sake; and, see, how he requites me!
O God! if my deep prayers cannot appease thee,
But thou wilt be avenged on my misdeeds,
Yet execute thy wrath on me alone :
O, spare my guiltless wife, and my poor children !
I pray thee, gentle keeper, stay by me;
My soul is heavy, and I fain would sleep.
Brak. I will, my lord; God give your grace good rest! (CLARENCE reposes himself on a chair.)
Sorrow breaks seasons and reposing hours,
Makes the night morning, and the noontide night.
Princes have but their titles for their glories,
An outward honour for an inward toil;
And, for unfelt imaginations,
They often feel a world of restless cares:
So that, between their titles, and low name,
There's nothing differs but the outward fame.
Glos. Now is the winter of our discontent
Made glorious summer by this son of York;
And all the clouds that low'r'd upon our house
In the deep bosom of the ocean buried.
Now are our brows bound with victorious wreaths;
Our stern alarums chang'd to merry meetings;
Our dreadful marches to delightful measures.
Grim-visag'd war hath smooth'd his wrinkled front;
And now, instead of mounting barbed steeds,
He capers nimbly in a lady's chamber
To the lascivious pleasing of a lute.
But I, that am not shaped for sportive tricks,
Nor made to court an amorous looking-glass;
I, that am curtail'd of this fair proportion,
Deform'd, unfinish'd, sent before my time
Into this breathing world, scarce half made up,
And that so lamely and unfashionable
That dogs bark at me as I halt by them;
Why, I, in this weak piping time of peace,
Have no delight to pass away the time,
Unless to spy my shadow in the sun,
And descant on mine own deformity:
And therefore, since I cannot prove a lover,
Plots have I laid, by prophecies and dreams,
To set my brother Clarence and the King
In deadly hate, the one against the other,
Dive, thoughts, down to my soul: here Clarence comes.
DOUGLAS'S ACCOUNT OF HIMSELF.
REV. JOHN HOME.
[See page 341.]
My name is Norval. On the Grampian hills
My father feeds his flocks; a frugal swain,
Whose constant cares were to increase his store,
And keep his only son, myself, at home:
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