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ART. O, Cæfar, read mine firft; for mine's a

fuit

That touches Cæfar nearer: Read it, great Cæfar.

CAS. What touches us ourself, shall be last serv'd. ART. Delay not, Cæfar; read it instantly.

CES. What, is the fellow mad?

PUB.

Sirrah, give place.

CAS. What, urge you your petitions in the street? Come to the Capitol.

Cæfar enters the Capitol, the reft following.
All the Senators rise.

Pop. I wish, your enterprize to-day may thrive.
CAS. What enterprize, Popilius?

Pop. Fare you well.

[advances to Cæfar.

BRU. What faid Popilius Lena?

CAS. He wish'd, to-day our enterprize might thrive.

I fear, our purpofe is discovered.

BRU. Look, how he makes to Cæfar: Mark him.' CAS. Cafca, be fudden, for we fear prevention.Brutus, what shall be done? If this be known, Caffius or Cæfar never fhall turn back,"

Mark him.] The metre being here imperfect, I think, we fhould be at liberty to read :-Mark him well. So, in the paper read by Artemidorus, p. 306.-" Mark well Metellus Cimber." STEEVENS.

6 Caffius or Cæfar never shall turn back,] I believe Shakspeare

wrote:

Caffius on Cafar never shall turn back.

The next line ftrongly fupports this conjecture. If the confpiracy was discovered, and the affaffination of Cæfar rendered impracticable by "prevention," which is the cafe fuppofed, Caffius could have no hope of being able to prevent Cæfar from " turning back”

For I will flay myself.

BRU.

Caffius, be conftant: Popilius Lena fpeaks not of our purposes ; For, look, he smiles, and Cæfar doth not change.

(allowing "turn back to be used for return back); and in all events this confpirator's" flaying himself" could not produce that effect.

Caffius had originally come with a defign to affaffinate Cæfar, or die in the attempt, and therefore there could be no question now concerning one or the other of them falling. The queftion now ftated is, if the plot was discovered, and their scheme could not be effected, how each confpirator fhould act; and Caffius declares, that, if this fhould prove the cafe, he will not endeavour to fave himself by flight from the Dictator and his partizans, but instantly put an end to his own life.

The paffage in Plutarch's life of Brutus, which Shakspeare appears to have had in his thoughts, adds fuch ftrength to this emendation, that if it had been propofed by any former editor, I should have given it a place in the text. " Popilius Læna, that had talked before with Brutus and Caffius, and had prayed the gods they might bring this enterprize to pass, went unto Cæfar, and kept him a long time with a talke.-Wherefore the confpirators-conjecturing by that he had tolde them a little before, that his talke was none other but the verie difcoverie of their confpiracie, they were affrayed euerie man of them, and one looking in another's face, it was easie to fee that they were all of a minde, that it was no tarrying for them till they were apprehended, but rather that they should kill themselves with their own handes. And when Caffius and certain others clapped their handes on their fwordes under their gownes to draw them, Brutus, marking the countenance and gesture of Læna, &c. with a pleasant countenance encouraged Caffius," &c.

They clapped their hands on their daggers undoubtedly to be ready to kill themselves, if they were difcovered. Shakspeare was induced to give this fentiment to Caffius, as being exactly agreeable to his character, and to that spirit which has appeared in a former scene:

MALONE.

"I know where I will wear this dagger then; "Caffius from bondage will deliver Caffius." The disjunctive is right, and the fenfe apparent. Caffius fays, If our purpofe is difcovered, either Cæfar or I fhall never return alive; for, if we cannot kill him, I will certainly flay myself. The confpirators were numerous and refolute, and had they been betrayed, the confufion that must have arifen might have afforded defperate men an opportunity to despatch the tyrant. RITSON.

CAS. Trebonius knows his time; for, look you, Brutus,

He draws Mark Antony out of the way.

[Exeunt ANTONY and TREBONIUS. CESAR and the Senators take their feats.

DEC. Where is Metellus Cimber? Let him go, And presently prefer his fuit to Cæfar.

BRU. He is address'd: 'press near, and second him. CIN. Cafca, you are the first that rears your hand. CES. Are we all ready? what is now amifs, That Cæfar, and his fenate, must redress??

MET. Moft high, moft mighty, and most puiffant Cæfar,

7 He is addrefs'd:] i. e. he is ready. See Vol. IX. p. 363, n. 4. STEEVENS.

you are the first that rears your hand.] This, I think, is not English. The first folio has reares, which is not much better. To reduce the paffage to the rules of grammar, we should read— You are the firft that rears his hand. TYRWHITT.

According to the rules of grammar Shakspeare certainly should have written his hand; but he is often thus inaccurate.

the last act of this play, Caffius fays of himself,

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-Caffius is aweary of the world ;

all his faults obferv'd,

"Set in a note-book, learn'd and conn'd by rote,
"To caft into my teeth."

So, in

There in ftrict propriety our poet certainly fhould have written - into his teeth." MALONE.

As this and fimilar offences against grammar, might have originated only from the ignorance of the players or their printers, I cannot concur in reprefenting fuch mistakes as the pofitive inaccuracies of Shak fpeare. According to this mode of reafoning, the falfe fpellings of the firft folio, as often as they are exampled by correfponding falfe fpellings in the fame book, may also be charged upon our author. STEEVENS.

9 Cin. Cafca, you are the first that rear your hand.

Cæf. Are we all ready? What is now amifs,

That Cæfar, and his fenate, muft redress?] The words-Are we all ready-feem to belong more properly to Cinna's speech, than to Cæfar's. RITSON.

Metellus Cimber throws before thy feat

An humble heart :

[Kneeling,

CAS. I must prevent thee, Cimber. These couchings, and these lowly courtefies, Might fire the blood of ordinary men; And turn pre-ordinance, and first decree, Into the law of children. Be not fond,

And turn pre-ordinance,] Pre-ordinance, for ordinance already eftablished. WARBURTON.

3 Into the law of children.] [Old copy-lane.] I do not well understand what is meant by the lane of children. I should read, the law of children. That is, change pre-ordinance and decree into the law of children; into fuch flight determinations as every start of will would alter. Lane and lawe in fome manuscripts are not

easily distinguished. JOHNSON.

If the lane of children be the true reading, it may poffibly receive illuftration from the following paffage in Ben Jonfon's Staple of

News:

"A narrow-minded man! my thoughts do dwell

"All in a lane."

The lane of children will then mean the narrow conceits of children, which muft change as their minds grow more enlarged. So, in Hamlet:

"For nature, crefcent, does not grow alone

"In thewes and bulk; but as this temple waxes,

"The inward fervice of the mind and foul,

"Grows wide withal.”

But even this explanation is harsh and violent. Perhaps the poet wrote:-" in the line of children,” i. e. after the method or manner of children. In Troilus and Creffida, he uses line for method, course :

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In an ancient bl. letter ballad, entitled, Houshold Talk, or Good Councel for a Married Man, I meet indeed with a phrase somewhat fimilar to the lane of children:

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Neighbour Roger, when you come

"Into the row of neighbours married." STEEVENS.

The w of Shakspeare's time differed from an n only by a small curl at the bottom of the fecond ftroke, which if an e happened to follow, could fcarcely be perceived. I have not hesitated therefore to adopt Dr. Johnson's emendation. The words pre-ordinance and decree ftrongly fupport it. MALONE.

To think that Cæfar bears such rebel blood,
That will be thaw'd from the true quality
With that which melteth fools; I mean, fweet words,
Low-crooked curt'fies, and base spaniel fawning.
Thy brother by decree is banished;

If thou dost bend, and pray, and fawn, for him,
I fpurn thee like a cur out of my way.

Know, Cæfar doth not wrong; nor without cause
Will he be fatisfied.*

Know, Cafar doth not wrong; nor without caufe

Will he be fatisfied.] Ben Jonfon quotes this line unfaithfully among his Discoveries, and ridicules it again in the Introduction to his Staple of News: "Cry you mercy; you never did wrong, but with just cause?? STEEVENS.

It may be doubted, I think, whether Jonfon has quoted this line unfaithfully. The turn of the fentence, and the defect in the metre (according to the prefent reading), rather incline me to believe that the paffage ftood originally thus:

Know, Cafar doth not wrong, but with juft caufe;

Nor without cause will he be satisfied,

We may fuppofe that Ben started this formidable criticism at one of the earlieft representations of the play, and that the players, or perhaps Shakspeare himself, over-awed by fo great an authority, withdrew the words in queftion; though, in my opinion, it would have been better to have told the captious cenfurer that his criticism was ill-founded; that wrong is not always a fynonymous term for injury; that, in poetical language especially, it may be very well understood to mean only harm, or hurt, what the law calls damnum fine injuria; and that, in this fenfe, there is nothing abfurd in Cæfar's faying, that he doth not wrong (i. e. doth not inflict any evil, or punishment) but with just caufe. But, fuppofing this paffage to have been really cenfurable, and to have been written by Shakspeare, the exceptionable words were undoubtedly left out when the play was printed in 1623; and therefore what are we to think of the malignant pleafure with which Jonfon continued to ridicule his deceafed friend for a flip, of which pofterity, without his information, would have been totally ignorant?

TYRWHITT. Mr. Tyrwhitt's interpretation of the word wrong is fupported by a line in our author's Rape of Lucrece :

"Time's glory is

"To wrong the wronger, till he render right." MALONE.

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