MET. Is there no voice more worthy than my

own,

To found more sweetly in great Cæfar's ear,
For the repealing of my banish'd brother?

BRU. I kifs thy hand, but not in flattery, Cæfar; Defiring thee, that Publius Cimber may

Have an immediate freedom of repeal.
CES. What, Brutus!

CAS.

Pardon, Cæfar; Cæfar, pardon: As low as to thy foot doth Caffius fall,

To beg enfranchisement for Publius Cimber.

CES. I could be well mov'd, if I were as you;
If I could pray to move, prayers would move me:
But I am constant as the northern star,
Of whofe true-fix'd, and refting quality,
There is no fellow in the firmament.

The fkies are painted with unnumber'd sparks,
They are all fire, and every one doth shine;
But there's but one in all doth hold his place:
So, in the world; 'Tis furnifh'd well with men,
And men are flesh and blood, and apprehenfive;'
Yet, in the number, I do know but one'
That unaffailable holds on his rank,"

S apprehenfive;] Sufceptible of fear, or other paffions.

JOHNSON. Apprehenfive does not mean, as Johnson explains it, fufceptible of fear, but intelligent, capable of apprehending. M. MASON. So, in King Henry IV. P. II. Act IV. fc. iii: "makes it apprehenfive, quick, forgetive," &c. STEEVENS.

6

7

but one-] One and only one. JOHNSON.

holds on his rank,] Perhaps, holds on his race; continues his course. We commonly fay, To hold a rank, and To hold on a courfe or way. JOHNSON.

To" hold on his rank," is to continue to hold it; and I take rank to be the right reading. The word race, which Johnson proposes,

Unfhak'd of motion: and, that I am he,
Let me a little fhow it, even in this;

That I was constant Cimber should be banish'd,
And conftant do remain to keep him fo.

CIN. O Cæfar,

CES.

Hence! Wilt thou lift up Olympus?

DEC. Great Cæfar,

CES.

Doth not Brutus bootlefs kneel??

CASCA. Speak, hands, for me.

[Cafca ftabs Cæfar in the neck. Cæfar catches bold of his arm. He is then ftabb'd by several other confpirators, and at laft by Marcus Brutus.

would but ill agree with the following words, unshak'd of motion, or with the comparison to the polar ftar :

"Of whofe true fix'd, and refting quality,

"There is no fellow in the firmament.'

Hold on his rank, in one part of the comparifon, has precifely the fame import with hold his place, in the other. M. MASON. 8 Unfhak'd of motion:] i. e. Unfhak'd by fuit or folicitation, of which the object is to move the perfon addreffed. MALONE. 9 Doth not Brutus bootlefs kneel?] I would read:

Do not Brutus bootless kneel! JOHNSON.

I cannot fubfcribe to Dr. Johnfon's opinion. Cæfar, as fome of the confpirators are preffing round him, answers their importunity properly: See you not my own Brutus kneeling in vain? What fuccefs can you expect to your folicitations, when his are ineffectual? This might have put my learned coadjutor in mind of the paffage of Homer, which he has fo elegantly introduced in his preface. Thou? (faid Achilles to his captive) when fo great a man as Patroclus has fallen before thee, doft thou complain of the common lot of mortality? STEEVENS.

The editor of the fecond folio faw this paffage in the fame light as Dr. Johnfon did, and made this improper alteration. By Brutus here Shakspeare certainly meant Marcus Brutus, because he has confounded him with Decimus, (or Decius as he calls him); and imagined that Marcus Brutus was the peculiar favourite of Cæfar, calling him his well-beloved;" whereas in fact it was Decimus Brutus that Cæfar was particularly attached to, appointing him by

CES. Et tu, Brute?-Then fall, Cæfar.

[Dies. The fenators and people retire in confufion.

his will his fecond heir, that is, in remainder after his primary devifees. MALONE.

2 Et tu, Brute ?- -] Suetonius fays, that when Cæfar put Metellus Cimber back, "he caught hold of Cæfar's gowne at both fhoulders, whereupon, as he cried out, This is violence, Caffius came in fecond full a front, and wounded him a little beneath the throat. Then Cæfar catching Caffius by the arme thruft it through with his ftile, or writing punches; and with that being about to leape forward, he was met with another wound and ftayed." Being then affailed on all fides, "with three and twenty wounds he was ftabbed, during which time he gave but one groan, (without any word uttered,) and that was at the first thruft; though fome have written, that as Marcus Brutus came running upon him, he faid, xai cú Tixver, and thou, my fonne." Holland's Translation, 1607. No mention is here made of the Latin exclamation, which our author has attributed to Cæfar, nor did North furnish him with it, or with English words of the fame import, as might naturally have been fuppofed. Plutarch fays, that on receiving his first wound from Cafca," he caught hold of Cafca's fword, and held it hard; and they both cried out, Cæfar in Latin, O vile traitor, Cafea, what doeft thou? and Cafca in Greek to his brother, Brother, help me."-The confpirators then "compaffed him on every fide with their fwordes drawn in their handes, that Cæfar turned him no where but he was ftricken by fome, and ftill had naked fwords in his face, and was hacked and mangled amongst them as a wild beaft taken of hunters.-And then Brutus himself gave him one wound about the privities.-Men report alfo, that Cæfar did ftill defend himself against the refte, running every way with his bodie, but when he faw Brutus with his fworde drawen in his hande, then he pulled his gowne over his heade, and made no more refiftance."

Neither of these writers therefore, we fee, furnished Shakspeare with this exclamation. His authority appears to have been a line in the old play, entitled The True Tragedie of Richarde Duke of Yorke, &c. printed in 1600, on which he formed his third part of King Henry VI:

"Et tu, Brute? Wilt thou ftab Cæfar too ?"

This line Shakspeare rejected when he wrote the piece above mentioned, (See Vol. X. p. 374, n. 8.) but it appears it had made an impreffion on his memory. The fame line is alfo found

CIN. Liberty! Freedom! Tyranny is dead!— Run hence, proclaim, cry it about the streets. CAS. Some to the common pulpits, and cry out, Liberty, freedom, and enfranchisement!

BRU. People, and fenators! be not affrighted; Fly not; stand still :-ambition's debt is paid. CASCA. Go to the pulpit, Brutus.3

DEC.

BRU. Where's Publius?

And Caffius too.

CIN. Here, quite confounded with this mutiny.
MET. Stand faft together, left fome friend of
Cæfar's

Should chance

BRU. Talk not of standing;-Publius, good
cheer;

There is no harm intended to your perfon,
Nor to no Roman elfe: fo tell them, Publius.

in Acolaftus bis After-witte, a poem by S. Nicholfon, printed in

1600:

"Et tu, Brute? Wilt thou ftab Cæfar too?

"Thou art my friend, and wilt not fee me wrong'd." So, in Cæfar's Legend, Mirrour for Magiftrates, 1587:

"O this, quoth I, is violence; then Caffius pierc'd my breaft;

"And Brutus thou, my fonne, quoth I, whom erft I loved beft."

The Latin words probably appeared originally in Dr. Eedes's play on this fubject. See p. 338, n. *. MALONE.

3 Go to the pulpit, Brutus.] We have now taken leave of Cafca. Shakspeare for once knew that he had a fufficient number of heroes on his hands, and was glad to lose an individual in the crowd. It may be added, that the fingularity of Casca's manners would have appeared to little advantage amidft the fucceeding varieties of tumult and war. STEEVENS.

4 Nor to no Roman elfe:] This ufe of two negatives, not to make an affirmative, but to deny more ftrongly, is common to Chaucer,

Cas. And leave us, Publius; left that the people, Rufhing on us, should do your age fome mischief. BRU. Do fo;-and let no man abide this deed, But we the doers.

Re-enter TREBONIUS.

CAS. Where's Antony?

TRE.

Fled to his house amaz'd:

Men, wives, and children, ftare, cry out, and run, As it were doomsday.

BRU. Fates! we will know your pleasures :That we shall die, we know; 'tis but the time, And drawing days out, that men stand upon.

CAS.' Why, he that cuts off twenty years of life, Cuts off fo many years of fearing death.

BRU. Grant that, and then is death a benefit: So are we Cæfar's friends, that have abridg'd His time of fearing death.-Stoop, Romans, ftoop, And let us bathe our hands in Cæfar's blood Up to the elbows, and befmear our fwords: Then walk we forth, even to the market-place; And, waving our red weapons o'er our heads, Let's all cry, Peace! Freedom! and Liberty!

Spenfer, and other of our ancient writers. Dr. Hickes obferves, that in the Saxon, even four negatives are fometimes conjoined, and ftill preserve a negative fignification. STEEVENS.

5 Caf.] Both the folios give this speech to Casca. REED.

6 Stoop, Romans, foop,]. Plutarch, in The Life of Cafar, fays, "Brutus and his followers, being yet hot with the murder, march'd in a body from the fenate-houfe to the Capitol, with their drawn fwords, with an air of confidence and affurance." And in The Life of Brutus,-" Brutus and his party betook themselves to the Capitol, and in their way, showing their hands all bloody, and their naked fwords, proclaim'd liberty to the people." THEOBALD.