And though we lay these honours on this man,
To ease ourselves of divers sland’rous loads,
He shall but bear them as the ass bears gold,
To groan and sweat under the business,
Either led or driven, as we point the way;
And having brought our treasure where we will,
Then take we down his load, and turn him off,
Like to empty ass , to shake his ears,
And graze in the commons.
Thus it is clear that he like Caesar was also mainly interested in power than the general good of Rome.
Next we have to switch our heads towards the conspirators. Cassius being the founder of the conspiracy is the first logical person to look at. In act i sc2, from the account he gives to Caesar it is difficult to find out whether Cassius kills Caesar for personal reasons or for the freedom of Rome. But if observe carefully we notice that he points out Caesar’s weaknesses:
On two occasions…
For , upon a raw and gusty day,
The troubled Tiber chafing with her shores,
Caesar said to me 'Darest thou, Cassius, now
Leap in with me into this angry flood,
And swim to yonder ?' 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 proposed,
Caesar cried 'Help me, Cassius, or I sink!'
I, as Aeneas, our great ancestor,
Did from the flames of Troy upon his shoulder
The old Anchises bear, so from the waves of Tiber
Did I the tired Caesar. And this man
Is now become a god, and Cassius is
A wretched creature and must bend his body,
If Caesar carelessly but nod on him.
And:
He had a fever when he was in Spain,
And when the was on him, I did mark
How he did shake: 'tis true, this god did shake;
His coward lips did from their fly,
And that same whose bend doth awe the world
Did lose his lustre: I did hear him groan:
Ay, and that tongue of his that bade the Romans
Mark him and write his speeches in their books,
Alas, it cried 'Give me some drink, Titinius,'
As a sick girl. Ye gods, it doth amaze me
A man of such a feeble should
So get the start of the majestic world
And bear the palm alone.
more than pointing out his(Caesar’s) tyranny:
Why, man, he doth bestride the narrow world
Like a Colossus, and we petty men
Walk under his huge legs and peep about
To find ourselves dishonourable graves.
Men at some time are masters of their fates:
The fault, dear Brutus, is not in our stars,
But in ourselves, that we are underlings.
Continues:
Upon what meat doth this our Caesar feed,
That he is grown so great? Age, thou art shamed!
Rome, thou hast lost the breed of noble bloods!
When went there by an age, since the great flood,
But it was famed 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?
Now is it Rome indeed and room enough,
When there is in it but one only man.
Also in actI sc3 we can confirm his jelousy:
And why should Caesar be a tyrant then?
Poor man! I know he would not be a wolf,
But that he sees the Romans are but sheep:
He were no lion, were not Romans hinds.
Those that with haste will make a mighty fire
Begin it with weak straws: what is Rome,
What rubbish and what offal, when it serves
For the matter to illuminate
So vile a thing as Caesar!
Thus we discover that he to killed Caesar not for the welfare of Rome but because of envy and jealousy towards Caesar.
Now we have to turn our attention towards Brutus who is said to be noble and honourable by both – the conspirators (his friends):
And his enemies:
This was the noblest Roman of them all.
All the conspirators save only he
Did that they did in envy of great Caesar;
He only , in a general honest thought
And common good to all, made one of the them.
His life was gentle, and the elements
So mix’d in him, that nature might stand up
And say to the world, ‘This was a man!’
(Antony’s account of Brutus Act V Sc5)
Another way from which we can find out that Brutus’s actions were more towards the good will of Rome is by looking at his soliloquy in Act II sc1 in which he reasons on why to kill Caesar:
It must be by his death; and for my part,
I know no personal cause to spurn at him,
But for the general.
and also by looking at a particular part of Act IV Sc3:
Remember March, the ides of March remember.
Did not great Julius bleed for justice’ sake?
What villain touch’d his body, that did stab,
And not for justice? What shall one of us ,
That struck the foremost man of all this world
But for supporting robbers, shall we now
Contaminate our fingers with base bribes,
And sell the mighty space of our large honours
For so much trash as may be grasped thus?
I had rather be a dog, and bay the moon,
Than such a Roman.
Where his love for justice, his honour, nobility, and patriotism are justified. Even when he died, he died honourably like a true hero – he ran on his own sword!
Therefore in all the major characters Brutus was the only true hero in the play. Only his actions were based on the good will of Rome without any personal reasons. Thus it is true to say that ‘This was a man!’.
Bibliography
Internet (lost site address)
Note given to us by Mr. Bernard Tan