Through this the well-beloved Brutus stabbed!
And, as he plucked his cursed steel away,
Mark how the blood of Cæsar followed it ;-
As rushing out of doors, to be resolved
If Brutus so unkindly knocked, or no;—
For Brutus, as you know, was Cæsar's angel!
Judge, O ye gods, how dearly Cæsar loved him!-
This, this was the unkindest cut of all;
For, when the noble Cæsar saw him stab,
Ingratitude, more strong than traitor's arms,
Quite vanquished him. Then burst his mighty heart;
And, in his mantle muffling up his face,
Even at the base of Pompey's statue
Which all the while ran blood-great Cæsar fell!
Oh, what a fall was there, my countrymen!
Then I, and you, and all of us, fell down;
Whilst bloody treason flourished over us!-
Oh, now you weep, and I perceive you feel
The dint of pity: these are gracious drops!
Kind souls!-what! weep you when you but behold
Our Cæsar's vesture wounded?-look you here!
Here is himself-marred, as you see, by traitors!-
Good friends! sweet friends! let me not stir you up
To such a sudden flood of mutiny!
They that have done this deed are honourable !—
What private griefs they have, alas! I know not,
That made them do it: they are wise and honourable,
And will, no doubt, with reason answer you!
I come not, friends, to steal away your hearts;
I am no orator, as Brutus is;
But, as you know me all, a plain, blunt man,
That loves his friend ;-and that they know full well.
That gave me public leave to speak of him ;—
For I have neither wit, nor words, nor worth,
Action, nor utterance, nor the power of speech,
To stir men's blood: I only speak right on!
I tell you that which you yourselves do know;
Show you sweet Caesar's wounds,-poor, poor, dumb mouths!—
And bid them speak for me. But, were I Brutus,
And Brutus Antony, there were an Antony
Would ruffle up your spirits, and put a tongue
wound of Cæsar, that should move
The stones of Rome to rise and mutiny!
III.-RICHMOND ENCOURAGING HIS SOLDIERS.-Shakspeare.
THUS far into the bowels of the land
Have we marched on without impediment.
Richard, the bloody and devouring boar,
Whose ravenous appetite has spoiled your fields,
Laid this rich country waste, and rudely cropped
Its ripened hopes of fair posterity,
Is now even in the centre of the isle.
Thrice is he armed who hath his quarrel just;
And he but naked, though locked up in steel,
Whose conscience with injustice is corrupted:
The very weight of Richard's guilt shall crush him-
Then, let us on, my friends, and boldly face him!
In peace, there's nothing so becomes a man
As mild behaviour and humanity;
But, when the blast of war blows in our ears,
Let us be tigers in our fierce deportment!
For me, the ransom of my bold attempt
Shall be this body on the earth's cold face;
But, if we thrive, the glory of the action
The meanest soldier here shall share his part of.
Advance your standards, draw your willing swords,
Sound drums and trumpets, boldly and cheerfully;
The words "St. George, Richmond, and Victory!"
IV.-HENRY V. TO HIS SOLDIERS AT THE SIEGE OF HARFLEUR.
ONCE more unto the breach, dear friends, once more;
Or close the wall up with our English dead!
In peace, there's nothing so becomes a man
As modest stillness and humility:
But when the blast of war blows in our ears,
Then imitate the action of the tiger;
Stiffen the sinews, summon up the blood,
Disguise fair nature with hard-favoured rage;
Then, lend the eye a terrible aspect;
Let it pry through the portage of the head,
Like the brass cannon; let the brow o'erwhelm it,
As fearfully as doth a gallèd rock
O'erhang and jutty his confounded base,
Swilled with the wild and wasteful ocean.-
Now set the teeth, and stretch the nostril wide,
Hold hard the breath, and bend up every spirit
To his full height! Now on! you noblest English,
Whose blood is fetched from fathers of war-proof;
Fathers, that, like so many Alexanders,
Have, in these parts, from morn till even fought,
And sheathed their swords for lack of argument !
I see you stand like greyhounds in the slips,
Straining upon the start. The game's a-foot;
Follow your spirit; and upon this charge,
Cry, Heaven for Harry, England, and St. George!
V.-CLARENCE'S DREAM.-Shakspeare.
Oh! I have passed a miserable night,
So full of ugly sights, of ghastly dreams,
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.
Methought that I had broken from the Tower
And was embarked to cross to Burgundy,-
And in my company my brother Glo'ster;
Who from my cabin tempted me to walk
Upon the hatches. Thence we looked toward England
And cited up a thousand heavy times
During the wars of York and Lancaster,
That had befallen us. As we passed along
Upon the giddy footing of the hatches,
Methought that Glo'ster stumbled, and, in falling,
Struck me (that sought to stay him) overboard,
Into the tumbling billows of the main.
Oh, Heaven! methought what pain it was to drown!
What dreadful noise of waters in mine ears!
What sights of ugly death within mine eyes!
I thought I saw a thousand fearful wrecks;
A thousand men that fishes gnawed upon;
Wedges of gold, great anchors, heaps of pearl,
Inestimable stones, unvalued jewels:
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 wooed the slimy bottom of the deep,
And mocked the dead bones that lay scattered by.
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 find the empty, vast, and wandering air;
But smothered it within my panting bulk,
Which almost burst to belch it in the sea.
Yet 'waked I not with this sore agony-
Ah no! my dream was lengthened after life:
Oh, then began the tempest of my soul!
I passed, methought, the melancholy flood,
With that grim ferryman whom 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 vanished. Then came wandering by
A shadow like an angel, with bright hair
Dabbled in blood; and he shrieked out aloud,——
“ Clarence is come, false, fleeting, perjured Clarence,
That stabbed me in the field by Tewkesbury:
Seize on him, furies, take him to your torments!"-
With that, methought, a legion of foul fiends
Environed me, and howlèd in my 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,
VI.-SOLILOQUY OF KING CLAUDIUS IN
OH! my offence is rank, it smells to Heaven!
It hath the primal, eldest curse upon't;
A brother's murder!-Pray I cannot:
Though inclination be as sharp as 'twill,
My stronger guilt defeats my strong intent:
And, like a man to double business bound,
I stand in pause where I shall first begin--
And both neglect. What if this cursed hand
Were thicker than itself with brother's blood-
Is there not rain enough in the sweet heaven
To wash it white as snow? Whereto serves mercy,
But to confront the visage of offence?
And what's in prayer, but this twofold force-
To be forestalled, ere we come to fall;
Or pardoned, being down?-Then I'll look up,
My fault is past.-But oh! what form of prayer
Can serve my turn ?-" Forgive me my foul murder!"—
That cannot be, since I am still possessed
Of those effects for which I did the murder—
My crown, my own ambition, and my queen.
May one be pardoned, and retain the offence?
In the corrupted currents of this world,
Offence's gilded hand may shove by Justice;
And oft 'tis seen, the wicked prize itself
Buys out the law. But 'tis not so above-
There is no shuffling: there the action lies
In its true nature, and we ourselves compelled
Even to the teeth and forehead of our faults,
To give in evidence. What then? What rests?
Try what repentance can:-what can it not?
Yet what can it, when one cannot repent?
Oh, wretched state! oh, bosom black as death!
Oh, limèd soul, that, struggling to be free,
Art more engaged! Help, angels!-Make essay:
Bow, stubborn knees; and, heart, with strings of steel,
Be soft as sinews of the new-born babe!
VII.-HENRY IV., ON SLEEP.- -Shakspeare.
How many thousands of my poorest subjects
Are at this hour asleep:-O gentle Sleep!
Nature's soft nurse! how have I frighted thee,
That thou no more wilt weigh my eye-lids down,
And steep my senses in forgetfulness!
Why rathor, Sleep, liest thou in smoky cribs,
Upon uneasy pallets stretching thee,
And hushed with buzzing night-flies to thy slumber
Than in the perfumed chambers of the great,
Under the canopies of costly state,
And lulled with sounds of sweetest melody?
Oh, thou dull god! why liest thou with the vile
In loathsome beds, and leav'st the kingly couch
A watch-case to a common 'larum-bell?
Wilt thou, upon the high and giddy mast,
Seal up the ship-boy's eyes, and rock his brains
In cradle of the rude imperious surge;
And, in the visitation of the winds,
Which take the ruffian billows by the top,
Curling their monstrous heads, and hanging them
With deafening clamours in the slippery shrouds,
That, with the hurly, Death itself awakes ;-
Canst thou, O partial Sleep! give thy repose
To the wet sea-boy in an hour so rude,
And, in the calmest and the stillest night,
With all appliances and means to boot,
Deny it to a king? Then, happy, lowly clown:
Uneasy lies the head that wears a crown.
VIII.-THE BISHOP OF CARLISLE IN DEFENCE OF KING
RICHARD II.-Shakspeare.
WORST in this royal presence may I speak,
Yet best beseeming me to speak the truth.
I would that any in this noble presence
Were enough noble to be upright judge
Of noble Richard; then true nobleness would
Teach him forbearance from so foul a wrong.
What subject can give sentence on a king?
And who sits here, that is not Richard's subject?
Thieves are not judged, but they are by to hear,
Although apparent guilt be seen in them:
And shall the figure of Heaven's Majesty,
His captain, steward, deputy elect,
Anointed, crowned, planted many years,
Be judged by subject and inferior breath,
And he himself not present? Oh, forbid it, heaven,
That, in a Christian climate, souls refined
Should show so heinous, black, obscene a deed!
I speak to subjects, and a subject speaks,
Stirred up by truth, thus boldly for his king.
My lord of Hereford here, whom you call king,
Is a foul traitor to proud Hereford's king:
And if you crown him, let me prophesy-
The blood of English shall manure the ground,
And future ages groan for this foul act;
Peace shall go sleep with Turks and infidels,
And, in this seat of peace, tumultuous wars
Shall kin with kin and kind with kind confound;
Disorder, horror, fear, and mutiny,
Shall here inhabit, and this land be called
The field of Golgotha and dead men's skulls.
Oh! if you rear this house against this house,
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