o
be crowned king, and he replies thus, contemplating suicide:

_"I know where I will wear this dagger then;
Cassius from bondage will deliver Cassius;
Therein, ye gods, you make the weak most strong;
Therein, ye gods, you tyrants do defeat;
Nor stony tower, nor walls of beaten brass,
Nor airless dungeon, nor strong links of iron
Can be retentive to the strength of spirit;
But life being weary of these worldly bars,
Never lacks power to dismiss itself;
That part of tyranny that I do bear
I can shake off at pleasure!"_

Brutus, contemplating assassination, says in soliloquy:

_"To speak the truth of Caesar,
I have not known when his affections swayed
More than his reason. But 'tis a common proof,
That lowliness is young ambition's ladder,
Whereto the climber upward turns his face;
But when he once attains the upmost round,
He then unto the ladder turns his back,
Looks in the clouds, scorning the base degrees
By which he did ascend!"_

This ingratitude of the great to the people is often recompensed by defeat
and death.

After the senatorial conspirators decided that Caesar should die, Cassius
insisted wisely that Marcus Antonius should not outlive the great Julius,
and said:

"Let Antony and Caesar fall together!"

But Brutus would not consent to the death of Antony, believing that he was
not dangerous to their future, yet insisting that "Caesar must bleed for
it."

_"Let's kill him bodily, but not wrathfully;
Let's carve him as a dish fit for the gods,
Not hew him as a carcass fit for hounds;
And let our hearts as subtle masters do,
Stir up their servants to an act of rage,
And after seem to chide them!"_

And yet this is the sweet-scented assassin who prates of "honor," and is
sometimes known as "the noblest Roman of them all!"

Portia, the wife of Brutus, felt a strange alarm at his recent conduct, and
Calphurnia, the wife of Caesar, implored him not to attend the session of
the senate, reminding him of the soothsayer's warning--"Beware the ides of
March."

Yet, Caesar threw off all fear and suspicion and said:

_"What can be avoided,
Whose end is purposed by the mighty gods?
Yet Caesar shall go forth, for these predictions
Are to the world in general, not to Caesar!
Cowards die many times before their deaths;
The valiant never taste of death but once!"_

The hour o