[Cæfar enters the Capitol, the reft following.]

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

Pop. Fare you well.

Bru. What faid Popilius Lena?

Caf. Hewish'd, to-day our enterprize might thrive. I fear, our purpose is difcovered.

Bru. Look, how he makes to Cæfar; Mark him. Caf. Cafca, be fudden, for we fear prevention.Brutus, what fhall be done? If this be known, Caffius, or Cæfar, never fhall turn back, For I will lay myself.

Bru. Caffius, be conftant;

Popilius Lena speaks not of our purposes;

For, look, he smiles, and Cæfar doth not change, Caf. Trebonius knows his time; for, look you, Brutus,

He draws Mark Antony out of the way.

[Exeunt Ant. and Treb. Dec. Where is Metellus Cimber? Let him go, And prefently prefer his fuit to Cæfar.

Bru. He is addreft3: prefs near, and fecond him. Cin. Cafca, you are the first that rear your hand*. Caf. Are we all ready? What is now amifs, That Cæfar, and his fenate, muft redress?

Met. Moft high, moft mighty, and moft puiffant Cæfar,

Metellus Cimber throws before thy feat [Kneeling. An humble heart:

Caf. I must prevent thee, Cimber.

3 He is addreft:] i. e. he is ready. See Vol. III. p. 117. We We are now to fuppofe the fenate is feated. STEEVENS.

4

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

ter.

Thefe

Thefe couchings, and thefe lowly courtefies,
Might fire the blood of ordinary men;

6

And turn pre-ordinance, and firft decree,

• Into the lane of children. Be not fond, To think that Cæfar bears fuch rebel blood, That will be thaw'd from the true quality

With that which melteth fools; I mean, fweet words,
Low-crooked curtfies, and bafe fpaniel fawning.
Thy brother by decree is banished;

If thou doft 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.

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

Into the lane of children.] I do not well understand what is meant by the lane of children. I fhould 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 manufcripts are not eafily diftinguished. 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 must 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 ufes line for method, course :

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

"Neighbour Roger, when you come

"Into the row of neighbours married." STEEVENS.

Will he be fatisfied"?

Met. Is there no voice more worthy than my own, To found more fweetly 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.
Caf. What, Brutus !

Know, Cafar doth not wrong; nor without cause
Will he be fatisfied.]

Ben Jonfon quotes this line unfaithfully among his Difcoveries, and ridicules it again in the Introduction to his Staple of News: "Cry you mercy; you never did wrong, but with just caufe ?"

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 flood originally thus:

Know, Cafar doth not wrong, but with just caufe;
Nor without caufe will he be fatisfied.

We may fuppofe that Ben started this formidable criticism at one of the earliest reprefentations 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 fynonimous 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 injuriâ; 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 juft 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 pleasure with which Jonfon continued to ridicule his deceafed friend for a flip, of which posterity, without his information, would have been totally ignorant? TYRWHITT.

Mr. Tyrwhitt's very ingenious conjecture is, in my opinion, ftrongly confirmed by our author's having used the verb, to wrong, in his Rape of Lucrece, in the fenfe in which he is fuppofed to have employed it here, as the paffage ftood originally: "Time's glory is

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

MALONE.

Caf.

Caf. Pardon, Cæfar; Cæfar, pardon:
As low as to thy foot doth Caffius fall,
To beg enfranchisement for Publius Cimber.
Caf. I could be well mov'd, if I were as you;
If I could pray to move, prayers would move me ;
But I am conftant as the northern star,
Of whofe true-fixt, and refting quality,
There is no fellow in the firmament.

The skies are painted with unnumbred fparks,
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,

I

8

Unfhak'd of motion: and, that I am he,
Let me a little fhew it, even in this;
That I was conftant Cimber should be banish'd,
And conftant do remain to keep him fo.
Cin. O Cæfar,-

Caf. Hence! Wilt thou lift up Olympus?
Dec. Great Cæfar,-

Caf. Doth not Brutus bootless kneel?

་

Cafca.

3-apprehenfive;] Sufceptible of fear, or other paffions.

JOHNSON.

So, in K. Hen. IV. P. II. A& IV. fc. iii: "makes it apprehenfive, quick, forgettive, &c." STEEVENS.

9 but one] One and only one. JOHNSON,

I

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

2 Doth not Brutus bootless kneel] I would read:

Do not Brutus bootlefs 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 inef factual? 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 so wear

2

a man

Cafca. Speak, hands, for me. [They ftab Cafar. Caf. Et tu, Brute ?Then fall, Cæfar! [Dies, Cin. Liberty! Freedom! Tyranny is dead!Run hence, proclaim, cry it about the ftreets. Caf. Some to the common pulpits, and cry out, Liberty, freedom, and enfranchisement!

Bru. People, and fenators! be not affrighted; Fly not; ftand ftill:-ambition's debt is paid. Cafca. Go to the pulpit, Brutus .

Dec. And Caffius too.

Bru. Where's Publius?

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.

Caf. And leave us, Publius; left that the people, Rufhing on us, fhould do your age fome mifchief. Bru. Do fo;-and let no man abide this deed, But we the doers.

Re-enter Trebonius.

Caf. Where is Antony?

Tre. Fled to his house amaz’d:

a man as Patroclus has fallen before thee, doft thou complain of the common lot of mortality? STEEVENS.

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 croud. It may be added, that the fingularity of Cafca's manners would have appeared to little advantage amidst the fucceeding varieties of tumult and war. STEEVENS.

Nor to no Roman elfe.] This ufe of two negatives, not to make an affirmative, but to deny more ftrongly, is common to Chaucer, Spenfer, and other of our ancient writers. Hickes obferves, that in the Saxon, even four negatives are fometimes conjoined, and ftill preferve a negative fignification. STEEVENS.

Men