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If you have tears, prepare to shed them now.
You all do know this mantle; I remember
The first time ever Cæsar put it on;

'Twas on a summer's evening in his tent;

That day he overcame the Nervii.

Look! In this place ran Cassius's dagger through:
See what a rent the envious Casca made:
Through this, the well-belovéd Brutus stabbed;
And as he plucked his curséd steel away,
Mark, how the blood of Cæsar followed it!
This was the most unkindest cut of all!
For when the noble Cæsar saw him stab,
Ingratitude, more strong than traitors' 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.
O, what a fall was there, my countrymen!
Then I, and you, and all of us, fell down,
Whilst bloody treason flourished over us.
O, 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 ye 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 honorable!
What private griefs they have, alas, I know not,
That made them do it! They are wise and honorable,

And will, no doubt, with reasons 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 love my 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 Cæsar'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
In every wound of Cæsar, that should move
The stones of Rome to rise and mutiny!

Shakspeare.

CCXLI.

HAMLET'S SOLILOQUY.

To be, or not to be; - that is the question : —

Whether 't is nobler in the mind, to suffer

The slings and arrows of outrageous Fortune;

Or to take arms against a sea of troubles,

And, by opposing, end them? - To die, to sleep, —
No more; and, by a sleep, to say we end

The heartache, and the thousand natural shocks

That flesh is heir to,

't is a consummation

Devoutly to be wished. To die, to sleep;

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To sleep! perchance to dream;-ay, there's the rub;
For in that sleep of death what dreams may come,
When we have shuffled off this mortal coil,

Must give us pause. There's the respect
That makes calamity of so long life;

For who would bear the whips and scorns of time,
The oppressor's wrong, the proud man's contumely,
The pangs of despiséd love, the law's delay,
The insolence of office, and the spurns
That patient merit of the unworthy takes,
When he himself might his quietus make

With a bare bodkin? Who would fardels bear,
To grunt and sweat under a weary
life;
But that the dread of something after death,
'The undiscovered country, from whose bourn
No traveller returns, puzzles the will,
And makes us rather bear those ills we have,
Than fly to others that we know not of?

Thus conscience does make cowards of us all;
And thus the native hue of resolution
Is sicklied o'er with pale cast of thought;
And enterprises of great pith and moment,
With this regard, their currents turn awry,
And lose the name of action.

Shakspeare.

CCXLII.

SOLILOQUY OF HAMLET'S UNCLE.

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 't will:
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 curséd hand
Were thicker than itself with brother's blood
Is there not rain enough in the sweet heavens
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,

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Or pardoned being down? Then I'll look up;
My fault is past. But, O, 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, mine 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 't is seen, the wicked prize itself
Buys out the law: but 't is not so above;
There is no shuffling; there the action lies
In his true nature; and we ourselves compell'd,
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 can not repent?

O wretched state! O bosom, black as death!

O limed soul, that, struggling to be free,
Art more engag'd! Help, angels! make assay !
Bow, stubborn knees; and, heart, with strings of steel,
Be soft as sinews of the new-born babe!

All may be well.

Shakspeare.

CCXLIII.

PERSEVERANCE KEEPS HONOR BRIGHT.

TIME

IME hath, my lord, a wallet at his back,
Wherein he puts alms for oblivion,

A great-sized monster of ingratitudes.

Those scraps are good deeds past, which are devoured

As fast as they are made, forgot as soon

As done. Perseverance, dear my lord,

Keeps honor bright. To have done, is to hang

Quite out of fashion, like a rusty mail

In monumental mockery. Take the instant way;
For Honor travels in a strait so narrow,
Where one but goes abreast: keep then the path;
For Emulation hath a thousand sons,
That one by one pursue: if you give way,
Or hedge aside from the direct forthright,
Like to an entered tide, they all rush by,
And leave you hindmost;

Or, like a gallant horse fallen in first rank,
Lie there for pavement to the abject rear,

O'errun and trampled on. Then what they do in present,
Though less than yours in past, must o'ertop yours:

For Time is like a fashionable host,

That slightly shakes his parting guest by the hand;

And with his arms outstretched, as he would fly,
Grasps-in the comer :

Welcome ever smiles,

And Farewell goes out sighing. O, let not Virtue seek Remuneration for the thing it was;

For beauty, wit,

High birth, vigor of bone, desert in service,
Love, friendship, charity, are subjects all

To envious and calumniating Time.

One touch of Nature makes the whole world kin, -
That all, with one consent, praise new-born gauds,
Though they are made and moulded of things past;
And give to dust, that is a little gilt,

More land than gilt o'erdusted.

The present eye praises the present object:
Then marvel not, thou great and complete man,
That all the Greeks begin to worship Ajax;
Since things in motion sooner catch the eye
Than what not stirs : The cry went once on thee,
And still it might, and yet it may again,

If thou wouldst not entomb thyself alive,
And case thy reputation in thy tent;

Whose glorious deeds, did but in these fields of late,
Made emulous missions 'mongst the gods themselves,
And drave great Mars to faction.

Shakspeare.

CCXLIV.

MACBETH'S SOLILOQUY.

Is this a dagger, which I see before me,

The handle toward my hand? Come, let me clutch thee:

I have thee not; and yet I see thee still.

Art thou not, fatal vision, sensible

To feeling as to sight, or art thou but

A dagger of the mind a false creation,

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Proceeding from the heat-oppressed brain?

I see thee yet, in form as palpable

As this which now I draw.

Thou marshal'st me the way that I was going;
And such an instrument I was to use.

Mine eyes are made the fools o' the other senses,
Or else worth all the rest: I see thee still;
And on thy blade and dudgeon gouts of blood,

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