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Julius Caesar: Act II, Scene 2

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Julius Caesar
Act II, Scene 2

Rome. Caesar’s house.

Byam Shaw, 1901

  1. Thunder and lightning.
  1. Enter Julius Caesar in his night-gown.

Caesar

1 - 3
  1. Nor heaven nor earth have been at peace tonight.
  2. Thrice hath Calphurnia in her sleep cried out,
  3. “Help, ho! They murder Caesar!” Who’s within?
  1. Enter a Servant.

Caesar’s Servant

4
  1. My lord?

Caesar

5 - 6
  1. Go bid the priests do present sacrifice,
  2. And bring me their opinions of success.

Caesar’s Servant

7
  1. I will, my lord.
  1. Exit.
  1. Enter Calphurnia.

Calphurnia

8 - 9
  1. What mean you, Caesar? Think you to walk forth?
  2. You shall not stir out of your house today.

Caesar

10 - 12
  1. Caesar shall forth; the things that threaten’d me
  2. Ne’er look’d but on my back; when they shall see
  3. The face of Caesar, they are vanished.

Calphurnia

13 - 26
  1. Caesar, I never stood on ceremonies,
  2. Yet now they fright me. There is one within,
  3. Besides the things that we have heard and seen,
  4. Recounts most horrid sights seen by the watch.
  5. A lioness hath whelped in the streets,
  6. And graves have yawn’d and yielded up their dead;
  7. Fierce fiery warriors fight upon the clouds
  8. In ranks and squadrons and right form of war,
  9. Which drizzled blood upon the Capitol;
  10. The noise of battle hurtled in the air;
  11. Horses did neigh, and dying men did groan,
  12. And ghosts did shriek and squeal about the streets.
  13. O Caesar, these things are beyond all use,
  14. And I do fear them.

Caesar

27 - 30
  1.                     What can be avoided
  2. Whose end is purpos’d by the mighty gods?
  3. Yet Caesar shall go forth; for these predictions
  4. Are to the world in general as to Caesar.

Calphurnia

31 - 32
  1. When beggars die there are no comets seen;
  2. The heavens themselves blaze forth the death of princes.

Caesar

33 - 39
  1. Cowards die many times before their deaths,
  2. The valiant never taste of death but once.
  3. Of all the wonders that I yet have heard,
  4. It seems to me most strange that men should fear,
  5. Seeing that death, a necessary end,
  6. Will come when it will come.
  7. Enter a Servant.
  8.                              What say the augurers?

Caesar’s Servant

40 - 42
  1. They would not have you to stir forth today.
  2. Plucking the entrails of an offering forth,
  3. They could not find a heart within the beast.

Caesar

43 - 50
  1. The gods do this in shame of cowardice;
  2. Caesar should be a beast without a heart
  3. If he should stay at home today for fear.
  4. No, Caesar shall not; Danger knows full well
  5. That Caesar is more dangerous than he.
  6. We are two lions litter’d in one day,
  7. And I the elder and more terrible;
  8. And Caesar shall go forth.

Calphurnia

51 - 57
  1.                            Alas, my lord,
  2. Your wisdom is consum’d in confidence.
  3. Do not go forth today; call it my fear
  4. That keeps you in the house, and not your own.
  5. We’ll send Mark Antony to the Senate-house,
  6. And he shall say you are not well today.
  7. Let me, upon my knee, prevail in this.

Caesar

58 - 60
  1. Mark Antony shall say I am not well,
  2. And for thy humor I will stay at home.
  3. Enter Decius.
  4. Here’s Decius Brutus, he shall tell them so.

Decius Brutus

61 - 62
  1. Caesar, all hail! Good morrow, worthy Caesar,
  2. I come to fetch you to the Senate-house.

Caesar

63 - 67
  1. And you are come in very happy time
  2. To bear my greeting to the senators,
  3. And tell them that I will not come today.
  4. Cannot, is false; and that I dare not, falser:
  5. I will not come today. Tell them so, Decius.

Calphurnia

68
  1. Say he is sick.

Caesar

69 - 72
  1.                 Shall Caesar send a lie?
  2. Have I in conquest stretch’d mine arm so far,
  3. To be afeard to tell greybeards the truth?
  4. Decius, go tell them Caesar will not come.

Decius Brutus

73 - 74
  1. Most mighty Caesar, let me know some cause,
  2. Lest I be laugh’d at when I tell them so.
Nancy Price as Calphurnia

Nancy Price as Calphurnia

Virtue & Co., circa 1900

Caesar

75 - 86
  1. The cause is in my will, I will not come:
  2. That is enough to satisfy the Senate.
  3. But for your private satisfaction,
  4. Because I love you, I will let you know.
  5. Calphurnia here, my wife, stays me at home:
  6. She dreamt tonight she saw my statuë,
  7. Which, like a fountain with an hundred spouts,
  8. Did run pure blood; and many lusty Romans
  9. Came smiling and did bathe their hands in it.
  10. And these does she apply for warnings and portents
  11. And evils imminent, and on her knee
  12. Hath begg’d that I will stay at home today.

Decius Brutus

87 - 94
  1. This dream is all amiss interpreted,
  2. It was a vision fair and fortunate.
  3. Your statue spouting blood in many pipes,
  4. In which so many smiling Romans bath’d,
  5. Signifies that from you great Rome shall suck
  6. Reviving blood, and that great men shall press
  7. For tinctures, stains, relics, and cognizance.
  8. This by Calphurnia’s dream is signified.

Caesar

95
  1. And this way have you well expounded it.

Decius Brutus

96 - 108
  1. I have, when you have heard what I can say;
  2. And know it now: the Senate have concluded
  3. To give this day a crown to mighty Caesar.
  4. If you shall send them word you will not come,
  5. Their minds may change. Besides, it were a mock
  6. Apt to be render’d, for some one to say,
  7. “Break up the Senate till another time,
  8. When Caesar’s wife shall meet with better dreams.”
  9. If Caesar hide himself, shall they not whisper,
  10. “Lo Caesar is afraid”?
  11. Pardon me, Caesar, for my dear dear love
  12. To your proceeding bids me tell you this;
  13. And reason to my love is liable.

Caesar

109 - 112
  1. How foolish do your fears seem now, Calphurnia!
  2. I am ashamed I did yield to them.
  3. Give me my robe, for I will go.
  4. Enter Brutus, Ligarius, Metellus, Casca, Trebonius, Cinna,
  5. and Publius.
  6. And look where Publius is come to fetch me.

Publius

113
  1. Good morrow, Caesar.

Caesar

114 - 119
  1.                      Welcome, Publius.
  2. What, Brutus, are you stirr’d so early too?
  3. Good morrow, Casca. Caius Ligarius,
  4. Caesar was ne’er so much your enemy
  5. As that same ague which hath made you lean.
  6. What is’t a’ clock?

Brutus

120
  1.                     Caesar, ’tis strucken eight.

Caesar

121 - 123
  1. I thank you for your pains and courtesy.
  2. Enter Antony.
  3. See, Antony, that revels long a-nights,
  4. Is notwithstanding up. Good morrow, Antony.

Mark Antony

124
  1. So to most noble Caesar.

Caesar

125 - 130
  1. Bid them prepare within;
  2. I am to blame to be thus waited for.
  3. Now, Cinna; now, Metellus; what, Trebonius:
  4. I have an hour’s talk in store for you;
  5. Remember that you call on me today;
  6. Be near me, that I may remember you.

Trebonius

131 - 133
  1. Caesar, I will;
  2. Aside.
  3. And so near will I be,
  4. That your best friends shall wish I had been further.

Caesar

134 - 135
  1. Good friends, go in, and taste some wine with me,
  2. And we, like friends, will straightway go together.

Brutus

136 - 137
  1. Aside.
  2. That every like is not the same, O Caesar,
  3. The heart of Brutus earns to think upon!
  1. Exeunt.
The Henry Irving Shakespeare

O Caesar, these things are beyond all use,
And I do fear them.

From: The Henry Irving Shakespeare

Henry, Sir Irving; Edward Dowden; Gordon Browne; 1888

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