Cui non vider mai par quest’ alte mura:”—P. 115.
Yet there is nothing stronger in all this than in Shakespeare. There Caesar comes in triumph over Pompey’s sons; not alone the parent, but the offspring have fallen. Brutus says,
“No, not an oath: if not the face of men,
The sufferance of our souls, the time’s abuse,—
If these be motives weak, break off betimes,
And every man hence to his idle bed;
So let high sighted tyranny rage on
Till each man drop by lottery” (II., 1, 114).
Nor can I, despite all this talk concerning ancient liberties, this vehement denunciation of tyranny, discern any definite republican tendencies in “Cesare.” As has already been pointed out, Pescetti’s treatment of Caesar aroused the resentment of the partisans of Alfonso d’Este, yet the author takes pains to have it understood that princes rule by divine right as God’s vicars on earth. In the fourth act, Brutus and Cassius indulge in a dialogue, entirely superfluous, regarding liberty, and Cassius advances what, to a Roman at least, must have seemed rather a novel view of this much discussed subject.
Cas.— “La libertà null’altro
È, ch’imperio, e dominio di se stesso.”—P. 89.