Again his tendency to parade by no means alters the fact, that he does possess in an extraordinary degree the intellectual and moral virtues that he would exaggerate in his own eyes and the eyes of others. Independence, resolution, courage, insight must have been his in amplest store or he would never have been able to
Get the start of the majestic world
And bear the palm alone;
(I. ii. 130.)
and there is evidence of them in the play. He is not moved by the deferential prayers of the senators: he does persist in the banishment of Publius Cimber; he has in very truth read the heart and taken the measure of Cassius:
Such men as he be never at heart’s ease,
Whiles they behold a greater than themselves;
(I. ii. 208.)
he neither shrinks nor complains when the fatal moment comes. The impression he makes on the unsophisticated mind, on average audiences and the elder school of critics, is undoubtedly an heroic one. It is only minute analysis that discovers his defects, and though the defects are certainly present and should be noted, they are far from sufficing to make the general effect absurd or contemptible. If they do so, we give them undue importance. It was not so that Shakespeare meant them to be taken. For he has invented for his Caesar not only these trivial blemishes, but several conspicuous exhibitions of nobility, which Plutarch nowhere suggests; and this should give pause to such as find in Shakespeare’s portrait merely a wilful or wanton caricature. Thus in regard to the interposition of Artemidorus, Shakespeare read in North:
He marking howe Caesar received all the supplications that were offered him, and that he gave them straight to his men that were about him, pressed neerer to him and sayed: “Caesar, reade this memoriall to your selfe, and that quickely, for they be matters of great waight and touch you neerely.” Caesar tooke it of him, but coulde never reade it, though he many times attempted it, for the multitude of people that did salute him: but holding it still in his hande, keeping it to him selfe, went on withall into the Senate house.[172]