BRUTUS.
The exhalations, whizzing in the air
Give so much light that I may read by them.
[Opens the letter and reads.]
Brutus, thou sleep’st: awake and see thyself.
Shall Rome, &c. Speak, strike, redress!
“Brutus, thou sleep’st: awake!”
Such instigations have been often dropp’d
Where I have took them up.
“Shall Rome, &c.” Thus must I piece it out:
Shall Rome stand under one man’s awe? What, Rome?
My ancestors did from the streets of Rome
The Tarquin drive, when he was call’d a king.
“Speak, strike, redress!” Am I entreated
To speak and strike? O Rome, I make thee promise,
If the redress will follow, thou receivest
Thy full petition at the hand of Brutus.
Enter Lucius.
LUCIUS.
Sir, March is wasted fifteen days.
[Knock within.]
BRUTUS.
’Tis good. Go to the gate, somebody knocks.
[Exit Lucius.]
Since Cassius first did whet me against Caesar,
I have not slept.
Between the acting of a dreadful thing
And the first motion, all the interim is
Like a phantasma, or a hideous dream:
The genius and the mortal instruments
Are then in council; and the state of man,
Like to a little kingdom, suffers then
The nature of an insurrection.
Enter Lucius.