The New Hudson Shakespeare: Julius Cæsar

by William Shakespeare

As a whole, Julius Cæsar is inferior to Coriolanus, but it abounds in scenes and passages fraught, with the highest virtue of Shakespeare's genius. Among these may be specially mentioned the second scene of the first act, where Cassius sows the seed of the conspiracy in Brutus's mind, warmed with such a wrappage of instigation as to assure its effective germination; also the first scene of the second act, unfolding the birth of the conspiracy, and winding up with the interview, so charged with domestic glory, of Brutus and Portia. The oration of Antony in Cæsar's funeral is such an interfusion of art and passion as realizes the very perfection of its kind. Adapted at once to the comprehension of the lowest mind and to the delectation of the highest, and running its pathos into the very quick of them that hear it, it tells with terrible effect on the people; and when it is done we feel that Cæsar's bleeding wounds are mightier than ever his genius and fortune were. The quarrel of Brutus and Cassius is deservedly celebrated. Dr. Johnson thought it "somewhat cold and unaffecting." Coleridge thought otherwise. See [note, p. 123]. But there is nothing in the play that is more divinely touched than the brief scene, already noticed, of Brutus and his boy Lucius—so gentle, so dutiful, so loving, so thoughtful and careful for his master, and yet himself no more conscious of his virtue than a flower of its fragrance. There is no more exquisite passage in all Shakespeare than that which tells of the boy's falling asleep in the midst of his song and exclaiming on being aroused, "The strings, my lord, are false."

[AUTHORITIES]

(With the more important abbreviations used in the notes)

F1 =	First Folio, 1623.
F2 =	Second Folio, 1632.
F3 =	Third Folio, 1664.
F4 =	Fourth Folio, 1685.
Ff =	all the seventeenth century Folios.
Rowe =	Rowe's editions, 1709, 1714.
Pope =	Pope's editions, 1723, 1728.
Theobald =	Theobald's editions, 1733, 1740.
Johnson =	Johnson's edition, 1765.
Capell =	Capell's edition, 1768.
Malone =	Malone's edition, 1790.
Steevens =	Steevens's edition, 1793.
Globe =	Globe edition (Clark and Wright), 1864.
Clar =	Clarendon Press edition (W.A. Wright), 1869.
Dyce =	Dyce's (third) edition, 1875.
Delius =	Delius's (fifth) edition, 1882.
Camb =	Cambridge (third) edition (W.A. Wright), 1891.
Abbott =	E.A. Abbott's A Shakespearian Grammar.
Schmidt =	Schmidt's Shakespeare Lexicon.
Skeat =	Skeat's An Etymological Dictionary.
Murray =	A New English Dictionary (The Oxford Dictionary).
Century =	The Century Dictionary.
Plutarch =	North's Plutarch, 1579.

[CHRONOLOGICAL CHART]

Except in the case of Shakespeare's plays (see note) the literature dates refer to first publication

Year	Shakespeare Biography; Poems Plays				British and Foreign Literature	History and Biography
1564	Birth. Baptism, April 26, Stratford-on-Avon				Quart livre de Pantagruel	Michelangelo died. Calvin died. Marlowe born. Galileo born.
1565	Father became alderman				Sackville and Norton's Gorboduc printed	Philip II of Spain gave his name to Philippine Islands
1566	Brother Gilbert born				Udall's Roister Doister printed?	Murder of Rizzio
1568	Father, as bailiff of Stratford, entertained Queen's and Earl of Worcester's actors	NOTE: The plays in the columns below are arranged in theprobable, though purely conjectural, order of composition. Dates appendedto plays are those of first publication. Where no date is given, the play wasfirst published in the First Folio (1623). M signifies that the play was mentionedby Meres in the Palladis Tamia (1598)			The Bishops Bible. La Taille's Saülle Furieux. R. Grafton's Chronicle	Mary of Scots a prisoner in England. Ascham died. Coverdale died. Netherlands War of Liberation
1572					Camoens' Os Lusiadas (The Lusiads)	Knox died. Massacre of St. Bartholomew
1573					Tasso's Aminta	Ben Jonson born? Donne born
1574	Brother Richard born				Mirror for Magistrates (third edition)	Earl of Leicester's players licensed
1575					Gammer Gurton's Needle. Golding's Ovid (complete)	Queen Elizabeth at Kenilworth. Palissy lectured on Natural History
1576					The Paradise of Dainty Devices. Gascoigne's Steel Glass	"The Theatre" opened in Finsbury Fields, London followed by "The Curtain." Hans Sachs died
1577	Father in financial difficulties				Holinshed's Chronicle	Drake sailed to circumnavigate globe
1579	Sister Ann died (aged eight)				Gosson's School of Abuse. North's Plutarch. Lyly's Euphues (pt. 1). Spenser's Shepherd's Calendar	Union of Utrecht. Tasso put in confinement at Ferrara
1580	Brother Edmund born				Montaigne's Essais (first edition)	Brown founded Separatists. Camoens died
1581					Tasso's Gerusalemme Liberata	Dutch Declaration of Independence
1582	Married Anne Hathaway				The Rheims New Testament	Accademia della Crusca founded
1583	Daughter Susanna born				Garnier's Les Juives	Sir Humphrey Gilbert drowned
1584					Lyly's Campaspe. Peele's Arraignment of Paris	William the Silent assassinated. Ivan the Terrible died
1585	Twin children (Hamnet, Judith) born				Guarini's Pastor Fido (1590)	Ronsard died
1586	Probably went to London				Camden's Britannia	Sir Philip Sidney killed
1587					Hakluyt's Four Voyages. Faustbuch (Spiess, Frankfort)	Execution of Mary of Scots
1588					Martin Marprelate: The Epistle	Defeat of Spanish Armada
1589		Comedies	Histories	Tragedies	Puttenham's Art of English Poesie	Henry of Navarre, King of France. Palissy died in Bastille
1590		Love's Labour's Lost (M, 1598)			Marlowe's Tamburlaine Spenser's Faerie Queene, I-III. Lodge's Rosalynde. Sidney's Arcadia	Battle of Ivry
1591		Comedy of Errors (M)	1 Henry VI 2 Henry VI		Sidney's Astrophel and Stella. Harington's tr. of Orlando Furioso	Herrick born
1592	Greene's attack in Groatsworth of Wit	Two Gentlemen of Verona (M)	Richard III (M, 1597). 3 Henry VI	Romeo and Juliet (M, 1597)	Daniel's Delia. Lyly's Gallathea (Galatea)	Greene died. Montaigne died. London theatres closed through plague
1593	Venus and Adonis (seven editions, 1594-1616)		King John (M). Richard II (M, 1597)	Titus Andronicus (M, 1594)	Peele's Edward I. Barnes's Sonnets	Marlowe died. Herbert born.
1594	Lucrece (five editions, 1594-1616)	A Midsummer Night's Dream (M, 1600)			Rinuccini's Dafne. Satire Ménipée	Palestrina ("Princeps Musicæ") died
1595	Valuable contemporary references to Shakespeare	All's Well that Ends Well. Taming of the Shrew			Peele's Old Wives' Tale. Spenser's Epithalamion	Tasso died. Sir Walter Raleigh's expedition to Guiana. Sir J. Hawkins died
1596	Son Hamnet died. Family applied for coat-of-arms		1 Henry IV (M, 1598). 2 Henry IV (1600)		Drayton's Mortimeriados. Faerie Queene, Books IV-VI	Burbage built Blackfriar's Theatre. Descartes born. Sir F. Drake died
1597	Purchased New Place, Stratford	Merry Wives of Windsor. Merchant of Venice (M, 1600)			Bacon's Essays (first edition). Hall's Virgidemiarum	The Tyrone rebellion
1598	Shakespeare acted in Jonson's Every Man in His Humour	Much Ado About Nothing (1600)	Henry V (1600)		Mere's Palladis Tamia. Chapman's Homer (pt. 1). Lope de Vega's Arcadia	Peele died. Edict of Nantes
1599	Part proprietor of Globe Theatre. Coat-of-arms granted. The Passionate Pilgrim	As You Like It			Aleman's Guzman de Alfarache. Peele's David and Bethsabe	Spenser died. Globe Theatre built. Oliver Cromwell born
1600	Won a London lawsuit	Twelfth Night			England's Helicon	Calderon born. Bruno died
1601	Father died. The Phoenix and Turtle			Julius Cæsar	Jonson's Poetaster	The Essex plot. Rivalry between London adult and boy actors
1602	Purchased more Stratford real estate			Hamlet (1603)	Dekker's Satiromastix	Bodleian Library founded
1603	His company acted before the Queen	Troilus and Cressida			Jonson's Sejanus	Queen Elizabeth died. Millenary Petition
1604	Sued Rogers at Stratford	Measure for Measure		Othello	Marlowe's Faustus (1588-1589)	Hampton Court Conference
1605	Godfather to William D'Avenant			Macbeth	Don Quixote (pt. 1)	Gunpowder plot. Sir Thomas Browne born
1606	King Lear given before Court			King Lear (1608)	Chapman's Monsieur D'Olive	Lyly died. Corneille born
1607	Daughter Susanna married Dr. Hall			Timon of Athens	Dekker and Webster's Westward Ho!	Settlement of Jamestown
1608	Birth of granddaughter Elizabeth Hall. Death of mother (Mary Arden)	Pericles (1609)		Antony and Cleopatra	Captain John Smith's A True Relation. Middleton's A Mad World	Milton born. Quebec founded
1609	Sonnets. A Lover's Complaint			Coriolanus	The Douai Old Testament	Separatists (Pilgrims) in Leyden
1610	Purchased more real estate	Cymbeline			Strachey's Wracke and Redemption	Henry IV (Navarre) assassinated
1611	Subscribed for better highways	Winter's Tale The Tempest			King James Bible (A.V.). Bellarmine's Puissance du Pape	Gustavus Adolphus, King of Sweden
1613	Invested in London house property. Brother Richard died		Henry VIII		Drayton's Polyolbion	Globe Theatre burned
1616	Made his will. Daughter Judith married Thomas Quiney. Died April 23 (May 3, New Style)				Captain John Smith's New England. Folio edition of Jonson's Poems. D'Aubigné's Les Tragiques (1577)	Cervantes died. Beaumont died. Baffin explores Baffin's Bay. Harvey lectured on the circulation of the blood