The Funeral of Gaius Julius Caesar

 44 BC, The Roman Forum, The Funeral of Gaius Julius Caesar

            “Friends, Romans, countrymen, lend me your ears,” Marcus Antonius addresses the crowd who have gathered at Caesar’s funeral. Brutus had just left, claiming that Caesar was an ambitious man. Antonius keeps his attention on the people. “I have come to bury Caesar, not to praise him. The evil that men do lives after them; the good is buried with their bones; so let it be with Caesar.”

            “Brutus had told you Caesar was ambitious. Brutus is an honorable man; so are they all, all honorable men. Gaius Julius Caesar was my friend, faithful and just in my eyes—yet Brutus claimed that he was ambitious. Caesar had brought so many captives home to Rome whose ransoms filled the general coffers—did this in Caesar seem ambitious? When that the poor have cried, Caesar had wept. Ambition should be made of sterner stuff.” Antonius can see the people nodding, agreeing with his words. He continues his speech.

            “Yet Brutus says he was ambitious; and I must once again repeat that Brutus is an honorable man. I do not want to bring taint to his name on this miserable day. However, you all did see that on the Festival of the Lupercalia I presented him a kingly crown time after time, which he always refused—was this ambition? Yet Brutus said that he was ambitious. I speak not to disprove what Brutus spoke, but here I am to speak what I do know. You all did love Caesar once, not without cause: What cause withholds you then, to mourn for him? Some men have lost their reason, but bear with me; my heart is in the coffin there with Caesar, and I must pause till it comes back to me.”

~

Cowards die many times before their deaths;

The valiant never taste of death but once.

Of all the wonders I yet have heard.

It seems to me that death, a necessary end,

Will come when it will come.

~

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