| “I know no personal cause to spurn at him, but for the general.” | Brutus (to himself) |
| “I have not known when his affections sway’d more than his reason.” | Brutus (to himself) |
| “The abuse of greatness is when it disjoins remorse from power.” | Brutus (to himself, about Caesar) |
| “…therefore think him as a serpent’s egg which hatch’d would as his kind grow mischievous, and kill him in the shell.” (also ladder metaphor!) | Brutus (to himself) |
| “Lowliness is young ambition’s ladder, Whereto the climber upward turns his face. But when he once attains the upmost round, He then unto the ladder turns his back.” | Brutus (to himself) |
| “‘Brutus, thou sleep’st: awake and see thyself. Shall Rome, &c. Speak, strike, redress. Brutus, thou sleep’st: awake.” | Letter from the “commoners” (to Brutus) |
| “Am I entreated to speak and strike? Oh Rome, I make thee promise…!” | Brutus (to himself) |
| “Thus I must piece it out: Shall Rome stand under one man’s awe?” | Brutus (to himself) |
| “Their hats are pluck’d about their ears, and half their faces buried in their cloaks, that by means I may discover them…” | Lucius to Brutus |
| “Here lies the east: doth not the day break here…””O, pardon, sir, it doth, and yon grey liens that fret the clouds are messengers of day.” | Decius/ Cinna to Casca |
| “You shall confess that you are both deceived…sun arises…growing on the south….he first presents his fire, and the high east stands as the Capitol…” | Casca to rest of conspirators (Cinna, etc.) |
| “But what of Cicero?… I think he will stand very strong with us.” | Cassius to conspirators (Brutus, Casca, etc.) |
| “O, let us have him, for his silver hairs will purchase us a good opinion…to commend our deeds…our youths and wildness..but all be buried in his gravity” | Metellus to conspirators (Brutus, Cassius, Casca) (about Cicero) |
| “Let Antony and Caesar fall together.” | Cassius to conspirators (Decius, Brutus, etc.) |
| “Let us be sacrificers, but not butchers…and in the spirit of men there is no blood…” | Brutus to conspirators (Cassius, specifically) |
| “We shall be call’d purgers, not murderers. And for Mark Antony, think not of him; For he can do no more than Caesar’s arm When Caesar’s head is off.” | Brutus to conspirators (Cassius, specifically) |
| “If these be motives weak, break off betimes, and every man hence to his bed…” | Brutus to conspirators (and in response to Cassius) |
| “I can o’ersway him; for he loves to hear, that unicorns may be betray’d with trees…but when I tell him he hates flatterers, he says he does, being then most flattered.” | Decius to conspirators (about Caesar) |
| “Is it excepted I should know no secrets that appertain to you? Am I yourself but, as it were, in sort or limitation, to keep with you at meals…” | Portia to Brutus |
| “… No, my Brutus. You have some sick offense within your mind, which by the right and virtue of my place I ought to know of.” | Portia to Brutus |
| “I have made strong proof of my constancy, giving myself a voluntary wound here, in the thigh. Can I bear that with patience, and not my husband’s secrets?” | Portia to Brutus |
| “…could it work so much upon your shape as it hath much prevail’d on your condition, I should not know you…” | Portia to Brutus |
| “I am not sick, if Brutus have in hand any exploit worthy the name of honor.” | Ligarius to Brutus |
| “I here discard my sickness! Soul of Rome! Thou, like an exorcist, hast conjured up my mortified sprit. Now I will strive with things impossible…” | Ligarius to Brutus |
| “A piece of work that will make sick men whole.” | Brutus to Ligarius |
| “And with a heart new-fired I follow you, to do I know not what.” | Ligarius to Brutus |
| “…the things that threaten’d me. Ne’er look’d but on my back; when they shall see the face of __, they are vanished.” | Caesar to Calpurnia |
| “for these predictions are to the world in general as to ___.” | Caesar to Calpurnia |
| “Cowards die many times before their deaths; the valiant never taste of death but once.” | Caesar to Calpurnia |
| “Plucking the entrails of an offering forth, they could not find a heart within the beast.” | Servant to Caesar |
| “When beggars die there are no comets seen.The heavens themselves blaze forth the death of princes.” | Calpurnia to Caesar |
| “No, ___ shall not: danger knows full well that ___ is more dangerous than he: We are two lions littered in one day,And I the elder and more terrible.” | Caesar to Calpurnia |
| “Your wisdom is confused in confidence…call it my fear.” | Calpurnia to Caesar |
| “The cause is in my will. I will not come.” | Caesar to Decius |
| “She dreamt tonight she saw my statue,Which, like a fountain with an hundred spouts,Did run pure blood. And many lusty RomansCame smiling and did bathe their hands in it.” | Caesar describing Calpurnia’s dream to Decius |
| “Your statue spouting blood in many pipes,In which so many smiling Romans bathed,Signifies that from you great Rome shall suckReviving blood, and that great men shall pressFor tinctures, stains, relics, and cognizance.” | Decius to Caesar (also tells him he will get a crown) |
| “‘Lo, Caesar is afraid?'” | Decius to Caesar |
| “That every “like” is not the same, O Caesar,…” | Brutus’s aside |
| “Caesar, beware of Brutus…Cassius, Casca, Cinna, Trebonius, Cimber, Decius, Ligarius…..My heart laments that virtue cannot liveOut of the teeth of emulation.” | Artemidorus |
| “Security gives way to conspiracy.” | Artemidorus |
| “If thou read this, O Caesar, thou mayst live.If not, the Fates with traitors do contrive.” | Artemidorus |
| “I prithee, boy, run to the senate house.” | Portia to Lucius |
| “I have a man’s mind but a woman’s might.How hard it is for women to keep counsel!—Art thou here yet?” | Portia to Lucius |
| “That I have, lady. If it will please CaesarTo be so good to Caesar as to hear me,I shall beseech him to befriend himself.” | Soothsayer to Portia |
| “Ay me, how weak a thingThe heart of woman is!” | Portia’s aside |
| “Brutus hath a suit that Caesar will not grant.” | Portia to Lucius |
Julius Caesar Act II Quotes
April 12, 2020