doors had been burst open, and some robber or assassin had stabbed her husband as he was lying in her arms.  The philosophy of those days found in these dreams mysterious and preternatural warnings of impending danger; that of ours, however, sees nothing either in the absurd sacrilegiousness of Caesar’s thoughts, or his wife’s incoherent and inconsistent images of terror—­nothing more than the natural and proper effects, on the one hand, of the insatiable ambition of man, and, on the other, of the conjugal affection and solicitude of woman.  The ancient sculptors carved out images of men, by the forms and lineaments of which we see that the physical characteristics of humanity have not changed.  History seems to do the same with the affections and passions of the soul.  The dreams of Caesar and his wife on the night before the Ides of March, as thus recorded, form a sort of spiritual statue, which remains from generation to generation, to show us how precisely all the inward workings of human nature are from age to age the same.

[Sidenote:  Caesar hesitates.]

When the morning came Caesar and Calpurnia arose, both restless and ill at ease.  Caesar ordered the auspices to be consulted with reference to the intended proceedings of the day.  The soothsayers came in in due time, and reported that the result was unfavorable.  Calpurnia, too, earnestly entreated her husband not to go to the senate-house that day.  She had a very strong presentiment that, if he did go, some great calamity would ensue.  Caesar himself hesitated.  He was half inclined to yield, and postpone his coronation to another occasion.

[Sidenote:  Decimus Brutus.]

In the course of the day, while Caesar was in this state of doubt and uncertainty, one of the conspirators, named Decimus Brutus, came in.  This Brutus was not a man of any extraordinary courage or energy, but he had been invited by the other conspirators to join them, on account of his having under his charge a large number of gladiators, who, being desperate and reckless men, would constitute a very suitable armed force for them to call in to their aid in case of any emergency arising which should require it.

[Sidenote:  Decimus Brutus waits upon Caesar.]

The conspirators having thus all their plans arranged, Decimus Brutus was commissioned to call at Caesar’s house when the time approached for the assembling of the Senate, both to avert suspicion from Caesar’s mind, and to assure himself that nothing had been discovered It was in the afternoon, the time for the meeting of the senators having been fixed at five o’clock.  Decimus Brutus found Caesar troubled and perplexed, and uncertain what to do.  After hearing what he had to say, he replied by urging him to go by all means to the senate-house, as he had intended.  “You have formally called the Senate together,” said he, “and they are now assembling.  They are all prepared to confer upon you the rank and title of king, not only in Parthia, while you are conducting this war but every where, by sea and land, except in Italy.  And now, while they are all in their places, waiting to consummate the great act, how absurd will it be for you to send them word to go home again, and come back some other day, when Calpurnia shall have had better dreams!”