O, name him not:  let us not break with him;
     For he will never follow any thing,
     That other men begin.

His scepticism as to prodigies and his moralizing on the weather—­ “This disturbed sky is not to walk in”—­are in the same spirit of refined imbecility.

Shakespeare has in this play and elsewhere shown the same penetration into political character and the springs of public events as into those of everyday life.  For instance, the whole design to liberate their country fails from the generous temper and overweening confidence of Brutus in the goodness of their cause and the assistance of others.  Thus it has always been.  Those who mean well themselves think well of others, and fall a prey to their security.  That humanity and sincerity which dispose men to resist injustice and tyranny render them unfit to cope with the cunning and power of those who are opposed to them.  The friends of liberty trust to the professions of others because they are themselves sincere, and endeavour to secure the public good with the least possible hurt to its enemies, who have no regard to anything but their own unprincipled ends, and stick at nothing to accomplish them.  Cassius was better cut out for a conspirator.  His heart prompted his head.  His habitual jealousy made him fear the worst that might happen, and his irritability of temper added to his inveteracy of purpose, and sharpened his patriotism.  The mixed nature of his motives made him fitter to contend with bad men.  The vices are never so well employed as in combating one another.  Tyranny and servility are to be dealt with after their own fashion:  otherwise, they will triumph over those who spare them, and finally pronounce their funeral panegyric, as Antony did that of Brutus.  All the conspirators, save only he,

     Did that they did in envy of great Caesar: 
     He only in a general honest thought
     And common good to all, made one of them.

The quarrel between Brutus and Cassius is managed in a masterly way.  The dramatic fluctuation of passion, the calmness of Brutus, the heat of Cassius, are admirably described; and the exclamation of Cassius on hearing of the death of Portia, which he does not learn till after the reconciliation, ’How ’scap’d I killing when I crost you so?’ gives double force to all that has gone before.  The scene between Brutus and Portia, where she endeavours to extort the secret of the conspiracy from him, is conceived in the most heroical spirit, and the burst of tenderness in Brutus: 

     You are my true and honourable wife;
     As dear to me as are the ruddy drops
     That visit my sad heart—­

is justified by her whole behaviour.  Portia’s breathless impatience to learn the event of the conspiracy, in the dialogue with Lucius, is full of passion.  The interest which Portia takes in Brutus and that which Calphurnia takes in the fate of Caesar are discriminated with the nicest precision.  Mark Antony’s speech over the dead body of Caesar has been justly admired for the mixture of pathos and artifice in it:  that of Brutus certainly is not so good.