Internet Shakespeare Editions

Author: William Shakespeare
Editor: Randall Martin
Not Peer Reviewed

Anthony and Cleopatra (Modern)

[1.4]
Enter Octavius [Caesar] reading a letter, Lepidus, and their train.
430Caesar
You may see, Lepidus, and henceforth know,
It is not Caesar's natural vice to hate
One great competitor. From Alexandria
This is the news: he fishes, drinks, and wastes
The lamps of night in revel; is not more manlike
435Than Cleopatra, nor the Queen of Ptolemy
More womanly than he; hardly gave audience
Or vouchsafed to think he had partners. You shall
Find there a man who is the abstract of all faults
That all men follow.
440Lepidus
I must not think there are
Evils enough to darken all his goodness.
His faults in him seem as the spots of heaven,
More fiery by night's blackness; hereditary
Rather than purchased; what he cannot change
445Than what he chooses.
Caesar
You are too indulgent. Let's grant it is not
Amiss to tumble on the bed of Ptolemy,
To give a kingdom for a mirth, to sit
And keep the turn of tippling with a slave,
450To reel the streets at noon and stand the buffet
With knaves that smells of sweat. Say this becomes him--
As his composure must be rare indeed
Whom these things cannot blemish--yet must Anthony
No way excuse his foils when we do bear
455So great weight in his lightness. If he filled
His vacancy with his voluptuousness,
Full surfeits and the dryness of his bones
Call on him for't. But to confound such time
That drums him from his sport and speaks as loud
460As his own state and ours, 'tis to be chid
As we rate boys who, being mature in knowledge,
Pawn their experience to their present pleasure
And so rebel to judgment.
Enter a Messenger.
465Lepidus
Here's more news.
Messenger
Thy biddings have been done, and every hour,
Most noble Caesar, shalt thou have report
How 'tis abroad. Pompey is strong at sea
And it appears he is beloved of those
470That only have feared Caesar. To the ports
The discontents repair, and men's reports
Give him much wronged.
[Exit Messenger.]
Caesar
I should have known no less.
It hath been taught us from the primal state
475That he which is was wished until he were;
And the ebbed man, ne'er loved till ne'er worth love,
Comes feared by being lacked. This common body,
Like to a vagabond flag upon the stream,
480Goes to, and back, lackeying the varying tide
To rot itself with motion.
Enter Second Messenger.
Second Messenger
Caesar, I bring thee word
Menecrates and Menas, famous pirates,
Makes the sea serve them, which they ear and wound
485With keels of every kind. Many hot inroads
They make in Italy; the borders maritime
Lack blood to think on't, and flush youth revolt.
No vessel can peep forth but 'tis as soon
Taken as seen; for Pompey's name strikes more
490Than could his war resisted.
Exit Second Messenger.
Caesar
Antony,
Leave thy lascivious vassals. When thou once
Was beaten from Modena, where thou slew'st
Hirtius and Pansa, consuls, at thy heel
495Did Famine follow, whom thou fought'st against,
Though daintily brought up, with patience more
Then savages could suffer. Thou didst drink
The stale of horses and the gilded puddle
Which beasts would cough at. Thy palate then did deign
500The roughest berry on the rudest hedge.
Yea, like the stag when snow the pasture sheets,
The barks of trees thou browsed. On the Alps,
It is reported thou didst eat strange flesh,
Which some did die to look on. And all this--
505It wounds thine honor that I speak it now--
Was borne so like a soldier that thy cheek
So much as lanked not.
Lepidus
'Tis pity of him.
Caesar
Let his shames quickly 510drive him to Rome.
'Tis time we twain did show ourselves i'th'field;
And to that end assemble we immediate counsel.
Pompey thrives in our idleness.
Lepidus
Tomorrow, Caesar,
515I shall be furnished to inform you rightly
Both what by sea and land I can be able
To front this present time.
Caesar
Till which encounter,
It is my business too. Farewell.
Lepidus
Farewell, my lord.
What you shall know meantime 520of stirs abroad,
I shall beseech you, sir, to let me be partaker.
Caesar
Doubt not sir. I knew it for my bond.
Exeunt [by different doors].