Cesario

“ Cesario. Watchman, what news?
A Voice. Sir, on the sea no sail!
One of the Crowd. But through the town below a horseman spurs— I think, Count Lucio! Yes—Count Lucio! He nears, draws rein, dismounts!
Cesario. Sure, he brings news.
Gamba. I think he brings word the Duke is sick; his loyal folk have drunk so much of his health. ”

“ Cesario was no sooner on the French shore, but numbers came to him of the Huguenot party, for whom he had arms, and who wanted them he furnished as far as he could, and immediately proclaimed himself King of France and Navarre, while the dirty crowd rang him peals of joy. But though the under world came in great crowds to his aid, he wanted still the main supporters of his cause, the men of substantial quality: if the ladies could have composed an army, he would not have wanted one, for his beauty had got them all on his side, and he charmed the fair wheresoever he rode. ”

“ To free you from the sorrow, not from life.
Cesar. Why life and sorrow are unseparable.
Alber. Be comforted Cesario, Mentivole
Shall not marry Clarissa.
Cesar. No Sir, ere he shall, I'll kill him.
Alb [e] r. But you forfeit your own life then.
Cesar. That's worth nothing.
Alber. Cesario, be thy self, be mine Cesario:
Make not thy self uncapable of that portion
I have full purpose to confer upon thee,
By falling into madness: bear thy wrongs
With noble patience, the afflicted's friend
Which ever in all actions crowns the end. ”

“ Yet they stab, Those needles. Oh, the devil take their tongues!
Cesario. Why, what's the matter?
Lucio. P'st! another lie Against the Countess Fulvia; and the train Laid to my sister's ear. Cesario, My sister is a saint—and yet she married: Therefore should understand ... Would saints, like cobblers, Stick but to business in this naughty world! Ah, well! the Duke comes home.
Cesario. And what of that?
Lucio. Release!
Cesario. Release?
Lucio (mocking a chant within the Chapel) . From priests and petticoats Deliver us, Good Lord!
Gamba (strikes a chord on viol) . AMEN!
Cesario. ”

“ Bap. How supposed?
Cesar. Pray Madam recollect your self.
Mar. The relish
Of a strange truth begins to work like Physick
Already: I have bitterness to mingle
With these preparatives, so deadly loathsome;
It will quite choak digestion; shortly hear it
Cesario, for I dare not rob unjustly
The poor soul of his name; this, this Cesario
Neither for Father had Alberto, me
For Mother, nor Clarissa for his Sister.
Claris. Mother, O Mother.
Ment. I am in a Dream sure.
Duke. No interruptions. Lady on.
Mari. Mistake not,
Great Duke of Tuscany, or the beginning
Or process of this novelty ”

“ She hoped by thus artfully making Cesario a present of the ring, she should give him some intimation of her design; and truly it did make Viola suspect; for knowing that Orsino had sent no ring by her, she began to recollect that Olivia's looks and manner were expressive of admiration, and she presently guessed her master's mistress had fallen in love with her. "Alas," said she, " the poor lady might as well love a dream. Disguise I see is wicked, for it has caused Olivia to breathe as fruitless sighs for me, as I do for Orsino." ”

“ Caesar comprehended her outbreak of passion and appeal for sympathy. Yet he did not pretend to do so, but letting his eyes rest upon the ground, he said only this: "Be of cheer, woman, and keep a good heart, for no harm shall befall you." She was distressed that he would neither look at her nor breathe a word about the kingdom or any sigh of love, and fell at his knees wailing: "Life for me, Caesar, is neither desirable nor possible. This favor I beseech of you in memory of your father,—that since Heaven gave me to Antony after him, I may also die with my lord. ”

“ XXIV On his return to Rome the year after, Caesar made himself a fourth time consul, and immediately proceeded to Spain, where the sons of Pompey, Cnaeus, and Sextus, had again raised a formidable war. Many engagements took place, the last near the city of Munda, in which Caesar was so nearly defeated, that, upon his forces giving way, he felt inclined to kill himself, lest, after such great glory in war, he should fall, at the age of fifty-six, into the hands of young men. At length, having rallied his troops, he gained the victory; the elder son of Pompey was slain, the younger fled. ”

“ It will take not a little to break Cesare--Cesare Borgia, Duke of Romagna, Imola and Faenza, Marquis of Rimini, Count of Forli, Lord of Pesaro and Fano, Gonfaloniere of the Church--good for a low-born bastard--eh? Ho! ho! break Cesare! Not you."
"Stronger trees have fallen, signore--remember we have France, and the Florentines on our side, and twenty thousand men, under Tremouille and Trevulzio, are not twenty miles from you." ”

“ From the ghastly visage of Caesar his gaze rested on the warm loveliness of Plautia, whose flushed countenance and sparkling eyes betrayed the excited conflict of her mind. Her yet unconquered love of the young soldier’s manly beauty, blown into fresh flame by the exhibition of his power—the sting of remorse at the unlooked-for effect of her plot, mingled with savage envy at the sight of her rival, and the bitter spectacle of their mutual devotion, were rioting in her breast. His glance was cold and contemptuous, as it was passing and brief, and stung her soul to madness. ”

“ But as the delicate meats succeeded each other—each duly tasted by Grifone before a morsel [Pg 210] went to plate—there was one, in the surge of her terrors, struck dumb with what was, rather, wonder. The magnificent Cesare went his road over the feelings of his host; the host bowed and waved his hands. Why should he not? Never one word of answer, never a gleam of attention did he win from the Roman. Why should he care? His wife was doing her duty, his enemy was webbed: what else could matter? The Italian shrug goes deeper than the shoulders; sometimes it strokes the heart of a man. ”

“ In the meantime Sylla's power being now on the decline, Caesar's friends advised him to return to Rome, but he went to Rhodes, and entered himself in the school of Apollonius, Molon's son, a famous rhetorician, one who had the reputation of a worthy man, and had Cicero for one of his scholars. Caesar is said to have been admirably fitted by nature to make a great statesman and orator, and to have taken such pains to improve his genius this way, that without dispute he might challenge the second place. ”

“ An aunt of Caesar had married Caius Marius, the modest bankrupt farmer of revenues, who, having entered politics, had become the first general of his time, had been elected consul six times, and had conquered Jugurtha, the Cimbri, and the Teutons. The self-made man had become famous and rich, and in the face of an aristocracy proud of its ancestors, had tried to ennoble his obscure origin by taking his wife from an ancient and most noble, albeit impoverished and decayed, patrician family. ”

“ And when many went to pay the usual compliments and attentions to the new consul, "Let us make haste," said Cicero, "lest the man be gone out of his office before we come."
Caesar was born to do great things, and had a passion after honor, and the many noble exploits he had done did not now serve as an inducement to him to sit still and reap the fruit of his past labors, but were incentives and encouragments to go on, and raised in him ideas of still greater actions, and a desire of new glory, as if the present were all spent. ”

“ In his journey, as he was crossing the Alps, and passing by a small village of the barbarians with but few inhabitants and those wretchedly poor, his companions asked the question among themselves by way of mockery, if there were any canvassing for offices there; any contention which should be uppermost, or feuds of great men one against another. To which Caesar made answer seriously, "For my part, I had rather be the first man among these fellows, than the second man in Rome." ”

“ If Caesar were as good as his word, he would be breathing the pure air of heaven in a few hours. The thought filled him with the glowing warmth and comfort of wine. On Cestus everything depended. Had he left for Rome? Should he meet him at the house of Fabricius? Had he the proofs, as he asserted, and would they be conclusive and satisfactory to the old man? Was she really anything but the simple girl he had always known her? The potter’s wife said she never had a child of her own. Her beauty seemed never to spring from such lowly parents. ”

“ As a preacher, Caesarius displayed great knowledge of Holy Scripture, and was eminently practical in his exhortations. Besides reproving ordinary vices of humanity, he had often to contend against lingering pagan superstitions, as auguries, heathen rites on the calends, etc. His sermons on O.T. are not critical, but dwell on its typical aspects.
Some rivalry appears to have existed in the 6th cent. between the sees of Arles and Vienne, but was adjusted by pope Leo, whose adjustment was confirmed by Symmachus. Caesarius was in favour at Rome. ”

“ Then Caesar cried: "Take we the course which the signs of the gods and the false dealing of our foes point out. The die is cast," said he.
33 Accordingly, crossing with his army, and welcoming the tribunes of the commons, who had come to him after being driven from Rome, he harangued the soldiers with tears, and rending his robe from his breast besought their faithful service. ”

“ He was in the very flower of his youth; some seven and twenty years of age; tall, straight and lithe as steel. His father, Pope Alexander VI., had been accounted in early life the handsomest man of his day; of a beauty of countenance, it was said, that acted upon women as the lodestone upon iron—which had by no means helped him to the virtuous course that should be looked for in a church man. That beauty Cesare had inherited, but refined and glorified by the graces of Madonna Vanozza de' Catanei, the Roman lady who had been his mother. ”

“ CICERO TO ATTICUS, GREETING.
Formiae, the evening of Feb. 8 or morning of Feb. 9, B.C. 49
I see there is not a foot of ground in Italy which is not in Caesar's power. I have no news of Pompey, and I imagine he will be captured unless he has taken to the sea. What marvellous dispatch! While our leader—: but it grieves me to blame him, as I am in an agony of suspense on his account. There is reason for you to fear butchery, not that anything could be less advantageous to secure Caesar a lasting victory and power; but I see on whose advice he will act. ”

“ Cesare could find no allies, and it seemed as though all Italy was about to turn against the hated family, when the French king promised help, and this was enough to frighten the confederates into coming to terms. Most of them had shown very little political or military skill, and several were ready to betray each other. But Cesare, while trusting no one, proved a match for them all. During his operations in northern Romagna, Vitelli, Oliverotto, Paolo Orsini, and the duke of Gravina, to show their repentance, seized Senigallia, which still held for the duke of Urbino, in his name. ”

“ The greatest and strongest party of the rebels, under the command of Abriorix, cut off Costa and Titurius with all their men, while a force sixty thousand strong besieged the legion under the command of Cicero, and had almost taken it by storm, the Roman soldiers being all wounded, and having quite spent themselves by a defense beyond their natural strength. But Caesar, who was at a great distance, having received the news, quickly got together seven thousand men, and hastened to relieve Cicero. ”

“ But when it was to no purpose, and the vessel now took in much water, Caesar finding himself in such danger in the very mouth of the river, much against his will permitted the master to turn back. When he was come to land, his soldiers ran to him in a multitude, reproaching him for what he had done, and indignant that he should think himself not strong enough to get a victory by their sole assistance, but must disturb himself, and expose his life for those who were absent, as if he could not trust those who were with him. ”

“ For the eldest of Ptolemy's two sons being dead, Caesar settled the kingdom upon the youngest, in conjunction with Cleopatra, the elder of the two sisters, who had always continued under his protection and guardianship. The younger, Arsinoe, in whose name Ganymed, as we have seen, tyrannically reigned for some time he thought proper to banish the kingdom, that she might not raise any new disturbance, through the agency of seditious men, before the king's authority should be firmly established. ”

“ Observe my strength of mind and my supreme indifference to the Felician [2] one-twelfth legacy, and also, by heaven, my very gratifying connexion with Caesar—for this delights me as the one spar left me from the present shipwreck—Caesar, I say, who treats your and my Quintus, heavens! with what honour, respect, and favours! It is exactly as if I were the imperator. The choice was just lately offered him of selecting any of the winter quarters, as he writes me word. Wouldn't you be fond of such a man as that? ”

“ The spot was not far from the camp, with a river surrounding it. Caesar, it is said, contended earnestly for Cicero the first two days; but on the third day he yielded, and gave him up. The terms of their mutual concessions were these; that Caesar should desert Cicero, Lepidus his brother Paulus, and Antony, Lucius Caesar, his uncle by his mother's side. Thus they let their anger and fury take from them the sense of humanity, and demonstrated that no beast is more savage than man, when possessed with power proportioned to his rage. ”