Mark Anthonys Funeral Speech from Julius Caesar by William Shakespeare
Shakespeare read by Classic Poetry Aloud:\nhttp://www.classicpoetryaloud.com/\nGiving voice to the poetry of the past.\n\n---------------------------------------------\n\nMark Anthony\u2019s Funeral Speech\nfrom Julius Caesar by William Shakespeare (1564 \u2013 1616)\n\nFriends, Romans, countrymen, lend me your ears;\nI come to bury Caesar, not to praise him.\nThe evil that men do lives after them;\nThe good is oft interred with their bones;\nSo let it be with Caesar. The noble Brutus\nHath told you Caesar was ambitious:\nIf it were so, it was a grievous fault,\nAnd grievously hath Caesar answer'd it.\nHere, under leave of Brutus and the rest--\nFor Brutus is an honourable man;\nSo are they all, all honourable men--\nCome I to speak in Caesar's funeral.\nHe was my friend, faithful and just to me:\nBut Brutus says he was ambitious;\nAnd Brutus is an honourable man.\nHe hath brought many captives home to Rome\nWhose ransoms did the general coffers fill:\nDid this in Caesar seem ambitious?\nWhen that the poor have cried, Caesar hath wept:\nAmbition should be made of sterner stuff:\nYet Brutus says he was ambitious;\nAnd Brutus is an honourable man.\nYou all did see that on the Lupercal\nI thrice presented him a kingly crown,\nWhich he did thrice refuse: was this ambition?\nYet Brutus says he was ambitious;\nAnd, sure, he is an honourable man.\nI speak not to disprove what Brutus spoke,\nBut here I am to speak what I do know.\nYou all did love him once, not without cause:\nWhat cause withholds you then, to mourn for him?\nO judgment! thou art fled to brutish beasts,\nAnd men have lost their reason. Bear with me;\nMy heart is in the coffin there with Caesar,\nAnd I must pause till it come back to me.