I know that virtue to be in you, Brutus...

I know that virtue to be in you, Brutus

As well as I do know your outward favor.

Well, honor is the subject of my story.

I cannot tell what you and other men

Think of this life, but, for my single self,

I had as lief not be as live to be

In awe of such a thing as I myself.

I was born free as Caesar. So were you.

We both have fed as well, and we can both

Endure the winter’s cold as well as he.

For once upon a gusty day,

The troubled Tiber chafing with her shores,

Caesar said to me, “Darest thou, Cassius, now

Leap in with me into this angry flood

And swim to yonder point? Upon the word,

Accoutred as I was, I plungèd in

And bade him follow. So indeed he did.

The torrent roared, and we did buffet it

With lusty sinews, throwing it aside

And stemming it with hearts of controversy.

But ere we could arrive the point proposed,

Caesar cried, “Help me, Cassius, or I sink!”

I, as Aeneas, our great ancestor,

Did from the flames of Troy upon his shoulder

The old Anchises bear, so from the waves of Tiber

Did I the tired Caesar. And this man

Is now become a god, and Cassius is

A wretched creature and must bend his body

If Caesar carelessly but nod on him.

Shakespeare, William, Julius Caesar, Act 1, Scene 2, ll. 92-120