Brutus and Cassius are embedded in an optics of intramission, where reflected light reveals reality.
What is it that you would impart to me?
If it be aught toward the general good,
Set honor in one eye and death i’ th’ other
And I will look on both indifferently;
For let the gods so speed me as I love
The name of honor more than I fear death. (Julius Caesar, I.2.91)
Brutus puts his internal conflict — between the love for his friend Caesar and his loyalty to the Republic — between two eyes. But what does this mean really, what is he actually saying? How can he look on both impartially? He immediately follows with wishing the gods to speed him to love honor more than to fear death. But that is far from indifferent. He doubts, hence the prayer. His hope rests on the prophetic metaphor of Plotinian vision that his soul will turn out to be properly adapted to the honorable path.
And whose death? It is not certain that he means his own. This could be a foreshadowing of Caesar’s death, or the widespread misery and death in the civil war that follows it. Brutus claims that he would look on honor and death indifferently. But he has already decided. He prays that the gods will help him choose the general good over his own personal safety. Brutus has already imagined what must be done.
What you would work me to, I have some aim.
How I have thought of this, and of these times,
I shall recount hereafter. For this present,
I would not, so with love I might entreat you,
Be any further moved. What you have said
I will consider; what you have to say
I will with patience hear, and find a time
Both meet to hear and answer such high things. (I.2.172)
Cassius replies with a speech about what honor has brought them so far. Cassius saved Caesar from drowning — that act has necessarily led to this moment. Caesar is a man no different than them, but they have made him into what he becomes. The honorable men of Rome created Caesar, just as the citizens do. There is a branching timeline that descends from every decision, from every moment. Saving Caesar from drowning was the father to this moment.
Brutus and Cassius are embedded in an optics of intramission, where reflected light reveals reality. This metaphor comes out of the “new” science of Alhazen. Brutus comes to know his own mind through Cassius and the other conspirators. This is a mediated consciousness, subject and object becoming clear to each other only through the mediation of a third, reflective surface.
The objective world is revealed by reflection, Subjectivity is revealed by refraction, the eyes are lenses into the interior. Cassius notes that:
I have not from your eyes that gentleness
And show of love as I was wont to have. (I.2.38)
The eyes are the portals of the soul, revealing the internal landscape of a person’s desires. The eyes cannot lie, they cannot help but to reveal what is hidden within. Brutus dissembles and tries to explain away what Cassius sees as merely a private, internal conflict. But Cassius has surmised that this private conflict is the conflict at the heart of their conspiracy. Brutus continues to insist that he is “with himself at war,” speaking of himself in the third person. The first battle of the civil war that will inflame Rome after Caesar’s assassination is fought inside Brutus.
Therefore, good Brutus, be prepared to hear.
And since you know you cannot see yourself
So well as by reflection, I, your glass,
Will modestly discover to yourself
That of yourself which you yet know not of. (I.2.72-84)
Are we meant to understand that what Cassius will reveal to Brutus is his own courage, his own sense of duty to the republic, and therefore his commitment to the conspiracy? Or is the civil war to follow what is revealed? For by pulling Brutus into the center of the conspiracy, Cassius has put in motion the first step towards civil war — the internal civil war in Brutus will be reflected into a real civil war that ends the republic forever.
CASSIUS ’Tis just.
And it is very much lamented, Brutus,
That you have no such mirrors as will turn
Your hidden worthiness into your eye,
That you might see your shadow. I have heard
Where many of the best respect in Rome,
Except immortal Caesar, speaking of Brutus
And groaning underneath this age’s yoke,
Have wished that noble Brutus had his eyes. (I.2.60-68)
So much turns on this idea of seeing ones own shadow. Cassius, speaking on behalf of the “best in Rome,” has an instrumental desire to get Brutus to see himself as others would see him. The worthiness that Cassius sees is the strength to oppose Caesar, and his wish is for Brutus to see himself in that role. But more is happening here beneath the surface.
One of many possible worlds opens up — consider Iago. What if a character like Iago emerges from Brutus’ shadow, someone capable of sociopathic behavior, lying without remorse, manipulating everyone around him?
Cassius wants Brutus to see his shadow, the shadow cast when his “hidden worthiness” illuminates him. A shadow is an insubstantial thing. Actors and performers were called “shadows” because they represent but aren’t the real thing. Brutus replies to Cassius:
Into what dangers would you lead me, Cassius,
That you would have me seek into myself
For that which is not in me? (I.2.69-71)
Civil warfare, constant conflicts and uncertainty, the yoke that weighs on the citizens of Rome — they would wish that Brutus could find within himself the strength to stand up to the threat that Caesar represents. But what is foreshadowed is what lies in the shadows of Brutus’ sub-consciousness. When it becomes visible, it will reveal a capacity for brutal violence. The dangers are very real.
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