Adrian Salazar

Mrs. Petrossian

May 14, 2015

Julius Caesar Essay

Julius Caesar is a tragedy based upon the death of Julius Caesar. The events
cause great trial, catastrophe, and distress on the city of Rome and pushes a group
of devious politicians to kill their leader and friend Julius Caesar. These
conspirators carried motives of superstitions, strong emotions, and loyalty with
them to drive the blade to Caesar's heart and empire. This leads to the great battle
of Philippi to take place. The first signs of betrayal was the envious Cassius and his
motive to kill Caesar.
The character that I would presumably blame most towards the death of
Caesar is Cassius because of his feelings against Caesar and his influence over
Rome. He proclaims "so I from the waves of Tiber did I the tired Caesar. And this
man is not become a god, and Cassius is a wretched creature, and must bend his
body if Caesar carelessly but not at him. " which stating his dislike of Caesar and his
power over Rome to be considered a god to the people. He manages to recruit a
group of members to join his cause, using different motives to drive them against
Caesar and his power over Rome. He deceives Brutus with the idea of Caesar not
having control of Rome, and to better Rome, he must fall.
Brutus's actions was considered by Antony as the most noblest of all the
conspirators. He states " This was the noblest Roman of all: All the conspirators,
save only he, did that they did in envy of great Caesar; He only, in a great honest
thought and common good to all, made one of them." In which Antony admires

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Brutus as the only conspirator to consider the common good of Rome and its
people, instead of their own good. As for some of the other conspirators, some
had a more superstitious look over their reason that Caesar should not rule over
Rome. As for Brutus the death of Caesar hurt him the most because he considered
him as a friend and would rather had not taken part of this treachery, stating that
"yet I love him well. but wherefore do you hold me here so long? What is it that you
would impart to me? If it aught toward the general good."
The conspirator with the most superstition was Casca, with his omens being
the real motivation for the death of Caesar. He stated "a common slave--you know
him well by sight-- held up his left hand, which did flame and burn like twenty
torches join' and yet his hand not sensible of fire remain'd unscorch'd." This being
the first warning of gods, being a very chaotic idea to take place on. Casca then
mentioned "Besides--I ha' not since put up my sword--Against the Capitol I met a
lion,Who glared upon me, and went surly by, Without annoying me." as every omen
he spoke of, Casca showed true frightens with the gods trying to show warnings to
him. The very next one he mentioned was of men and ghosts: both being very
frightening to Casca "Without annoying me: and there were drawn upon a heap a
hundred ghastly women,Transformed with their fear; who swore they sawMen all in
fire walk up and down the streets." The final omen he mentions is of one of the
most noticeable omen to find "And yesterday the bird of night did sit even at noonday upon the market-place,Hooting and shrieking." Of what I know, owls have been
known to show great darkness was to come upon. As for Casca, he finally states
that he believes these so called signs from the gods, he states "Do so conjointly
meet, let not men say 'these are their reasons; they are natural; 'for, I believe, they
are portentous things unto the climate that they point upon." What though most
intrigued me was that Casca was deceived with misinterpreting these omens as
signs of Caesar's rule will bring much disaster to the people of Rome.
These motives, when put together, brought lots of destruction and mayhem to
Rome and its people. These conspirators deceived all of Rome of their intentions

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and actions, with only Antony, the only politician to think that Caesar was a good
leader, proving Caesar's good intentions to the people of Rome to action against
the conspirators. As for the understanding of why the people of Rome managed to
kill the innocent Romans, with no such good reasoning and justice against the
conspirators.
My final conclusion is that the conspirators of Rome used their own motives
to push one another towards the conspiracy against Caesar and his death at the
end of the story. The multitude of examples with the conspirators using their own
motives to push one another towards the ultimate goal; the death of Julius Caesar
and his reign over Rome.

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