Brutus had married Cato’s daughter and shared many of Cato’s ideas. Round him there gathered a knot of men, among whom the ablest was Caius Cassius, who determined to free the city of the tyrant. To the minds of Brutus and Cassius it seemed that Caesar was destroying the seeds of greatness in all other men, to make himself supreme. Shakespeare makes Cassius argue thus: _The Penalty of Greatness_ _Cassius._ Why, man, he doth bestride the narrow world Like a Colossus; and we petty men Walk under his huge legs, and peep about To find ourselves dishonourable graves. Men at some time are masters of their fates: The fault, dear Brutus, is not in our stars, But in ourselves, that we are underlings. Brutus and Caesar: what should be in that ‘Caesar’? Why should that name be sounded more than yours? Write them together, yours is as fair a name; Sound them, it doth become the mouth as well; Weigh them, it is as heavy; conjure with ’em, ‘Brutus’ will start a spirit as soon as ‘Caesar’. Now, in the names of all the gods at once, Upon what meat doth this our Caesar feed, That he is grown so great? Age, thou art sham’d! Rome, thou hast lost the breed of noble bloods! When went there by an age, since the great flood, But it was fam’d with more than with one man? When could they say, till now, that talk’d of Rome, That her wide walls encompassed but one man? Now is it Rome indeed, and room enough, When there is in it but one only man. O! you and I have heard our fathers say, There was a Brutus once that would have brook’d The eternal devil to keep his state in Rome As easily as a king. Shakespeare, _Julius Caesar_, I. ii. Caesar was warned of the conspiracy but took little heed. He had always taken his life in his hand. He knew that he walked in constant danger. When a soothsayer warned him to beware the Ides of March he only laughed; and when the Ides (March 15) came and his wife implored him to stay indoors, he paid no attention but set out for a meeting of the Senate as usual to transact his daily business, hearing petitions and so on. It was the day chosen by the conspirators. One of them detained Marcus Antonius, who generally watched over his chief’s safety: the others gathered round Caesar. At a sudden signal, they fell upon him with their daggers. Caesar was unarmed. At the foot of the statue of Pompeius, which he had himself caused to be set up in a place of honour, he fell. Pierced by six and thirty wounds he died. Marcus Brutus raised his dagger, dyed with Caesar’s blood, and holding it aloft declared that he had freed Rome from a tyrant.