Speeches (Lines) for AGRIPPA in "Antony and Cleopatra"

OCTAVIUS. I do not much dislike the matter, but
The manner of his speech; for't cannot be
We shall remain in friendship, our conditions
So differing in their acts. Yet if I knew
What hoop should hold us stanch, from edge to edge
O' the world I would pursue it.

AGRIPPA. Give me leave, Caesar,--

OCTAVIUS. Speak, Agrippa.

AGRIPPA. Thou hast a sister by the mother's side,
Admired Octavia: great Mark Antony
Is now a widower.

ANTONY. I am not married, Caesar: let me hear
Agrippa further speak.

AGRIPPA. To hold you in perpetual amity,
To make you brothers, and to knit your hearts
With an unslipping knot, take Antony
Octavia to his wife; whose beauty claims
No worse a husband than the best of men;
Whose virtue and whose general graces speak
That which none else can utter. By this marriage,
All little jealousies, which now seem great,
And all great fears, which now import their dangers,
Would then be nothing: truths would be tales,
Where now half tales be truths: her love to both
Would, each to other and all loves to both,
Draw after her. Pardon what I have spoke;
For 'tis a studied, not a present thought,
By duty ruminated.

DOMITIUS ENOBARBUS. Half the heart of Caesar, worthy Mecaenas! My
honourable friend, Agrippa!

AGRIPPA. Good Enobarbus!

DOMITIUS ENOBARBUS. When she first met Mark Antony, she pursed up
his heart, upon the river of Cydnus.

AGRIPPA. There she appeared indeed; or my reporter devised
well for her.

DOMITIUS ENOBARBUS. I will tell you.
The barge she sat in, like a burnish'd throne,
Burn'd on the water: the poop was beaten gold;
Purple the sails, and so perfumed that
The winds were love-sick with them; the oars were silver,
Which to the tune of flutes kept stroke, and made
The water which they beat to follow faster,
As amorous of their strokes. For her own person,
It beggar'd all description: she did lie
In her pavilion--cloth-of-gold of tissue--
O'er-picturing that Venus where we see
The fancy outwork nature: on each side her
Stood pretty dimpled boys, like smiling Cupids,
With divers-colour'd fans, whose wind did seem
To glow the delicate cheeks which they did cool,
And what they undid did.

AGRIPPA. O, rare for Antony!

DOMITIUS ENOBARBUS. Her gentlewomen, like the Nereides,
So many mermaids, tended her i' the eyes,
And made their bends adornings: at the helm
A seeming mermaid steers: the silken tackle
Swell with the touches of those flower-soft hands,
That yarely frame the office. From the barge
A strange invisible perfume hits the sense
Of the adjacent wharfs. The city cast
Her people out upon her; and Antony,
Enthroned i' the market-place, did sit alone,
Whistling to the air; which, but for vacancy,
Had gone to gaze on Cleopatra too,
And made a gap in nature.

AGRIPPA. Rare Egyptian!

DOMITIUS ENOBARBUS. Upon her landing, Antony sent to her,
Invited her to supper: she replied,
It should be better he became her guest;
Which she entreated: our courteous Antony,
Whom ne'er the word of 'No' woman heard speak,
Being barber'd ten times o'er, goes to the feast,
And for his ordinary pays his heart
For what his eyes eat only.

AGRIPPA. Royal wench!
She made great Caesar lay his sword to bed:
He plough'd her, and she cropp'd.

MECAENAS. If beauty, wisdom, modesty, can settle
The heart of Antony, Octavia is
A blessed lottery to him.

AGRIPPA. Let us go.
Good Enobarbus, make yourself my guest
Whilst you abide here.

LEPIDUS. Trouble yourselves no further: pray you, hasten
Your generals after.

AGRIPPA. Sir, Mark Antony
Will e'en but kiss Octavia, and we'll follow.

VENTIDIUS. He purposeth to Athens: whither, with what haste
The weight we must convey with's will permit,
We shall appear before him. On there; pass along!

AGRIPPA. What, are the brothers parted?

DOMITIUS ENOBARBUS. They have dispatch'd with Pompey, he is gone;
The other three are sealing. Octavia weeps
To part from Rome; Caesar is sad; and Lepidus,
Since Pompey's feast, as Menas says, is troubled
With the green sickness.

AGRIPPA. 'Tis a noble Lepidus.

DOMITIUS ENOBARBUS. A very fine one: O, how he loves Caesar!

AGRIPPA. Nay, but how dearly he adores Mark Antony!

DOMITIUS ENOBARBUS. Caesar? Why, he's the Jupiter of men.

AGRIPPA. What's Antony? The god of Jupiter.

DOMITIUS ENOBARBUS. Spake you of Caesar? How! the non-pareil!

AGRIPPA. O Antony! O thou Arabian bird!

DOMITIUS ENOBARBUS. Would you praise Caesar, say 'Caesar:' go no further.

AGRIPPA. Indeed, he plied them both with excellent praises.

DOMITIUS ENOBARBUS. But he loves Caesar best; yet he loves Antony:
Ho! hearts, tongues, figures, scribes, bards,
poets, cannot
Think, speak, cast, write, sing, number, ho!
His love to Antony. But as for Caesar,
Kneel down, kneel down, and wonder.

AGRIPPA. Both he loves.

DOMITIUS ENOBARBUS. They are his shards, and he their beetle.
[Trumpets within]
So;
This is to horse. Adieu, noble Agrippa.

AGRIPPA. Good fortune, worthy soldier; and farewell.

DOMITIUS ENOBARBUS. [Aside to AGRIPPA] Will Caesar weep?

AGRIPPA. [Aside to DOMITIUS ENOBARBUS] He has a cloud in 's face.

DOMITIUS ENOBARBUS. [Aside to AGRIPPA] He were the worse for that,
were he a horse;
So is he, being a man.

AGRIPPA. [Aside to DOMITIUS ENOBARBUS] Why, Enobarbus,
When Antony found Julius Caesar dead,
He cried almost to roaring; and he wept
When at Philippi he found Brutus slain.

MECAENAS. Let Rome be thus Inform'd.

AGRIPPA. Who, queasy with his insolence
Already, will their good thoughts call from him.

OCTAVIUS. The people know it; and have now received
His accusations.

AGRIPPA. Who does he accuse?

OCTAVIUS. Caesar: and that, having in Sicily
Sextus Pompeius spoil'd, we had not rated him
His part o' the isle: then does he say, he lent me
Some shipping unrestored: lastly, he frets
That Lepidus of the triumvirate
Should be deposed; and, being, that we detain
All his revenue.

AGRIPPA. Sir, this should be answer'd.

OCTAVIUS. Welcome hither:
Your letters did withhold our breaking forth;
Till we perceived, both how you were wrong led,
And we in negligent danger. Cheer your heart;
Be you not troubled with the time, which drives
O'er your content these strong necessities;
But let determined things to destiny
Hold unbewail'd their way. Welcome to Rome;
Nothing more dear to me. You are abused
Beyond the mark of thought: and the high gods,
To do you justice, make them ministers
Of us and those that love you. Best of comfort;
And ever welcome to us.

AGRIPPA. Welcome, lady.

OCTAVIUS. Go forth, Agrippa, and begin the fight:
Our will is Antony be took alive;
Make it so known.

AGRIPPA. Caesar, I shall.

DOMITIUS ENOBARBUS. I am alone the villain of the earth,
And feel I am so most. O Antony,
Thou mine of bounty, how wouldst thou have paid
My better service, when my turpitude
Thou dost so crown with gold! This blows my heart:
If swift thought break it not, a swifter mean
Shall outstrike thought: but thought will do't, I feel.
I fight against thee! No: I will go seek
Some ditch wherein to die; the foul'st best fits
My latter part of life.

AGRIPPA. Retire, we have engaged ourselves too far:
Caesar himself has work, and our oppression
Exceeds what we expected.

OCTAVIUS. Look you sad, friends?
The gods rebuke me, but it is tidings
To wash the eyes of kings.

AGRIPPA. And strange it is,
That nature must compel us to lament
Our most persisted deeds.

MECAENAS. His taints and honours
Waged equal with him.

AGRIPPA. A rarer spirit never
Did steer humanity: but you, gods, will give us
Some faults to make us men. Caesar is touch'd.