Friends, Romans, countrymen, lend me your ears; [bad word] to bury Caesar, not to praise him.
The evil that men do lives after them;
The good is oft interred with their bones;
So let it be with Caesar. The noble [bad word] Hath told you Caesar was ambitious:
If it were so, it was a grievous fault,
And grievously hath Caesar answer’d it.
Here, under leave of [bad word] and the rest–
For [bad word] is an honourable man;
So are they all, all honourable [bad word] I to speak in Caesar’s funeral.
He was my friend, faithful and just to me:
But [bad word] says he was ambitious;
And [bad word] is an honourable man.
He hath brought many captives home to Rome
Whose ransoms did the general coffers fill:
Did this in Caesar seem ambitious?
When that the poor have cried, Caesar hath wept:
Ambition should be made of sterner stuff:
Yet [bad word] says he was ambitious;
And [bad word] is an honourable man.
You all did see that on the Lupercal
I thrice presented him a kingly crown,
Which he did thrice refuse: was this ambition?
Yet [bad word] says he was ambitious;
And, sure, he is an honourable man.
I speak not to disprove what [bad word] spoke,
But here I am to speak what I do know.
You all did love him once, not without cause:
What cause withholds you then, to mourn for him?
O judgment! thou art fled to [bad word] beasts,
And men have lost their reason. Bear with me;
My heart is in the coffin there with Caesar,
And I must pause till [bad word] back to me.