"Julius Caesar" by Shakespeare

The Wake of Death

As a result of killing Caesar, Brutus demonstrates a perfect example of karma; in this case, proving murder brings death in its wake. For example when Brutus kills Caesar, Antony swears that he will "let slip the dogs of war, / That this foul deed shall above the earth/ With carrion men, groaning for burial." (III.1.273-275).Caesars' death has led Antony to swear the complete and total destruction of all the conspirators. By killing Caesar, Brutus seals his own fate. But Brutus does not know he sealed his death because he promises the audience "I have the same dagger for myself when it/ Shall please my country to need my death." (III.2.48-49) he then points the bloody dagger to his naked chest. By writing this Shakespeare foreshadows not only Brutus' but Cassius' death because Brutus commits assisted suicide with the same dagger he points at his chest, and Cassius commits suicide with the dagger that he stabbed Caesar with as well.

Caesar's Death. Attention: Image is laterally reve...

Brutus and the Ghost of Caesar. Copperplate engrav...

Marcus Junius Brutus (Rome character)

When Brutus says this he proves to the reader that he kills Caesar because of his love for Rome, he loves Rome so much he would end his own life without a second thought. However when Brutus discovers his friends corpses lying dead on the ground, his death becomes inevitable to the audience, and in his last words one can hear the dreadful feeling of a dream gone wrong as Brutus begs Caesar's ghost to "be still./ I killed not thee with half so good a will." (V.5.50-51). In Brutus' final words Brutus reveals that he feels worse about stabbing Caesar, a friend, than how he feels regarding his own death. Brutus then ends his own life with the same dagger that had ended Caesar's life; this symbolism directly relates both Caesar's death and...