CATO
A monologue from the
play by Joseph
Addison
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NOTE: This monologue is reprinted
from One Hundred Choice Selections. Ed. Phineas Garrett.
Philadelphia: Penn Publishing Co., 1897. |
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- CATO: [Sitting in a thoughtful posture, with Plato's
book on the Immortality of the Soul in his hand, and a drawn
sword on the table by him.]
- It must be so.--Plato, thou reasonest well!
- Else whence this pleasing hope, this fond desire
- This longing after immortality?
- Or whence this secret dread, and inward horror,
- Of falling into naught? Why shrinks the soul
- Back on herself, and startles at destruction?
- 'Tis the divinity that stirs within us;
- 'Tis heaven itself, that points out a hereafter,
- And intimates eternity to man.
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- Eternity!--thou pleasing, dreadful thought!
- Through what variety of untried being,
- Through what new scenes and changes must we pass!
- The wide, the unbounded prospect lies before me;
- But shadows, clouds, and darkness rest upon it.
- Here will I hold. If there's a Power above us,--
- And that there is, all Nature cries aloud
- Through all her works,--He must delight in virtue;
- And that which He delights in must be happy.
- But when? or where? This world was made for Caesar.
- I'm weary of conjectures,--this must end them.
- [Laying his hand on his sword.]
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- Thus am I doubly armed. My death and life,
- My bane and antidote, are both before me.
- This in a moment brings me to my end;
- But this informs me I shall never die.
- The soul, secure in her existence, smiles
- At the drawn dagger, and defies its point.
- The stars shall fade away, the sun himself
- Grow dim with age, and Nature sink in years;
- But thou shalt flourish in immortal youth,
- Unhurt amid the war of elements,
- The wreck of matter, and the crush of worlds.
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MONOLOGUES BY JOSEPH ADDISON |
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