Act 4, Scene 6

Alexandria. CAESAR'S camp.

[Flourish. Enter AGRIPPA, CAESAR, with DOLABELLA and ENOBARBUS.]
Octavius Caesar
2500 Go forth, Agrippa, and begin the fight:
2501 Our will is Antony be took alive;
2502 Make it so known.
Agrippa
2503 Caesar, I shall.
[Exit.]
Octavius Caesar
2504 The time of universal peace is near:
2505 Prove this a prosperous day, the three-nook'd world
2506 Shall bear the olive freely.
[Enter a Messenger.]
Messenger
2507 Antony
2508 Is come into the field.
Octavius Caesar
2509 Go charge Agrippa
2510 Plant those that have revolted in the van,
2511 That Antony may seem to spend his fury
2512 Upon himself.
[Exeunt CAESAR and his Train.]
Enobarbus
2513 Alexas did revolt; and went to Jewry on
2514 Affairs of Antony; there did dissuade
2515 Great Herod to incline himself to Caesar
2516 And leave his master Antony: for this pains
2517 Casaer hath hang'd him. Canidius and the rest
2518 That fell away, have entertainment, but
2519 No honourable trust. I have done ill;
2520 Of which I do accuse myself so sorely
2521 That I will joy no more.
[Enter a SOLDIER of CAESAR'S.]
Soldier
2522 Enobarbus, Antony
2523 Hath after thee sent all thy treasure, with
2524 His bounty overplus: the messenger
2525 Came on my guard, and at thy tent is now
2526 Unloading of his mules.
Enobarbus
2527 I give it you.
Soldier
2528 Mock not, Enobarbus.
2529 I tell you true: best you saf'd the bringer
2530 Out of the host; I must attend mine office,
2531 Or would have done't myself. Your emperor
2532 Continues still a Jove.
[Exit.]
Enobarbus
2533 I am alone the villain of the earth,
2534 And feel I am so most. O Antony,
2535 Thou mine of bounty, how wouldst thou have paid
2536 My better service, when my turpitude
2537 Thou dost so crown with gold! This blows my heart:
2538 If swift thought break it not, a swifter mean
2539 Shall outstrike thought: but thought will do't, I feel.
2540 I fight against thee!—No: I will go seek
2541 Some ditch wherein to die; the foul'st best fits
2542 My latter part of life.
[Exit.]

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Notes

TLN 2504historical topical
“The time of universal peace is near”
Octavius Caesar is predicting the Pax Romana, the era of empire-wide peace he will inaugurate after defeating Antony. 'The three-nook'd world' is the known world divided into three continents — Europe, Asia, and Africa; 'bear the olive freely' means produce peace (the olive branch was the classical symbol of peace). By defeating the last rival, Octavius will become the first Roman emperor and close a century of civil war.
historical Octavius, Augustus, and the universal peace
TLN 2510historical topical
“Plant those that have revolted in the van”
Octavius Caesar orders his commanders to place soldiers who have defected from Antony at the front of the battle line (the 'van,' short for vanguard). The tactic is coldly calculated: if Antony sees his own former men in the forefront, he will either be forced to kill them or hesitate — and Octavius can then claim that Antony 'seem to spend his fury / Upon himself,' as if tearing his own army apart.
TLN 2531classical allusion
“Your emperor / Continues still a Jove”
Caesar's soldier calls Antony a 'Jove' — Jove being the Roman name for Jupiter, king of the gods, whose defining trait was sovereign munificence and the dispensing of gifts. Antony has just sent Enobarbus, who betrayed him, not punishment but all of his treasure back plus a 'bounty overplus' (an extra gift on top). Comparing him to Jove says he is so far above ordinary men that betrayal cannot diminish him.
TLN 2537archaic vocab
“This blows my heart: / If swift thought break it not, a swifter mean / Shall outstrike thought”
Enobarbus is saying that Antony's act of forgiving him has broken his heart with grief and shame. 'Blows my heart' means swells it to bursting, as if inflating a vessel until it splits. He then weighs two ways to die: 'swift thought' means grief so intense it kills by itself (the Elizabethan belief that extreme sorrow could stop the heart); 'a swifter mean shall outstrike thought' means he may choose a faster, deliberate method before grief can do the job. He dies, in the next scene, of a broken heart after all.