Pete Yemc
6/1/99
Period 7
Third Caesar Journal
In Act Two Scene One and explained in the ninth quote by Miriam Griffith, Brutus reveals his reasoning behind his conclusion that death is the only way to save The Republic from Caesar. Brutus’s conclusion was that Caesar inevitably would become power hungry and eliminate the aspects of government which formed the Roman Republic. Though Caesar has never acted with a desire to be a sole powerful ruler, Brutus has clouded his head with the idea that this change will come to Caesar. And thus the only way to save Rome and Caesar is to kill Caesar.
The reasoning that the only way to save something is to destroy it is prevalent in our world today as leaders explain their actions as saving despite the harm that they caused (for the greater good). One such quote comes from the Vietnam War, when a sergeant explained his squad’s actions with the quote, “the only way to save the village was to destroy it.” Similarly, in Yugoslavia today, NATO attempts to save the Kosovars from Serbian persecution by destroying the country which the Kosovars hold dear. The only way to save the Kosovars is to destroy anything which could cause them harm and inadvertently destroy what they hold dear and desire.
A cinematic allusion to Brutus’s reasoning occurs in the movie Outbreak, where army officials feel that the only way to save a diseased, quarantined town is to firebomb it. Their solution is to save the people by killing them (and ultimately benefiting the greater good) in a form of undesired euthanasia.