Power and Arrogance: A Bad Combination

Power and Arrogance: A Bad Combination Jimi Hendrix said,” When the power of love overcomes the love of power, the world will know peace.” It means that when people stop being “power-hungry” then, slowly, the corruption of the world will decline. In Shakespeare’s, The Tragedy of Julius Caesar, Caesar was a”power-hungry” person. After he defeated Pompey, he wanted to become emperor of Rome. Rome was a republic and didn’t want an emperor or dictator. In the tragedy, Brutus was convinced that to protect Rome he would have to get rid of Caesar. So, he joined the conspirators. On the Ides of March, March 15th, the conspirators stabbed Caesar 33 times. The literal Caesar’s downfall was his arrogance. He was warned several times by several different people that he should be careful on the Ides of March (Holt Elements of Literature, Fourth Course, pgs. 762, 796, 801). He didn’t listen to any of the warnings. Power and arrogance are dangerous and should be used wisely. In the tragedy, they pulled out the bad that Caesar did, but Caesar was actually just trying to help Rome. He gave them lands, built up an Army, and so much more. What was the harm? After he got power, he didn’t know when to stop wanting more. He wanted more and more power. Caesar didn’t have control of his power. The historical Caesar was a very good military leader. He conquered many lands. Like the literal Caesar, the historical Caesar was very arrogant. The historical Caesar conquered, most of what is now today, Central Europe. Unlike the tragedy, the historical Caesar’s dead body wasn’t carried by Marc Antony; the historical Caesars’ dead body was carried away by three slaves (http://www.vroma.org/~bmcmanus/caesar.html). Like both Caesars, Adolf Hitler was an autocratic dictator. He was very manipulative with words. He could get people to do a lot with the use of some words and propaganda. He told people what they wanted to hear and