You should now see a pattern emerging: after the opening sentence which contains a general criticism of Antony’s intemperance and exasperation at the excesses of his “dotage”, each sentence begins with a reminder of the position Antony once held and the esteem of his men and ends with a terse, trenchant condemnation of what Antony, in Philo’s view, has become. Philo is particularly exercised because Antony is still his commander, “our general”; it appears that Philo feels personally let down, even betrayed: the verbs “bend”, “turn” and “renege” are especially forceful in this context. Philo cannot understand how Antony, who had resembled the god of war when he surveyed their ranks, could stoop to devote himself to the “tawny front” of Cleopatra. The contrast of the brilliance of “those his goodly eyes” which “glowed like plated Mars” with the darkness of Cleopatra’s “tawny” skin is intended to suggest a descent into the darkness of irrational lust.

In the next of these sentences (lines 6–10), “His captain’s heart”, which once burst with a warrior’s courage, is now in the service of a “gipsy”. As Philo makes this comment, Cleopatra enters fanned by eunuchs; Antony is thus directly compared to the eunuchs – his “dotage” has clearly, in Philo’s estimation, emasculated him. In the last statement (lines 11-13), Antony, the foundation and ruler of a third of the Roman Empire, is judged to have been transformed into the plaything of a prostitute.

The first half of each of these sentences thus vividly evokes Antony’s past greatness; the second pronounces Philo’s severe judgement on his decline. This decline is expressed in terms of Antony’s loss of command of himself; it suggests a moral degradation which exposes the Roman Empire to danger.

The touchstones by which Philo measures Antony are moderation and restraint: it is not so much the fact that Antony has a romantic entanglement with Cleopatra that angers Philo, but that it “o’erflows the measure” and that it “reneges all temper”. Restraint in matters of love or personal affairs is seen as desirable in a Roman general; but while condemning Antony’s lack of restraint in love (lust, in his view), he admires the excesses of Antony’s warlike courage, that in battle his “captain’s heart … hath burst the buckles on his breast”. One might thus argue that there is a degree of tension in this opening speech. 1 Although Philo believes that Antony’s behaviour will prove him right, part of him wishes to be proved wrong.

It is essential then to see Antony’s first speech in this Roman context. He rejects the notion that love “can be reckoned”. He argues that lovers will, like voyagers to the new world, discover “new heaven, new earth” where no limits will be set on love. Whether such a challenge to Rome can succeed is the subject of the play.