A flourish. Cornets. Enter Tullus Aufidius, bloody, with two or three
soldiers.
AUFIDIUS.
The town is ta’en.
SOLDIER.
’Twill be delivered back on good condition.
AUFIDIUS.
Condition?
I would I were a Roman, for I cannot,
Being a Volsce, be that I am. Condition?
What good condition can a treaty find
I’ th’ part that is at mercy? Five times, Martius,
I have fought with thee; so often hast thou beat me
And wouldst do so, I think, should we encounter
As often as we eat. By th’ elements,
If e’er again I meet him beard to beard,
He’s mine or I am his. Mine emulation
Hath not that honour in’t it had; for where
I thought to crush him in an equal force,
True sword to sword, I’ll potch at him some way,
Or wrath or craft may get him.
SOLDIER.
He’s the devil.
AUFIDIUS.
Bolder, though not so subtle. My valour’s poisoned
With only suff’ring stain by him; for him
Shall fly out of itself. Nor sleep nor sanctuary,
Being naked, sick, nor fane nor Capitol,
The prayers of priests nor times of sacrifice,
Embarquements all of fury, shall lift up
Their rotten privilege and custom ’gainst
My hate to Martius. Where I find him, were it
At home, upon my brother’s guard, even there,
Against the hospitable canon, would I
Wash my fierce hand in’s heart. Go you to th’ city;
Learn how ’tis held and what they are that must
Be hostages for Rome.
SOLDIER.
Will not you go?
AUFIDIUS.
I am attended at the cypress grove. I pray you—
’Tis south the city mills,—bring me word thither
How the world goes, that to the pace of it
I may spur on my journey.
SOLDIER.
I shall, sir.
[_Exeunt._]
ACT II
SCENE I. Rome. A public place
Enter Menenius with the two Tribunes of the people, Sicinius and
Brutus.
MENENIUS.
The augurer tells me we shall have news tonight.
BRUTUS.
Good or bad?
MENENIUS.
Not according to the prayer of the people, for they love not Martius.
SICINIUS.
Nature teaches beasts to know their friends.
MENENIUS.
Pray you, who does the wolf love?
SICINIUS.
The lamb.
MENENIUS.
Ay, to devour him, as the hungry plebeians would the noble Martius.
BRUTUS.
He’s a lamb indeed, that baas like a bear.
MENENIUS.
He’s a bear indeed, that lives like a lamb. You two are old men; tell
me one thing that I shall ask you.
BOTH TRIBUNES.
Well, sir.
MENENIUS.
In what enormity is Martius poor in, that you two have not in
abundance?
BRUTUS.
He’s poor in no one fault, but stored with all.
SICINIUS.
Especially in pride.
BRUTUS.
And topping all others in boasting.
MENENIUS.
This is strange now. Do you two know how you are censured here in the
city, I mean of us o’ th’ right-hand file, do you?
BOTH TRIBUNES.
Why, how are we censured?
MENENIUS.
Because you talk of pride now, will you not be angry?
BOTH TRIBUNES.
Well, well, sir, well?
MENENIUS.
Why, ’tis no great matter; for a very little thief of occasion will rob
you of a great deal of patience. Give your dispositions the reins, and
be angry at your pleasures, at the least, if you take it as a pleasure
to you in being so. You blame Martius for being proud.
BRUTUS.
We do it not alone, sir.
MENENIUS.
I know you can do very little alone, for your helps are many, or else
your actions would grow wondrous single. Your abilities are too
infantlike for doing much alone. You talk of pride. O that you could
turn your eyes toward the napes of your necks and make but an interior
survey of your good selves! O, that you could!
BOTH TRIBUNES.
What then, sir?
MENENIUS.
Why, then you should discover a brace of unmeriting, proud, violent,
testy magistrates, alias fools, as any in Rome.
SICINIUS.
Menenius, you are known well enough, too.
MENENIUS.
I am known to be a humorous patrician and one that loves a cup of hot
wine with not a drop of allaying Tiber in’t; said to be something
imperfect in favouring the first complaint, hasty and tinder-like upon
too trivial motion; one that converses more with the buttock of the
night than with the forehead of the morning. What I think I utter, and
spend my malice in my breath. Meeting two such wealsmen as you are—I
cannot call you Lycurguses—if the drink you give me touch my palate
adversely, I make a crooked face at it. I cannot say your Worships have
delivered the matter well when I find the ass in compound with the
major part of your syllables. And though I must be content to bear with
those that say you are reverend grave men, yet they lie deadly that
tell you have good faces. If you see this in the map of my microcosm,
follows it that I am known well enough too? What harm can your bisson
conspectuities glean out of this character, if I be known well enough,
too?
BRUTUS.
Come, sir, come; we know you well enough.
MENENIUS.
You know neither me, yourselves, nor anything. You are ambitious for
poor knaves’ caps and legs. You wear out a good wholesome forenoon in
hearing a cause between an orange-wife and a faucet-seller, and then
rejourn the controversy of threepence to a second day of audience. When
you are hearing a matter between party and party, if you chance to be
pinched with the colic, you make faces like mummers, set up the bloody
flag against all patience, and, in roaring for a chamber pot, dismiss
the controversy bleeding, the more entangled by your hearing. All the
peace you make in their cause is calling both the parties knaves. You
are a pair of strange ones.
BRUTUS.
Come, come. You are well understood to be a perfecter giber for the
table than a necessary bencher in the Capitol.
MENENIUS.
Our very priests must become mockers if they shall encounter such
ridiculous subjects as you are. When you speak best unto the purpose,
it is not worth the wagging of your beards, and your beards deserve not
so honourable a grave as to stuff a botcher’s cushion or to be entombed
in an ass’s packsaddle. Yet you must be saying Martius is proud, who,
in a cheap estimation, is worth all your predecessors since Deucalion,
though peradventure some of the best of ’em were hereditary hangmen.
Good e’en to your Worships. More of your conversation would infect my
brain, being the herdsmen of the beastly plebeians. I will be bold to
take my leave of you.
[_He begins to exit. Brutus and Sicinius stand aside._]
Enter Volumnia, Virgilia and Valeria
How now, my as fair as noble ladies—and the moon, were she earthly, no
nobler—whither do you follow your eyes so fast?
VOLUMNIA.
Honourable Menenius, my boy Martius approaches. For the love of Juno,
let’s go!
MENENIUS.
Ha? Martius coming home?
VOLUMNIA.
Ay, worthy Menenius, and with most prosperous approbation.
MENENIUS.
Take my cap, Jupiter, and I thank thee! Hoo! Martius coming home?
VALERIA, VIRGILIA.
Nay, ’tis true.
VOLUMNIA.
Look, here’s a letter from him. The state hath another, his wife
another, and I think there’s one at home for you.
MENENIUS.
I will make my very house reel tonight. A letter for me?
VIRGILIA.
Yes, certain, there’s a letter for you; I saw it.
MENENIUS.
A letter for me? It gives me an estate of seven years’ health, in which
time I will make a lip at the physician. The most sovereign
prescription in Galen is but empiricutic and, to this preservative, of
no better report than a horse drench. Is he not wounded? He was wont to
come home wounded.
VIRGILIA.
O, no, no, no!
VOLUMNIA.
O, he is wounded, I thank the gods for’t.
MENENIUS.
So do I too, if it be not too much. Brings he victory in his pocket,
the wounds become him.
VOLUMNIA.
On’s brows, Menenius. He comes the third time home with the oaken
garland.
MENENIUS.
Has he disciplined Aufidius soundly?
VOLUMNIA.
Titus Lartius writes they fought together, but Aufidius got off.
MENENIUS.
And ’twas time for him too, I’ll warrant him that. An he had stayed by
him, I would not have been so ’fidiused for all the chests in Corioles
and the gold that’s in them. Is the Senate possessed of this?
VOLUMNIA.
Good ladies, let’s go.—Yes, yes, yes. The Senate has letters from the
General, wherein he gives my son the whole name of the war. He hath in
this action outdone his former deeds doubly.
VALERIA.
In troth, there’s wondrous things spoke of him.
MENENIUS.
Wondrous? Ay, I warrant you, and not without his true purchasing.
VIRGILIA.
The gods grant them true.
VOLUMNIA.
True? Pow, waw!
MENENIUS.
True? I’ll be sworn they are true. Where is he wounded? [_To the
Tribunes_.] God save your good Worships! Martius is coming home; he has
more cause to be proud.—Where is he wounded?
VOLUMNIA.
I’ th’ shoulder and i’ th’ left arm. There will be large cicatrices to
show the people when he shall stand for his place. He received in the
repulse of Tarquin seven hurts i’ th’ body.
MENENIUS.
One i’ th’ neck and two i’ th’ thigh—there’s nine that I know.
VOLUMNIA.
He had, before this last expedition, twenty-five wounds upon him.
MENENIUS.
Now it’s twenty-seven. Every gash was an enemy’s grave.
[_A shout and flourish_.]
Hark, the trumpets!
VOLUMNIA.
These are the ushers of Martius: before him he carries noise, and
behind him he leaves tears.
Death, that dark spirit, in’s nervy arm doth lie,
Which, being advanced, declines, and then men die.
[_A sennet_.]
Enter Cominius the General and Titus Lartius, between them Coriolanus
crowned with an oaken garland, with Captains and Soldiers and a Herald.
Trumpets sound.
HERALD.
Know, Rome, that all alone Martius did fight
Within Corioles’ gates, where he hath won,
With fame, a name to Caius Martius; these
In honour follows “Coriolanus.”
Welcome to Rome, renowned Coriolanus.
[_Sound flourish._]
ALL.
Welcome to Rome, renowned Coriolanus!
CORIOLANUS.
No more of this, it does offend my heart.
Pray now, no more.
COMINIUS.
Look, sir, your mother.
CORIOLANUS.
O,
You have, I know, petitioned all the gods
For my prosperity.
[_Kneels._]
VOLUMNIA.
Nay, my good soldier, up.
[_He stands._]
My gentle Martius, worthy Caius, and
By deed-achieving honour newly named—
What is it? Coriolanus must I call thee?
But, O, thy wife—
CORIOLANUS.
My gracious silence, hail.
Wouldst thou have laughed had I come coffined home,
That weep’st to see me triumph? Ah, my dear,
Such eyes the widows in Corioles wear
And mothers that lack sons.
MENENIUS.
Now the gods crown thee!
CORIOLANUS.
And live you yet? [_To Valeria_] O my sweet lady, pardon.
VOLUMNIA.
I know not where to turn. O, welcome home!
And welcome, general.—And you’re welcome all.
MENENIUS.
A hundred thousand welcomes! I could weep,
And I could laugh; I am light and heavy. Welcome.
A curse begin at very root on’s heart
That is not glad to see thee! You are three
That Rome should dote on; yet, by the faith of men,
We have some old crab trees here at home that will not
Be grafted to your relish. Yet welcome, warriors!
We call a nettle but a nettle, and
The faults of fools but folly.
COMINIUS.
Ever right.
CORIOLANUS.
Menenius ever, ever.
HERALD.
Give way there, and go on!
CORIOLANUS.
[_To Volumnia and Virgilia_.] Your hand, and yours.
Ere in our own house I do shade my head,
The good patricians must be visited,
From whom I have received not only greetings,
But with them change of honours.
VOLUMNIA.
I have lived
To see inherited my very wishes
And the buildings of my fancy. Only
There’s one thing wanting, which I doubt not but
Our Rome will cast upon thee.
CORIOLANUS.
Know, good mother,
I had rather be their servant in my way
Than sway with them in theirs.
COMINIUS.
On, to the Capitol.
[_Flourish of cornets. Exeunt in state, as before._]
Brutus and Sicinius come forward.
BRUTUS.
All tongues speak of him, and the bleared sights
Are spectacled to see him. Your prattling nurse
Into a rapture lets her baby cry
While she chats him. The kitchen malkin pins
Her richest lockram ’bout her reechy neck,
Clamb’ring the walls to eye him. Stalls, bulks, windows
Are smothered up, leads filled, and ridges horsed
With variable complexions, all agreeing
In earnestness to see him. Seld-shown flamens
Do press among the popular throngs and puff
To win a vulgar station. Our veiled dames
Commit the war of white and damask in
Their nicely-gauded cheeks to th’ wanton spoil
Of Phoebus’ burning kisses. Such a pother,
As if that whatsoever god who leads him
Were slyly crept into his human powers
And gave him graceful posture.
SICINIUS.
On the sudden
I warrant him consul.
BRUTUS.
Then our office may,
During his power, go sleep.
SICINIUS.
He cannot temp’rately transport his honours
From where he should begin and end, but will
Lose those he hath won.
BRUTUS.
In that there’s comfort.
SICINIUS.
Doubt not the commoners, for whom we stand,
But they, upon their ancient malice will forget
With the least cause these his new honours—which
That he will give them make as little question
As he is proud to do’t.
BRUTUS.
I heard him swear,
Were he to stand for consul, never would he
Appear i’ th’ marketplace nor on him put
The napless vesture of humility,
Nor showing, as the manner is, his wounds
To th’ people, beg their stinking breaths.
SICINIUS.
’Tis right.
BRUTUS.
It was his word. O, he would miss it rather
Than carry it but by the suit of the gentry to him
And the desire of the nobles.
SICINIUS.
I wish no better
Than have him hold that purpose and to put it
In execution.
BRUTUS.
’Tis most like he will.
SICINIUS.
It shall be to him then, as our good wills,
A sure destruction.
BRUTUS.
So it must fall out
To him, or our authorities for an end.
We must suggest the people in what hatred
He still hath held them; that to’s power he would
Have made them mules, silenced their pleaders, and
Dispropertied their freedoms; holding them
In human action and capacity
Of no more soul nor fitness for the world
Than camels in their war, who have their provand
Only for bearing burdens, and sore blows
For sinking under them.
SICINIUS.
This, as you say, suggested
At some time when his soaring insolence
Shall touch the people—which time shall not want
If it be put upon’t, and that’s as easy
As to set dogs on sheep—will be his fire
To kindle their dry stubble, and their blaze
Shall darken him for ever.
Enter a Messenger.
BRUTUS.
What’s the matter?
MESSENGER.
You are sent for to the Capitol. ’Tis thought
That Martius shall be consul. I have seen
The dumb men throng to see him, and the blind
to hear him speak; matrons flung gloves,
Ladies and maids their scarves and handkerchiefs,
Upon him as he passed; the nobles bended
As to Jove’s statue, and the Commons made
A shower and thunder with their caps and shouts.
I never saw the like.
BRUTUS.
Let’s to the Capitol;
And carry with us ears and eyes for th’ time,
But hearts for the event.
SICINIUS.
Have with you.
[_Exeunt._]
SCENE II. Rome. The Capitol
Enter two Officers, to lay cushions, as it were in the Capitol.
FIRST OFFICER.
Come, come. They are almost here. How many stand for consulships?
SECOND OFFICER.
Three, they say; but ’tis thought of everyone Coriolanus will carry it.
FIRST OFFICER.
That’s a brave fellow, but he’s vengeance proud and loves not the
common people.
SECOND OFFICER.
’Faith, there have been many great men that have flattered the people
who ne’er loved them; and there be many that they have loved they know
not wherefore; so that, if they love they know not why, they hate upon
no better a ground. Therefore, for Coriolanus neither to care whether
they love or hate him manifests the true knowledge he has in their
disposition and, out of his noble carelessness, lets them plainly
see’t.
FIRST OFFICER.
If he did not care whether he had their love or no, he waved
indifferently ’twixt doing them neither good nor harm; but he seeks
their hate with greater devotion than they can render it him and leaves
nothing undone that may fully discover him their opposite. Now, to seem
to affect the malice and displeasure of the people is as bad as that
which he dislikes, to flatter them for their love.
SECOND OFFICER.
He hath deserved worthily of his country, and his ascent is not by such
easy degrees as those who, having been supple and courteous to the
people, bonnetted, without any further deed to have them at all into
their estimation and report; but he hath so planted his honours in
their eyes and his actions in their hearts that for their tongues to be
silent and not confess so much were a kind of ingrateful injury. To
report otherwise were a malice that, giving itself the lie, would pluck
reproof and rebuke from every ear that heard it.
FIRST OFFICER.
No more of him; he’s a worthy man. Make way. They are coming.
A sennet. Enter the Patricians and the Tribunes of the people, Lictors
before them; Coriolanus, Menenius, Cominius the consul. The Patricians
sit. Sicinius and Brutus take their places by themselves. Coriolanus
stands.
MENENIUS.
Having determined of the Volsces and
To send for Titus Lartius, it remains,
As the main point of this our after-meeting,
To gratify his noble service that
Hath thus stood for his country. Therefore please you,
Most reverend and grave elders, to desire
The present consul and last general
In our well-found successes to report
A little of that worthy work performed
By Martius Caius Coriolanus, whom
We met here both to thank and to remember
With honours like himself.
[_Coriolanus sits._]
FIRST SENATOR.
Speak, good Cominius.
Leave nothing out for length, and make us think
Rather our state’s defective for requital,
Than we to stretch it out. Masters o’ th’ people,
We do request your kindest ears and, after,
Your loving motion toward the common body
To yield what passes here.
SICINIUS.
We are convented
Upon a pleasing treaty and have hearts
Inclinable to honour and advance
The theme of our assembly.
BRUTUS.
Which the rather
We shall be blest to do if he remember
A kinder value of the people than
He hath hereto prized them at.
MENENIUS.
That’s off, that’s off!
I would you rather had been silent. Please you
To hear Cominius speak?
BRUTUS.
Most willingly.
But yet my caution was more pertinent
Than the rebuke you give it.
MENENIUS.
He loves your people,
But tie him not to be their bedfellow.—
Worthy Cominius, speak.
[_Coriolanus rises, and offers to go away._]
Nay, keep your place.
FIRST SENATOR.
Sit, Coriolanus. Never shame to hear
What you have nobly done.
CORIOLANUS.
Your Honours, pardon.
I had rather have my wounds to heal again
Than hear say how I got them.
BRUTUS.
Sir, I hope
My words disbenched you not?
CORIOLANUS.
No, sir. Yet oft,
When blows have made me stay, I fled from words.
You soothed not, therefore hurt not; but your people,
I love them as they weigh.
MENENIUS.
Pray now, sit down.
CORIOLANUS.
I had rather have one scratch my head i’ th’ sun
When the alarum were struck than idly sit
To hear my nothings monstered.
[_Exit._]
MENENIUS.
Masters of the people,
Your multiplying spawn how can he flatter—
That’s thousand to one good one—when you now see
He had rather venture all his limbs for honour
Than one on’s ears to hear it?—Proceed, Cominius.
COMINIUS.
I shall lack voice. The deeds of Coriolanus
Should not be uttered feebly. It is held
That valour is the chiefest virtue and
Most dignifies the haver; if it be,
The man I speak of cannot in the world
Be singly counterpoised. At sixteen years,
When Tarquin made a head for Rome, he fought
Beyond the mark of others. Our then dictator,
Whom with all praise I point at, saw him fight
When with his Amazonian chin he drove
The bristled lips before him. He bestrid
An o’erpressed Roman and i’ th’ Consul’s view
Slew three opposers. Tarquin’s self he met
And struck him on his knee. In that day’s feats,
When he might act the woman in the scene,
He proved best man i’ th’ field and for his meed
Was brow-bound with the oak. His pupil age
Man-entered thus, he waxed like a sea,
And in the brunt of seventeen battles since
He lurched all swords of the garland. For this last,
Before and in Corioles, let me say,
I cannot speak him home. He stopped the flyers
And by his rare example made the coward
Turn terror into sport. As weeds before
A vessel under sail, so men obeyed
And fell below his stem. His sword, Death’s stamp,
Where it did mark, it took; from face to foot
He was a thing of blood, whose every motion
Was timed with dying cries. Alone he entered
The mortal gate o’ th’ city, which he painted
With shunless destiny; aidless came off
And with a sudden reinforcement struck
Corioles like a planet. Now all’s his,
When by and by the din of war gan pierce
His ready sense; then straight his doubled spirit
Requickened what in flesh was fatigate,
And to the battle came he, where he did
Run reeking o’er the lives of men as if
’Twere a perpetual spoil; and till we called
Both field and city ours, he never stood
To ease his breast with panting.
MENENIUS.
Worthy man!
FIRST SENATOR.
He cannot but with measure fit the honours
Which we devise him.
COMINIUS.
Our spoils he kicked at;
And looked upon things precious as they were
The common muck of the world. He covets less
Than misery itself would give, rewards
His deeds with doing them, and is content
To spend the time to end it.
MENENIUS.
He’s right noble.
Let him be called for.
FIRST SENATOR.
Call Coriolanus.
OFFICER.
He doth appear.
Enter Coriolanus.
MENENIUS.
The Senate, Coriolanus, are well pleased
To make thee consul.
CORIOLANUS.
I do owe them still
My life and services.
MENENIUS.
It then remains
That you do speak to the people.
CORIOLANUS.
I do beseech you
Let me o’erleap that custom, for I cannot
Put on the gown, stand naked, and entreat them
For my wounds’ sake to give their suffrage. Please you
That I may pass this doing.
SICINIUS.
Sir, the people
Must have their voices; neither will they bate
One jot of ceremony.
MENENIUS.
Put them not to’t.
Pray you, go fit you to the custom, and
Take to you, as your predecessors have,
Your honour with your form.
CORIOLANUS.
It is a part
That I shall blush in acting, and might well
Be taken from the people.
BRUTUS.
Mark you that?
CORIOLANUS.
To brag unto them, “thus I did, and thus!”
Show them th’ unaching scars which I should hide,
As if I had received them for the hire
Of their breath only!
MENENIUS.
Do not stand upon’t.—
We recommend to you, tribunes of the people,
Our purpose to them, and to our noble consul
Wish we all joy and honour.
SENATORS.
To Coriolanus come all joy and honour!
[_Flourish cornets. Exeunt all but Sicinius and Brutus._]
BRUTUS.
You see how he intends to use the people.
SICINIUS.
May they perceive’s intent! He will require them
As if he did contemn what he requested
Should be in them to give.
BRUTUS.
Come, we’ll inform them
Of our proceedings here. On th’ marketplace
I know they do attend us.
[_Exeunt._]
SCENE III. Rome. The Forum
Enter seven or eight Citizens.
FIRST CITIZEN.
Once, if he do require our voices, we ought not to deny him.
SECOND CITIZEN.
We may, sir, if we will.
THIRD CITIZEN.
We have power in ourselves to do it, but it is a power that we have no
power to do; for, if he show us his wounds and tell us his deeds, we
are to put our tongues into those wounds and speak for them. So, if he
tell us his noble deeds, we must also tell him our noble acceptance of
them. Ingratitude is monstrous, and for the multitude to be ingrateful
were to make a monster of the multitude, of the which we being members,
should bring ourselves to be monstrous members.
FIRST CITIZEN.
And to make us no better thought of, a little help will serve; for once
we stood up about the corn, he himself stuck not to call us the
many-headed multitude.
THIRD CITIZEN.
We have been called so of many; not that our heads are some brown, some
black, some auburn, some bald, but that our wits are so diversely
coloured; and truly I think if all our wits were to issue out of one
skull, they would fly east, west, north, south, and their consent of
one direct way should be at once to all the points o’ th’ compass.
SECOND CITIZEN.
Think you so? Which way do you judge my wit would fly?
THIRD CITIZEN.
Nay, your wit will not so soon out as another man’s will; ’tis strongly
wedged up in a blockhead. But if it were at liberty, ’twould, sure,
southward.
SECOND CITIZEN.
Why that way?
THIRD CITIZEN.
To lose itself in a fog, where being three parts melted away with
rotten dews, the fourth would return for conscience’ sake, to help to
get thee a wife.
SECOND CITIZEN.
You are never without your tricks. You may, you may.
THIRD CITIZEN.
Are you all resolved to give your voices? But that’s no matter; the
greater part carries it. I say, if he would incline to the people,
there was never a worthier man.
Enter Coriolanus in a gown of humility, with Menenius.
Here he comes, and in the gown of humility. Mark his behaviour. We are
not to stay all together, but to come by him where he stands, by ones,
by twos, and by threes. He’s to make his requests by particulars,
wherein everyone of us has a single honour in giving him our own voices
with our own tongues. Therefore follow me, and I’ll direct you how you
shall go by him.
ALL.
Content, content.
[_Exeunt._]
MENENIUS.
O sir, you are not right. Have you not known
The worthiest men have done’t?
CORIOLANUS.
What must I say?
“I pray, sir”—plague upon’t! I cannot bring
My tongue to such a pace. “Look, sir, my wounds!
I got them in my country’s service when
Some certain of your brethren roared and ran
From th’ noise of our own drums.”
MENENIUS.
O me, the gods!
You must not speak of that. You must desire them
To think upon you.
CORIOLANUS.
Think upon me! Hang ’em!
I would they would forget me, like the virtues
Which our divines lose by ’em.
MENENIUS.
You’ll mar all.
I’ll leave you. Pray you speak to ’em, I pray you,
In wholesome manner.
[_Exit Menenius._]
CORIOLANUS.
Bid them wash their faces
And keep their teeth clean.
Enter three of the Citizens.
So, here comes a brace.
You know the cause, sirs, of my standing here.
THIRD CITIZEN.
We do, sir. Tell us what hath brought you to’t.
CORIOLANUS.
Mine own desert.
SECOND CITIZEN.
Your own desert?
CORIOLANUS.
Ay, but not mine own desire.
THIRD CITIZEN.
How, not your own desire?
CORIOLANUS.
No, sir, ’twas never my desire yet to trouble the poor with begging.
THIRD CITIZEN.
You must think if we give you anything, we hope to gain by you.
CORIOLANUS.
Well then, I pray, your price o’ th’ consulship?
FIRST CITIZEN.
The price is to ask it kindly.
CORIOLANUS.
Kindly, sir, I pray, let me ha’t. I have wounds to show you, which
shall be yours in private.—Your good voice, sir. What say you?
SECOND CITIZEN.
You shall ha’ it, worthy sir.
CORIOLANUS.
A match, sir. There’s in all two worthy voices begged. I have your
alms. Adieu.
THIRD CITIZEN.
But this is something odd.
SECOND CITIZEN.
An ’twere to give again—but ’tis no matter.
[_Exeunt two citizens._]
Enter two other Citizens.
CORIOLANUS.
Pray you now, if it may stand with the tune of your voices that I may
be consul, I have here the customary gown.
FOURTH CITIZEN.
You have deserved nobly of your country, and you have not deserved
nobly.
CORIOLANUS.
Your enigma?
FOURTH CITIZEN.
You have been a scourge to her enemies; you have been a rod to her
friends. You have not indeed loved the common people.
CORIOLANUS.
You should account me the more virtuous that I have not been common in
my love. I will, sir, flatter my sworn brother, the people, to earn a
dearer estimation of them; ’tis a condition they account gentle. And
since the wisdom of their choice is rather to have my hat than my
heart, I will practise the insinuating nod and be off to them most
counterfeitly. That is, sir, I will counterfeit the bewitchment of some
popular man and give it bountiful to the desirers. Therefore, beseech
you, I may be consul.
FIFTH CITIZEN.
We hope to find you our friend, and therefore give you our voices
heartily.
FOURTH CITIZEN.
You have received many wounds for your country.
CORIOLANUS.
I will not seal your knowledge with showing them. I will make much of
your voices and so trouble you no farther.
BOTH CITIZENS.
The gods give you joy, sir, heartily.
[_Exeunt citizens._]
CORIOLANUS.
Most sweet voices!
Better it is to die, better to starve,
Than crave the hire which first we do deserve.
Why in this wolvish toge should I stand here
To beg of Hob and Dick that does appear
Their needless vouches? Custom calls me to’t.
What custom wills, in all things should we do’t?
The dust on antique time would lie unswept
And mountainous error be too highly heaped
For truth to o’erpeer. Rather than fool it so,
Let the high office and the honour go
To one that would do thus. I am half through;
The one part suffered, the other will I do.
Enter three Citizens more.
Here come more voices.
Your voices! For your voices I have fought;
Watched for your voices; for your voices bear
Of wounds two dozen odd. Battles thrice six
I have seen and heard of; for your voices have
Done many things, some less, some more. Your voices!
Indeed, I would be consul.
SIXTH CITIZEN.
He has done nobly, and cannot go without any honest man’s voice.
SEVENTH CITIZEN.
Therefore let him be consul. The gods give him joy, and make him good
friend to the people!
ALL THREE CITIZENS.
Amen, amen. God save thee, noble consul.
[_Exeunt citizens._]
CORIOLANUS.
Worthy voices!
Enter Menenius with Brutus and Sicinius.
MENENIUS.
You have stood your limitation, and the Tribunes
Endue you with the people’s voice. Remains
That in th’ official marks invested, you
Anon do meet the Senate.
CORIOLANUS.
Is this done?
SICINIUS.
The custom of request you have discharged.
The people do admit you, and are summoned
To meet anon upon your approbation.
CORIOLANUS.
Where? At the Senate House?
SICINIUS.
There, Coriolanus.
CORIOLANUS.
May I change these garments?
SICINIUS.
You may, sir.
CORIOLANUS.
That I’ll straight do and, knowing myself again,
Repair to th’ Senate House.
MENENIUS.
I’ll keep you company.—Will you along?
BRUTUS.
We stay here for the people.
SICINIUS.
Fare you well.
[_Exeunt Coriolanus and Menenius._]
He has it now; and by his looks, methinks,
’Tis warm at his heart.
BRUTUS.
With a proud heart he wore
His humble weeds. Will you dismiss the people?
Enter the Pebleians.
SICINIUS.
How now, my masters, have you chose this man?
FIRST CITIZEN.
He has our voices, sir.
BRUTUS.
We pray the gods he may deserve your loves.
SECOND CITIZEN.
Amen, sir. To my poor unworthy notice,
He mocked us when he begged our voices.
THIRD CITIZEN.
Certainly, he flouted us downright.
FIRST CITIZEN.
No, ’tis his kind of speech. He did not mock us.
SECOND CITIZEN.
Not one amongst us, save yourself, but says
He used us scornfully. He should have showed us
His marks of merit, wounds received for’s country.
SICINIUS.
Why, so he did, I am sure.
ALL.
No, no. No man saw ’em.
THIRD CITIZEN.
He said he had wounds, which he could show in private,
And with his hat, thus waving it in scorn,
“I would be consul,” says he; “aged custom,
But by your voices, will not so permit me;
Your voices therefore.” When we granted that,
Here was “I thank you for your voices. Thank you.
Your most sweet voices! Now you have left your voices,
I have no further with you.” Was not this mockery?
SICINIUS.
Why either were you ignorant to see’t
Or, seeing it, of such childish friendliness
To yield your voices?
BRUTUS.
Could you not have told him
As you were lessoned? When he had no power,
But was a petty servant to the state,
He was your enemy, ever spake against
Your liberties and the charters that you bear
I’ th’ body of the weal; and, now arriving
A place of potency and sway o’ th’ state,
If he should still malignantly remain
Fast foe to th’ plebeii, your voices might
Be curses to yourselves. You should have said
That as his worthy deeds did claim no less
Than what he stood for, so his gracious nature
Would think upon you for your voices, and
Translate his malice towards you into love,
Standing your friendly lord.
SICINIUS.
Thus to have said,
As you were fore-advised, had touched his spirit
And tried his inclination; from him plucked
Either his gracious promise, which you might,
As cause had called you up, have held him to;
Or else it would have galled his surly nature,
Which easily endures not article
Tying him to aught. So putting him to rage,
You should have ta’en th’ advantage of his choler
And passed him unelected.
BRUTUS.
Did you perceive
He did solicit you in free contempt
When he did need your loves, and do you think
That his contempt shall not be bruising to you
When he hath power to crush? Why, had your bodies
No heart among you? Or had you tongues to cry
Against the rectorship of judgment?
SICINIUS.
Have you ere now denied the asker, and now
Again, of him that did not ask but mock,
Bestow your sued-for tongues?
THIRD CITIZEN.
He’s not confirmed.
We may deny him yet.
SECOND CITIZEN.
And will deny him.
I’ll have five hundred voices of that sound.
FIRST CITIZEN.
I twice five hundred, and their friends to piece ’em.
BRUTUS.
Get you hence instantly, and tell those friends
They have chose a consul that will from them take
Their liberties, make them of no more voice
Than dogs that are as often beat for barking
As therefore kept to do so.
SICINIUS.
Let them assemble
And, on a safer judgment, all revoke
Your ignorant election. Enforce his pride
And his old hate unto you. Besides, forget not
With what contempt he wore the humble weed,
How in his suit he scorned you; but your loves,
Thinking upon his services, took from you
Th’ apprehension of his present portance,
Which most gibingly, ungravely, he did fashion
After the inveterate hate he bears you.
BRUTUS.
Lay
A fault on us, your tribunes, that we laboured,
No impediment between, but that you must
Cast your election on him.
SICINIUS.
Say you chose him
More after our commandment than as guided
By your own true affections, and that your minds,
Preoccupied with what you rather must do
Than what you should, made you against the grain
To voice him consul. Lay the fault on us.
BRUTUS.
Ay, spare us not. Say we read lectures to you,
How youngly he began to serve his country,
How long continued, and what stock he springs of,
The noble house o’ th’ Martians, from whence came
That Ancus Martius, Numa’s daughter’s son,
Who, after great Hostilius here was king,
Of the same house Publius and Quintus were,
That our best water brought by conduits hither;
And Censorinus, that was so surnamed,
And nobly named so, twice being censor,
Was his great ancestor.
SICINIUS.
One thus descended,
That hath beside well in his person wrought
To be set high in place, we did commend
To your remembrances; but you have found,
Scaling his present bearing with his past,
That he’s your fixed enemy, and revoke
Your sudden approbation.
BRUTUS.
Say you ne’er had done’t—
Harp on that still—but by our putting on.
And presently when you have drawn your number,
Repair to th’ Capitol.
ALL.
We will so. Almost all
Repent in their election.
[_Exeunt Plebeians._]
BRUTUS.
Let them go on.
This mutiny were better put in hazard
Than stay, past doubt, for greater.
If, as his nature is, he fall in rage
With their refusal, both observe and answer
The vantage of his anger.
SICINIUS.
To th’ Capitol, come.
We will be there before the stream o’ th’ people,
And this shall seem, as partly ’tis, their own,
Which we have goaded onward.
[_Exeunt._]
ACT III
SCENE I. Rome. A street
Cornets. Enter Coriolanus, Menenius, all the Gentry, Cominius, Titus
Lartius and other Senators.
CORIOLANUS.
Tullus Aufidius then had made new head?
LARTIUS.
He had, my lord, and that it was which caused
Our swifter composition.
CORIOLANUS.
So then the Volsces stand but as at first,
Ready, when time shall prompt them, to make road
Upon’s again.
COMINIUS.
They are worn, lord consul, so
That we shall hardly in our ages see
Their banners wave again.
CORIOLANUS.
Saw you Aufidius?
LARTIUS.
On safeguard he came to me, and did curse
Against the Volsces, for they had so vilely
Yielded the town. He is retired to Antium.
CORIOLANUS.
Spoke he of me?
LARTIUS.
He did, my lord.
CORIOLANUS.
How? What?
LARTIUS.
How often he had met you sword to sword;
That of all things upon the earth he hated
Your person most; that he would pawn his fortunes
To hopeless restitution, so he might
Be called your vanquisher.
CORIOLANUS.
At Antium lives he?
LARTIUS.
At Antium.
CORIOLANUS.
I wish I had a cause to seek him there,
To oppose his hatred fully. Welcome home.
Enter Sicinius and Brutus.
Behold, these are the tribunes of the people,
The tongues o’ th’ common mouth. I do despise them,
For they do prank them in authority
Against all noble sufferance.
SICINIUS.
Pass no further.
CORIOLANUS.
Ha? What is that?
BRUTUS.
It will be dangerous to go on. No further.
CORIOLANUS.
What makes this change?
MENENIUS.
The matter?
COMINIUS.
Hath he not passed the noble and the common?
BRUTUS.
Cominius, no.
CORIOLANUS.
Have I had children’s voices?
FIRST SENATOR.
Tribunes, give way. He shall to the marketplace.
BRUTUS.
The people are incensed against him.
SICINIUS.
Stop,
Or all will fall in broil.
CORIOLANUS.
Are these your herd?
Must these have voices, that can yield them now
And straight disclaim their tongues? What are your offices?
You being their mouths, why rule you not their teeth?
Have you not set them on?
MENENIUS.
Be calm, be calm.
CORIOLANUS.
It is a purposed thing, and grows by plot,
To curb the will of the nobility.
Suffer’t, and live with such as cannot rule
Nor ever will be ruled.
BRUTUS.
Call’t not a plot.
The people cry you mocked them; and, of late,
When corn was given them gratis, you repined,
Scandaled the suppliants for the people, called them
Timepleasers, flatterers, foes to nobleness.
CORIOLANUS.
Why, this was known before.
BRUTUS.
Not to them all.
CORIOLANUS.
Have you informed them sithence?
BRUTUS.
How? I inform them?
COMINIUS.
You are like to do such business.
BRUTUS.
Not unlike, each way, to better yours.
CORIOLANUS.
Why then should I be consul? By yond clouds,
Let me deserve so ill as you, and make me
Your fellow tribune.
SICINIUS.
You show too much of that
For which the people stir. If you will pass
To where you are bound, you must inquire your way,
Which you are out of, with a gentler spirit,
Or never be so noble as a consul,
Nor yoke with him for tribune.
MENENIUS.
Let’s be calm.
COMINIUS.
The people are abused, set on. This palt’ring
Becomes not Rome, nor has Coriolanus
Deserved this so dishonoured rub, laid falsely
I’ th’ plain way of his merit.
CORIOLANUS.
Tell me of corn?
This was my speech, and I will speak’t again.
MENENIUS.
Not now, not now.
FIRST SENATOR.
Not in this heat, sir, now.
CORIOLANUS.
Now, as I live, I will.
My nobler friends, I crave their pardons. For
The mutable, rank-scented many, let them
Regard me, as I do not flatter, and
Therein behold themselves. I say again,
In soothing them we nourish ’gainst our senate
The cockle of rebellion, insolence, sedition,
Which we ourselves have ploughed for, sowed, and scattered
By mingling them with us, the honoured number,
Who lack not virtue, no, nor power, but that
Which they have given to beggars.
MENENIUS.
Well, no more.
FIRST SENATOR.
No more words, we beseech you.
CORIOLANUS.
How? No more?
As for my country I have shed my blood,
Not fearing outward force, so shall my lungs
Coin words till their decay against those measles
Which we disdain should tetter us, yet sought
The very way to catch them.
BRUTUS.
You speak o’ th’ people
As if you were a god to punish, not
A man of their infirmity.
SICINIUS.
’Twere well
We let the people know’t.
MENENIUS.
What, what? His choler?
CORIOLANUS.
Choler?
Were I as patient as the midnight sleep,
By Jove, ’twould be my mind.
SICINIUS.
It is a mind
That shall remain a poison where it is,
Not poison any further.
CORIOLANUS.
“Shall remain”?
Hear you this Triton of the minnows? Mark you
His absolute “shall”?
COMINIUS.
’Twas from the canon.
CORIOLANUS.
“Shall”?
O good but most unwise patricians, why,
You grave but reckless senators, have you thus
Given Hydra leave to choose an officer,
That with his peremptory “shall,” being but
The horn and noise o’ th’ monster’s, wants not spirit
To say he’ll turn your current in a ditch
And make your channel his? If he have power,
Then vail your ignorance; if none, awake
Your dangerous lenity. If you are learned,
Be not as common fools; if you are not,
Let them have cushions by you. You are plebeians,
If they be senators; and they are no less
When, both your voices blended, the great’st taste
Most palates theirs. They choose their magistrate,
And such a one as he, who puts his “shall,”
His popular “shall,” against a graver bench
Than ever frowned in Greece. By Jove himself,
It makes the consuls base! And my soul aches
To know, when two authorities are up,
Neither supreme, how soon confusion
May enter ’twixt the gap of both and take
The one by th’ other.
COMINIUS.
Well, on to th’ marketplace.
CORIOLANUS.
Whoever gave that counsel to give forth
The corn o’ th’ storehouse gratis, as ’twas used
Sometime in Greece—
MENENIUS.
Well, well, no more of that.
CORIOLANUS.
Though there the people had more absolute power,
I say they nourished disobedience, fed
The ruin of the state.
BRUTUS.
Why shall the people give
One that speaks thus their voice?
CORIOLANUS.
I’ll give my reasons,
More worthier than their voices. They know the corn
Was not our recompense, resting well assured
They ne’er did service for’t. Being pressed to th’ war,
Even when the navel of the state was touched,
They would not thread the gates. This kind of service
Did not deserve corn gratis. Being i’ th’ war,
Their mutinies and revolts, wherein they showed
Most valour, spoke not for them. Th’ accusation
Which they have often made against the Senate,
All cause unborn, could never be the native
Of our so frank donation. Well, what then?
How shall this bosom multitude digest
The senate’s courtesy? Let deeds express
What’s like to be their words: “We did request it;
We are the greater poll, and in true fear
They gave us our demands.” Thus we debase
The nature of our seats and make the rabble
Call our cares fears, which will in time
Break ope the locks o’ th’ Senate and bring in
The crows to peck the eagles.
MENENIUS.
Come, enough.
BRUTUS.
Enough, with over-measure.
CORIOLANUS.
No, take more!
What may be sworn by, both divine and human,
Seal what I end withal! This double worship—
Where one part does disdain with cause, the other
Insult without all reason, where gentry, title, wisdom
Cannot conclude but by the yea and no
Of general ignorance—it must omit
Real necessities and give way the while
To unstable slightness. Purpose so barred, it follows
Nothing is done to purpose. Therefore, beseech you—
You that will be less fearful than discreet,
That love the fundamental part of state
More than you doubt the change on’t, that prefer
A noble life before a long, and wish
To jump a body with a dangerous physic
That’s sure of death without it—at once pluck out
The multitudinous tongue; let them not lick
The sweet which is their poison. Your dishonour
Mangles true judgment and bereaves the state
Of that integrity which should become’t,
Not having the power to do the good it would
For th’ ill which doth control’t.
BRUTUS.
’Has said enough.
SICINIUS.
’Has spoken like a traitor, and shall answer
As traitors do.
CORIOLANUS.
Thou wretch, despite o’erwhelm thee!
What should the people do with these bald tribunes,
On whom depending, their obedience fails
To th’ greater bench. In a rebellion,
When what’s not meet but what must be was law,
Then were they chosen. In a better hour,
Let what is meet be said it must be meet,
And throw their power i’ th’ dust.
BRUTUS.
Manifest treason.
SICINIUS.
This a consul? No.
BRUTUS.
The aediles, ho! Let him be apprehended.
Enter an Aedile.
SICINIUS.
Go call the people;
[_Exit Aedile._]
in whose name myself
Attach thee as a traitorous innovator,
A foe to th’ public weal. Obey, I charge thee,
And follow to thine answer.
CORIOLANUS.
Hence, old goat.
ALL PATRICIANS.
We’ll surety him.
COMINIUS.
[_to Sicinius_.] Aged sir, hands off.
CORIOLANUS.
[_to Sicinius_.] Hence, rotten thing, or I shall shake thy bones
Out of thy garments.
SICINIUS.
Help, ye citizens!
Enter a rabble of Plebeians with the Aediles.
MENENIUS.
On both sides more respect!
SICINIUS.
Here’s he that would take from you all your power.
BRUTUS.
Seize him, aediles.
ALL PLEBEIANS.
Down with him, down with him!
SECOND SENATOR.
Weapons, weapons, weapons!
[_They all bustle about Coriolanus._]
Tribunes, patricians, citizens, what, ho!
Sicinius, Brutus, Coriolanus, citizens!
ALL.
Peace, peace, peace! Stay, hold, peace!
MENENIUS.
What is about to be? I am out of breath.
Confusion’s near. I cannot speak. You tribunes
To th’ people!—Coriolanus, patience!—
Speak, good Sicinius.
SICINIUS.
Hear me, people! Peace!
ALL PLEBEIANS.
Let’s hear our tribune. Peace! Speak, speak, speak.
SICINIUS.
You are at point to lose your liberties.
Martius would have all from you, Martius,
Whom late you have named for consul.
MENENIUS.
Fie, fie, fie!
This is the way to kindle, not to quench.
FIRST SENATOR.
To unbuild the city and to lay all flat.
SICINIUS.
What is the city but the people?
ALL PLEBEIANS.
True,
The people are the city.
BRUTUS.
By the consent of all, we were established
The people’s magistrates.
ALL PLEBEIANS.
You so remain.
MENENIUS.
And so are like to do.
COMINIUS.
That is the way to lay the city flat,
To bring the roof to the foundation
And bury all which yet distinctly ranges
In heaps and piles of ruin.
SICINIUS.
This deserves death.
BRUTUS.
Or let us stand to our authority
Or let us lose it. We do here pronounce,
Upon the part o’ th’ people, in whose power
We were elected theirs, Martius is worthy
Of present death.
SICINIUS.
Therefore lay hold of him,
Bear him to th’ rock Tarpeian, and from thence
Into destruction cast him.
BRUTUS.
Aediles, seize him!
ALL PLEBEIANS.
Yield, Martius, yield!
MENENIUS.
Hear me one word.
Beseech you, tribunes, hear me but a word.
AEDILES.
Peace, peace!
MENENIUS.
Be that you seem, truly your country’s friend,
And temp’rately proceed to what you would
Thus violently redress.
BRUTUS.
Sir, those cold ways,
That seem like prudent helps, are very poisonous
Where the disease is violent.—Lay hands upon him,
And bear him to the rock.
[_Coriolanus draws his sword._]
CORIOLANUS.
No; I’ll die here.
There’s some among you have beheld me fighting.
Come, try upon yourselves what you have seen me.
MENENIUS.
Down with that sword!—Tribunes, withdraw awhile.
BRUTUS.
Lay hands upon him!
MENENIUS.
Help Martius, help!
You that be noble, help him, young and old!
ALL PLEBEIANS.
Down with him, down with him!
[_In this mutiny the Tribunes, the Aediles and the People are beat
in._]
MENENIUS.
Go, get you to your house. Begone, away.
All will be naught else.
SECOND SENATOR.
Get you gone.
CORIOLANUS.
Stand fast!
We have as many friends as enemies.
MENENIUS.
Shall it be put to that?
FIRST SENATOR.
The gods forbid!
I prithee, noble friend, home to thy house;
Leave us to cure this cause.
MENENIUS.
For ’tis a sore upon us
You cannot tent yourself. Begone, beseech you.
COMINIUS.
Come, sir, along with us.
CORIOLANUS.
I would they were barbarians, as they are,
Though in Rome littered, not Romans, as they are not,
Though calved i’ th’ porch o’ th’ Capitol.
MENENIUS.
Begone!
Put not your worthy rage into your tongue.
One time will owe another.
CORIOLANUS.
On fair ground
I could beat forty of them.
MENENIUS.
I could myself
Take up a brace o’ th’ best of them, yea, the two tribunes.
COMINIUS.
But now ’tis odds beyond arithmetic,
And manhood is called foolery when it stands
Against a falling fabric. Will you hence,
Before the tag return, whose rage doth rend
Like interrupted waters, and o’erbear
What they are used to bear?
MENENIUS.
Pray you, begone.
I’ll try whether my old wit be in request
With those that have but little. This must be patched
With cloth of any colour.
COMINIUS.
Nay, come away.
[_Exeunt Coriolanus and Cominius._]
PATRICIAN.
This man has marred his fortune.
MENENIUS.
His nature is too noble for the world.
He would not flatter Neptune for his trident
Or Jove for’s power to thunder. His heart’s his mouth;
What his breast forges, that his tongue must vent,
And, being angry, does forget that ever
He heard the name of death.
[_A noise within._]
Here’s goodly work.
PATRICIAN.
I would they were abed!
MENENIUS.
I would they were in Tiber! What the vengeance,
Could he not speak ’em fair?
Enter Brutus and Sicinius with the rabble again.
SICINIUS.
Where is this viper
That would depopulate the city and
Be every man himself?
MENENIUS.
You worthy tribunes—
SICINIUS.
He shall be thrown down the Tarpeian rock
With rigorous hands. He hath resisted law,
And therefore law shall scorn him further trial
Than the severity of the public power
Which he so sets at naught.
FIRST CITIZEN.
He shall well know
The noble tribunes are the people’s mouths,
And we their hands.
ALL PLEBEIANS.
He shall, sure on’t.
MENENIUS.
Sir, sir—
SICINIUS.
Peace!
MENENIUS.
Do not cry havoc where you should but hunt
With modest warrant.
SICINIUS.
Sir, how comes’t that you
Have holp to make this rescue?
MENENIUS.
Hear me speak.
As I do know the Consul’s worthiness,
So can I name his faults.
SICINIUS.
Consul? What consul?
MENENIUS.
The consul Coriolanus.
BRUTUS.
He consul?
ALL PLEBEIANS.
No, no, no, no, no!
MENENIUS.
If, by the Tribunes’ leave, and yours, good people,
I may be heard, I would crave a word or two,
The which shall turn you to no further harm
Than so much loss of time.
SICINIUS.
Speak briefly then,
For we are peremptory to dispatch
This viperous traitor. To eject him hence
Were but one danger, and to keep him here
Our certain death. Therefore it is decreed
He dies tonight.
MENENIUS.
Now the good gods forbid
That our renowned Rome, whose gratitude
Towards her deserved children is enrolled
In Jove’s own book, like an unnatural dam
Should now eat up her own.
SICINIUS.
He’s a disease that must be cut away.
MENENIUS.
O, he’s a limb that has but a disease—
Mortal to cut it off; to cure it easy.
What has he done to Rome that’s worthy death?
Killing our enemies, the blood he hath lost—
Which I dare vouch is more than that he hath
By many an ounce—he dropt it for his country;
And what is left, to lose it by his country
Were to us all, that do’t and suffer it
A brand to th’ end o’ th’ world.
SICINIUS.
This is clean cam.
BRUTUS.
Merely awry. When he did love his country,
It honoured him.
MENENIUS.
The service of the foot,
Being once gangrened, is not then respected
For what before it was.
BRUTUS.
We’ll hear no more.
Pursue him to his house, and pluck him thence,
Lest his infection, being of catching nature,
Spread further.
MENENIUS.
One word more, one word!
This tiger-footed rage, when it shall find
The harm of unscanned swiftness, will too late,
Tie leaden pounds to’s heels. Proceed by process,
Lest parties—as he is beloved—break out
And sack great Rome with Romans.
BRUTUS.
If it were so—
SICINIUS.
What do ye talk?
Have we not had a taste of his obedience?
Our aediles smote! Ourselves resisted? Come.
MENENIUS.
Consider this: he has been bred i’ th’ wars
Since he could draw a sword, and is ill schooled
In bolted language; meal and bran together
He throws without distinction. Give me leave,
I’ll go to him and undertake to bring him
Where he shall answer by a lawful form,
In peace, to his utmost peril.
FIRST SENATOR.
Noble tribunes,
It is the humane way: the other course
Will prove too bloody, and the end of it
Unknown to the beginning.
SICINIUS.
Noble Menenius,
Be you then as the people’s officer.—
Masters, lay down your weapons.
BRUTUS.
Go not home.
SICINIUS.
Meet on the marketplace. We’ll attend you there,
Where if you bring not Martius, we’ll proceed
In our first way.
MENENIUS.
I’ll bring him to you.
[_To Senators_.] Let me desire your company. He must come,
Or what is worst will follow.
FIRST SENATOR.
Pray you, let’s to him.
[_Exeunt._]
SCENE II. Rome. A room in Coriolanus’s house
Enter Coriolanus with Nobles.
CORIOLANUS.
Let them pull all about mine ears, present me
Death on the wheel or at wild horses’ heels,
Or pile ten hills on the Tarpeian rock,
That the precipitation might down stretch
Below the beam of sight, yet will I still
Be thus to them.
FIRST PATRICIAN.
You do the nobler.
CORIOLANUS.
I muse my mother
Does not approve me further, who was wont
To call them woollen vassals, things created
To buy and sell with groats, to show bare heads
In congregations, to yawn, be still, and wonder
When one but of my ordinance stood up
To speak of peace or war.
Enter Volumnia.
I talk of you.
Why did you wish me milder? Would you have me
False to my nature? Rather say I play
The man I am.
VOLUMNIA.
O, sir, sir, sir,
I would have had you put your power well on
Before you had worn it out.
CORIOLANUS.
Let go.
VOLUMNIA.
You might have been enough the man you are
With striving less to be so. Lesser had been
The thwartings of your dispositions if
You had not showed them how ye were disposed
Ere they lacked power to cross you.
CORIOLANUS.
Let them hang!
VOLUMNIA.
Ay, and burn too.
Enter Menenius with the Senators.
MENENIUS.
Come, come, you have been too rough, something too rough.
You must return and mend it.
FIRST SENATOR.
There’s no remedy,
Unless, by not so doing, our good city
Cleave in the midst and perish.
VOLUMNIA.
Pray be counselled.
I have a heart as little apt as yours,
But yet a brain that leads my use of anger
To better vantage.
MENENIUS.
Well said, noble woman.
Before he should thus stoop to th’ herd—but that
The violent fit o’ th’ time craves it as physic
For the whole state—I would put mine armour on,
Which I can scarcely bear.
CORIOLANUS.
What must I do?
MENENIUS.
Return to th’ Tribunes.
CORIOLANUS.
Well, what then? What then?
MENENIUS.
Repent what you have spoke.
CORIOLANUS.
For them? I cannot do it to the gods.
Must I then do’t to them?
VOLUMNIA.
You are too absolute,
Though therein you can never be too noble
But when extremities speak. I have heard you say
Honour and policy, like unsevered friends,
I’ th’ war do grow together. Grant that, and tell me
In peace what each of them by th’ other lose
That they combine not there.
CORIOLANUS.
Tush, tush!
MENENIUS.
A good demand.
VOLUMNIA.
If it be honour in your wars to seem
The same you are not, which for your best ends
You adopt your policy, how is it less or worse
That it shall hold companionship in peace
With honour as in war, since that to both
It stands in like request?
CORIOLANUS.
Why force you this?
VOLUMNIA.
Because that now it lies you on to speak
To th’ people, not by your own instruction,
Nor by th’ matter which your heart prompts you,
But with such words that are but rooted in
Your tongue, though but bastards and syllables
Of no allowance to your bosom’s truth.
Now, this no more dishonours you at all
Than to take in a town with gentle words,
Which else would put you to your fortune and
The hazard of much blood.
I would dissemble with my nature where
My fortunes and my friends at stake required
I should do so in honour. I am in this
Your wife, your son, these senators, the nobles;
And you will rather show our general louts
How you can frown than spend a fawn upon ’em
For the inheritance of their loves and safeguard
Of what that want might ruin.
MENENIUS.
Noble lady!—
Come, go with us; speak fair. You may salve so,
Not what is dangerous present, but the loss
Of what is past.
VOLUMNIA.
I prithee now, my son,
Go to them with this bonnet in thy hand,
And thus far having stretched it—here be with them—
Thy knee bussing the stones—for in such busines
Action is eloquence, and the eyes of th’ ignorant
More learned than the ears—waving thy head,
Which often thus correcting thy stout heart,
Now humble as the ripest mulberry
That will not hold the handling. Or say to them
Thou art their soldier and, being bred in broils,
Hast not the soft way, which thou dost confess
Were fit for thee to use, as they to claim,
In asking their good loves; but thou wilt frame
Thyself, forsooth, hereafter theirs, so far
As thou hast power and person.
MENENIUS.
This but done
Even as she speaks, why, their hearts were yours;
For they have pardons, being asked, as free
As words to little purpose.
VOLUMNIA.
Prithee now,
Go, and be ruled; although I know thou hadst rather
Follow thine enemy in a fiery gulf
Than flatter him in a bower.
Enter Cominius.
Here is Cominius.
COMINIUS.
I have been i’ th’ marketplace; and, sir, ’tis fit
You make strong party or defend yourself
By calmness or by absence. All’s in anger.
MENENIUS.
Only fair speech.
COMINIUS.
I think ’twill serve, if he
Can thereto frame his spirit.
VOLUMNIA.
He must, and will.—
Prithee, now, say you will, and go about it.
CORIOLANUS.
Must I go show them my unbarbed sconce? Must I
With my base tongue give to my noble heart
A lie that it must bear? Well, I will do’t.
Yet, were there but this single plot to lose,
This mould of Martius, they to dust should grind it
And throw’t against the wind. To th’ marketplace!
You have put me now to such a part which never
I shall discharge to th’ life.
COMINIUS.
Come, come, we’ll prompt you.
VOLUMNIA.
I prithee now, sweet son, as thou hast said
My praises made thee first a soldier, so,
To have my praise for this, perform a part
Thou hast not done before.
CORIOLANUS.
Well, I must do’t.
Away, my disposition, and possess me
Some harlot’s spirit! My throat of war be turned,
Which choired with my drum, into a pipe
Small as an eunuch or the virgin voice
That babies lulls asleep! The smiles of knaves
Tent in my cheeks, and schoolboys’ tears take up
The glasses of my sight! A beggar’s tongue
Make motion through my lips, and my armed knees,
Who bowed but in my stirrup, bend like his
That hath received an alms! I will not do’t,
Lest I surcease to honour mine own truth
And, by my body’s action, teach my mind
A most inherent baseness.
VOLUMNIA.
At thy choice, then.
To beg of thee, it is my more dishonour
Than thou of them. Come all to ruin. Let
Thy mother rather feel thy pride than fear
Thy dangerous stoutness, for I mock at death
With as big heart as thou. Do as thou list.
Thy valiantness was mine; thou suck’dst it from me,
But owe thy pride thyself.
CORIOLANUS.
Pray, be content.
Mother, I am going to the marketplace.
Chide me no more. I’ll mountebank their loves,
Cog their hearts from them, and come home beloved
Of all the trades in Rome. Look, I am going.
Commend me to my wife. I’ll return consul,
Or never trust to what my tongue can do
I’ th’ way of flattery further.
VOLUMNIA.
Do your will.
[_Exit Volumnia._]
COMINIUS.
Away! The Tribunes do attend you. Arm yourself
To answer mildly, for they are prepared
With accusations, as I hear, more strong
Than are upon you yet.
CORIOLANUS.
The word is “mildly.” Pray you, let us go.
Let them accuse me by invention, I
Will answer in mine honour.
MENENIUS.
Ay, but mildly.
CORIOLANUS.
Well, mildly be it, then. Mildly.
[_Exeunt._]
SCENE III. Rome. The Forum
Enter Sicinius and Brutus.
BRUTUS.
In this point charge him home, that he affects
Tyrannical power. If he evade us there,
Enforce him with his envy to the people,
And that the spoil got on the Antiates
Was ne’er distributed.
Enter an Aedile.
What, will he come?
AEDILE.
He’s coming.
BRUTUS.
How accompanied?
AEDILE.
With old Menenius, and those senators
That always favoured him.
SICINIUS.
Have you a catalogue
Of all the voices that we have procured,
Set down by th’ poll?
AEDILE.
I have. ’Tis ready.
SICINIUS.
Have you collected them by tribes?
AEDILE.
I have.
SICINIUS.
Assemble presently the people hither;
And when they hear me say “It shall be so
I’ th’ right and strength o’ th’ commons,” be it either
For death, for fine, or banishment, then let them
If I say “Fine,” cry “Fine,” if “Death,” cry “Death,”
Insisting on the old prerogative
And power i’ th’ truth o’ th’ cause.
AEDILE.
I shall inform them.
BRUTUS.
And when such time they have begun to cry,
Let them not cease, but with a din confused
Enforce the present execution
Of what we chance to sentence.
AEDILE.
Very well.
SICINIUS.
Make them be strong and ready for this hint
When we shall hap to give’t them.
BRUTUS.
Go about it.
[_Exit Aedile._]
Put him to choler straight. He hath been used
Ever to conquer and to have his worth
Of contradiction. Being once chafed, he cannot
Be reined again to temperance; then he speaks
What’s in his heart; and that is there which looks
With us to break his neck.
Enter Coriolanus, Menenius and Cominius with other Senators.
SICINIUS.
Well, here he comes.
MENENIUS.
Calmly, I do beseech you.
CORIOLANUS.
Ay, as an ostler, that for th’ poorest piece
Will bear the knave by th’ volume.—Th’ honoured gods
Keep Rome in safety and the chairs of justice
Supplied with worthy men! Plant love among’s!
Throng our large temples with the shows of peace
And not our streets with war!
FIRST SENATOR.
Amen, amen.
MENENIUS.
A noble wish.
Enter the Aedile with the Plebeians.
SICINIUS.
Draw near, ye people.
AEDILE.
List to your tribunes. Audience! Peace, I say!
CORIOLANUS.
First, hear me speak.
BOTH TRIBUNES.
Well, say.—Peace, ho!
CORIOLANUS.
Shall I be charged no further than this present?
Must all determine here?
SICINIUS.
I do demand
If you submit you to the people’s voices,
Allow their officers, and are content
To suffer lawful censure for such faults
As shall be proved upon you.
CORIOLANUS.
I am content.
MENENIUS.
Lo, citizens, he says he is content.
The warlike service he has done, consider. Think
Upon the wounds his body bears, which show
Like graves i’ th’ holy churchyard.
CORIOLANUS.
Scratches with briars,
Scars to move laughter only.
MENENIUS.
Consider further,
That when he speaks not like a citizen,
You find him like a soldier. Do not take
His rougher accents for malicious sounds,
But, as I say, such as become a soldier
Rather than envy you.
COMINIUS.
Well, well, no more.
CORIOLANUS.
What is the matter,
That, being passed for consul with full voice,
I am so dishonoured that the very hour
You take it off again?
SICINIUS.
Answer to us.
CORIOLANUS.
Say then. ’Tis true, I ought so.
SICINIUS.
We charge you that you have contrived to take
From Rome all seasoned office and to wind
Yourself into a power tyrannical,
For which you are a traitor to the people.
CORIOLANUS.
How? Traitor?