(ADAPTED FROM "CORIOLANUS")
No doubt the world is cursed with grafters and parasites--men who live
off the body economic and give nothing substantial in return. But an
appearance of uselessness is not always proof of such. We should not
condemn men in ignorance. As old as Aesop is the fable of the rebellion
of the other members of the body against the idle unproductiveness of
the belly. In this passage the fable is used as an answer to the
plebeians of Rome who have complained that the patricians are merely an
encumbrance.
There was a time when all the body's members
Rebelled against the belly; thus accused it:
That only like a gulf it did remain
I' the midst o' the body, idle and unactive,
Still cupboarding the viand, never bearing
Like labor with the rest, where the other instruments
Did see and hear, devise, instruct, walk, feel,
And, mutually participant, did minister
Unto the appetite and affection common
Of the whole body. Note me this, good friend;
Your most grave belly was deliberate,
Not rash like his accusers, and thus answered:
"True is it, my incorporate friends," quoth he,
"That I receive the general food at first,
Which you do live upon; and fit it is;
Because I am the store-house and the shop
Of the whole body: but, if you do remember,
I send it through the rivers of your blood,
Even to the court, the heart, to the seat o' the brain:
And, through the cranks and offices of man,
The strongest nerves and small inferior veins
From me receive that natural competency
Whereby they live. Though all at once cannot
See what I do deliver out to each,
Yet I can make my audit up, that all
From me do back receive the flour of all,
And leave me but the bran." What say you to 't?
_William Shakespeare._