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 safe-guard 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 call’d 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’ the 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 pass’d the noble
and the common?
BRUTUS Cominius, no.
CORIOLANUS Have I had children’s voices?
First Senator Tribunes, give way;
he shall to the market-place.
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 mock’d them, and of late,
When corn was given them gratis, you repined;
Scandal’d the suppliants for the people, call’d them
Time-pleasers, flatterers, foes to nobleness.
CORIOLANUS Why, this was known before.
BRUTUS Not to them all.
CORIOLANUS Have you inform’d them sithence?
BRUTUS How! I inform them!
CORIOLANUS 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 paltering
Becomes not Rome, nor has Coriolanus
Deserved this so dishonour’d rub, laid falsely
I’ the 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 plough’d for,
sow’d, and scatter’d,
By mingling them with us, the honour’d 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 tatter us, yet sought
The very way to catch them.
BRUTUS You speak o’ the 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 here to choose an officer,
That with his peremptory ‘shall,’ being but
The horn and noise o’ the 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. 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 frown 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 the other.
COMINIUS Well, on to the market-place.
CORIOLANUS Whoever gave that counsel, to give forth
The corn o’ the 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 nourish’d 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
That ne’er did service for’t: being press’d to the war,
Even when the navel of the state was touch’d,
They would not thread the gates. This kind of service
Did not deserve corn gratis. Being i’ the war
Their mutinies and revolts, wherein they show’d
Most valour, spoke not for them. Well, what then?
How shall this bisson 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’ the 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 barr’d, 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 the in 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 the 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’ the dust.
BRUTUS Manifest treason!
SICINIUS This a consul? no.
BRUTUS The aediles, ho!
[Enter an AEdile]
SICINIUS Go, call the people:
[Exit AEdile]
in whose name myself
Attach thee as a traitorous innovator,
A foe to the public weal: obey, I charge thee,
And follow to thine answer.
CORIOLANUS Hence, old goat!
Hence, rotten thing! or I shall shake thy bones
Out of thy garments.
SICINIUS Help, ye citizens!
[Enter a rabble of Citizens (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!
Citizens Down with him! down with him!
Senators, &C Weapons, weapons, weapons!
[They all bustle about CORIOLANUS, crying]
‘Tribunes!’ ‘Patricians!’ ‘Citizens!’ ‘What, ho!’
‘Sicinius!’ ‘Brutus!’ ‘Coriolanus!’ ‘Citizens!’
‘Peace, peace, peace!’ ‘Stay, hold, peace!’
SICINIUS Hear me, people; peace!
Citizens Let’s hear our tribune: peace Speak,
speak, speak.
SICINIUS You are at point to lose your liberties:
Marcius would have all from you; Marcius,
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?
Citizens True,
The people are the city.
BRUTUS By the consent of all, we were establish’d
The people’s magistrates.
Citizens 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’ the people, in whose power
We were elected theirs, Marcius is worthy
Of present death.
SICINIUS Therefore lay hold of him;
Bear him to the rock Tarpeian, and from thence
Into destruction cast him.
BRUTUS AEdiles, seize him!
Citizens Yield, Marcius, yield!
MENENIUS Hear me one word;
Beseech you, tribunes, hear me but a word.
MENENIUS [To BRUTUS] Be that you seem,
truly your country’s friend,
And temperately 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 No, I’ll die here.
[Drawing his sword]
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.
Go, get you to your house; be gone, away!
CORIOLANUS I would they were barbarians — as they are,
Though in Rome litter’d–not Romans–as they are not,
Though calved i’ the porch o’ the Capitol–
MENENIUS Be gone;
Put not your worthy rage into your tongue;
One time will owe another.
CORIOLANUS On fair ground
I could beat forty of them.
MENENIUS Pray you, be gone:
I’ll try whether my old wit be in request
With those that have but little: this must be patch’d
With cloth of any colour.
COMINIUS Nay, come away.
[Exeunt CORIOLANUS, COMINIUS, and others]
A Patrician This man has marr’d his fortune.
[Re-enter BRUTUS and SICINIUS, with the rabble]
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 nought.
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!
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 to-night.
MENENIUS Now the good gods forbid
That our renowned Rome, whose gratitude
Towards her deserved children is enroll’d
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.
SICINIUS This is clean kam.
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 unscann’d 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’ the wars
Since he could draw a sword, and is ill school’d
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 market-place.
We’ll attend you there:
Where, if you bring not Marcius, we’ll proceed
In our first way.
MENENIUS I’ll bring him to you.
[Exeunt]
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