William Shakespeare - William Shakespeare - Complete Works

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!

PATRICIANS. We'll surety him.

COMINIUS. Ag'd sir, hands off.

CORIOLANUS. 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.

PLEBEIANS. Down with him! down with him!

SECOND SENATOR. Weapons, weapons, weapons!

[They all bustle about CORIOLANUS]

ALL. Tribunes! patricians! citizens! What, ho! Sicinius!

Brutus! Coriolanus! Citizens!

PATRICIANS. 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!

PLEBEIANS. 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 nam'd 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?

PLEBEIANS. True,

The people are the city.

BRUTUS. By the consent of all we were establish'd

The people's magistrates.

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: Marcius 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.

PLEBEIANS. Yield, Marcius, 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 Marcius, help,

You that be noble; help him, young and old.

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; be gone, away.

All will be nought 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; be gone, beseech you.

COMINIUS. Come, sir, along with us.

CORIOLANUS. I would they were barbarians, as they are,

Though in Rome litter'd; not Romans, as they are not,

Though calved i' th' porch o' th' 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. 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 call'd 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 us'd to bear.

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 and COMINIUS, with others

PATRICIANS. This man has marr'd 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!

PATRICIANS. I would they were a-bed.

MENENIUS. I would they were in Tiber.

What the vengeance, could he not speak 'em fair?

Re-enter BRUTUS and SICINIUS, 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 nought.

FIRST CITIZEN. He shall well know

The noble tribunes are the people's mouths,

And we their hands.

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!

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 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-

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 kam.

BRUTUS. Merely awry. When he did love his country,

It honour'd him.

SICINIUS. The service of the foot,

Being once gangren'd, 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