The Complete Works of William Shakespeare by William Shakespeare (book suggestions TXT) 📖

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-advis’d, had touch’d his spirit And tried his inclination; from him pluck’d Either his gracious promise, which you might, As cause had call’d you up, have held him to; Or else it would have gall’d 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 pass’d 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 su’d-for tongues?

THIRD CITIZEN. He’s not confirm’d: we may deny him yet.

SECOND CITIZENS. 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 scorn’d 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 labour’d, 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, Pre-occupied 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’ Marcians; from whence came That Ancus Marcius, 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, nobly named so,

Twice being by the people chosen 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.

CITIZENS. will 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 caus’d 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 retir’d 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’ 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 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 th’ marketplace.

BRUTUS. The people are incens’d 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 purpos’d 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 rul’d.

BRUTUS. Call’t not a plot.

The people cry you mock’d them; and of late, When corn was given them gratis, you repin’d; 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!

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 enquire 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 abus’d; set on. This palt’ring Becomes not Rome; nor has Coriolanus

Deserved this so dishonour’d 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 meiny, 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 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 here 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 learn’d, 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 frown’d 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 us’d Sometime in Greece-MENENIUS. Well, well, no more of that.

CORIOLANUS. Though there the people had more absolute pow’r-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 assur’d They ne’er did service for’t; being press’d to th’ 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’ th’ war, Their mutinies and revolts, wherein they show’d 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 multiplied 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 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