SIC.

Have with you.

 

Exeunt.

 

 

[Scene II]

Enter two Officers to lay cushions, as it were in the Capitol.

 

1. OFF. Come, come, they are almost here. How many stand for consulships?

2. OFF. Three, they say; but 'tis thought of every one Coriolanus will carry it.

1. OFF. That's a brave fellow; but he's vengeance proud, and loves not the common people.

2. OFF. Faith, there hath been many great men that have flatter'd the people, who ne'er lov'd them; and there be many that they have lov'd, 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.

1. OFF. If he did not care whether he had their love or no, he wav'd 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.

2. OFF. He hath deserv'd worthily of his country, and his ascent is not by such easy degrees as those who, having been supple and courteous to the people, bonneted, without any further deed to have them at all into their estimation and report. But he hath so planted his honors 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.

1. OFF. 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 [Sicinius and Brutus], Lictors before them; Coriolanus, Menenius, Cominius the Consul. Sicinius and Brutus take their places by themselves. Coriolanus stands.

 

MEN.

Having determin'd 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 perform'd

By Martius Caius Coriolanus, whom

We met here both to thank and to remember

With honors like himself.

 

[Coriolanus sits.]

 

1. SEN.

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.

 

[To the Tribunes.]

 

Masters a' th' people,

We do request your kindest ears, and after,

Your loving motion toward the common body

To yield what passes here.

SIC.

We are convented

Upon a pleasing treaty, and have hearts

Inclinable to honor and advance

The theme of our assembly.

BRU.

Which the rather

We shall be blest to do, if he remember

A kinder value of the people than

He hath hereto priz'd them at.

MEN.

That's off, that's off;

I would you rather had been silent. Please you

To hear Cominius speak?

BRU.

Most willingly;

But yet my caution was more pertinent

Than the rebuke you give it.