ACT III
SCENE II A room in CORIOLANUS'S house.


 [Enter CORIOLANUS with Patricians]

CORIOLANUS Let them puff all about mine ears, present me
 Death on the wheel or at wild horses' heels,
 Or pile ten hills on the Tarpeian rock,
 That the precipitation might down stretch
 Below the beam of sight, yet will I still
 Be thus to them.

A Patrician You do the nobler.

CORIOLANUS I muse my mother
 Does not approve me further, who was wont
 To call them woollen vassals, things created
 To buy and sell with groats, to show bare heads
 In congregations, to yawn, be still and wonder,
 When one but of my ordinance stood up
 To speak of peace or war.

 [Enter VOLUMNIA]

      I talk of you:
 Why did you wish me milder? would you have me
 False to my nature? Rather say I play
 The man I am.

VOLUMNIA                   O, sir, sir, sir,
 I would have had you put your power well on,
 Before you had worn it out.

CORIOLANUS Let go.

VOLUMNIA You might have been enough the man you are,
 With striving less to be so; lesser had been
 The thwartings of your dispositions, if
 You had not show'd them how ye were disposed
 Ere they lack'd power to cross you.

CORIOLANUS Let them hang.

A Patrician Ay, and burn too.

 [Enter MENENIUS and Senators]

MENENIUS Come, come, you have been too rough, something
 too rough;
 You must return and mend it.

First Senator There's no remedy;
 Unless, by not so doing, our good city
 Cleave in the midst, and perish.

VOLUMNIA Pray, be counsell'd:
 I have a heart as little apt as yours,
 But yet a brain that leads my use of anger
 To better vantage.

MENENIUS                   Well said, noble woman?
 Before he should thus stoop to the herd, but that
 The violent fit o' the time craves it as physic
 For the whole state, I would put mine armour on,
 Which I can scarcely bear.

CORIOLANUS What must I do?

MENENIUS Return to the tribunes.

CORIOLANUS Well, what then? what then?

MENENIUS Repent what you have spoke.

CORIOLANUS For them! I cannot do it to the gods;
 Must I then do't to them?

VOLUMNIA You are too absolute;
 Though therein you can never be too noble,
 But when extremities speak. I have heard you say,
 Honour and policy, like unsever'd friends,
 I' the war do grow together: grant that, and tell me,
 In peace what each of them by the other lose,
 That they combine not there.

CORIOLANUS Tush, tush!

MENENIUS A good demand.

VOLUMNIA If it be honour in your wars to seem
 The same you are not, which, for your best ends,
 You adopt your policy, how is it less or worse,
 That it shall hold companionship in peace
 With honour, as in war, since that to both
 It stands in like request?

CORIOLANUS Why force you this?

VOLUMNIA Because that now it lies you on to speak
 To the people; not by your own instruction,
 Nor by the matter which your heart prompts you,
 But with such words that are but rooted in
 Your tongue, though but bastards and syllables
 Of no allowance to your bosom's truth.
 Now, this no more dishonours you at all
 Than to take in a town with gentle words,
 Which else would put you to your fortune and
 The hazard of much blood.
 I would dissemble with my nature where
 My fortunes and my friends at stake required
 I should do so in honour: I am in this,
 Your wife, your son, these senators, the nobles;
 And you will rather show our general louts
 How you can frown than spend a fawn upon 'em,
 For the inheritance of their loves and safeguard
 Of what that want might ruin.

MENENIUS Noble lady!
 Come, go with us; speak fair: you may salve so,
 Not what is dangerous present, but the loss
 Of what is past.

VOLUMNIA                   I prithee now, my son,
 Go to them, with this bonnet in thy hand;
 And thus far having stretch'd it--here be with them--
 Thy knee bussing the stones--for in such business
 Action is eloquence, and the eyes of the ignorant
 More learned than the ears--waving thy head,
 Which often, thus, correcting thy stout heart,
 Now humble as the ripest mulberry
 That will not hold the handling: or say to them,
 Thou art their soldier, and being bred in broils
 Hast not the soft way which, thou dost confess,
 Were fit for thee to use as they to claim,
 In asking their good loves, but thou wilt frame
 Thyself, forsooth, hereafter theirs, so far
 As thou hast power and person.

MENENIUS This but done,
 Even as she speaks, why, their hearts were yours;
 For they have pardons, being ask'd, as free
 As words to little purpose.

VOLUMNIA Prithee now,
 Go, and be ruled: although I know thou hadst rather
 Follow thine enemy in a fiery gulf
 Than flatter him in a bower. Here is Cominius.

 [Enter COMINIUS]

COMINIUS I have been i' the market-place; and, sir,'tis fit
 You make strong party, or defend yourself
 By calmness or by absence: all's in anger.

MENENIUS Only fair speech.

COMINIUS                   I think 'twill serve, if he
 Can thereto frame his spirit.

VOLUMNIA He must, and will
 Prithee now, say you will, and go about it.

CORIOLANUS Must I go show them my unbarbed sconce?
 Must I with base tongue give my noble heart
 A lie that it must bear? Well, I will do't:
 Yet, were there but this single plot to lose,
 This mould of Marcius, they to dust should grind it
 And throw't against the wind. To the market-place!
 You have put me now to such a part which never
 I shall discharge to the life.

COMINIUS Come, come, we'll prompt you.

VOLUMNIA I prithee now, sweet son, as thou hast said
 My praises made thee first a soldier, so,
 To have my praise for this, perform a part
 Thou hast not done before.

CORIOLANUS Well, I must do't:
 Away, my disposition, and possess me
 Some harlot's spirit! my throat of war be turn'd,
 Which quired with my drum, into a pipe
 Small as an eunuch, or the virgin voice
 That babies lulls asleep! the smiles of knaves
 Tent in my cheeks, and schoolboys' tears take up
 The glasses of my sight! a beggar's tongue
 Make motion through my lips, and my arm'd knees,
 Who bow'd but in my stirrup, bend like his
 That hath received an alms! I will not do't,
 Lest I surcease to honour mine own truth
 And by my body's action teach my mind
 A most inherent baseness.

VOLUMNIA At thy choice, then:
 To beg of thee, it is my more dishonour
 Than thou of them. Come all to ruin; let
 Thy mother rather feel thy pride than fear
 Thy dangerous stoutness, for I mock at death
 With as big heart as thou. Do as thou list
 Thy valiantness was mine, thou suck'dst it from me,
 But owe thy pride thyself.

CORIOLANUS Pray, be content:
 Mother, I am going to the market-place;
 Chide me no more. I'll mountebank their loves,
 Cog their hearts from them, and come home beloved
 Of all the trades in Rome. Look, I am going:
 Commend me to my wife. I'll return consul;
 Or never trust to what my tongue can do
 I' the way of flattery further.

VOLUMNIA Do your will.

 [Exit]

COMINIUS Away! the tribunes do attend you: arm yourself
 To answer mildly; for they are prepared
 With accusations, as I hear, more strong
 Than are upon you yet.

CORIOLANUS The word is 'mildly.' Pray you, let us go:
 Let them accuse me by invention, I
 Will answer in mine honour.

MENENIUS Ay, but mildly.

CORIOLANUS Well, mildly be it then. Mildly!

 [Exeunt]




 CORIOLANUS


ACT III