Abbildungen der Seite
PDF
EPUB

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 Caius Marcius Coriolanus; whom

We meet here, both to thank, and to remember
With honours like himself.

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. Masters o'the 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 honour and advance
The theme of our assembly.

Bru. Which the rather

We shall be bless'd 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.

Men. He loves your people;

But tie him not to be their bedfellow.

Worthy Cominius, speak,-Nay, keep your place.

[CORIOLANUS rises, and offers to go away.

1 Sen. Sit, Coriolanus; never shame to hear What you have nobly done.

Cor. Your honours' pardon;

I had rather have my wounds to heal again,

Than hear say how I got them.

Bru. Sir, I hope,

My words dis-bench'd you not.

Cor, No, sir: yet oft,

[5] Your kind interposition with the common people. JOHNSON. 161 i. e. that is nothing to the purpose. JOHNSON.

When blows have made me stay, I fled from words. You sooth'd not, therefore hurt not: But, your people, I love them as they weigh.

Men. Pray now, sit down.

Cor. I had rather have one scratch my head i'the sun, When the alarum were struck, than idly sit To hear my nothings monster'd.

Men. Masters o'the people,

Your multiplying spawn how can he flatter,'

[Exit COR.

(That's thousand to one good one,) when you now see, He had rather venture all his limbs for honour,

Than one of his ears to hear it ?-Proceed, Cominius.
Com. I shall lack voice: the deeds of Coriolanus
Should not be utter'd feebly.It is held,

That valour is the chiefest virtue, and
Most dignifies the haver: if it be,

The man I speak of cannot in the world
Be singly counterpois'd. At sixteen years,
When Tarquin made a head for Rome, he fought
Beyond the mark of others: our then dictator,
Whom with all praise I point at, saw him fight,
When with his Amazonian chin3 he drove
The bristled lips before him: he bestrid
An o'er press'd Roman, and i'the consul's view
Slew three opposers: Tarquin's self he met,
And struck him on his knee in that day's feats,
When he might act the woman in the scene,
He prov'd the best man i'the field, and for his meed
Was brow-bound with the oak. His pupil age
Man-enter'd thus, he waxed like a sea;

And, in the brunt of seventeen battles since,
He lurch'd all swords o'the garland. For this last,
Before and in Corioli, let me say,

I cannot speak him home: He stopp'd the fliers ;
And, by his rare example, made the coward
Turn terror into sport: as waves before

A vessel under sail, so men obey'd,

And fell below his stem: his sword (death's stamp)
Where it did mark, it took; from face to foot
He was a thing of blood, whose every motion
Was timed with dying cries: alone he enter'd

[1] How can he be expected to practise flattery to others, who abhors it so much that he cannot hear it when even offered to himself. JOHNSON.

[2] When Tarquin raised a power to recover Rome. JOHNSON.

[S] That is, his chin on which there was no beard. STEEVENS.

14] To lurch, in Shakespeare's time, signified to win a maiden set at cards.

The mortal gate o'the city, which he painted
With shunless destiny, aidless came off,
And with a sudden re-inforcement struck
Corioli, like a planet : Now all's his :
When by and by the din of war 'gan pierce
His ready sense: then straight his doubled spirit
Re-quicken'd what in flesh was fatigate,
And to the battle came he; where he did
Run reeking o'er the lives of men, as if
"Twere a perpetual spoil: and, till we call'd
Both field and city ours, he never stood
To ease his breast with panting.

Men. Worthy man!

1 Sen. He cannot but with measure fit the honours Which we devise him.

Com. Our spoils he kick'd at;

And look'd upon things precious, as they were
The common muck o'the world: he covets less
Than misery itself would give; rewards
His deeds with doing them; and is content
To spend the time, to end it.

Men. He's right noble ;

Let him be call'd for.

Sen. Call Coriolanus.

Off. He doth appear.

Re-enter CORIOLANUS.

Men. The senate, Coriolanus, are well pleas'd

To make thee consul.

Cor. I do owe them still

My life, and services.

Men. It then remains,

That you do speak to the people."

Cor. I do beseech you,

Let me o'erleap that custom; for I cannot

Put on the gown, stand naked, and entreat them,

[5] That is, no honour will be too great for him; he will show a mind equal to any elevation. JOHNSON.

[6] Misery for avarice; because a miser signifies avaricious. WARBURTON. [7] Coriolanus was banished U. C. 262. But till the time of Manlius Torquatus. U. C. 393, the senate chose both the consuls: And then the people, assisted by the seditious temper of the tribunes, got the choice of one. But it would be unjust to attribute this entirely to Shakespeare's ignorance; it sometimes proceeded from the too powerful blaze of his imagination, which when once lighted up, made all acquired knowledge fade and disappear before it. For sometimes again we find him, when occasion serves, not only writing up to the truth of history, but fitting his sentiments to the nicest manners of his peculiar subject, as well as to the dignity of his characters, or the dictates of nature in general. WARBURTON.------The inaccuracy is to be attributed not to our author, but to Plutarch. North's translation. 1.244. MALONE.

For my wounds' sake, to give their suffrage: please you,

That I may pass this doing.

Sic. Sir, the people

Must have their voices; neither will they bate

One jot of ceremony.

Men. Put them not to't.

Pray you, go fit you to the custom; and

Take to you, as your predecessors have,
Your honour with your form.

Cor. It is a part

That I shall blush in acting, and might well
Be taken from the people.

Bru. Mark you that?

Cor. To brag unto them,-Thus I did, and thus ;Show them the unaking scars, which I should hide, As if I had receiv'd them for the hire

Of their breath only :

Men. Do not stand upon't.

-We recommend to you, tribunes of the people, Our purpose to them; and to our noble consul Wish we all joy and honour.

Sen. To Coriolanus come all joy and honour! [Flourish. Then exeunt senators. Bru. You see how he intends to use the people. Sic. May they perceive his intent! He that will require them,

As if he did contemn what he requested

Should be in them to give.

Bru. Come, we'll inform them

Of our proceedings here: on the market-place,

I know, they do attend us.

[Exeunt.

SCENE III. The same. The Forum. Enter several Citizens.

1 Cit. Once, if he do require our voices, we ought not to deny him.

2 Cit. We may, sir, if we will.

3 Cit. We have power in ourselves to do it, but it is a power that we have no power to do: for if he show us his wounds, and tell us his deeds, we are to put our tongues into those wounds, and speak for them; so, if he tell us his noble deeds, we must also tell him our noble acceptance of them. Ingratitude is monstrous and for the multitude to be ingrateful, were to make a monster of the multitude; of the which, we being members, should bring ourselves to be monstrous members.

:

1 Cit. And to make us no better thought of, a little help will serge for once, when we stood up about the corn, he himself stuck not to call us the many-headed multitude.

3 Cit. We have been called so of many; not that our heads are some brown, some black, some auburn, some bald, but that our wits are so diversely coloured: and truly I think, if all our wits were to issue out of one skull, they would fly east, west, north, south; and their consent of one direct way should be at once to all the points of the compass.

2 Cit. Think you so? Which way, do you judge, my wit would fly?

3 Cit. Nay, your wit will not so soon out as another man's will, 'tis strongly wedged up in a block-head: but if it were at liberty, 'twould, sure, southward.

2 Cit. Why that way ?

3 Cit. To lose itself in a fog; where, being three parts melted away with rotten dews, the fourth would return for conscience sake, to help to get thee a wife.

2 Cit. You are never without your tricks :-You may,

you may.

3 Cit. Are you all resolved to give your voices? But that's no matter, the greater part carries it. I say, if he would incline to the people, there was never a worthier man.

Enter CORIOLANUS and MENenius. Here he comes, and in the gown of humility; mark his behaviour. We are not to stay altogether, but to come by him where he stands, by ones, by twos, and by threes. He's to make his requests by particulars: wherein every one of us has a single honour, in giving him our own voices with our own tongues: therefore, follow me, and I'll direct you how you shall go by him.

All. Content, content.

[Exeunt.

Men. O, sir, you are not right: have you not known The worthiest men have done it?

Cor. What must I say?

I pray, sir, Plague upon't! I cannot bring

My tongue to such a pace :-Look, sir ;-my wounds ;I got them in my country's service, when

Some certain of your brethren roar'd, and ran

[8] To suppose all their wits to issue from one skull, and that their common consent and agreement to go all one way, should end in their flying to every point of the compass, is a just description of the variety and inconsistency of the opinions, wishes, and actions of the multitude. M. MASON.

« ZurückWeiter »