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Rome. Before a Gate of the City. | |
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Enter CORIOLANUS, VOLUMNIA, VIRGILIA, MENENIUS, COMINIUS, and several young Patricians. | |
| Cor. Come, leave your tears: a brief farewell: the beast | |
| With many heads butts me away. Nay, mother, | |
| Where is your ancient courage? you were us’d, | 5 |
| To say extremity was the trier of spirits; | |
| That common chances common men could bear; | |
| That when the sea was calm all boats alike | |
| Show’d mastership in floating; fortune’s blows, | |
| When most struck home, being gentle wounded, craves | 10 |
| A noble cunning: you were us’d to load me | |
| With precepts that would make invincible | |
| The heart that conn’d them. | |
| Vir. O heavens! O heavens! | |
| Cor. Nay, I prithee, woman,— | 15 |
| Vol. Now the red pestilence strike all trades in Rome, | |
| And occupations perish! | |
| Cor. What, what, what! | |
| I shall be lov’d when I am lack’d. Nay, mother, | |
| Resume that spirit, when you were wont to say, | 20 |
| If you had been the wife of Hercules, | |
| Six of his labours you’d have done, and sav’d | |
| Your husband so much sweat. Cominius, | |
| Droop not; adieu. Farewell, my wife! my mother! | |
| I’ll do well yet. Thou old and true Menenius, | 25 |
| Thy tears are salter than a younger man’s. | |
| And venomous to thine eyes. My sometime general, | |
| I have seen thee stern, and thou hast oft beheld | |
| Heart-hardening spectacles; tell these sad women | |
| ’Tis fond to wail inevitable strokes | 30 |
| As ’tis to laugh at them. My mother, you wot well | |
| My hazards still have been your solace; and | |
| Believe ’t not lightly,—though I go alone | |
| Like to a lonely dragon, that his fen | |
| Makes fear’d and talk’d of more than seen,—your son | 35 |
| Will or exceed the common or be caught | |
| With cautelous baits and practice. | |
| Vol. My first son, | |
| Whither wilt thou go? Take good Cominius | |
| With thee awhile: determine on some course, | 40 |
| More than a wild exposture to each chance | |
| That starts i’ the way before thee. | |
| Cor. O the gods! | |
| Com. I’ll follow thee a month, devise with thee | |
| Where thou shalt rest, that thou mayst hear of us, | 45 |
| And we of thee: so, if the time thrust forth | |
| A cause for thy repeal, we shall not send | |
| O’er the vast world to seek a single man, | |
| And lose advantage, which doth ever cool | |
| I’ the absence of the needer. | 50 |
| Cor. Fare ye well: | |
| Thou hast years upon thee; and thou art too full | |
| Of the wars’ surfeits, to go rove with one | |
| That’s yet unbruis’d: bring me but out at gate. | |
| Come, my sweet wife, my dearest mother, and | 55 |
| My friends of noble touch, when I am forth, | |
| Bid me farewell, and smile. I pray you, come. | |
| While I remain above the ground you shall | |
| Hear from me still; and never of me aught | |
| But what is like me formerly. | 60 |
| Men. That’s worthily | |
| As any ear can hear. Come, let’s not weep. | |
| If I could shake off but one seven years | |
| From these old arms and legs, by the good gods, | |
| I’d with thee every foot. | 65 |
| Cor. Give me thy hand: | |
| Come. [Exeunt. | |
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