CORIOLANUS.
I’ll know no further.
Let them pronounce the steep Tarpeian death,
Vagabond exile, flaying, pent to linger
But with a grain a day, I would not buy
Their mercy at the price of one fair word,
Nor check my courage for what they can give,
To have’t with saying “Good morrow.”
SICINIUS.
For that he has,
As much as in him lies, from time to time
Envied against the people, seeking means
To pluck away their power, as now at last
Given hostile strokes, and that not in the presence
Of dreaded justice, but on the ministers
That do distribute it, in the name o’ th’ people
And in the power of us the Tribunes, we,
Even from this instant, banish him our city
In peril of precipitation
From off the rock Tarpeian, never more
To enter our Rome gates. I’ th’ people’s name,
I say it shall be so.
ALL PLEBEIANS.
It shall be so, it shall be so! Let him away!
He’s banished, and it shall be so.
COMINIUS.
Hear me, my masters and my common friends—
SICINIUS.
He’s sentenced. No more hearing.
COMINIUS.
Let me speak.
I have been consul and can show for Rome
Her enemies’ marks upon me. I do love
My country’s good with a respect more tender,
More holy and profound, than mine own life,
My dear wife’s estimate, her womb’s increase,
And treasure of my loins. Then if I would
Speak that—
SICINIUS.
We know your drift. Speak what?
BRUTUS.
There’s no more to be said, but he is banished
As enemy to the people and his country.
It shall be so.
ALL PLEBEIANS.
It shall be so, it shall be so!
CORIOLANUS.
You common cry of curs, whose breath I hate
As reek o’ th’ rotten fens, whose loves I prize
As the dead carcasses of unburied men
That do corrupt my air, I banish you!
And here remain with your uncertainty;
Let every feeble rumour shake your hearts;
Your enemies, with nodding of their plumes,
Fan you into despair! Have the power still
To banish your defenders, till at length
Your ignorance—which finds not till it feels,
Making but reservation of yourselves,
Still your own foes—deliver you,
As most abated captives to some nation
That won you without blows! Despising
For you the city, thus I turn my back.
There is a world elsewhere.