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Appear in your impediment. For the dearth, |
The gods, not the patricians, make it, and |
Your knees to them, not arms, must help. Alack, |
You are transported by calamity |
Thither where more attends you; and you slander |
The helms o' th' state, who care for you like fathers, |
When you curse them as enemies. |
FIRST CITIZEN. Care for us! True, indeed! They ne'er car'd for us |
yet. Suffer us to famish, and their storehouses cramm'd with |
grain; make edicts for usury, to support usurers; repeal daily |
any wholesome act established against the rich, and provide more |
piercing statutes daily to chain up and restrain the poor. If the |
wars eat us not up, they will; and there's all the love they bear |
us. |
MENENIUS. Either you must |
Confess yourselves wondrous malicious, |
Or be accus'd of folly. I shall tell you |
A pretty tale. It may be you have heard it; |
But, since it serves my purpose, I will venture |
To stale't a little more. |
FIRST CITIZEN. Well, I'll hear it, sir; yet you must not think to |
fob off our disgrace with a tale. But, an't please you, deliver. |
MENENIUS. There was a time when all the body's members |
Rebell'd against the belly; thus accus'd it: |
That only like a gulf it did remain |
I' th' midst o' th' body, idle and unactive, |
Still cupboarding the viand, never bearing |
Like labour with the rest; where th' other instruments |
Did see and hear, devise, instruct, walk, feel, |
And, mutually participate, did minister |
Unto the appetite and affection common |
Of the whole body. The belly answer'd- |
FIRST CITIZEN. Well, sir, what answer made the belly? |
MENENIUS. Sir, I shall tell you. With a kind of smile, |
Which ne'er came from the lungs, but even thus- |
For look you, I may make the belly smile |
As well as speak- it tauntingly replied |
To th' discontented members, the mutinous parts |
That envied his receipt; even so most fitly |
As you malign our senators for that |
They are not such as you. |
FIRST CITIZEN. Your belly's answer- What? |
The kingly crowned head, the vigilant eye, |
The counsellor heart, the arm our soldier, |
Our steed the leg, the tongue our trumpeter, |
With other muniments and petty helps |
Is this our fabric, if that they- |
MENENIUS. What then? |
Fore me, this fellow speaks! What then? What then? |
FIRST CITIZEN. Should by the cormorant belly be restrain'd, |
Who is the sink o' th' body- |
MENENIUS. Well, what then? |
FIRST CITIZEN. The former agents, if they did complain, |
What could the belly answer? |
MENENIUS. I will tell you; |
If you'll bestow a small- of what you have little- |
Patience awhile, you'st hear the belly's answer. |
FIRST CITIZEN. Y'are long about it. |
MENENIUS. Note me this, good friend: |
Your most grave belly was deliberate, |
Not rash like his accusers, and thus answered. |
'True is it, my incorporate friends,' quoth he |
'That I receive the general food at first |
Which you do live upon; and fit it is, |
Because I am the storehouse and the shop |
Of the whole body. But, if you do remember, |
I send it through the rivers of your blood, |
Even to the court, the heart, to th' seat o' th' brain; |
And, through the cranks and offices of man, |
The strongest nerves and small inferior veins |
From me receive that natural competency |
Whereby they live. And though that all at once |
You, my good friends'- this says the belly; mark me. |
FIRST CITIZEN. Ay, sir; well, well. |
MENENIUS. 'Though all at once cannot |
See what I do deliver out to each, |
Yet I can make my audit up, that all |
From me do back receive the flour of all, |
And leave me but the bran.' What say you to' t? |
FIRST CITIZEN. It was an answer. How apply you this? |
MENENIUS. The senators of Rome are this good belly, |
And you the mutinous members; for, examine |
Their counsels and their cares, digest things rightly |
Touching the weal o' th' common, you shall find |
No public benefit which you receive |
But it proceeds or comes from them to you, |
And no way from yourselves. What do you think, |
You, the great toe of this assembly? |
FIRST CITIZEN. I the great toe? Why the great toe? |
MENENIUS. For that, being one o' th' lowest, basest, poorest, |
Of this most wise rebellion, thou goest foremost. |
Thou rascal, that art worst in blood to run, |
Lead'st first to win some vantage. |
But make you ready your stiff bats and clubs. |
Rome and her rats are at the point of battle; |
The one side must have bale. |
Enter CAIUS MARCIUS |
Hail, noble Marcius! |
MARCIUS. Thanks. What's the matter, you dissentious rogues |
That, rubbing the poor itch of your opinion, |
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