Act 1. Scene I

SCENE I. Rome. A street.

Enter a company of mutinous Citizens, with staves, clubs, and other weapons
First Citizen
Before we proceed any further, hear me speak.

All
Speak, speak.

First Citizen
You are all resolved rather to die than to famish?

All
Resolved. resolved.

First Citizen
First, you know Caius Marcius is chief enemy to the people.

All
We know't, we know't.

First Citizen
Let us kill him, and we'll have corn at our own price.
Is't a verdict?

All
No more talking on't; let it be done: away, away!

Second Citizen
One word, good citizens.

First Citizen
We are accounted poor citizens, the patricians good.
What authority surfeits on would relieve us: if they
would yield us but the superfluity, while it were
wholesome, we might guess they relieved us humanely;
but they think we are too dear: the leanness that
afflicts us, the object of our misery, is as an
inventory to particularise their abundance; our
sufferance is a gain to them Let us revenge this with
our pikes, ere we become rakes: for the gods know I
speak this in hunger for bread, not in thirst for revenge.

Second Citizen
Would you proceed especially against Caius Marcius?

All
Against him first: he's a very dog to the commonalty.

Second Citizen
Consider you what services he has done for his country?

First Citizen
Very well; and could be content to give him good
report fort, but that he pays himself with being proud.

Second Citizen
Nay, but speak not maliciously.

First Citizen
I say unto you, what he hath done famously, he did
it to that end: though soft-conscienced men can be
content to say it was for his country he did it to
please his mother and to be partly proud; which he
is, even till the altitude of his virtue.

Second Citizen
What he cannot help in his nature, you account a
vice in him. You must in no way say he is covetous.

First Citizen
If I must not, I need not be barren of accusations;
he hath faults, with surplus, to tire in repetition.

Shouts within

What shouts are these? The other side o' the city
is risen: why stay we prating here? to the Capitol!

All
Come, come.

First Citizen
Soft! who comes here?

Enter MENENIUS AGRIPPA

Second Citizen
Worthy Menenius Agrippa; one that hath always loved
the people.

First Citizen
He's one honest enough: would all the rest were so!

MENENIUS
What work's, my countrymen, in hand? where go you
With bats and clubs? The matter? speak, I pray you.

First Citizen
Our business is not unknown to