The Tragedy Of Coriolanus

1 Enter Aufidius with his Lieutenant.
2 AUFIDIUS.
3 Do they still fly to th’ Roman?
4 LIEUTENANT.
5 I do not know what witchcraft’s in him, but
6 Your soldiers use him as the grace ’fore meat,
7 Their talk at table, and their thanks at end;
8 And you are dark’ned in this action, sir,
9 Even by your own.
10 AUFIDIUS.
11 I cannot help it now,
12 Unless by using means I lame the foot
13 Of our design. He bears himself more proudlier,
14 Even to my person, than I thought he would
15 When first I did embrace him. Yet his nature
16 In that’s no changeling, and I must excuse
17 What cannot be amended.
18 LIEUTENANT.
19 Yet I wish, sir—
20 I mean for your particular—you had not
21 Joined in commission with him, but either
22 Had borne the action of yourself or else
23 To him had left it solely.
24 AUFIDIUS.
25 I understand thee well, and be thou sure,
26 When he shall come to his account, he knows not
27 What I can urge against him, although it seems,
28 And so he thinks and is no less apparent
29 To th’ vulgar eye, that he bears all things fairly,
30 And shows good husbandry for the Volscian state,
31 Fights dragonlike, and does achieve as soon
32 As draw his sword; yet he hath left undone
33 That which shall break his neck or hazard mine
34 Whene’er we come to our account.
35 LIEUTENANT.
36 Sir, I beseech you, think you he’ll carry Rome?
37 AUFIDIUS.
38 All places yield to him ere he sits down,
39 And the nobility of Rome are his;
40 The Senators and Patricians love him too.
41 The Tribunes are no soldiers, and their people
42 Will be as rash in the repeal as hasty
43 To expel him thence. I think he’ll be to Rome
44 As is the osprey to the fish, who takes it
45 By sovereignty of nature. First, he was
46 A noble servant to them, but he could not
47 Carry his honours even. Whether ’twas pride,
48 Which out of daily fortune ever taints
49 The happy man; whether defect of judgment,
50 To fail in the disposing of those chances
51 Which he was lord of; or whether nature,
52 Not to be other than one thing, not moving
53 From th’ casque to th’ cushion, but commanding peace
54 Even with the same austerity and garb
55 As he controlled the war; but one of these—
56 As he hath spices of them all—not all,
57 For I dare so far free him—made him feared,
58 So hated, and so banished. But he has a merit
59 To choke it in the utt’rance. So our virtues
60 Lie in th’ interpretation of the time,
61 And power, unto itself most commendable,
62 Hath not a tomb so evident as a chair
63 T’ extol what it hath done.
64 One fire drives out one fire, one nail one nail;
65 Rights by rights falter; strengths by strengths do fail.
66 Come, let’s away. When, Caius, Rome is thine,
67 Thou art poor’st of all; then shortly art thou mine.
68 [_Exeunt._]