MENENIUS. Put them not to’t. Pray you, go fit you to the custom, and Take to you, as your predecessors have, Your honour with your form. CORIOLANUS. It is a part That I shall blush in acting, and might well Be taken from the people. BRUTUS. Mark you that? CORIOLANUS. To brag unto them, “thus I did, and thus!” Show them th’ unaching scars which I should hide, As if I had received them for the hire Of their breath only! MENENIUS. Do not stand upon’t.— We recommend to you, tribunes of the people, Our purpose to them, and to our noble consul Wish we all joy and honour. SENATORS. To Coriolanus come all joy and honour! [_Flourish cornets. Exeunt all but Sicinius and Brutus._] BRUTUS. You see how he intends to use the people. SICINIUS. May they perceive’s intent! He will require them As if he did contemn what he requested Should be in them to give. BRUTUS. Come, we’ll inform them Of our proceedings here. On th’ marketplace I know they do attend us. [_Exeunt._] SCENE III. Rome. The Forum Enter seven or eight Citizens. FIRST CITIZEN. Once, if he do require our voices, we ought not to deny him. SECOND CITIZEN. We may, sir, if we will. THIRD CITIZEN. We have power in ourselves to do it, but it is a power that we have no power to do; for, if he show us his wounds and tell us his deeds, we are to put our tongues into those wounds and speak for them. So, if he tell us his noble deeds, we must also tell him our noble acceptance of them. Ingratitude is monstrous, and for the multitude to be ingrateful were to make a monster of the multitude, of the which we being members, should bring ourselves to be monstrous members. FIRST CITIZEN. And to make us no better thought of, a little help will serve; for once we stood up about the corn, he himself stuck not to call us the many-headed multitude. THIRD CITIZEN. We have been called so of many; not that our heads are some brown, some black, some auburn, some bald, but that our wits are so diversely coloured; and truly I think if all our wits were to issue out of one skull, they would fly east, west, north, south, and their consent of one direct way should be at once to all the points o’ th’ compass. SECOND CITIZEN. Think you so? Which way do you judge my wit would fly? THIRD CITIZEN. Nay, your wit will not so soon out as another man’s will; ’tis strongly wedged up in a blockhead. But if it were at liberty, ’twould, sure, southward. SECOND CITIZEN. Why that way? THIRD CITIZEN. To lose itself in a fog, where being three parts melted away with rotten dews, the fourth would return for conscience’ sake, to help to get thee a wife. SECOND CITIZEN. You are never without your tricks. You may, you may. THIRD CITIZEN. Are you all resolved to give your voices? But that’s no matter; the greater part carries it. I say, if he would incline to the people, there was never a worthier man. Enter Coriolanus in a gown of humility, with Menenius.