1Then fear came over the senators that, if the army were disbanded, there would again be secret meetings and conspiracies. 1And so, although the levy had been held by the dictator, yet, thinking that since the men had sworn their oath to the consuls the soldiers were bound by it, they ordered the legions to be led out of the city on the pretext that war had been renewed by the Aequi. 1This action brought the sedition to a head. 2And at first, it is said, there was talk of killing the consuls, so as to be released from their oath; 2then, having been taught that no religious obligation is dissolved by a crime, they withdrew, at the prompting of one Sicinius and without the consuls' orders, to the Sacred Mount — it is across the river Anio, three miles from the city; 3this account is more widespread than the one, of which Piso is the authority, that the secession was made to the Aventine — ; 4there, without any leader, having fortified a camp with rampart and ditch, they kept quiet for some days, taking nothing but what they needed for food, neither provoked nor provoking.
5There was great panic in the city, and everything was held in suspense by mutual fear. 5The plebs, left behind by their own people, feared the violence of the senators; 5the senators feared the plebs remaining in the city, unsure whether they would rather it stayed or went. 6And how long would the multitude that had seceded stay peaceful? 7What would happen then, if some foreign war should break out meanwhile? 7Surely they thought no hope remained except in the harmony of the citizens; 8this must be restored to the state by fair means or foul. 8It was decided therefore to send to the plebs as spokesman Menenius Agrippa, an eloquent man and, because he was by origin one of them, dear to the plebs.
8Admitted into the camp, he is said to have told them, in that old-fashioned and rough manner of speaking, nothing but this: that at the time when in a man the parts did not, as now, all agree together as one, but each member had its own counsel and its own speech, the other parts were indignant that everything was got for the belly by their care, their toil and service, while the belly, quiet in the middle, did nothing but enjoy the pleasures given to it; 10they then conspired that the hands should not carry food to the mouth, nor the mouth take what was given, nor the teeth chew it.
10While in this anger they sought to tame the belly by hunger, the members themselves and the whole body came to the last stage of wasting. 11From this it became plain that the belly too performed no idle service, and that it was nourished no more than it nourished, sending out to all parts of the body this blood, by which we live and thrive, distributed equally through the veins and enriched by the digested food. 11By comparing in this way how like the internal sedition of the body was to the anger of the plebs against the senators, he changed the men's minds.