[MACHEATH]
Now those among you full of pious teaching
Who teach us to renounce the major sins
Should know before you do your heavy preaching
Our middle's empty, there it all begins
Your vices and our virtues are so dear to you
So learn the simple truth from this our song
Wherever you aspire, whatever you may do
First feed the face, and then talk right and wrong
For even honest folk may act like sinners
Unless they've had their customary dinners

[WOMAN]
What keeps a man alive?

[MACHEATH]
What keeps a man alive? He lives on others
He likes to taste the first, then eat them whole if he can
(spoken)
Forgets that they're supposed to be his brothers
(sung)
That he himself was ever called a man

[ENSEMBLE]
Remember if you wish to stay alive
For once do something bad and you'll survive!
[MRS. PEACHUM]
You warn us with appropriate caresses
That virtue, humble virtue always wins
Now please, before your moral fervor presses
Our middle's empty, there it all begins
Oh, you who dote on our despair and your desire
May learn the simple truth from this our song
Whatever you may do, whatever you aspire
First feed the face, and then talk right and wrong
For even saintly folk may act like sinners
Unless they've had their customary dinners

[MAN]
What keeps a man alive?

[MRS. PEACHUM]
What keeps a man alive? He lives on others
He likes to taste the first, then eat them whole if he can
Forgets that they're supposed to be his brothers
That he himself was ever called a man

[ENSEMBLE]
Remember if you wish to stay alive
For once do something bad and you'll survive!