Antony has finished the part of his speech to the common people where he lifts up the mantle (cloak) of the dead Caesar and shows where the different senators slashed it while plunging their daggers into Caesar's flesh. This raises the crowd to a furor of anger against the conspirators. They cry:

Revenge! About! Seek! Burn! Fire! Kill! Slay!
Let not a traitor live!

Antony then bids them to calm down. By saying he doesn't want a "sudden flood of mutiny," he means he doesn't want the people in the crowd to take on killing Brutus, Cassius, and the other assassins on the spot—at least not yet.

Antony is furious that the senators murdered Caesar, a man he dearly loved, and he has deliberately stirred the crowd up against them with his speech. However, he doesn't want the mob to go out of control before he reads them Caesar's will. He is able calm them down long enough to do that and then sends them off with even more anger in their hearts against the assassins.

Antony’s speech is masterful. But in order to understand it better, we need to know the context. Antony’s speech takes place after the death of Caesar and after Brutus’s speech to the public. Brutus’s speech satisfies the people. Brutus makes the public believe that he loved Caesar but the Republic more. What makes Brutus’s speech powerful is that it is true. Brutus was a reluctant conspirator.

After Brutus’s speech, Antony addresses the same crowd. Within this speech Antony has a refrain—that the conspirator are honorable men—more specifically that Brutus is an honorable man. At first, there is nothing unusual about the word, “honorable.” But as the speech progresses, it is clear that Antony is getting more and more sarcastic as Antony points out the good things that Caesar has done. He begins to win the crowd over, which makes Brutus less and less honorable.

Antony, then, shows Caesar’s will. But he hesitates the reading of it, lest he stir them up. Here is the quote:

Good friends, sweet friends, let me not stir you up
To such a sudden flood of mutiny.
They that have done this deed are honourable:
What private griefs they have, alas, I know not,
That made them do it: they are wise and honourable,
And will, no doubt, with reasons answer you.
I come not, friends, to steal away your hearts . . .

Eventually Antony reads the will, and the people find out Caesar left them money. This shows that the conspirators were not honorable. The one who was honorable was Caesar.

What makes this quote really interesting is that it develops the dramatic irony in Antony's funeral oration. Despite what Antony says, we know that stirring up the crowd and turning them against the conspirators is exactly what he intended to do, and he does it masterfully. Antony is shown in this scene to be highly intelligent and manipulative. He plays upon the emotions of the crowd. He understands human nature in a way that escapes Brutus completely.

In this quote Marc Anthony is speaking to the crowd at Caesar's funeral.  He has told the people how much Caesar loved them, he has told them that even though the men who killed him were "honorable" men,( he then begins to prove they are traitors), they stabbed Caesar because he was ambitous.  The crowd begins to listen intently to Marc Anthony when he tells them that Ceaser refused to take the crown three different times.  Marc indicates the he should not read Caesar's will because the crowd will become too angry when they hear how much their Caesar loved them.  They demand revenge and begin becoming unsettled and shouting angry replies.  It is then that Marc Anthony says,

"Good friends, sweet friends, don’t let me stir you up
To such a sudden flood of rebellion.
They who have done this deed are honorable.
What private sorrows they have that made them do it,
Alas, I don’t know,
They're wise and honorable,And will, no doubt, answer you with reasons."