Thus Spoke Zarathustra

“ Something higher than all reconciliation must the Will will which is the Will to Power-: but how does that take place? Who has taught it also to will backwards?
-But at this point it chanced that Zarathustra suddenly paused, and looked like a person in the greatest alarm. With terror in his eyes did he gaze on his disciples; his glances pierced as with arrows their thoughts and arrear-thoughts. But after a brief space he again laughed, and said soothedly:
"It is difficult to live amongst men, because silence is so difficult- especially for a babbler."-
Thus spoke Zarathustra. ”

“ O Zarathustra, thou art more pious than thou believest, with such an unbelief! Some God in thee hath converted thee to thine ungodliness.
Is it not thy piety itself which no longer letteth thee believe in a God? And thine over-great honesty will yet lead thee even beyond good and evil!
Behold, what hath been reserved for thee? Thou hast eyes and hands and mouth, which have been predestined for blessing from eternity. One doth not bless with the hand alone. ”

“ And if thou wouldst now die, O Zarathustra, behold, we know also how thou wouldst then speak to thyself:—but thine animals beseech thee not to die yet!
Thou wouldst speak, and without trembling, buoyant rather with bliss, for a great weight and worry would be taken from thee, thou patientest one!—
‘Now do I die and disappear,’ wouldst thou say, ‘and in a moment I am nothing. Souls are as mortal as bodies. ”

“ One thing however do I know,- from yourself did I learn it once, O Zarathustra: he who wants to kill most thoroughly, laughs.
'Not by wrath but by laughter does one kill'- thus spoke you once, O Zarathustra, you hidden one, you destroyer without wrath, you dangerous saint,- you are a rogue!"
2. Then, however, did it come to pass that Zarathustra, astonished at such merely roguish answers, jumped back to the door of his cave, and turning towards all his guests, cried out with a strong voice:
"O you wags, all of you, you fools! Why do you dissemble and disguise yourselves before me! ”

“ Once on a time, Zarathustra also cast his fancy beyond man, like all backworldsmen. The work of a suffering and tortured God, did the world then seem to me.
The dream—and diction—of a God, did the world then seem to me; coloured vapours before the eyes of a divinely dissatisfied one.
Good and evil, and joy and woe, and I and thou—coloured vapours did they seem to me before creative eyes. The creator wished to look away from himself,—thereupon he created the world.
Intoxicating joy is it for the sufferer to look away from his suffering and forget himself. ”

“ Zarathustra however spoke thus: "You despairing ones! You strange ones! So it was your cry of distress that I heard? And now do I know also where he is to be sought, whom I have sought for in vain today: the higher man-:
-In my own cave sits he, the higher man! But why do I wonder! Have not I myself allured him to me by honey-offerings and artful lure-calls of my happiness?
But it seems to me that you are badly adapted for company: you make one another's hearts fretful, you that cry for help, when you sit here together? ”

“ Zarathustra, said he, wilt thou even sing consolation to the sea?
Ah, thou amiable fool, Zarathustra, thou too-blindly confiding one! But thus hast thou ever been: ever hast thou approached confidently all that is terrible.
Every monster wouldst thou caress. A whiff of warm breath, a little soft tuft on its paw—: and immediately wert thou ready to love and lure it.
LOVE is the danger of the lonesomest one, love to anything, IF IT ONLY LIVE! ”

“ depart from me, and guard yourselves against Zarathustra! And better still: be ashamed of him! Perhaps he hath deceived you.
The man of knowledge must be able not only to love his enemies, but also to hate his friends.
One requiteth a teacher badly if one remain merely a scholar. And why will ye not pluck at my wreath?
Ye venerate me; but what if your veneration should some day collapse? Take heed lest a statue crush you!
Ye say, ye believe in Zarathustra? But of what account is Zarathustra! Ye are my believers: but of what account are all believers!
Ye had not yet sought yourselves: ”

“ No one speaketh unto me; the frost of solitude maketh me tremble. What do I seek on the height?
My contempt and my longing increase together; the higher I clamber, the more do I despise him who clambereth. What doth he seek on the height?
How ashamed I am of my clambering and stumbling! How I mock at my violent panting! How I hate him who flieth! How tired I am on the height!”
Here the youth was silent. And Zarathustra contemplated the tree beside which they stood, and spake thus:
“This tree standeth lonely here on the hills; it hath grown up high above man and beast. ”

“ Where one can no longer love, there should one- pass by!-
Thus spoke Zarathustra, and passed by the fool and the great city. ”

“ Redemption WHEN Zarathustra went one day over the great bridge, then did the cripples and beggars surround him, and a hunchback spoke thus to him:
"Behold, Zarathustra! Even the people learn from you, and acquire faith in your teaching: but for them to believe fully in you, one thing is still needful- you must first of all convince us cripples! Here have you now a fine selection, and verily, an opportunity with more than one forelock! The blind can you heal, and make the lame run ”

“ Worse verily, doest thou here than with thy bad brown girls, thou bad, new believer!”
“It is sad enough,” answered the wanderer and shadow, “thou art right: but how can I help it! The old God liveth again, O Zarathustra, thou mayst say what thou wilt.
The ugliest man is to blame for it all: he hath reawakened him. And if he say that he once killed him, with Gods DEATH is always just a prejudice.”
—“And thou,” said Zarathustra, “thou bad old magician, what didst thou do! ”

“ And that we despairing ones have now come into your cave, and already no longer despair:- it is but a prognostic and a presage that better ones are on the way to you,-
-For they themselves are on the way to you, the last remnant of God among men- that is to say, all the men of great longing, of great loathing, of great satiety,
-All who do not want to live unless they learn again to hope- unless they learn from you, O Zarathustra, the great hope!" Thus spoke the king on the right, and seized the hand of Zarathustra in order to kiss it ”

“ To prick a swollen one in the belly, I call good pastime. Hear that, you boys!
Our today is of the popular: who still knows what is great and what is small! Who could there seek successfully for greatness! A fool only: it succeeds with fools.
You seek for great men, you strange fool? Who taught that to you? Is today the time for it? Oh, you bad seeker, why do you- tempt me?"- -
Thus spoke Zarathustra, comforted in his heart, and went laughing on his way. ”

“ In his teaching alone do we meet with truthfulness upheld as the highest virtue—i.e.: the reverse of the COWARDICE of the ‘idealist’ who flees from reality. Zarathustra had more courage in his body than any other thinker before or after him. To tell the truth and TO AIM STRAIGHT: that is the first Persian virtue. Am I understood?... The overcoming of morality through itself—through truthfulness, the overcoming of the moralist through his opposite—THROUGH ME—: that is what the name Zarathustra means in my mouth. ”

“ Thus spake the conscientious one; but Zarathustra, who had just come back into his cave and had heard and divined the last discourse, threw a handful of roses to the conscientious one, and laughed on account of his “truths.” “Why!” he exclaimed, “what did I hear just now? Verily, it seemeth to me, thou art a fool, or else I myself am one: and quietly and quickly will I put thy ‘truth’ upside down.
For FEAR—is an exception with us. Courage, however, and adventure, and delight in the uncertain, in the unattempted—COURAGE seemeth to me the entire primitive history of man. ”

“ I love all who are like heavy drops falling one by one out of the dark cloud that lowereth over man: they herald the coming of the lightning, and succumb as heralds.
Lo, I am a herald of the lightning, and a heavy drop out of the cloud: the lightning, however, is the SUPERMAN.—
5.
When Zarathustra had spoken these words, he again looked at the people, and was silent. “There they stand,” said he to his heart; “there they laugh: they understand me not; I am not the mouth for these ears.
Must one first batter their ears, that they may learn to hear with their eyes? ”

“ He who doth not believe in himself always lieth.
A God’s mask have ye hung in front of you, ye “pure ones”: into a God’s mask hath your execrable coiling snake crawled.
Verily ye deceive, ye “contemplative ones!” Even Zarathustra was once the dupe of your godlike exterior; he did not divine the serpent’s coil with which it was stuffed.
A God’s soul, I once thought I saw playing in your games, ye pure discerners! No better arts did I once dream of than your arts!
Serpents’ filth and evil odour, the distance concealed from me: and that a lizard’s craft prowled thereabouts lasciviously. ”

“ From the sun did I learn this, when it goeth down, the exuberant one: gold doth it then pour into the sea, out of inexhaustible riches,—
—So that the poorest fisherman roweth even with GOLDEN oars! For this did I once see, and did not tire of weeping in beholding it.—
Like the sun will also Zarathustra go down: now sitteth he here and waiteth, old broken tables around him, and also new tables—half-written. ”

“ This old saint in the forest hath not yet heard of it, that GOD IS DEAD!”
3.
When Zarathustra arrived at the nearest town which adjoineth the forest, he found many people assembled in the market-place; for it had been announced that a rope-dancer would give a performance. And Zarathustra spake thus unto the people:
I TEACH YOU THE SUPERMAN. Man is something that is to be surpassed. What have ye done to surpass man?
All beings hitherto have created something beyond themselves: and ye want to be the ebb of that great tide, and would rather go back to the beast than surpass man? ”

“ And though it honoureth thee that thou speakest only in praise of this dead one, yet thou knowest as well as I WHO he was, and that he went curious ways.”
“To speak before three eyes,” said the old pope cheerfully (he was blind of one eye) , “in divine matters I am more enlightened than Zarathustra himself—and may well be so.
My love served him long years, my will followed all his will. A good servant, however, knoweth everything, and many a thing even which a master hideth from himself. ”

“ ‘To live as I incline, or not to live at all’: so do I wish; so wisheth also the holiest. But alas! how have I still—inclination?
Have I—still a goal? A haven towards which MY sail is set?
A good wind? Ah, he only who knoweth WHITHER he saileth, knoweth what wind is good, and a fair wind for him.
What still remaineth to me? A heart weary and flippant; an unstable will; fluttering wings; a broken backbone.
This seeking for MY home: O Zarathustra, dost thou know that this seeking hath been MY home-sickening; it eateth me up. ”

“ But the devil is never at the place which would be his right place: he always cometh too late, that cursed dwarf and club-foot!”—
Thus cursed Zarathustra impatiently in his heart, and considered how with averted look he might slip past the black man. But behold, it came about otherwise. For at the same moment had the sitting one already perceived him; and not unlike one whom an unexpected happiness overtaketh, he sprang to his feet, and went straight towards Zarathustra. ”

“ With tones danceth our love on variegated rainbows.—
—“O Zarathustra,” said then his animals, “to those who think like us, things all dance themselves: they come and hold out the hand and laugh and flee—and return.
Everything goeth, everything returneth; eternally rolleth the wheel of existence. Everything dieth, everything blossometh forth again; eternally runneth on the year of existence.
Everything breaketh, everything is integrated anew; eternally buildeth itself the same house of existence. All things separate, all things again greet one another ”

“ Thus spoke the wanderer who called himself Zarathustra's shadow; and before any one answered him, he had seized the harp of the old magician, crossed his legs, and looked calmly and sagely around him:- with his nostrils, however, he inhaled the air slowly and questioningly, like one who in new countries tastes new foreign air. Afterward he began to sing with a kind of roaring.
2. The deserts grow: woe him who does them hide! ”

“ No one ever spoke such warlike words: 'What is good? To be brave is good. It is the good war that hallows every cause.'
O Zarathustra, our fathers' blood stirred in our veins at such words: it was like the voice of spring to old wine-casks.
When the swords ran among one another like red-spotted serpents, then did our fathers become fond of life; the sun of every peace seemed to them languid and lukewarm, the long peace, however, made them ashamed. ”

“ The deserts grow: woe him who do them hide!
77. The Awakening 1. AFTER the song of the wanderer and shadow, the cave became all at once full of noise and laughter: and since the assembled guests all spoke simultaneously, and even the ass, encouraged thereby, no longer remained silent, a little aversion and scorn for his visitors came over Zarathustra, although he rejoiced at their gladness. For it seemed to him a sign of convalescence. So he slipped out into the open air and spoke to his animals. ”

“ This Zarathustra did; and no sooner had he laid himself on the ground in the stillness and secrecy of the variegated grass, than he had forgotten his little thirst, and fell asleep. For as the aphorism of Zarathustra says: "One thing is more necessary than the other." Only that his eyes remained open:- for they never grew weary of viewing and admiring the tree and the love of the vine. In falling asleep, however, Zarathustra spoke thus to his heart:
"Hush! ”