 FOURTH AND LAST PART.

Ah, where in the world have there been
greater follies than with the pitiful?
And what in the world hath caused more
suffering than the follies of the
pitiful?

Woe unto all loving ones who have not an
elevation which is above their pity!

Thus spake the devil unto me, once on a
time: “Even God hath his hell: it is his
love for man.”

And lately did I hear him say these
words: “God is dead: of his pity for man
hath God died.”--ZARATHUSTRA, II., “The
Pitiful.”



LXI. THE HONEY SACRIFICE.

--And again passed moons and years over
Zarathustra’s soul, and he heeded it
not; his hair, however, became white.
One day when he sat on a stone in front
of his cave, and gazed calmly into the
distance--one there gazeth out on the
sea, and away beyond sinuous
abysses,--then went his animals
thoughtfully round about him, and at
last set themselves in front of him.

“O Zarathustra,” said they, “gazest thou
out perhaps for thy happiness?”--“Of
what account is my happiness!” answered
he, “I have long ceased to strive any
more for happiness, I strive for my
work.”--“O Zarathustra,” said the
animals once more, “that sayest thou as
one who hath overmuch of good things.
Liest thou not in a sky-blue lake of
happiness?”--“Ye wags,” answered
Zarathustra, and smiled, “how well did
ye choose the simile! But ye know also
that my happiness is heavy, and not like
a fluid wave of water: it presseth me
and will not leave me, and is like
molten pitch.”--

Then went his animals again thoughtfully
around him, and placed themselves once
more in front of him. “O Zarathustra,”
said they, “it is consequently FOR THAT
REASON that thou thyself always becometh
yellower and darker, although thy hair
looketh white and flaxen? Lo, thou
sittest in thy pitch!”--“What do ye say,
mine animals?” said Zarathustra,
laughing; “verily I reviled when I spake
of pitch. As it happeneth with me, so is
it with all fruits that turn ripe. It is
the HONEY in my veins that maketh my
blood thicker, and also my soul
stiller.”--“So will it be, O
Zarathustra,” answered his animals, and
pressed up to him; “but wilt thou not
to-day ascend a high mountain? The air
is pure, and to-day one seeth more of
the world than ever.”--“Yea, mine
animals,” answered he, “ye counsel
admirably and according to my heart: I
will to-day ascend a high mountain! But
see that honey is there ready to hand,
yellow, white, good, ice-cool,
golden-comb-honey. For know that when
aloft I will make the
honey-sacrifice.”--

When Zarathustra, however, was aloft on
the summit, he sent his animals home
that had accompanied him, and found that
he was now alone:--then he laughed from
the bottom of his heart, looked around
him, and spake thus:

That I spake of sacrifices and
honey-sacrifices, it was merely a ruse
in talking and verily, a useful folly!
Here aloft can I now speak freer than in
front of mountain-caves and anchorites’
domestic animals.

What to sacrifice! I squander what is
given me, a squanderer with a thousand
hands: how could I call
that--sacrificing?

And when I desired honey I only desired
bait, and sweet mucus and mucilage, for
which even the mouths of growling bears,
and strange, sulky, evil birds, water:

--The best bait, as huntsmen and
fishermen require it. For if the world
be as a gloomy forest of animals, and a
pleasure-ground for all wild huntsmen,
it seemeth to me rather--and
preferably--a fathomless, rich sea;

--A sea full of many-hued fishes and
crabs, for which even the Gods might
long, and might be tempted to become
fishers in it, and casters of nets,--so
rich is the world in wonderful things,
great and small!

Especially the human world, the human
sea:--towards IT do I now throw out my
golden angle-rod and say: Open up, thou
human abyss!

Open up, and throw unto me thy fish and
shining crabs! With my best bait shall I
allure to myself to-day the strangest
human fish!

--My happiness itself do I throw out
into all places far and wide ‘twixt
orient, noontide, and occident, to see
if many human fish will not learn to hug
and tug at my happiness;--

Until, biting at my sharp hidden hooks,
they have to come up unto MY height, the
motleyest abyss-groundlings, to the
wickedest of all fishers of men.

For THIS am I from the heart and from
the beginning--drawing, hither-drawing,
upward-drawing, upbringing; a drawer, a
trainer, a training-master, who not in
vain counselled himself once on a time:
“Become what thou art!”

Thus may men now come UP to me; for as
yet do I await the signs that it is time
for my down-going; as yet do I not
myself go down, as I must do, amongst
men.

Therefore do I here wait, crafty and
scornful upon high mountains, no
impatient one, no patient one; rather
one who hath even unlearnt
patience,--because he no longer
“suffereth.”

For my fate giveth me time: it hath
forgotten me perhaps? Or doth it sit
behind a big stone and catch flies?

And verily, I am well-disposed to mine
eternal fate, because it doth not hound
and hurry me, but leaveth me time for
merriment and mischief; so that I have
to-day ascended this high mountain to
catch fish.

Did ever any one catch fish upon high
mountains? And though it be a folly what
I here seek and do, it is better so than
that down below I should become solemn
with waiting, and green and yellow--

--A posturing wrath-snorter with
waiting, a holy howl-storm from the
mountains, an impatient one that
shouteth down into the valleys:
“Hearken, else I will scourge you with
the scourge of God!”

Not that I would have a grudge against
such wrathful ones on that account: they
are well enough for laughter to me!
Impatient must they now be, those big
alarm-drums, which find a voice now or
never!

Myself, however, and my fate--we do not
talk to the Present, neither do we talk
to the Never: for talking we have
patience and time and more than time.
For one day must it yet come, and may
not pass by.

What must one day come and may not pass
by? Our great Hazar, that is to say, our
great, remote human-kingdom, the
Zarathustra-kingdom of a thousand
years--

How remote may such “remoteness” be?
What doth it concern me? But on that
account it is none the less sure unto
me--, with both feet stand I secure on
this ground;

--On an eternal ground, on hard primary
rock, on this highest, hardest, primary
mountain-ridge, unto which all winds
come, as unto the storm-parting, asking
Where? and Whence? and Whither?

Here laugh, laugh, my hearty, healthy
wickedness! From high mountains cast
down thy glittering scorn-laughter!
Allure for me with thy glittering the
finest human fish!

And whatever belongeth unto ME in all
seas, my in-and-for-me in all
things--fish THAT out for me, bring THAT
up to me: for that do I wait, the
wickedest of all fish-catchers.

Out! out! my fishing-hook! In and down,
thou bait of my happiness! Drip thy
sweetest dew, thou honey of my heart!
Bite, my fishing-hook, into the belly of
all black affliction!

Look out, look out, mine eye! Oh, how
many seas round about me, what dawning
human futures! And above me--what rosy
red stillness! What unclouded silence!




LXII. THE CRY OF DISTRESS.

The next day sat Zarathustra again on
the stone in front of his cave, whilst
his animals roved about in the world
outside to bring home new food,--also
new honey: for Zarathustra had spent and
wasted the old honey to the very last
particle. When he thus sat, however,
with a stick in his hand, tracing the
shadow of his figure on the earth, and
reflecting--verily! not upon himself and
his shadow,--all at once he startled and
shrank back: for he saw another shadow
beside his own. And when he hastily
looked around and stood up, behold,
there stood the soothsayer beside him,
the same whom he had once given to eat
and drink at his table, the proclaimer
of the great weariness, who taught: “All
is alike, nothing is worth while, the
world is without meaning, knowledge
strangleth.” But his face had changed
since then; and when Zarathustra looked
into his eyes, his heart was startled
once more: so much evil announcement and
ashy-grey lightnings passed over that
countenance.

The soothsayer, who had perceived what
went on in Zarathustra’s soul, wiped his
face with his hand, as if he would wipe
out the impression; the same did also
Zarathustra. And when both of them had
thus silently composed and strengthened
themselves, they gave each other the
hand, as a token that they wanted once
more to recognise each other.

“Welcome hither,” said Zarathustra,
“thou soothsayer of the great weariness,
not in vain shalt thou once have been my
messmate and guest. Eat and drink also
with me to-day, and forgive it that a
cheerful old man sitteth with thee at
table!”--“A cheerful old man?” answered
the soothsayer, shaking his head, “but
whoever thou art, or wouldst be, O
Zarathustra, thou hast been here aloft
the longest time,--in a little while thy
bark shall no longer rest on dry
land!”--“Do I then rest on dry
land?”--asked Zarathustra,
laughing.--“The waves around thy
mountain,” answered the soothsayer,
“rise and rise, the waves of great
distress and affliction: they will soon
raise thy bark also and carry thee
away.”--Thereupon was Zarathustra silent
and wondered.--“Dost thou still hear
nothing?” continued the soothsayer:
“doth it not rush and roar out of the
depth?”--Zarathustra was silent once
more and listened: then heard he a long,
long cry, which the abysses threw to one
another and passed on; for none of them
wished to retain it: so evil did it
sound.

“Thou ill announcer,” said Zarathustra
at last, “that is a cry of distress, and
the cry of a man; it may come perhaps
out of a black sea. But what doth human
distress matter to me! My last sin which
hath been reserved for me,--knowest thou
what it is called?”

--“PITY!” answered the soothsayer from
an overflowing heart, and raised both
his hands aloft--“O Zarathustra, I have
come that I may seduce thee to thy last
sin!”--

And hardly had those words been uttered
when there sounded the cry once more,
and longer and more alarming than
before--also much nearer. “Hearest thou?
Hearest thou, O Zarathustra?” called out
the soothsayer, “the cry concerneth
thee, it calleth thee: Come, come, come;
it is time, it is the highest time!”--

Zarathustra was silent thereupon,
confused and staggered; at last he
asked, like one who hesitateth in
himself: “And who is it that there
calleth me?”

“But thou knowest it, certainly,”
answered the soothsayer warmly, “why
dost thou conceal thyself? It is THE
HIGHER MAN that crieth for thee!”

“The higher man?” cried Zarathustra,
horror-stricken: “what wanteth HE? What
wanteth HE? The higher man! What wanteth
he here?”--and his skin covered with
perspiration.

The soothsayer, however, did not heed
Zarathustra’s alarm, but listened and
listened in the downward direction.
When, however, it had been still there
for a long while, he looked behind, and
saw Zarathustra standing trembling.

“O Zarathustra,” he began, with
sorrowful voice, “thou dost not stand
there like one whose happiness maketh
him giddy: thou wilt have to dance lest
thou tumble down!

But although thou shouldst dance before
me, and leap all thy side-leaps, no one
may say unto me: ‘Behold, here danceth
the last joyous man!’

In vain would any one come to this
height who sought HIM here: caves would
he find, indeed, and back-caves,
hiding-places for hidden ones; but not
lucky mines, nor treasure-chambers, nor
new gold-veins of happiness.

Happiness--how indeed could one find
happiness among such buried-alive and
solitary ones! Must I yet seek the last
happiness on the Happy Isles, and far
away among forgotten seas?

But all is alike, nothing is worth
while, no seeking is of service, there
are no longer any Happy Isles!”--

Thus sighed the soothsayer; with his
last sigh, however, Zarathustra again
became serene and assured, like one who
hath come out of a deep chasm into the
light. “Nay! Nay! Three times Nay!”
exclaimed he with a strong voice, and
stroked his beard--“THAT do I know
better! There are still Happy Isles!
Silence THEREON, thou sighing
sorrow-sack!

Cease to splash THEREON, thou rain-cloud
of the forenoon! Do I not already stand
here wet with thy misery, and drenched
like a dog?

Now do I shake myself and run away from
thee, that I may again become dry:
thereat mayest thou not wonder! Do I
seem to thee discourteous? Here however
is MY court.

But as regards the higher man: well! I
shall seek him at once in those forests:
FROM THENCE came his cry. Perhaps he is
there hard beset by an evil beast.

He is in MY domain: therein shall he
receive no scath! And verily, there are
many evil beasts about me.”--

With those words Zarathustra turned
around to depart. Then said the
soothsayer: “O Zarathustra, thou art a
rogue!

I know it well: thou wouldst fain be rid
of me! Rather wouldst thou run into the
forest and lay snares for evil beasts!

But what good will it do thee? In the
evening wilt thou have me again: in
thine own cave will I sit, patient and
heavy like a block--and wait for
thee!”

“So be it!” shouted back Zarathustra, as
he went away: “and what is mine in my
cave belongeth also unto thee, my
guest!

Shouldst thou however find honey
therein, well! just lick it up, thou
growling bear, and sweeten thy soul! For
in the evening we want both to be in
good spirits;

--In good spirits and joyful, because
this day hath come to an end! And thou
thyself shalt dance to my lays, as my
dancing-bear.

Thou dost not believe this? Thou shakest
thy head? Well! Cheer up, old bear! But
I also--am a soothsayer.”

Thus spake Zarathustra.



LXIII. TALK WITH THE KINGS.

1.

Ere Zarathustra had been an hour on his
way in the mountains and forests, he saw
all at once a strange procession. Right
on the path which he was about to
descend came two kings walking, bedecked
with crowns and purple girdles, and
variegated like flamingoes: they drove
before them a laden ass. “What do these
kings want in my domain?” said
Zarathustra in astonishment to his
heart, and hid himself hastily behind a
thicket. When however the kings
approached to him, he said half-aloud,
like one speaking only to himself:
“Strange! Strange! How doth this
harmonise? Two kings do I see--and only
one ass!”

Thereupon the two kings made a halt;
they smiled and looked towards the spot
whence the voice proceeded, and
afterwards looked into each other’s
faces. “Such things do we also think
among ourselves,” said the king on the
right, “but we do not utter them.”

The king on the left, however, shrugged
his shoulders and answered: “That may
perhaps be a goat-herd. Or an anchorite
who hath lived too long among rocks and
trees. For no society at all spoileth
also good manners.”

“Good manners?” replied angrily and
bitterly the other king: “what then do
we run out of the way of? Is it not
‘good manners’? Our ‘good society’?

Better, verily, to live among anchorites
and goat-herds, than with our gilded,
false, over-rouged populace--though it
call itself ‘good society.’

--Though it call itself ‘nobility.’ But
there all is false and foul, above all
the blood--thanks to old evil diseases
and worse curers.

The best and dearest to me at present is
still a sound peasant, coarse, artful,
obstinate and enduring: that is at
present the noblest type.

The peasant is at present the best; and
the peasant type should be master! But
it is the kingdom of the populace--I no
longer allow anything to be imposed upon
me. The populace, however--that meaneth,
hodgepodge.

Populace-hodgepodge: therein is
everything mixed with everything, saint
and swindler, gentleman and Jew, and
every beast out of Noah’s ark.

Good manners! Everything is false and
foul with us. No one knoweth any longer
how to reverence: it is THAT precisely
that we run away from. They are fulsome
obtrusive dogs; they gild palm-leaves.

This loathing choketh me, that we kings
ourselves have become false, draped and
disguised with the old faded pomp of our
ancestors, show-pieces for the
stupidest, the craftiest, and whosoever
at present trafficketh for power.

We ARE NOT the first men--and have
nevertheless to STAND FOR them: of this
imposture have we at last become weary
and disgusted.

From the rabble have we gone out of the
way, from all those bawlers and
scribe-blowflies, from the
trader-stench, the ambition-fidgeting,
the bad breath--: fie, to live among the
rabble;

--Fie, to stand for the first men among
the rabble! Ah, loathing! Loathing!
Loathing! What doth it now matter about
us kings!”--

“Thine old sickness seizeth thee,” said
here the king on the left, “thy loathing
seizeth thee, my poor brother. Thou
knowest, however, that some one heareth
us.”

Immediately thereupon, Zarathustra, who
had opened ears and eyes to this talk,
rose from his hiding-place, advanced
towards the kings, and thus began:

“He who hearkeneth unto you, he who
gladly hearkeneth unto you, is called
Zarathustra.

I am Zarathustra who once said: ‘What
doth it now matter about kings!’ Forgive
me; I rejoiced when ye said to each
other: ‘What doth it matter about us
kings!’

Here, however, is MY domain and
jurisdiction: what may ye be seeking in
my domain? Perhaps, however, ye have
FOUND on your way what _I_ seek: namely,
the higher man.”

When the kings heard this, they beat
upon their breasts and said with one
voice: “We are recognised!

With the sword of thine utterance
severest thou the thickest darkness of
our hearts. Thou hast discovered our
distress; for lo! we are on our way to
find the higher man--

--The man that is higher than we,
although we are kings. To him do we
convey this ass. For the highest man
shall also be the highest lord on
earth.

There is no sorer misfortune in all
human destiny, than when the mighty of
the earth are not also the first men.
Then everything becometh false and
distorted and monstrous.

And when they are even the last men, and
more beast than man, then riseth and
riseth the populace in honour, and at
last saith even the populace-virtue:
‘Lo, I alone am virtue!’”--

What have I just heard? answered
Zarathustra. What wisdom in kings! I am
enchanted, and verily, I have already
promptings to make a rhyme thereon:--

--Even if it should happen to be a rhyme
not suited for every one’s ears. I
unlearned long ago to have consideration
for long ears. Well then! Well now!

(Here, however, it happened that the ass
also found utterance: it said distinctly
and with malevolence, Y-E-A.)

‘Twas once--methinks year one of our
blessed Lord,--Drunk without wine, the
Sybil thus deplored:--“How ill things
go! Decline! Decline! Ne’er sank the
world so low! Rome now hath turned
harlot and harlot-stew, Rome’s Caesar a
beast, and God--hath turned Jew!

2.

With those rhymes of Zarathustra the
kings were delighted; the king on the
right, however, said: “O Zarathustra,
how well it was that we set out to see
thee!

For thine enemies showed us thy likeness
in their mirror: there lookedst thou
with the grimace of a devil, and
sneeringly: so that we were afraid of
thee.

But what good did it do! Always didst
thou prick us anew in heart and ear with
thy sayings. Then did we say at last:
What doth it matter how he look!

We must HEAR him; him who teacheth: ‘Ye
shall love peace as a means to new wars,
and the short peace more than the
long!’

No one ever spake such warlike words:
‘What is good? To be brave is good. It
is the good war that halloweth 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.

How they sighed, our fathers, when they
saw on the wall brightly furbished,
dried-up swords! Like those they
thirsted for war. For a sword thirsteth
to drink blood, and sparkleth with
desire.”--

--When the kings thus discoursed and
talked eagerly of the happiness of their
fathers, there came upon Zarathustra no
little desire to mock at their
eagerness: for evidently they were very
peaceable kings whom he saw before him,
kings with old and refined features. But
he restrained himself. “Well!” said he,
“thither leadeth the way, there lieth
the cave of Zarathustra; and this day is
to have a long evening! At present,
however, a cry of distress calleth me
hastily away from you.

It will honour my cave if kings want to
sit and wait in it: but, to be sure, ye
will have to wait long!

Well! What of that! Where doth one at
present learn better to wait than at
courts? And the whole virtue of kings
that hath remained unto them--is it not
called to-day: ABILITY to wait?”

Thus spake Zarathustra.



LXIV. THE LEECH.

And Zarathustra went thoughtfully on,
further and lower down, through forests
and past moory bottoms; as it happeneth,
however, to every one who meditateth
upon hard matters, he trod thereby
unawares upon a man. And lo, there
spurted into his face all at once a cry
of pain, and two curses and twenty bad
invectives, so that in his fright he
raised his stick and also struck the
trodden one. Immediately afterwards,
however, he regained his composure, and
his heart laughed at the folly he had
just committed.

“Pardon me,” said he to the trodden one,
who had got up enraged, and had seated
himself, “pardon me, and hear first of
all a parable.

As a wanderer who dreameth of remote
things on a lonesome highway, runneth
unawares against a sleeping dog, a dog
which lieth in the sun:

--As both of them then start up and snap
at each other, like deadly enemies,
those two beings mortally frightened--so
did it happen unto us.

And yet! And yet--how little was lacking
for them to caress each other, that dog
and that lonesome one! Are they not
both--lonesome ones!”

--“Whoever thou art,” said the trodden
one, still enraged, “thou treadest also
too nigh me with thy parable, and not
only with thy foot!

Lo! am I then a dog?”--And thereupon the
sitting one got up, and pulled his naked
arm out of the swamp. For at first he
had lain outstretched on the ground,
hidden and indiscernible, like those who
lie in wait for swamp-game.

“But whatever art thou about!” called
out Zarathustra in alarm, for he saw a
deal of blood streaming over the naked
arm,--“what hath hurt thee? Hath an evil
beast bit thee, thou unfortunate one?”

The bleeding one laughed, still angry,
“What matter is it to thee!” said he,
and was about to go on. “Here am I at
home and in my province. Let him
question me whoever will: to a dolt,
however, I shall hardly answer.”

“Thou art mistaken,” said Zarathustra
sympathetically, and held him fast;
“thou art mistaken. Here thou art not at
home, but in my domain, and therein
shall no one receive any hurt.

Call me however what thou wilt--I am who
I must be. I call myself Zarathustra.

Well! Up thither is the way to
Zarathustra’s cave: it is not far,--wilt
thou not attend to thy wounds at my
home?

It hath gone badly with thee, thou
unfortunate one, in this life: first a
beast bit thee, and then--a man trod
upon thee!”--

When however the trodden one had heard
the name of Zarathustra he was
transformed. “What happeneth unto me!”
he exclaimed, “WHO preoccupieth me so
much in this life as this one man,
namely Zarathustra, and that one animal
that liveth on blood, the leech?

For the sake of the leech did I lie here
by this swamp, like a fisher, and
already had mine outstretched arm been
bitten ten times, when there biteth a
still finer leech at my blood,
Zarathustra himself!

O happiness! O miracle! Praised be this
day which enticed me into the swamp!
Praised be the best, the livest
cupping-glass, that at present liveth;
praised be the great conscience-leech
Zarathustra!”--

Thus spake the trodden one, and
Zarathustra rejoiced at his words and
their refined reverential style. “Who
art thou?” asked he, and gave him his
hand, “there is much to clear up and
elucidate between us, but already
methinketh pure clear day is dawning.”

“I am THE SPIRITUALLY CONSCIENTIOUS
ONE,” answered he who was asked, “and in
matters of the spirit it is difficult
for any one to take it more rigorously,
more restrictedly, and more severely
than I, except him from whom I learnt
it, Zarathustra himself.

Better know nothing than half-know many
things! Better be a fool on one’s own
account, than a sage on other people’s
approbation! I--go to the basis:

--What matter if it be great or small?
If it be called swamp or sky? A
handbreadth of basis is enough for me,
if it be actually basis and ground!

--A handbreadth of basis: thereon can
one stand. In the true knowing-knowledge
there is nothing great and nothing
small.”

“Then thou art perhaps an expert on the
leech?” asked Zarathustra; “and thou
investigatest the leech to its ultimate
basis, thou conscientious one?”

“O Zarathustra,” answered the trodden
one, “that would be something immense;
how could I presume to do so!

That, however, of which I am master and
knower, is the BRAIN of the leech:--that
is MY world!

And it is also a world! Forgive it,
however, that my pride here findeth
expression, for here I have not mine
equal. Therefore said I: ‘here am I at
home.’

How long have I investigated this one
thing, the brain of the leech, so that
here the slippery truth might no longer
slip from me! Here is MY domain!

--For the sake of this did I cast
everything else aside, for the sake of
this did everything else become
indifferent to me; and close beside my
knowledge lieth my black ignorance.

My spiritual conscience requireth from
me that it should be so--that I should
know one thing, and not know all else:
they are a loathing unto me, all the
semi-spiritual, all the hazy, hovering,
and visionary.

Where mine honesty ceaseth, there am I
blind, and want also to be blind. Where
I want to know, however, there want I
also to be honest--namely, severe,
rigorous, restricted, cruel and
inexorable.

Because THOU once saidest, O
Zarathustra: ‘Spirit is life which
itself cutteth into life’;--that led and
allured me to thy doctrine. And verily,
with mine own blood have I increased
mine own knowledge!”

--“As the evidence indicateth,” broke in
Zarathustra; for still was the blood
flowing down on the naked arm of the
conscientious one. For there had ten
leeches bitten into it.

“O thou strange fellow, how much doth
this very evidence teach me--namely,
thou thyself! And not all, perhaps,
might I pour into thy rigorous ear!

Well then! We part here! But I would
fain find thee again. Up thither is the
way to my cave: to-night shalt thou
there be my welcome guest!

Fain would I also make amends to thy
body for Zarathustra treading upon thee
with his feet: I think about that. Just
now, however, a cry of distress calleth
me hastily away from thee.”

Thus spake Zarathustra.



LXV. THE MAGICIAN.

1.

When however Zarathustra had gone round
a rock, then saw he on the same path,
not far below him, a man who threw his
limbs about like a maniac, and at last
tumbled to the ground on his belly.
“Halt!” said then Zarathustra to his
heart, “he there must surely be the
higher man, from him came that dreadful
cry of distress,--I will see if I can
help him.” When, however, he ran to the
spot where the man lay on the ground, he
found a trembling old man, with fixed
eyes; and in spite of all Zarathustra’s
efforts to lift him and set him again on
his feet, it was all in vain. The
unfortunate one, also, did not seem to
notice that some one was beside him; on
the contrary, he continually looked
around with moving gestures, like one
forsaken and isolated from all the
world. At last, however, after much
trembling, and convulsion, and
curling-himself-up, he began to lament
thus:

 Who warm’th me, who lov’th me still?
Give ardent fingers! Give heartening
charcoal-warmers! Prone, outstretched,
trembling, Like him, half dead and cold,
whose feet one warm’th-- And shaken, ah!
by unfamiliar fevers, Shivering with
sharpened, icy-cold frost-arrows, By
thee pursued, my fancy! Ineffable!
Recondite! Sore-frightening! Thou
huntsman ‘hind the cloud-banks! Now
lightning-struck by thee, Thou mocking
eye that me in darkness watcheth: --Thus
do I lie, Bend myself, twist myself,
convulsed With all eternal torture, And
smitten By thee, cruellest huntsman,
Thou unfamiliar--GOD...

 Smite deeper! Smite yet once more!
Pierce through and rend my heart! What
mean’th this torture With dull, indented
arrows? Why look’st thou hither, Of
human pain not weary, With
mischief-loving, godly flash-glances?
Not murder wilt thou, But torture,
torture? For why--ME torture, Thou
mischief-loving, unfamiliar God?--

 Ha! Ha! Thou stealest nigh In
midnight’s gloomy hour?... What wilt
thou? Speak! Thou crowdst me, pressest--
Ha! now far too closely! Thou hearst me
breathing, Thou o’erhearst my heart,
Thou ever jealous one! --Of what, pray,
ever jealous? Off! Off! For why the
ladder? Wouldst thou GET IN? To heart
in-clamber? To mine own secretest
Conceptions in-clamber? Shameless one!
Thou unknown one!--Thief! What seekst
thou by thy stealing? What seekst thou
by thy hearkening? What seekst thou by
thy torturing? Thou torturer!
Thou--hangman-God! Or shall I, as the
mastiffs do, Roll me before thee? And
cringing, enraptured, frantical, My tail
friendly--waggle!

 In vain! Goad further! Cruellest
goader! No dog--thy game just am I,
Cruellest huntsman! Thy proudest of
captives, Thou robber ‘hind the
cloud-banks... Speak finally! Thou
lightning-veiled one! Thou unknown one!
Speak! What wilt thou, highway-ambusher,
from--ME? What WILT thou,
unfamiliar--God? What? Ransom-gold? How
much of ransom-gold? Solicit much--that
bid’th my pride! And be concise--that
bid’th mine other pride!

 Ha! Ha! ME--wantst thou? me?
--Entire?...

 Ha! Ha! And torturest me, fool that
thou art, Dead-torturest quite my pride?
Give LOVE to me--who warm’th me still?
Who lov’th me still?-- Give ardent
fingers Give heartening
charcoal-warmers, Give me, the
lonesomest, The ice (ah! seven-fold
frozen ice For very enemies, For foes,
doth make one thirst). Give, yield to
me, Cruellest foe, --THYSELF!--

 Away! There fled he surely, My final,
only comrade, My greatest foe, Mine
unfamiliar-- My hangman-God!...

 --Nay! Come thou back! WITH all of thy
great tortures! To me the last of
lonesome ones, Oh, come thou back! All
my hot tears in streamlets trickle Their
course to thee! And all my final hearty
fervour-- Up-glow’th to THEE! Oh, come
thou back, Mine unfamiliar God! my PAIN!
My final bliss!

2.

--Here, however, Zarathustra could no
longer restrain himself; he took his
staff and struck the wailer with all his
might. “Stop this,” cried he to him with
wrathful laughter, “stop this, thou
stage-player! Thou false coiner! Thou
liar from the very heart! I know thee
well!

I will soon make warm legs to thee, thou
evil magician: I know well how--to make
it hot for such as thou!”

--“Leave off,” said the old man, and
sprang up from the ground, “strike me no
more, O Zarathustra! I did it only for
amusement!

That kind of thing belongeth to mine
art. Thee thyself, I wanted to put to
the proof when I gave this performance.
And verily, thou hast well detected
me!

But thou thyself--hast given me no small
proof of thyself: thou art HARD, thou
wise Zarathustra! Hard strikest thou
with thy ‘truths,’ thy cudgel forceth
from me--THIS truth!”

--“Flatter not,” answered Zarathustra,
still excited and frowning, “thou
stage-player from the heart! Thou art
false: why speakest thou--of truth!

Thou peacock of peacocks, thou sea of
vanity; WHAT didst thou represent before
me, thou evil magician; WHOM was I meant
to believe in when thou wailedst in such
wise?”

“THE PENITENT IN SPIRIT,” said the old
man, “it was him--I represented; thou
thyself once devisedst this
expression--

--The poet and magician who at last
turneth his spirit against himself, the
transformed one who freezeth to death by
his bad science and conscience.

And just acknowledge it: it was long, O
Zarathustra, before thou discoveredst my
trick and lie! Thou BELIEVEDST in my
distress when thou heldest my head with
both thy hands,--

--I heard thee lament ‘we have loved him
too little, loved him too little!’
Because I so far deceived thee, my
wickedness rejoiced in me.”

“Thou mayest have deceived subtler ones
than I,” said Zarathustra sternly. “I am
not on my guard against deceivers; I
HAVE TO BE without precaution: so
willeth my lot.

Thou, however,--MUST deceive: so far do
I know thee! Thou must ever be
equivocal, trivocal, quadrivocal, and
quinquivocal! Even what thou hast now
confessed, is not nearly true enough nor
false enough for me!

Thou bad false coiner, how couldst thou
do otherwise! Thy very malady wouldst
thou whitewash if thou showed thyself
naked to thy physician.

Thus didst thou whitewash thy lie before
me when thou saidst: ‘I did so ONLY for
amusement!’ There was also SERIOUSNESS
therein, thou ART something of a
penitent-in-spirit!

I divine thee well: thou hast become the
enchanter of all the world; but for
thyself thou hast no lie or artifice
left,--thou art disenchanted to
thyself!

Thou hast reaped disgust as thy one
truth. No word in thee is any longer
genuine, but thy mouth is so: that is to
say, the disgust that cleaveth unto thy
mouth.”--

--“Who art thou at all!” cried here the
old magician with defiant voice, “who
dareth to speak thus unto ME, the
greatest man now living?”--and a green
flash shot from his eye at Zarathustra.
But immediately after he changed, and
said sadly:

“O Zarathustra, I am weary of it, I am
disgusted with mine arts, I am not
GREAT, why do I dissemble! But thou
knowest it well--I sought for
greatness!

A great man I wanted to appear, and
persuaded many; but the lie hath been
beyond my power. On it do I collapse.

O Zarathustra, everything is a lie in
me; but that I collapse--this my
collapsing is GENUINE!”--

“It honoureth thee,” said Zarathustra
gloomily, looking down with sidelong
glance, “it honoureth thee that thou
soughtest for greatness, but it
betrayeth thee also. Thou art not
great.

Thou bad old magician, THAT is the best
and the honestest thing I honour in
thee, that thou hast become weary of
thyself, and hast expressed it: ‘I am
not great.’

THEREIN do I honour thee as a
penitent-in-spirit, and although only
for the twinkling of an eye, in that one
moment wast thou--genuine.

But tell me, what seekest thou here in
MY forests and rocks? And if thou hast
put thyself in MY way, what proof of me
wouldst thou have?--

--Wherein didst thou put ME to the
test?”

Thus spake Zarathustra, and his eyes
sparkled. But the old magician kept
silence for a while; then said he: “Did
I put thee to the test? I--seek only.

O Zarathustra, I seek a genuine one, a
right one, a simple one, an unequivocal
one, a man of perfect honesty, a vessel
of wisdom, a saint of knowledge, a great
man!

Knowest thou it not, O Zarathustra? I
SEEK ZARATHUSTRA.”

--And here there arose a long silence
between them: Zarathustra, however,
became profoundly absorbed in thought,
so that he shut his eyes. But afterwards
coming back to the situation, he grasped
the hand of the magician, and said, full
of politeness and policy:

“Well! Up thither leadeth the way, there
is the cave of Zarathustra. In it mayest
thou seek him whom thou wouldst fain
find.

And ask counsel of mine animals, mine
eagle and my serpent: they shall help
thee to seek. My cave however is
large.

I myself, to be sure--I have as yet seen
no great man. That which is great, the
acutest eye is at present insensible to
it. It is the kingdom of the populace.

Many a one have I found who stretched
and inflated himself, and the people
cried: ‘Behold; a great man!’ But what
good do all bellows do! The wind cometh
out at last.

At last bursteth the frog which hath
inflated itself too long: then cometh
out the wind. To prick a swollen one in
the belly, I call good pastime. Hear
that, ye boys!

Our to-day is of the populace: who still
KNOWETH what is great and what is small!
Who could there seek successfully for
greatness! A fool only: it succeedeth
with fools.

Thou seekest for great men, thou strange
fool? Who TAUGHT that to thee? Is to-day
the time for it? Oh, thou bad seeker,
why dost thou--tempt me?”--

Thus spake Zarathustra, comforted in his
heart, and went laughing on his way.



LXVI. OUT OF SERVICE.

Not long, however, after Zarathustra had
freed himself from the magician, he
again saw a person sitting beside the
path which he followed, namely a tall,
black man, with a haggard, pale
countenance: THIS MAN grieved him
exceedingly. “Alas,” said he to his
heart, “there sitteth disguised
affliction; methinketh he is of the type
of the priests: what do THEY want in my
domain?

What! Hardly have I escaped from that
magician, and must another necromancer
again run across my path,--

--Some sorcerer with laying-on-of-hands,
some sombre wonder-worker by the grace
of God, some anointed world-maligner,
whom, may the devil take!

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.

“Whoever thou art, thou traveller,” said
he, “help a strayed one, a seeker, an
old man, who may here easily come to
grief!

The world here is strange to me, and
remote; wild beasts also did I hear
howling; and he who could have given me
protection--he is himself no more.

I was seeking the pious man, a saint and
an anchorite, who, alone in his forest,
had not yet heard of what all the world
knoweth at present.”

“WHAT doth all the world know at
present?” asked Zarathustra. “Perhaps
that the old God no longer liveth, in
whom all the world once believed?”

“Thou sayest it,” answered the old man
sorrowfully. “And I served that old God
until his last hour.

Now, however, am I out of service,
without master, and yet not free;
likewise am I no longer merry even for
an hour, except it be in
recollections.

Therefore did I ascend into these
mountains, that I might finally have a
festival for myself once more, as
becometh an old pope and church-father:
for know it, that I am the last pope!--a
festival of pious recollections and
divine services.

Now, however, is he himself dead, the
most pious of men, the saint in the
forest, who praised his God constantly
with singing and mumbling.

He himself found I no longer when I
found his cot--but two wolves found I
therein, which howled on account of his
death,--for all animals loved him. Then
did I haste away.

Had I thus come in vain into these
forests and mountains? Then did my heart
determine that I should seek another,
the most pious of all those who believe
not in God--, my heart determined that I
should seek Zarathustra!”

Thus spake the hoary man, and gazed with
keen eyes at him who stood before him.
Zarathustra however seized the hand of
the old pope and regarded it a long
while with admiration.

“Lo! thou venerable one,” said he then,
“what a fine and long hand! That is the
hand of one who hath ever dispensed
blessings. Now, however, doth it hold
fast him whom thou seekest, me,
Zarathustra.

It is I, the ungodly Zarathustra, who
saith: ‘Who is ungodlier than I, that I
may enjoy his teaching?’”--

Thus spake Zarathustra, and penetrated
with his glances the thoughts and
arrear-thoughts of the old pope. At last
the latter began:

“He who most loved and possessed him
hath now also lost him most--:

--Lo, I myself am surely the most
godless of us at present? But who could
rejoice at that!”--

--“Thou servedst him to the last?” asked
Zarathustra thoughtfully, after a deep
silence, “thou knowest HOW he died? Is
it true what they say, that sympathy
choked him;

--That he saw how MAN hung on the cross,
and could not endure it;--that his love
to man became his hell, and at last his
death?”--

The old pope however did not answer, but
looked aside timidly, with a painful and
gloomy expression.

“Let him go,” said Zarathustra, after
prolonged meditation, still looking the
old man straight in the eye.

“Let him go, he is gone. 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.

He was a hidden God, full of secrecy.
Verily, he did not come by his son
otherwise than by secret ways. At the
door of his faith standeth adultery.

Whoever extolleth him as a God of love,
doth not think highly enough of love
itself. Did not that God want also to be
judge? But the loving one loveth
irrespective of reward and requital.

When he was young, that God out of the
Orient, then was he harsh and
revengeful, and built himself a hell for
the delight of his favourites.

At last, however, he became old and soft
and mellow and pitiful, more like a
grandfather than a father, but most like
a tottering old grandmother.

There did he sit shrivelled in his
chimney-corner, fretting on account of
his weak legs, world-weary, will-weary,
and one day he suffocated of his
all-too-great pity.”--

“Thou old pope,” said here Zarathustra
interposing, “hast thou seen THAT with
thine eyes? It could well have happened
in that way: in that way, AND also
otherwise. When Gods die they always die
many kinds of death.

Well! At all events, one way or
other--he is gone! He was counter to the
taste of mine ears and eyes; worse than
that I should not like to say against
him.

I love everything that looketh bright
and speaketh honestly. But he--thou
knowest it, forsooth, thou old priest,
there was something of thy type in him,
the priest-type--he was equivocal.

He was also indistinct. How he raged at
us, this wrath-snorter, because we
understood him badly! But why did he not
speak more clearly?

And if the fault lay in our ears, why
did he give us ears that heard him
badly? If there was dirt in our ears,
well! who put it in them?

Too much miscarried with him, this
potter who had not learned thoroughly!
That he took revenge on his pots and
creations, however, because they turned
out badly--that was a sin against GOOD
TASTE.

There is also good taste in piety: THIS
at last said: ‘Away with SUCH a God!
Better to have no God, better to set up
destiny on one’s own account, better to
be a fool, better to be God oneself!’”

--“What do I hear!” said then the old
pope, with intent ears; “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.

Nigh unto thee, though thou professest
to be the ungodliest one, I feel a hale
and holy odour of long benedictions: I
feel glad and grieved thereby.

Let me be thy guest, O Zarathustra, for
a single night! Nowhere on earth shall I
now feel better than with thee!”--

“Amen! So shall it be!” said
Zarathustra, with great astonishment;
“up thither leadeth the way, there lieth
the cave of Zarathustra.

Gladly, forsooth, would I conduct thee
thither myself, thou venerable one; for
I love all pious men. But now a cry of
distress calleth me hastily away from
thee.

In my domain shall no one come to grief;
my cave is a good haven. And best of all
would I like to put every sorrowful one
again on firm land and firm legs.

Who, however, could take THY melancholy
off thy shoulders? For that I am too
weak. Long, verily, should we have to
wait until some one re-awoke thy God for
thee.

For that old God liveth no more: he is
indeed dead.”--

Thus spake Zarathustra.



LXVII. THE UGLIEST MAN.

--And again did Zarathustra’s feet run
through mountains and forests, and his
eyes sought and sought, but nowhere was
he to be seen whom they wanted to
see--the sorely distressed sufferer and
crier. On the whole way, however, he
rejoiced in his heart and was full of
gratitude. “What good things,” said he,
“hath this day given me, as amends for
its bad beginning! What strange
interlocutors have I found!

At their words will I now chew a long
while as at good corn; small shall my
teeth grind and crush them, until they
flow like milk into my soul!”--

When, however, the path again curved
round a rock, all at once the landscape
changed, and Zarathustra entered into a
realm of death. Here bristled aloft
black and red cliffs, without any grass,
tree, or bird’s voice. For it was a
valley which all animals avoided, even
the beasts of prey, except that a
species of ugly, thick, green serpent
came here to die when they became old.
Therefore the shepherds called this
valley: “Serpent-death.”

Zarathustra, however, became absorbed in
dark recollections, for it seemed to him
as if he had once before stood in this
valley. And much heaviness settled on
his mind, so that he walked slowly and
always more slowly, and at last stood
still. Then, however, when he opened his
eyes, he saw something sitting by the
wayside shaped like a man, and hardly
like a man, something nondescript. And
all at once there came over Zarathustra
a great shame, because he had gazed on
such a thing. Blushing up to the very
roots of his white hair, he turned aside
his glance, and raised his foot that he
might leave this ill-starred place.
Then, however, became the dead
wilderness vocal: for from the ground a
noise welled up, gurgling and rattling,
as water gurgleth and rattleth at night
through stopped-up water-pipes; and at
last it turned into human voice and
human speech:--it sounded thus:

“Zarathustra! Zarathustra! Read my
riddle! Say, say! WHAT IS THE REVENGE ON
THE WITNESS?

I entice thee back; here is smooth ice!
See to it, see to it, that thy pride
doth not here break its legs!

Thou thinkest thyself wise, thou proud
Zarathustra! Read then the riddle, thou
hard nut-cracker,--the riddle that I am!
Say then: who am _I_!”

--When however Zarathustra had heard
these words,--what think ye then took
place in his soul? PITY OVERCAME HIM;
and he sank down all at once, like an
oak that hath long withstood many
tree-fellers,--heavily, suddenly, to the
terror even of those who meant to fell
it. But immediately he got up again from
the ground, and his countenance became
stern.

“I know thee well,” said he, with a
brazen voice, “THOU ART THE MURDERER OF
GOD! Let me go.

Thou couldst not ENDURE him who beheld
THEE,--who ever beheld thee through and
through, thou ugliest man. Thou tookest
revenge on this witness!”

Thus spake Zarathustra and was about to
go; but the nondescript grasped at a
corner of his garment and began anew to
gurgle and seek for words. “Stay,” said
he at last--

--“Stay! Do not pass by! I have divined
what axe it was that struck thee to the
ground: hail to thee, O Zarathustra,
that thou art again upon thy feet!

Thou hast divined, I know it well, how
the man feeleth who killed him,--the
murderer of God. Stay! Sit down here
beside me; it is not to no purpose.

To whom would I go but unto thee? Stay,
sit down! Do not however look at me!
Honour thus--mine ugliness!

They persecute me: now art THOU my last
refuge. NOT with their hatred, NOT with
their bailiffs;--Oh, such persecution
would I mock at, and be proud and
cheerful!

Hath not all success hitherto been with
the well-persecuted ones? And he who
persecuteth well learneth readily to be
OBSEQUENT--when once he is--put behind!
But it is their PITY--

--Their pity is it from which I flee
away and flee to thee. O Zarathustra,
protect me, thou, my last refuge, thou
sole one who divinedst me:

--Thou hast divined how the man feeleth
who killed HIM. Stay! And if thou wilt
go, thou impatient one, go not the way
that I came. THAT way is bad.

Art thou angry with me because I have
already racked language too long?
Because I have already counselled thee?
But know that it is I, the ugliest
man,

--Who have also the largest, heaviest
feet. Where _I_ have gone, the way is
bad. I tread all paths to death and
destruction.

But that thou passedst me by in silence,
that thou blushedst--I saw it well:
thereby did I know thee as
Zarathustra.

Every one else would have thrown to me
his alms, his pity, in look and speech.
But for that--I am not beggar enough:
that didst thou divine.

For that I am too RICH, rich in what is
great, frightful, ugliest, most
unutterable! Thy shame, O Zarathustra,
HONOURED me!

With difficulty did I get out of the
crowd of the pitiful,--that I might find
the only one who at present teacheth
that ‘pity is obtrusive’-- thyself, O
Zarathustra!

--Whether it be the pity of a God, or
whether it be human pity, it is
offensive to modesty. And unwillingness
to help may be nobler than the virtue
that rusheth to do so.

THAT however--namely, pity--is called
virtue itself at present by all petty
people:--they have no reverence for
great misfortune, great ugliness, great
failure.

Beyond all these do I look, as a dog
looketh over the backs of thronging
flocks of sheep. They are petty,
good-wooled, good-willed, grey people.

As the heron looketh contemptuously at
shallow pools, with backward-bent head,
so do I look at the throng of grey
little waves and wills and souls.

Too long have we acknowledged them to be
right, those petty people: SO we have at
last given them power as well;--and now
do they teach that ‘good is only what
petty people call good.’

And ‘truth’ is at present what the
preacher spake who himself sprang from
them, that singular saint and advocate
of the petty people, who testified of
himself: ‘I--am the truth.’

That immodest one hath long made the
petty people greatly puffed up,--he who
taught no small error when he taught:
‘I--am the truth.’

Hath an immodest one ever been answered
more courteously?--Thou, however, O
Zarathustra, passedst him by, and
saidst: ‘Nay! Nay! Three times Nay!’

Thou warnedst against his error; thou
warnedst--the first to do so--against
pity:--not every one, not none, but
thyself and thy type.

Thou art ashamed of the shame of the
great sufferer; and verily when thou
sayest: ‘From pity there cometh a heavy
cloud; take heed, ye men!’

--When thou teachest: ‘All creators are
hard, all great love is beyond their
pity:’ O Zarathustra, how well versed
dost thou seem to me in weather-signs!

Thou thyself, however,--warn thyself
also against THY pity! For many are on
their way to thee, many suffering,
doubting, despairing, drowning, freezing
ones--

I warn thee also against myself. Thou
hast read my best, my worst riddle,
myself, and what I have done. I know the
axe that felleth thee.

But he--HAD TO die: he looked with eyes
which beheld EVERYTHING,--he beheld
men’s depths and dregs, all his hidden
ignominy and ugliness.

His pity knew no modesty: he crept into
my dirtiest corners. This most prying,
over-intrusive, over-pitiful one had to
die.

He ever beheld ME: on such a witness I
would have revenge--or not live
myself.

The God who beheld everything, AND ALSO
MAN: that God had to die! Man cannot
ENDURE it that such a witness should
live.”

Thus spake the ugliest man. Zarathustra
however got up, and prepared to go on:
for he felt frozen to the very bowels.

“Thou nondescript,” said he, “thou
warnedst me against thy path. As thanks
for it I praise mine to thee. Behold, up
thither is the cave of Zarathustra.

My cave is large and deep and hath many
corners; there findeth he that is most
hidden his hiding-place. And close
beside it, there are a hundred
lurking-places and by-places for
creeping, fluttering, and hopping
creatures.

Thou outcast, who hast cast thyself out,
thou wilt not live amongst men and men’s
pity? Well then, do like me! Thus wilt
thou learn also from me; only the doer
learneth.

And talk first and foremost to mine
animals! The proudest animal and the
wisest animal--they might well be the
right counsellors for us both!”--

Thus spake Zarathustra and went his way,
more thoughtfully and slowly even than
before: for he asked himself many
things, and hardly knew what to
answer.

“How poor indeed is man,” thought he in
his heart, “how ugly, how wheezy, how
full of hidden shame!

They tell me that man loveth himself.
Ah, how great must that self-love be!
How much contempt is opposed to it!

Even this man hath loved himself, as he
hath despised himself,--a great lover
methinketh he is, and a great
despiser.

No one have I yet found who more
thoroughly despised himself: even THAT
is elevation. Alas, was THIS perhaps the
higher man whose cry I heard?

I love the great despisers. Man is
something that hath to be surpassed.”--




LXVIII. THE VOLUNTARY BEGGAR.

When Zarathustra had left the ugliest
man, he was chilled and felt lonesome:
for much coldness and lonesomeness came
over his spirit, so that even his limbs
became colder thereby. When, however, he
wandered on and on, uphill and down, at
times past green meadows, though also
sometimes over wild stony couches where
formerly perhaps an impatient brook had
made its bed, then he turned all at once
warmer and heartier again.

“What hath happened unto me?” he asked
himself, “something warm and living
quickeneth me; it must be in the
neighbourhood.

Already am I less alone; unconscious
companions and brethren rove around me;
their warm breath toucheth my soul.”

When, however, he spied about and sought
for the comforters of his lonesomeness,
behold, there were kine there standing
together on an eminence, whose proximity
and smell had warmed his heart. The
kine, however, seemed to listen eagerly
to a speaker, and took no heed of him
who approached. When, however,
Zarathustra was quite nigh unto them,
then did he hear plainly that a human
voice spake in the midst of the kine,
and apparently all of them had turned
their heads towards the speaker.

Then ran Zarathustra up speedily and
drove the animals aside; for he feared
that some one had here met with harm,
which the pity of the kine would hardly
be able to relieve. But in this he was
deceived; for behold, there sat a man on
the ground who seemed to be persuading
the animals to have no fear of him, a
peaceable man and Preacher-on-the-Mount,
out of whose eyes kindness itself
preached. “What dost thou seek here?”
called out Zarathustra in
astonishment.

“What do I here seek?” answered he: “the
same that thou seekest, thou
mischief-maker; that is to say,
happiness upon earth.

To that end, however, I would fain learn
of these kine. For I tell thee that I
have already talked half a morning unto
them, and just now were they about to
give me their answer. Why dost thou
disturb them?

Except we be converted and become as
kine, we shall in no wise enter into the
kingdom of heaven. For we ought to learn
from them one thing: ruminating.

And verily, although a man should gain
the whole world, and yet not learn one
thing, ruminating, what would it profit
him! He would not be rid of his
affliction,

--His great affliction: that, however,
is at present called DISGUST. Who hath
not at present his heart, his mouth and
his eyes full of disgust? Thou also!
Thou also! But behold these kine!”--

Thus spake the Preacher-on-the-Mount,
and turned then his own look towards
Zarathustra--for hitherto it had rested
lovingly on the kine--: then, however,
he put on a different expression. “Who
is this with whom I talk?” he exclaimed
frightened, and sprang up from the
ground.

“This is the man without disgust, this
is Zarathustra himself, the surmounter
of the great disgust, this is the eye,
this is the mouth, this is the heart of
Zarathustra himself.”

And whilst he thus spake he kissed with
o’erflowing eyes the hands of him with
whom he spake, and behaved altogether
like one to whom a precious gift and
jewel hath fallen unawares from heaven.
The kine, however, gazed at it all and
wondered.

“Speak not of me, thou strange one; thou
amiable one!” said Zarathustra, and
restrained his affection, “speak to me
firstly of thyself! Art thou not the
voluntary beggar who once cast away
great riches,--

--Who was ashamed of his riches and of
the rich, and fled to the poorest to
bestow upon them his abundance and his
heart? But they received him not.”

“But they received me not,” said the
voluntary beggar, “thou knowest it,
forsooth. So I went at last to the
animals and to those kine.”

“Then learnedst thou,” interrupted
Zarathustra, “how much harder it is to
give properly than to take properly, and
that bestowing well is an ART--the last,
subtlest master-art of kindness.”

“Especially nowadays,” answered the
voluntary beggar: “at present, that is
to say, when everything low hath become
rebellious and exclusive and haughty in
its manner--in the manner of the
populace.

For the hour hath come, thou knowest it
forsooth, for the great, evil, long,
slow mob-and-slave-insurrection: it
extendeth and extendeth!

Now doth it provoke the lower classes,
all benevolence and petty giving; and
the overrich may be on their guard!

Whoever at present drip, like bulgy
bottles out of all-too-small necks:--of
such bottles at present one willingly
breaketh the necks.

Wanton avidity, bilious envy, careworn
revenge, populace-pride: all these
struck mine eye. It is no longer true
that the poor are blessed. The kingdom
of heaven, however, is with the kine.”

“And why is it not with the rich?” asked
Zarathustra temptingly, while he kept
back the kine which sniffed familiarly
at the peaceful one.

“Why dost thou tempt me?” answered the
other. “Thou knowest it thyself better
even than I. What was it drove me to the
poorest, O Zarathustra? Was it not my
disgust at the richest?

--At the culprits of riches, with cold
eyes and rank thoughts, who pick up
profit out of all kinds of rubbish--at
this rabble that stinketh to heaven,

--At this gilded, falsified populace,
whose fathers were pickpockets, or
carrion-crows, or rag-pickers, with
wives compliant, lewd and
forgetful:--for they are all of them not
far different from harlots--

Populace above, populace below! What are
‘poor’ and ‘rich’ at present! That
distinction did I unlearn,--then did I
flee away further and ever further,
until I came to those kine.”

Thus spake the peaceful one, and puffed
himself and perspired with his words: so
that the kine wondered anew.
Zarathustra, however, kept looking into
his face with a smile, all the time the
man talked so severely--and shook
silently his head.

“Thou doest violence to thyself, thou
Preacher-on-the-Mount, when thou usest
such severe words. For such severity
neither thy mouth nor thine eye have
been given thee.

Nor, methinketh, hath thy stomach
either: unto IT all such rage and hatred
and foaming-over is repugnant. Thy
stomach wanteth softer things: thou art
not a butcher.

Rather seemest thou to me a plant-eater
and a root-man. Perhaps thou grindest
corn. Certainly, however, thou art
averse to fleshly joys, and thou lovest
honey.”

“Thou hast divined me well,” answered
the voluntary beggar, with lightened
heart. “I love honey, I also grind corn;
for I have sought out what tasteth
sweetly and maketh pure breath:

--Also what requireth a long time, a
day’s-work and a mouth’s-work for gentle
idlers and sluggards.

Furthest, to be sure, have those kine
carried it: they have devised ruminating
and lying in the sun. They also abstain
from all heavy thoughts which inflate
the heart.”

--“Well!” said Zarathustra, “thou
shouldst also see MINE animals, mine
eagle and my serpent,--their like do not
at present exist on earth.

Behold, thither leadeth the way to my
cave: be to-night its guest. And talk to
mine animals of the happiness of
animals,--

--Until I myself come home. For now a
cry of distress calleth me hastily away
from thee. Also, shouldst thou find new
honey with me, ice-cold,
golden-comb-honey, eat it!

Now, however, take leave at once of thy
kine, thou strange one! thou amiable
one! though it be hard for thee. For
they are thy warmest friends and
preceptors!”--

--“One excepted, whom I hold still
dearer,” answered the voluntary beggar.
“Thou thyself art good, O Zarathustra,
and better even than a cow!”

“Away, away with thee! thou evil
flatterer!” cried Zarathustra
mischievously, “why dost thou spoil me
with such praise and flattery-honey?

“Away, away from me!” cried he once
more, and heaved his stick at the fond
beggar, who, however, ran nimbly away.




LXIX. THE SHADOW.

Scarcely however was the voluntary
beggar gone in haste, and Zarathustra
again alone, when he heard behind him a
new voice which called out: “Stay!
Zarathustra! Do wait! It is myself,
forsooth, O Zarathustra, myself, thy
shadow!” But Zarathustra did not wait;
for a sudden irritation came over him on
account of the crowd and the crowding in
his mountains. “Whither hath my
lonesomeness gone?” spake he.

“It is verily becoming too much for me;
these mountains swarm; my kingdom is no
longer of THIS world; I require new
mountains.

My shadow calleth me? What matter about
my shadow! Let it run after me! I--run
away from it.”

Thus spake Zarathustra to his heart and
ran away. But the one behind followed
after him, so that immediately there
were three runners, one after the
other--namely, foremost the voluntary
beggar, then Zarathustra, and thirdly,
and hindmost, his shadow. But not long
had they run thus when Zarathustra
became conscious of his folly, and shook
off with one jerk all his irritation and
detestation.

“What!” said he, “have not the most
ludicrous things always happened to us
old anchorites and saints?

Verily, my folly hath grown big in the
mountains! Now do I hear six old fools’
legs rattling behind one another!

But doth Zarathustra need to be
frightened by his shadow? Also,
methinketh that after all it hath longer
legs than mine.”

Thus spake Zarathustra, and, laughing
with eyes and entrails, he stood still
and turned round quickly--and behold, he
almost thereby threw his shadow and
follower to the ground, so closely had
the latter followed at his heels, and so
weak was he. For when Zarathustra
scrutinised him with his glance he was
frightened as by a sudden apparition, so
slender, swarthy, hollow and worn-out
did this follower appear.

“Who art thou?” asked Zarathustra
vehemently, “what doest thou here? And
why callest thou thyself my shadow? Thou
art not pleasing unto me.”

“Forgive me,” answered the shadow, “that
it is I; and if I please thee not--well,
O Zarathustra! therein do I admire thee
and thy good taste.

A wanderer am I, who have walked long at
thy heels; always on the way, but
without a goal, also without a home: so
that verily, I lack little of being the
eternally Wandering Jew, except that I
am not eternal and not a Jew.

What? Must I ever be on the way? Whirled
by every wind, unsettled, driven about?
O earth, thou hast become too round for
me!

On every surface have I already sat,
like tired dust have I fallen asleep on
mirrors and window-panes: everything
taketh from me, nothing giveth; I become
thin--I am almost equal to a shadow.

After thee, however, O Zarathustra, did
I fly and hie longest; and though I hid
myself from thee, I was nevertheless thy
best shadow: wherever thou hast sat,
there sat I also.

With thee have I wandered about in the
remotest, coldest worlds, like a phantom
that voluntarily haunteth winter roofs
and snows.

With thee have I pushed into all the
forbidden, all the worst and the
furthest: and if there be anything of
virtue in me, it is that I have had no
fear of any prohibition.

With thee have I broken up whatever my
heart revered; all boundary-stones and
statues have I o’erthrown; the most
dangerous wishes did I pursue,--verily,
beyond every crime did I once go.

With thee did I unlearn the belief in
words and worths and in great names.
When the devil casteth his skin, doth
not his name also fall away? It is also
skin. The devil himself is
perhaps--skin.

‘Nothing is true, all is permitted’: so
said I to myself. Into the coldest water
did I plunge with head and heart. Ah,
how oft did I stand there naked on that
account, like a red crab!

Ah, where have gone all my goodness and
all my shame and all my belief in the
good! Ah, where is the lying innocence
which I once possessed, the innocence of
the good and of their noble lies!

Too oft, verily, did I follow close to
the heels of truth: then did it kick me
on the face. Sometimes I meant to lie,
and behold! then only did I hit--the
truth.

Too much hath become clear unto me: now
it doth not concern me any more. Nothing
liveth any longer that I love,--how
should I still love myself?

‘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.

‘WHERE is--MY home?’ For it do I ask and
seek, and have sought, but have not
found it. O eternal everywhere, O
eternal nowhere, O eternal--in-vain!”

Thus spake the shadow, and Zarathustra’s
countenance lengthened at his words.
“Thou art my shadow!” said he at last
sadly.

“Thy danger is not small, thou free
spirit and wanderer! Thou hast had a bad
day: see that a still worse evening doth
not overtake thee!

To such unsettled ones as thou, seemeth
at last even a prisoner blessed. Didst
thou ever see how captured criminals
sleep? They sleep quietly, they enjoy
their new security.

Beware lest in the end a narrow faith
capture thee, a hard, rigorous delusion!
For now everything that is narrow and
fixed seduceth and tempteth thee.

Thou hast lost thy goal. Alas, how wilt
thou forego and forget that loss?
Thereby--hast thou also lost thy way!

Thou poor rover and rambler, thou tired
butterfly! wilt thou have a rest and a
home this evening? Then go up to my
cave!

Thither leadeth the way to my cave. And
now will I run quickly away from thee
again. Already lieth as it were a shadow
upon me.

I will run alone, so that it may again
become bright around me. Therefore must
I still be a long time merrily upon my
legs. In the evening, however, there
will be--dancing with me!”--

Thus spake Zarathustra.



LXX. NOONTIDE.

--And Zarathustra ran and ran, but he
found no one else, and was alone and
ever found himself again; he enjoyed and
quaffed his solitude, and thought of
good things--for hours. About the hour
of noontide, however, when the sun stood
exactly over Zarathustra’s head, he
passed an old, bent and gnarled tree,
which was encircled round by the ardent
love of a vine, and hidden from itself;
from this there hung yellow grapes in
abundance, confronting the wanderer.
Then he felt inclined to quench a little
thirst, and to break off for himself a
cluster of grapes. When, however, he had
already his arm out-stretched for that
purpose, he felt still more inclined for
something else--namely, to lie down
beside the tree at the hour of perfect
noontide and sleep.

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
proverb of Zarathustra saith: “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
spake thus to his heart:

“Hush! Hush! Hath not the world now
become perfect? What hath happened unto
me?

As a delicate wind danceth invisibly
upon parqueted seas, light,
feather-light, so--danceth sleep upon
me.

No eye doth it close to me, it leaveth
my soul awake. Light is it, verily,
feather-light.

It persuadeth me, I know not how, it
toucheth me inwardly with a caressing
hand, it constraineth me. Yea, it
constraineth me, so that my soul
stretcheth itself out:--

--How long and weary it becometh, my
strange soul! Hath a seventh-day evening
come to it precisely at noontide? Hath
it already wandered too long,
blissfully, among good and ripe
things?

It stretcheth itself out, long--longer!
it lieth still, my strange soul. Too
many good things hath it already tasted;
this golden sadness oppresseth it, it
distorteth its mouth.

--As a ship that putteth into the
calmest cove:--it now draweth up to the
land, weary of long voyages and
uncertain seas. Is not the land more
faithful?

As such a ship huggeth the shore,
tuggeth the shore:--then it sufficeth
for a spider to spin its thread from the
ship to the land. No stronger ropes are
required there.

As such a weary ship in the calmest
cove, so do I also now repose, nigh to
the earth, faithful, trusting, waiting,
bound to it with the lightest threads.

O happiness! O happiness! Wilt thou
perhaps sing, O my soul? Thou liest in
the grass. But this is the secret,
solemn hour, when no shepherd playeth
his pipe.

Take care! Hot noontide sleepeth on the
fields. Do not sing! Hush! The world is
perfect.

Do not sing, thou prairie-bird, my soul!
Do not even whisper! Lo--hush! The old
noontide sleepeth, it moveth its mouth:
doth it not just now drink a drop of
happiness--

--An old brown drop of golden happiness,
golden wine? Something whisketh over it,
its happiness laugheth. Thus--laugheth a
God. Hush!--

--‘For happiness, how little sufficeth
for happiness!’ Thus spake I once and
thought myself wise. But it was a
blasphemy: THAT have I now learned. Wise
fools speak better.

The least thing precisely, the gentlest
thing, the lightest thing, a lizard’s
rustling, a breath, a whisk, an
eye-glance--LITTLE maketh up the BEST
happiness. Hush!

--What hath befallen me: Hark! Hath time
flown away? Do I not fall? Have I not
fallen--hark! into the well of
eternity?

--What happeneth to me? Hush! It
stingeth me--alas--to the heart? To the
heart! Oh, break up, break up, my heart,
after such happiness, after such a
sting!

--What? Hath not the world just now
become perfect? Round and ripe? Oh, for
the golden round ring--whither doth it
fly? Let me run after it! Quick!

Hush--” (and here Zarathustra stretched
himself, and felt that he was asleep.)

“Up!” said he to himself, “thou sleeper!
Thou noontide sleeper! Well then, up, ye
old legs! It is time and more than time;
many a good stretch of road is still
awaiting you--

Now have ye slept your fill; for how
long a time? A half-eternity! Well then,
up now, mine old heart! For how long
after such a sleep mayest thou--remain
awake?”

(But then did he fall asleep anew, and
his soul spake against him and defended
itself, and lay down again)--“Leave me
alone! Hush! Hath not the world just now
become perfect? Oh, for the golden round
ball!--

“Get up,” said Zarathustra, “thou little
thief, thou sluggard! What! Still
stretching thyself, yawning, sighing,
falling into deep wells?

Who art thou then, O my soul!” (and here
he became frightened, for a sunbeam shot
down from heaven upon his face.)

“O heaven above me,” said he sighing,
and sat upright, “thou gazest at me?
Thou hearkenest unto my strange soul?

When wilt thou drink this drop of dew
that fell down upon all earthly
things,--when wilt thou drink this
strange soul--

--When, thou well of eternity! thou
joyous, awful, noontide abyss! when wilt
thou drink my soul back into thee?”

Thus spake Zarathustra, and rose from
his couch beside the tree, as if
awakening from a strange drunkenness:
and behold! there stood the sun still
exactly above his head. One might,
however, rightly infer therefrom that
Zarathustra had not then slept long.



LXXI. THE GREETING.

It was late in the afternoon only when
Zarathustra, after long useless
searching and strolling about, again
came home to his cave. When, however, he
stood over against it, not more than
twenty paces therefrom, the thing
happened which he now least of all
expected: he heard anew the great CRY OF
DISTRESS. And extraordinary! this time
the cry came out of his own cave. It was
a long, manifold, peculiar cry, and
Zarathustra plainly distinguished that
it was composed of many voices: although
heard at a distance it might sound like
the cry out of a single mouth.

Thereupon Zarathustra rushed forward to
his cave, and behold! what a spectacle
awaited him after that concert! For
there did they all sit together whom he
had passed during the day: the king on
the right and the king on the left, the
old magician, the pope, the voluntary
beggar, the shadow, the intellectually
conscientious one, the sorrowful
soothsayer, and the ass; the ugliest
man, however, had set a crown on his
head, and had put round him two purple
girdles,--for he liked, like all ugly
ones, to disguise himself and play the
handsome person. In the midst, however,
of that sorrowful company stood
Zarathustra’s eagle, ruffled and
disquieted, for it had been called upon
to answer too much for which its pride
had not any answer; the wise serpent
however hung round its neck.

All this did Zarathustra behold with
great astonishment; then however he
scrutinised each individual guest with
courteous curiosity, read their souls
and wondered anew. In the meantime the
assembled ones had risen from their
seats, and waited with reverence for
Zarathustra to speak. Zarathustra
however spake thus:

“Ye despairing ones! Ye 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 to-day: THE HIGHER MAN--:

--In mine own cave sitteth 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 seemeth to me that ye are badly
adapted for company: ye make one
another’s hearts fretful, ye that cry
for help, when ye sit here together?
There is one that must first come,

--One who will make you laugh once more,
a good jovial buffoon, a dancer, a wind,
a wild romp, some old fool:--what think
ye?

Forgive me, however, ye despairing ones,
for speaking such trivial words before
you, unworthy, verily, of such guests!
But ye do not divine WHAT maketh my
heart wanton:--

--Ye yourselves do it, and your aspect,
forgive it me! For every one becometh
courageous who beholdeth a despairing
one. To encourage a despairing
one--every one thinketh himself strong
enough to do so.

To myself have ye given this power,--a
good gift, mine honourable guests! An
excellent guest’s-present! Well, do not
then upbraid when I also offer you
something of mine.

This is mine empire and my dominion:
that which is mine, however, shall this
evening and tonight be yours. Mine
animals shall serve you: let my cave be
your resting-place!

At house and home with me shall no one
despair: in my purlieus do I protect
every one from his wild beasts. And that
is the first thing which I offer you:
security!

The second thing, however, is my little
finger. And when ye have THAT, then take
the whole hand also, yea, and the heart
with it! Welcome here, welcome to you,
my guests!”

Thus spake Zarathustra, and laughed with
love and mischief. After this greeting
his guests bowed once more and were
reverentially silent; the king on the
right, however, answered him in their
name.

“O Zarathustra, by the way in which thou
hast given us thy hand and thy greeting,
we recognise thee as Zarathustra. Thou
hast humbled thyself before us; almost
hast thou hurt our reverence--:

--Who however could have humbled himself
as thou hast done, with such pride? THAT
uplifteth us ourselves; a refreshment is
it, to our eyes and hearts.

To behold this, merely, gladly would we
ascend higher mountains than this. For
as eager beholders have we come; we
wanted to see what brighteneth dim
eyes.

And lo! now is it all over with our
cries of distress. Now are our minds and
hearts open and enraptured. Little is
lacking for our spirits to become
wanton.

There is nothing, O Zarathustra, that
groweth more pleasingly on earth than a
lofty, strong will: it is the finest
growth. An entire landscape refresheth
itself at one such tree.

To the pine do I compare him, O
Zarathustra, which groweth up like
thee--tall, silent, hardy, solitary, of
the best, supplest wood, stately,--

--In the end, however, grasping out for
ITS dominion with strong, green
branches, asking weighty questions of
the wind, the storm, and whatever is at
home on high places;

--Answering more weightily, a commander,
a victor! Oh! who should not ascend high
mountains to behold such growths?

At thy tree, O Zarathustra, the gloomy
and ill-constituted also refresh
themselves; at thy look even the
wavering become steady and heal their
hearts.

And verily, towards thy mountain and thy
tree do many eyes turn to-day; a great
longing hath arisen, and many have
learned to ask: ‘Who is Zarathustra?’

And those into whose ears thou hast at
any time dripped thy song and thy honey:
all the hidden ones, the lone-dwellers
and the twain-dwellers, have
simultaneously said to their hearts:

‘Doth Zarathustra still live? It is no
longer worth while to live, everything
is indifferent, everything is useless:
or else--we must live with
Zarathustra!’

‘Why doth he not come who hath so long
announced himself?’ thus do many people
ask; ‘hath solitude swallowed him up? Or
should we perhaps go to him?’

Now doth it come to pass that solitude
itself becometh fragile and breaketh
open, like a grave that breaketh open
and can no longer hold its dead.
Everywhere one seeth resurrected ones.

Now do the waves rise and rise around
thy mountain, O Zarathustra. And however
high be thy height, many of them must
rise up to thee: thy boat shall not rest
much longer on dry ground.

And that we despairing ones have now
come into thy cave, and already no
longer despair:--it is but a prognostic
and a presage that better ones are on
the way to thee,--

--For they themselves are on the way to
thee, 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 thee, O Zarathustra, the
GREAT hope!”

Thus spake the king on the right, and
seized the hand of Zarathustra in order
to kiss it; but Zarathustra checked his
veneration, and stepped back frightened,
fleeing as it were, silently and
suddenly into the far distance. After a
little while, however, he was again at
home with his guests, looked at them
with clear scrutinising eyes, and
said:

“My guests, ye higher men, I will speak
plain language and plainly with you. It
is not for YOU that I have waited here
in these mountains.”

(“‘Plain language and plainly?’ Good
God!” said here the king on the left to
himself; “one seeth he doth not know the
good Occidentals, this sage out of the
Orient!

But he meaneth ‘blunt language and
bluntly’--well! That is not the worst
taste in these days!”)

“Ye may, verily, all of you be higher
men,” continued Zarathustra; “but for
me--ye are neither high enough, nor
strong enough.

For me, that is to say, for the
inexorable which is now silent in me,
but will not always be silent. And if ye
appertain to me, still it is not as my
right arm.

For he who himself standeth, like you,
on sickly and tender legs, wisheth above
all to be TREATED INDULGENTLY, whether
he be conscious of it or hide it from
himself.

My arms and my legs, however, I do not
treat indulgently, I DO NOT TREAT MY
WARRIORS INDULGENTLY: how then could ye
be fit for MY warfare?

With you I should spoil all my
victories. And many of you would tumble
over if ye but heard the loud beating of
my drums.

Moreover, ye are not sufficiently
beautiful and well-born for me. I
require pure, smooth mirrors for my
doctrines; on your surface even mine own
likeness is distorted.

On your shoulders presseth many a
burden, many a recollection; many a
mischievous dwarf squatteth in your
corners. There is concealed populace
also in you.

And though ye be high and of a higher
type, much in you is crooked and
misshapen. There is no smith in the
world that could hammer you right and
straight for me.

Ye are only bridges: may higher ones
pass over upon you! Ye signify steps: so
do not upbraid him who ascendeth beyond
you into HIS height!

Out of your seed there may one day arise
for me a genuine son and perfect heir:
but that time is distant. Ye yourselves
are not those unto whom my heritage and
name belong.

Not for you do I wait here in these
mountains; not with you may I descend
for the last time. Ye have come unto me
only as a presage that higher ones are
on the way to me,--

--NOT the men of great longing, of great
loathing, of great satiety, and that
which ye call the remnant of God;

--Nay! Nay! Three times Nay! For OTHERS
do I wait here in these mountains, and
will not lift my foot from thence
without them;

--For higher ones, stronger ones,
triumphanter ones, merrier ones, for
such as are built squarely in body and
soul: LAUGHING LIONS must come!

O my guests, ye strange ones--have ye
yet heard nothing of my children? And
that they are on the way to me?

Do speak unto me of my gardens, of my
Happy Isles, of my new beautiful
race--why do ye not speak unto me
thereof?

This guests’-present do I solicit of
your love, that ye speak unto me of my
children. For them am I rich, for them I
became poor: what have I not
surrendered,

--What would I not surrender that I
might have one thing: THESE children,
THIS living plantation, THESE life-trees
of my will and of my highest hope!”

Thus spake Zarathustra, and stopped
suddenly in his discourse: for his
longing came over him, and he closed his
eyes and his mouth, because of the
agitation of his heart. And all his
guests also were silent, and stood still
and confounded: except only that the old
soothsayer made signs with his hands and
his gestures.



LXXII. THE SUPPER.

For at this point the soothsayer
interrupted the greeting of Zarathustra
and his guests: he pressed forward as
one who had no time to lose, seized
Zarathustra’s hand and exclaimed: “But
Zarathustra!

One thing is more necessary than the
other, so sayest thou thyself: well, one
thing is now more necessary UNTO ME than
all others.

A word at the right time: didst thou not
invite me to TABLE? And here are many
who have made long journeys. Thou dost
not mean to feed us merely with
discourses?

Besides, all of you have thought too
much about freezing, drowning,
suffocating, and other bodily dangers:
none of you, however, have thought of MY
danger, namely, perishing of hunger-”

(Thus spake the soothsayer. When
Zarathustra’s animals, however, heard
these words, they ran away in terror.
For they saw that all they had brought
home during the day would not be enough
to fill the one soothsayer.)

“Likewise perishing of thirst,”
continued the soothsayer. “And although
I hear water splashing here like words
of wisdom--that is to say, plenteously
and unweariedly, I--want WINE!

Not every one is a born water-drinker
like Zarathustra. Neither doth water
suit weary and withered ones: WE deserve
wine--IT alone giveth immediate vigour
and improvised health!”

On this occasion, when the soothsayer
was longing for wine, it happened that
the king on the left, the silent one,
also found expression for once. “WE took
care,” said he, “about wine, I, along
with my brother the king on the right:
we have enough of wine,--a whole
ass-load of it. So there is nothing
lacking but bread.”

“Bread,” replied Zarathustra, laughing
when he spake, “it is precisely bread
that anchorites have not. But man doth
not live by bread alone, but also by the
flesh of good lambs, of which I have
two:

--THESE shall we slaughter quickly, and
cook spicily with sage: it is so that I
like them. And there is also no lack of
roots and fruits, good enough even for
the fastidious and dainty,--nor of nuts
and other riddles for cracking.

Thus will we have a good repast in a
little while. But whoever wish to eat
with us must also give a hand to the
work, even the kings. For with
Zarathustra even a king may be a
cook.”

This proposal appealed to the hearts of
all of them, save that the voluntary
beggar objected to the flesh and wine
and spices.

“Just hear this glutton Zarathustra!”
said he jokingly: “doth one go into
caves and high mountains to make such
repasts?

Now indeed do I understand what he once
taught us: Blessed be moderate poverty!’
And why he wisheth to do away with
beggars.”

“Be of good cheer,” replied Zarathustra,
“as I am. Abide by thy customs, thou
excellent one: grind thy corn, drink thy
water, praise thy cooking,--if only it
make thee glad!

I am a law only for mine own; I am not a
law for all. He, however, who belongeth
unto me must be strong of bone and light
of foot,--

--Joyous in fight and feast, no sulker,
no John o’ Dreams, ready for the hardest
task as for the feast, healthy and
hale.

The best belongeth unto mine and me; and
if it be not given us, then do we take
it:--the best food, the purest sky, the
strongest thoughts, the fairest
women!”--

Thus spake Zarathustra; the king on the
right however answered and said:
“Strange! Did one ever hear such
sensible things out of the mouth of a
wise man?

And verily, it is the strangest thing in
a wise man, if over and above, he be
still sensible, and not an ass.”

Thus spake the king on the right and
wondered; the ass however, with
ill-will, said YE-A to his remark. This
however was the beginning of that long
repast which is called “The Supper” in
the history-books. At this there was
nothing else spoken of but THE HIGHER
MAN.



LXXIII. THE HIGHER MAN.

1.

When I came unto men for the first time,
then did I commit the anchorite folly,
the great folly: I appeared on the
market-place.

And when I spake unto all, I spake unto
none. In the evening, however,
rope-dancers were my companions, and
corpses; and I myself almost a corpse.

With the new morning, however, there
came unto me a new truth: then did I
learn to say: “Of what account to me are
market-place and populace and
populace-noise and long
populace-ears!”

Ye higher men, learn THIS from me: On
the market-place no one believeth in
higher men. But if ye will speak there,
very well! The populace, however,
blinketh: “We are all equal.”

“Ye higher men,”--so blinketh the
populace--“there are no higher men, we
are all equal; man is man, before
God--we are all equal!”

Before God!--Now, however, this God hath
died. Before the populace, however, we
will not be equal. Ye higher men, away
from the market-place!

2.

Before God!--Now however this God hath
died! Ye higher men, this God was your
greatest danger.

Only since he lay in the grave have ye
again arisen. Now only cometh the great
noontide, now only doth the higher man
become--master!

Have ye understood this word, O my
brethren? Ye are frightened: do your
hearts turn giddy? Doth the abyss here
yawn for you? Doth the hell-hound here
yelp at you?

Well! Take heart! ye higher men! Now
only travaileth the mountain of the
human future. God hath died: now do WE
desire--the Superman to live.

3.

The most careful ask to-day: “How is man
to be maintained?” Zarathustra however
asketh, as the first and only one: “How
is man to be SURPASSED?”

The Superman, I have at heart; THAT is
the first and only thing to me--and NOT
man: not the neighbour, not the poorest,
not the sorriest, not the best.--

O my brethren, what I can love in man is
that he is an over-going and a
down-going. And also in you there is
much that maketh me love and hope.

In that ye have despised, ye higher men,
that maketh me hope. For the great
despisers are the great reverers.

In that ye have despaired, there is much
to honour. For ye have not learned to
submit yourselves, ye have not learned
petty policy.

For to-day have the petty people become
master: they all preach submission and
humility and policy and diligence and
consideration and the long et cetera of
petty virtues.

Whatever is of the effeminate type,
whatever originateth from the servile
type, and especially the
populace-mishmash:--THAT wisheth now to
be master of all human destiny--O
disgust! Disgust! Disgust!

THAT asketh and asketh and never tireth:
“How is man to maintain himself best,
longest, most pleasantly?” Thereby--are
they the masters of to-day.

These masters of to-day--surpass them, O
my brethren--these petty people: THEY
are the Superman’s greatest danger!

Surpass, ye higher men, the petty
virtues, the petty policy, the
sand-grain considerateness, the ant-hill
trumpery, the pitiable comfortableness,
the “happiness of the greatest
number”--!

And rather despair than submit
yourselves. And verily, I love you,
because ye know not to-day how to live,
ye higher men! For thus do YE
live--best!

4.

Have ye courage, O my brethren? Are ye
stout-hearted? NOT the courage before
witnesses, but anchorite and eagle
courage, which not even a God any longer
beholdeth?

Cold souls, mules, the blind and the
drunken, I do not call stout-hearted. He
hath heart who knoweth fear, but
VANQUISHETH it; who seeth the abyss, but
with PRIDE.

He who seeth the abyss, but with eagle’s
eyes,--he who with eagle’s talons
GRASPETH the abyss: he hath courage.--

5.

“Man is evil”--so said to me for
consolation, all the wisest ones. Ah, if
only it be still true to-day! For the
evil is man’s best force.

“Man must become better and eviler”--so
do _I_ teach. The evilest is necessary
for the Superman’s best.

It may have been well for the preacher
of the petty people to suffer and be
burdened by men’s sin. I, however,
rejoice in great sin as my great
CONSOLATION.--

Such things, however, are not said for
long ears. Every word, also, is not
suited for every mouth. These are fine
far-away things: at them sheep’s claws
shall not grasp!

6.

Ye higher men, think ye that I am here
to put right what ye have put wrong?

Or that I wished henceforth to make
snugger couches for you sufferers? Or
show you restless, miswandering,
misclimbing ones, new and easier
footpaths?

Nay! Nay! Three times Nay! Always more,
always better ones of your type shall
succumb,--for ye shall always have it
worse and harder. Thus only--

--Thus only groweth man aloft to the
height where the lightning striketh and
shattereth him: high enough for the
lightning!

Towards the few, the long, the remote go
forth my soul and my seeking: of what
account to me are your many little,
short miseries!

Ye do not yet suffer enough for me! For
ye suffer from yourselves, ye have not
yet suffered FROM MAN. Ye would lie if
ye spake otherwise! None of you
suffereth from what _I_ have
suffered.--

7.

It is not enough for me that the
lightning no longer doeth harm. I do not
wish to conduct it away: it shall
learn--to work for ME.--

My wisdom hath accumulated long like a
cloud, it becometh stiller and darker.
So doeth all wisdom which shall one day
bear LIGHTNINGS.--

Unto these men of to-day will I not be
LIGHT, nor be called light. THEM--will I
blind: lightning of my wisdom! put out
their eyes!

8.

Do not will anything beyond your power:
there is a bad falseness in those who
will beyond their power.

Especially when they will great things!
For they awaken distrust in great
things, these subtle false-coiners and
stage-players:--

--Until at last they are false towards
themselves, squint-eyed, whited cankers,
glossed over with strong words, parade
virtues and brilliant false deeds.

Take good care there, ye higher men! For
nothing is more precious to me, and
rarer, than honesty.

Is this to-day not that of the populace?
The populace however knoweth not what is
great and what is small, what is
straight and what is honest: it is
innocently crooked, it ever lieth.

9.

Have a good distrust to-day ye, higher
men, ye enheartened ones! Ye
open-hearted ones! And keep your reasons
secret! For this to-day is that of the
populace.

What the populace once learned to
believe without reasons, who could--
refute it to them by means of reasons?

And on the market-place one convinceth
with gestures. But reasons make the
populace distrustful.

And when truth hath once triumphed
there, then ask yourselves with good
distrust: “What strong error hath fought
for it?”

Be on your guard also against the
learned! They hate you, because they are
unproductive! They have cold, withered
eyes before which every bird is
unplumed.

Such persons vaunt about not lying: but
inability to lie is still far from being
love to truth. Be on your guard!

Freedom from fever is still far from
being knowledge! Refrigerated spirits I
do not believe in. He who cannot lie,
doth not know what truth is.

10.

If ye would go up high, then use your
own legs! Do not get yourselves CARRIED
aloft; do not seat yourselves on other
people’s backs and heads!

Thou hast mounted, however, on
horseback? Thou now ridest briskly up to
thy goal? Well, my friend! But thy lame
foot is also with thee on horseback!

When thou reachest thy goal, when thou
alightest from thy horse: precisely on
thy HEIGHT, thou higher man,--then wilt
thou stumble!

11.

Ye creating ones, ye higher men! One is
only pregnant with one’s own child.

Do not let yourselves be imposed upon or
put upon! Who then is YOUR neighbour?
Even if ye act “for your neighbour”--ye
still do not create for him!

Unlearn, I pray you, this “for,” ye
creating ones: your very virtue wisheth
you to have naught to do with “for” and
“on account of” and “because.” Against
these false little words shall ye stop
your ears.

“For one’s neighbour,” is the virtue
only of the petty people: there it is
said “like and like,” and “hand washeth
hand”:--they have neither the right nor
the power for YOUR self-seeking!

In your self-seeking, ye creating ones,
there is the foresight and foreseeing of
the pregnant! What no one’s eye hath yet
seen, namely, the fruit--this,
sheltereth and saveth and nourisheth
your entire love.

Where your entire love is, namely, with
your child, there is also your entire
virtue! Your work, your will is YOUR
“neighbour”: let no false values impose
upon you!

12.

Ye creating ones, ye higher men! Whoever
hath to give birth is sick; whoever hath
given birth, however, is unclean.

Ask women: one giveth birth, not because
it giveth pleasure. The pain maketh hens
and poets cackle.

Ye creating ones, in you there is much
uncleanliness. That is because ye have
had to be mothers.

A new child: oh, how much new filth hath
also come into the world! Go apart! He
who hath given birth shall wash his
soul!

13.

Be not virtuous beyond your powers! And
seek nothing from yourselves opposed to
probability!

Walk in the footsteps in which your
fathers’ virtue hath already walked! How
would ye rise high, if your fathers’
will should not rise with you?

He, however, who would be a firstling,
let him take care lest he also become a
lastling! And where the vices of your
fathers are, there should ye not set up
as saints!

He whose fathers were inclined for
women, and for strong wine and flesh of
wildboar swine; what would it be if he
demanded chastity of himself?

A folly would it be! Much, verily, doth
it seem to me for such a one, if he
should be the husband of one or of two
or of three women.

And if he founded monasteries, and
inscribed over their portals: “The way
to holiness,”--I should still say: What
good is it! it is a new folly!

He hath founded for himself a
penance-house and refuge-house: much
good may it do! But I do not believe in
it.

In solitude there groweth what any one
bringeth into it--also the brute in
one’s nature. Thus is solitude
inadvisable unto many.

Hath there ever been anything filthier
on earth than the saints of the
wilderness? AROUND THEM was not only the
devil loose--but also the swine.

14.

Shy, ashamed, awkward, like the tiger
whose spring hath failed--thus, ye
higher men, have I often seen you slink
aside. A CAST which ye made had
failed.

But what doth it matter, ye
dice-players! Ye had not learned to play
and mock, as one must play and mock! Do
we not ever sit at a great table of
mocking and playing?

And if great things have been a failure
with you, have ye yourselves
therefore--been a failure? And if ye
yourselves have been a failure, hath man
therefore--been a failure? If man,
however, hath been a failure: well then!
never mind!

15.

The higher its type, always the seldomer
doth a thing succeed. Ye higher men
here, have ye not all--been failures?

Be of good cheer; what doth it matter?
How much is still possible! Learn to
laugh at yourselves, as ye ought to
laugh!

What wonder even that ye have failed and
only half-succeeded, ye half-shattered
ones! Doth not--man’s FUTURE strive and
struggle in you?

Man’s furthest, profoundest,
star-highest issues, his prodigious
powers--do not all these foam through
one another in your vessel?

What wonder that many a vessel
shattereth! Learn to laugh at
yourselves, as ye ought to laugh! Ye
higher men, O, how much is still
possible!

And verily, how much hath already
succeeded! How rich is this earth in
small, good, perfect things, in
well-constituted things!

Set around you small, good, perfect
things, ye higher men. Their golden
maturity healeth the heart. The perfect
teacheth one to hope.

16.

What hath hitherto been the greatest sin
here on earth? Was it not the word of
him who said: “Woe unto them that laugh
now!”

Did he himself find no cause for
laughter on the earth? Then he sought
badly. A child even findeth cause for
it.

He--did not love sufficiently: otherwise
would he also have loved us, the
laughing ones! But he hated and hooted
us; wailing and teeth-gnashing did he
promise us.

Must one then curse immediately, when
one doth not love? That--seemeth to me
bad taste. Thus did he, however, this
absolute one. He sprang from the
populace.

And he himself just did not love
sufficiently; otherwise would he have
raged less because people did not love
him. All great love doth not SEEK
love:--it seeketh more.

Go out of the way of all such absolute
ones! They are a poor sickly type, a
populace-type: they look at this life
with ill-will, they have an evil eye for
this earth.

Go out of the way of all such absolute
ones! They have heavy feet and sultry
hearts:--they do not know how to dance.
How could the earth be light to such
ones!

17.

Tortuously do all good things come nigh
to their goal. Like cats they curve
their backs, they purr inwardly with
their approaching happiness,--all good
things laugh.

His step betrayeth whether a person
already walketh on HIS OWN path: just
see me walk! He, however, who cometh
nigh to his goal, danceth.

And verily, a statue have I not become,
not yet do I stand there stiff, stupid
and stony, like a pillar; I love fast
racing.

And though there be on earth fens and
dense afflictions, he who hath light
feet runneth even across the mud, and
danceth, as upon well-swept ice.

Lift up your hearts, my brethren, high,
higher! And do not forget your legs!
Lift up also your legs, ye good dancers,
and better still, if ye stand upon your
heads!

18.

This crown of the laughter, this
rose-garland crown: I myself have put on
this crown, I myself have consecrated my
laughter. No one else have I found
to-day potent enough for this.

Zarathustra the dancer, Zarathustra the
light one, who beckoneth with his
pinions, one ready for flight, beckoning
unto all birds, ready and prepared, a
blissfully light-spirited one:--

Zarathustra the soothsayer, Zarathustra
the sooth-laugher, no impatient one, no
absolute one, one who loveth leaps and
side-leaps; I myself have put on this
crown!

19.

Lift up your hearts, my brethren, high,
higher! And do not forget your legs!
Lift up also your legs, ye good dancers,
and better still if ye stand upon your
heads!

There are also heavy animals in a state
of happiness, there are club-footed ones
from the beginning. Curiously do they
exert themselves, like an elephant which
endeavoureth to stand upon its head.

Better, however, to be foolish with
happiness than foolish with misfortune,
better to dance awkwardly than walk
lamely. So learn, I pray you, my wisdom,
ye higher men: even the worst thing hath
two good reverse sides,--

--Even the worst thing hath good
dancing-legs: so learn, I pray you, ye
higher men, to put yourselves on your
proper legs!

So unlearn, I pray you, the
sorrow-sighing, and all the
populace-sadness! Oh, how sad the
buffoons of the populace seem to me
to-day! This to-day, however, is that of
the populace.

20.

Do like unto the wind when it rusheth
forth from its mountain-caves: unto its
own piping will it dance; the seas
tremble and leap under its footsteps.

That which giveth wings to asses, that
which milketh the lionesses:-- praised
be that good, unruly spirit, which
cometh like a hurricane unto all the
present and unto all the populace,--

--Which is hostile to thistle-heads and
puzzle-heads, and to all withered leaves
and weeds:--praised be this wild, good,
free spirit of the storm, which danceth
upon fens and afflictions, as upon
meadows!

Which hateth the consumptive
populace-dogs, and all the
ill-constituted, sullen brood:--praised
be this spirit of all free spirits, the
laughing storm, which bloweth dust into
the eyes of all the melanopic and
melancholic!

Ye higher men, the worst thing in you is
that ye have none of you learned to
dance as ye ought to dance--to dance
beyond yourselves! What doth it matter
that ye have failed!

How many things are still possible! So
LEARN to laugh beyond yourselves! Lift
up your hearts, ye good dancers, high!
higher! And do not forget the good
laughter!

This crown of the laughter, this
rose-garland crown: to you my brethren
do I cast this crown! Laughing have I
consecrated; ye higher men, LEARN, I
pray you--to laugh!



LXXIV. THE SONG OF MELANCHOLY.

1.

When Zarathustra spake these sayings, he
stood nigh to the entrance of his cave;
with the last words, however, he slipped
away from his guests, and fled for a
little while into the open air.

“O pure odours around me,” cried he, “O
blessed stillness around me! But where
are mine animals? Hither, hither, mine
eagle and my serpent!

Tell me, mine animals: these higher men,
all of them--do they perhaps not SMELL
well? O pure odours around me! Now only
do I know and feel how I love you, mine
animals.”

--And Zarathustra said once more: “I
love you, mine animals!” The eagle,
however, and the serpent pressed close
to him when he spake these words, and
looked up to him. In this attitude were
they all three silent together, and
sniffed and sipped the good air with one
another. For the air here outside was
better than with the higher men.

2.

Hardly, however, had Zarathustra left
the cave when the old magician got up,
looked cunningly about him, and said:
“He is gone!

And already, ye higher men--let me
tickle you with this complimentary and
flattering name, as he himself
doeth--already doth mine evil spirit of
deceit and magic attack me, my
melancholy devil,

--Which is an adversary to this
Zarathustra from the very heart: forgive
it for this! Now doth it wish to conjure
before you, it hath just ITS hour; in
vain do I struggle with this evil
spirit.

Unto all of you, whatever honours ye
like to assume in your names, whether ye
call yourselves ‘the free spirits’ or
‘the conscientious,’ or ‘the penitents
of the spirit,’ or ‘the unfettered,’ or
‘the great longers,’--

--Unto all of you, who like me suffer
FROM THE GREAT LOATHING, to whom the old
God hath died, and as yet no new God
lieth in cradles and swaddling
clothes--unto all of you is mine evil
spirit and magic-devil favourable.

I know you, ye higher men, I know
him,--I know also this fiend whom I love
in spite of me, this Zarathustra: he
himself often seemeth to me like the
beautiful mask of a saint,

--Like a new strange mummery in which
mine evil spirit, the melancholy devil,
delighteth:--I love Zarathustra, so doth
it often seem to me, for the sake of
mine evil spirit.--

But already doth IT attack me and
constrain me, this spirit of melancholy,
this evening-twilight devil: and verily,
ye higher men, it hath a longing--

--Open your eyes!--it hath a longing to
come NAKED, whether male or female, I do
not yet know: but it cometh, it
constraineth me, alas! open your wits!

The day dieth out, unto all things
cometh now the evening, also unto the
best things; hear now, and see, ye
higher men, what devil--man or
woman--this spirit of evening-melancholy
is!”

Thus spake the old magician, looked
cunningly about him, and then seized his
harp.

3.

 In evening’s limpid air, What time the
dew’s soothings Unto the earth downpour,
Invisibly and unheard-- For tender
shoe-gear wear The soothing dews, like
all that’s kind-gentle--: Bethinkst thou
then, bethinkst thou, burning heart, How
once thou thirstedest For heaven’s
kindly teardrops and dew’s
down-droppings, All singed and weary
thirstedest, What time on yellow
grass-pathways Wicked, occidental sunny
glances Through sombre trees about thee
sported, Blindingly sunny glow-glances,
gladly-hurting?

 “Of TRUTH the wooer? Thou?”--so taunted
they-- “Nay! Merely poet! A brute
insidious, plundering, grovelling, That
aye must lie, That wittingly, wilfully,
aye must lie: For booty lusting, Motley
masked, Self-hidden, shrouded, Himself
his booty-- HE--of truth the wooer? Nay!
Mere fool! Mere poet! Just motley
speaking, From mask of fool confusedly
shouting, Circumambling on fabricated
word-bridges, On motley rainbow-arches,
‘Twixt the spurious heavenly, And
spurious earthly, Round us roving, round
us soaring,-- MERE FOOL! MERE POET!

 HE--of truth the wooer? Not still,
stiff, smooth and cold, Become an image,
A godlike statue, Set up in front of
temples, As a God’s own door-guard: Nay!
hostile to all such
truthfulness-statues, In every desert
homelier than at temples, With cattish
wantonness, Through every window leaping
Quickly into chances, Every wild forest
a-sniffing, Greedily-longingly,
sniffing, That thou, in wild forests,
‘Mong the motley-speckled fierce
creatures, Shouldest rove, sinful-sound
and fine-coloured, With longing lips
smacking, Blessedly mocking, blessedly
hellish, blessedly bloodthirsty,
Robbing, skulking, lying--roving:--

 Or unto eagles like which fixedly, Long
adown the precipice look, Adown THEIR
precipice:-- Oh, how they whirl down
now, Thereunder, therein, To ever deeper
profoundness whirling!-- Then, Sudden,
With aim aright, With quivering flight,
On LAMBKINS pouncing, Headlong down,
sore-hungry, For lambkins longing,
Fierce ‘gainst all lamb-spirits,
Furious-fierce all that look Sheeplike,
or lambeyed, or crisp-woolly, --Grey,
with lambsheep kindliness!

 Even thus, Eaglelike, pantherlike, Are
the poet’s desires, Are THINE OWN
desires ‘neath a thousand guises, Thou
fool! Thou poet! Thou who all mankind
viewedst-- So God, as sheep--: The God
TO REND within mankind, As the sheep in
mankind, And in rending LAUGHING--

 THAT, THAT is thine own blessedness! Of
a panther and eagle--blessedness! Of a
poet and fool--the blessedness!--

 In evening’s limpid air, What time the
moon’s sickle, Green, ‘twixt the
purple-glowings, And jealous, steal’th
forth: --Of day the foe, With every step
in secret, The rosy garland-hammocks
Downsickling, till they’ve sunken Down
nightwards, faded, downsunken:--

 Thus had I sunken one day From mine own
truth-insanity, From mine own fervid
day-longings, Of day aweary, sick of
sunshine, --Sunk downwards, evenwards,
shadowwards: By one sole trueness All
scorched and thirsty: --Bethinkst thou
still, bethinkst thou, burning heart,
How then thou thirstedest?-- THAT I
SHOULD BANNED BE FROM ALL THE TRUENESS!
MERE FOOL! MERE POET!



LXXV. SCIENCE.

Thus sang the magician; and all who were
present went like birds unawares into
the net of his artful and melancholy
voluptuousness. Only the spiritually
conscientious one had not been caught:
he at once snatched the harp from the
magician and called out: “Air! Let in
good air! Let in Zarathustra! Thou
makest this cave sultry and poisonous,
thou bad old magician!

Thou seducest, thou false one, thou
subtle one, to unknown desires and
deserts. And alas, that such as thou
should talk and make ado about the
TRUTH!

Alas, to all free spirits who are not on
their guard against SUCH magicians! It
is all over with their freedom: thou
teachest and temptest back into
prisons,--

--Thou old melancholy devil, out of thy
lament soundeth a lurement: thou
resemblest those who with their praise
of chastity secretly invite to
voluptuousness!”

Thus spake the conscientious one; the
old magician, however, looked about him,
enjoying his triumph, and on that
account put up with the annoyance which
the conscientious one caused him. “Be
still!” said he with modest voice, “good
songs want to re-echo well; after good
songs one should be long silent.

Thus do all those present, the higher
men. Thou, however, hast perhaps
understood but little of my song? In
thee there is little of the magic
spirit.

“Thou praisest me,” replied the
conscientious one, “in that thou
separatest me from thyself; very well!
But, ye others, what do I see? Ye still
sit there, all of you, with lusting
eyes--:

Ye free spirits, whither hath your
freedom gone! Ye almost seem to me to
resemble those who have long looked at
bad girls dancing naked: your souls
themselves dance!

In you, ye higher men, there must be
more of that which the magician calleth
his evil spirit of magic and deceit:--we
must indeed be different.

And verily, we spake and thought long
enough together ere Zarathustra came
home to his cave, for me not to be
unaware that we ARE different.

We SEEK different things even here
aloft, ye and I. For I seek more
SECURITY; on that account have I come to
Zarathustra. For he is still the most
steadfast tower and will--

--To-day, when everything tottereth,
when all the earth quaketh. Ye, however,
when I see what eyes ye make, it almost
seemeth to me that ye seek MORE
INSECURITY,

--More horror, more danger, more
earthquake. Ye long (it almost seemeth
so to me--forgive my presumption, ye
higher men)--

--Ye long for the worst and dangerousest
life, which frighteneth ME most,--for
the life of wild beasts, for forests,
caves, steep mountains and labyrinthine
gorges.

And it is not those who lead OUT OF
danger that please you best, but those
who lead you away from all paths, the
misleaders. But if such longing in you
be ACTUAL, it seemeth to me nevertheless
to be IMPOSSIBLE.

For fear--that is man’s original and
fundamental feeling; through fear
everything is explained, original sin
and original virtue. Through fear there
grew also MY virtue, that is to say:
Science.

For fear of wild animals--that hath been
longest fostered in man, inclusive of
the animal which he concealeth and
feareth in himself:--Zarathustra calleth
it ‘the beast inside.’

Such prolonged ancient fear, at last
become subtle, spiritual and
intellectual--at present, me thinketh,
it is called SCIENCE.”--

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.

The wildest and most courageous animals
hath he envied and robbed of all their
virtues: thus only did he become--man.

THIS courage, at last become subtle,
spiritual and intellectual, this human
courage, with eagle’s pinions and
serpent’s wisdom: THIS, it seemeth to
me, is called at present--”

“ZARATHUSTRA!” cried all of them there
assembled, as if with one voice, and
burst out at the same time into a great
laughter; there arose, however, from
them as it were a heavy cloud. Even the
magician laughed, and said wisely:
“Well! It is gone, mine evil spirit!

And did I not myself warn you against it
when I said that it was a deceiver, a
lying and deceiving spirit?

Especially when it showeth itself naked.
But what can _I_ do with regard to its
tricks! Have _I_ created it and the
world?

Well! Let us be good again, and of good
cheer! And although Zarathustra looketh
with evil eye--just see him! he
disliketh me--:

--Ere night cometh will he again learn
to love and laud me; he cannot live long
without committing such follies.

HE--loveth his enemies: this art knoweth
he better than any one I have seen. But
he taketh revenge for it--on his
friends!”

Thus spake the old magician, and the
higher men applauded him; so that
Zarathustra went round, and
mischievously and lovingly shook hands
with his friends,--like one who hath to
make amends and apologise to every one
for something. When however he had
thereby come to the door of his cave,
lo, then had he again a longing for the
good air outside, and for his
animals,--and wished to steal out.



LXXVI. AMONG DAUGHTERS OF THE DESERT.

1.

“Go not away!” said then the wanderer
who called himself Zarathustra’s shadow,
“abide with us--otherwise the old gloomy
affliction might again fall upon us.

Now hath that old magician given us of
his worst for our good, and lo! the
good, pious pope there hath tears in his
eyes, and hath quite embarked again upon
the sea of melancholy.

Those kings may well put on a good air
before us still: for that have THEY
learned best of us all at present! Had
they however no one to see them, I wager
that with them also the bad game would
again commence,--

--The bad game of drifting clouds, of
damp melancholy, of curtained heavens,
of stolen suns, of howling
autumn-winds,

--The bad game of our howling and crying
for help! Abide with us, O Zarathustra!
Here there is much concealed misery that
wisheth to speak, much evening, much
cloud, much damp air!

Thou hast nourished us with strong food
for men, and powerful proverbs: do not
let the weakly, womanly spirits attack
us anew at dessert!

Thou alone makest the air around thee
strong and clear! Did I ever find
anywhere on earth such good air as with
thee in thy cave?

Many lands have I seen, my nose hath
learned to test and estimate many kinds
of air: but with thee do my nostrils
taste their greatest delight!

Unless it be,--unless it be--, do
forgive an old recollection! Forgive me
an old after-dinner song, which I once
composed amongst daughters of the
desert:--

For with them was there equally good,
clear, Oriental air; there was I
furthest from cloudy, damp, melancholy
Old-Europe!

Then did I love such Oriental maidens
and other blue kingdoms of heaven, over
which hang no clouds and no thoughts.

Ye would not believe how charmingly they
sat there, when they did not dance,
profound, but without thoughts, like
little secrets, like beribboned riddles,
like dessert-nuts--

Many-hued and foreign, forsooth! but
without clouds: riddles which can be
guessed: to please such maidens I then
composed an after-dinner psalm.”

Thus spake 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 tasteth new foreign air.
Afterward he began to sing with a kind
of roaring.

2.

THE DESERTS GROW: WOE HIM WHO DOTH THEM
HIDE!

 --Ha! Solemnly! In effect solemnly! A
worthy beginning! Afric manner,
solemnly! Of a lion worthy, Or perhaps
of a virtuous howl-monkey-- --But it’s
naught to you, Ye friendly damsels
dearly loved, At whose own feet to me,
The first occasion, To a European under
palm-trees, A seat is now granted.
Selah.

 Wonderful, truly! Here do I sit now,
The desert nigh, and yet I am So far
still from the desert, Even in naught
yet deserted: That is, I’m swallowed
down By this the smallest oasis--: --It
opened up just yawning, Its loveliest
mouth agape, Most sweet-odoured of all
mouthlets: Then fell I right in, Right
down, right through--in ‘mong you, Ye
friendly damsels dearly loved! Selah.

 Hail! hail! to that whale, fishlike, If
it thus for its guest’s convenience Made
things nice!--(ye well know, Surely, my
learned allusion?) Hail to its belly, If
it had e’er A such loveliest oasis-belly
As this is: though however I doubt about
it, --With this come I out of
Old-Europe, That doubt’th more eagerly
than doth any Elderly married woman. May
the Lord improve it! Amen!

 Here do I sit now, In this the smallest
oasis, Like a date indeed, Brown, quite
sweet, gold-suppurating, For rounded
mouth of maiden longing, But yet still
more for youthful, maidlike, Ice-cold
and snow-white and incisory Front teeth:
and for such assuredly, Pine the hearts
all of ardent date-fruits. Selah.

 To the there-named south-fruits now,
Similar, all-too-similar, Do I lie here;
by little Flying insects Round-sniffled
and round-played, And also by yet
littler, Foolisher, and peccabler Wishes
and phantasies,-- Environed by you, Ye
silent, presentientest Maiden-kittens,
Dudu and Suleika, --ROUNDSPHINXED, that
into one word I may crowd much feeling:
(Forgive me, O God, All such
speech-sinning!) --Sit I here the best
of air sniffling, Paradisal air, truly,
Bright and buoyant air, golden-mottled,
As goodly air as ever From lunar orb
downfell-- Be it by hazard, Or
supervened it by arrogancy? As the
ancient poets relate it. But doubter,
I’m now calling it In question: with
this do I come indeed Out of Europe,
That doubt’th more eagerly than doth any
Elderly married woman. May the Lord
improve it! Amen.

 This the finest air drinking, With
nostrils out-swelled like goblets,
Lacking future, lacking remembrances
Thus do I sit here, ye Friendly damsels
dearly loved, And look at the palm-tree
there, How it, to a dance-girl, like,
Doth bow and bend and on its haunches
bob, --One doth it too, when one view’th
it long!-- To a dance-girl like, who as
it seem’th to me, Too long, and
dangerously persistent, Always, always,
just on SINGLE leg hath stood? --Then
forgot she thereby, as it seem’th to me,
The OTHER leg? For vainly I, at least,
Did search for the amissing Fellow-jewel
--Namely, the other leg-- In the
sanctified precincts, Nigh her very
dearest, very tenderest, Flapping and
fluttering and flickering skirting. Yea,
if ye should, ye beauteous friendly
ones, Quite take my word: She hath,
alas! LOST it! Hu! Hu! Hu! Hu! Hu! It is
away! For ever away! The other leg! Oh,
pity for that loveliest other leg! Where
may it now tarry, all-forsaken weeping?
The lonesomest leg? In fear perhaps
before a Furious, yellow, blond and
curled Leonine monster? Or perhaps even
Gnawed away, nibbled badly-- Most
wretched, woeful! woeful! nibbled badly!
Selah.

 Oh, weep ye not, Gentle spirits! Weep
ye not, ye Date-fruit spirits!
Milk-bosoms! Ye sweetwood-heart
Purselets! Weep ye no more, Pallid Dudu!
Be a man, Suleika! Bold! Bold! --Or else
should there perhaps Something
strengthening, heart-strengthening, Here
most proper be? Some inspiring text?
Some solemn exhortation?-- Ha! Up now!
honour! Moral honour! European honour!
Blow again, continue, Bellows-box of
virtue! Ha! Once more thy roaring, Thy
moral roaring! As a virtuous lion Nigh
the daughters of deserts roaring! --For
virtue’s out-howl, Ye very dearest
maidens, Is more than every European
fervour, European hot-hunger! And now do
I stand here, As European, I can’t be
different, God’s help to me! Amen!

THE DESERTS GROW: WOE HIM WHO DOTH THEM
HIDE!



LXXVII. 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 spake
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 spake to his animals.

“Whither hath their distress now gone?”
said he, and already did he himself feel
relieved of his petty disgust--“with me,
it seemeth that they have unlearned
their cries of distress!

--Though, alas! not yet their crying.”
And Zarathustra stopped his ears, for
just then did the YE-A of the ass mix
strangely with the noisy jubilation of
those higher men.

“They are merry,” he began again, “and
who knoweth? perhaps at their host’s
expense; and if they have learned of me
to laugh, still it is not MY laughter
they have learned.

But what matter about that! They are old
people: they recover in their own way,
they laugh in their own way; mine ears
have already endured worse and have not
become peevish.

This day is a victory: he already
yieldeth, he fleeth, THE SPIRIT OF
GRAVITY, mine old arch-enemy! How well
this day is about to end, which began so
badly and gloomily!

And it is ABOUT TO end. Already cometh
the evening: over the sea rideth it
hither, the good rider! How it bobbeth,
the blessed one, the home-returning one,
in its purple saddles!

The sky gazeth brightly thereon, the
world lieth deep. Oh, all ye strange
ones who have come to me, it is already
worth while to have lived with me!”

Thus spake Zarathustra. And again came
the cries and laughter of the higher men
out of the cave: then began he anew:

“They bite at it, my bait taketh, there
departeth also from them their enemy,
the spirit of gravity. Now do they learn
to laugh at themselves: do I hear
rightly?

My virile food taketh effect, my strong
and savoury sayings: and verily, I did
not nourish them with flatulent
vegetables! But with warrior-food, with
conqueror-food: new desires did I
awaken.

New hopes are in their arms and legs,
their hearts expand. They find new
words, soon will their spirits breathe
wantonness.

Such food may sure enough not be proper
for children, nor even for longing girls
old and young. One persuadeth their
bowels otherwise; I am not their
physician and teacher.

The DISGUST departeth from these higher
men; well! that is my victory. In my
domain they become assured; all stupid
shame fleeth away; they empty
themselves.

They empty their hearts, good times
return unto them, they keep holiday and
ruminate,--they become THANKFUL.

THAT do I take as the best sign: they
become thankful. Not long will it be ere
they devise festivals, and put up
memorials to their old joys.

They are CONVALESCENTS!” Thus spake
Zarathustra joyfully to his heart and
gazed outward; his animals, however,
pressed up to him, and honoured his
happiness and his silence.

2.

All on a sudden however, Zarathustra’s
ear was frightened: for the cave which
had hitherto been full of noise and
laughter, became all at once still as
death;--his nose, however, smelt a
sweet-scented vapour and incense-odour,
as if from burning pine-cones.

“What happeneth? What are they about?”
he asked himself, and stole up to the
entrance, that he might be able
unobserved to see his guests. But wonder
upon wonder! what was he then obliged to
behold with his own eyes!

“They have all of them become PIOUS
again, they PRAY, they are mad!”--said
he, and was astonished beyond measure.
And forsooth! all these higher men, the
two kings, the pope out of service, the
evil magician, the voluntary beggar, the
wanderer and shadow, the old soothsayer,
the spiritually conscientious one, and
the ugliest man--they all lay on their
knees like children and credulous old
women, and worshipped the ass. And just
then began the ugliest man to gurgle and
snort, as if something unutterable in
him tried to find expression; when,
however, he had actually found words,
behold! it was a pious, strange litany
in praise of the adored and censed ass.
And the litany sounded thus:

Amen! And glory and honour and wisdom
and thanks and praise and strength be to
our God, from everlasting to
everlasting!

--The ass, however, here brayed YE-A.

He carrieth our burdens, he hath taken
upon him the form of a servant, he is
patient of heart and never saith Nay;
and he who loveth his God chastiseth
him.

--The ass, however, here brayed YE-A.

He speaketh not: except that he ever
saith Yea to the world which he created:
thus doth he extol his world. It is his
artfulness that speaketh not: thus is he
rarely found wrong.

--The ass, however, here brayed YE-A.

Uncomely goeth he through the world.
Grey is the favourite colour in which he
wrappeth his virtue. Hath he spirit,
then doth he conceal it; every one,
however, believeth in his long ears.

--The ass, however, here brayed YE-A.

What hidden wisdom it is to wear long
ears, and only to say Yea and never Nay!
Hath he not created the world in his own
image, namely, as stupid as possible?

--The ass, however, here brayed YE-A.

Thou goest straight and crooked ways; it
concerneth thee little what seemeth
straight or crooked unto us men. Beyond
good and evil is thy domain. It is thine
innocence not to know what innocence
is.

--The ass, however, here brayed YE-A.

Lo! how thou spurnest none from thee,
neither beggars nor kings. Thou
sufferest little children to come unto
thee, and when the bad boys decoy thee,
then sayest thou simply, YE-A.

--The ass, however, here brayed YE-A.

Thou lovest she-asses and fresh figs,
thou art no food-despiser. A thistle
tickleth thy heart when thou chancest to
be hungry. There is the wisdom of a God
therein.

--The ass, however, here brayed YE-A.



LXXVIII. THE ASS-FESTIVAL.

1.

At this place in the litany, however,
Zarathustra could no longer control
himself; he himself cried out YE-A,
louder even than the ass, and sprang
into the midst of his maddened guests.
“Whatever are you about, ye grown-up
children?” he exclaimed, pulling up the
praying ones from the ground. “Alas, if
any one else, except Zarathustra, had
seen you:

Every one would think you the worst
blasphemers, or the very foolishest old
women, with your new belief!

And thou thyself, thou old pope, how is
it in accordance with thee, to adore an
ass in such a manner as God?”--

“O Zarathustra,” answered the pope,
“forgive me, but in divine matters I am
more enlightened even than thou. And it
is right that it should be so.

Better to adore God so, in this form,
than in no form at all! Think over this
saying, mine exalted friend: thou wilt
readily divine that in such a saying
there is wisdom.

He who said ‘God is a Spirit’--made the
greatest stride and slide hitherto made
on earth towards unbelief: such a dictum
is not easily amended again on earth!

Mine old heart leapeth and boundeth
because there is still something to
adore on earth. Forgive it, O
Zarathustra, to an old, pious
pontiff-heart!--”

--“And thou,” said Zarathustra to the
wanderer and shadow, “thou callest and
thinkest thyself a free spirit? And thou
here practisest such idolatry and
hierolatry?

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!
Who ought to believe any longer in thee
in this free age, when THOU believest in
such divine donkeyism?

It was a stupid thing that thou didst;
how couldst thou, a shrewd man, do such
a stupid thing!”

“O Zarathustra,” answered the shrewd
magician, “thou art right, it was a
stupid thing,--it was also repugnant to
me.”

--“And thou even,” said Zarathustra to
the spiritually conscientious one,
“consider, and put thy finger to thy
nose! Doth nothing go against thy
conscience here? Is thy spirit not too
cleanly for this praying and the fumes
of those devotees?”

“There is something therein,” said the
spiritually conscientious one, and put
his finger to his nose, “there is
something in this spectacle which even
doeth good to my conscience.

Perhaps I dare not believe in God:
certain it is however, that God seemeth
to me most worthy of belief in this
form.

God is said to be eternal, according to
the testimony of the most pious: he who
hath so much time taketh his time. As
slow and as stupid as possible: THEREBY
can such a one nevertheless go very
far.

And he who hath too much spirit might
well become infatuated with stupidity
and folly. Think of thyself, O
Zarathustra!

Thou thyself--verily! even thou couldst
well become an ass through
superabundance of wisdom.

Doth not the true sage willingly walk on
the crookedest paths? The evidence
teacheth it, O Zarathustra,--THINE OWN
evidence!”

--“And thou thyself, finally,” said
Zarathustra, and turned towards the
ugliest man, who still lay on the ground
stretching up his arm to the ass (for he
gave it wine to drink). “Say, thou
nondescript, what hast thou been
about!

Thou seemest to me transformed, thine
eyes glow, the mantle of the sublime
covereth thine ugliness: WHAT didst thou
do?

Is it then true what they say, that thou
hast again awakened him? And why? Was he
not for good reasons killed and made
away with?

Thou thyself seemest to me awakened:
what didst thou do? why didst THOU turn
round? Why didst THOU get converted?
Speak, thou nondescript!”

“O Zarathustra,” answered the ugliest
man, “thou art a rogue!

Whether HE yet liveth, or again liveth,
or is thoroughly dead--which of us both
knoweth that best? I ask thee.

One thing however do I know,--from
thyself did I learn it once, O
Zarathustra: he who wanteth to kill most
thoroughly, LAUGHETH.

‘Not by wrath but by laughter doth one
kill’--thus spakest thou once, O
Zarathustra, thou hidden one, thou
destroyer without wrath, thou dangerous
saint,--thou art 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 ye wags, all of you, ye buffoons! Why
do ye dissemble and disguise yourselves
before me!

How the hearts of all of you convulsed
with delight and wickedness, because ye
had at last become again like little
children--namely, pious,--

--Because ye at last did again as
children do--namely, prayed, folded your
hands and said ‘good God’!

But now leave, I pray you, THIS nursery,
mine own cave, where to-day all
childishness is carried on. Cool down,
here outside, your hot child-wantonness
and heart-tumult!

To be sure: except ye become as little
children ye shall not enter into THAT
kingdom of heaven.” (And Zarathustra
pointed aloft with his hands.)

“But we do not at all want to enter into
the kingdom of heaven: we have become
men,--SO WE WANT THE KINGDOM OF
EARTH.”

3.

And once more began Zarathustra to
speak. “O my new friends,” said he,--
“ye strange ones, ye higher men, how
well do ye now please me,--

--Since ye have again become joyful! Ye
have, verily, all blossomed forth: it
seemeth to me that for such flowers as
you, NEW FESTIVALS are required.

--A little valiant nonsense, some divine
service and ass-festival, some old
joyful Zarathustra fool, some blusterer
to blow your souls bright.

Forget not this night and this
ass-festival, ye higher men! THAT did ye
devise when with me, that do I take as a
good omen,--such things only the
convalescents devise!

And should ye celebrate it again, this
ass-festival, do it from love to
yourselves, do it also from love to me!
And in remembrance of me!”

Thus spake Zarathustra.



LXXIX. THE DRUNKEN SONG.

1.

Meanwhile one after another had gone out
into the open air, and into the cool,
thoughtful night; Zarathustra himself,
however, led the ugliest man by the
hand, that he might show him his
night-world, and the great round moon,
and the silvery water-falls near his
cave. There they at last stood still
beside one another; all of them old
people, but with comforted, brave
hearts, and astonished in themselves
that it was so well with them on earth;
the mystery of the night, however, came
nigher and nigher to their hearts. And
anew Zarathustra thought to himself:
“Oh, how well do they now please me,
these higher men!”--but he did not say
it aloud, for he respected their
happiness and their silence.--

Then, however, there happened that which
in this astonishing long day was most
astonishing: the ugliest man began once
more and for the last time to gurgle and
snort, and when he had at length found
expression, behold! there sprang a
question plump and plain out of his
mouth, a good, deep, clear question,
which moved the hearts of all who
listened to him.

“My friends, all of you,” said the
ugliest man, “what think ye? For the
sake of this day--_I_ am for the first
time content to have lived mine entire
life.

And that I testify so much is still not
enough for me. It is worth while living
on the earth: one day, one festival with
Zarathustra, hath taught me to love the
earth.

‘Was THAT--life?’ will I say unto death.
‘Well! Once more!’

My friends, what think ye? Will ye not,
like me, say unto death: ‘Was
THAT--life? For the sake of Zarathustra,
well! Once more!’”--

Thus spake the ugliest man; it was not,
however, far from midnight. And what
took place then, think ye? As soon as
the higher men heard his question, they
became all at once conscious of their
transformation and convalescence, and of
him who was the cause thereof: then did
they rush up to Zarathustra, thanking,
honouring, caressing him, and kissing
his hands, each in his own peculiar way;
so that some laughed and some wept. The
old soothsayer, however, danced with
delight; and though he was then, as some
narrators suppose, full of sweet wine,
he was certainly still fuller of sweet
life, and had renounced all weariness.
There are even those who narrate that
the ass then danced: for not in vain had
the ugliest man previously given it wine
to drink. That may be the case, or it
may be otherwise; and if in truth the
ass did not dance that evening, there
nevertheless happened then greater and
rarer wonders than the dancing of an ass
would have been. In short, as the
proverb of Zarathustra saith: “What doth
it matter!”

2.

When, however, this took place with the
ugliest man, Zarathustra stood there
like one drunken: his glance dulled, his
tongue faltered and his feet staggered.
And who could divine what thoughts then
passed through Zarathustra’s soul?
Apparently, however, his spirit
retreated and fled in advance and was in
remote distances, and as it were
“wandering on high mountain-ridges,” as
it standeth written, “‘twixt two seas,

--Wandering ‘twixt the past and the
future as a heavy cloud.” Gradually,
however, while the higher men held him
in their arms, he came back to himself a
little, and resisted with his hands the
crowd of the honouring and caring ones;
but he did not speak. All at once,
however, he turned his head quickly, for
he seemed to hear something: then laid
he his finger on his mouth and said:
“COME!”

And immediately it became still and
mysterious round about; from the depth
however there came up slowly the sound
of a clock-bell. Zarathustra listened
thereto, like the higher men; then,
however, laid he his finger on his mouth
the second time, and said again: “COME!
COME! IT IS GETTING ON TO
MIDNIGHT!”--and his voice had changed.
But still he had not moved from the
spot. Then it became yet stiller and
more mysterious, and everything
hearkened, even the ass, and
Zarathustra’s noble animals, the eagle
and the serpent,--likewise the cave of
Zarathustra and the big cool moon, and
the night itself. Zarathustra, however,
laid his hand upon his mouth for the
third time, and said:

COME! COME! COME! LET US NOW WANDER! IT
IS THE HOUR: LET US WANDER INTO THE
NIGHT!

3.

Ye higher men, it is getting on to
midnight: then will I say something into
your ears, as that old clock-bell saith
it into mine ear,--

--As mysteriously, as frightfully, and
as cordially as that midnight clock-bell
speaketh it to me, which hath
experienced more than one man:

--Which hath already counted the
smarting throbbings of your fathers’
hearts--ah! ah! how it sigheth! how it
laugheth in its dream! the old, deep,
deep midnight!

Hush! Hush! Then is there many a thing
heard which may not be heard by day; now
however, in the cool air, when even all
the tumult of your hearts hath become
still,--

--Now doth it speak, now is it heard,
now doth it steal into overwakeful,
nocturnal souls: ah! ah! how the
midnight sigheth! how it laugheth in its
dream!

--Hearest thou not how it mysteriously,
frightfully, and cordially speaketh unto
THEE, the old deep, deep midnight?

O MAN, TAKE HEED!

4.

Woe to me! Whither hath time gone? Have
I not sunk into deep wells? The world
sleepeth--

Ah! Ah! The dog howleth, the moon
shineth. Rather will I die, rather will
I die, than say unto you what my
midnight-heart now thinketh.

Already have I died. It is all over.
Spider, why spinnest thou around me?
Wilt thou have blood? Ah! Ah! The dew
falleth, the hour cometh--

--The hour in which I frost and freeze,
which asketh and asketh and asketh: “Who
hath sufficient courage for it?

--Who is to be master of the world? Who
is going to say: THUS shall ye flow, ye
great and small streams!”

--The hour approacheth: O man, thou
higher man, take heed! this talk is for
fine ears, for thine ears--WHAT SAITH
DEEP MIDNIGHT’S VOICE INDEED?

5.

It carrieth me away, my soul danceth.
Day’s-work! Day’s-work! Who is to be
master of the world?

The moon is cool, the wind is still. Ah!
Ah! Have ye already flown high enough?
Ye have danced: a leg, nevertheless, is
not a wing.

Ye good dancers, now is all delight
over: wine hath become lees, every cup
hath become brittle, the sepulchres
mutter.

Ye have not flown high enough: now do
the sepulchres mutter: “Free the dead!
Why is it so long night? Doth not the
moon make us drunken?”

Ye higher men, free the sepulchres,
awaken the corpses! Ah, why doth the
worm still burrow? There approacheth,
there approacheth, the hour,--

--There boometh the clock-bell, there
thrilleth still the heart, there
burroweth still the wood-worm, the
heart-worm. Ah! Ah! THE WORLD IS DEEP!

6.

Sweet lyre! Sweet lyre! I love thy tone,
thy drunken, ranunculine tone!--how
long, how far hath come unto me thy
tone, from the distance, from the ponds
of love!

Thou old clock-bell, thou sweet lyre!
Every pain hath torn thy heart,
father-pain, fathers’-pain,
forefathers’-pain; thy speech hath
become ripe,--

--Ripe like the golden autumn and the
afternoon, like mine anchorite
heart--now sayest thou: The world itself
hath become ripe, the grape turneth
brown,

--Now doth it wish to die, to die of
happiness. Ye higher men, do ye not feel
it? There welleth up mysteriously an
odour,

--A perfume and odour of eternity, a
rosy-blessed, brown, gold-wine-odour of
old happiness,

--Of drunken midnight-death happiness,
which singeth: the world is deep, AND
DEEPER THAN THE DAY COULD READ!

7.

Leave me alone! Leave me alone! I am too
pure for thee. Touch me not! Hath not my
world just now become perfect?

My skin is too pure for thy hands. Leave
me alone, thou dull, doltish, stupid
day! Is not the midnight brighter?

The purest are to be masters of the
world, the least known, the strongest,
the midnight-souls, who are brighter and
deeper than any day.

O day, thou gropest for me? Thou feelest
for my happiness? For thee am I rich,
lonesome, a treasure-pit, a gold
chamber?

O world, thou wantest ME? Am I worldly
for thee? Am I spiritual for thee? Am I
divine for thee? But day and world, ye
are too coarse,--

--Have cleverer hands, grasp after
deeper happiness, after deeper
unhappiness, grasp after some God; grasp
not after me:

--Mine unhappiness, my happiness is
deep, thou strange day, but yet am I no
God, no God’s-hell: DEEP IS ITS WOE.

8.

God’s woe is deeper, thou strange world!
Grasp at God’s woe, not at me! What am
I! A drunken sweet lyre,--

--A midnight-lyre, a bell-frog, which no
one understandeth, but which MUST speak
before deaf ones, ye higher men! For ye
do not understand me!

Gone! Gone! O youth! O noontide! O
afternoon! Now have come evening and
night and midnight,--the dog howleth,
the wind:

--Is the wind not a dog? It whineth, it
barketh, it howleth. Ah! Ah! how she
sigheth! how she laugheth, how she
wheezeth and panteth, the midnight!

How she just now speaketh soberly, this
drunken poetess! hath she perhaps
overdrunk her drunkenness? hath she
become overawake? doth she ruminate?

--Her woe doth she ruminate over, in a
dream, the old, deep midnight--and still
more her joy. For joy, although woe be
deep, JOY IS DEEPER STILL THAN GRIEF CAN
BE.

9.

Thou grape-vine! Why dost thou praise
me? Have I not cut thee! I am cruel,
thou bleedest--: what meaneth thy praise
of my drunken cruelty?

“Whatever hath become perfect,
everything mature--wanteth to die!” so
sayest thou. Blessed, blessed be the
vintner’s knife! But everything immature
wanteth to live: alas!

Woe saith: “Hence! Go! Away, thou woe!”
But everything that suffereth wanteth to
live, that it may become mature and
lively and longing,

--Longing for the further, the higher,
the brighter. “I want heirs,” so saith
everything that suffereth, “I want
children, I do not want MYSELF,”--

Joy, however, doth not want heirs, it
doth not want children,--joy wanteth
itself, it wanteth eternity, it wanteth
recurrence, it wanteth everything
eternally-like-itself.

Woe saith: “Break, bleed, thou heart!
Wander, thou leg! Thou wing, fly!
Onward! upward! thou pain!” Well! Cheer
up! O mine old heart: WOE SAITH: “HENCE!
GO!”

10.

Ye higher men, what think ye? Am I a
soothsayer? Or a dreamer? Or a drunkard?
Or a dream-reader? Or a midnight-bell?

Or a drop of dew? Or a fume and
fragrance of eternity? Hear ye it not?
Smell ye it not? Just now hath my world
become perfect, midnight is also
mid-day,--

Pain is also a joy, curse is also a
blessing, night is also a sun,--go away!
or ye will learn that a sage is also a
fool.

Said ye ever Yea to one joy? O my
friends, then said ye Yea also unto ALL
woe. All things are enlinked, enlaced
and enamoured,--

--Wanted ye ever once to come twice;
said ye ever: “Thou pleasest me,
happiness! Instant! Moment!” then wanted
ye ALL to come back again!

--All anew, all eternal, all enlinked,
enlaced and enamoured, Oh, then did ye
LOVE the world,--

--Ye eternal ones, ye love it eternally
and for all time: and also unto woe do
ye say: Hence! Go! but come back! FOR
JOYS ALL WANT--ETERNITY!

11.

All joy wanteth the eternity of all
things, it wanteth honey, it wanteth
lees, it wanteth drunken midnight, it
wanteth graves, it wanteth grave-tears’
consolation, it wanteth gilded
evening-red--

--WHAT doth not joy want! it is
thirstier, heartier, hungrier, more
frightful, more mysterious, than all
woe: it wanteth ITSELF, it biteth into
ITSELF, the ring’s will writheth in
it,--

--It wanteth love, it wanteth hate, it
is over-rich, it bestoweth, it throweth
away, it beggeth for some one to take
from it, it thanketh the taker, it would
fain be hated,--

--So rich is joy that it thirsteth for
woe, for hell, for hate, for shame, for
the lame, for the WORLD,--for this
world, Oh, ye know it indeed!

Ye higher men, for you doth it long,
this joy, this irrepressible, blessed
joy--for your woe, ye failures! For
failures, longeth all eternal joy.

For joys all want themselves, therefore
do they also want grief! O happiness, O
pain! Oh break, thou heart! Ye higher
men, do learn it, that joys want
eternity.

--Joys want the eternity of ALL things,
they WANT DEEP, PROFOUND ETERNITY!

12.

Have ye now learned my song? Have ye
divined what it would say? Well! Cheer
up! Ye higher men, sing now my
roundelay!

Sing now yourselves the song, the name
of which is “Once more,” the
signification of which is “Unto all
eternity!”--sing, ye higher men,
Zarathustra’s roundelay!

 O man! Take heed! What saith deep
midnight’s voice indeed? “I slept my
sleep--, “From deepest dream I’ve woke,
and plead:-- “The world is deep, “And
deeper than the day could read. “Deep is
its woe--, “Joy--deeper still than grief
can be: “Woe saith: Hence! Go! “But joys
all want eternity-, “-Want deep,
profound eternity!”



LXXX. THE SIGN.

In the morning, however, after this
night, Zarathustra jumped up from his
couch, and, having girded his loins, he
came out of his cave glowing and strong,
like a morning sun coming out of gloomy
mountains.

“Thou great star,” spake he, as he had
spoken once before, “thou deep eye of
happiness, what would be all thy
happiness if thou hadst not THOSE for
whom thou shinest!

And if they remained in their chambers
whilst thou art already awake, and
comest and bestowest and distributest,
how would thy proud modesty upbraid for
it!

Well! they still sleep, these higher
men, whilst _I_ am awake: THEY are not
my proper companions! Not for them do I
wait here in my mountains.

At my work I want to be, at my day: but
they understand not what are the signs
of my morning, my step--is not for them
the awakening-call.

They still sleep in my cave; their dream
still drinketh at my drunken songs. The
audient ear for ME--the OBEDIENT ear, is
yet lacking in their limbs.”

--This had Zarathustra spoken to his
heart when the sun arose: then looked he
inquiringly aloft, for he heard above
him the sharp call of his eagle. “Well!”
called he upwards, “thus is it pleasing
and proper to me. Mine animals are
awake, for I am awake.

Mine eagle is awake, and like me
honoureth the sun. With eagle-talons
doth it grasp at the new light. Ye are
my proper animals; I love you.

But still do I lack my proper men!”--

Thus spake Zarathustra; then, however,
it happened that all on a sudden he
became aware that he was flocked around
and fluttered around, as if by
innumerable birds,--the whizzing of so
many wings, however, and the crowding
around his head was so great that he
shut his eyes. And verily, there came
down upon him as it were a cloud, like a
cloud of arrows which poureth upon a new
enemy. But behold, here it was a cloud
of love, and showered upon a new
friend.

“What happeneth unto me?” thought
Zarathustra in his astonished heart, and
slowly seated himself on the big stone
which lay close to the exit from his
cave. But while he grasped about with
his hands, around him, above him and
below him, and repelled the tender
birds, behold, there then happened to
him something still stranger: for he
grasped thereby unawares into a mass of
thick, warm, shaggy hair; at the same
time, however, there sounded before him
a roar,--a long, soft lion-roar.

“THE SIGN COMETH,” said Zarathustra, and
a change came over his heart. And in
truth, when it turned clear before him,
there lay a yellow, powerful animal at
his feet, resting its head on his
knee,--unwilling to leave him out of
love, and doing like a dog which again
findeth its old master. The doves,
however, were no less eager with their
love than the lion; and whenever a dove
whisked over its nose, the lion shook
its head and wondered and laughed.

When all this went on Zarathustra spake
only a word: “MY CHILDREN ARE NIGH, MY
CHILDREN”--, then he became quite mute.
His heart, however, was loosed, and from
his eyes there dropped down tears and
fell upon his hands. And he took no
further notice of anything, but sat
there motionless, without repelling the
animals further. Then flew the doves to
and fro, and perched on his shoulder,
and caressed his white hair, and did not
tire of their tenderness and joyousness.
The strong lion, however, licked always
the tears that fell on Zarathustra’s
hands, and roared and growled shyly.
Thus did these animals do.--

All this went on for a long time, or a
short time: for properly speaking, there
is NO time on earth for such things--.
Meanwhile, however, the higher men had
awakened in Zarathustra’s cave, and
marshalled themselves for a procession
to go to meet Zarathustra, and give him
their morning greeting: for they had
found when they awakened that he no
longer tarried with them. When, however,
they reached the door of the cave and
the noise of their steps had preceded
them, the lion started violently; it
turned away all at once from
Zarathustra, and roaring wildly, sprang
towards the cave. The higher men,
however, when they heard the lion
roaring, cried all aloud as with one
voice, fled back and vanished in an
instant.

Zarathustra himself, however, stunned
and strange, rose from his seat, looked
around him, stood there astonished,
inquired of his heart, bethought
himself, and remained alone. “What did I
hear?” said he at last, slowly, “what
happened unto me just now?”

But soon there came to him his
recollection, and he took in at a glance
all that had taken place between
yesterday and to-day. “Here is indeed
the stone,” said he, and stroked his
beard, “on IT sat I yester-morn; and
here came the soothsayer unto me, and
here heard I first the cry which I heard
just now, the great cry of distress.

O ye higher men, YOUR distress was it
that the old soothsayer foretold to me
yester-morn,--

--Unto your distress did he want to
seduce and tempt me: ‘O Zarathustra,’
said he to me, ‘I come to seduce thee to
thy last sin.’

To my last sin?” cried Zarathustra, and
laughed angrily at his own words: “WHAT
hath been reserved for me as my last
sin?”

--And once more Zarathustra became
absorbed in himself, and sat down again
on the big stone and meditated. Suddenly
he sprang up,--

“FELLOW-SUFFERING! FELLOW-SUFFERING WITH
THE HIGHER MEN!” he cried out, and his
countenance changed into brass. “Well!
THAT--hath had its time!

My suffering and my
fellow-suffering--what matter about
them! Do I then strive after HAPPINESS?
I strive after my WORK!

Well! The lion hath come, my children
are nigh, Zarathustra hath grown ripe,
mine hour hath come:--

This is MY morning, MY day beginneth:
ARISE NOW, ARISE, THOU GREAT
NOONTIDE!”--

Thus spake Zarathustra and left his
cave, glowing and strong, like a morning
sun coming out of gloomy mountains.

 END

 

"Reading this really makes me want to
leave my own cave. I wonder if there is
a way?"

-A Shade