Thus Spoke Zarathustra

by Friedrich Nietzsche

  The river now carries your boat onward: it must carry it. Small matter if the rough wave foams and angrily resists its keel!

  It is not the river that is your danger and the end of your good and evil, you wisest men, but that will itself, the will to power—the unexhausted procreating will of life.

  But that you may understand my teaching on good and evil, I shall relate to you my teaching on life and the nature of all the living.

  I have followed the living, I walked in the broadest and narrowest paths to learn its nature.

  With a hundred-faced mirror I caught its glance when its mouth was shut, so that its eye might speak to me. And its eye spoke to me.

  But wherever I found the living, there too I heard the language of obedience. All that lives, obeys.

  And this is the second point: he who cannot obey himself is commanded. Such is the nature of the living.

  But this is the third thing I heard: that commanding is more difficult than obeying. And not only because the commander bears the burden of all who obey, and because this burden may easily crush him:—

  All commanding seemed to me to be an experiment and a risk: and whenever it commands, the living risks itself.

  Yes, even when it commands itself, it must still pay for its commanding. It must become the judge and avenger and victim of its own law.

  How does this happen! so I asked myself. What persuades the living thing to obey and to command and even to be obedient in commanding?

  Listen now to my word, you wisest men! Test in all seriousness whether I have crept into the heart of life itself and into the very roots of its heart!

  Wherever I found the living, there I found will to power; and even in the will of the servant I found the will to be master.

  That the weaker shall serve the stronger, to that it is persuaded by its own will, which would be master over what is weaker still: that pleasure alone it is unwilling to forego.

  And as the lesser surrenders to the greater that he may have delight and power over the least of all, so even the greatest surrenders himself, and for the sake of power stakes-life.

  That is the surrender of the greatest—that they face risk and danger and roll dice for death.

  And where there is sacrifice and service and loving glances, there is also the will to be master. By secret paths the weaker slinks into the castle and even into the heart of the more powerful-and there steals power.

  And life itself spoke this secret to me. “Behold,” it said, “I am that which must ever overcome itself.

  “To be sure, you call it a will to procreate or a drive toward a goal, towards the higher, remoter, more manifold: but all that is one and the same secret.

  “I would rather perish than renounce this one thing; and truly, where there is perishing and the falling of leaves, behold, there life sacrifices itself-for power!

  “That I must be struggle and becoming and goal and conflict of goals: ah, he who divines my will surely divines on what crooked paths it must tread!

  “Whatever I create and however much I love it—soon I have to oppose it and my love: so my will wills it.

  “And even you, knowing one, are only a path and footstep of my will: truly, my will to power even steps on the feet of your will to truth!

  “He certainly did not hit the truth who shot at it the doctrine, ‘will to existence’: this will-does not exist!

  “For what is not cannot will; but that which is in existence—how could it still strive for existence!

  “Only where there is life is there also will: but not will to life, rather—so I teach you—will to power!

  “Much is valued more highly than life itself by the living; but out of the valuing itself speaks-the will to power!”—

  Thus life taught me once: and thereby, you wisest men, I solve the riddle of your hearts.

  Truly, I say to you: unchanging good and evil-do not exist! From out of themselves they must overcome themselves again and again.

  With your values and doctrines of good and evil, you exercise power, you valuers: and that is your secret love, and the sparkling, trembling, and overflowing of your souls.

  But a stronger power grows out of your values, and a new overcoming: egg and eggshell break against them.

  And he who must be a creator of good and evil: truly, he must first be a destroyer and break values.

  Thus the greatest evil belongs with the greatest good: that, however, is the creative good.—

  Let us speak of this, you wisest men, even if it be bad. To be silent is worse; all suppressed truths become poisonous.

  And let everything break that is able to be broken by our truths! Many a house is still to be built!—

  Thus spoke Zarathustra.

  THE SUBLIME ONES

  STILL IS THE BOTTOM of my sea: who would guess that it hides sportive monsters!

  Imperturbable is my depth: but it sparkles with swimming riddles and laughter.

  I saw a sublime one today, a solemn one, a penitent of the spirit: oh, how my soul laughed at his ugliness!

  With upraised breast, and like those who draw in their breath: thus he stood, the sublime one, and in silence:

  Overhung with ugly truths, the spoil of his hunting, and rich in torn clothes; many thorns also hung on him—but I saw no rose.

  He had not yet learned laughing and beauty. This hunter returned gloomily from the forest of knowledge.

  He returned home from the fight with wild beasts: but even yet a wild beast gazes out of his seriousness-an unconquered wild beast!

  He always stands like a tiger about to spring; but I do not like those strained souls, my taste does not favor all these withdrawn men.

  And you tell me, friends, that there is to be no dispute about taste and tasting? But all life is a dispute about taste and tasting!

  Taste: that is weight and at the same time scales and weigher; and ah for every living thing that would live without any dispute about weight and scales and weigher!

  If he became weary of his sublimity, this sublime one, only then would his beauty begin-and then only will I taste him and find him savory.

  And only when he turns away from himself will he overleap his own shadow—and truly! into his sun.

  Far too long he sat in the shade; the cheeks of the penitent of the spirit became pale; he almost starved on his expectations.

  Contempt is still in his eye, and loathing hides in his mouth. To be sure, he now rests, but he has not yet lain down in the sunshine.

  He should behave like the ox; and his happiness should smell of the earth, and not of contempt for the earth.

  I would like to see him as a white ox, snorting and bellowing as he walks before the plough: and his bellowing should also praise all that is earthly!

  His face is still dark; the shadow of his hand dances upon it. The sense of his eye too is overshadowed.

  His deed itself is still the shadow upon him: his doing obscures the doer. He has not yet overcome his deed.

  To be sure, I love in him the shoulders of the ox: but now I want to see also the eye of the angel.

  He must unlearn his heroic will too: he shall be an exalted one, and not only a sublime one:-the ether itself should raise him, the will-less one!

  He has subdued monsters, he has solved enigmas. But he should also redeem his monsters and enigmas; into heavenly children he should transform them.

  As yet his knowledge has not learned to smile and to be without jealousy; as yet his gushing passion has not become calm in beauty.

  Truly, not in satiety shall his longing cease and disappear, but in beauty! The generosity of the magnanimous should include gracefulness.

  His arm across his head: that is how the hero should rest, and thus too he should overcome his rest.

  But it is precisely to the hero that beauty is the hardest thing of all. Beauty is unattainable by all violent wills.

  A little more, a little less: precisely this is more here, here it is the most.

  To s
tand with relaxed muscles and with unharnessed will: that is the hardest for all of you, you sublime ones!

  When power becomes gracious and descends into the visible: I call such descent beauty.

  And from no one do I want beauty so much as from you, you powerful one: let your goodness be your last self-conquest.

  I believe you capable of all evil: therefore I desire the good from you.

  Truly, I have often laughed at the weaklings, who think themselves good because their claws are blunt!

  You will strive after the virtue of the pillar: the higher it rises, the more beautiful and graceful it becomes, but inwardly harder and able to bear more weight.

  Yes, you sublime one, one day you will also be beautiful, and hold up the mirror to your own beauty.

  Then your soul will shudder with divine desires; and there will be worship even in your vanity!

  For this is the secret of the soul: only when the hero has abandoned it does the superhero approach it in dreams.-Thus spoke Zarathustra.

  THE LAND OF CULTURE 10

  I FLEW TOO FAR into the future: a horror seized me.

  And when I looked around me, behold! there time was my only contemporary.

  Then I flew backwards, homewards—and always faster. Thus I came to you, you men of the present, and into the land of culture.

  For the first time I brought an eye to see you and healthy desires: truly, I came with longing in my heart.

  But how did it turn out with me? Although so alarmed—I had yet to laugh! Never did my eye see anything so mottled!

  I laughed and laughed, while my foot still trembled and my heart as well: “Here indeed, is the home of all the paint pots,”—I said.

  With fifty patches painted on faces and limbs-so you sat there to my astonishment, you men of the present!

  And with fifty mirrors around you, which flattered your play of colors and repeated it!

  Truly, you could wear no better masks, you men of the present, than your own faces! Who could—recognize you!

  Written all over with the characters of the past, and these characters also penciled over with new characters-thus you have concealed yourselves well from all interpreters of signs!

  And even if one could try the reins, who still believes that you have reins! You seem to be baked out of colors and scraps of paper glued together.

  All times and peoples gaze many-colored from your veils; all customs and beliefs speak many-colored in your gestures.

  He who would strip you of veils and wrappers, and paints and gestures, would have just enough left to scare the crows.

  Truly, I am myself the scared crow that once saw you naked and without paint; and I flew away when the skeleton flirted with me.

  I would rather be a day laborer in the underworld among the shades of the bygone!—Indeed the underworldlings are fatter and fuller than you!

  This, yes this, is bitterness to my entrails, that I can endure you neither naked nor clothed, you men of the present!

  All that is unfamiliar in the future, and whatever makes strayed birds shiver, is truly more familiar and cozy than your “reality.”

  For thus you speak: “We are wholly real and without belief or superstition”: thus you thump your chests—ah, even with hollow chests!

  Indeed, how would you be able to believe, you many-colored ones!—you who are pictures of all that has ever been believed!

  You are walking refutations of belief and a fracture of all thought. Unbelievable: thus I call you, you real men!

  In your spirits all ages babble in confusion; and the dreaming and babbling of all ages were even more real than your waking lives!

  You are unfruitful: therefore you lack belief. But he who had to create, has always had his prescient dreams and astrological signs—and believed in belief!—

  You are half-open doors at which gravediggers wait. And this is your reality: “Everything deserves to perish.”

  Ah, how you stand there before me, you unfruitful ones; how lean your ribs! And indeed many of you have noticed that.

  Many a one has said: “Surely a god stole something from me secretly while I slept? Truly, enough to make a little woman for himself!

  “The poverty of my ribs is amazing!” thus many a man of the present has spoken.

  Yes, you are laughable to me, you men of the present! And especially when you marvel at yourselves!

  And woe to me if I could not laugh at your marveling, and had to swallow all that is repugnant in your bowels!

  As it is, however, I will take you more lightly, since I have to carry what is heavy; and does it matter if beetles and dragonflies also alight on my load!

  Truly, it shall not on that account become heavier to me! And not from you, you men of the present, shall my great weariness arise.—

  Ah, where shall I now ascend with my longing! From all mountains I look out for fatherlands and motherlands.

  But I have nowhere found a home: I am unsettled in every city and I depart from every gate.

  The men of the present, to whom my heart once drove me, are alien to me and a mockery; and I have been driven from fatherlands and motherlands.

  Thus I love only my children’s land, undiscovered in the remotest sea: I bid my sails to search and search for it.

  To my children I will make amends for being the child of my fathers: and to all the future-for this present!—

  Thus spoke Zarathustra.

  ON IMMACULATE PERCEPTION

  WHEN THE MOON ROSE yesterday I thought it was about to bear a sun: so broad and pregnant did it lie on the horizon.

  But it was a liar with its pregnancy; and I will sooner believe in the man in the moon than in the woman.

  To be sure, he is not much of a man either, that timid nightreveler. Truly, with a bad conscience he stalks over the roofs.

  For he is covetous and jealous, the monk in the moon; covetous of the earth, and all the joys of lovers.

  No, I do not like him, that tomcat on the roofs! I hate all that slink around half-closed windows !

  Piously and silently he stalks along on carpets of stars-but I do not like light-stepping feet on which not even a spur jingles.

  Every honest man’s step speaks; the cat, however, steals along over the ground. Behold, the moon comes along cat-like and dishonestly. —

  This parable I speak to you sentimental hypocrites, to you “pure knowers!” I call you—lustful!

  You too love the earth and the earthly: I have seen through you!-but shame is in your love and a bad conscience—you are like the moon!

  Your spirit has been persuaded to despise the earthly, but your entrails have not: these, however, are the strongest in you!

  And now your spirit is ashamed to be at the service of your entrails, and goes by-ways and lying ways to escape its own shame.

  “That would be the highest thing for me”—so your lying spirit says to itself—“to gaze upon life without desire, and not like the dog with its tongue hanging out,

  “To be happy in gazing: with a dead will, free from the grip and greed of selfishness—cold and grey as ash in body but with intoxicated moon-eyes!11

  “That would be the dearest thing to me”—thus does the seduced one seduce himself—“to love the earth as the moon loves it, and with the eye only to feel its beauty.

  “And this I call immaculate perception of all things: to want nothing else from them, but to be allowed to lie before them as a mirror with a hundred eyes.”—

  Oh, you sentimental hypocrites, you lustful ones! You lack innocence in your desire: and therefore now you slander desire!

  Truly, you do not love the earth as creators, procreators, and those who have joy in becoming!

  Where is innocence? Where there is will to procreation. And he who seeks to create beyond himself in my view has the purest will.

  Where is beauty? Where I must will with my whole will; where I will love and perish, that an image may not remain merely an image.

  Loving and perishing
: these have rhymed from eternity. Will to love: that is to be willing also to die. Thus I speak to you cowards!

  But now your emasculated leers wish to be “contemplation!” And that which can be examined with cowardly eyes is to be christened “beautiful!” Oh you befoulers of noble names!

  But it shall be your curse, you immaculate ones, you pure knowers, that you shall never give birth, even though you lie broad and pregnant on the horizon!

  Truly, you fill your mouth with noble words: and we are to believe that your heart overflows, you great liars?

  But my words are poor, despised, crooked words: I gladly pick up what falls from the table at your meals.

  I can still use them to speak-the truth to hypocrites! Yes, my fishbones, shells, and prickly leaves shall—tickle the noses of hypocrites!

  Bad air always surrounds you and your meals: your lustful thoughts, your lies and secrets are indeed in the air!

  Only dare to believe in yourselves-in yourselves and in your entrails! He who does not believe in himself always lies.

  You have put on a god’s mask, you “pure” ones: into a god’s mask your dreadful coiling snake has crawled.

  Truly, you deceive, you “contemplative ones!” Even Zarathustra was once the dupe of your godlike exterior; he did not guess at the serpent’s coil with which it was stuffed.

  I once thought I saw a god’s soul at play in your games, you pure knowers! Once I thought there was no better art than your arts!

  Distance concealed from me the serpent’s filth and foul odor: and that a lizard’s cunning crawled around lecherously.

  But I came near to you: then the day dawned for me—and now it dawns for you—the moon’s love affair is at an end!

  See there! Caught and pale it stands there-before the dawn!

  For already she comes, the glowing one-her love to the earth comes! All solar love is innocence and creative desire!

  See there, how she comes impatiently over the sea! Do you not feel the thirst and the hot breath of her love?

  She wants to suck at the sea and drink its depths to her height: now the desire of the sea rises with its thousand breasts.