Thus Spake Zarathustra, Friedrich Nietzsche [top fiction books of all time .TXT] 📗

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 someone 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 everyone’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, Ye‑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!”

II

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 today: 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 everyone 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