Nietzsche Thus spoke Zarathustra

English translation by Torsten

Schwanke

Zarathustra's preface

When Zarathustra was thirty years old, he left his home and the lake of his homeland and went into
the mountains. Here he enjoyed his spirit and his solitude and did not tire of it for ten years. Finally,
however, his heart changed, - and one morning he rose with the dawn, stood before the sun and
spoke to it thus:

„Great star! What happiness would you have if you did not have the one for whom shine!

Ten years you came up here to my cave: you would have been satisfied with your light and this way
without me, my eagle and my snake.

But we waited for you every morning, took your abundance and blessed you for it.

Behold! I am weary of my Wisdom, like the bee that has gathered too much of the honey, I need
hands to stretch out.

I want to give away and distribute, until the wise among men have once more rejoiced in their folly
and the poor once more in their riches.

For this I must go down into the depths: as you do the evening when you go beyond the sea and
bring light to the underworld, you overflowing star!

I must, like you, go down, as the people call it, to whom I want to descend.

Bless me then, O calm eye, which can see without envy even the greatest happiness!

Bless the cup that will overflow, that the water may flow out of it golden, and carry everywhere the
radiance of your delight!
Behold! This cup will become empty again, and Zarathustra will become man again.“

- So began the downfall of Zarathustra.

Zarathustra climbed down the mountain alone and no one met him. But when he came into the
woods, an old man stood before him who had left his holy hut to search for roots in the forest. And
so the old man spoke to Zarathustra:

„I am no stranger to this wanderer: some years ago he passed by here. His name was Zarathustra,
but he has changed.

In those days you carried your ashes to the mountains: will you carry your fire into the valleys
today? Do you not fear the punishment of the arsonist?

Yes, I recognize Zarathustra. His eye is pure, and there is no disgust in his mouth. Does he not walk
like a dancer?

Zarathustra has been transformed, Zarathustra was made a child, Zarathustra is an awakened man:
what do you want now with the sleeping?

As in the sea, you lived in solitude, and the sea carried you. Woe betide you if you go ashore! Woe
betide you if you carry your own body again!“

Zarathustra replied, „I love men.“

„Why,“ said the saint, „did I go into the forest and the wasteland? Was it not because I loved people
too much?

Now I love GOD: I do not love people. Man is too imperfect a thing for me. Love for man would
kill me.“

Zarathustra replied, „Why did I speak of love? I bring a gift to mankind!“

„Give them nothing,“ said the saint. „Better take something from them and carry it with them - that
will do them the most good: if only it will do you good!

And if you want to give them, do not give more than charity, and make them beg for it!“

„No“, answered Zarathustra, „I do not give alms. I am not poor enough.“

The Saint laughed at Zarathustra and said: „See that they accept your treasures! They are suspicious
of the hermits and do not believe that we come to give.

Our footsteps sound too lonely to them through the alleys. And as when they hear a man walking in
their beds at night long before the sun rises, they wonder: where is the thief going?

Do not go to the people, stay in the forest! Rather go to the animals! Why won't you be like me - a
bear among bears, a bird among birds!“
„And what's the saint doing in the forest?“ asked Zarathustra.

The saint replied, „I make songs and sing them, and when I make songs I laugh, cry and growl: so I
praise GOD.

With singing, weeping, laughing and humming I praise the GOD who is my GOD. But what do you
bring us as a gift?“

When Zarathustra heard these words, he greeted the saint and said, „What have I to give you? But
let me go quickly, for I am taking nothing from you!“ - And so they parted, the old man and the
young man, laughing like two boys.

But when Zarathustra was alone, he said to his heart: „Is it possible! This old saint has not yet heard
in his forest that GOD is dead?"

When Zarathustra came to the next town, which is situated at the woods, he found there a lot of
people gathered at the market: because it had been promised that a tightrope walker should be seen.
And Zarathustra spoke to the people:

„I will teach you the superhuman. Man is something that must be overcome. What have you done to
overcome him?

All beings so far have created something beyond themselves: and you want to be the ebb of this
great flood and prefer to go back to the animal rather than to overcome man?

What is the monkey to man? A laughter or a painful shame. And in the same way man shall be for
the superhuman: a laughter or a painful shame.

You have made the way from worm to man, and much is still worm in you. Once you were
monkeys, and even now man is still more ape than any ape.

But he who is the wisest among you is but a hermaphrodite of plant and ghost. But do I call you
ghosts or plants?

Behold, I teach you the superhuman!

The superhuman is the meaning of the earth. Your will says: the superhuman is the purpose of the
earth!

I beseech you, my brothers, remain faithful to the earth and do not believe those who tell you of
supernatural hopes. They are poisoners, whether they know it or not.

They are despisers of life, the dying and the poisoned themselves, of whom the earth is tired: so let
them go!

Once the iniquity against GOD was the greatest iniquity, but GOD died, and so did those who did
wrong. To commit iniquity against the earth is now the most terrible thing, and the bowels of the
unfathomable must be held in higher esteem than the meaning of the earth!
Once the soul looked contemptuously upon the body: and at that time this contempt was the highest
thing - it wanted it lean, horrible, starved. So the soul thought to escape from the body and the earth.

Oh, this soul itself was still lean, horrible and starved: and cruelty was the lust of this soul!

But you too, my brothers, tell me: what does your body tell of your soul? Is not your soul poverty
and filth and a miserable comfort?

Verily, a dirty river is man. One must be a sea to be able to receive a dirty stream without becoming
unclean.

Behold, I teach you the superhuman: he is this sea, in him your great contempt can be submerged.

What is the greatest thing you can experience? This is the hour of great contempt. The hour in
which also your happiness becomes disgusting and also your reason and your virtue.

The hour in which you say: What is the reason for my happiness? It is poverty and dirt and a
miserable comfort. But my happiness should justify existence itself!

The hour when you say, What is my reason? Does it crave knowledge like a lion craves food? It is
poverty and filth and a miserable comfort!

The hour when you say, What is my virtue! It has not yet made me a race. How weary I am of my
good and my evil! All this is poverty and filth and miserable comfort!

The hour when you say, What is the cause of my justice? I don't see that I am embers and coals. But
the righteous man is coal and fire.

The hour when you say, What is the cause of my suffering? Isn't pity the cross on which the one
who loves people is nailed? But my pity isn't a crucifixion.

Have you spoken like this before? Have you ever screamed like that? Oh, I wish I had heard you
scream like that.

Not your sin - your frugality screams to heaven, your stinginess even in your sins screams to
heaven!

Where is the lightning that licks you with its tongue? Where is the madness with which you should
be inoculated?

Behold, I teach you the superhuman: he is this lightning, he is this madness!“...

When Zarathustra had spoken like this, one of the people shouted: „We have heard enough of the
tightrope walker; now let us see him too!“ And all the people laughed at Zarathustra. But the
tightrope walker, who believed that the word was his, set about his work.

But Zarathustra looked at the people and wondered. Then he spoke:

„Man is a rope tied between beast and superhuman - a rope over a precipice.
A dangerous crossing, a dangerous going on the way, a dangerous looking back, a dangerous
shuddering and stopping.

What is great in man is that he is a bridge and not a purpose: what can be loved in man is that he is
a transition and a downfall.

I love those who do not know how to live, except as those who perish, for they are the ones who
pass over.

I love the great despisers because they are the great worshippers and arrows of longing for the other
shore.

I love those who do not seek a reason to sink behind the stars and be victims: but those who
sacrifice themselves to the earth so that the earth may one day become the superhuman.

I love the one who lives so that he may know, and who wants to know so that the superhuman may
one day live. And so he wants his downfall.

I love the one who works and invents to prepare the building of the house for the superhuman, and
to him earth, animal and plant: for that is how he wants his downfall.

I love him who loves his virtue: for virtue is the will to destruction and an arrow of longing.

I love him who does not keep a drop of spirit for himself, but wants to be completely the spirit of
his virtue: thus he crosses the bridge as a spirit.

I love him who makes of his virtue his inclination and his fate: so for the sake of his virtue he wants
to live and no longer exist.

I love him who does not want to have too many virtues. One virtue is more virtue than two, because
it are more knots on which fate hangs.

I love him whose soul is wasted, who does not want thanks and does not give back: for he always
gives and does not want to preserve.

I love him who is ashamed when the lot falls to his luck and then asks: am I a false player? - for he
wants to perish.

I love him who throws golden words before his deeds and still keeps more than he promises: for he
wants to perish.

I love him who justifies the future and redeems the past: for he wants to perish in the present.

I love him who chastises his GOD, because he loves his GOD: for he must perish in the wrath of his
GOD.

I love him whose soul is deep even in the wounded, and who can perish by a little experience: so he
likes to cross the bridge.

I love him whose soul is overflowing, so that he forgets himself, and all things are in him: so all
things will be his downfall.
I love him who is free of mind and heart: so his head is only the bowels of his heart, but his heart
drives him to ruin.

I love all those who are like heavy drops falling one by one from the dark cloud hanging over man:
they proclaim that lightning is coming and perish as preachers.

Behold, I am a preacher of lightning, and a heavy drop from the cloud: but this lightning is called
superhuman.“

When Zarathustra had spoken these words, he looked at the people again and kept silent. „There
they stand,“ he said to his heart, „there they laugh: they do not understand me, I am not the mouth
for these ears.

Must their ears first be crushed so that they may learn to hear with their eyes? Must one rattle like
kettledrums and preachers of repentance? Or do they believe only the stammering?

They have something to be proud of. What do they call it that makes them proud? They call it
education, it distinguishes them from the goatherds.

That's why they don't like to hear the word contempt in their mouths. So I will speak to their pride
and joy.

I will speak to them of the most contemptible thing, but that is the last man.“

And thus Zarathustra spoke to the people:

„It is time for man to set his purpose in life. It is time for man to plant the seed of his highest hope.

His soil is still rich enough for that. But this soil will one day be poor and tame, and no tall tree will
be able to grow from it.

Don't you dare? There comes a time when man does not throw the arrow of his longing very much
beyond man, and has forgotten how to buzz the sinew of his bow!

I tell you: one must still have chaos in oneself to be able to give birth to a dancing star! I say to you:
you still have chaos within you.

Woe! The time will come when man will no longer give birth to a star. Woe! There comes a time of
the most contemptible man, who can no longer despise himself.

Look, I'll show you the last man.

What is love? What is creation? What is longing? What is a star? - the last man asks.

The earth has then become small, and on it the last man, who makes everything small, jumps. His
race is indelible like the flea of the earth; the last man lives the longest.

We have invented happiness - say the last man.

They have left the areas where it was hard to live: because one needs warmth. One still loves his
neighbour and rubs against him: for one needs warmth...

To be sick and distrustful is sinful to them: one walks along attentively. A fool that still stumbles
over stones or people!

A little poison every now and then: that makes pleasant dreams... And a lot of poison in the end, for
a pleasant dying...

One is still working, because work is a conversation. But you make sure that the conversation
doesn't attack you.

You no longer become rich and poor: both are too burdensome. Who wants to govern anymore?
Who else wants to obey? Both are too burdensome.

No shepherd and one flock! Everyone wants the same, everyone is equal: whoever feels differently,
voluntarily goes to the madhouse...

Once the whole world was mad - say the finest and blink.

One is wise and knows everything that has happened: there is no end to mock. One still quarrels,
but one soon reconciles - otherwise it spoils the stomach...

One has his desire for the day and his desire for the night: but he honours health.

We invented happiness - say the last man and blink.“

And here the first speech of Zarathustra, which is also called "the preface", ended: for at this point
the shouting and the lust of the crowd interrupted him. „Give us these last men, O Zarathustra“, they
cried, „create us these last men! And so we give you the superhuman!“ And all the people cheered
and clicked their tongues. But Zarathustra was grieved and said to his heart:

„They do not understand me: I am not the mouth for these ears.

Too long have I lived in the mountains, too much have I listened only to streams and trees: now I
speak to them as the goatherds do.

My soul is as motionless and light as the mountains in the morning. But they think I am cold and a
mocker in terrible jest.

And now they look at me and laugh: and by laughing they still hate me! There is ice in their
laughter.“

But then something happened that made every mouth silent and every eye rigid. For in the
meantime the tightrope walker had begun his work: he had stepped out of a small door and walked
over the rope that was stretched between two towers, so that it hung over the market and the people.
When he was just in the middle of his way, the small door opened again, and a colorful companion,
like a jester, jumped out and followed the first one with quick steps. „Forward, lame foot,“ cried his
terrible voice, „forward, sloth, creeper, paleface! Don't let me tickle you with my heel! What are
you doing between towers? You belong in the tower, they should lock you up, you shall be better
than you are, you block the way!“ And with every word he came closer and closer to him: but when
he was only one step behind him, the terrible thing happened, which made every mouth silent and
every eye rigid - he uttered a scream like a devil and jumped over whoever was in his way. But
when he saw his rival win, he lost his head and the rope; he threw away his pole and shot down
faster than it, like a whirl of arms and legs. The market and the people resembled as the sea when
the storm came in: everything fled apart and over each other, and most of all where the body had to
fall down.

But Zarathustra stopped, and just beside him the body fell, badly battered and broken, but not yet
dead. After a while the shattered man regained consciousness and saw Zarathustra kneeling beside
him. „What are you doing?“ he finally said, „I knew for a long time that the devil would trip me up.
Now he drags me to hell: will you fight with him?“

„By my honor, friend,“ Zarathustra replied, „there is no such thing as what you are talking about:
there is no devil and no hell. Your soul will be dead even quicker than your body: fear no more!“

The man looked up suspiciously. „If you speak the truth“, he then said, „I lose nothing if I lose life.
I'm not much more than an animal that was taught to dance by beatings and small bites.“

„Not so“, said Zarathustra, „you have made your profession out of danger, there is nothing to
despise in that. Now you will perish in your profession, and I will bury you with my hands.“

When Zarathustra had said this, the dying man did not answer; but he moved his hand as if seeking
the hand of Zarathustra to thank him.

Meanwhile evening came, and the market was in darkness: the people lost their way, for even
curiosity and horror grow tired. But Zarathustra sat beside the dead man on the earth and was lost in
thought: so he forgot the time. Finally night fell, and a cold wind blew over the lonely man. Then
Zarathustra rose and said to his heart:

„Truly, a fine catch Zarathustra made today! He did not catch a man, but he did catch a corpse.

Human existence is uncanny and still without meaning: a buffoon can become his undoing.

I want to teach people the meaning of their being: which is the superhuman, the lightning from the
dark cloud of man.

But I am still far away from them, and one mind does not speak to their minds. I am still a middle
between a fool and a corpse.

Dark is the night, dark are the ways of Zarathustra. Come, you cold and stiff companion! I will
carry you where I bury you with my own hands.“

8
When Zarathustra had said this to his heart, he loaded the corpse onto his back and set off. And not
yet had he walked a hundred paces, when a man crept up to him and whispered in his ear - and
behold! He who spoke was the buffoon from the tower. „Go away from this city, O Zarathustra,“ he
said, „too many hate you here! The good and righteous hate thee, and they call you their enemy and
despiser: the believers of the right faith hate you, and they call you the danger of the multitude. It
was your good fortune that they laughed at you: and verily thou talkest like a buffoon. It was your
good fortune that you joined the dead dog: when you humbled yourself in this way, you saved
yourself for this day. But go away from this city or tomorrow I'll jump over you, a living man over a
dead man.“ And when he had said this, the man disappeared; but Zarathustra went on through the
dark alleys.

At the gate of the city the gravedigger met him: he shone a torch in his face, he knew Zarathustra
and mocked him very much. „Zarathustra carries the dead dog away: well-behaved that Zarathustra
became the gravedigger! For my hands are too clean for this roast. Will Zarathustra steal the devil's
bite? Come on, then! And good luck with your meal! If only the devil isn't a better thief than
Zarathustra! He steals them both, he eats them both!“

Zarathustra said not a word about it and went his way. When he had walked for two hours, past
woods and swamps, he had heard too much the hungry howling of the wolves, and hunger came to
him himself. So he stopped at a lonely house where a light was burning.

"Hunger overtakes me," said Zarathustra, "like a robber. In woods and marshes my hunger
overtakes me, and in deep night.

My hunger has strange whims. Often it comes after a meal, and today it didn't come all day: where
did it stay?“

And with that Zarathustra struck at the gate of the house. An old man appeared, carrying the light,
and asked, „Who will come to me and to my dreadful sleep?“

„One living and one dead,“ said Zarathustra, „give me food and drink, I forget in the daytime. He
who feeds the hungry refreshes his own soul: thus speaks Lady Wisdom.“

The old man went away, but came right back and offered Zarathustra bread and wine. „It's an evil
place for the hungry,“ he said, „that's why I live here. Man and beast come to me, the hermit. But let
your companion eat and drink, for he is more weary than you.“ Zarathustra replied, „Dead is my
companion, I shall hardly persuade him.“ - „It's none of my business,“ the old man said sullenly,
„whoever knocks at my house must also take what I offer him. Eat and be well!“

Then Zarathustra walked another two hours and trusted the way and the light of the stars: for he was
a habitual night-walker and loved to look into the face of all who slept. But when Aurora dawned,
Zarathustra found himself in a deep forest, and no path showed itself to him. So he laid the dead
man in a hollow tree to his head - for he wanted to protect him from the wolves - and himself on the
ground and the moss. And immediately he fell asleep, tired body, but with an unmoved soul.

For a long time Zarathustra slept, and not only did the dawn pass over his face, but also the
morning. Finally, however, his eye opened: in wonder, Zarathustra looked into the forest and the
silence, in wonder he looked within himself. Then he rose quickly, like a sailor who suddenly saw
land, and rejoiced: for he saw a new truth. And so he spoke to his heart:
„A light came to me: I need companions, and living companions, not dead companions, and bodies
to carry with me wherever I go.

But I need living companions who follow me because they want to follow themselves - and
wherever I want to go.

A light came to me: do not speak to the people, but to companions! Zarathustra shall not become a
shepherd and a dog in a flock!

To lure many away from the herd - that is what I came to do. The people and the flock shall be
angry with me: robber shall call the shepherds Zarathustra.

I say shepherds, but they call themselves the good and righteous. I say shepherds, but they call
themselves the believers of the right faith.

Behold the good and the just! Whom do they hate the most? He who breaks their table of values, the
breaker, the criminal - but this is the creator.

Behold the believers of every faith! Whom do they hate most? He who breaks their table of values,
the breaker, the criminal, but this is the creator.

The creator seeks companions, not corpses, nor flocks, nor believers. The creator seeks the fellow-
creators, those who write new values on new tablets.

The creator seeks companions, and co-creators: for everything is ripe for harvest with him. But he
lacks the hundred sickles: so he plucks out ears of grain and is angry.

The creator seeks companions and those who know how to sharpen their sickles. They will be
called destroyers and despisers of good and evil. But they are the reaping and the celebrating.

Co-creator seeks Zarathustra, co-harvesters and co-partyers seeks Zarathustra: what does he have to
do with flocks and shepherds and dead corpses!

And you, my first companion, be well! I buried you well in your hollow tree, I saved you from the
wolves.

But I'm going to part with you now. Time's up. Between dawn and dusk a new truth came to me.

I shall not be a shepherd, I shall not be gravedigger. Not once will I speak again to the people; for
the last time I spoke to a dead.

I will join those who create, those who harvest, those who celebrate: I will show them the rainbow
and all the steps of the superhuman.

To the hermits I will sing my song; and to him who still has ears for unheard-of things I will make
his heart heavy with my happiness.

To my goal I will go my way; over the hesitant and the faltering, I will jump over them. So let my
walk be their downfall!“
10

Zarathustra had said this to his heart when the sun stood at noon: then he looked up inquiringly - for
he heard above him the sharp call of a bird. And behold! An eagle moved in wide circles through
the air, and on it hung a snake, not like a prey, but like a friend: for it hung around his neck.

„They are my animals,“ said Zarathustra, rejoicing with all his heart.

„The proudest animal under the sun and the cleverest animal under the sun - they went out on
clientele.

They want to find out if Zarathustra is still alive. And am I still alive?

I found it more dangerous among humans than among animals, Zarathustra takes dangerous paths.
May my animals guide me!“

When Zarathustra had said this, he remembered the words of the saint in the wood, he sighed and
thus spoke to his heart:

„Would that I were wiser! I want to be wise from the bottom up, like my snake!

But I ask the impossible: I ask my pride always to walk with my Lady Wisdom!

And if my Lady Wisdom leaves me once - oh, she loves to fly away! - may my pride fly with my
folly!“

And thus began Zarathustra's downfall.

The speaches of Zarathustra

On the three transformations

Three transformations I call you of the spirit: as the spirit becomes a camel, and the camel a lion,
and the lion a child.

Much heaviness is given to the spirit, the strong, bearing spirit, which is filled with awe: after the
heavy and heaviest thing its strength demands.

What is heavy? asks the spirit, the strong and docile spirit, kneels down like a camel and wants to
be well loaded.

What is the heaviest thing, heroes? asks the slow spirit, so that I may take it upon myself and rejoice
in my strength.

Is it not this: to humble oneself in order to wipe out his own pride? To let his Dame Folly shine to
mock his Lady Wisdom?

Or is it this: to part from our reason when it celebrates its victory? To climb high mountains to
tempt the tempter?
Or is it this: to feed on acorns and grass of knowledge, and suffer hunger in the soul for the truth?

Or is it this: being sick and sending home the comforter and making friends with the deaf that never
hear what you want?

Or is it this: to rise into dirty water when it is the water of truth, and not reject cold frogs and hot
toads?

Or is it this: to love those who love and despise, and to reach out your hand to the ghost when it
wants to make us afraid?

All these heaviest things are taken upon himself by the sluggish spirit: like the camel that hurries
loaded into the desert, so he hurries into his desert.

But in the most lonely desert the second transformation takes place: the spirit becomes a lion there,
he wants to capture freedom and be master in his own desert.

He seeks his master there: he wants to become an enemy to him and his GOD, he wants to fight for
victory with the great dragon.

Which is the great dragon, whom the spirit may no longer call Lord and GOD? „Thou shalt not“ is
the name of the great dragon. But the spirit of the lion says, „I will.“

„Thou shalt not“ lies in his path, glistening with gold, a scaly animal, and on every scale shines a
golden „Thou shalt not!“

A thousand year old values shine on these scales, and so the mightiest of all dragons says: „All
value of things - it shines on me.

All value was already created, and all value created is me. Verily, there shall be no more: I will!“ So
speaks the dragon.

My brothers, why do we need the lion in spirit? What is not enough of the beast of burden, which is
renounced and reverenced?

To create new values - even the lion is not yet able to do that: but freedom to create new creations -
that is what the power of the lion is able to give.

Freedom to create and a holy „no“ even before duty: for this, my brothers, the lion is needed.

Taking the right to new values - that is the most terrible taking for a sustainable and reverent spirit.
Verily, it is a robbing thing to him and a robbing beast.

As his holiest thing he once loved the „Thou should not“: now he must find delusion and
arbitrariness even in the holiest thing, that he robs himself of his freedom, of his love: the lion is
needed for this robbery.

But say, my brothers, what is the child able to do that even the lion is not able to do? What else
must the robbing lion become a child?
Innocence is the child and forgetting, a new beginning, a game, a wheel rolling out, a first
movement, a holy „Yes“.

Yes, to play the game of creation, my brothers, a holy saying of „yes“ is needed: his will is now
wanted by the spirit, his world wins over those who are lost in the world.

Three transformations I called you of the spirit: as the spirit became a camel, and the camel a lion,
and the lion at last a child.

Thus spoke Zarathustra. And at that time he stayed in the city that is called: the colorful cow.

On the chairs of virtue

A wise man who knew how to speak well of sleep and of virtue was praised to Zarathustra: he was
honoured and rewarded for it, and all the young men sat before his chair. Zarathustra went to him,
and he sat before his chair with all the young men. And so the wise man said:

„Honour before sleep! This is the first! And to avoid all those who sleep badly and keep watch at
night!

The thief is still ashamed before sleep: he always steals quietly through the night. But shameless is
the watchman of the night, shameless is he who wears his horn.

Sleeping is no small art: it is necessary to keep awake all day long.

Ten times a day thou must overcome thyself: it is a good tiredness, and the poppy of the soul.

Ten times you must reconcile yourself with yourself, for overcoming is bitterness, and the
unforgiven sleeps badly.

You must find ten truths by day; otherwise you will seek for truth by night, and your soul will
remain thirsty.

You must laugh ten times a day and be cheerful, or your stomach will disturb you at night, this
father of sorrows.

Few know this: but one must have all the virtues to sleep well. Will I bear false witness? Will I
commit adultery?

Will I take lust from my neighbor's maid? All these things would go badly with a good night's
sleep...

And even if one has all the virtues, one must still agree on one thing: to send even the virtues to
sleep at the right time.

Don't let them quarrel with each other, the good women! And about you, you wretch!

Peace with GOD and with your neighbor: that is what a good sleep wants. And peace also with your
neighbour's devil! Or else he will come after you in the night...
Honour and to authority and obedience to authority. That's the way a good sleep wants it. It's not my
fault that the power likes to walk on crooked legs.

He shall always be called the best shepherd who leads his sheep to the greenest meadow: so it is
compatible with a good sleep.

I will not much honor, nor much treasure, but it sears the spleen. But badly is sleep without a good
name and a little treasure.

A little company is more welcome to me than an evil one: but it must go and come at the right time.
Thus it is compatible with a good sleep.

I also love the poor in spirit: they promote sleep. Blessed are they, especially if they are always
proved right.

So the day of the virtuous runs. Come night! I will not call for sleep. He who is the Lord of virtues,
sleep, it will not be called.

But I think what I did and thought that day. Ruminantly I ask myself, patiently like a cow: what
were your ten overcomings?

And what were the ten reconciliations and the ten truths and the ten laughter with which my heart
made peace?

Pondering these things, and being weighed down by forty thoughts, suddenly sleep, the uncalled,
the Lord of virtues, overcomes me.

Sleep comes knocking on my eyes: it is difficult. Sleep touches my mouth: it remains open.

Verily, on soft soles he comes to me, the dearest of thieves, and steals my thoughts from me: stupid
I stand there like this chair.

But I do not stand much longer: there I lie already.“

So when Zarathustra heard the wise man speak, he laughed in his heart: for a light had been shone
upon him. And thus he spoke to his heart:

„A fool is this wise man with his forty thoughts: but I think that he is a good sleeper.

Happy is he who lives near this wise man! Such a sleep is contagious, nor through a thick wall does
it become contagious.

There is a magic even in his chair. And not in vain did the young men sit before this preacher of
virtue.

His wisdom is: awake to sleep well. And indeed, if life had no meaning and if I had to choose
nonsense, this would be the most worthy nonsense for me too!

Now, I clearly understand what was once sought above all else when one sought teachers of virtue:
Good sleep was sought, and poppy-virtues as well!
To all these vowed sages on the chairs, Wisdom was sleep without dreams: they knew no better
meaning of life.

Even today there are still some, like this preacher of virtue, and not always so honest: but their time
is over. And they will not stand much longer: there they lie.

Blessed are these sleepy ones: for they shall soon doze off!“

Thus spoke Zarathustra.

On the preachers of the beyond

Once upon a time, Zarathustra also cast his madness beyond mankind, like all preachers of the
beyond. The world seemed to me to be the work of a suffering and tormented GOD.

The world seemed to me like a dream and the poetry of GOD, coloured smoke before the eyes of a
divinely unsatisfied person.

Good and evil and lust and suffering and me and you - coloured smoke it seemed to me before
creative eyes. The Creator wanted to look away from himself - so he created the world.

It is the suffering man's drunken lust to look away from his suffering and lose himself... Drunken
lust and losing oneself is what the world once thought of me...

This world, the for ever imperfect one, the image of a contradiction and imperfect image - a
drunken lust of its Creator - so once I thought about the world.

So I too once cast my delusion beyond man, like all the preachers of the beyond. Beyond man in
truth?

Oh, brothers, this GOD I created was man's work and madness, like all gods!

He was man, and only a poor piece of man and me: out of his own ashes and embers he came to me,
this ghost, and verily! He did not come to me from the beyond!

What happened, my brothers? I overcame myself, my suffering, I carried my own ashes to the
mountains, I invented a brighter flame. And behold! And the ghost departed from me!

Suffering would be it for me now and torment for the convalescent to believe such ghosts: suffering
would be it for me now and humiliation. So I speak to the preachers of the beyond.

Suffering was it and inability that created all after-worlds; and that brief madness of happiness that
only the most suffering experiences.

Tiredness that wants to jump to the last, with a leap of death, a poor ignorant tiredness that doesn't
even want anymore: that created all gods and after-worlds.

Believe it, my brothers! It was the body that despaired of the body - it was the body that groped the
last walls with the fingers of the beguiled spirit.
Believe it, my brothers! It was the body that despaired of the earth - it heard the belly of being
speak to itself.

And then he wanted to pass through the last walls with his head, and not only with his head - over to
that other world.

But that other world is well hidden from man, that dehumanized inhuman world, which is a
heavenly nothing; and the belly of being does not speak to man at all, except as man.

Verily, difficult it is to prove all being and difficult to make it speak. Tell me, brethren, is not the
most wondrous of things still the best proved?

Yes, this ego and this ego's contradiction and confusion still speaks most honestly of its being, this
creating, wanting, evaluating ego, which is the measure and value of all things.

And this most honest being, the ego - that speaks of the body, and it still wants the body, even if it
swarms and flutters with broken wings.

It learns to speak ever more honestly, the ego: and the more it learns, the more it finds words and
honours for body and earth.

A new pride was taught to me by my ego, which I teach men: no longer to bury its head in the sand
of heavenly things, but to carry it freely, an earthly head that creates meaning for the earth!

I teach men a new will: to want this way, which man has blindly gone, and to approve of it, and no
longer creep aside from it, like the sick and dying!

It was the sick and the dying, who despised body and earth, who invented the heavenly and the
drops of blood that redeemed: but he also took these sweet and dark poisons from body and earth!

He wanted to escape from his misery, and the stars were too far for him. Then he sighed: „Oh, that
there were heavenly ways to creep into another being and happiness!“ He invented his tricks and
bloody potions!

Enraptured from his body and from this earth, he thought he was ungrateful. But to whom did he
thank his rapture of delight and delight? His body and this earth.

Gentle is Zarathustra to the sick. Verily, he is not angry with their ways of comfort and ingratitude.
May they become healers and conquerors and create a higher body for themselves!

Not even Zarathustra is angry with the convalescent when he looks tenderly at his delusion and
creeps around the grave of his GOD at midnight: but sickness and a sick body remain to me even
his tears.

There has always been a great number of pathological people among those who are dense and
godly; they are angry and hate the one who knows, and the youngest of the virtues, which is called
Honesty.

They always look back to dark times: of course, madness and faith were different things; the frenzy
of reason was similar to GOD, and doubt was sin.
All too well I know these godlike people: they want people to believe in them, and doubt is sin. All
too well I also know what they themselves believe in.

Not in after-worlds and drops of blood, but in the body they also believe, and their own body is
their own thing-in-itself.

But it is a pathological thing to them, and they would like to get out of their skin. Therefore they
listen to the preachers of death and preach after-worlds to themselves.

Listen rather, my brothers, to the voice of the healthy body: a more honest and pure voice is this.

More honest and pure speaks the healthy body, the perfect and right-angled body: and it speaks of
the purpose of the earth.

Thus spoke Zarathustra.

On the despisers of the body

To the despisers of the body I will give my word. They shall not retrain or teach me, but only say
good-bye to their own bodies - and thus become dumb.

„I am body and soul“, so the child says. And why shouldn't we talk like children?

But the awakened one, the one who knows, says: Body I am completely and nothing else; and soul
is only a word for something in the body.

The body is a great reason, a multiplicity with one sense, a war and a peace, a flock and a shepherd.

The instrument of your body is also your little reason, my brethren, which you call Spirit, a little
work and plaything of your great reason.

„Ego“, you say and are proud of that word. But the greater thing is what you do not want to believe
in - your body and its great reason: it does not say Ego but does Ego.

What the mind feels, what the spirit recognizes, never has an end in itself. But mind and spirit want
to persuade you that they are the end of all things: that is how vain they are.

Toys and implements are sense and spirit: behind them still lies the self. The self also searches with
the eyes of the senses; it also listens with the ears of the spirit.

The self always listens and searches: it compares, conquers, destroys. It rules and is also the master
of the ego.

Behind your thoughts and feelings, my brethren, there is a mighty ruler, an unknown wise man - he
is called self. In your body he dwells, he is your body.

There is more reason in your body than in your best wisdom. And who knows what your body
needs for your best wisdom?
Thy self laughs at thy ego and its proud leaps. „What are these leaps and bounds of thought?“ it
says. „A detour to my purpose. I am the passage of the ego and the blower of its terms.“

The self says to the ego, „here, feel pain!“ And there it suffers and thinks how it no longer suffers -
and that's what it should think about.

The self says to the ego „Here, feel pleasure!“ There it rejoices and thinks, as it often rejoices - and
it should think about that.

To the despisers of the body I will say a word. That they despise, that is what they do. What is it that
created respect and contempt and value and will?

The creating self created respect and contempt for itself, it created desire and pain. The creating
body created the spirit as a hand of its will.

Still in your folly and contempt, ye despisers of the body, you serve your own self. I tell you: your
self wants to die, and turns away from life.

No longer is it able to do what it wants most of all - to go beyond itself. That is what it wants most
of all, that is its whole fervor.

But it was too late for it now - so let your self perish, ye despisers of the body.

Your self wants to go down, and that is why ye became despisers of the body! For you are no longer
able to create beyond yourselves.

And that is why you are now angry with life and earth. An unconscious envy is in the soulful gaze
of your contempt.

I will not go your way, ye despisers of the body! You are no bridges to the superhuman!

Thus spoke Zarathustra.

On the joys and passions

My brother, if you have a virtue and it is your virtue, you have it in common with no other.

You will call it by name, and caress it, and pluck at its ears, and indulge in pastimes with it.

And behold! Now you have its name in common with the people, and have become both people and
flock with your virtue.

You would do better to say: „Inexpressible and nameless is that which torments and sweetens my
soul and is the hunger of my bowels.“

Your virtue be too great for the confidentiality of names: and if you must speak of it, be not
ashamed to stammer of it.

Thus speak and stammer: „This is my good, this I love, this I like completely, this alone I want: the
good.
I do not want it as one of GOD's laws, I do not want it as one of man's statutes and needs: no sign is
it for me for the super-earth and paradise.

It is an earthly virtue that I love: there is a little Wisdom in it, and least of all reason.

But this bird built its nest with me: therefore I love and cherish it, - now it sits with me on its golden
eggs.“

Thus you shall stammer and praise your virtue.

Once you had passions and called them evil. But now you have only your virtues, which grew out
of your passions.

You put your highest purpose to these passions: then they became your virtues and your pleasures.

And whether you were of the race of the irascible, or of the lustful, or of the faith-seeking, or of the
vengeful:

In the end, all your passions became virtues and all your demons became angels.

Once you had wild dogs in your cellar: but in the end they turned into birds and lovely singers.

From your poisons you brewed your balm; your cow of mourning you milked - now you drink the
sweet milk of her udder...

And nothing evil will grow out of you henceforth, except the evil that grows out of the struggle of
your virtues.

My brother, if you are happy, you have one virtue and no more: you will cross the bridge more
easily.

It is excellent to have many virtues, but a hard lot; and some went into the desert and killed
themselves because they were tired of being battle and battlefield of virtues.

My brother, is war and battle an evil? But necessary is this evil; necessary is envy and distrust and
slander among your virtues.

Behold how every one of your virtues covets the Most High: it wants all your spirit to be its herald,
it wants all your strength in anger, hatred and love.

Every virtue is jealous of the other, and a terrible thing is jealousy. Even virtues may perish in
jealousy.

Whom the flame of jealousy surrounds, the last, like the scorpion, turns the poisoned sting against
himself.

Alas, my brother, have you never seen a virtue slandering and stabbing itself?

Man is something that must be overcome: and therefore you shall love your virtues - for you will
perish in them.“
Thus spoke Zarathustra.

On the pale criminal

You will not kill, ye judges and victims, until the animal has nodded? Behold, the pale criminal has
nodded: out of his eyes speaks the great contempt.

„My ego is something that is to be overcome: my ego is the great contempt of man“: this is what it
says from this eyes.

That he judged himself was his supreme moment: do not let the exalted man return to his lowly
state!

There is no redemption for the one who suffers so much from himself, except a quick death...

Let your killing, ye judges, be a pity, not a revenge. And by killing, see that you yourselves justify
life!

It is not enough that you reconcile with the one you kill. Let your sadness be love for the
superhuman: that is how you justify your life!

You should say „enemy“ but not „villain“; you should say „sick“ but not „wretch“; you should say
„fool“ but not „sinner“.

And you, red judge, if you wanted to say aloud what you have already done in your thoughts:
everyone would cry out, „Away with this filth and poisonous worm!“

But another is thought, another is action, another is the image of action. The wheel of reason does
not roll between them.

One image made this man pale. He was equal in stature to his deed when he did it, but he could not
bear its image when it was done.

He always saw himself now as the doer of one deed. I call this madness: the exception turned into
the essence.

The stroke banished the hen; the prank he played banished his poor reason – I call this the madness
after the deed.

Hear, ye judges! There is another madness, and it is before the deed. Alas, ye go not deep enough
into my soul.

Thus says the red judge: „Why did this criminal murder? He meant to rob.“ But I tell you, his soul
desired for blood, not for robbery: he thirsted for the happiness of the knife!

But his poor reason could not understand this madness and persuaded him. „What is blood in
blood?“ said his reason, „will you not make a robbery of it at least? To take revenge?“

And he hearkened to his poor reason: her speech was as lead upon him, there he robbed as he
murdered. He would not be ashamed of his madness.
And now again the lead of his iniquity is upon him, and again his poor reason is so stiff, so
paralyzed, so heavy.

If he could only shake his head, his burden would roll down: but who is shaking this head?

What is this person? A heap of diseases, which reach out into the world through the spirit: there they
want to make their prey.

What is this person? A bunch of wild snakes, which seldom have peace together, they go away for
themselves and look for prey in the world.

Look at this poor body! What he suffered and desired, this poor soul interpreted to herself, it
interpreted it as murderous lust and greed for the happiness of the knife.

Whoever falls ill now will be overcome by the evil that is evil now: woe betide him with that which
woe befalls him. But there have been other times and other evils and other good things.

Once doubt was evil and the will to the self. In those days the sick person became a heretic and a
witch: as a heretic and a witch he suffered and wanted to make suffering.

But this does not want to get into your ears: your good ones will be harmed, you tell me. But what
do I care about your good ones!

Much of your goodness disgusts me, and certainly not their evil. I would that they had a madness in
which they perished, like that pale criminal!

Verily, I would that their madness were called truth or faithfulness or justice: but they have their
virtue to live long and in a miserable comfort.

I am a handrail on the river: seize me who can seize me! But I am not your crutch.

Thus spoke Zarathustra.

On reading and writing

Of all that is written, I love only what one writes with his blood! Write with blood: and you will
know that blood is spirit!

It is not easy to understand foreign blood: I hate the idle reader!

He who knows the reader does nothing more for the reader. Another century of readers - and the
spirit itself will stink!

The fact that everyone is allowed to learn to read will in the long run spoil not only writing, but also
thinking.

Once the Spirit was GOD, then it became man, and now it is even becoming rabble.

Whoever writes in blood and proverbs does not want to be read, but learned by heart.
In the mountains the next way is from peak to peak: but for that you must have long legs. Proverbs
shall be summits: and those to whom they speak shall be great and tall.

The air is thin and pure, the danger is near, and the spirit is full of a cheerful malice: so it fits well
together.

I will have goblins around me, for I am brave. Courage that frightens away the ghosts creates
goblins for itself, courage wants to laugh.

I no longer feel with you: this cloud that I see beneath me, this blackness and heaviness that I laugh
at, this is your thundercloud.

You look up when you ask for elevation. And I look down because I am lifted up!

Who among you can laugh and be lifted up at the same time?

He who climbs the highest mountains laughs at all the games of mourning and the seriousness of
mourning.

Brave, carefree, mocking, violent - this is what Lady Wisdom wants us to do: She is a woman and
loves only one warrior at a time!

You tell me, „Life is hard to bear.“ But why would you take pride in the morning and surrender in
the evening?

Life is hard to bear, but don't act so tenderly! We are all pretty, heavy donkeys.

What do we have in common with the rosebud which trembles because a drop of dew is on its
body?

It is true: we love life, not because we are used to live, but because we are used to love.

There is always something madness in love!... But there is always a little reason in madness.

And even I, who am good to life, seem to know most about happiness, butterflies and soap bubbles
and what is their nature among people.

To see these light foolishly dainty moving little souls fluttering, this tempts Zarathustra to tears and
songs...

I would only believe in a GOD who could dance!

And when I saw my demon, I found him serious, thorough, deep, solemn; it was the spirit of
heaviness, through him all things fall.

Not by anger, but by laughter one kills. Come on, let us kill the spirit of gravity!

I have learned to walk: since then I have let myself go. I have learned to fly: since then I do not
want to be pushed to get out of place.

Now I am light, now I fly, now I see myself underneath me, now a GOD dances in me!
Thus spoke Zarathustra.

On the tree on the mountain

Zarathustra's eyes had seen that a young man avoided him. And one evening, as he was walking
alone through the mountains surrounding the city, which is called the coloured cow, he found this
young man sitting leaning against a tree and looking down into the valley with a tired look.
Zarathustra touched the tree where the young man was sitting and spoke thus:

„If I wanted to shake this tree with my hands, I would not be able to do it.

But the wind, which we do not see, tortures and bends it wherever it wants. We are worst of all bent
and tormented by invisible hands.“

Then the young man rose in consternation and said: „I hear Zarathustra and I was just thinking of
him.“ And Zarathustra replied:

„Why are you frightened? Man is like the tree.

The more he wants to go up into the high and bright, the stronger his roots will go down, into the
dark, down - into evil.“

„Yes, into evil!“ cried the young man. „How is it possible that you discovered my soul?“

Zarathustra smiled and said: „Some souls you will never discover unless you invent them first.“

„Yes, into evil!“ cried the young man again.

„You told the truth, Zarathustra. I don't trust myself anymore since I want to go up, and nobody
trusts me anymore, how does this happen?

I change too quickly: my today disproves my yesterday. I often skip steps when I climb, no step will
forgive me.

When I am on the top, I always find myself alone... No one talks to me, I shiver in the frost of
loneliness... Why do I want to be on the top?

My contempt and my longing grow together; the higher I climb, the more I despise those who
climb: What does he want in the heights?

How ashamed I am of my climbing and stumbling! How I scoff at my violent snorting! How I hate
the flyer! How tired I am on high!“

Here the young man was silent. And Zarathustra looked at the tree where they stood and said:

„This tree stands alone here in the mountains; it grew tall above man and beast.

And if he wanted to speak, he would have no one to understand him: so high it grew...
Now he is waiting and waiting - what is he waiting for? He lives too close to the seat of the clouds:
he is waiting for the first lightning!“

When Zarathustra had said this, the young man cried out with violent gestures, „Yes, Zarathustra,
you speak the truth. When I wanted to go down, I demanded to go up, and you are the lightning I
was waiting for! Behold, what else am I since you appeared to us? It is envy of you that has
destroyed me?“ Thus spoke the youth and wept bitterly. But Zarathustra put his arm around him and
took him away with him.

And when they had walked together for a while, Zarathustra began to speak:

„It tears my heart apart! Better than your words say, your eyes tell me all your danger.

You're not free yet, you're still looking for freedom. Your search and your watchfulness have made
you sleepy.

Into the free height you want, for stars your soul thirsts. But even your evil urges thirst for freedom.

Your wild dogs want to go to freedom; they bark with lust in their cellar when your spirit tries to
solve all prisons.

You are still a prisoner to me, who imagines freedom: ah, the soul of such prisoners becomes wise,
but also malicious and bad.

The liberated spirit must still purify itself. Much prison and mould is still in him: his eyes must still
become pure.

Yes, I know your danger. But with my love and hope I implore you: do not throw away your love
and hope!

You still feel noble, and noble are those who still feel noble for you, who are grieving and send you
evil looks. Know that a noble man stands against all.

Even the good have a superior man against them, and even if they call him a good man, they want
to put him aside.

The superior man wants to create something new and a new virtue. The good man wants the old,
and that the old be preserved.

But that is not the danger of the superior man that he may become a good man, but a cheeky one, a
scornful one, a destroyer.

Ah, I have known the nobles, who lost their highest hopes. And now they slandered all high hopes.

Now they lived impudently in short desires, and throughout the day they hardly threw any goals.

Spirit is also lust - so they said. Then the wings of their spirit broke: now it crawls around, dirty in
its gnawing.

They only thought they'd become heroes: Now they're lecherous. A grief and a horror is their hero.
But with my love and hope I implore you: do not throw away the hero in your soul! Keep your
highest hope holy!“

Thus spoke Zarathustra.

On the preachers of death

There are preachers of death: and the earth is full of those to whom repentance must be preached.

The earth is full of the superfluous; life is corrupted by the many. May they be lured away from this
life with eternal life!

Brown, that's what they call the preachers of death, or blacks. But I want to show them to you in
other colors.

There are the fearful ones, who carry the predator inside them and have no choice but lust or self-
destruction. And even their lust is self-mutilation.

They have not even become human beings, these fearful ones: may they preach renunciation of life
and go there themselves!

There are the consumptives of the soul: as soon as they are born, they begin to die and long for
teachings of weariness and renunciation.

They want to be dead, and we should approve their will. Let us take care not to wake up these dead
and to damage these living coffins.

They are met by a sick or old man or corpse, and immediately they say, Life is disproved!

But only they are disproved and their eyes, which see only the one face in existence.

Wrapped in a thick gloom and eager for the little coincidences that bring death: so they wait and grit
their teeth.

Or else, they reach for sweets and mock their childishness: they hang life from their straw and mock
that they are still hanging from a straw.

Their wisdom is: A fool who lives, but we are fools so much! And that is the most foolish thing to
be alive!

Life is suffering - so say others and do not lie! So take care that you stop! So make sure that life,
which is only suffering, stops!

And so the teaching of your virtue was: You shall kill yourself! You shall steal yourself away!

Lust is sin - so say some who preach death - let us go aside and not bear children!

Bearing children is laborious - say others - what is the point of bearing children? Only unfortunates
give birth! - And they too are preachers of death.
Mercy is needed, says the third, take what I have! Accept what I am! Life binds me all the less!

If they were compassionate by nature, they would deprive their neighbor of life. To be evil, that
would be their right kindness.

But they want to get rid of life! What do they care that they bind others even more firmly with their
chains and gifts?

And also you, for whom life is work and unrest: are you not very tired of life? Are you not very
mature to preach death?

All of you who love work and the fast, new, foreign things - you bear yourselves badly, your
diligence is a curse and a will to forget yourselves.

If you would believe more in life, you would throw yourselves less into the moment. But you do not
have enough content in you to wait - and not even to be lazy...

Everywhere resounds the voice of those who preach death: and the earth is full of those to whom
death must be preached.

Or eternal life: this applies to me equally, - if only they go there quickly!...

Thus spoke Zarathustra.

On war and warriors

We do not want to be spared from our best enemies, nor from those whom we love from the bottom
of our hearts. So let me then tell you the truth!

My brothers at war! I love you from the bottom of my heart, I am and was your kind. And I am also
your best enemy. So let me then tell you the truth!

I know about the hate and envy of your heart. You are not big enough not to know hate and envy. So
may you be big enough not to be ashamed of them!

And if you cannot be saints of knowledge, at least be men of war. These are the companions and
forerunners of such holiness.

I see many soldiers, I would see many warriors. May it not be a uni-form that they hide in
themselves.

You shall be to me those whose eyes are always searching for an enemy, your enemy. And in some
of you there is hate at first sight.

Your enemy you shall seek, your war you shall wage for your thoughts! And if your thought is
defeated, your honesty shall triumph over it!

You shall love peace as a reason to new wars. And you shall love the short peace more than the
long.
I advise you not to work, but to fight. May your work be a struggle, may your peace be a victory.

You can only be silent and sit still when you have your bow and arrow, otherwise you will chatter
and quarrel. May your peace be a victory!

You say it is the good cause that sanctifies even war? I tell you that it is the good war that sanctifies
every cause.

War and courage have done more great things than pity. Not your pity, but your bravery has saved
the casualties.

„What is good?“ you ask. Being brave is good. Let the little girls talk: „To be good is to be beautiful
and sentimental at the same time.“

They call you heartless: but your heart is real, and I love the chastity of your heartiness. You are
ashamed of your flood, others are ashamed of their ebb.

You are ugly? Well, well, my brothers! Take the greatness around you, the mantle of ugliness.

And when your soul grows great, it becomes exuberant, and in your greatness is malice. I know you
well.

In wickedness the cocky man meets the weakling. But they misunderstand each other. I know you
well.

You must have enemies to hate, but not enemies to despise. You must be proud of your enemy: then
the successes of your enemy are also your successes.

Revolution, that is the nobility of slavery. Your nobility is obedience! Your command itself may be
obedience!

To a good warrior „you shall“ sounds more pleasant than „I will“. And all that you hold dear, you
must first let yourself be commanded.

Let your love for life be love for your highest hopes: and your highest hopes be the highest thoughts
of life!

But your highest thoughts you should let me command you, and they say: man is something that is
to be overcome.

So live your life of obedience and war! What lies in long life? Which warrior wants to be spared?

I do not spare you, I love you from the bottom up, my brothers in war!

Thus spoke Zarathustra.

The new idol

Somewhere there are still peoples and herds, but not with us, my brothers: there are states.
States? What is that? Come on! Now open your ears, for now I am telling you my word about the
death of nations.

State is the coldest of cold monsters. Cold, too, it lies, and this lie crawls from its mouth: „I, the
state, am the people.“

It is a lie. They were the creators, who created the nations and put faith and love on them: so they
served life.

They are the destroyers, who set traps for many and call them state: they hang a sword and a
hundred lusts upon it.

Where there are still people, they do not understand the state and hate it as an evil eye and sin
against morals and rights.

This is the sign I give you: each people speaks its tongue of good and evil: the neighbour does not
understand it. Its language was invented by its customs and its rights.

But the state lies in all the tongues of good and evil: and whatever he speaks, he lies, and whatever
he has, he has stolen.

All things are false in him; with stolen teeth he bites, the biter. Even his bowels are false.

Verbal confusion of good and evil: this sign I give you as a sign of the state. Verily, the will to death
is indicated by this sign. Verily, it beckons the preachers of death.

Far too many are born: for the superfluous the state was invented.

Look how it attracts them to itself, the many-too-many. How he gobbles them and chews them and
chews them again.

„On earth there is nothing greater than I: I am the organizing finger of GOD“, so the beast roars.
And not only long-eared and short-eyed ones fall on their knees!

Oh, also in you, great souls, he murmurs his gloomy lies! Oh, he speakes to the rich hearts that like
to waste themselves!

Yes, he speakes to you too, conquerors of the old GOD! You got tired in the struggle, and now your
tiredness still serves the new idol!

The new idol would like to raise heroes and honorable men around it. It likes to bask in the sunshine
of good conscience, the cold beast!

It will give you everything if you worship it, the new idol: so it buys the splendour of your virtues
and the look of your proud eyes.

It wants to use you as a bait for the many-too-many! A hellish trick was invented there, a horse of
death clanging in the plaster of divine honours!

Yea, a dying for many was invented, which praises itself as life: verily, a hearty service to all
preachers of death!
State I call it, where all poison-drinkers are, good and bad: State, where all lose themselves, good
and bad: State, where the slow suicide of all is called life.

Look at these superfluous. They steal the works of inventors and the treasures of the wise: They call
education their theft and everything becomes illness and adversity for them!

Look at these superfluous. They are always ill, they vomit for their bile and call it newspaper. They
devour each other and cannot even digest.

Look at these superfluous ones! They acquire riches and become poorer with them. They want
power and first of all the crowbar of power, a lot of money, these impoverished people!

Look at them climbing, these fading apes! They climb over each other and thus drag themselves
into the mud and the deep.

Towards the throne they all want: it is their madness, as if happiness were sitting on the throne!
Often the mud sits on the throne and often the throne sits on the mud.

They are all mad, climbing monkeys and overheating. Evil is their idol, the cold beast: they all
smell ugly, these idolaters.

My brothers, will you suffocate in the fog of their mouths and desires? Better break the windows
and leap out into the open.

Avoid the ugly smell! Get away from the idolatry of the superfluous!

Avoid the ugly smell. Get away from the vapour of these human sacrifices!

Even now the earth is still free for great souls. Many seats for the lonely, around which the smell of
the silent seas wafts, are still empty.

A free life still stands free for great souls. Truly, the one who possesses little is possessed all the
less: praise be to the little poverty!

Where the state ends, there only begins the man who is not superfluous: there begins the song of the
necessary, the unique and irreplaceable way.

There where the state stops - look at me, my brothers! Do you not see the rainbow and the bridges
of the superhuman?

Thus spoke Zarathustra.

On the flies of the market

Flee, my friend, into your loneliness. I see you numbed by the noise of the great men and pricked by
the spikes of the small.

Worthy are the rocks and the forests to remain silent with you. Like the tree that you love, the
broad-branched tree that hangs silently and attentively over the sea.
Where the loneliness ends, there the market begins; and where the market begins, there the noise of
the great actors and the buzzing of poisonous flies begins.

In the world, the best things are not yet any good without someone to perform them first: „great
men“ are the people's names for these performers.

Little do the people understand the great, which is: the creative. But they have senses for all
performers and actors of great things.

The world revolves around the inventors of new values, invisibly it revolves. But the people and
fame revolve around the actors: that is the course of the world.

The actor has spirit, but little conscience of spirit. He always believes in what he believes most
strongly: makes believe in himself!

Tomorrow he has a new faith and the day after tomorrow a newer faith. He has quick senses, like
the people, and changeable weather conditions.

To overthrow, that means to prove to him. To be frolic, that means to convince him. And blood is
considered the best of all reasons.

A truth that only slips into fine ears, he calls a lie and nothing. Verily, he believes only in gods that
make great noise in the world!

The market is full of solemn buffoons and the people boast of their great men! These are the lords
of the hour for them.

But the hour urges them: so they urge you: and they want yes or no from you too. Woe betide you if
you put your seat between the yes and no!

Be without jealousy for the sake of this unconditional and pressing matter, you lover of truth! Never
before has truth hung on the arm of an unconditional.

For the sake of this suddenly go back to your safety: only on the market you are attacked with yes
or no.

Slowly is the experience of all deep wells: long they have to wait until they know what fell into
their depths.

Away from the market and fame everything great is happening: away from the market and fame
there have always been the inventors of new values.

Flee, my friend, into your loneliness: I see you bitten by poisonous flies. Flee to the place where the
rough, strong air blows!

Flee into your loneliness! You lived too close to the small and wretched. Flee from their invisible
revenge! Against you, they are nothing but revenge.

Don't raise your arm against them anymore! They are innumerable, and it is not your lot to be a
flyspeck.
Innumerable are these small and wretched ones; and raindrops and weeds have been enough to ruin
many a proud building.

You are not a stone, but you have already become hollow from many drops. You will be broken and
burst by many drops.

I see you tired from poisonous flies, I see you bleeding in a hundred places, and your pride will not
even be angry.

Blood they want from you in all innocence, blood their bloodless souls desire and they therefore
sting in all innocence.

But you, deep soul, you suffer too deeply even from small wounds; and before you have been
healed, the same poisonous worm crawled over your hand.

You are too proud for me to kill those who have a sweet tooth. But beware that it shall not be your
doom to bear all their poisonous wrongs!

They hum around you also with their praise: importunity is their praise. They want the closeness of
your skin and your blood.

They flatter thee as a god or devil; they whine before thee as before a god or devil. What does it do!
Flatterers they are and nothing more.

They also often give themselves to you as lovly. But that was always the wisdom of the fearful. Yes,
fearfull men are clever!

They think a lot of you with their narrow minds. They always worry about you. Everything that is
thought about a lot becomes dubious.

They punish you for all your virtues. They only forgive you from the bottom up - your mistakes.

Because you are gentle and righteous, you say, „I am innocent of their little lives.“ But their narrow
souls think: „Guilt is all the greatness of existence.“

Even though you are gentle with them, they still feel despised by you; and they return your
beneficence with hidden wrongs.

Your wordless pride always goes against their taste; they rejoice when you are humble enough to be
vain.

That which we recognize in a man, we also ignite in him. So beware of the little ones!

They feel little before you, and their lowliness glows and glows against you in invisible revenge.

Do you not notice how often they became silent when you came to them, and how their power went
from them like smoke from a dying fire?

Yes, my friend, you are an evil conscience to your neighbors, for they are unworthy of you. So they
hate you and would like to suck your blood.
Your neighbors will always be poisonous flies; that which is great about you, that itself must make
them more poisonous and more and more flylike.

Flee, my friend, into your solitude and to where a rough, strong air blows. It is not your lot to be a
fly-whisk.

Thus spoke Zarathustra.

On chastity

I love the forest. It's hard to live in the cities: there are too many of the rutting people.

Is it not better to fall into the hands of a murderer than into the dreams of a woman full of lust?

And yet look at these men: their eyes say it, they know nothing better on earth than to lie in a bed
with a woman.

Mud is at the bottom of their soul; and woe betide them if their mud has spirit!

That you would at least be perfect as animals! But innocence belongs to the animal.

Do I advise you to kill your senses? Yes, I advise you to kill your senses.

Do I advise you to be chaste? Chastity is a virtue for some, but a vice for many.

These may abstain: but the dog's sensuality looks with envy from everything they do.

Still in the heights of their virtue and up to the cold spirit, these creatures and their discord follow
them.

And how well-behavedly the bitch sensuality knows how to beg for a piece of spirit when she is
denied a piece of flesh.

You love tragedies and everything that breaks the heart? But I am suspicious of your bitches.

Your eyes are too cruel and you look lustfully at those who suffer. Is it not only your lust that has
disguised itself as pity?

And also this parable I give to you: not a few who wanted to cast out their demon, drove themselves
into the sows.

To whom chastity is difficult, it is to be advised against: that it should not become the way to hell,
that is to mud and heat of the soul.

Do I speak of dirty things? That is not the worst thing for me.

It is not when the truth is dirty, but when it is shallow, that the one who knows it reluctantly rises
into its waters.
Verily, there is chastity from the bottom of the heart: they are milder from the heart, they prefer to
laugh and laugh more abundantly than you.

They also laugh at chastity and ask: „What is chastity?“

„Is chastity not folly? But this folly came to us, and not we to it.“

„We offered this guest shelter and a heart: now it lives with us, it may stay as long as it likes!

Thus spoke Zarathustra.

On friends

„One is always too many around me“, so the hermit thinks. „One thing at a time, that makes two in
the long run!“

I and I are always too eager to talk: how would it be bearable if there wasn't a friend?

For the hermit the friend is always the third: the third is the cork that prevents the conversation of
the two from sinking into the depths.

Oh, there are too many depths for all hermits. That is why they long for a friend and for his height.

Our faith in others betrays what we would like to believe in ourselves. Our longing for a friend is
our betrayal.

And oftentimes love is just a means of overcoming envy. And often one attacks and makes an
enemy to hide that one alone is vulnerable.

„At least be my enemy!“ speaks the true awe that dare not ask for friendship.

If one wants to have a friend, one must also want to wage war for him: and to wage war, one must
be able to be an enemy.

One should still honour the enemy in his friend. Can you come close to your friend without going
over to him?

One should have his best enemy in his friend. You should be closest to his heart when you resist
him.

You won't wear a dress in front of your friend? Shall it be an honour to your friend that you give
yourself to him as you are? But he wishes you to go to the devil for your self!

He who makes no secret of himself is outraged: you have reason to fear nudity! If ye were gods, ye
should be ashamed of your clothes.

You cannot clean yourself well enough for your friend: for you shall be to him an arrow and a
longing for the superhuman.
Have you seen your friend asleep, so that you can see what he looks like? What else is your friend's
face? It is your own face, on a rough and imperfect mirror.

Did you see your friend asleep? Aren't you scared that your friend looks like that? Oh, my friend,
man is something that must be overcome.

In speaking and in silence the friend should be the master: you do not have to want to see
everything. Let your dream tell you what your friend is doing while awake.

Let your compassion be heard: that you first know whether your friend wants to suffer. Perhaps he
loves in you the unbroken eye and the look of eternity.

Pity for your friend is hidden under a hard shell, and you should grit your teeth on him. So he will
have his fineness and sweetness.

Are you pure air and solitude and bread and medicine to your friend? Some cannot loosen their own
chains, and yet they are a deliverer to their friend.

Are you a slave? You can't be a friend like that. Are you a tyrant? You can't have friends like that.

For too long, women have been slaves and tyrants. That is why woman is not yet capable of
friendship: she knows only love.

In woman's love there is injustice and blindness to all that she does not love. And also in the
knowing love of woman there is still assault and lightning and night beside the light.

Woman is not yet capable of friendship: women are still cats, and birds. Or, in the best case, cows.

Woman is not yet capable of friendship. But tell me, men, which of you is apt to be a friend?

O your poverty, men, and your stinginess of soul! How much you give to your friend, I will give it
to my enemy, and I will not be poorer for it.

There is comradeship: may there be friendship!

Thus spoke Zarathustra.

On a thousand and one goals

Zarathustra saw many countries and many peoples: so he discovered good and evil for many
peoples. No greater power found Zarathustra on earth than good and evil.

No people could live unless they first appreciated; but if they want to preserve their lives, they must
not appreciate as their neighbor appreciates.

Much that was good to this people was a mockery and disgrace to another: so I found it. Many
things were called evil here and cleaned with purple honours there.
Never did one neighbour understand another: his soul was always astonished at the neighbour's
madness and malice.

A tablet of goods hangs over every nation. Behold, it is the tablet of his conquest; behold, it is the
voice of his will to power.

That which is difficult for him is praiseworthy; that which is indispensable and difficult is good; and
that which frees from the greatest need, the rare and the heaviest, is holy.

That which makes it reign and triumph and shine, its neighbor to horror and envy: that is the high,
the first, the measuring, the sense of all things to him.

Verily, my brother, when you have recognized the misery and the land and the heaven and the
neighbor of a people, you can guess the law of its overcoming and why it rises on this ladder to its
hope.

„You shall always be first, and you shall tell others: your jealous soul shall love no one except your
friend“: this made a Greek's soul tremble, and he walked his path of greatness.

„Speak truth and do well with bow and arrow“: so it seemed to that people from whom my name
comes, the name that is both dear and heavy to me.

„Honour your father and mother and do their will down to the very root of your soul“: this tablet of
conquest was hung above them by another people and became powerful and eternal with it.

„To be faithful and for the sake of faithfulness to put honour and blood on evil and dangerous
things“: thus teaching, another people conquered itself, and thus conquering itself it became
pregnant and heavy with great hopes.

Verily, men gave all their good and evil to each other. Verily, they took it not, they found it not, nor
did it fall to them as a voice from heaven.

It was man who first put values into things, to preserve himself, he first created meaning for things,
a human reason! That is why he calls himself „man“, that is: the one who evaluates.

Evaluation is creation: hear it, you who create! Evaluation itself is the treasure and jewel of all
treasured things.

Only through evaluation does value exist: and without evaluation the nut of existence would be
hollow. Hear it, ye creators!

Change of values, that is change of creators. Always destroys the man who must be a creator.

Creators were first peoples, and later individuals; indeed, the individual himself is still the youngest
creation.

Peoples once hung a tablet of good upon themselves. Love that wants to rule and love that wants to
obey created such tablets.

The lust for the flock is older than the lust for the self: and as long as the good conscience is called
flock, only the bad conscience says: Me.
Verily, the cunning ego, the unloving ego, which wants its benefit in the benefit of many: this is not
the flock's origin, but its downfall.

It were always the lovers and the creators who created good and evil. Fire of love glows in all
virtues names and fire of wrath.

Many countries saw Zarathustra and many peoples: no greater power found Zarathustra on earth
than the works of the lovers: good and evil is their name.

Verily, a monster is the power of this praise and rebuke. Tell me, who can conquer it, brothers? Tell
me, who will cast the shackle over the thousand necks of this beast?

There have been a thousand purposes, for there have been a thousand nations. Only the shackle of a
thousand necks is missing, the one goal is missing. Mankind has no goal yet.

But tell me, my brothers: if mankind still lacks the goal, is it not also lacking - they themselves?

Thus spoke Zarathustra.

On charity

You jostle for your neighbor and you have fine words for him. But I tell you: your love for your
neighbor is your bad love for yourself.

You flee from yourselves for your neighbor and want to make a virtue of it: but I see through your
selflessness.

The You is older than the I; the You is canonized, but not yet the I: in this way, man pushes himself
toward his neighbor.

Do I advise you to love your neighbor? I would rather advise you to flee from your neighbor and to
love from afar!...

Higher than the love for one's neighbor is the love for the farthest and future; even higher than the
love for people is the love for things and ghosts...

This ghost that runs before you, my brother, is more beautiful than you; why don't you give him
your flesh and bones? But you are afraid and run to your neighbor.

You cannot endure it with yourself and do not love yourself enough: now you want to seduce your
neighbor to love and gild yourself with this error.

I would that you could not endure it with all kinds of neighbors and their neighbors; so, you would
have to create your friend and his overflowing heart from yourself.

You invite a witness to yourself when you want to speak well of yourself; and when you have
seduced him to think well of you, you think well of yourself.
Not only he who speaks against his own knowledge is a liar, but even more so he who speaks
against his own ignorance. And so you speak of yourself in the wrong way and lie with you to your
neighbor.

So the fool says: „Dealing with people spoils your character, especially if you have none...“

The one goes to the neighbor because he seeks himself, and the other because he wants to lose
himself. Your bad love for yourself turns your loneliness into a prison.

It is the far-away ones who pay for your love of your neighbor; and already when there are five of
you together, a sixth one always has to die.

I do not love your feasts either: I found too many actors in them, and also the audience often
behaved like actors.

I do not teach you your neighbor, but your friend. May your friend be the feast of the earth and a
presence of the superhuman.

I teach you the friend and his overflowing heart. But one must understand to be a sponge if one
wants to be loved by overflowing hearts.

I teach you the friend in whom the world is finished, a bowl of goods, the creative friend who
always has a finished world to give away.

And as the world rolled apart for him, so it rolls together again in rings for him, as the becoming of
good by evil, as the becoming of ends by chance.

Let the future and the most distant be the cause of your today: in your friend you shall love the
superhuman as your cause.

My brothers, I do not advise you to love your neighbor: I advise you to love the farthest.

Thus spoke Zarathustra.

On the way of the creator

Do you, my brother, want to go into solitary? Do you want to find the way to yourself? Hesitate a
little longer and hear me.

„He who seeks is easily lost. All loneliness is guilt“: so speaks the flock. You've been a member of
the herd for too long a time.

The voice of the flock will still resound in you. And when you will say: „I no longer have the same
conscience with you“, it will be a lament and a pain.

Behold, this pain itself still gave birth to your own conscience: and this conscience of last glimmer
still glows in your tribulation.
But thou wilt walk the way of thy affliction, which is the way to yourself? Then show me your right
and your strength for it!

Are you a new strength and a new right? A first move? A wheel that rolls out? Can you force the
stars to turn around you?

Oh, there is so much lust for heights! There are so many cramps in the ambitious! Show me that you
are not a lecherous and ambitious man.

Oh, there are so many great thoughts, they do no more than bellows: they inflate and empty.

Do you call yourself free? I want to hear your ruling thought and not that you have escaped a yoke.

Are you one of those who were allowed to escape from a yoke? There are some who threw away
their last value when they threw away their servitude.

Free from what? What does Zarathustra care about that? But let your eyes tell me: free for what?

Can you give yourself your own evil and your own good and hang your will upon yourself like a
law? Can you be your own judge and avenger of your law?

It is terrible to be alone with the judge and avenger of your own law! So a star is thrown out into the
barren space and into the icy breath of being alone!

Even today you suffer from the many, you one and lonely: even today you have still all your
courage and your hopes.

But one day loneliness will made you tired, one day your pride will bend and your courage will
crunch. One day you will cry out: “I am lonely!“

One day you will no longer see your high and your low all too close; your sublimity itself will make
you fear like a ghost. One day you will cry, „All is falshood!“

There are feelings that want to kill the lonely one; if they do not succeed, well, they themselves
must die! But can you do that, being a murderer of your self?

Have you, my brother, ever heard the word „contempt“? And the agony of your justice, to be just to
those who despise you?

You force many to relearn about you; they count that hard on you. You came near them and yet
passed by: they will never forgive you that.

You go beyond them: but the higher you climb, the smaller the eyes of envy see you. But what they
hate most is the flying.

„How you tried to be fair to me!“ you must speak, „I will mention your injustice as my own due.“

Injustice and dirt they throw at the lonely one! But, my brother, if you want to be a star, you must
not therefore shine less to them!

And beware of the good and righteous! They like to crucify those who invent their own virtue! They
hate the lonely one!
Beware also of holy simplicity! Everything is unholy to her that is not simple-minded; she also likes
to play with fire, the pyre.

And beware also of the fits of your love! Too quickly the lonely man reaches out his hand to the one
who meets him.

You must not give a hand to some people, but only a paw: and I want your paw to have claws!

But the worst enemy you can meet will always be yourself; you yourself are lurking in caves and
woods.

Lonely one, you walk the path to yourself! And your path leads past yourself, and past your seven
demons!

Heretic you will be yourself, and witcher, and soothsayer, and fool, and doubter, and unholy one,
and wicked one.

Thou shalt burn thyself in thy own flame: how wouldst thou become new, if you hadst not first
become ashes!

Lonely one, you will walk in the way of the Creator: you will create for thyself a GOD from your
seven demons.

Lonely one, you walk the way of the lover: you love yourself and therefore you despise yourself as
only lovers despise...

The lover wants to create because he despises! What does he know of love who has not had to
despise what he loved!...

With your love go into your solitude! and with your work, my brother; and only late will justice lag
behind you.

With your tears go into your loneliness! my brother. I love him who wants to create a self beyond
himself and thus perishes.

Thus spoke Zarathustra.

On old and young women

„Why do you creep so timidly through the twilight, Zarathustra? And what do you cautiously hide
under your cloak?

Is it a treasure that has been given to you? Or a child that was born to you? Or do you now walk in
the paths of thieves, friend of the wicked?"

Verily, my brother! said Zarathustra, it is a treasure that has been given to me: a little truth it is that I
carry.
But she is unruly like a young child; and if I do not shut her mouth, she cries out loud.

As I walked my way alone today, at the hour when the sun is setting, an old woman met me and
spoke to my soul:

„Zarathustra also has spoken many things to us women, but he never spoke to us about the woman.“

And I replied, „About Woman shall be spoken of only to men."

„Speak to me also of woman“, she said. „I am old enough to forget it at once.“

And I went to the old woman and spoke to her:

„Everything about a woman is a mystery, and everything about a woman has a solution.

The man is a meaning to the woman: the end is always the child. But what is woman to man?

The real man wants two things: danger and play. That's why he wants the woman as the most
dangerous toy.

The man is to be educated for war and the woman for the warrior's recreation: everything else is
folly.

Sweet fruits - the warrior does not like them. Therefore he likes the woman; bitter is also the
sweetest woman.

Better than a man does a woman understand the children, but the man is more childlike than the
woman.

In the real man there is a child hidden: he wants to play. Come, women, discover the child in man.

Let the woman be a toy, pure and fine, like precious stones, radiant with the virtues of a world that
is not yet there.

The ray of a star shines in your love! Your hope is: May I give birth to the superhuman!

In your love, be brave! With your love you shall strike him who instills fear in you.

In your love, be honorable! Little else does the woman understand honor. But this be your honour,
always to love more than you are loved, and never to be the second.

Man is afraid of woman when she loves, for she brings every sacrifice, and every other thing is of
no value to her.

Man is afraid of woman when she hates: for man is evil in the soul, but woman is evil in hate.

Who hates the woman most? - So the iron said to the magnet: I hate you most because you attract,
but are not strong enough to attract.

The man's happiness is called: I want. Woman's happiness is: he wants.

Behold, just now the world is perfect! - so thinks every woman, if she obeys with all her love.
And the woman must obey and find a depth to her surface. The surface is the mind of the woman, a
moving, stormy skin on a shallow water.

But the man's mind is deep, his stream rushes in underground caves: the woman suspects his power,
but does not understand it.“

Then the old woman replied to me: „Zarathustra said many good things, especially for those who
are young enough to do so.

It is strange, Zarathustra knows little about women, and yet he is right about them! Does this
happen because with women no thing is impossible?

And now take a little truth to thank you! I'm old enough for it!

Wrap her up and keep her mouth shut, or she'll scream her head off, that little truth.“

„Give me, woman, your little truth!“ I said. And so the old woman said:

„You go to women? Do not forget the whip!“

Thus spoke Zarathustra.

On the bite of the snake

One day Zarathustra had fallen asleep under a fig tree because it was hot, and had put his arms over
his face. Then a viper came and bit him in the neck, so that Zarathustra cried out in pain. When he
had taken his arm off his face, he looked at the snake: then it recognized the eyes of Zarathustra,
and it wriggled awkwardly and wanted to get away. „Not so“, said Zarathustra; „nor did you accept
my thanks! You have awakened me for the moment, my path is still long.“ - „Your path is still
short“, said the viper sadly, „my poison is killing.“ Zarathustra smiled. „When did a dragon ever die
from the venom of a snake?“ he said. „But take your poison back! You are not rich enough to give it
to me.“ Then the viper fell around his neck again and licked his wounds.

When Zarathustra once told this to his disciples, they asked, „And what, O Zarathustra, is the moral
of your story?“ And Zarathustra replied:

„The good and the righteous call me the destroyer of morals: my story is immoral.

But if you have an enemy, do not repay him evil with good: for that would be shameful. But prove
that he has done good to you.

And rather be angry than ashamed. And if you are cursed, I do not like it that you should bless. It is
better to curse a little too!

And if a great wrong has been done to you, do five little ones to me quickly! What a horrible sight
to behold, that only injustice troubles.
Did you know this already? Injustice shared is half right. And he who can bear the burden of
injustice shall bear it.

A little revenge is more human than no revenge at all. And if the punishment is not also a right and
an honour for the transgressor, I do not like your punishment either.

It's more noble to be wrong than to be right, especially when you are right. But one must be rich
enough to do so.

I do not like your cold justice; and from the eyes of your judges the executioner and his cold iron
always look at me.

Tell me, where is justice, that is Love with seeing eyes?

Then invent for me Love that bears not only all punishment but also all guilt!

So invent me the justice that absolves everyone except the judge!

Do you want to hear this too? In him who wants to be just from the bottom up, even a lie still
becomes human kindness.

But how could I be righteos from the bottom up! How can I give everyone what he wants! This is
enough for me: I give to each one what is mine.

Finally, my brothers, beware of doing wrong to an hermit! How could a hermit forget? How could
he repay?

A hermit is like a deep well. It's easy to throw a stone into it, but if it sank to the bottom, who would
bring it out?

Beware of insulting the hermit! But if you do, well, kill him too!

Thus spoke Zarathustra.

On marriage and children

I have a question for you alone, my brother: like a plumb bob I throw this question into your soul,
that I may know how deep it is.

You are young and want to have marriage and children. But I ask you: are you a person who can
wish for children?

Are you the victorious one, the self-conqueror, the master of the senses, the lord of your virtues? So
I ask you.

Or does the animal and the need speak out of your desire? Or loneliness? Or restlessness with
youself?

I want your victory and your freedom to long for children. You shall build living monuments to
your victory and your liberation.
You shall build beyond yourself. But first you must built yourself, square in body and soul.

You shall not only plant yourself, but goe into the heights! For this purpose the garden of
matrimony shall help thee!

You shall create a higher body, a first movement, a wheel rolling out of itself - you shall create a
creator.

Marriage: that is my name for the will to two, to create the One, which is more than they created.
Awe of one another I call marriage as of the willing of such a will.

This is the meaning and truth of marriage. But that which the Many-Too-Many call marriage, those
superfluous - oh, what do I call it?

Oh, this poverty of the soul in pairs! Oh, the filth of the soul in two! Oh, the wretched comfort of
the two!

Before they call all this, they say their marriages are made in heaven.

Well, I do not like it, this „heaven“ of the superfluous. No, I do not like them, these animals
entangled in the heavenly net!

Far be it from me, too, to think of a GOD who is about to bless what he did not put together!

Do not laugh at such marriages. What child would not have reason to weep over his parents?

This man seemed to me worthy and mature for the purpose of the earth: but when I saw his wife,
the earth seemed to me a house for the senseless.

Yes, I wanted the earth to tremble in convulsions when a saint and a goose mate!

This one went for the Truth like a hero, and at last he got himself a small, polished lie. He calls it
his marriage.

The latter was brittle in his dealings and chose selectively. But all at once he spoiled his company
for all times: his marriage, he calls it.

He was looking for a maid with the virtues of an angel... But suddenly he became a foolish woman,
and now he needed to become an angel!

Carefully I found all the buyers, and they all have crafty eyes. But even the most cunning buys his
wife in a sack.

Many short follies - that means love for you. And your marriage puts an end to many short follies,
as one long foolish one.

Your love for woman and the love of woman for man: oh, let her be compassionate to suffering and
veiled gods and goddesses! But two animals usually guess at each other.

But even your best love is but a raptured parable and a painful glow. She is a torch that will light
your way to higher places.
Beyond yourself you shall love one day! So learn to love first! And that is why you had to drink the
bitter cup of Love!

Bitterness is also in the cup of the best love: thus it makes longing for the superhuman, thus it
makes you thirsty for the creator!

Thirst for the creator, arrow and longing for the superhuman: say, my brother, is this your will for
marriage?

Such a thirst and such a marriage is holy to me.

Thus spoke Zarathustra.

On death

Many die too late, and some die too soon. The teaching still sounds strange: Die at the right time!

Die in the due time, so Zarathustra teaches.

Of course, if one never lives at the right time, how could one ever die at the right time? Let him
never be born! So I advise the superfluous.

But even the superfluous still do important things with their dying, and even the most hollow nut
still wants to be cracked.

All take dying seriously: but death is not yet a celebration. Men have not yet learned how to
consecrate the most beautiful feasts.

I will show you the accomplishing death, which will become a sting and a vow to the living.

His death is the accomplishing one, victorious, surrounded by hopes and vows.

So one should learn to die; and there should be no feast where such a dying person did not
consecrate vows to the living!

In this way to die is the best; but the second best is to die in battle and to waste a great soul.

But your grinning death, which creeps up like a thief, is as hateful to the fighter as it is to the victor,
and yet it comes as the lord.

I praise my death, the free death that comes to me because I want it.

And when will I want it? - He who has a goal and an heir, he wants death at the right time for goal
and heir.

And out of reverence for goal and heir, he shall hang no more barren wreaths in the sanctuary of
life.
Verily, I will not be like the twisters of the rope: they stretch out their thread and always go
backwards.

Many a one will also grow too old for his truths and victories; a toothless mouth no longer has the
right to any truth.

And everyone who wants fame must take leave of honour in time and practise the difficult art of
going at the right time.

One must stop letting oneself be eaten when one tastes best: those who want to be loved for a long
time know this.

There are sour apples, of course, whose fate would have them wait until the last day of autumn: and
at the same time they become ripe, yellow and wrinkled.

To some the heart ages first and to others the spirit. And some are old already in their youth: but late
young keeps long young.

Some are displeased with life: a poisonous worm eats its way into their hearts. So may he see that
dying becomes the more advisable for him.

Some never become sweet, they rot in summer. It is cowardice that holds him to his branch.

Far too many live and for far too long they hang on their branches. May a storm come and shake all
this laziness and worminess from the tree!

I want preachers to come of the swift death! These would be the right storms and the right shakers
of the trees of life! But all I hear is preaching slow death and patience with all things earthly.

Oh, you preach patience with earthly things? It is this earthly thing that has too much patience with
you, ye blasphemers!

Verily, the Jew whom the preachers of the slow death honour died too soon: and it has been the fate
of many since then that he died too soon.

He still knew only the tears and melancholy of the Jews, and the hatred of the good and righteous -
the Jew JESUS: then the longing for death overtook him.

If only he had stayed in the desert, far from the good and righteous! Perhaps he would have learned
to live and love the earth - and laughter too!

Believe me, my brothers! He died too soon; he himself would have revoked his teaching if he had
come to my age! He was noble enough to recant!

But he was still immature. Immature loves the youths, and immature hates man and earth. His mind
and wings of spirit are still bound and heavy.

But there is more child in man than in youth, and less melancholy: he understands death and life
better.

Free to die and free in death, a holy nay-sayer, when there is no more time to say yes: so he
understands himself in death and life.
That your dying is not a blasphemy on man and earth, my friends, I ask this honey of your souls.

In your dying your spirit and your virtue shall still glow, like a sunset around the earth: or else your
dying has turned out badly.

Therefore I myself will die, that ye friends may love the earth more for my sake: and to the earth I
will return, that I may have rest in the rest that gave me birth.

Verily, Zarathustra had a goal, he threw his ball: now you friends are heirs of my goal, to you I
throw the golden ball.

Better than all I see you, my friends, throwing the golden ball! And so I forgive a little bit on earth:
forgive me!

Thus spoke Zarathustra.

On the gift-giving virtue

When Zarathustra had taken leave of the city, to which his heart was devoted and whose name was
"the multicoloured cow" - many who called themselves his disciples followed him and gave him
escort. So they came to a cross-way: there Zarathustra told them that now he wanted to go alone, for
he was a friend of going alone. And his disciples gave him a rod for his farewell, and a serpent
round about the sun on its golden handle. Zarathustra rejoiced at the staff and leaned on it; then he
spoke to his disciples:

Tell me, how did gold reach its highest value? Because it is uncommon and useless and bright and
mild in luster; it always gives itself.

Only as an image of the highest virtue did gold come to the highest value. The giver's eyes shine
like gold. A golden shine concludes peace between moon and sun.

Exceptional is the highest virtue and useless, luminous is it and mild in luster: a gift-giving virtue is
the highest virtue.

Verily, I well guess you, my disciples, that you seek, like me, the gift-giving virtue. What would you
have in common with cats and wolves?

This is your thirst to become sacrifices and gifts: and therefore you thirst to heap up all riches in
your soul.

Insatiably your soul seeks treasures and jewels, because your virtue is insatiable in the desire of
giving away.

You force all things to yourselves and within you, that they may flow back from your heart as the
gifts of your love.
Verily, such a gift-giving love must become the robber of all values; but holy and sacred is my name
for this „selfishness“.

There is another selfishness, an overly poor selfishness, a hungry one who always wants to steal, the
selfishness of the sick, the sick selfishness.

With the eye of the thief it looks at all that is shining; with the greed of hunger it measures him who
has rich food; and it always creeps around the table of the giver.

Sickness speaks of such lust and invisible degeneration; of its own body speaks the thieving greed
of this selfishness.

Tell me, my brothers: what do we consider to be bad and evil? Is it not degeneracy? - And we
always guess degeneration where the self-giving soul is missing.

Upward goes our path, from species to super-species. But a horror is the degenerate sense that says,
„All for me.“

Our sense flies upwards, and is thus a parable of our body, an exaltation parable. Such exalted
parables are the names of virtues.

So the body goes through history, a becoming and a struggling body. And the spirit - what is it to
him? His battles‘ and victories‘ herald, comrade and eccho.

Parables are all names of good and evil: they do not speak, they only wave. A fool who wants
knowledge from them.

Watch me, my brothers, for every hour when your spirit wants to speak in parables: there is the
origin of your virtue.

Exalted is your body, and risen; with his delight he ravishes the spirit, that he may become creator,
and appreciator, and lover, and benefactor of all things.

When your heart is wide and full, like the river, a blessing and a danger to those who dwell therein:
there is the origin of your virtue.

When you are above praise and reproach, and want to command your will to all things, as a lover's
will: there is the origin of your virtue.

If you despise what is pleasant and the soft bed, and of the wimpy bed you cannot be far enough:
there is the origin of your virtue.

If you are willing of one will, and this turn of all adversity means necessity to you: there is the
origin of your virtue.

Verily, it is a new good and evil! Verily, a new deep roaring and a new source of voice!

Power is it, this new virtue; a ruling thought is it, and around it a wise soul: a golden sun, and
around it the serpent of knowledge.

2
Here Zarathustra was silent for a while and looked with love at his disciples. So then he continued
to speak, and his voice had changed.

Be faithful to me on earth, my brothers, with the power of your virtue! Your giving love and your
knowledge serve the purpose of the earth! So I beg and implore you.

Do not let them fly away from the earth and beat their wings against eternal walls! Oh, there has
always been so much fleeting virtue!

Lead, like me, the fleeting virtue back to earth - yes, back to body and life: that it may give the earth
its meaning, a human sense!

A hundred times over, spirit and virtue have been lost and have been mistaken for each other. Alas,
in our body now still dwells all this delusion and error: it has become body and will.

Spirit and virtue have tried and lost their way a hundred times. Yes, man has been one attempt. Oh,
much ignorance and error has become body to us!

Not only the reason of thousand years - also their madness breaks out on us. It is dangerous to be
heirs.

We are still struggling step by step with the giant of chance, and over all of humanity there still
reigned nonsense, non-sense.

Let your spirit and your virtue serve the purpose of the earth, my brothers: and let all things be
worthy of you anew! Therefore you shall be fighters! Therefore you shall be creators!

Knowingly the body purifies itself; with knowledge it tries to increase; to the one who knows all
instincts sanctify themselves; to the one who is lifted up the soul becomes joyful.

Physician, help yourself: in this way you will also help your sick person. May this be his best help,
that he may see with his eyes him who heals himself.

There are a thousand paths that have never been walked before, a thousand recoveries and hidden
haste of life. Unexhausted and undiscovered is still man and humanity‘s earth.

Watch and listen, you lonely ones! From the future come winds with secret flapping of wings; and
good news go out to fine ears.

You lonely people of today, you who are retiring, you shall one day be one people: out of you, who
chose yourselves, a chosen people shall arise - and out of it the superhuman.

Verily, the earth shall yet become a place of recovery! And already there is a new smell around it, a
salvific - and a new hope!

When Zarathustra had said these words, he was silent, like one who did not say his last word; for a
long time he weighed the staff in his hand in doubt. At last he said: - and his voice had changed.
I go alone now, my disciples! You also go away now and alone! That is the way I want it.

Verily, I advise you: go away from me and defend yourselves against Zarathustra! And better still:
be ashamed of him! Perhaps he deceived you.

The man of knowledge must not only love his enemies, but also be able to hate his friends.

It is a bad reward for a teacher to remain a student forever. And why won't you pluck my laurel?

You worship me; but how, if one day your worship should fall away? Beware lest a statue fall upon
you.

You say you „believe2 in Zarathustra? But what is the matter with Zarathustra? You are my
believers - but what is the matter with all believers!

You hadn't looked for yourself when you found me. So do all believers; that's why it's so little with
all their faith.

Now I call you: lose me and find yourselves; and only when you all have denied me I will return
back to you.

Verily, my brethren, with other eyes I will then seek my lost ones; with another love I then will love
you.

And once more you shall become my friends and children of one hope: then I will be with you a
third time, to celebrate the great noon with you.

And this is the great noon, when man stands in the middle of his course between the beast and the
superhuman and celebrates his way to the evening as his highest hope: for it is the way to a new
morning.

Then the one who goes down will bless himself that he is a passing man; and the sun of his
knowledge will be upon him at noon.

„All the gods and godesses are dead: now we want the superhuman to live“ - this will be our last
will at noon!

Thus spoke Zarathustra.