The Portable Nietzsche (26 page)

The tarantulas, of course, would have it otherwise. “What justice means to us is precisely that the world be filled with the storms of our revenge”—thus they speak to each other. “We shall wreak vengeance and abuse on all whose equals we are not”—thus do the tarantulahearts vow. “And ‘will to equality' shall henceforth be the name for virtue; and against all that has power we want to raise our clamor!”

You preachers of equality, the tyrannomania of impotence clamors thus out of you for equality: your most secret ambitions to be tyrants thus shroud themselves in words of virtue. Aggrieved conceit, repressed envy—perhaps the conceit and envy of your fathers—erupt from you as a flame and as the frenzy of revenge.

What was silent in the father speaks in the son; and often I found the son the unveiled secret of the father.

They are like enthusiasts, yet it is not the heart that fires them—but revenge. And when they become elegant and cold, it is not the spirit but envy that makes them elegant and cold. Their jealousy leads them even on the paths of thinkers; and this is the sign of their jealousy: they always go too far, till their weariness must in the end lie down to sleep in the snow. Out of every one of their complaints sounds revenge; in their praise there is always a sting, and to be a judge seems bliss to them.

But thus I counsel you, my friends: Mistrust all in whom the impulse to punish is powerful. They are people of a low sort and stock; the hangman and the bloodhound look out of their faces. Mistrust all who talk much of their justice! Verily, their souls lack more than honey. And when they call themselves the good and the just, do not forget that they would be pharisees, if only they had—power.

My friends, I do not want to be mixed up and confused with others. Some preach my doctrine of life and are at the same time preachers of equality and tarantulas. Although they are sitting in their holes, these poisonous spiders, with their backs turned on life, they speak in favor of life, but only because they wish to hurt. They wish to hurt those who now have power, for among these the preaching of death is still most at home. If it were otherwise, the tarantulas would teach otherwise; they themselves were once the foremost slanderers of the world and burners of heretics.

I do not wish to be mixed up and confused with these preachers of equality. For, to
me
justice speaks thus: “Men are not equal.” Nor shall they become equal! What would my love of the overman be if I spoke otherwise?

On a thousand bridges and paths they shall throng to the future, and ever more war and inequality shall divide them: thus does my great love make me speak. In their hostilities they shall become inventors of images and ghosts, and with their images and ghosts they shall yet fight the highest fight against one another. Good and evil, and rich and poor, and high and low, and all the names of values—arms shall they be and clattering signs that life must overcome itself again and again.

Life wants to build itself up into the heights with pillars and steps; it wants to look into vast distances and out toward stirring beauties: therefore it requires height. And because it requires height, it requires steps and contradiction among the steps and the climbers. Life wants to climb and to overcome itself climbing.

And behold, my friends: here where the tarantula has its hole, the ruins of an ancient temple rise; behold it with enlightened eyes! Verily, the man who once piled his thoughts to the sky in these stones—he, like the wisest, knew the secret of all life. That struggle and inequality are present even in beauty, and also war for power and more power: that is what he teaches us here in the plainest parable. How divinely vault and arches break through each other in a wrestling match; how they strive against each other with light and shade, the godlike strivers—with such assurance and beauty let us be enemies too, my friends! Let us strive against one another like gods.

 

Alas, then the tarantula, my old enemy, bit me. With godlike assurance and beauty it bit my finger. “Punishment there must be and justice,” it thinks; “and here he shall not sing songs in honor of enmity in vain.”

Indeed, it has avenged itself. And alas, now it will make my soul, too, whirl with revenge. But to keep me from whirling, my friends, tie me tight to this column. Rather would I be a stylite even, than a whirl of revenge.

Verily, Zarathustra is no cyclone or whirlwind; and if he is a dancer, he will never dance the tarantella.

Thus spoke Zarathustra.

You have served the people and the superstition of the people, all you famous wise men—and
not
truth. And that is precisely why you were accorded respect. And that is also why your lack of faith was tolerated: it was a joke and a circuitous route to the people. Thus the master lets his slaves have their way and is even amused by their pranks.

But the free spirit, the enemy of fetters, the nonadorer who dwells in the woods, is as hateful to the people as a wolf to dogs. To hound him out of his lair—that is what the people have ever called “a sense of decency”; and against him the people still set their fiercest dogs.

“Truth is there: after all, the people are there! Let those who seek beware!”—these words have echoed through the ages. You wanted to prove your people right in their reverence: that is what you called “will to truth,” you famous wise men. And your hearts ever said to themselves: “From among the people I came, and from there too the voice of God came to me. As the people's advocates you have always been stiff-necked and clever like asses.

And many who were powerful and wanted to get along smoothly with the people harnessed in front of their horses a little ass, a famous wise man.

And now I should wish, you famous wise men, that you would at long last throw off the lion's skin completely. The skin of the beast of prey, mottled, and the mane of those who search, seek, and conquer.

Oh, to make me believe in your “truthfulness” you would first have to break your revering will.

Truthful I call him who goes into godless deserts, having broken his revering heart. In the yellow sands, burned by the sun, he squints thirstily at the islands abounding in wells, where living things rest under dark trees. Yet his thirst does not persuade him to become like these, dwelling in comfort; for where there are oases there are also idols.

Hungry, violent, lonely, godless: thus the lion-will wants itself. Free from the happiness of slaves, redeemed from gods and adorations, fearless and fearinspiring, great and lonely: such is the will of the truthful.

It was ever in the desert that the truthful have dwelt, the free spirits, as masters of the desert; but in the cities dwell the well-fed, famous wise men—the beasts of burden. For, as asses, they always pull the people's cart. Not that I am angry with them for that: but for me they remain such as serve and work in a harness, even when they shine in harnesses of gold. And often they have been good servants, worthy of praise. For thus speaks virtue: “If you must be a servant, seek him who profits most from your service. The spirit and virtue of your master shall grow by your being his servant: then you yourself will grow with his spirit and his virtue.” And verily, you famous wise men, you servants of the people, you yourselves have grown with the spirit and virtue of the people—and the people through you. In your honor I say this. But even in your virtues you remain for me part of the people, the dumb-eyed people —the people, who do not know what spirit is.

Spirit is the life that itself cuts into life: with its own agony it increases its own knowledge. Did you know that?

And the happiness of the spirit is this: to be anointed and through tears to be consecrated as a sacrificial animal. Did you know that?

And the blindness of the blind and their seeking and groping shall yet bear witness to the power of the sun, into which they have looked. Did you know that?

And the lover of knowledge shall learn to
build
with mountains. It means little that the spirit moves mountains. Did you know that?

You know only the spark of the spirit, but you do not see the anvil it is, nor the cruelty of its hammer.

Verily, you do not know the pride of the spirit! But even less would you endure the modesty of the spirit, if ever it would speak.

And you have never yet been able to cast your spirit into a pit of snow: you are not hot enough for that. Hence you also do not know the ecstasies of its coldness.

In all things, however, you act too familiarly with the spirit, and you have often made wisdom into a poorhouse and a hospital for bad poets.

You are no eagles: hence you have never experienced the happiness that is in the terror of the spirit. And he who is not a bird should not build his nest over abysses.

You are lukewarm to me, but all profound knowledge flows cold. Ice cold are the inmost wells of the spirit: refreshing for hot hands and men of action. You stand there honorable and stiff and with straight backs, you famous wise men: no strong wind and will drives you.

Have you never seen a sail go over the sea, rounded and taut and trembling with the violence of the wind? Like the sail, trembling with the violence of the spirit, my wisdom goes over the sea—my wild wisdom.

But you servants of the people, you famous wise men—how could you go with me?

Thus spoke Zarathustra.

Night has come; now all fountains speak more loudly. And my soul too is a fountain.

Night has come; only now all the songs of lovers awaken. And my soul too is the song of a lover.

Something unstilled, unstillable is within me; it wants to be voiced. A craving for love is within me; it speaks the language of love.

Light am I; ah, that I were night! But this is my loneliness that I am girt with light. Ah, that I were dark and nocturnal! How I would suck at the breasts of light! And even you would I bless, you little sparkling stars and glowworms up there, and be overjoyed with your gifts of light.

But I live in my own light; I drink back into myself the flames that break out of me. I do not know the happiness of those who receive; and I have often dreamed that even stealing must be more blessed than receiving. This is my poverty, that my hand never rests from giving; this is my envy, that I see waiting eyes and the lit-up nights of longing. Oh, wretchedness of all givers! Oh, darkening of my sun! Oh, craving to cravel I Oh, ravenous hunger in satiation!

They receive from me, but do I touch their souls? There is a cleft between giving and receiving; and the narrowest cleft is the last to be bridged. A hunger grows out of my beauty: I should like to hurt those for whom I shine; I should like to rob those to whom I give; thus do I hunger for malice. To withdraw my hand when the other hand already reaches out to it; to linger like the waterfall, which lingers even while it plunges: thus do I hunger for malice. Such revenge my fullness plots: such spite wells up out of my loneliness. My happiness in giving died in giving; my virtue tired of itself in its overflow.

The danger of those who always give is that they lose their sense of shame; and the heart and hand of those who always mete out become callous from always meting out. My eye no longer wells over at the shame of those who beg; my hand has grown too hard for the trembling of filled hands. Where have the tears of my eyes gone and the down of my heart? Oh, the loneliness of all givers! Oh, the taciturnity of all who shine!

Many suns revolve in the void: to all that is dark they speak with their light—to me they are silent. Oh, this is the enmity of the light against what shines: merciless it moves in its orbit. Unjust in its heart against all that shines, cold against suns—thus moves every sun.

The suns fly like a storm in their orbits: that is their motion. They follow their inexorable will: that is their coldness.

Oh, it is only you, you dark ones, you nocturnal ones, who create warmth out of that which shines. It is only you who drink milk and refreshment out of the udders of light.

Alas, ice is all around me, my hand is burned by the icy. Alas, thirst is within me that languishes after your thirst.

Night has come: alas, that I must be light! And thirst for the nocturnal! And loneliness!

Night has come: now my craving breaks out of me like a well; to speak I crave.

Night has come; now all fountains speak more loudly. And my soul too is a fountain.

Night has come; now all the songs of lovers awaken. And my soul too is the song of a lover.

Thus sang Zarathustra.

One evening Zarathustra walked through a forest with his disciples; and as he sought a well, behold, he came upon a green meadow, silently surrounded by trees and shrubs, and upon it girls were dancing with each other. As soon as the girls recognized Zarathustra they ceased dancing. But Zarathustra walked up to them with a friendly gesture and spoke these words:

“Do not cease dancing, you lovely girls! No killjoy has come to you with evil eyes, no enemy of girls. God's advocate am I before the devil: but the devil is the spirit of gravity. How could I, you lightfooted ones, be an enemy of godlike dances? Or of girls' feet with pretty ankles?

“Indeed, I am a forest and a night of dark trees: but he who is not afraid of my darkness will also find rose slopes under my cypresses. And he will also find the little god whom girls like best: beside the well he lies, still, with his eyes shut. Verily, in bright daylight he fell asleep, the sluggard! Did he chase after butterflies too much? Do not be angry with me, you beautiful dancers, if I chastise the little god a bit. He may cry and weep—but he is laughable even when he weeps. And with tears in his eyes he shall ask you for a dance, and I myself will sing a song for his dance: a dancing and mocking song on the spirit of gravity, my supreme and most powerful devil, of whom they say that he is ‘the master of the world.' ”