Thus Spoke Zarathustra (35 page)

‘Where my honesty ceases I am blind and want to be blind. But where I want to know I also want to be honest, that is, severe, stern, strict, cruel, inexorable.

‘Because
you
, O Zarathustra, once said: “Spirit is the life that itself cuts into life”, that led and seduced me to your teaching. And truly, with my own blood have I increased my own knowledge!’

‘As the evidence indicates,’ Zarathustra interposed; for blood continued to run down the naked arm of the man of conscience. For ten leeches had bitten into it.

‘Oh you strange fellow, how much this evidence tells me, for it tells me about yourself! And perhaps I could not pour all of it into your stern ears!

‘Very well! Let us part here! But I should like to meet you again. Up yonder leads the way to my cave: tonight you shall there be my welcome guest!

‘And I should also like to make amends to your body for treading upon you: I shall think about that. But now a cry of distress calls me hurriedly away from you.’

Thus spoke Zarathustra.

The Sorcerer

1

W
HEN
Zarathustra had turned the corner around a rock, however, he saw not far below him on the same pathway a man who was throwing his arms about as if in a frenzy and who finally hurled himself to earth flat on his belly. ‘Stop!’ said Zarathustra then to his heart, ‘he yonder must surely be the Higher Man, that evil cry of distress came from him – I will see if he can be helped.’ But when he ran to the spot where the man lay on the ground, he found a trembling old man with staring eyes; and however much Zarathustra tried to raise him and set him upon his legs, it was in vain. Neither did the unfortunate man seem to notice that there was anyone with him; on the contrary, he continually looked around him with
pathetic gestures, like one forsaken by and isolated from all the world. Eventually, however, after much trembling, quivering, and self-contortion, he began to wail thus:

Who still warms me, who still loves me?
Offer me hot hands!
Offer me coal-warmers for the heart!
Spread-eagled, shuddering,
Like a half-dead man whose feet are warmed –
Shaken, alas! by unknown fevers,
Trembling with sharp icy frost-arrows,
Pursued by you, my thought!
Unutterable, veiled, terrible one!
Huntsman behind the clouds!
Struck down by your lightning-bolt,
You mocking eye that stares at me from the darkness –
     thus I lie,
Bend myself, twist myself, tortured
By every eternal torment, Smitten
By you, cruel huntsman,
You unknown – God!

Strike deeper!
Strike once again!
Sting and sting, shatter this heart!
What means this torment
With blunt arrows?
Why do you look down,
Unwearied of human pain,
With malicious divine flashing eyes?
Will you not kill,
Only torment, torment?
Why – torment
me
,
You malicious, unknown God?

Ha ha! Are you stealing near?
At such a midnight hour
What do you want? Speak!
You oppress me, press me –
Ha! far too closely!
Away! Away!
You hear me breathing,
You overhear my heart,
You jealous God –
Yet, jealous of what?
Away! Away! Why the ladder?
Would you climb
Into my heart,
Climb into my most secret
Thoughts?
Shameless, unknown – thief!
What would you get by stealing?
What would you get by listening?
What would you get by torturing,
You torturer?
You – Hangman-god!
Or shall I, like a dog,
Roll before you?
Surrendering, raving with rapture,
Wag – love to you?

In vain! Strike again,
Cruellest knife! No,
Not dog – I am only your game,
Cruellest huntsman!
Your proudest prisoner,
You robber behind the clouds!
For the last time, speak!
What do you want, way layer, from me?
You God veiled in lightning! Unknown One! Speak,
What do you want, unknown – God?

What? Ransom?
How much ransom?
Demand much – thus speaks my pride!
And be brief – thus speaks my other pride!

Ha ha!
Me
– you want me?

Me – all of me?…

Ha ha!
And you torment me, fool that you are,
You rack my pride?
Offer me love – who still warms me?
Who still loves me? – offer me hot hands!
Offer me coal-warmers for the heart,
Offer me, the most solitary,
Whom ice, alas! sevenfold ice
Has taught to long for enemies,
For enemies themselves,
Offer, yes yield to me,
Cruellest enemy –
Yourself
!

He is gone!
He himself has fled,
My last, sole companion,
My great enemy,
My unknown,
My Hangman-god!

No! Come back,
With all your torments!
Oh come back
To the last of all solitaries!
All the streams of my tears
Run their course to you!
And the last flame of my heart –
It burns up
to you
!
Oh come back,
My unknown God! My pain! My last – happiness!

2

At this point, however, Zarathustra could restrain himself no longer; he took his stick and struck the wailing man with all
his force. ‘Stop!’ he shouted at him with furious laughter, ‘stop, you actor! You fabricator! You liar from the heart! I know you well!

‘I will warm your legs for you, you evil sorcerer, I well know how to make things warm for such as you!’

‘Leave off,’ said the old man and jumped up from the ground, ‘beat me no more, O Zarathustra! I was doing it only in fun!

‘Such things are part of my art; I wanted to put you yourself to the proof when I gave you this exhibition!
⁴²
And truly, you have seen well through me!

‘But you, too, have given me no small proof of yourself: you are
hard
, you wise Zarathustra! You strike hard with your “truths”, your cudgel forced from me –
this
truth!’

‘Do not flatter,’ answered Zarathustra, still excited and frowning,’ you actor from the heart! You are false: why speak – of truth!

‘You peacock of peacocks, you ocean of vanity,
what
did you play before me, you evil sorcerer, in
whom
was I supposed to believe when you wailed in such a fashion?’

‘
The penitent of the spirit
,’ said the old man, ‘it was
he
I played: you yourself once invented this expression – the poet and sorcerer who at last turns his spirit against himself, the transformed man who freezes through his bad knowledge and bad conscience.

‘And just confess it: it took a long time, O Zarathustra, for you to see through my trick and lie! You
believed
in my distress when you took my head in your hands,

‘I heard you wail: “He has been too little loved, too little loved!” My wickedness rejoiced within me that I had deceived you so far.’

‘You may have deceived subtler men than me,’ said Zarathustra severely. ‘I am not on my guard against deceivers, I
must
be without caution: so my fate will have it.

‘You, however,
must
deceive: I know you so far. You must always be ambiguous, with two, three, four, five meanings! And what you just confessed was not nearly true enough and not nearly false enough for me!

‘You evil fabricator, how could you do otherwise! You would even deck your disease if you showed yourself naked to your physician.

‘Thus you decked your lie before me when you said “I was doing it
only
in fun!” There was also
earnestness
in it, you
are
something of a penitent of the spirit!

‘I have divined you well: you have become the enchanter of everyone, but against yourself you have no lie and no cunning left – you are disenchanted with yourself!

‘You have reaped disgust as your single truth. With you, no word is genuine any more, but your mouth is genuine: that is, the disgust that clings to your mouth.’

‘But who are you!’ the old sorcerer cried at this point in a defiant voice, ‘who dares to speak like this to
me
, the greatest man, living today?’ – and a green lightning-flash shot from his eye at Zarathustra. But immediately he changed and said sadly:

‘O Zarathustra, I am tired of it, my arts disgust me, I am not
great
, why do I pretend! But, you know it well – I sought greatness!

‘I wanted to appear a great man and I convinced many: but this lie has been beyond my strength. I am collapsing under it.

‘O Zarathustra, everything about me is a lie; but that I am collapsing – this is
genuine
!’

‘It honours you,’ said Zarathustra gloomily, casting down his eyes, ‘it honours you that you sought greatness, but it also betrays you. You are not great.

‘You evil old sorcerer,
this
is the best and most honest thing that I honour in you, that you have grown weary of yourself and have declared “I am not great”.

‘In
that
do I honour you as a penitent of the spirit: and, if only for a passing breath, in this one moment you were – genuine.

‘But say, what do you seek here among
my
forests and cliffs? And when you laid yourself in
my
path, what proof did you want of me?

‘What did you test
me
in?’

Thus spoke Zarathustra and his eyes sparkled. The old
sorcerer was silent for a time, then he said: ‘Did I test you? I – only seek.

‘O Zarathustra, I seek a genuine man, a proper, simple man, a man of one meaning and of all honesty, a repository of wisdom, a saint of knowledge, a great man!

‘For do you not know, O Zarathustra?
I seek Zarathustra
.’

And at this point a long silence arose between the two; Zarathustra, however, became deeply absorbed, so that he closed his eyes. Then, however, returning to his companion, he grasped the sorcerer’s hand and said, with much politeness and guile:

‘Very well! Up yonder leads the way to where Zarathustra’s cave lies. You may seek there him you wish to find.

‘And ask advice of my animals, my eagle and my serpent: they shall help you seek. But my cave is big.

‘I myself, to be sure – I have never yet seen a great man. The eye of the subtlest is crude today for what is great. It is the kingdom of the mob.

‘I have found so many who stretched and inflated themselves, and the people cried: “Behold a great man!” But what good are all bellows! The wind escapes from them at last.

‘A frog that has blown itself out too long explodes at last: then the wind escapes. To prick the belly of a puffed-up windbag I call a fine sport. Hear that, lads!

‘Today belongs to the mob: who still
knows
what is great, what small! Who could successfully seek greatness there! Only a fool: a fool would succeed.

‘Do you seek great men, you strange fool? Who
taught
you to? Is today the time for it? Oh, you evil seeker, why – do you tempt
⁴³
me?’

Thus spoke Zarathustra, comforted at heart, and continued, laughing, on his way.

Retired from Service

N
OT
long after Zarathustra had freed himself from the sorcerer, however, he again saw someone sitting beside the path he was going: a tall, dark man with a pale, haggard face;
this
man greatly vexed him. ‘Alas,’ he said to his heart,’ there sits disguised affliction, he seems to be of the priestly sort: what do
they
want in my kingdom?

‘What! I have hardly escaped from that sorcerer: must another magician cross my path,

‘some wizard who operates by laying on hands, some gloomy miracle-worker by the grace of God, some anointed world-slanderer: may the Devil take him!

‘But the Devil is never in his proper place: he always comes too late, that confounded dwarf and club-foot!’

Thus cursed Zarathustra impatiently in his heart and considered how, with averted gaze, he might slip past the dark man: but behold, it turned out differently. For at the same moment the sitting man had already seen him; and not unlike someone whom an unexpected happiness has befallen, he jumped up and went towards Zarathustra.

‘Whoever you may be, traveller,’ he said, ‘help one who has gone astray, a seeker, an old man who may easily come to harm here!

‘The world here is strange and remote to me, and I hear the howling of wild animals; and he who could have afforded me protection is himself no more.

‘I was seeking the last pious man, a saint and hermit who, alone in his forest, had as yet heard nothing of what all the world knows today.’

‘What
does all the world know today?’ asked Zarathustra. ‘This, perhaps: that the old God in whom all the world once believed no longer lives?’

‘That is so,’ answered the old man sadly. ‘And I served that old God until his last hour.

‘Now, however, I am retired from service, without master,
and yet I am not free, neither am I merry even for an hour, except in memories.