Thus Spake Zarathustra Part 34

Where ye are, there must always be dregs at hand, and much that is spongy, hollow, and compressed: it wanteth to have freedom.

'Freedom' ye all roar most eagerly: but I have unlearned the belief in 'great events,' when there is much roaring and smoke about them.

And believe me, friend Hullabaloo! The greatest events--are not our noisiest, but our stillest hours.

Not around the inventors of new noise, but around the inventors of new values, doth the world revolve; INAUDIBLY it revolveth.

And just own to it! Little had ever taken place when thy noise and smoke pa.s.sed away. What, if a city did become a mummy, and a statue lay in the mud!

And this do I say also to the o'erthrowers of statues: It is certainly the greatest folly to throw salt into the sea, and statues into the mud.

In the mud of your contempt lay the statue: but it is just its law, that out of contempt, its life and living beauty grow again!

With diviner features doth it now arise, seducing by its suffering; and verily! it will yet thank you for o'erthrowing it, ye subverters!

This counsel, however, do I counsel to kings and churches, and to all that is weak with age or virtue--let yourselves be o'erthrown! That ye may again come to life, and that virtue--may come to you!--"

Thus spake I before the fire-dog: then did he interrupt me sullenly, and asked: "Church? What is that?"

"Church?" answered I, "that is a kind of state, and indeed the most mendacious. But remain quiet, thou dissembling dog! Thou surely knowest thine own species best!

Like thyself the state is a dissembling dog; like thee doth it like to speak with smoke and roaring--to make believe, like thee, that it speaketh out of the heart of things.

For it seeketh by all means to be the most important creature on earth, the state; and people think it so."

When I had said this, the fire-dog acted as if mad with envy. "What!"

cried he, "the most important creature on earth? And people think it so?" And so much vapour and terrible voices came out of his throat, that I thought he would choke with vexation and envy.

At last he became calmer and his panting subsided; as soon, however, as he was quiet, I said laughingly:

"Thou art angry, fire-dog: so I am in the right about thee!

And that I may also maintain the right, hear the story of another fire-dog; he speaketh actually out of the heart of the earth.

Gold doth his breath exhale, and golden rain: so doth his heart desire.

What are ashes and smoke and hot dregs to him!

Laughter flitteth from him like a variegated cloud; adverse is he to thy gargling and spewing and grips in the bowels!

The gold, however, and the laughter--these doth he take out of the heart of the earth: for, that thou mayst know it,--THE HEART OF THE EARTH IS OF GOLD."

When the fire-dog heard this, he could no longer endure to listen to me.

Abashed did he draw in his tail, said "bow-wow!" in a cowed voice, and crept down into his cave.--

Thus told Zarathustra. His disciples, however, hardly listened to him: so great was their eagerness to tell him about the sailors, the rabbits, and the flying man.

"What am I to think of it!" said Zarathustra. "Am I indeed a ghost?

But it may have been my shadow. Ye have surely heard something of the Wanderer and his Shadow?

One thing, however, is certain: I must keep a tighter hold of it; otherwise it will spoil my reputation."

And once more Zarathustra shook his head and wondered. "What am I to think of it!" said he once more.

"Why did the ghost cry: 'It is time! It is the highest time!'

For WHAT is it then--the highest time?"--

Thus spake Zarathustra.

XLI. THE SOOTHSAYER.

"-And I saw a great sadness come over mankind. The best turned weary of their works.

A doctrine appeared, a faith ran beside it: 'All is empty, all is alike, all hath been!'

And from all hills there re-echoed: 'All is empty, all is alike, all hath been!'

To be sure we have harvested: but why have all our fruits become rotten and brown? What was it fell last night from the evil moon?

In vain was all our labour, poison hath our wine become, the evil eye hath singed yellow our fields and hearts.

Arid have we all become; and fire falling upon us, then do we turn dust like ashes:--yea, the fire itself have we made aweary.

All our fountains have dried up, even the sea hath receded. All the ground trieth to gape, but the depth will not swallow!

'Alas! where is there still a sea in which one could be drowned?' so soundeth our plaint--across shallow swamps.

Verily, even for dying have we become too weary; now do we keep awake and live on--in sepulchres."

Thus did Zarathustra hear a soothsayer speak; and the foreboding touched his heart and transformed him. Sorrowfully did he go about and wearily; and he became like unto those of whom the soothsayer had spoken.--

Verily, said he unto his disciples, a little while, and there cometh the long twilight. Alas, how shall I preserve my light through it!

That it may not smother in this sorrowfulness! To remoter worlds shall it be a light, and also to remotest nights!

Thus did Zarathustra go about grieved in his heart, and for three days he did not take any meat or drink: he had no rest, and lost his speech.

At last it came to pa.s.s that he fell into a deep sleep. His disciples, however, sat around him in long night-watches, and waited anxiously to see if he would awake, and speak again, and recover from his affliction.

And this is the discourse that Zarathustra spake when he awoke; his voice, however, came unto his disciples as from afar:

Hear, I pray you, the dream that I dreamed, my friends, and help me to divine its meaning!

A riddle is it still unto me, this dream; the meaning is hidden in it and encaged, and doth not yet fly above it on free pinions.