Then was there again spoken unto me without voice: "What matter about thyself, Zarathustra! Speak thy word, and succ.u.mb!"

And I answered: "Ah, is it MY word? Who am _I_? I await the worthier one; I am not worthy even to succ.u.mb by it."

Then was there again spoken unto me without voice: "What matter about thyself? Thou art not yet humble enough for me. Humility hath the hardest skin."--

And I answered: "What hath not the skin of my humility endured! At the foot of my height do I dwell: how high are my summits, no one hath yet told me. But well do I know my valleys."

Then was there again spoken unto me without voice: "O Zarathustra, he who hath to remove mountains removeth also valleys and plains."--

And I answered: "As yet hath my word not removed mountains, and what I have spoken hath not reached man. I went, indeed, unto men, but not yet have I attained unto them."

Then was there again spoken unto me without voice: "What knowest thou THEREOF! The dew falleth on the gra.s.s when the night is most silent."--

And I answered: "They mocked me when I found and walked in mine own path; and certainly did my feet then tremble.

And thus did they speak unto me: Thou forgottest the path before, now dost thou also forget how to walk!"

Then was there again spoken unto me without voice: "What matter about their mockery! Thou art one who hast unlearned to obey: now shalt thou command!

Knowest thou not who is most needed by all? He who commandeth great things.

To execute great things is difficult: but the more difficult task is to command great things.

This is thy most unpardonable obstinacy: thou hast the power, and thou wilt not rule."--

And I answered: "I lack the lion's voice for all commanding."

Then was there again spoken unto me as a whispering: "It is the stillest words which bring the storm. Thoughts that come with doves' footsteps guide the world.

O Zarathustra, thou shalt go as a shadow of that which is to come: thus wilt thou command, and in commanding go foremost."--

And I answered: "I am ashamed."

Then was there again spoken unto me without voice: "Thou must yet become a child, and be without shame.

The pride of youth is still upon thee; late hast thou become young: but he who would become a child must surmount even his youth."--

And I considered a long while, and trembled. At last, however, did I say what I had said at first. "I will not."

Then did a laughing take place all around me. Alas, how that laughing lacerated my bowels and cut into my heart!

And there was spoken unto me for the last time: "O Zarathustra, thy fruits are ripe, but thou art not ripe for thy fruits!

So must thou go again into solitude: for thou shalt yet become mellow."--

And again was there a laughing, and it fled: then did it become still around me, as with a double stillness. I lay, however, on the ground, and the sweat flowed from my limbs.

--Now have ye heard all, and why I have to return into my solitude.

Nothing have I kept hidden from you, my friends.

But even this have ye heard from me, WHO is still the most reserved of men--and will be so!

Ah, my friends! I should have something more to say unto you! I should have something more to give unto you! Why do I not give it? Am I then a n.i.g.g.ard?--

When, however, Zarathustra had spoken these words, the violence of his pain, and a sense of the nearness of his departure from his friends came over him, so that he wept aloud; and no one knew how to console him. In the night, however, he went away alone and left his friends.

THIRD PART.

"Ye look aloft when ye long for exaltation, and I look downward because I am exalted.

"Who among you can at the same time laugh and be exalted?

"He who climbeth on the highest mountains, laugheth at all tragic plays and tragic realities."--ZARATHUSTRA, I., "Reading and Writing."

XLV. THE WANDERER.

Then, when it was about midnight, Zarathustra went his way over the ridge of the isle, that he might arrive early in the morning at the other coast; because there he meant to embark. For there was a good roadstead there, in which foreign ships also liked to anchor: those ships took many people with them, who wished to cross over from the Happy Isles. So when Zarathustra thus ascended the mountain, he thought on the way of his many solitary wanderings from youth onwards, and how many mountains and ridges and summits he had already climbed.

I am a wanderer and mountain-climber, said he to his heart, I love not the plains, and it seemeth I cannot long sit still.

And whatever may still overtake me as fate and experience--a wandering will be therein, and a mountain-climbing: in the end one experienceth only oneself.

The time is now past when accidents could befall me; and what COULD now fall to my lot which would not already be mine own!

It returneth only, it cometh home to me at last--mine own Self, and such of it as hath been long abroad, and scattered among things and accidents.

And one thing more do I know: I stand now before my last summit, and before that which hath been longest reserved for me. Ah, my hardest path must I ascend! Ah, I have begun my lonesomest wandering!

He, however, who is of my nature doth not avoid such an hour: the hour that saith unto him: Now only dost thou go the way to thy greatness!

Summit and abyss--these are now comprised together!

Thou goest the way to thy greatness: now hath it become thy last refuge, what was. .h.i.therto thy last danger!

Thou goest the way to thy greatness: it must now be thy best courage that there is no longer any path behind thee!

Thou goest the way to thy greatness: here shall no one steal after thee!

Thy foot itself hath effaced the path behind thee, and over it standeth written: Impossibility.

And if all ladders henceforth fail thee, then must thou learn to mount upon thine own head: how couldst thou mount upward otherwise?

Upon thine own head, and beyond thine own heart! Now must the gentlest in thee become the hardest.