Friedrich Nietzsche: Thus Spake Zarathustra

THIRD PART. 60. LX. THE SEVEN SEALS. (continued)

Oh, how could I not be ardent for Eternity, and for the marriage-ring of rings--the ring of the return?

Never yet have I found the woman by whom I should like to have children, unless it be this woman whom I love: for I love thee, O Eternity!

FOR I LOVE THEE, O ETERNITY!

5.

If I be fond of the sea, and all that is sealike, and fondest of it when it angrily contradicteth me:

If the exploring delight be in me, which impelleth sails to the undiscovered, if the seafarer's delight be in my delight:

If ever my rejoicing hath called out: "The shore hath vanished,--now hath fallen from me the last chain--

The boundless roareth around me, far away sparkle for me space and time,-- well! cheer up! old heart!"--

Oh, how could I not be ardent for Eternity, and for the marriage-ring of rings--the ring of the return?

Never yet have I found the woman by whom I should like to have children, unless it be this woman whom I love: for I love thee, O Eternity!

FOR I LOVE THEE, O ETERNITY!

6.

If my virtue be a dancer's virtue, and if I have often sprung with both feet into golden-emerald rapture:

If my wickedness be a laughing wickedness, at home among rose-banks and hedges of lilies:

--For in laughter is all evil present, but it is sanctified and absolved by its own bliss:--

And if it be my Alpha and Omega that everything heavy shall become light, every body a dancer, and every spirit a bird: and verily, that is my Alpha and Omega!--