Friedrich Nietzsche: Thus Spake Zarathustra

THIRD PART. 53. LIII. THE RETURN HOME. (continued)

--Until at last thou alone sattest thirsty amongst the drunken ones, and wailedst nightly: 'Is taking not more blessed than giving? And stealing yet more blessed than taking?'--THAT was forsakenness!

And dost thou remember, O Zarathustra? When thy stillest hour came and drove thee forth from thyself, when with wicked whispering it said: 'Speak and succumb!'-

--When it disgusted thee with all thy waiting and silence, and discouraged thy humble courage: THAT was forsakenness!"--

O lonesomeness! My home, lonesomeness! How blessedly and tenderly speaketh thy voice unto me!

We do not question each other, we do not complain to each other; we go together openly through open doors.

For all is open with thee and clear; and even the hours run here on lighter feet. For in the dark, time weigheth heavier upon one than in the light.

Here fly open unto me all being's words and word-cabinets: here all being wanteth to become words, here all becoming wanteth to learn of me how to talk.

Down there, however--all talking is in vain! There, forgetting and passing-by are the best wisdom: THAT have I learned now!

He who would understand everything in man must handle everything. But for that I have too clean hands.

I do not like even to inhale their breath; alas! that I have lived so long among their noise and bad breaths!

O blessed stillness around me! O pure odours around me! How from a deep breast this stillness fetcheth pure breath! How it hearkeneth, this blessed stillness!

But down there--there speaketh everything, there is everything misheard. If one announce one's wisdom with bells, the shopmen in the market-place will out-jingle it with pennies!

Everything among them talketh; no one knoweth any longer how to understand. Everything falleth into the water; nothing falleth any longer into deep wells.