Thus Spoke Zarathustra
Friedrich Nietzsche
3,679 passages indexed from Thus Spoke Zarathustra (Friedrich Nietzsche) — Page 23 of 74
License: Public Domain
Thus Spoke Zarathustra, passage 3626
The poem in this discourse is, of course, reminiscent of Wagner’s own poetical manner, and it must be remembered that the whole was written subsequent to Nietzsche’s final break with his friend. The dialogue between Zarathustra and the Magician reveals pretty fully what it was that Nietzsche grew to loathe so intensely in Wagner,—viz., his pronounced histrionic tendencies, his dissembling powers, his inordinate vanity, his equivocalness, his falseness. “It honoureth thee,” says Zarathustra, “that thou soughtest for greatness, but it betrayeth thee also. Thou art not great.” The Magician is nevertheless sent as a guest to Zarathustra’s cave; for, in his heart, Zarathustra believed until the end that the Magician was a higher man broken by modern values.
Thus Spoke Zarathustra, passage 2057
Or they learn in godly-gay style to play the harp with a hymn-poet, who would fain harp himself into the heart of young girls:—for he hath tired of old girls and their praises.
Thus Spoke Zarathustra, passage 2421
Ye flee from me? Ye are frightened? Ye tremble at this word?
Thus Spoke Zarathustra, passage 3550
Nietzsche tried to be all things to all men; he was sufficiently fond of his fellows for that: in the Return Home he describes how he ultimately returns to loneliness in order to recover from the effects of his experiment.
Thus Spoke Zarathustra, passage 3459
Concepts of good and evil are therefore, in their origin, merely a means to an end, they are expedients for acquiring power.
Thus Spoke Zarathustra, passage 1845
The God veileth his beauty: thus hidest thou thy stars. Thou speakest not: THUS proclaimest thou thy wisdom unto me.
Thus Spoke Zarathustra, passage 1246
This curse upon you, mine enemies! Have ye not made mine eternal short, as a tone dieth away in a cold night! Scarcely, as the twinkle of divine eyes, did it come to me—as a fleeting gleam!
Thus Spoke Zarathustra, passage 228
But I am asking the impossible. Therefore do I ask my pride to go always with my wisdom!
Thus Spoke Zarathustra, passage 1316
With upraised breast, and like those who draw in their breath: thus did he stand, the sublime one, and in silence:
Thus Spoke Zarathustra, passage 1737
Thus spake Zarathustra on the ridge of the mountain where it was cold: when, however, he came into the vicinity of the sea, and at last stood alone amongst the cliffs, then had he become weary on his way, and eagerer than ever before.
Thus Spoke Zarathustra, passage 2152
That the lonesome height may not for ever remain lonesome and self-sufficing; that the mountains may come to the valleys and the winds of the heights to the plains:—
Thus Spoke Zarathustra, passage 2166
The spurious wise, however, all the priests, the world-weary, and those whose souls are of feminine and servile nature—oh, how hath their game all along abused selfishness!
Thus Spoke Zarathustra, passage 1309
And he who hath to be a creator in good and evil—verily, he hath first to be a destroyer, and break values in pieces.
Thus Spoke Zarathustra, passage 1695
To execute great things is difficult: but the more difficult task is to command great things.
Thus Spoke Zarathustra, passage 2095
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.
Thus Spoke Zarathustra, passage 2042
COULD they do otherwise, then would they also WILL otherwise. The half-and-half spoil every whole. That leaves become withered,—what is there to lament about that!
Thus Spoke Zarathustra, passage 2174
Nourished with innocent things, and with few, ready and impatient to fly, to fly away—that is now my nature: why should there not be something of bird-nature therein!
Thus Spoke Zarathustra, passage 2833
—That he saw how MAN hung on the cross, and could not endure it;—that his love to man became his hell, and at last his death?”—
Thus Spoke Zarathustra, passage 1777
“Thou spirit of gravity!” said I wrathfully, “do not take it too lightly! Or I shall let thee squat where thou squattest, Haltfoot,—and I carried thee HIGH!”
Thus Spoke Zarathustra, passage 1552
Like a bitterly angry croaking ran the sound through the long corridors when the leaves of the gate opened: ungraciously did this bird cry, unwillingly was it awakened.
Thus Spoke Zarathustra, passage 348
And lo! Then hast thou its name in common with the people, and hast become one of the people and the herd with thy virtue!
Thus Spoke Zarathustra, passage 287
To all those belauded sages of the academic chairs, wisdom was sleep without dreams: they knew no higher significance of life.
Thus Spoke Zarathustra, passage 1709
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 niggard?—
Thus Spoke Zarathustra, passage 2521
O my soul, I gave thee the right to say Nay like the storm, and to say Yea as the open heaven saith Yea: calm as the light remainest thou, and now walkest through denying storms.
Thus Spoke Zarathustra, passage 1250
But then did ye enemies steal my nights, and sold them to sleepless torture: ah, whither hath that joyous wisdom now fled?
Thus Spoke Zarathustra, passage 1727
He, however, who is obtrusive with his eyes as a discerner, how can he ever see more of anything than its foreground!
Thus Spoke Zarathustra, passage 3204
When Zarathustra spake these sayings, he stood nigh to the entrance of his cave; with the last words, however, he slipped away from his guests, and fled for a little while into the open air.
Thus Spoke Zarathustra, passage 1892
They all speak of me when they sit around their fire in the evening—they speak of me, but no one thinketh—of me!
Thus Spoke Zarathustra, passage 913
But that I may reveal my heart entirely unto you, my friends: IF there were gods, how could I endure it to be no God! THEREFORE there are no Gods.
Thus Spoke Zarathustra, passage 1960
A poor bed warmeth me more than a rich one, for I am jealous of my poverty. And in winter she is most faithful unto me.
Thus Spoke Zarathustra, passage 787
My death, praise I unto you, the voluntary death, which cometh unto me because _I_ want it.
Thus Spoke Zarathustra, passage 1295
And this secret spake Life herself unto me. “Behold,” said she, “I am that WHICH MUST EVER SURPASS ITSELF.
Thus Spoke Zarathustra, passage 3528
This oppressive and paralysing sense of guilt and of sin is what Nietzsche refers to when he speaks of “the spirit of gravity.” This creature half-dwarf, half-mole, whom he bears with him a certain distance on his climb and finally defies, and whom he calls his devil and arch-enemy, is nothing more than the heavy millstone “guilty conscience,” together with the concept of sin which at present hangs round the neck of men. To rise above it—to soar—is the most difficult of all things to-day.
Thus Spoke Zarathustra, passage 2303
O my brethren, not backward shall your nobility gaze, but OUTWARD! Exiles shall ye be from all fatherlands and forefather-lands!
Thus Spoke Zarathustra, passage 1978
MUST I not wear stilts, that they may OVERLOOK my long legs—all those enviers and injurers around me?
Thus Spoke Zarathustra, passage 1364
For thus speak ye: “Real are we wholly, and without faith and superstition”: thus do ye plume yourselves—alas! even without plumes!
Thus Spoke Zarathustra, passage 339
The creating Self created for itself esteeming and despising, it created for itself joy and woe. The creating body created for itself spirit, as a hand to its will.
Thus Spoke Zarathustra, passage 2574
Then did Life answer me thus, and kept thereby her fine ears closed:
Thus Spoke Zarathustra, passage 2048
Thou knowest it well: the faint-hearted devil in thee, which would fain fold its arms, and place its hands in its bosom, and take it easier:—this faint-hearted devil persuadeth thee that “there IS a God!”
Thus Spoke Zarathustra, passage 46
We remained somewhat too long in Rome that spring, and what with the effect of the increasing heat and the discouraging circumstances already described, my brother resolved not to write any more, or in any case, not to proceed with “Zarathustra”, although I offered to relieve him of all trouble in connection with the proofs and the publisher.
Thus Spoke Zarathustra, passage 2100
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!
Thus Spoke Zarathustra, passage 2530
—Filled and weighted by thy happiness, waiting from superabundance, and yet ashamed of thy waiting.
Thus Spoke Zarathustra, passage 3451
Those who can read German will find an excellent guide, in this respect, in Frau Foerster-Nietzsche’s exhaustive and highly interesting biography of her brother: “Das Leben Friedrich Nietzsche’s” (published by Naumann); while the works of Deussen, Raoul Richter, and Baroness Isabelle von Unger-Sternberg, will be found to throw useful and necessary light upon many questions which it would be difficult for a sister to touch upon.
Thus Spoke Zarathustra, passage 3610
Nietzsche earnestly believed that the Zarathustra-kingdom—his dynasty of a thousand years—would one day come; if he had not believed it so earnestly, if every artist in fact had not believed so earnestly in his Hazar, whether of ten, fifteen, a hundred, or a thousand years, we should have lost all our higher men; they would have become pessimists, suicides, or merchants.
Thus Spoke Zarathustra, passage 3134
Especially when they will great things! For they awaken distrust in great things, these subtle false-coiners and stage-players:—
Thus Spoke Zarathustra, passage 827
Upward soareth our sense: thus is it a simile of our body, a simile of an elevation. Such similes of elevations are the names of the virtues.
Thus Spoke Zarathustra, passage 1093
But I will soon bring your hiding-places to the light: therefore do I laugh in your face my laughter of the height.
Thus Spoke Zarathustra, passage 936
My friends, there hath arisen a satire on your friend: “Behold Zarathustra! Walketh he not amongst us as if amongst animals?”
Thus Spoke Zarathustra, passage 2865
“Zarathustra! Zarathustra! Read my riddle! Say, say! WHAT IS THE REVENGE ON THE WITNESS?
Thus Spoke Zarathustra, passage 3078
Besides, all of you have thought too much about freezing, drowning, suffocating, and other bodily dangers: none of you, however, have thought of MY danger, namely, perishing of hunger—”