查拉图斯特拉如是说 英文版 Thus Spake Zarathustra
尼采 Friedrich Nietzsche
XLI. The Soothsayer.
"-And I saw a great sadness come over mankind. The best turned weary oftheir 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 hathbeen!'
To be sure we have harvested: but why have all our fruits become rottenand 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 hathsinged yellow our fields and hearts.
Arid have we all become; and fire falling upon us, then do we turn dustlike ashes:--yea, the fire itself have we made aweary.
All our fountains have dried up, even the sea hath receded. All the groundtrieth to gape, but the depth will not swallow!
'Alas! where is there still a sea in which one could be drowned?' sosoundeth our plaint--across shallow swamps.
Verily, even for dying have we become too weary; now do we keep awake andlive on--in sepulchres."
Thus did Zarathustra hear a soothsayer speak; and the foreboding touchedhis 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 thelong twilight. Alas, how shall I preserve my light through it!
That it may not smother in this sorrowfulness! To remoter worlds shall itbe a light, and also to remotest nights!
Thus did Zarathustra go about grieved in his heart, and for three days hedid not take any meat or drink: he had no rest, and lost his speech. Atlast it came to pass that he fell into a deep sleep. His disciples,however, sat around him in long night-watches, and waited anxiously to seeif 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 todivine its meaning!
A riddle is it still unto me, this dream; the meaning is hidden in it andencaged, and doth not yet fly above it on free pinions.
All life had I renounced, so I dreamed. Night-watchman and grave-guardianhad I become, aloft, in the lone mountain-fortress of Death.
There did I guard his coffins: full stood the musty vaults of thosetrophies of victory. Out of glass coffins did vanquished life gaze uponme.
The odour of dust-covered eternities did I breathe: sultry and dust-covered lay my soul. And who could have aired his soul there!
Brightness of midnight was ever around me; lonesomeness cowered beside her;and as a third, death-rattle stillness, the worst of my female friends.
Keys did I carry, the rustiest of all keys; and I knew how to open withthem the most creaking of all gates.
Like a bitterly angry croaking ran the sound through the long corridorswhen the leaves of the gate opened: ungraciously did this bird cry,unwillingly was it awakened.
But more frightful even, and more heart-strangling was it, when it againbecame silent and still all around, and I alone sat in that malignantsilence.
Thus did time pass with me, and slip by, if time there still was: what doI know thereof! But at last there happened that which awoke me.
Thrice did there peal peals at the gate like thunders, thrice did thevaults resound and howl again: then did I go to the gate.
Alpa! cried I, who carrieth his ashes unto the mountain? Alpa! Alpa! whocarrieth his ashes unto the mountain?
And I pressed the key, and pulled at the gate, and exerted myself. But nota finger's-breadth was it yet open:
Then did a roaring wind tear the folds apart: whistling, whizzing, andpiercing, it threw unto me a black coffin.
And in the roaring, and whistling, and whizzing the coffin burst up, andspouted out a thousand peals of laughter.
And a thousand caricatures of children, angels, owls, fools, and child-sized butterflies laughed and mocked, and roared at me.
Fearfully was I terrified thereby: it prostrated me. And I cried withhorror as I ne'er cried before.
But mine own crying awoke me:--and I came to myself.--
Thus did Zarathustra relate his dream, and then was silent: for as yet heknew not the interpretation thereof. But the disciple whom he loved mostarose quickly, seized Zarathustra's hand, and said:
"Thy life itself interpreteth unto us this dream, O Zarathustra!
Art thou not thyself the wind with shrill whistling, which bursteth openthe gates of the fortress of Death?
Art thou not thyself the coffin full of many-hued malices and angel-caricatures of life?
Verily, like a thousand peals of children's laughter cometh Zarathustrainto all sepulchres, laughing at those night-watchmen and grave-guardians,and whoever else rattleth with sinister keys.
With thy laughter wilt thou frighten and prostrate them: fainting andrecovering will demonstrate thy power over them.
And when the long twilight cometh and the mortal weariness, even then wiltthou not disappear from our firmament, thou advocate of life!
New stars hast thou made us see, and new nocturnal glories: verily,laughter itself hast thou spread out over us like a many-hued canopy.
Now will children's laughter ever from coffins flow; now will a strong windever come victoriously unto all mortal weariness: of this thou art thyselfthe pledge and the prophet!
Verily, THEY THEMSELVES DIDST THOU DREAM, thine enemies: that was thysorest dream.
But as thou awokest from them and camest to thyself, so shall they awakenfrom themselves--and come unto thee!"
Thus spake the disciple; and all the others then thronged aroundZarathustra, grasped him by the hands, and tried to persuade him to leavehis bed and his sadness, and return unto them. Zarathustra, however, satupright on his couch, with an absent look. Like one returning from longforeign sojourn did he look on his disciples, and examined their features;but still he knew them not. When, however, they raised him, and set himupon his feet, behold, all on a sudden his eye changed; he understoodeverything that had happened, stroked his beard, and said with a strongvoice:
"Well! this hath just its time; but see to it, my disciples, that we have agood repast; and without delay! Thus do I mean to make amends for baddreams!
The soothsayer, however, shall eat and drink at my side: and verily, Iwill yet show him a sea in which he can drown himself!"--
Thus spake Zarathustra. Then did he gaze long into the face of thedisciple who had been the dream-interpreter, and shook his head.--