查拉图斯特拉如是说 英文版 Thus Spake Zarathustra
尼采 Friedrich Nietzsche
XLVI. The Vision and the Enigma.
1.
When it got abroad among the sailors that Zarathustra was on board theship--for a man who came from the Happy Isles had gone on board along withhim,--there was great curiosity and expectation. But Zarathustra keptsilent for two days, and was cold and deaf with sadness; so that he neitheranswered looks nor questions. On the evening of the second day, however,he again opened his ears, though he still kept silent: for there were manycurious and dangerous things to be heard on board the ship, which came fromafar, and was to go still further. Zarathustra, however, was fond of allthose who make distant voyages, and dislike to live without danger. Andbehold! when listening, his own tongue was at last loosened, and the ice ofhis heart broke. Then did he begin to speak thus:
To you, the daring venturers and adventurers, and whoever hath embarkedwith cunning sails upon frightful seas,--
To you the enigma-intoxicated, the twilight-enjoyers, whose souls areallured by flutes to every treacherous gulf:
--For ye dislike to grope at a thread with cowardly hand; and where ye canDIVINE, there do ye hate to CALCULATE--
To you only do I tell the enigma that I SAW--the vision of the lonesomestone.--
Gloomily walked I lately in corpse-coloured twilight--gloomily and sternly,with compressed lips. Not only one sun had set for me.
A path which ascended daringly among boulders, an evil, lonesome path,which neither herb nor shrub any longer cheered, a mountain-path, crunchedunder the daring of my foot.
Mutely marching over the scornful clinking of pebbles, trampling the stonethat let it slip: thus did my foot force its way upwards.
Upwards:--in spite of the spirit that drew it downwards, towards the abyss,the spirit of gravity, my devil and arch-enemy.
Upwards:--although it sat upon me, half-dwarf, half-mole; paralysed,paralysing; dripping lead in mine ear, and thoughts like drops of lead intomy brain.
"O Zarathustra," it whispered scornfully, syllable by syllable, "thou stoneof wisdom! Thou threwest thyself high, but every thrown stone must--fall!
O Zarathustra, thou stone of wisdom, thou sling-stone, thou star-destroyer!Thyself threwest thou so high,--but every thrown stone--must fall!
Condemned of thyself, and to thine own stoning: O Zarathustra, far indeedthrewest thou thy stone--but upon THYSELF will it recoil!"
Then was the dwarf silent; and it lasted long. The silence, however,oppressed me; and to be thus in pairs, one is verily lonesomer than whenalone!
I ascended, I ascended, I dreamt, I thought,--but everything oppressed me.A sick one did I resemble, whom bad torture wearieth, and a worse dreamreawakeneth out of his first sleep.--
But there is something in me which I call courage: it hath hitherto slainfor me every dejection. This courage at last bade me stand still and say:"Dwarf! Thou! Or I!"--
For courage is the best slayer,--courage which ATTACKETH: for in everyattack there is sound of triumph.
Man, however, is the most courageous animal: thereby hath he overcomeevery animal. With sound of triumph hath he overcome every pain; humanpain, however, is the sorest pain.
Courage slayeth also giddiness at abysses: and where doth man not stand atabysses! Is not seeing itself--seeing abysses?
Courage is the best slayer: courage slayeth also fellow-suffering.Fellow-suffering, however, is the deepest abyss: as deeply as man lookethinto life, so deeply also doth he look into suffering.
Courage, however, is the best slayer, courage which attacketh: it slayetheven death itself; for it saith: "WAS THAT life? Well! Once more!"
In such speech, however, there is much sound of triumph. He who hath earsto hear, let him hear.--
2.
"Halt, dwarf!" said I. "Either I--or thou! I, however, am the stronger ofthe two:--thou knowest not mine abysmal thought! IT--couldst thou notendure!"
Then happened that which made me lighter: for the dwarf sprang from myshoulder, the prying sprite! And it squatted on a stone in front of me.There was however a gateway just where we halted.
"Look at this gateway! Dwarf!" I continued, "it hath two faces. Two roadscome together here: these hath no one yet gone to the end of.
This long lane backwards: it continueth for an eternity. And that longlane forward--that is another eternity.
They are antithetical to one another, these roads; they directly abut onone another:--and it is here, at this gateway, that they come together.The name of the gateway is inscribed above: 'This Moment.'
But should one follow them further--and ever further and further on,thinkest thou, dwarf, that these roads would be eternally antithetical?"--
"Everything straight lieth," murmured the dwarf, contemptuously. "Alltruth is crooked; time itself is a circle."
"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 carriedthee HIGH!"
"Observe," continued I, "This Moment! From the gateway, This Moment, thererunneth a long eternal lane BACKWARDS: behind us lieth an eternity.
Must not whatever CAN run its course of all things, have already run alongthat lane? Must not whatever CAN happen of all things have alreadyhappened, resulted, and gone by?
And if everything have already existed, what thinkest thou, dwarf, of ThisMoment? Must not this gateway also--have already existed?
And are not all things closely bound together in such wise that This Momentdraweth all coming things after it? CONSEQUENTLY--itself also?
For whatever CAN run its course of all things, also in this long laneOUTWARD--MUST it once more run!--
And this slow spider which creepeth in the moonlight, and this moonlightitself, and thou and I in this gateway whispering together, whispering ofeternal things--must we not all have already existed?
--And must we not return and run in that other lane out before us, thatlong weird lane--must we not eternally return?"--
Thus did I speak, and always more softly: for I was afraid of mine ownthoughts, and arrear-thoughts. Then, suddenly did I hear a dog HOWL nearme.
Had I ever heard a dog howl thus? My thoughts ran back. Yes! When I wasa child, in my most distant childhood:
--Then did I hear a dog howl thus. And saw it also, with hair bristling,its head upwards, trembling in the stillest midnight, when even dogsbelieve in ghosts:
--So that it excited my commiseration. For just then went the full moon,silent as death, over the house; just then did it stand still, a glowingglobe--at rest on the flat roof, as if on some one's property:--
Thereby had the dog been terrified: for dogs believe in thieves andghosts. And when I again heard such howling, then did it excite mycommiseration once more.
Where was now the dwarf? And the gateway? And the spider? And all thewhispering? Had I dreamt? Had I awakened? 'Twixt rugged rocks did Isuddenly stand alone, dreary in the dreariest moonlight.
BUT THERE LAY A MAN! And there! The dog leaping, bristling, whining--nowdid it see me coming--then did it howl again, then did it CRY:--had I everheard a dog cry so for help?
And verily, what I saw, the like had I never seen. A young shepherd did Isee, writhing, choking, quivering, with distorted countenance, and with aheavy black serpent hanging out of his mouth.
Had I ever seen so much loathing and pale horror on one countenance? Hehad perhaps gone to sleep? Then had the serpent crawled into his throat--there had it bitten itself fast.
My hand pulled at the serpent, and pulled:--in vain! I failed to pull theserpent out of his throat. Then there cried out of me: "Bite! Bite!
Its head off! Bite!"--so cried it out of me; my horror, my hatred, myloathing, my pity, all my good and my bad cried with one voice out of me.--
Ye daring ones around me! Ye venturers and adventurers, and whoever of youhave embarked with cunning sails on unexplored seas! Ye enigma-enjoyers!
Solve unto me the enigma that I then beheld, interpret unto me the visionof the lonesomest one!
For it was a vision and a foresight:--WHAT did I then behold in parable?And WHO is it that must come some day?
WHO is the shepherd into whose throat the serpent thus crawled? WHO is theman into whose throat all the heaviest and blackest will thus crawl?
--The shepherd however bit as my cry had admonished him; he bit with astrong bite! Far away did he spit the head of the serpent--: and sprangup.--
No longer shepherd, no longer man--a transfigured being, a light-surroundedbeing, that LAUGHED! Never on earth laughed a man as HE laughed!
O my brethren, I heard a laughter which was no human laughter,--and nowgnaweth a thirst at me, a longing that is never allayed.
My longing for that laughter gnaweth at me: oh, how can I still endure tolive! And how could I endure to die at present!--
Thus spake Zarathustra.