--- title: "Thus Spake Zarathustra" author: "Friedrich Nietzsche" translator: "Thomas Common" languages: [en] shelf: "Philosophy" section: 66 of 95 url: https://scriptura.si/works/nietzsche-zarathustra/66/ cite: "Friedrich Nietzsche, tr. Thomas Common, Thus Spake Zarathustra, section 66. Scriptura (scriptura.si), https://scriptura.si/works/nietzsche-zarathustra/66/" --- # Thus Spake Zarathustra *Friedrich Nietzsche, tr. Thomas Common* A prophet comes down from his mountain to teach the overman, in sermons and songs. ## 66. LVI. Old and New Tables · 6 of 6 Source: https://scriptura.si/works/nietzsche-zarathustra/66/ · cite a paragraph as https://scriptura.si/works/nietzsche-zarathustra/66/#p-N [¶0] The good MUST crucify him who deviseth his own virtue! That IS the truth! [¶1] The second one, however, who discovered their country—the country, heart and soil of the good and just,—it was he who asked: “Whom do they hate most?” [¶2] The CREATOR, hate they most, him who breaketh the tables and old values, the breaker,—him they call the law-breaker. [¶3] For the good—they CANNOT create; they are always the beginning of the end:— [¶4] —They crucify him who writeth new values on new tables, they sacrifice UNTO THEMSELVES the future—they crucify the whole human future! [¶5] The good—they have always been the beginning of the end.— ### 27 [¶7] O my brethren, have ye also understood this word? And what I once said of the “last man”?— [¶8] With whom lieth the greatest danger to the whole human future? Is it not with the good and just? [¶9] BREAK UP, BREAK UP, I PRAY YOU, THE GOOD AND JUST!—O my brethren, have ye understood also this word? ### 28 [¶11] Ye flee from me? Ye are frightened? Ye tremble at this word? [¶12] O my brethren, when I enjoined you to break up the good, and the tables of the good, then only did I embark man on his high seas. [¶13] And now only cometh unto him the great terror, the great outlook, the great sickness, the great nausea, the great sea-sickness. [¶14] False shores and false securities did the good teach you; in the lies of the good were ye born and bred. Everything hath been radically contorted and distorted by the good. [¶15] But he who discovered the country of “man,” discovered also the country of “man’s future.” Now shall ye be sailors for me, brave, patient! [¶16] Keep yourselves up betimes, my brethren, learn to keep yourselves up! The sea stormeth: many seek to raise themselves again by you. [¶17] The sea stormeth: all is in the sea. Well! Cheer up! Ye old seaman-hearts! [¶18] What of fatherland! THITHER striveth our helm where our CHILDREN’S LAND is! Thitherwards, stormier than the sea, stormeth our great longing!— ### 29 [¶20] “Why so hard!”—said to the diamond one day the charcoal; “are we then not near relatives?”— [¶21] Why so soft? O my brethren; thus do I ask you: are ye then not—my brethren? [¶22] Why so soft, so submissive and yielding? Why is there so much negation and abnegation in your hearts? Why is there so little fate in your looks? [¶23] And if ye will not be fates and inexorable ones, how can ye one day— conquer with me? [¶24] And if your hardness will not glance and cut and chip to pieces, how can ye one day—create with me? [¶25] For the creators are hard. And blessedness must it seem to you to press your hand upon millenniums as upon wax,— [¶26] —Blessedness to write upon the will of millenniums as upon brass,—harder than brass, nobler than brass. Entirely hard is only the noblest. [¶27] This new table, O my brethren, put I up over you: BECOME HARD!— ### 30 [¶29] O thou, my Will! Thou change of every need, MY needfulness! Preserve me from all small victories! [¶30] Thou fatedness of my soul, which I call fate! Thou In-me! Over-me! Preserve and spare me for one great fate! [¶31] And thy last greatness, my Will, spare it for thy last—that thou mayest be inexorable IN thy victory! Ah, who hath not succumbed to his victory! [¶32] Ah, whose eye hath not bedimmed in this intoxicated twilight! Ah, whose foot hath not faltered and forgotten in victory—how to stand!— [¶33] —That I may one day be ready and ripe in the great noontide: ready and ripe like the glowing ore, the lightning-bearing cloud, and the swelling milk-udder:— [¶34] —Ready for myself and for my most hidden Will: a bow eager for its arrow, an arrow eager for its star:— [¶35] —A star, ready and ripe in its noontide, glowing, pierced, blessed, by annihilating sun-arrows:— [¶36] —A sun itself, and an inexorable sun-will, ready for annihilation in victory! [¶37] O Will, thou change of every need, MY needfulness! Spare me for one great victory!— [¶38] Thus spake Zarathustra.