EXPLANATORY NOTES TO “THUS SPAKE ZARATHUSTRA”
Project Gutenberg EPUB3 edition
Nietzsche, Friedrich Wilhelm, Levy, Oscar, and Ludovici, Anthony M. (Anthony Mario)
2. The gloomy, ambitious son of the people, shy, lonely, and ready for anything,—who chooses rather to be alone than to be a destroyer,—he offers himself as an instrument.
3. The ugliest man, who is obliged to adorn himself (historical sense) and who is always in search of a new garment: he desires to make his appearance becoming, and finally retires into solitude in order not to be seen, he is ashamed of himself.
4. He who honours facts (“the brain of a leech”), the most subtle intellectual conscience, and because he has it in excess, a guilty conscience,—he wants to get rid of himself.
5. The poet, who at bottom thirsts, for savage freedom,—he chooses loneliness and the severity of knowledge.
6. The discoverer of new intoxicants,—the musician, the sorcerer, who finally drops on his knees before a loving heart and says: “Not to me do I wish to lead you but yonder to him.”
Those who are sober to excess and who have a yearning for intoxication which they do not gratify. The Supersobersides.
7. Genius (as an attack of insanity), becoming frozen through lack of love: “I am neither a genius nor a god.” Great tenderness: “people must show him more love!”
8. The rich man who has given everything away and who asks everybody: “Have you anything you do not want? give me some of it!” as a beggar.
9. The Kings who renounce dominion: “we seek him who is more worthy to rule”—against “equality”: the great man is lacking, consequently reverence is lacking too.
10. The actor of happiness.
11. The pessimistic soothsayer who detects fatigue everywhere.
12. The fool of the big city.
13. The youth from the mount
14. The woman (seeks the man).
15. The envious emaciated toiler and arriviste.
16. The good, } and their mad fancy:
17. The pious, }“For God” that
18. The self-centred and } means “For me.” and saints,
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“I gave you the most weighty thought: maybe mankind will perish through it, perhaps also mankind will be elevated through it inasmuch as by its means the elements which are hostile to life will be overcome and eliminated.” “Ye must not chide Life, but yourselves!”—The destiny of higher man is to be a creator. The organisation of higher men, the education of the future ruler. “YE must rejoice in your superior power when ye rule and when ye form anew.” “Not only man but Superman will recur eternally!”
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The typical suffering of the reformer and also his consolations. The seven solitudes.
He lives as though he were beyond all ages: his loftiness allows him to have intercourse with the anchorites and the misunderstood of every age.
Only his beauty is his defence. He lays his hands on the next thousand years.
His love increases as he sees the impossibility of avoiding the affliction of pain with it.
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Zarathustra’s mood is not one of mad impatience for Superman! It is peaceful, it can wait: but all action has derived some purpose from being the road and means thither,—and must be done well and perfectly.
The repose of the great stream! Consecration of the smallest thing. All unrest, and violent longing, all loathing should be presented in the third part and be overcome! The gentleness, and mildness, &c., in the first and second parts are both signs of a power which is not yet self-reliant!
With the recovery of Zarathustra, Cæsar stands there inexorable and kind:—the gulf separating creation, goodness, and wisdom is annihilated.
Clearness, peace, no exaggerated craving, happiness in the moment which is properly occupied and immortalised!
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Zarathustra, Part III.: “I myself am happy.”—When he had taken leave of mankind he returned unto himself. Like a cloud it vanishes from him. The manner in which Superman must live: like an Epicurean God.
Divine suffering is the substance of the third part of Zarathustra. The human state of the legislator is only brought forward as an example.
His intense love for his friends seems to him a disease,—once more he becomes peaceful.
When the invitations come he gently evades them.
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In the fourth part it is necessary to say precisely why it is that the time of the great noon has come: It is really a description of the age given by means of visits, but interpreted by Zarathustra.
In the fourth part it is necessary to say precisely why “a chosen people” has first to be created:—they are the lucky cases of nature as opposed to the unlucky (exemplified by the visitors): only to them —the lucky cases—is Zarathustra able to express himself concerning ultimate problems, them alone is he able to inspire with activity on behalf of this theory. They are strong, healthy, hard and above all noble enough for him to give them the hammer with which to remould the whole world.
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The unity in power of the creator, the lover and the knight of knowledge.