Part 33 (1/2)
”As I lay in sleep a sheep ate up the ivy crown of my head--ate and then said: 'Zarathustra is no more a scholar.'
”Said it and went strutting away, and proud. A child told it to me....
”This is the truth. I am gone out of the house of the scholars, and have slammed to the door behind me....
”I am too hot, and burning with my own thoughts; oft will it take away my breath. I must into the open and out of all dusty rooms.
”But they sit cool in cool shadows; they wish in all things to be but spectators, and guard themselves lest they sit where the sun burns the steps.
”Like those who stand upon the street and stare at the people who go by; so they wait also and stare at the thoughts that others have thought.
”If one touches them with the hands, they make dust around them like meal-sacks, and involuntarily; _but who could guess that their dust comes from corn and the golden rapture of the summer fields?_”
”Too far away into the future I flew; a horror overcame me. And as I looked around me, there was Time my only companion.
”Then I flew backward, homeward--and ever faster: so I came to you, men of the present, and to the Land of Culture.
”For the first time I brought an eye for you, and good wishes; truly, with longing in my heart I came.
”And what happened to me? Frightened as I was--I had to laugh. Never had my eyes seen anything so color-besprinkled!
”I laughed and laughed while my foot still trembled, and my heart too: 'Here is the home of all paint-pots!' said I.
”Painted over with fifty spots in face and limbs; so sat ye there, to my amazement, ye men of the present!...
”Written all over with the signs of the past, and also these signs painted over with new signs; so you have hidden yourself well from all sign-readers!...
”All Times and Principles look piebald out of your coverings; all Customs and Faiths speak piebald out of your features....
”How _could_ ye believe, ye color-besprinkled!--who are pictures of everything that ever was believed!...
”Ah, whither shall I go now with my longing?”
”Who are pictures of everything that ever was believed! Who are pictures of everything that ever was believed!” I read that and I slapped my knees and I lay back and laughed like a very Falstaff. ”Pictures of everything that ever was believed!” Ho, ho, ho!
--That is some of Nietzsche!
January 8th.
To-day it snowed hard, and it occurred to me that I might add to my money.
I bought a second-hand shovel and went out to shovel snow. It is not so bad, I said, you are out of doors, and also you can think of Nietzsche.