Page:Thus Spake Zarathustra - Alexander Tille - 1896.djvu/164

 I3O + THUS SPAKE ZARATHUSTRA, II

We bite nobody and go out of the way of him who seeketh to bite ; and in all things we have the opinion we are given.'

And again there are such as love gestures and think virtue is a kind of gesture.

Their knees always adore, and their hands are a praise of virtue, but their heart knoweth nothing of it.

And again there are such as deem it virtue to say : ' Virtue is necessary ' ; but in reality they only believe police to be necessary.

And many a one who cannot see what is sublime in men, calleth it virtue to see too well what is base in them : thus he calleth his evil eye virtue.

And some wish to be edified and lifted up, and call it virtue; and others wish to be cast down and call it virtue also.

And in this way almost all believe they share in virtue. At any rate everybody would have himself to be an expert as to 'good' and 'evil.'

Zarathustra hath not come to say unto all these liars and fools : ' What know ye of virtue ! What could ye know of virtue ! '

But that ye, my friends, may become weary of the old words which ye have learnt from fools and liars.

Weary of the words ' reward,' ' retaliation,' ' punish- ment,' 'revenge in justice'

Weary of saying : ' That an action is good, springeth from its being unselfish.'

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