Page:Thus Spake Zarathustra - Thomas Common - 1917.djvu/166

 and even should I walk on my own errors, still would I be above them and their heads.

For men are not equal: so speaks justice. And what I will, they may not will!-

Thus spoke Zarathustra.

39. Poets
"SINCE I have known the body better"- said Zarathustra to one of his disciples- "the spirit has only been to me symbolically spirit; and all the 'imperishable'- that is also but a parable."

"So have I heard you say once before," answered the disciple, "and then you added: 'But the poets lie too much.' Why did you say that the poets lie too much?"

"Why?" said Zarathustra. "You ask why? I do not belong to those who may be asked after their Why.

Is my experience but of yesterday? It is long ago that I experienced the reasons for my opinions.

Should I not have to be a cask of memory, if I also wanted to have my reasons with me?

It is already too much for me even to retain my opinions; and many a bird flies away.

And sometimes, also, do I find a fugitive creature in my dovecote, which is alien to me, and trembles when I lay my hand upon it.

But what did Zarathustra once say to you? That the poets lie too much?- But Zarathustra also is a poet.