Your highest thought, however, ye shall have it commanded unto you by me—and it is this: man is something that is to be surpassed.
Zarathustra gives his hearers their highest thought: man is to be surpassed.
- The Superman (Übermensch)It restates the book's central teaching as a command to warriors.
What the critics said
Brandes argues that Nietzsche, like Hartmann, denies the possibility of equality and peace because life is inequality and war, praising the good war that hallows every cause, and that both reflect the militarism of the new German Empire, Nietzsche differing only in wanting war so that manliness may not die out.
Mencken argues that for Nietzsche instinct and experiment reveal one's power, that happiness lies in unrestrained yielding to the will to power through constant contest, citing Zarathustra's 'not to peace, but to victory' and casting dice with death, and that this means a crusade against ethics of self-sacrifice for inferiors and a transvaluation that frees the will to power from infamy.