I pass through this people and keep mine eyes open: they do not forgive me for not envying their virtues.
They bite at me, because I say unto them that for small people, small virtues are necessary—and because it is hard for me to understand that small people are NECESSARY!
Here am I still like a cock in a strange farm-yard, at which even the hens peck: but on that account I am not unfriendly to the hens.
I am courteous towards them, as towards all small annoyances; to be prickly towards what is small, seemeth to me wisdom for hedgehogs.
They all speak of me when they sit around their fire in the evening—they speak of me, but no one thinketh—of me!
This is the new stillness which I have experienced: their noise around me spreadeth a mantle over my thoughts.
They shout to one another: “What is this gloomy cloud about to do to us? Let us see that it doth not bring a plague upon us!”
And recently did a woman seize upon her child that was coming unto me: “Take the children away,” cried she, “such eyes scorch children’s souls.”
They cough when I speak: they think coughing an objection to strong winds—they divine nothing of the boisterousness of my happiness!
“We have not yet time for Zarathustra”—so they object; but what matter about a time that “hath no time” for Zarathustra?
And if they should altogether praise me, how could I go to sleep on THEIR praise? A girdle of spines is their praise unto me: it scratcheth me even when I take it off.
And this also did I learn among them: the praiser doeth as if he gave back; in truth, however, he wanteth more to be given him!
Ask my foot if their lauding and luring strains please it! Verily, to such measure and ticktack, it liketh neither to dance nor to stand still.
To small virtues would they fain lure and laud me; to the ticktack of small happiness would they fain persuade my foot.
What the critics said
Brandes summarises Zarathustra's disgust with the petty virtues that make men smaller, his being called godless, the apostasy of his former companions, and his loathing of the great city and of the State.
Brandes summarises Zarathustra's disgust with the petty virtues that make men smaller, his being called godless, the apostasy of his former companions, and his loathing of the great city and of the State.
Ludovici explains that by 'the great noontide' Nietzsche meant the present period as the noon of man's history: the childhood of mankind is over, we now know, and there is no longer any excuse for mistakes that botch the type man.
Ludovici argues that in 'Old and New Tables' freedom receives its death-blow as a general desideratum: Nietzsche held freedom dangerous in unworthy hands, asking 'free for what?' and requiring that one first be such as can will.