A plaything let woman be, pure and fine like the precious stone, illumined with the virtues of a world not yet come.
Let the beam of a star shine in your love! Let your hope say: “May I bear the Superman!”
In your love let there be valour! With your love shall ye assail him who inspireth you with fear!
In your love be your honour! Little doth woman understand otherwise about honour. But let this be your honour: always to love more than ye are loved, and never be the second.
Let man fear woman when she loveth: then maketh she every sacrifice, and everything else she regardeth as worthless.
Let man fear woman when she hateth: for man in his innermost soul is merely evil; woman, however, is mean.
What the critics said
Ludovici argues that hostility to Nietzsche's views on women is a misunderstanding: his doctrine is that the sexes are fundamentally antagonistic and should be kept so, against the democratic levelling that would masculinise women and feminise men, a view Ludovici judges right and just; he adds that the discourse's notorious last line was suggested by a woman.