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Ascolo Parodites
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Camest I unto men, and I found them with my parents and the parents of my friends, all of them sleeping upon the old conceit of their moralities.
These men thinkest that they hath long since known of good and evil, ever since the days of Homer and Hesiod, which appear old and forspent unto them.
Before going to sleep these men tell each other of their Love for one another, for they wishest to sleep well, - -
thinkest them that Good and Evil is wisely thereunto that word apportioned, thereunto that word contained.
But I did not disturb the sleeping of these men, but I did not disturb the sleeping of my parents and the parents of my friends. And this I shall tell thee why not.
Art not the pinacothecas and annals of philosophy deserving of less blame than the misuse which their lovers hath made of them?
For verily I say unto you, the truth of the old poet holdest yet; - terra salutares herbas eademque nocentes nutrit, et urticae proxima saepe rosa est.
For these men need somewhat of the fallowcrop, wherein there art as many weeds as worthful herbages.
Amongst these men, a little vision and superstition would not merit merely indulgence or foolish enthusiasm,
for something of this leaven rather is necessary to start off the soul's fermentation towards a philosophical heroism.
Although these men, with my parents and the parents of my friends, hath not acquired the fact of what is good and evil,
yet they do possess the consciousness of struggle. Else would they not wrestle the word love to come free of their lips?
Verily, the will to good and to evil ceased to be a ponderance upon me.
Verily, amongst these men meseemed I am become a ship drunken with the sea.
Verily do I give ye this noble dictum which saith:
" Glorificatio, Glorificatio! Glory is the oldest
aesthetic!"
Thus noble souls, ** they desire to have nothing gratuitously, least of all, life.
He who is of the populace so wisheth to live, yet we others, however, to who life
hath given herself in affiance -- we are considering what we can best give in return.
Verily do I give thee this noble dictum also, "Lacking Hope all seeking is a Faith with vain striving!"
Therefor do I rather say unto ye, seeketh ye for hope, and get ye a new faith therefor.
Upon the World ye shall give nothing back in return, wherein God holdest himself in affiance with Sin.
For Hope lieth not upon the Affirmation of memories, but upon the Redemption of their impressions!
All ye must do is Hope! And get ye a new faith thereunto!
FOR verily I say unto you, the Glory of God is the only Hope for Man!
Man, thy flesh is not tender, - thy skin is not lamb's skin: - -
For thou art not ashamed to bear the standard of the man of whom Ecce Homo was said,
for thou art guilty of that oldest of humanistic prides, for thou art the all-too-human critic.
Wilst thou seek for guilt and for pain now? When guilt and pain springs from thee?
Therefor I love the ones that do not wish to preserve themselves;
verily they do not come to please, but dreadfully like the Son of Agamemnon to purify. ****
Verily, say I, - believe ye not in the pride of man.
For surely the Pride of Man is but the spring of Guilt and of Pain become overabundant,
such that lacking Hope man's seeking becometh a Faith with vain striving.
Verily, this is what you call Pride.
This thee I asketh: doth time cease, carrying one's thoughts to the fathers of one's fathers?
Naye, for that I abnegateth pride, hath my empathy with man outweighed my sympathy for the past.
Therefor I see that the past is not abandoned.
- Is not abandoned to the favor, the spirit and madness of every generation that cometh , and reinterpreteth all that hath been as it's bridge.
For when the blind lead the blind both fall upon the ditch, therefor I believe that now the leader and the led should set still,
whereby all of Time shall be drowned in the shoal.
Therefor as thou disbelievest in the Pride of Man, equally thou disbelieveth in Nobility.
Thus thou askest: "Why then should one live? Since that all is vanity?"
Thus thou sayest: "To live--that is to bestrew, that is to thrash straw; to live--that is to burn oneself and yet to dwell in ashes, and freeze in time of winter seasons."
Oftener has it seemed to me as if such original fulmination of man's Will, to lighten, more and more into Day;
that the Chaotic Night that threatened to engulf him in its hindrances and its horrors, were properly the only grandeur there is in History.
Thus there is much wisdom in the fact that much darkness and filth is there in the world:
loathing itself createth wings, and finds out that obscurity with fountain-divining powers!
Thus, to the clean, all things art clean.
Rather I say unto thee, thou must not call unclean what God has made clean.
When is action annihilated? This is the most important of questions.
This is a mystery,- read thee that Christ feedeth multitudes?
For in THEM the Will is taught the reconciliation with time,
for in Christ's superfluity *** something higher than reconciliation is.
For it should be, that at the last will, willing shall in a great flammis adolere Penatis become not willing, and Will shall save itself.
The 'It Was' is a fragment, and a dismal accident,- the 'It Will' is a hopeless riddle;
but verily I say unto thee that the 'It Abounds' is intelligible.
Verily I say unto thee, so as the psalm is the oldest of aesthetics, do I sing unto thee this fabulous song of madness.
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