my destiny, said he at last, sadly. Well! I am ready. Now
hath my last lonesomeness begun.

Ah, this sombre, sad sea, below me! Ah, this sombre nocturnal vexation!
Ah, fate and sea! To you must I now GO DOWN!

Before my highest mountain do I stand, and before my longest wandering:
therefore must I first go deeper down than I ever ascended:

--Deeper down into pain than I ever ascended, even into its darkest
flood! So willeth my fate. Well! I am ready.

Whence come the highest mountains? so did I once ask. Then did I learn
that they come out of the sea.

That testimony is inscribed on their stones, and on the walls of their
summits. Out of the deepest must the highest come to its height.--

Thus spake Zarathustra on the ridge of the mountain where it was cold:
when, however, he came into the vicinity of the sea, and at last stood
alone amongst the cliffs, then had he become weary on his way, and
eagerer than ever before.

Everything as yet sleepeth, said he; even the sea sleepeth. Drowsily and
strangely doth its eye gaze upon me.

But it breatheth warmly--I feel it. And I feel also that it dreameth. It
tosseth about dreamily on hard pillows.

Hark! Hark! How it groaneth with evil recollections! Or evil
expectations?

Ah, I am sad along with thee, thou dusky monster, and angry with myself
even for thy sake.

Ah, that my hand hath not strength enough! Gladly, indeed, would I free
thee from evil dreams!--

And while Zarathustra thus spake, he laughed at himself with melancholy
and bitterness. What! Zarathustra, said he, wilt thou even sing
consolation to the sea?

Ah, thou amiable fool, Zarathustra, thou too-blindly confiding one! But
thus hast thou ever been: ever hast thou approached confidently all that
is terrible.

Every monster wouldst thou caress. A whiff of warm breath, a little soft
tuft on its paw--: and immediately wert thou ready to love and lure it.

LOVE is the danger of the lonesomest one, love to anything, IF IT ONLY
LIVE! Laughable, verily, is my folly and my modesty in love!--

Thus spake Zarathustra, and laughed thereby a second time. Then,
however, he thought of his abandoned friends--and as if he had done them
a wrong with his thoughts, he upbraided himself because of his thoughts.
And forthwith it came to pass that the laugher wept--with anger and
longing wept Zarathustra bitterly.

XLVI. THE VISION AND THE ENIGMA.

1.

When it got abroad among the sailors that Zarathustr