266 THUS SPAKE ZARATHUSTRA, III
Oh, loneliness ! Thou my home, loneliness ! How blissfully and fondly speaketh thy voice unto me!
We do not ask each other, we do not wail with each other, we openly go together through open doors.
For all is open and bright with thee, and even the hours run here on lighter feet. For in the dark, time is a heavier burden than in the light.
Here the words of being and shrines of words of being open suddenly. All being longeth here to become language, all becoming longeth here to learn to speak from me.
But down there all speech is in vain! There to forget and to pass by are the best wisdom. That have I learnt now!
He who would conceive all with men, would have to touch everything. But for that my hands are too clean.
I do not like to breathe even their breath. Alas, that I have lived so long amid their noise and bad breath !
Oh, blissful stillness round me! Oh, pure odours round me! Oh, how this stillness bringeth pure breath out of a deep breast ! Oh, how it hearkeneth, this blissful stillness !
But down there everything speaketh, everything is overheard. Let folk proclaim their wisdom by ringing bells, the shopkeepers in the market will outring them with their pennies!
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