The Hardest Truth to Swallow — Thus Spoke Zarathustra

One morning Zarathustra leaps from his bed like a madman and shouts at a thought sleeping inside him. He calls it his most abysmal thought and demands it wake up. When it finally speaks, disgust chokes him. He falls down as if dead and lies that way for seven days while his eagle and serpent bring him berries, apples, herbs, and even two lambs from the hills.

When he rises, pale and shaking, he tells his animals what broke him. It was not only that life returns, but that small, petty, mediocre people return too, forever, just like the greatest. Even the greatest man looked too human and too small when seen clearly. That thought filled him with such sickness that he nearly could not bear existence at all.

His animals say they understand his teaching of eternal return: all things cycle back, and we have lived this same life countless times before. They tell him this fate is now his to teach, even though it is his greatest danger. He should sing new songs and heal. Zarathustra lies quietly, communing with his soul, while his animals respectfully withdraw. He remembers how disgust sat on every human grave and would not get up.