The Youth on the Mountain — Thus Spoke Zarathustra

Zarathustra finds a young man alone on the hills, avoiding him. He compares the boy to a tree bent by wind we cannot see. The more a person climbs toward light, Zarathustra says, the more their roots reach down into darkness. The youth cries that Zarathustra has found his secret.

The boy trusts himself less every day. He changes too fast. On the height he feels frozen and alone. The higher he climbs, the more he despises himself and other climbers. He wanted Zarathustra to strike him like lightning and end him. His envy of Zarathustra has been eating him alive.

Zarathustra leads him away and warns him not to throw away hope. Wild dogs in the cellar still bark for freedom. Breaking every lock is not enough. The freed spirit must still purify itself. Do not become a scoffer or a destroyer. Above all, do not kill the hero still inside you. Zarathustra compares the lonely tree on the hill to the boy: grown too high for anyone below to understand, waiting perhaps for lightning. Noble people block the good too, he says, because they want to create new virtues while others only want to conserve the old. Keep your highest hope holy.