The Portable Nietzsche

by Friedrich Nietzsche

If one took the veils and wraps and colors and gestures away from you, just enough would be left to scare away the crows. Verily, I myself am the scared crow who once saw you naked and without color; and I flew away when the skeleton beckoned to me lovingly. Rather would I be a day laborer in Hades among the shades of the past! Even the underworldly are plumper and fuller than you. This, indeed this, is bitterness for my bowels, that I can endure you neither naked nor clothed, you men of today. All that is uncanny in the future and all that has ever made fugitive birds shudder is surely more comfortable and cozy than your “reality.” For thus you speak: “Real are we entirely, and without belief or superstition.” Thus you stick out your chests—but alas, they are hollow! Indeed, how should you be capable of any belief, being so dappled and motley—you who are paintings of all that men have ever believed? You are walking refutations of all belief, and you break the limbs of all thought. Unbelievable: thus I call you, for all your pride in being real!