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My brother, have you ever known the word ‘contempt’? And the anguish of your justice in being just to those who despise you? You compel many to change their opinion about you; they hold that very much against you. You approached them and yet went on past them: that they will never forgive you. You go above and beyond them: but the higher you climb, the smaller you appear to the eye of envy. And he who flies is hated most of all. — Thus Spoke Zarathustra

I still remember the delightful dawn when I translated this beautiful piece

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Are you a new strength and a new right? A first motion? A self-propelling wheel? Can you also compel stars to revolve about you? Alas, there is so much lusting for eminence! There is so  much convulsion of the ambitious! Show me that you are not one of the lustful or ambitious! Alas, there are so many great ideas that do no more than a bellows: they inflate and make emptier. Do you call yourself free? I want to hear your ruling idea, and not that you have escaped from a yoke. Are you such a man as ought to escape a yoke? There are many who threw off their final worth when they threw off their bondage. Free from what? Zarathustra does not care about that! But your eye should clearly tell me: free for what? Can you furnish yourself with your own good and evil and hang up your own will above yourself as a law? Can you be judge of yourself and avenger of your law? It is terrible to be alone with the judge and avenger of one’s own law. It is to be like a star thrown forth into empty space and into the icy breath of solitude. Today you still suffer from the many, O man set apart: today you still have your courage whole and your hopes. But one day solitude will make you weary, one day your pride will bend and your courage break. One day you will cry: ‘I am alone!’ One day you will no longer see what is exalted in you; and what is base in you, you will see all too closely; your sublimity itself will make you afraid, as if it were a phantom. One day you will cry: ‘Everything is false!’ There are emotions that seek to kill the solitary; if they do not succeed, well, they must die themselves! But are you capable of being a murderer? — Thus Spoke Zarathustra

When life becomes maddeningly polite, think about me. Think about me, Will. Don't worry about me. — Hannibal

فَتاةٌ تَساوى عِقدُها وَكَلامُها وَمَبسِمُها الدُرِّيُّ في الحُسنِ وَالنَظمِ جَفَتني كَأَنّي لَستُ أَنطَقَ قَومِها وَأَطعَنَهُم وَالشُهبُ في صورَةِ الدُهمِ يُحاذِرُني حَتفي كَأَنِّيَ حَتفُهُ وَتَنكُزُني الأَفعى فَيَقتُلُها سُمّي — أبو الطيب المتنبي

وَأَبصَرَ مِن زَرقاءِ جَوٍّ لِأَنَّني إِذا نَظَرَت عَينايَ ساواهُما عِلمي كَأَنّي دَحَوتُ الأَرضَ مِن خِبرَتي بِها كَأَنّي بَنى الإِسكَندَرُ السَدَّ مِن عَزمي — أبو الطيب المتنبي

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Lilly Martin Spencer, Domestic Happiness, 1849, oil on canvas, 140.3 × 116.2 cm, Detroit Institute of Art

— The Sense of an Ending

I survived. “He survived to tell the tale”—that’s what people say, don’t they? History isn’t the lies of the victors, as I once glibly assured Old Joe Hunt; I know that now. It’s more the memories of the survivors, most of whom are neither victorious nor defeated.

“We could start, perhaps, with the seemingly simple question, What is History? Any thoughts, Webster?” “History is the lies of the victors,” I replied, a little too quickly. “Yes, I was rather afraid you’d say that. Well, as long as you remember thatit is also the self-delusions of the defeated. Simpson?” Colin was more prepared than me. “History is a raw onion sandwich, sir.” “For what reason?” “It just repeats, sir. It burps. We’ve seen it again and again this year. Same old story, same old oscillation between tyranny and rebellion, war and peace, prosperity and impoverishment.” “Rather a lot for a sandwich to contain, wouldn’t you say?” We laughed far more than was required, with an end-of-term hysteria. “Finn?” “ ‘History is that certainty produced at the point where the imperfections of memory meet the inadequacies of documentation.’ ”

إنّ تَعَذُّرَ المرءِ بالطِّباع الشخصية والنفسية في تبرير أفعالِه (كأن يقول: "أنا غضوبٌ بطبعي" أو "ورثتُ هذه العادة من أبي ولا قدرة لي على تغييرها") هو علامةٌ على ضعف الإرادة وبدائيةِ العقل. ميزةُ الجهاز العصبي هي قدرته على التعلّم من تجارب الذات والغير، وتوظيفِ هذا العِلم لتغيير سلوك الكائن الحي حتى يتكيف أكثر مع بيئته وينجو، بل وربما يزدهر. فالمرءُ الذي إذا انتُقِدَ فاتّقى النّقدَ بالاستتار خلفَ عُذرِ الطباع والصفات والوراثة هو امرؤٌ لا يريد استخدامَ جهازه العصبي، والطينُ الذي هو منه كان أحرى لو وُضِع في أصيصٍ وزُرِعَ آسًا أو حتى بصلًا.

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