What, if some day or night, a demon were to steal after you into your
loneliest loneliness and say to you: ‘This life, as you now live it and
have lived it, you will have to live once more and innumerable times
more; and there will be nothing new in it, but every pain and every joy
and every thought and sigh… must return to you—all in the same
succession and sequence—even this spider and this moonlight between the
trees and even this moment and I myself. The eternal hourglass of
existence is turned over again and again—and you with it, speck of
dust!’ Would you not throw yourself down and gnash your teeth and curse
the demon who spoke thus? Or have you once experienced a tremendous
moment when you would have answered him: ‘You are a god, and never have I
heard anything more divine!’ If this thought were to gain possession of
you, it would change you as you are, or perhaps crush you. The question
in each and every thing, “do you want this once more and innumerable
times more?” would lie upon your actions as the greatest weight. Or how
well disposed would you have to become to yourself and to life to crave
nothing more fervently than this ultimate eternal confirmation and
seal?”
(Friedrich Nietzsche)
(Friedrich Nietzsche)
