There are times when I can sympathize with my enemies. Or even love them ever so much. There I am, telling them exactly what is in store. Yes, to the letter. And no lies. Everything is up for grabs. Open, truthful, honest, I do not hide a single thing in my vast arsenal. Closed, given to paltry deceptions, ever so fearful of a single word they utter within an earshot of someone who is not the closest of their relatives, they do their best to conspire against me. But in vain. Forever in vain, as a matter of fact. Our origins shine through at all times. Peasants to boot, they have never met a patrician like me. They cannot even imagine someone who is not of their own subterranean ilk. I am forever out of their reach. Confused, they fumble. Ridiculous, they stumble. Which is why I keep telling them exactly what is in store. And no kidding. Open, truthful, honest, I try to help them every inch of the way. But to no avail. Our origins keep shining through. Peasants to boot, my wretched enemies are simply not up to par in this silly game.

Addendum (June 13, 2016)

Gosh, what a joy it is to come across these exuberant words so many years later! Yes, they smack of good old Nietzsche. Having read the piece with due care, I reached for my copy of The Will to Power on top of one of the book piles on my dining table.[1] I went straight to the Contents, and then I looked for its last page, where sections of Book Four, “Discipline and Breeding,” are listed in order.[2] In the end I read aloud the section titles of the last book’s first part, entitled “Order of Rank”:

The Doctrine of Order and Rank
The Strong and the Weak
The Noble Man
The Masters of the Earth
The Great Human Being
The Highest Man as Legislator of the Future

Indeed, my piece smacks of Nietzsche’s gems on discipline and breeding, which forever remain beyond my enemies’ ken. Delighted, I opened the book close to its end, and I started reading the first paragraph my eyes lit upon: “To spend one’s life amid delicate and absurd things; a stranger to reality; half an artist, half a bird; with no care for reality, except now and then to acknowledge it in the manner of a good dancer with the tips of one’s toes; always tickled by some sunray of happiness; exuberant and encouraged even by misery—for misery preserves the happy man; fixing a little humorous tail even to the holiest of things…”[3] Yes! Only try to understand Nietzsche’s exuberant words, poor peasants!

Footnotes

1. New York: Vintage Books, 1968.

2. Op. cit., p. xi.

3. Op. cit., p. 535.