War And Warriors

We do not want to be spared by:

• our best enemies
• those whom we deeply love

My brethren in war! I love you from the very heart.

I am, and was ever, your counterpart. I am also your best enemy.

I know the hatred and envy of your hearts. Ye are not great enough not to know of hatred and envy.

Then be great enough not to be ashamed of them!

And if ye cannot be saints of knowledge, then be at least its warriors.

They are the companions and forerunners of such saintship.

I see many soldiers; could I but see many warriors!

“Uniform” one calleth what they wear; may it not be uniform what they therewith hide!

Ye shall be those whose eyes ever seek for an enemy—for YOUR enemy. And with some of you there is hatred at first sight.

You shall seek your enemy.

You will wage war for the sake of your thoughts!

If your thoughts succumb, your uprightness shall still shout triumph!

Ye shall love:

• peace as a means to new wars
• the short peace more than the long.

I advise you:

• to fight, not to work.
• to victory, not to peace

Let your work be a fight, let your peace be a victory!

One can only be silent and sit peacefully when one has an arrow and bow.

Otherwise, one prateth and quarrelleth. Let your peace be a victory!

Ye say it is the good cause which halloweth even war?

It is the good war which halloweth every cause.

War and courage have done more great things than charity.

Your bravery has saved the victims, not your sympathy.

“What is good?” ye ask.

To be brave is good.

Let the little girls say: “To be good is what is pretty, and at the same time touching.”

They call you heartless. But your heart is true.

I love the bashfulness of your good-will.

Ye are ashamed of your flow, and others are ashamed of their ebb.

Ye are ugly?

Well then, take the sublime about you, the mantle of the ugly!

And when your soul becometh great, then doth it become haughty, and in your sublimity there is wickedness.

I know you.

In wickedness, the haughty man and the weakling meet. But they misunderstand one another.

I know you.

You shall only have enemies to be hated, but not enemies to be despised.

You must be proud of your enemies so that the successes of your enemies are also your successes.

Resistance is the distinction of the slave.

Let your distinction be obedience. Let your commanding itself be obeying!

To the good warrior, “thou shalt” sounds pleasanter than “I will.”

And all that is dear unto you, ye shall first have it commanded unto you.

Let your love to life be love to your highest hope. Let your highest hope be the highest thought of life!

Your highest thought, however, is my command: man is something that is to be surpassed.

So live your life of obedience and of war!

What matter about long life! What warrior wisheth to be spared!