Friend: I don’t understand; are you joking or
Master: Woe to him whose aesthetic taste is too refined! Woe to him who, as I, looks into the future with bated breath, who desires with all his soul, but does not see there the superman.
Friend: I don’t really understand what you’re looking for! You want the restoration of the long obsolete forms of life.
Master: My dear friend, although perhaps even very highly respected people spread the report of my madness, it’s not really true. I’m not striving for the alteration of social laws. You can’t alter the inevitable. But if I could only fight for the beauty of olden life, if I could only count upon the very smallest success, how happy I should be, with what unweariedness, with what ardour I should set to work! But you remember your evangelist said that the social movement flows naturally from the historical development of society, and, most unfortunately, this is irrefutable. I could shout myself hoarse, crying, “Stop! Whither bound? Go back!” I could shout myself hoarse and not be heard.
Friend: It's amusing to listen to you.
