This guests’-present do I solicit of your love, that ye speak unto me of my children. For them am I rich, for them I became poor: what have I not surrendered,
—What would I not surrender that I might have one thing: THESE children, THIS living plantation, THESE life-trees of my will and of my highest hope!”
Thus spake Zarathustra, and stopped suddenly in his discourse: for his longing came over him, and he closed his eyes and his mouth, because of the agitation of his heart. And all his guests also were silent, and stood still and confounded: except only that the old soothsayer made signs with his hands and his gestures.
LXXII. THE SUPPER.
For at this point the soothsayer interrupted the greeting of Zarathustra and his guests: he pressed forward as one who had no time to lose, seized Zarathustra’s hand and exclaimed: “But Zarathustra!
One thing is more necessary than the other, so sayest thou thyself: well, one thing is now more necessary UNTO ME than all others.
A word at the right time: didst thou not invite me to TABLE? And here are many who have made long journeys. Thou dost not mean to feed us merely with discourses?
Besides, all of you have thought too much about freezing, drowning, suffocating, and other bodily dangers: none of you, however, have thought of MY danger, namely, perishing of hunger—”
(Thus spake the soothsayer. When Zarathustra’s animals, however, heard these words, they ran away in terror. For they saw that all they had brought home during the day would not be enough to fill the one soothsayer.)