Again he did not answer.
“You judge from yourself, perhaps.”
“Every one cannot judge except from himself,” he said, reddening. “There will be full freedom when it will be just the same to live or not to live. That’s the goal for all.”
“The goal? But perhaps no one will care to live then?”
“No one,” he pronounced with decision.
“Man fears death because he loves life. That’s how I understand it,” I observed, “and that’s determined by nature.”
“That’s abject; and that’s where the deception comes in.” His eyes flashed. “Life is pain, life is terror, and man is unhappy. Now all is pain and terror. Now man loves life, because he loves pain and terror, and so they have done according. Life is given now for pain and terror, and that’s the deception. Now man is not yet what he will be. There will be a new man, happy and proud. For whom it will be the same to live or not to live, he will be the new man. He who will conquer pain and terror will himself be a god. And this God will not be.”
“Then this God does exist according to you?”
“He does not exist, but He is. In the stone there is no pain, but in the fear of the stone is the pain. God is the pain of the fear of death. He who will conquer pain and terror will become himself a god. Then there will be a new life, a new man; everything will be new … then they will divide history into two parts: from the gorilla to the annihilation of God, and from the annihilation of God to …”
“To the gorilla?”