Perhaps truth is a woman who has reasons for not showing her reasons? Perhaps her name is Baubo, to speak in Greek?... Oh, those Greeks! They knew how _to live:_ for that purpose it is necessary to keep bravely to the surface, the fold and the skin; to worship appearance, to believe in forms, tones, and words, in the whole Olympus of appearance! Those Greeks were superficial--_from profundity!_ And are we not coming back precisely to this point, we dare-devils of the spirit, who have scaled the highest and most dangerous peak of contemporary thought, and have looked around us from it, have _looked down_ from it? Are we not precisely in this respect--Greeks? Worshippers of forms, of tones, and of words? And precisely on that account--artists? RUTA, near GENOA _Autumn,_ 1886. [1] This means literally to put the numeral X instead of the numeral V (formerly U); hence it means to double a number unfairly, to exaggerate, humbug, cheat.--TR. [2] An allusion to Schiller's poem: "The Veiled Image of Sais."--TR. JEST, RUSE AND REVENGE. A PRELUDE IN RHYME. 1. _Invitation._ Venture, comrades, I implore you, On the fare I set before you, You will like it more to-morrow, Better still the following day: If yet more you're then requiring, Old success I'll find inspiring, And fresh courage thence will borrow Novel dainties to display. 2. _My Good Luck._ Weary of Seeking had I grown, So taught myself the way to Find: Back by the storm I once was blown, But follow now, where drives the wind. 3. _Undismayed._ Where you're standing, dig, dig out: Down below's the Well: Let them that walk in darkness shout: "Down below--there's Hell!" 4. _Dialogue._ _A._ Was I ill? and is it ended? Pray, by what physician tended? I recall no pain endured! _B._ Now I know your trouble's ended: He that can forget, is cured. 5. _To the Virtuous._ Let our virtues be easy and nimble-footed in motion, Like unto Homer's verse ought they to come _and to go_. 6. _Worldly Wisdom._ Stay not on level plain, Climb not the mount too high. But half-way up remain-- The world you'll best descry! 7. _Vademecum--Vadetecum._ Attracted by my style and talk You'd follow, in my footsteps walk? Follow yourself unswervingly, So--careful!--shall you follow me. 8. _The Third Sloughing_ My skin bursts, breaks for fresh rebirth, And new desires come thronging: Much I've devoured, yet for more earth The serpent in me's longing. 'Twixt stone and grass I crawl once more, Hungry, by crooked ways, To eat the food I ate before, Earth-fare all serpents praise! 9. _My Roses._ My luck's good--I'd make yours fairer, (Good luck ever needs a sharer), Will you stop and pluck my roses?