The higher its type, always the seldomer does a thing succeed. You higher men here, have you not all—been failures?
Be of good cheer; what does it matter? How much is still possible! Learn to laugh at yourselves, as you ought to laugh!
What wonder even that you have failed and only half-succeeded, you half-shattered ones! Do not—man's future strive and struggle in you?
Man's furthest, profoundest, star-highest issues, his prodigious powers—do not all these foam through one another in your vessel?
What wonder that many a vessel shatters! Learn to laugh at yourselves, as you ought to laugh! You higher men, Oh, how much is still possible!
And verily, how much has already succeeded! How rich is this earth in small, good, perfect things, in well-constituted things!
Set around you small, good, perfect things, you higher men. Their golden maturity heals the heart. The perfect teaches one to hope.