The Case of Wagner Complete Works, Volume 8 · Friedrich Wilhelm Nietzsche
2.
Henceforward alone and cruelly distrustful of myself, I then took up sides--not without anger--_against myself_ and _for_ all that which hurt me and fell hard upon me: and thus I found the road to that courageous pessimism which is the opposite of all idealistic falsehood, and which, as it seems to me, is also the road to _me--to my mission...._ That hidden and dominating thing, for which for long ages we have had no name, until ultimately it comes forth as our mission,--this tyrant in us wreaks a terrible revenge upon us for every attempt we make either to evade him or to escape him, for every one of our experiments in the way of befriending people to whom we do not belong, for every active occupation, however estimable, which may make us diverge from our principal object:--aye, and even for every virtue which would fain protect us from the rigour of our most intimate sense of responsibility. Illness is always the answer, whenever we venture to doubt our right to _our_ mission, whenever we begin to make things too easy for ourselves. Curious and terrible at the same time! It is for our relaxation that we have to pay most dearly! And should we wish after all to return to health, we then have no choice: we are compelled to burden ourselves _more_ heavily than we had been burdened before....
Text from Project Gutenberg, public domain in the United States.