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Eleven books by a shoemaker of Görlitz who wrote, by his own account, because he could not help it. Ten of them stand here in the seventeenth-century English of John Sparrow, who translated Boehme within a generation of his death and whose prose is itself now four hundred years old; where that English has drifted out of reach, the facing pane carries a modern register — the same text with archaic inflection and spelling normalised by rule, never paraphrased. Nothing is reworded, and where no register appears beside a passage it is because the rules found nothing to change.
The eleventh book is not in English at all, and it is the reason this note exists.
Des trois principes de l'essence divine, printed at Paris in 1802, is the same work as Concerning the Three Principles of the Divine Essence, which stands here as the second book — the same twenty-seven chapters in the same order, opening `Du premier principe de l'essence divine` against Sparrow's `Of the first Principle of the Divine Essence`. Its translator was Louis-Claude de Saint-Martin, who gave the last years of his life to putting Boehme into French, and who has a shelf of his own in this Lycaeum.
That makes a closed circuit inside this archive, and it is worth naming plainly. Saint-Martin translates Boehme. La Iniciación, printed in Montevideo a hundred and forty years later, traces its own descent through Saint-Martin. A reader can therefore follow one thread from a German mystic of 1619, through the French philosopher who carried him into another language, to a Spanish-language monthly of the 1940s that claimed them both — and read every step of it in the original.
The two are shelved as one work rather than two because that is what they are. They are not set as facing panes: an English translation of 1619 and a French translation of 1802 are two independent readings of a lost German original, and pairing them line by line would assert a correspondence neither translator ever claimed.
1pérît pas ; mais cela ne servit de rien : ils éloient méchans. Alors Dieu enQamma Sodome et Gcmorrhe , tous les cinq royaumes , par la colère du iwemier principe , pour les effrayer : cela ne servit de rien. Le péché poussa comme une branche féconde. Alors Dieu fil une promesse à la famille choisie , qu'elle marcheroit devant lui ; qu'il vouloit les bénir comme les étoiles du ciel , et rendre leur nombre aussi considérable 5 mais la méchanceté étoil cachée , et coupoie parmi eux. Alors Dieu les conduisit dans un pays étranger , et leur fît du bien'pourvoir s'ils reconnoîtroienl sa bonté, et s'attacheroient à lui ; mais ils ne furent que méchans. 3l. [ Le cîiifre 3o n^ent pas dans le texte. ] Alors Dieu leur suscita un prophète Moïso qui leur donna des lois et un sévère enseignement que la nature exigeoit, et qui leur fut donné par l'esprit du grand monde dans le zèle et dans le feu ; mais puisqu'ils vouloient vivre dans la rudesse > alors se fit l'essai s'ils pourroient vivre dans le père. Dieu leur donna du pain du ciel , et les nourrit quarante ans pour voir enfin ce que le peuple vouloil devenir , et s'ils pourroient par quelque voie s'attacher à Dieu : il leur donna un régime et des ordonnances dans le boire et le manger 5 en outre un ordre sacerdotal, avec des lois sévères renfermant de fortes punitions, qu'il fit publier parmi eux : mais cela ne servit de rien. Us n'étoient que méchans , et marchoient dans le régime des asire;i eidans des voia« encore plus méchantes, tout- à- lait dans le colérique iufernal. en. 18. ( 67 j
23a. Ici il nous est important «îe.Voir la différence dei nourritures 'que Dieu leur avoit dë/endues particulièrement la viande de porc, dont la source ne se soutient pas dans le feu , mais ne donne qu'une puanteur. C'est aussi ce qui se passe dans le feu de lame qu. louche l'origine du premier principe ,■ d ou le premier principe fait une puanteur dans lame, ce qui est opposé à la parole et à la noble v-erge soraiE et rend les portes du brisement gonflées et ténébreuses : car l'ame es, aussi un feu quî brute la , et s. elle reçoit une semblable source, elle » obscurcit encore plus fort, et elle brûle dans la vapeur comme un éclair, comme cela se voit dans la graisse de porc , au sujet de laquelle Dieu leur fit des défenses. 33. Il n'jr avoitaucun autre motif pour qu'ils s'occupassent de sacrifices, sinon que l'homme étoit terrestre, et que la parole étoit près de l'ame dan» les portes de la lumière de la vie ; ainsi Dieu entendoit leur prière par la source terrestre de leur encens, de façon qu'ils avoient un témoignage dan. le feu , que leur prière étoit agréable à Dieu comme on le voit en plusieurs endroits dans Moïse. ce qui sera éclairci en son lieu. ■ 34. Nous avons une chose très importante à ob-' «erver dans Moise, au sujet de sa face illuminée • car là on éprouvoit s'il seroit possible que l'ame pût , par la clarté du père dans le feu . être susceptible de rançon , en cas qu'elle vécût dans sa loi qui étoit rigide et déyorante , et étoit pour l'ame :i.. ( 68 ) CIT. i8une pointe aiguë'i mais cela fui inutile : cela ne put pas être.
335. Pour que la pauvre ame de iMiomme put cependant être délivrée de l'éternelle mort , et être engendrée de nouveau dans le fils de la vierge , alors la noble vierge ou soPHiE,signala à r homme par l'esprit des prophètes , la semence de la femme ou le fds de Marie.son incarnation, ses souffrances et sa mortjce qui arriva après 8970 années ; et cette parole de la promesse ( que Dieu le père promit à Eve et Adam dans le paradis , dan. le jardin d'Eden , lorsqu'ils tombèrent dans le péché , laquelle se représenta dans le centre de la vie , par le moyen de quoi tous jes hommes qui viennent à Dieu sont justiiiés ) devint homme. 1 i» i 36 Ceci subsista pendant long-lems dans l alliance de la circoncision (dans la vie et la lumière du père ) , sous les ombres et le type de l'incarnation du fils i mais cela ne pouvoil renfermer l'importante eilicacilé de la résurrection du corps hors du tombeau. Il falloit nécessairement que le verbe devint homme pour que l'homme pût ressusciter du tombeau. L'alliance de la circoncision avoit bien servi de rançon à l'ame , de façon qu'elle pouvoit subsister devant le père dans les portes de la corruptibiité , dans le feu de l'aigu ; mais non point dans l'aimable joie , devant la lumière delà Irimté sainte : en outre , celte alliance ne pouvoit point non plus tirer de l'élément le nouveau corps , parc© qu'il étoit trop fortement souillé par le péché.
The source text as printed, transcribed diplomatically. Where the source language uses a non-Latin script that reaches us only through a Victorian romanisation, this layer is labelled transliteration, because that is what we hold.
1should not perish; but that served for nothing: they were wicked. Then God set Sodom and Gomorrah aflame, all the five kingdoms, by the anger of the first principle, to frighten them: that served for nothing. Sin shot up like a fruitful branch. Then God made a promise to the chosen family, that it should walk before him; that he would bless them like the stars of heaven, and render their number as considerable 5 but wickedness was hidden, and brooded among them. Then God led them into a foreign country, and did them good to see whether they would acknowledge his goodness, and would attach themselves to him; but they were only wicked. 3l. [ The figure 3o is not in the text. ] Then God raised up for them a prophet Moses who gave them laws and a severe teaching that nature required, and which was given to them by the spirit of the great world in zeal and in fire; but since they would live in rudeness, then the trial was made whether they could live in the father. God gave them bread of heaven, and nourished them forty years to see at last what the people would become, and whether they could by some way attach themselves to God: he gave them a régime and ordinances in drinking and eating 5 besides a sacerdotal order, with severe laws enclosing strong punishments, which he caused to be published among them: but that served for nothing. They were only wicked, and walked in the régime of the stars and in ways still more wicked, quite in the infernal choleric. en. 18. ( 67 j
23a. Here it is important for us to see the difference of the nourishments that God had forbidden them, particularly the flesh of swine, whose source does not sustain itself in the fire, but gives only a stench. It is also what passes in the fire of the soul which touches the origin of the first principle, whence the first principle makes a stench in the soul, which is opposed to the word and to the noble virgin SOPHIA and renders the gates of the breaking swollen and tenebrous: for the soul is also a fire which burns there, and if it receives a like source, it obscures itself still more strongly, and it burns in the vapour like a flash, as that is seen in the fat of swine, upon the subject of which God made them prohibitions. 33. There was no other motive for their occupying themselves with sacrifices, save that man was terrestrial, and that the word was near the soul in the gates of the light of life; thus God heard their prayer by the terrestrial source of their incense, so that they had a testimony in the fire, that their prayer was agreeable to God as one sees it in several places in Moses, which will be cleared up in its place. ■ 34. We have a very important thing to observe in Moses, upon the subject of his illuminated face; for there it was tried whether it would be possible that the soul might, by the clearness of the father in the fire, be susceptible of ransom, in case it lived in his law which was rigid and devouring, and was for the soul :i.. ( 68 ) CIT. i8a sharp point; but that was useless: that could not be.
335. In order that the poor soul of man might nevertheless be delivered from the eternal death, and be begotten anew in the son of the virgin, then the noble virgin or SOPHIA, signalled to man by the spirit of the prophets, the seed of the woman or the son of Mary, his incarnation, his sufferings and his death; which came to pass after 8970 years; and this word of the promise ( which God the father promised to Eve and Adam in paradise, in the garden of Eden, when they fell into sin, which represented itself in the centre of life, by means of which all the men who come to God are justified ) became man. 1 i» i 36 This subsisted for a long time in the alliance of circumcision ( in the life and the light of the father ), under the shadows and the type of the incarnation of the son; but that could not enclose the important efficacy of the resurrection of the body out of the tomb. It was necessary that the word should become man in order that man might rise again from the tomb. The alliance of circumcision had indeed served as ransom to the soul, so that it could subsist before the father in the gates of corruptibility, in the fire of the sharp; but not at all in the amiable joy, before the light of the holy trinity: besides, this alliance could not either draw from the element the new body, because it was too strongly soiled by sin.
Our translation, period-faithful. Citable as our translation, never as the source.
Saint-Martin's French rendering of Boehme's 'Von den drei Principien göttlichen Wesens'. The same work stands in this estate in English as boehme:2. The title page also advertises 'L'Aurore naissante, du même Auteur' from the same booksellers — Saint-Martin's translation of the Aurora, whose English counterpart the estate holds as boehme:1. Reading the two versions against each other shows what a Martinist made of a German shoemaker's theosophy.
→ boehme:2
This work carries, in the author's own voice, both a set of hostile comparisons drawn against named peoples and an explicit refusal of any such boundary, and the Press publishes both rather than either alone. At Ch.25 §85 he calls the Jews blind; at Ch.17 §106 he warns of a coming visitation of the Jews and the Turks; and at Ch.26 §32-33, asked whence the Turks are grown, he answers "From thy perverted sense" — laying the rise of Mahomet at the door of christian pride and disputation. Against these stands Ch.25 §72, which opens the grace with no boundary at all: all men are invited to it, of whatever race, "whether Turks, Jews, Pagans, Christians", and no one is excluded. The same chapter that indicts turns the indictment inward at §105-106 — each believes not to dwell in Babel, and the author includes himself — and §33 concludes that God should be as near the one as the other. The contradiction is the author's, it is not resolved by him, and removing either half would misrepresent the work. Operator ruling, 2026-08-29.
This work carries, in the author's own voice, both a set of hostile comparisons drawn against named peoples and an explicit refusal of any such boundary, and the Press publishes both rather than either alone. At Ch.25 §85 he calls the Jews blind; at Ch.17 §106 he warns of a coming visitation of the Jews and the Turks; and at Ch.26 §32-33, asked whence the Turks are grown, he answers "From thy perverted sense" — laying the rise of Mahomet at the door of christian pride and disputation. Against these stands Ch.25 §72, which opens the grace with no boundary at all: all men are invited to it, of whatever race, "whether Turks, Jews, Pagans, Christians", and no one is excluded. The same chapter that indicts turns the indictment inward at §105-106 — each believes not to dwell in Babel, and the author includes himself — and §33 concludes that God should be as near the one as the other. The contradiction is the author's, it is not resolved by him, and removing either half would misrepresent the work. Operator ruling, 2026-08-29.
This work carries, in the author's own voice, both a set of hostile comparisons drawn against named peoples and an explicit refusal of any such boundary, and the Press publishes both rather than either alone. At Ch.25 §85 he calls the Jews blind; at Ch.17 §106 he warns of a coming visitation of the Jews and the Turks; and at Ch.26 §32-33, asked whence the Turks are grown, he answers "From thy perverted sense" — laying the rise of Mahomet at the door of christian pride and disputation. Against these stands Ch.25 §72, which opens the grace with no boundary at all: all men are invited to it, of whatever race, "whether Turks, Jews, Pagans, Christians", and no one is excluded. The same chapter that indicts turns the indictment inward at §105-106 — each believes not to dwell in Babel, and the author includes himself — and §33 concludes that God should be as near the one as the other. The contradiction is the author's, it is not resolved by him, and removing either half would misrepresent the work. Operator ruling, 2026-08-29.