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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.
13 Mais , que maintenant la furieuse Babel dévore tout et obscurcisse entièrement le mystère ; qu'elle transforme en ténèbres, la fontaine de l'éternel e génération , seulement pour en laire sourcer la colère ; qu'elle ne voie point dans la génération de réternité, mais qu'elle fasse d'une chose existante, «n néant absolu , cela est une bien plus grande confusion. Car non -seulement cette Babel la se dévore elle-même , mais elle se rend entièrement aveugle dans la lumière de la nature. Elle fait de l'image humaine de purs animaux malfaisans et gloutons, qui «royent être 1res étrangers à Babel, Lis qui sont cependant engendrés en elle , et sont dans le corps de la vorace et méchante bête. Ils devorent ainsi la maison de leur mère , et la font reconnoîlre pour une demeure corrompue el pleine d'infection , et ils ne veulent cependant pas en sortir. Or , le tout ensemble est un royaume , qui s'engendre toujours dans sa propre volonté et dans son orgueil, qui manifeste toujours sa propre honte , qui se dévore toujours dans la colère de son propre péché , et doit vraiment , et à juste titre s'appeler Babel. , « , , j 1. 4 Mais si nous voulons passer de Babel dans le nouvel engendrement , considérer notre corruption , en. rç. ( lot ) dans laquelle gît prisonnière la pauvre ame • el ensuite notre renaissance en Jésus - Christ j corn* inent nous sommes réengendré^ de Dieu j enfin comment l'homme doit entrer dans cette nouvelle génération , et être réengendré dans la génératioa du Christ, nous trouverons bien alors ce que doit être l'inquiétude de Pam^ après la brisure du corps.
25. Car Tarae qui est d^ premier principe , d^ l'alliance de l'éternité , a été insufflée de la fort© puissance de Dieu en l'image de Dieu , dans l'élément du corps , et a été éclairée de la lumière dé Dieu , de façon qu'elle a reçu une source angelique. 6. Mais lorsqu'elle passa de la lumière de Difeii dans l'esprit de ce monde, alors la source du premier principe s'introduisit en elle , et elle ne vit ni ne sentit plus le rayaume de Dieu , jusqu'à co que le cœur de Dieu se plaça de nouveau da»s \q milieu ; c'est dans ce cœur que Tame devoit entrei; de nouveau et être régénérée. 7. Or, pour qu'elle pût y parvenir , le cœur de. Dieu devint lui-même une ame humaine. Il étouffa , par son entrée dans la mort , l'esprit de ce monde. Il apporta , de nouveau , dans son ame humaine , la plénitude de la divinité , de façon que nous pouvons ainsi toys tant que nous sommes , user de son ame humaine , comme si c'étoit la notre propre et pénétrer par lui dans le saint élément devant Dieu; car il ne nous manque plus rien ttiainteûant , si ce n'est que par notre forme souiL-- ( 102 ) CH. 19. lée, et appesantie, nous nous laissons atteindre uuw Tersellement par Tespril de ce monde , et imprëgiier tout-à-lail p^* l'orgueil, Tamour-propre , la cupidité et la gourmandise , tellement que nous ne nous apercevons pas même que [ par rapport à y esprit de ce monde] nous ne sommes que des pèlerins. Cependant dès que Tesprit Jde ce monde nous a saisis dans le corps de la mère , dès lors nous sommes des pèlerins , et nous devons , avec nos âmes , voyager dans un autre pa;ys où le corps terrestre ne peut pas demeurer.
38. Car de même que ce monde se brise et passe ; de même aussi toute chair qui est engendrée de l'esprit de ce monde doit se briser et passer. Si donc maintenant la pauvre ame doit cheminer hors du corps dans lequel oUe est cependant née 5 mais qu'elle n'ait pas en soi le nouveau vêtement de la régénération de l'esprit saint, et qu'elle ne soit pas en soi vêtue avec l'habit du pur élément , avec le manteau du Christ , avec son homification , ses souffrances, sa mort et sa résurrection , alors il lui prend de grandes inquiétudes et un grand repentir , particulièrement pour ceux qui à la brisure de leur corps sont encore dans les portes , et nagent ainsi entre le ciel et l'enfer ; là il y a des assauts et des combats comme cela se voit dans plusieurs , lorsqu'ils sont prés de mourir, 9. Car alors la pauvre ame nage dans le premier principe , dans les portes de la profondeur , telles meut comprimée et enveloppée par la région des étoiles , qu'elle n'éprouve qu'oue vraie inquiétude de la part de l'essence de l'Univers. Là ensuite la pauvre ame se remplit d'angoisse î et elle apparoit ainsi par la puissance de la région des étoiles, dans Ja forme du corps qu'elle a eu ici ; souvent ella désire telle ou telle chose qui a été sa dernière volonté , dans l'espérance d'amendement, et d'obtenir par là du repos ; souvent aussi .elon l'esprit astral, elle s'annonce la nuit, d'une manière très turbulente , avec du fracas et par des apparitions corporelles que nos savans de l'école de ce monde attribuent au démon. Mais ils n'ont dans ceci aucune connoissance.
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.
13 But, that now the furious Babel devour all and entirely obscure the mystery; that it transform into darkness, the fountain of eternal generation, only to make the anger source therefrom; that it see not into the generation of eternity, but that it make of an existing thing, an absolute nothing, that is a much greater confusion. For not only does this Babel devour itself, but it renders itself entirely blind in the light of nature. It makes of the human image pure malignant and gluttonous animals, who believe themselves to be 1res strangers to Babel, but who are nevertheless begotten in her, and are in the body of the voracious and wicked beast. They devour thus the house of their mother, and make her be recognised for a corrupted dwelling and full of infection, and they will nevertheless not come out of it. Now, the whole together is a kingdom, which begets itself always in its own will and in its pride, which manifests always its own shame, which devours itself always in the anger of its own sin, and must truly, and with just title be called Babel. , « , , j 1. 4 But if we will pass from Babel into the new begetting, consider our corruption, en. rç. ( lot ) in which lies prisoner the poor soul; and then our rebirth in Jesus-Christ; how we are rebegotten of God; finally how man must enter into this new generation, and be rebegotten in the generation of Christ, we shall then indeed find what must be the disquiet of the soul after the breaking of the body.
25. For the soul which is of the first principle, of the alliance of eternity, has been insufflated of the strong power of God into the image of God, in the element of the body, and has been enlightened by the light of God, so that it received an angelic source. 6. But when it passed from the light of God into the spirit of this world, then the source of the first principle introduced itself into it, and it saw and felt no more the kingdom of God, until the heart of God placed itself anew in the midst; it is in this heart that the soul was to enter anew and be regenerated. 7. Now, that it might attain thereto, the heart of God became itself a human soul. It stifled, by its entrance into death, the spirit of this world. It brought, anew, into its human soul, the plenitude of the divinity, so that we can thus all as many as we are, use his human soul, as if it were our own, and penetrate by him into the holy element before God; for nothing is wanting to us now, save that by our soi- ( 102 ) CH. 19. led, and weighed-down form, we let ourselves be reached universally by the spirit of this world, and impregnated altogether by pride, self-love, cupidity and gourmandise, so much that we do not even perceive that [ in respect of the spirit of this world ] we are but pilgrims. Nevertheless as soon as the spirit of this world has seized us in the body of the mother, from then we are pilgrims, and we must, with our souls, voyage into another country where the terrestrial body cannot dwell.
38. For just as this world breaks itself and passes; likewise also all flesh which is begotten of the spirit of this world must break itself and pass. If then now the poor soul must journey out of the body in which it is nevertheless born 5 but has not in itself the new garment of the regeneration of the holy spirit, and is not in itself clothed with the habit of the pure element, with the mantle of Christ, with his homification, his sufferings, his death and his resurrection, then there take it great disquiets and a great repentance, particularly for those who at the breaking of their body are still in the gates, and swim thus between heaven and hell; there are assaults and combats as that is seen in several, when they are near dying, 9. For then the poor soul swims in the first principle, in the gates of the depth, so strongly compressed and enveloped by the region of the stars, that it experiences but a true disquiet on the part of the essence of the Universe. There then the poor soul fills itself with anguish; and it appears thus by the power of the region of the stars, in the form of the body that it had here; often it desires such or such a thing which was its last will, in the hope of amendment, and of obtaining thereby some repose; often also according to the astral spirit, it announces itself in the night, in a very turbulent manner, with a din and by corporeal apparitions that our learned men of the school of this world attribute to the demon. But they have in this no knowledge.
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.