Fetching
One moment.
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.
1109. Là , la parole, ou le briseur de serpent s'est établi dans le nouvel élément régénéré dans l'ame d'Abel , dans le centre , dans les portes de la profondeur. Cette parole a brisé au serpent, c'est-àdire, au royaume de la colère la tête de sa puissance , car la tête signifie la forte puissance de l'âprelé colérique. Alors l'amour de Dieu s'est jeté du cœur de Dieu dans l'enfer de la colère , et a éteint de nouveau dans l'amour le feu allumé de la pauvre ame ; et là , fut réalisée la première oeuvre, selon que Dieu i'avoit ainsi promis à Adam et k Eve. 1 10. Secondement , l'œuvre effrovable de l'entrée dans la colère , a été aussi réalisée en Caïn ; car chaque règne expérimente ce qui est sien. Or , lorsque Caïn entra dans la colère , alors l'amour de Dieu dans le centre lui resta entièrement caché. Là Caïn devoit , comme un champion, briser la lête du serpent, ce qu'il s'étoit imaginé qu'il étoit dans son pouvoir de faire ; et ici se fit l'épreuve , s'il ne seroit pas possible qu'un être , par sa propre puissance , possédât le royaume de Dieu par l'éclat du père dans le feu, m. L'épreuve fut inutile et douloureuse, car ( 17© ) «w. lo; C«ÏB cria 9 dans sa délicate humanité : Malheur ef douleur sur moi ; mes péchés sont plus grands que moi; je ne peux point entrer dans Dieu par ma puissance. 11 s'arréla , il trembla , il pâlit devant l'abîme de l'enfer, qui l'avoit pris prisonnier , et le retenoit en soi. Il se retira aussi d'avec les humains , et dit : Maintenant quiconque me trouverai me tuera, car je dois fuir de devant ta face.
2IIS. Or, l'un voit ici la séparation de l'églisar cLrétienoo d'avec la caïnique , lorsque Dieu chassa Caïn , cusorte qu'il lui fallait habiter un autre lien. Lu vraie iutelligcncc de ce haut secret, est toute cachée daus la parole sous le voile, el n'a presque jamais été connue ; mais elle doit l'être au tems du lys , dans les merveilles. Et toi , église caïnique , anti-chrétienne , qui es sur la terre , tu dois savoir ceci, que tout ce que tu inventes sans l'esprit do pieu, pour la pompe et ton orgueil, ainsi que pour ton autorité et la puissance, est passé (aven Caïn ) , d'Abel ou de l'église du Christ , au-delà d'Eden , dans le pays de nod , si toutefois tu es asac'A profondément instruite, et que tu entendes dans le langage de la nature ce que cela est , comme tes flatteurs le prétendent, avec leur couronne doctorale. Mais ils ne conçoivent avec Caïn que les quatre éléraens en explosion , et non pas l'élément devant Dieu. C'est pourquoi c'est la Babel de la confusiou et de la multitude des opinions opposées. Ce n'est pas là la base de l'élément, qui existe en un , et non en plusieurs. Ii3. Tu as ici un beau miroir des propres opi* ctt, ^t ( ï?! )
3nions de l'homme dans Caïn. Qu'est-ce que c'est que la propre opinion, sans l'esprit de Dieu ? Caïu n'alla point dans le bercail, à la porte que Dieu avoit bâtie à Adam et à Eve , par la parole et la briseur de serj^ent; mais il y monta par ailleurs , par sa forte fureur, participant à celle du lion. Il voulut être un dominateur sur le troupeau, et il fut un voleur et un meurtrier du troupeau ; et le trou-^ peau ne le suivit point , mais il passa avec Abel, au travers de l'épée, de la colère do l'ange Chérub , ou de cette vie passagère et périssable avec le briseur de serpent, dans son paisible bercail, où il n'y a plus aucun loup. Car le Chérub n'en laisse plus entrer , et s'il en vient quelques uns, il leur ]fetranche entièrement leur cœur de loup colérique du royaume de ce monde.Alors ils deviennent aussi des brebis, ils se couchent patiemment parmi la troupeau , ils ne cherchent plus après le loup, car il est au-delà d'Eden , et dans le pays de nod, mais ils sout entrés dans le paradis , au travers de l'épée de Chérub: là, il n'entre aucun loup. Il y a, à cet effet, la barrière d'un principe (c'est-à-dire, une entière génération). ii'^i. £t toi, église caïnique , avec tes lois et la radotage de tes subtiles explications des écrits des saints , qui ont parlé dans l'esprit de Dieu , tu devrois bieu t'exaiuiner, et ne pas établir sur cela si fortement ton règne dg voluptés; car ces saints écri-w vains, qui pour la plupart sont dans le paradis, traitent de l'élément , ils parlent de la racine du saiflt élément par rexlra-géuération des quatre élui ■i V r; ^ i ( i^ja ) en, 20I
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.
1109. There, the word, or the bruiser of the serpent established itself in the new element regenerated in the soul of Abel, in the centre, in the gates of the depth. This word broke for the serpent, that is to say, for the kingdom of anger the head of its power, for the head signifies the strong power of the choleric harshness. Then the love of God cast itself from the heart of God into the hell of anger, and extinguished anew in love the kindled fire of the poor soul; and there, was realised the first work, according as God had thus promised it to Adam and to Eve. 1 10. Secondly, the frightful work of the entry into the anger, has been also realised in Cain; for each reign experiences what is its own. Now, when Cain entered into the anger, then the love of God in the centre remained entirely hidden from him. There Cain was to, as a champion, break the head of the serpent, which he had imagined that it was in his power to do; and here was made the trial, whether it would not be possible that a being, by his own power, should possess the kingdom of God by the brightness of the father in the fire, m. The trial was useless and painful, for ( 17© ) «w. lo; Cain cried 9 in his delicate humanity: Woe and pain upon me; my sins are greater than I; I cannot enter into God by my power. 11 stopped, he trembled, he paled before the abyss of hell, which had taken him prisoner, and retained him in itself. He withdrew also from among humans, and said: Now whosoever shall find me will kill me, for I must flee from before thy face.
2IIS. Now, one sees here the separation of the christian church from the cainic, when God chased Cain, so that he had to inhabit another place. The true intelligence of this high secret, is all hidden in the word under the veil, and has almost never been known; but it must be at the time of the lily, in the marvels. And thou, cainic church, anti-christian, who art upon the earth, thou must know this, that all that thou inventest without the spirit of God, for pomp and thy pride, as well as for thy authority and power, is passed ( with Cain ), from Abel or from the church of Christ, beyond Eden, into the country of nod, if however thou art deeply enough instructed, and if thou understandest in the language of nature what that is, as thy flatterers pretend, with their doctoral crown. But they conceive with Cain only the four elements in explosion, and not at all the element before God. That is why it is the Babel of confusion and of the multitude of opposed opinions. That is not the base of the element, which exists in one, and not in several. Ii3. Thou hast here a fair mirror of the proper opi- ctt, ^t ( ï?! )
3nions of man in Cain. What is proper opinion, without the spirit of God? Cain went not into the sheepfold, to the door that God had built for Adam and for Eve, by the word and the bruiser of the serpent; but he mounted there elsewhere, by his strong fury, participating in that of the lion. He would be a dominator over the flock, and he was a thief and a murderer of the flock; and the flock followed him not, but it passed with Abel, through the sword, of the anger of the angel Cherub, or of this passing and perishable life with the bruiser of the serpent, into his peaceable sheepfold, where there is no more any wolf. For the Cherub lets no more enter, and if some come, he cuts off from them entirely their choleric wolf-heart of the kingdom of this world. Then they become also sheep, they lie down patiently among the flock, they seek no more after the wolf, for he is beyond Eden, and in the country of nod, but they are entered into paradise, through the sword of Cherub: there, no wolf enters. There is, to that effect, the barrier of a principle ( that is to say, an entire generation ). ii'^i. And thou, cainic church, with thy laws and the drivel of thy subtle explanations of the writings of the saints, who have spoken in the spirit of God, thou oughtest indeed to examine thyself, and not to establish so strongly upon that thy reign of voluptuousness; for these holy writers, who for the most part are in paradise, treat of the element, they speak of the root of the holy element by the extra-generation of the four elem ■i V r; ^ i ( i^ja ) en, 20I
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.