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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.
110. Toutefois il a connu la profondeur dans le centre de la génération , beaucoup mieux que nous dans nos écoles ; cela est prouvé par la langue , en ce qu'il a donné les noms à toutes choses , à chacune selon .son essence , son espèce et ses propriétés , comme s'il avoit été placé dans toutes choses, et qu*il eût éprouvé toutes les essences; tandis qu'alors il ne connut les essences que par leur «o/r, par la forme de leur aspect , et par l'odeur et le goût , et qu'il ne connut les métaux que par l'éclat de la teinture et dans le feu , comme cela es| encore facile à reconnoître. 11. Car Adam éloit le cœur de tontes, les choses dé ce monde, et créé de l'originel de toutes choses. Soil ame brilla du premier principe par le second; «t sou corps étoit de l'élément, de BARMj ou génération de la puissance divine devant Dieu, lequel corps s'introduisit «dans l'exlra-géuéralion de l'élément , c'est-à-dire, dans les quatre élémens, et entièrement dans l'esprit de ce monde, ou dans le troisième principe. C'est pourquoi il avoit eu en soi la teinture de tous les êtres avec laquelle il alteignoit dans toutes les essences, elles éprouvoit toutes, 11 ( 186 ) « "• ««us le de! , «ur la lerre , dans le feu , l'air, l'eau , et dans tout ce qui en étoit enj<endré, la. Ainsi une teinture a saisi l'autre, celle qui «st forte a soumis à l'épreuve celle qui est foible, et a donné à toutes choses son nom selon ses essences } et le vrai fondement de la chute d'Adam Tient de ce qu'il a passé de ce qui est éternel, dam l'exlra-génération de ce qui est périssable, et de ce qu'il s'est revêtu de l'image corruptible, ce que Dieu lui avoit défendu.
2,3. L'on voit ici les deux fortes régions de I eternité , qui ont été en combat Tune et l'autre , et qu. T sont toujours , et le combat demeure en éler.ué. En effet il est aussi de toute éternité entre la tolère, et k douceur. ( Car s'il n'y avoit aucune colère , il n'y auroit aucun mouvement dans l étet- »ilé. Mais la colère, selon ce monde , ne domme ««e dans le règne «le l'enfer, et elle fait dau. le eiel la joie qui s'élève au plus haut degré. ) ,4. Dans la lumière île la nature , nous pouvon. hautement con.idé.-ef et découvrir comment U colère e*t 1. racine de toutes choses , et est en outre l'origine de la vie; comment c'est dans elle seule „«'e«sle.Ute puissance et la force, et qued elle seule sortent les merveilles-, enfin comment, sans la ce 1ère il n'y auroit aucune MUis^biliU, mais tout leroi't un rien , comme cela a été dit ci-dessus. ï5 Alors nous trouvons comment la douceur est la force e1 l'esprit , en sorte que oii la douceur n'est tas , la colère en soi n'est rien que les ténèbres et Tue mon , et qu'en elle aucune production ne peu» s'élever , ni engendrer et manifester «es merveille». 16. Nous trouvons aussi que la colère est la cause des essences , et la douceur une cause de la joie , de l'ascension et de l'expansion des essences ; eu outre , que l'esprit est engendré par le bouillonnement, ou l'ascension des essences, et qu'aussi la colère est la source de l'esprit , et que la douceur est sa vie.
317. Mais enfin aucune douceur ne peut être sans la lumière , car la lumière fait la douceur. De même aussi aucune colère ne peut être sans la lumière ; car la lumière fait un désir dans les ténèbres ,• et cependant là il n'y aucunes ténèbres , mais le désir fait les ténèbres dans la volonté , en sorte que la vo*- lônté attire à soi , et imprègne le désir , qui par Ik devient épais et ténébreux, car il est plus substantiel que la volonté: c'est pourquoi il ombrage la vo* lonté, et il est les ténèbres de la volonté* î8. Et lorsqtie la volonté est ainsi dans les tétîèbres , elle est dans l'angoisse , car elle désire d'être hors des ténèbres , et le désir est le bouillonnement et Vattirement en soi-même. Là , cependant on ne sent rien qu'une source coléri<iue en soimême , laquelle par son attirement , produit la rudfesse et la durelé , ce que la volonté ne peut pa» supporter , et elle remue ainsi la racine du feu dans réclair, comme cela a été dit ci-dessus. De là la voîonlé reconçue passe de l'éclair dans soi-même; ^lle disperse les ténèbres , et demeure dans les té^ îièbres dispersées , dans la lumière , dans une joie aimable, en soi-même 5 apiès laqnello joie la vo- ( r88 ) en. 21 - lonté dans les ténèbres soupire toujours; de là résulte le désir, et c'est ainsi une élerneiie alliance , qui ne peut jamais être rompue. 19. Or alors la volonté travaille dans les portes brisées, de façon qu'elle manifeste ses merveilles par elle-même, comme on le voit sufKsamment à la création de ce monde , et en toutes les créatures.
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.
110. However he knew the depth in the centre of generation, much better than we in our schools; that is proved by the tongue, in that he gave the names to all things, to each according to its essence, its species and its properties, as if he had been placed in all things, and had proved all the essences; whilst then he knew the essences only by their sound, by the form of their aspect, and by the odour and the taste, and he knew the metals only by the brightness of the tincture and in the fire, as that is still easy to recognise. 11. For Adam was the heart of all the things of this world, and created of the original of all things. His soul shone from the first principle through the second; and his body was of the element, of BARM, or generation of the divine power before God, which body introduced itself into the extra-generation of the element, that is to say, into the four elements, and entirely into the spirit of this world, or into the third principle. That is why he had had in himself the tincture of all beings with which he reached into all the essences, and proved them all, 11 ( 186 ) « "• under the heaven, upon the earth, in the fire, the air, the water, and in all that was begotten thereof, la. Thus one tincture has seized the other, that which is strong has submitted to the trial that which is feeble, and has given to all things its name according to its essences; and the true foundation of the fall of Adam comes from his having passed from what is eternal, into the extra-generation of what is perishable, and from his having clothed himself with the corruptible image, which God had forbidden him.
2,3. One sees here the two strong regions of eternity, which have been in combat the one and the other, and which are so always, and the combat remains in eternity. In effect it is also from all eternity between the anger, and the sweetness. ( For if there were no anger, there would be no movement in eternity. But the anger, according to this world, dominates only in the reign of hell, and it makes in heaven the joy which rises to the highest degree. ) ,4. In the light of nature, we can highly consider and discover how the anger is 1. the root of all things, and is besides the origin of life; how it is in it alone that exist all power and force, and that of it alone go out the marvels; at last how, without the ang1er there would be no seizability, but all would be a nothing, as that has been said above. ï5 Then we find how the sweetness is the force e1 the spirit, so that where the sweetness is not, the anger in itself is nothing but the darkness and a death, and that in it no production can rise, nor beget and manifest its marvels. 16. We find also that the anger is the cause of the essences, and the sweetness a cause of joy, of the ascension and of the expansion of the essences; besides, that the spirit is begotten by the boiling, or the ascension of the essences, and that also the anger is the source of the spirit, and that the sweetness is its life.
317. But at last no sweetness can be without the light, for the light makes the sweetness. Likewise also no anger can be without the light; for the light makes a desire in the darkness; and nevertheless there is there no darkness, but the desire makes the darkness in the will, so that the will draws to itself, and impregnates the desire, which thereby becomes thick and tenebrous, for it is more substantial than the will: that is why it shadows the will, and it is the darkness of the will. î8. And when the will is thus in the darkness, it is in anguish, for it desires to be out of the darkness, and the desire is the boiling and the attraction in itself. There, however one feels nothing but a choleric source in itself, which by its attraction, produces the rudeness and the hardness, which the will cannot support, and it moves thus the root of fire in the flash, as that has been said above. Thence the reconceived will passes from the flash into itself; it disperses the darkness, and remains in the dispersed darkness, in the light, in an amiable joy, in itself 5 after which joy the ( r88 ) en. 21 - will in the darkness sighs always; thence results the desire, and it is thus an eternal alliance, which can never be broken. 19. Now then the will labours in the broken gates, so that it manifests its marvels by itself, as one sees it sufficiently at the creation of this world, and in all the creatures.
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.