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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.
1.6 Maintenant regarde. Le ciel est la grande profondeur , aussi loin que l'Etl.er s'est étendu pour la génération de ce monde ; et cela est la malnce d ou Ta terre , les pierres , et l'eau matérielle sont engendrées. Or , Dieu a séparé en ce poml I eau matérielle d'avec la matrice ; et on voit très part^cul.erement ici comment l'eau matérielle estcomme morte , ou que la mort est dans elle : car elle n'a pas pu rester dans la mère couvante , mais elle a été créée sut ,e Rlobe de la terre , et Dieu là nommée mer. Dans ceci , il faut entendre dans la langue de la nature une végétation dans la mort , ou une vie dans la brisure. Ouoiqu'ici je puisse être comme muet pour le lecteur , je sais cependant cela très sûrement : laissemoi m'en réjouir. Comme l'homme animal n est pas digne de savoir ces choses , c'est pour cela que ie ne veux pas jeter des perles devant les pourceaux. Quant aux enfans de Dieu , à quL ces choses conviennent . l'esprit de Dieu saura bien les leur euseiener et les leur apprendre. 17. Lorsque le ciel,par une impulsion simultanée, t OH la ccurétion ] fut purgé de la terre et du cahos ténébreux, alors dans ce lieu , dans la matrice du «el , ont été les trois élémcns , Jeu , air et eau. L« ca. 6. ( 83 ) sont trois choses l'une dans l'autre dans une seule mère , et la mère alors s'est nommée ciel ; c'est pourquoi j'emploierai désormais dans mes écrits le mot ciel en place du mot matrice , car le ciel est la matrice. i8. Et il se nomme ciel à cause de la séparation , de façon que la quintessence des constellations est séparée et placée dans le ciel supérieur , là où la matrice est plus ignée, comme il faut l'entendre particoUèrement dans le langage de la nature, et comme cela est aussi devant les yeux.
219. Mais il faut décrii-e ici la qualité , la génération et la propriété du ciel , puisque là les quatre élémens se manifestent comme étant dans leur mère ; or en eux se trouve la forme de tout ce qui est vivant dans ce monde. Il nous faut décrire l'origine des élémens parmi lesquels on doit, avec raison, comprendre d'abord ce qu'est le ciel etc. (84) CHAPITRE SEPTIEME, Du ciel , de son éternelle génération , et substance ; comment les élémens sont engendrés ^ ce dans quoi l'éternelle alliance pourra être mieux et plus amplement comprise par la contemplation et Tobservation du monde matériel. La grande profondeur, I, Aucun esprit ne voit plus loin que dans sa mère5de laquelle il a tiré son origine et dans laquelle il se manifeste ; car il n'est donné à aucun esprit dans sa propre puissance naturelle de voir dans un autre principe , et de le contempler à moins qu'il ne soit de nouveau engendré dans ce principe. a. Mais l'homme naturel ( que la matrice de ce inonde a emprisonné dans sa chute ) a un esprit naturel qui se meut entre deux principes ; savoir : entre le divin et l'infernal , et il est entre deux portes ; dans celui de ces principes où il tombe , il y est là do nouveau engendré , soit dans le royaume du ciel , soit dans le royaume de l'enfer , et ne peut néanmoins, pendant ce tems-ci, en contempler aucun. Dans sa substance et dans tout son être il est ua CH. 7.' ( 85 )
3liomme double , car son ame , dans sa propre substance , vient du premier principe , qui de toute éternité n'a ni commencement ni fin ; et dans le moment de la création de l'homme dans le paradis ou dans le royaume céleste, elle a été corporisée par le FIAT en nature d'esprit 5 mais elle est restée inséparablement dans la première racine , avec la preuiiiVe veriuqui^de toute éternité,est dans sa première et propre puissance 5 et elle est pénétrée par la lumière du second principe ou du cœur de Dieu 5 par Je moyen de quoi se trouvant dans le paradis , elle a été soufflée par le bouillonnant esprit de Dieu dans la matrice du troisième principe , dans l'homme astral et élémenlairc. L'homme peut ainsi atteindre par sa compréhension jusqu'aux degrés où la lumière de Dieu brille en lui ; par laquelle lumière, il peut comprendre le fondement du cieî , ;,ussi bien que celui des élémens et de l'enfer. Car si la lumière est en lui, dès lors il est engendré dans les trois principes, sans quoi il n'en est qu'une étincelle et non pas la grande fontaine qui timi à Dieu même. 3. C'est pourquoi le Christ dit : Si vous aviez de la foi gros comme un grain de sénevé, vous pourriez dire à une montagne ; jète-toi dans la mer, et cela arri^ veroit. Et c'est par cette puissance que des hommes, par la parole et la vertu de Dieu , ont ressuscité des morts, et ont guéri des malades; autrement ils u'auroient pas pu opérer de pareilles œuvres , s'ils n'avoient pas été dans la puissance de tous les trois principes. 4. Car l'esprit créé de l'homme , qui est de la ma- ( 86 ) en. 7.
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.
1.6 Now look. The heaven is the great depth, as far as the Ether has extended for the generation of this world; and that is the matrix whence the earth, the stones, and the material water are begotten. Now, God separated in that point the material water from the matrix; and one sees very particularly here how the material water is as it were dead, or that death is in it: for it could not remain in the brooding mother, but it was created upon the globe of the earth, and God named it sea. In this, there must be understood in the language of nature a vegetation in death, or a life in the breaking. Although here I may be as it were mute for the reader, I nevertheless know that very surely: let me rejoice in it. As the animal man is not worthy to know these things, it is for that that I will not cast pearls before swine. As for the children of God, to whom these things belong, the spirit of God will know well how to teach them and to instruct them. 17. When the heaven, by a simultaneous impulsion, or the curation was purged of the earth and of the tenebrous chaos, then in that place, in the matrix of the heaven, were the three elements, fire, air and water. They ca. 6. ( 83 ) are three things the one in the other in one single mother, and the mother then named itself heaven; it is why I shall henceforth employ in my writings the word heaven in place of the word matrix, for the heaven is the matrix. i8. And it is named heaven because of the separation, so that the quintessence of the constellations is separated and placed in the superior heaven, there where the matrix is more igneous, as it must be understood particularly in the language of nature, and as that is also before the eyes.
219. But there must be described here the quality, the generation and the property of the heaven, since there the four elements manifest themselves as being in their mother; now in them is found the form of all that is living in this world. We must describe the origin of the elements, among which one must, with reason, comprehend first what the heaven is, etc. (84) CHAPTER THE SEVENTH, Of the heaven, of its eternal generation, and substance; how the elements are begotten; that wherein the eternal alliance may be better and more amply comprehended by the contemplation and the observation of the material world. The great depth. I, No spirit sees further than into its mother5from which it has drawn its origin and wherein it manifests itself; for it is given to no spirit in its own natural power to see into another principle, and to contemplate it unless it be anew begotten in that principle. a. But the natural man ( whom the matrix of this world imprisoned in his fall ) has a natural spirit which moves between two principles; to wit: between the divine and the infernal, and he is between two gates; in whichever of those principles he falls, he is there anew begotten, either in the kingdom of heaven or in the kingdom of hell, and can nevertheless, during this time here, contemplate neither. In his substance and in all his being he is a CH. 7.' ( 85 )
3double man, for his soul, in its own substance, comes from the first principle, which from all eternity has neither beginning nor end; and in the moment of the creation of man in paradise or in the celestial kingdom, it was corporised by the FIAT in nature of spirit 5 but it has remained inseparably in the first root, with the first virtue which from all eternity is in its first and own power 5 and it is penetrated by the light of the second principle or of the heart of God 5 by means of which, finding itself in paradise, it was breathed by the boiling spirit of God into the matrix of the third principle, into the astral and elementary man. Man may thus attain by his comprehension to the degrees where the light of God shines in him; by which light, he may comprehend the foundation of the heaven, as well as that of the elements and of hell. For if the light is in him, from then he is begotten in the three principles, without which he is but a spark of it and not the great fountain which holds to God himself. 3. It is why the Christ says: If you had faith as big as a grain of mustard seed, you might say to a mountain: cast thyself into the sea, and that would arrive. And it is by that power that men, by the word and the virtue of God, have raised the dead, and have healed the sick; otherwise they could not have operated such works, if they had not been in the power of all the three principles. 4. For the created spirit of man, which is of the ma- ( 86 ) en. 7.
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.