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.
1toit représentée dans toutes les formes dans le FUf • 19. Mais , en ce moment, les ténèbres et le tour-* ment furent dans le centre 5 c'est-à-dire que , dans ce centre , la mort et la colère pénétrèrent , et qu'ils y font sentir leurs pointes aiguës et la cor« ruption. Si cela n'avoit pas été , ce monde eût subsisté éternellement , et Adam n'auroit point été tenté. Le tourment et les ténèbres ont aussi ( comme une mort ou un ver destructeur de la source }^ travaillé de concert, et engendré de leur siège ou dans le milieu , l'arbre bon et mauvais , puisque la mort pique dans le milieu dans le centre , pat. le moyen de quoi ce monde , à la fin des jours , sera enflammé par le feu ; et ce même tourment est la colère de Dieu, que le cœur ou la lumière de Dieu dans l'éternel père , rétablit continuellement dans la douceur : c'est pourquoi la parole , ou le cœur de Dieu , s'appelle l'éternelle miséricorde de Dieu. ao. Puisque toutes les formes dévoient s'élever dans l'éternelle nature , il falloit donc que la forme de la colère et de l'âpreté se produisît aussi , comme tu le vois , aux crapauds , aux serpens , aux vers et aux mauvais animaux; car c'est cette forme là, c'estè-dire, le poison ou l'esprit de souffre, qui pique dans le centre , dans la génération , dans toutes les créatures ; comme tu vois que toutes les créatures ont du poison et du fiel , et que la vie des créatures pointe dans cette puissance ; et comme tu as vu cidessus, dans tous les chapitres de ce Uvtq, dgr l i8o ) 'ê«. 1x5 quelle manière k nature éternelle a'originise^ opère, et quelle est son essence.
2ai. Or, l'arbre de la colère, ou celui qui est au milieu de la nature , a poussé aussi au milieu du jardin d'Eden , et est devenu le plus grand et le plus puissant de tous au moyen de sa propre forme , qu'ilavoit dans l'origine, dans les qualités éternelles 5 et on voit ici clairement que Dieu vouloit avoir et conserver l'homme dans le paradis ; car il lui avoit défendu cet arbre, et avoit laissé croître assez d'autres arbres , et d'autres fruits de toutes formes, et de diverses essences. Za porte de la tentation, 22. Saint -Paul dit : Dieu a prévu ou choisi Vhomme en Jéaus-Chriat , avant que le fondement du monde fût posé. Ici nous trouvons si bien la base, que nous nous plaisons à l'écrire, et à chercher la perle -, car , vois : dans l'éternelle sagesse de Dieu , avant la création du monde , a été vue et aperçue dans l'éternelle matrice , la chute des démons ainsi que de l'homme , puisque l'éternel verbe dansl'éternelle lumière savoit bien que s'il ouvroit la fontaine de l'éternelle génération , chaque forme feroit son explosion : toutefois ce n'étoit point la volonté de Tamour dans le verbe de la lumière, que la forme de la colère dût s'élever au-dessus de la forme de la douceur ; mais comme elle a eu une qualité puis^ saute à ce point là , cela est néanmoins arrivé. CH. lï.' ( 181 )
3a3. C'est pourquoi le démon , à cause de la colère , de la puissance , etc. , est aussi appelé un prince de ce monde qui est dans la colère ; ce dont il sera question lors de la chute -, et c'est pourquoi Dieu ne créa qu'un seul homme. Car l'amour de Dieu vouloit que l'homme demeurât dans le paradis , et y vécût éternellement 5 or , la colère voulut le tenter pour savoir s'il mettroit son imagination et sa volonté entière dans le cœur de Dieu , et dans le paradis où il étoit. 24. Puisqu'Adam étoit également extrait de l'eslence colérique , il devoit être éprouvé pour savoi^ si son essence , d'où provenoit son imagination et son altract, pourroit rester dans la qualité céleste ; s'il mangeroit du verbe de Dieu ; et laquelle essence de la paradisiaque ou de la colérique seroit surmontée dans Adam. 25 .Et tel étoit le plan du cœur de Dieu; c'est pourquoi il ne créa qu'un seul homme , afin qu'il pût être éprouvé , pour savoir comment il se maintiendroit , et afin que dans la chute il fût d'autant plus secouru : or , avant la création du monde le cœur de Dieu avoit projeté , dans son amour, de venir à son secours; et , lorsqu'il n'y eut pas d'autre moyen , le cœur de Dieu voulut plutôt se faire homme lui-même , et engendrer de nouveau l'homme. 26. Car Adam n'est pas tombé par orgueil colérique , comme le démon i mais son essence terrestre a surmonté son essence paradisiaque , et l'a ( i82 ) en. iu portée dans l'altract de la terreslréilé ; c*est pourquoi aussi la grâce s'est reportée vers lui. La très haute , très forte , et très puissante porté de la tentation dans Adam,
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.
1presented in all the forms in the Fiat • 19. But, at this moment, the darkness and the torment were in the centre 5 that is to say that, in this centre, death and anger penetrated, and that they make their sharp points and corruption to be felt there. If that had not been, this world would have subsisted eternally, and Adam would not have been tempted. The torment and the darkness have also (as a death or a destroying worm of the source) worked in concert, and begotten from their seat or in the midst, the tree good and evil, since death pricks in the midst in the centre, by means of which this world, at the end of days, shall be inflamed by fire; and this same torment is the anger of God, which the heart or the light of God in the eternal father, re-establishes continually in the sweetness: that is why the word, or the heart of God, is called the eternal mercy of God. ao. Since all the forms were to rise in the eternal nature, it was needful then that the form of anger and of harshness should produce itself also, as thou seest it, in the toads, the serpents, the worms and the evil animals; for it is that form there, that is to say, the poison or the spirit of sulphur, which pricks in the centre, in the generation, in all the creatures; as thou seest that all the creatures have poison and gall, and that the life of the creatures points in this power; and as thou hast seen above, in all the chapters of this book, in l i8o ) 'ê«. 1x5 what manner the eternal nature originises itself, operates, and what its essence is.
2ai. Now, the tree of anger, or that which is in the midst of nature, has grown also in the midst of the garden of Eden, and is become the greatest and the most powerful of all by means of its own form, which it had in the origin, in the eternal qualities 5 and one sees here clearly that God would have and preserve man in paradise; for he had forbidden him this tree, and had let grow enough other trees, and other fruits of all forms, and of divers essences. The gate of the temptation, 22. Saint Paul says: God has foreseen or chosen man in Jesus-Christ, before the foundation of the world was laid. Here we find so well the base, that we take pleasure in writing it, and in seeking the pearl; for, see: in the eternal wisdom of God, before the creation of the world, was seen and perceived in the eternal matrix, the fall of the demons as well as of man, since the eternal word in the eternal light knew well that if it opened the fountain of the eternal generation, each form would make its explosion: nevertheless it was not the will of the love in the word of the light, that the form of anger should rise above the form of the sweetness; but as it has had a quality so power- ful to that point, this has nevertheless happened. CH. lï.' ( 181 )
3a3. That is why the demon, because of the anger, of the power, etc., is also called a prince of this world who is in the anger; whereof there will be question at the fall; and that is why God created but one single man. For the love of God would that man should dwell in paradise, and live there eternally 5 now, the anger would tempt him to know whether he would put his imagination and his entire will in the heart of God, and in the paradise where he was. 24. Since Adam was equally extracted from the choleric essence, he was to be proved to know whether his essence, whence proceeded his imagination and his attract, could remain in the celestial quality; whether he would eat of the word of God; and which essence of the paradisiacal or of the choleric would be overcome in Adam. 25 .And such was the plan of the heart of God; that is why he created but one single man, so that he might be proved, to know how he would maintain himself, and so that in the fall he should be so much the more succoured: now, before the creation of the world the heart of God had projected, in his love, to come to his succour; and, when there was no other means, the heart of God would rather make himself man, and beget anew man. 26. For Adam is not fallen by choleric pride, like the demon; but his terrestrial essence has overcome his paradisiacal essence, and has ( i82 ) en. iu carried it into the attract of the terrestriality; that is why also grace has carried itself back toward him. The very high, very strong, and very powerful gate of the temptation in Adam,
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.