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.
1puissante, et cependani elle ne fait rien : si elle s'éloifjne d'un chose, eUe n'y revient pas : non , mais elle demeure dans son Eiher ^jamais elle ne se co< rompt , et cependant elle peat atis&i s'accroître. 26. Mais tu dis : Cela doit être Dieu. 'Non , ce n'est pas Dieu , mais l'amie de Dieu» Christ dit : Mon père a^ic ^ et mvi J'agis aussi, Tduteibis , elle est imperceptible dans une chose , et l'on peut cependant avoir des droits sur elle, et l'employer, particulièrement dans les mét#»jx , où , si elle est inlacle, elle peut, du ferel du cuivre , faire un or pur. Elle peut faire beaucoup avec peu , et cèpe»- daul elle n'excite rien. Sa voie est aussi sul»lile que les pensées de l'homme, et aussi lés pensées en viennent-elles* ' 27. C'est pourquoi quand l'homme dort , en aorte qu'elle soit dans le repos, il n'y a alors aucune pensé© dans l'esprit ; mais la constellation forme un bruissement et un murmure dans les élémens ; elle imprime ou inculque dans le cerveau , ce qui à l'avenir doit lui arriver par leur opération , quoique cepee» dant cela soit souvent détruit par une autre conjonction, de façon que cela ne vient point en œuvre. En outre V astre ne peut rien montrer de complet , à moins que ce ne soit par une conjonction des planettes et des é\o\\es fixes qui procède et suit son cours ; alors cela lient, mais tout s'^y représente terrestrement , selon l'esprit de ce monde, de façon quo quand l'esprit astral doit parler de l'homme, il parle $ouveut des animaux , et représeote toujours la CH. i3. ( 23i 3 contre-partie. Selon que l'esprit terrestre se préoc-. cupe de l'esprit de l'étoile, tel est aussi son rêve.
228. Puisque nous avons parlé de la teinture comme de la maison de l'ame , nous voulons aussi parler de l'ame ; dire ce qu'elle est et comment elle peut être propagée ; ce dans quoi nous pourrons mettre la teinture dans un plus grand jour. L'ame n'est pas aussi subtile que la teinture, mais elle est puissante et a une grande autorité. Elle peut par la teinture renverser les montagnes, si elle voyage dans la teinture sur le char marital de la vierge sophie, comme Christ en parle. Tout ce qui se fait par une ' vraie foi, en quelque lieu que la teinture ait la supé-. riorilé , c'est la teinture qui le fait , et l'ame donne l'ébranlement. Là cependant aucune puissance ne se fait ressentir : c'est ainsi que la terre nage sur la teinture céleste, tandis qu'il n'y a cependant qu'une teinture dans le ciel et dans ce monde ; mais elle a diverses qualités selon chaque essence ; elle n'est pas dans les animaux comme dans les hommes , dans les poissons comme dans les animaux terrestres; elle est autrement aussi dans les cailloux que dan» les pierres précieuses, et autrement encore dans les anges que dans l'esprit de ce monde. 29. Mais elle est semblable dans Dieu , dans les anges et dans les âmes virginales 5 entendez les âmes pures dans lesquelles elle est entièrement devant la face de Dieu. Le démon a aussi une teinture ; mais «ne teinture fausse , qui ne subsiste pas dans le feu. Par le moyen de cette teinture fausse , il peut atteindre le cœur de l'homme qui lui donne entrée ; ( a52 ) ch. i5. et s'ÎDSînuer en lui , comme un flatteur et un voleur déguisé^qui vient avec des carresses et veut le spolier : ce pourquoi Christ nous avertit que nous devons veiller.
33o. Si maintenant nous voulons parler de la substance de l'ame et de son essence , alor^ nous devons dire que l'ame est ce qu'il y a de plus cru dans l'homme ; car elle est l'origine des autres essences. Elle est ignée, astringente , amère et âpre, et elle so peut comparer à une grande puissance : ses essences se comparent à un souffre ; sa porte , ou son siège , provenant de l'éternelle origine , lient le milies entre la quatrième et la cinquième forme dans l'éternelle génération , et entre l'alliauGe indissoluble de la forte puissance de Dieu le père , là où s'engendre l'éternelle lumière de son cœur , lequel fait le second principe. Si elle perd entièrement la vierge de la .puissance divine ou la soprie qui s'est donnée , de laquelle la lumière de Dieu s'engendre , et qui est donnée à l'ame pour perle, comme cela a été exposé, .alors elle devient et est un vrai démon , semblable à tous les autres dans les essences , dans la forme et aussi dans la source. ( Ici les anciens sages ont supposé que l'homme avoit deux anges ; que l'un le pousse à tous les maux , et que l'autre agit pour le délivrer. Il est vrai que le combat dure aussi longtems que l'homme vit ici y quoiqu'il n'y ait point d'anges* ) [ On pourrait dire^à la rigueur , que les anges bons et mauvais ne viennent qu^à C occasion de ce combat ; on pourrait croire aussi que ce passage est interpolé ; car CH. l3. ( 233 ) l'auteur est bien loin de hier la présehée des anges bonf et mauvais auprès de nous. Voyez VAutofe baissante ^ cJiap, II, »o. 74 5 et chap. 19 , n^. 82. Seulement il prétend qu^ils ne sont pas saisissables à notre homme extérieur, ]
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.
1powerful, and nevertheless it does nothing: if it withdraw from a thing, it returns not thither: no, but it dwells in its Ether; never does it corrupt itself, and nevertheless it can also increase. 26. But thou sayest: That must be God. No, it is not God, but the friend of God. Christ says: My father acts, and I act also. Nevertheless, it is imperceptible in a thing, and one can however have rights upon it, and employ it, particularly in the metals, where, if it be intact, it can, of iron and of copper, make a pure gold. It can do much with little, and nevertheless it excites nothing. Its way is as subtle as the thoughts of man, and also thoughts come of it. 27. That is why when man sleeps, so that it be in repose, there is then no thought in the spirit; but the constellation forms a rustling and a murmur in the elements; it imprints or inculcates in the brain, what in the future must happen to him by their operation, although nevertheless that be often destroyed by another conjunction, so that it comes not into work. Besides the star can show nothing complete, unless it be by a conjunction of the planets and of the fixed stars which proceeds and follows its course; then that holds, but all represents itself there terrestrially, according to the spirit of this world, so that when the astral spirit must speak of man, it speaks often of the animals, and always represents the CH. i3. ( 23i 3 counter-part. According as the terrestrial spirit preoccupies itself with the spirit of the star, such also is its dream.
228. Since we have spoken of the tincture as of the house of the soul, we will also speak of the soul; say what it is and how it may be propagated; wherein we shall be able to put the tincture in a greater light. The soul is not so subtle as the tincture, but it is powerful and has a great authority. It can by the tincture overturn the mountains, if it travel in the tincture upon the marital chariot of the virgin Sophia, as Christ speaks of it. All that is done by a true faith, in whatever place the tincture has the superiority, it is the tincture that does it, and the soul gives the shaking. There nevertheless no power makes itself felt: it is thus that the earth swims upon the celestial tincture, whilst there is nevertheless but one tincture in heaven and in this world; but it has divers qualities according to each essence; it is not in the animals as in men, in the fishes as in the terrestrial animals; it is otherwise also in the pebbles than in the precious stones, and otherwise again in the angels than in the spirit of this world. 29. But it is alike in God, in the angels and in the virginal souls 5 understand the pure souls in which it is entirely before the face of God. The demon has also a tincture; but a false tincture, which subsists not in the fire. By means of this false tincture, he can reach the heart of the man who gives him entrance; ( a52 ) ch. i5. and insinuate himself into him, as a flatterer and a disguised thief who comes with caresses and would spoil him: wherefore Christ warns us that we must watch.
33o. If now we will speak of the substance of the soul and of its essence, then we must say that the soul is what there is of most crude in man; for it is the origin of the other essences. It is fiery, astringent, bitter and harsh, and it may be compared to a great power: its essences are compared to a sulphur; its gate, or its seat, proceeding from the eternal origin, holds the midst between the fourth and the fifth form in the eternal generation, and between the indissoluble alliance of the strong power of God the father, there where is begotten the eternal light of his heart, which makes the second principle. If it lose entirely the virgin of the divine power or the Sophia who has given herself, of whom the light of God is begotten, and who is given to the soul for pearl, as this has been exposed, then it becomes and is a true demon, like to all the others in the essences, in the form and also in the source. ( Here the ancient sages have supposed that man had two angels; that the one pushes him to all evils, and that the other acts to deliver him. It is true that the combat lasts as long a time as man lives here, although there be no angels. ) [ One might say, strictly, that the good and evil angels come only on the occasion of this combat; one might believe also that this passage is interpolated; for CH. l3. ( 233 ) the author is very far from denying the presence of the good and evil angels near us. See the Aurora nascent, chap, II, no. 74 5 and chap. 19, no. 82. Only he maintains that they are not seizable to our exterior man, ]
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.