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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.
13i. Mais si elle prend en soi la résolution cTe marcher dans la douceur, c'est-à-dire, Jans l'obéissance à Dieu 5 alors elle est une source du cœur de Dieu ; elle reooit la puissance divine , et toutes ses essences rudes deviennent angéliqués et pleines de joie ; alors ses essences rudes fa servent bien , et lui sont plus salutaires et plus utiles que si , dans l'orîgine, elles étoient toutes douces , et qu'il n'y eût en elles aucune force ni puissance , comme ils'eu Iroiivè dans l'astringent , l'amer etVigné. 32. Car le feu devient dans l'essence une lumière douce , et n'est qu'un ardent emjlammement dans la teinture, et l'essence astringente fait que la puissance divine peut la tirer à soi et la goûter 5 Car dans cette essence , consiste le goût dans la nature. Ainsi l'essence amère lui sert pour le mouvement qui élève la joie , la bonne odeur et raccroissemenl 5 et de ces formes sort la teinture , et c'est là la maison de l'ame. De m^me que l'esprit saint vient du père et du fils i de même aussi la teinture sort do la lumière de Pams embrasée , et par conséquent de ses essences puissantes 5 elle se compare à l'<^sprit saint , mais l'esprit saint de Dieu est un degré au-dessus. Car il sort du centre de la lumière par le cœur de Dieu , toul-à-fait dans la cinquième forme , à la limite de la nature. ( 234 ) CH. 1^'
233. C'est pourquoi la teinture clans Thomme est une différence d'avec l'esprit saint ; et la vierge de la puissance divine ou sophie qui s'est donnée , demeure dans la teinture de l'ame, si elle est fidèle ; sinon la SOPHIE se retire dans son centre qui n'est pas entièrement lermé ( car il y a une demie génération entre ) , à moins que l'ame ne marche dans la racine de Tastringence et de la méchanceté. Alors il y a unegénéralion entière entre ;car l'astringence réside dans la quatrième forme des ténèbres , et l'amertume , dans le feu , entre la quatrième et la cinquième forme , comme cela est dit ci-dessus. 34. Maintenant on se demande : Comment Eve et Adam ont-ils reçu l'ame ! Vois. Lorsque le fiât astringent de Dieu pritja cote d'Adam , il tira à soi toutes les essences, et le fiât s'imprima dedans , pour demeurer ainsi éternellement. Alors la teinture dans Adam n'étoit point encore éteinte , mais l'ame d'Adam siégeoit encore dans la teinture , très fortement et puissamment ; seulement la vierge sophib s'étoitéloignée,etleFiAT ne prit que la teinture: or l'essence astringente inqualifia avec le fiât astringent , car le fiât et l'astringence qui est dans les essences ne sont qu'une seule essence. 35. Ainsi le fiât s'inclina alors vers le cœur de Dieu , et les essences reçurent la puissance divine; alors la fleur s'éleva dans le feu , et de la fleur , de rechef , la teinture propre [ de Pâme ] ; ainsi Eve devint une ame vivante , et la teinture se remplit dans le végètement ^ comme étant une cause de tout végètement, en sorte que dans celte prompte opéra* CH. i3. ( î^35 >
3tion , ily eut un corpsentier[flM une circonscription] dans la teinture ; car cela étoit possible : ils n'étoient pas encore tombés dans le péché , et ils n'étoient pas encore des nœuds durs et des os. 36. Entends-bien ceci. Eve n'a point reçu l'ame d'Adam , ni le corps d'Adam ; seulement une côte, mais elle a été extraite des essences , et elle a pris «on, ame dans ses essences qui lui furent données dans la leiutuie, et le corps lui poussa dans sa propre teinture ; ne s'élevant , à la vérité , qu'en puissance ; mais le fiât l'eut bientôt formée en une femme , non pas informe , mais entièrement gracieuse ; car elle étoit encore à la manière céleste dans le paradis ; mais par le fiât du grand monde, les marques dialinctives Çureni bientôt mises ; et cela ne pouvoit être autrement : elle devoit être une femme d'Adam. Ils éloient toutefois dans le paradis ; s'ils n'avoient pas mangé de l'arbre et s^ils s'éloient tournés vers Dteudansleur imagination /ils seroient demeurés dans le paradis ; mais la propagation auroit dû avoir Keu à la manière féminine, et cependant cela n'eût pas duré : car Satan l'eût poussée trop loin , quoiqu'il ne se fût pas encore laissé voir. Seulement il auroit répandu du sucre dans l'esprit du grand monde , jusqu'à ce que l'aimable bêle se fût «enfin placé , sur Farbre, comme un flatteur et un menteur. La porte de notre propagation dans la chaire Zq> Ainsi que je l'ai représenté ci-dessus , la noble ( a36 ) CH. i?,
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.
13i. But if it take in itself the resolution to walk in the sweetness, that is to say, in the obedience to God 5 then it is a source of the heart of God; it receives the divine power, and all its rude essences become angelic and full of joy; then its rude essences serve it well, and are more salutary and more useful to it than if, in the origin, they were all sweet, and there were in them no force nor power, as is found in the astringent, the bitter and the fiery. 32. For the fire becomes in the essence a sweet light, and is but an ardent inflaming in the tincture, and the astringent essence makes that the divine power can draw it to itself and taste it 5 For in this essence, consists the taste in nature. Thus the bitter essence serves it for the movement which raises the joy, the good odour and the increase 5 and of these forms goes forth the tincture, and that is the house of the soul. Even as the holy spirit comes from the father and from the son; so also the tincture goes forth from the light of the enkindled soul, and consequently from its powerful essences 5 it is compared to the holy spirit, but the holy spirit of God is a degree above. For it goes forth from the centre of the light by the heart of God, quite into the fifth form, at the limit of nature. ( 234 ) CH. 1^'
233. That is why the tincture in man is a difference from the holy spirit; and the virgin of the divine power or Sophia who has given herself, dwells in the tincture of the soul, if it be faithful; if not the SOPHIA withdraws into her centre which is not entirely closed ( for there is a half generation between ), unless the soul walk in the root of the astringency and of the wickedness. Then there is an entire generation between; for the astringency resides in the fourth form of the darkness, and the bitterness, in the fire, between the fourth and the fifth form, as this is said above. 34. Now one asks: How have Eve and Adam received the soul? See. When the astringent fiat of God took the rib of Adam, it drew to itself all the essences, and the fiat imprinted itself therein, to dwell thus eternally. Then the tincture in Adam was not yet extinguished, but the soul of Adam sat still in the tincture, very strongly and powerfully; only the virgin Sophia had withdrawn, and the FIAT took but the tincture: now the astringent essence inqualified with the astringent fiat, for the fiat and the astringency which is in the essences are but one single essence. 35. Thus the fiat inclined itself then toward the heart of God, and the essences received the divine power; then the flower rose in the fire, and of the flower, afresh, the proper tincture [ of the soul ]; thus Eve became a living soul, and the tincture filled itself in the vegetating, as being a cause of all vegetating, so that in this prompt opera- CH. i3. ( î^35 >
3tion, there was an entire body [or a circumscription] in the tincture; for that was possible: they were not yet fallen into sin, and they were not yet hard knots and bones. 36. Understand this well. Eve received not the soul of Adam, nor the body of Adam; only a rib, but she was extracted from the essences, and she took her soul in her essences which were given to her in the tincture, and the body grew for her in her own tincture; rising, in truth, only in power; but the fiat had soon formed her into a woman, not shapeless, but entirely gracious; for she was still in the celestial manner in paradise; but by the fiat of the great world, the distinctive marks were soon set; and that could not be otherwise: she was to be a woman of Adam. They were nevertheless in paradise; if they had not eaten of the tree and if they had turned themselves toward God in their imagination, they would have remained in paradise; but the propagation would have had to take place in the feminine manner, and nevertheless that would not have lasted: for Satan would have pushed it too far, although he had not yet let himself be seen. Only he would have spread sugar in the spirit of the great world, until the amiable beast had at last placed itself upon the tree, as a flatterer and a liar. The gate of our propagation in the flesh Zq> As I have represented it above, the noble ( a36 ) CH. i?,
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.