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.
158. Ainsi nous devons sonder et voir ce que c'est qli'nne image ; comnrent elle prend ainsi son origine, defaron que l'homme porte : i». une image terrestre,élojnentaire,et2o. aussi une image céleste - et non-seulement cela, mais il porte Iroisicmement avec soi une image infernale, qui est encline à tous les péchés et à toutes les méchancetés ; et tout cela commence à la fois avec Pasrension de la vie. 59. Et -en outre, nous devons voir oà se trouve la volonté propre ; de façon que , dans sa puissance particulière ,un homme puisse sedonner au royaume du ciel, ou au royaume de Penfer , à celui qu'il veut'. lïous appelons devant ce miroir celui qui a faim et soif de la noble connoissance , et nous lui signalons le but , afin que dans sa base affective, il se délivre des erreurs et des disputes coutentieuses qui se passent dans le royaume deTantcchrist ; or , quicont|ue saisira bien cette porte comprendra Tessence de- toutes les essences , et apprendra àconcevoir ( s'ilLs^observe bien)ce qu'ont écrit Moïse et tous les prophètes, et en outre tous les saints apôtres ; dans quel esprit cliacun a parlé , et ce qui a été , et ce qui à l'avenir peuteucore être et sera. lia très phf^cièUëe porté dans la racine du lys. Go. Si nous considérons les trois principes , comment ils sont dans leur origine, et comment ils s'engendrent, nous trouvonsalors l'essence de toutes les essences j comment l'une sort de l'autre j corn- ( 276 ) eu. 14. ment aussi l'une est d'un rang plus élevé que l'autre-, comment l'une est éternelle et l'autre est périssable 5 et comment l'une est plus belle et meilleure que l'autre : nous trouvons aussi pourquoi l'une veut aller en avant, et l'autre eu arrière; de plus , l'amour et le désir , ainsi que l'inimiliô de chaque chose.
261. Ainsi d'abord ,nous ne pouvons rien dire de l'origine de l'être de tous les êtres , sinon que dans l'origine il n'y a seulement qu'une essence d'où sort alors l'essence de toutes les essences. Cette même essence est l'éternelle ame de Dieu , laquelle demeure dans les ténèbres. Or , de toute éternité cette même essence s'est désirée elle-même ardemment , et a été dans la volonté d'engendrer la lumière : ce même désir est la source , et cette même volonté est le bourgeonnement ou Tascension. Or 5 l'ascension fait le mouvement et la mobilité ; la mobilité fait Vatiirement dans la volonté , et la volonté fait le désir ; de façon que la volonté s'empresse toujours après la lumière , et c'est là une éternelle alliance , qui est sans commencement et sans fin. Car là où il y a une volonté , ily a aussi un désir ; et où il y a un désir, là il y a aussi, dans le désir de la volonté , un atlirement de ce que la Tolonté désire -, mais le désir est astringent, dur et froid , car il tire à soi, et il retient. En effet, là où il n'y a rien, le désir ne peut rien retenir: or si la volonté veut retenir quelque chose, il faut que le désir ait une solide consistance , afin que la volonté puisse le saisir -, et comme il n'y^ avoit rien de toute éternité , alors la volonté ne pouvoit aussi rien embrasser ni retenir. 62. Ainsi maintenant nous trouvons que les trois sont de toute éternité une alliance sans commencement et indissoluble ; savoir : le penchant , la volonté , et le désir. L'un engendre l'autre ; et si l'un n'étoit pas, l'autre ne seroit pas non -plus : de-là vient que personne ne sait ce que c'est. Car cela en soi-même n'est autre chose qu'un esprit qui , en soi-même, est dans les ténèbres; et là cependant il n'y a pas de ténèbres , mais un rien , ni ténèbres ni lumières.
363. Enfin , le penchant est un chercher ou une stimulation du désir , et la volonté est une pause , une rétention àdiïxs le désir: or , si la volonté doit le retenir , co désir , il faut qu'il soit saisissable , et il ne doit pas y avoir une seule chose dans la vo« lonlé , mais deux ; maintenant puisqu'il y a ces deux choses , Vattirement doit être la troisième , pour qu'il attire dans la volonté ce qu'il y a de saisissable. Enfin , si cela est ainsi de toute éter- »ité , il se trouve que de toute éternité il y a un sourcement et un mobilisant; car ce qui est compacté doit sourcer et être quelque chose , pour que la volonté puisse saisir quelque chose. Si donc cela est quelque chose , il faut que cela soit astringent et attirant , pour arriver à être quelque chose : si donc cela est astringent et attirant , alors l'attirant foit la aaisUsabilité , de façon que la volonté a quelque chose à saisir et à retenir. Si donc cela est saisissable , cela est plus substandcl ou plus ( ^7^ ) €■. 14. ^paîs que îa voTonté. Cela obscurcit la volonté et la couvre ; mais la volonté est dans ce aaisisaable , cl Vattract opère les deux. Si donc la volonté est ilans le oaisUàublê , alors le saisia^sable est les ténèbres de la volonté; car il a embrassé la volonté avec sa aai^^L^Aubillté, Enfin la volonté ne peut sortir du aai^iissable ; elle soupire néanmoins toujours après la lumière , afin d'être délivrée des ténèbres qu'elle se produit cependant à elle-même y par le dosir et Vattract,
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.
158. Thus we must sound and see what an image is; how it takes thus its origin, in such fashion that man bears: i». a terrestrial, elementary image, and 2o. also a celestial image; and not only that, but he bears thirdly with him an infernal image, which is inclined to all sins and to all wickednesses; and all that begins at once with the ascension of the life. 59. And besides, we must see where the proper will is found; in such fashion that, in his particular power, a man may give himself to the kingdom of heaven, or to the kingdom of hell, to whichever he will. We call before this mirror him who has hunger and thirst for the noble knowledge, and we point out to him the aim, so that in his affective base, he may deliver himself from the errors and the contentious disputes which pass in the kingdom of the antichrist; now, whoever shall well seize this gate will comprehend the essence of all the essences, and will learn to conceive ( if he observe himself well ) what Moses and all the prophets have written, and besides all the holy apostles; in what spirit each has spoken, and what has been, and what in the future may yet be and shall be. The very precious gate in the root of the lily. Go. If we consider the three principles, how they are in their origin, and how they beget themselves, we find then the essence of all the essences; how the one goes forth from the other; how ( 276 ) eu. 14. also the one is of a rank more elevated than the other; how the one is eternal and the other is perishable 5 and how the one is fairer and better than the other: we find also why the one will go forward, and the other backward; moreover, the love and the desire, as well as the enmity of each thing.
261. Thus firstly, we can say nothing of the origin of the being of all beings, save that in the origin there is only one essence whence goes forth then the essence of all the essences. This same essence is the eternal soul of God, which dwells in the darkness. Now, from all eternity this same essence has ardently desired itself, and has been in the will to beget the light: this same desire is the source, and this same will is the budding or the ascension. Now 5 the ascension makes the movement and the mobility; the mobility makes the attraction in the will, and the will makes the desire; so that the will presses always after the light, and that is an eternal alliance, which is without beginning and without end. For where there is a will, there is also a desire; and where there is a desire, there is also, in the desire of the will, an attraction of what the will desires; but the desire is astringent, hard and cold, for it draws to itself, and it retains. In effect, there where there is nothing, the desire can retain nothing: now if the will will retain something, the desire must have a solid consistency, so that the will may seize it; and as there was nothing from all eternity, then the will could also embrace nothing nor retain anything. 62. Thus now we find that the three are from all eternity an alliance without beginning and indissoluble; to wit: the inclination, the will, and the desire. The one begets the other; and if the one were not, the other would not be either: thence comes it that no one knows what it is. For that in itself is nothing else than a spirit which, in itself, is in the darkness; and there nevertheless there is no darkness, but a nothing, neither darkness nor light.
363. Finally, the inclination is a seeking or a stimulation of the desire, and the will is a pause, a retention in the desire: now, if the will must retain it, this desire, it must be seizable, and there must not be one single thing in the will, but two; now since there are these two things, the attraction must be the third, so that it may draw into the will what there is of seizable. Finally, if that is thus from all eternity, it is found that from all eternity there is a sourcing and a mobilising; for what is compacted must source and be something, so that the will may seize something. If then that be something, it must be astringent and attracting, to arrive at being something: if then that be astringent and attracting, then the attracting makes the seizability, so that the will has something to seize and to retain. If then that be seizable, that is more substantial or more ( ^7^ ) €■. 14. thick than the will. That obscures the will and covers it; but the will is in this seizable, and the attract operates the two. If then the will be in the seizable, then the seizable is the darkness of the will; for it has embraced the will with its seizability. Finally the will cannot go forth from the seizable; it sighs nevertheless always after the light, in order to be delivered from the darknesses which it produces nevertheless to itself, by the desire and the attract,
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.