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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.
1106. For when the spirits with their light move or boil, turn about and rise one in another, then the life is always generated; for one spirit always affordeth to the others its taste or relish, that is, it is affected by the others. 107. Thus one taste th and feeleth another, and in the sound one heareth another, and the tone presseth forth from all the seven spirits towards the heart, and riseth up in the heart in the flash of the light, and then rise up the voices and joyfulness of the Son of God; and all the seven spirits triumph and rejoice in the Heart of God, each according to its quality. 108. For in the light in the sweet water all astringency and hardness and bitterness and heat are mitigated and made pleasant, and so there is in the seven spirits nothing else but a pleasant striving, struggling and wonderful generating, like a divine holy sport or scene of God. 109. But their sharp or tart birth, of which I have written above, abideth hidden as a kernel, for it becometh mitigated by the light and the sweet water. 110. Just as a sour bitter green apple is forced by the sun, that it becometh very pleasant or lovely to be eaten, and yet all its qualities are tasted; so the Deity keepeth its qualities also, but striveth or struggleth gently, like a pleasant lovely sport or scene. 111. But if the qualifying or fountain spirits should extol or lift up themselves, and penetrate suddenly one into another, driving hard, rubbing and thronging, crowding or squeezing, then the sweet water would be squeezed out, and the fierce heat would be kindled, and then would rise up the fire of the seven spirits, as it did in Lucifer.
2112. This is now the true birth or geniture of the Deity, which hath been so from eternity in all corners and places whatsoever, and abideth so in all eternity. 113. But in the kingdom of Lucifer, the destroyer, it is otherwise, as I have written above concerning the fierceness; and in this world, which is now half kindled also, it is likewise after another manner, and will be so till the day of the restitution; of which I shall write when I treat concerning the creation of this world. 114. Now in this glorious, lovely and heavenly Salitter or divine qualities, the kingdom of Lucifer also was created without any greater motion than in the others. 115. For when Lucifer was created, he was altogether perfect, and was the fairest prince in heaven, adorned and endued with the fairest clarity or brightness of the Son of God. 116. But if Lucifer had been spoiled or destroyed in the moving of the creation, as he pretendeth, then he had never had his perfection, beauty and clarity, but would have been presently a fierce dark devil, and not a Cherubim. Of the glorious Birth and Beauty of King Lucifer. 117. Behold, thou murderous and lying spirit! here I will describe thy royal birth, how thou wert in thy creation, how God created thee, and how thou becamest so beautiful, and to what end God created thee.
3118. If thou sayest any other thing than this, which heaven and earth and all the creatures testify, then thou liest; nay, the whole Deity testifieth against thee, that God created thee for his praise out of himself, to be a prince and king of God, as he did prince Michael, and prince Uriel. Now observe: 119. When the Deity moved itself to creation, and would form, image or frame creatures in its body, it kindled not the qualifying spirits, else they would have burnt eternally, but it stirred them very gently or softly in the astringent quality. 120. That drew or attracted the divine Salitter together, and dried it, so that it became a body, and so the whole divine power of all the seven qualifying or fountain spirits of that place or room, as far as that of the angels reached, was captivated in the body, and became the propriety of the body, which neither can nor will be destroyed again in eternity, but will remain the body's propriety or proper own in eternity. 121. Now the captivated or incorporated power of all the seven qualifying or fountain spirits had its propriety in the body, and is risen in the body, and hath generated itself in the same manner as the whole Deity generateth itself from all the seven qualifying or fountain spirits. 122. One quality hath always generated the others alike, and none of them have vanished or gone out of sight, just as it is in the whole God; and then the whole body, as it is also in the Ternary, generated itself just as the Deity generateth itself, without or distinct from the body in the Ternary.
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.
1106. For when the spirits with their light move or boil, turn about and rise one in another, then the life is always generated; for one spirit always affordeth to the others its taste or relish, that is, it is affected by the others. 107. Thus one taste th and feeleth another, and in the sound one heareth another, and the tone presseth forth from all the seven spirits towards the heart, and riseth up in the heart in the flash of the light, and then rise up the voices and joyfulness of the Son of God; and all the seven spirits triumph and rejoice in the Heart of God, each according to its quality. 108. For in the light in the sweet water all astringency and hardness and bitterness and heat are mitigated and made pleasant, and so there is in the seven spirits nothing else but a pleasant striving, struggling and wonderful generating, like a divine holy sport or scene of God. 109. But their sharp or tart birth, of which I have written above, abideth hidden as a kernel, for it becometh mitigated by the light and the sweet water. 110. Just as a sour bitter green apple is forced by the sun, that it becometh very pleasant or lovely to be eaten, and yet all its qualities are tasted; so the Deity keepeth its qualities also, but striveth or struggleth gently, like a pleasant lovely sport or scene. 111. But if the qualifying or fountain spirits should extol or lift up themselves, and penetrate suddenly one into another, driving hard, rubbing and thronging, crowding or squeezing, then the sweet water would be squeezed out, and the fierce heat would be kindled, and then would rise up the fire of the seven spirits, as it did in Lucifer.
2112. This is now the true birth or geniture of the Deity, which hath been so from eternity in all corners and places whatsoever, and abideth so in all eternity. 113. But in the kingdom of Lucifer, the destroyer, it is otherwise, as I have written above concerning the fierceness; and in this world, which is now half kindled also, it is likewise after another manner, and will be so till the day of the restitution; of which I shall write when I treat concerning the creation of this world. 114. Now in this glorious, lovely and heavenly Salitter or divine qualities, the kingdom of Lucifer also was created without any greater motion than in the others. 115. For when Lucifer was created, he was altogether perfect, and was the fairest prince in heaven, adorned and endued with the fairest clarity or brightness of the Son of God. 116. But if Lucifer had been spoiled or destroyed in the moving of the creation, as he pretendeth, then he had never had his perfection, beauty and clarity, but would have been presently a fierce dark devil, and not a Cherubim. Of the glorious Birth and Beauty of King Lucifer. 117. Behold, thou murderous and lying spirit! here I will describe thy royal birth, how thou wert in thy creation, how God created thee, and how thou becamest so beautiful, and to what end God created thee.
3118. If thou sayest any other thing than this, which heaven and earth and all the creatures testify, then thou liest; nay, the whole Deity testifieth against thee, that God created thee for his praise out of himself, to be a prince and king of God, as he did prince Michael, and prince Uriel. Now observe: 119. When the Deity moved itself to creation, and would form, image or frame creatures in its body, it kindled not the qualifying spirits, else they would have burnt eternally, but it stirred them very gently or softly in the astringent quality. 120. That drew or attracted the divine Salitter together, and dried it, so that it became a body, and so the whole divine power of all the seven qualifying or fountain spirits of that place or room, as far as that of the angels reached, was captivated in the body, and became the propriety of the body, which neither can nor will be destroyed again in eternity, but will remain the body's propriety or proper own in eternity. 121. Now the captivated or incorporated power of all the seven qualifying or fountain spirits had its propriety in the body, and is risen in the body, and hath generated itself in the same manner as the whole Deity generateth itself from all the seven qualifying or fountain spirits. 122. One quality hath always generated the others alike, and none of them have vanished or gone out of sight, just as it is in the whole God; and then the whole body, as it is also in the Ternary, generated itself just as the Deity generateth itself, without or distinct from the body in the Ternary.
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.
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