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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.
1137. So that when the seven qualities in an angel, in the centre of the heart, do generate the light and the spirit or understanding, that then that same spirit, which in the light of the heart goeth forth at the mouth of the angel, in the divine power, should, as an audible sound in the power of all the qualities in God, sing and ring forth as a melodious music, and in the forming, imaging, framing or qualifying of God, rise up as a pleasant, hearty, loving voice, in Gods forming. 138. And when the Holy Ghost formeth the heavenly fruit, then should the tone, which should rise up in the praising of God from the angels, be also together in the forming or imaging of the fruit; and so on the other side again, the fruit should be the food of the angels. 139. Therefore also we pray in Our Father, [Matt vi. 11] saying, GIB uns unser taglich Brodt (GIVE us our daily bread) so that the tone or word, GIB (GIVE), which we thrust forth from our centre of the light, through the animated, animal or soulish [psychical] spirit, out at the mouth forth from us, into the divine power, should, in the divine power, as a fellowforming [coforming] or fellowgenerating [cogenerating], help to image or frame unser taglich, Brodt (our daily bread), which afterwards Der Vater gibet Uns (the Father giveth to us) for food. 140. Then, when our tone is thus incorporated in God's tone, so that the fruit is formed, imaged or framed, it must needs be wholesome or healthful for us, and so we are in God's love, and have that food to make use of, as by the right of nature, being our spirit in God's love did help to image and form the same. 141. Herein standeth the innermost and greatest depth of God. O man, consider thyself!
2I will more largely declare it in its due place. 142. Now for such an end hath God created the angels, and they do so too: * for their spirit, which in the centre or heart goeth forth from their light in the power of all the seven qualifying or fountain spirits, that goeth forth at their mouth, as God the Holy Ghost goeth forth from the Father and Son, and helpeth to form, image or frame all in God (that is to say, in the divine nature) through the Mercurius, song and speaking and sport or scene of joy. * "and they do so too." The translation is literal; the sense is, of course, " and they work it out," that is, they work out the end for which they have been created. 143. For as God worketh in nature to the producing of all manner of forms, ideas, images, vegetations, springings, fruits and colours, so do the angels also, in very great simplicity or sincerity; and though they should scarce touch the least twig, ** or scarce rejoice in the beauteous flowers in the heavenly May, and discourse and confer never so little, weakly, meanly or simply thereof; yet nevertheless that very tone or speech riseth up together in the divine Salitter, and helpeth to coimage and frame or form all. ** " touch the least twig," lit., " ride upon a stick " = ride upon a hobbyhorse. St M. translates simply, "play as children." 144. Thou hast many examples thereof in this world, that if some creature or man look upon a thing, it perisheth because of the poison or venom in the creature: * On the other side again, some men, as also beasts and other creatures, can with their tone or words change or alter the malignity or evil of a thing, and bring it into a right form.
3* "that if some creature or man look upon a thing, it perisheth because of the poison or venom in the creature," or, " for many a creature or man cannot look upon a thing without corrupting (verdirbet) the same, because of the poison in that creature or man." 145. That now is the divine power, which all the creatures are subjected to; for all whatsoever it is that liveth and moveth is in God, and God himself is all, and all whatsoever is formed or framed, is formed out of HIM, be it either out of love or out of wrath. The HeadSpring or FountainVein of Sin. 146. Now Lucifer being so royally imaged or framed, that his spirit in his forming and imaging rose up in him, and was received or embraced of God very excellently and lovingly, and was set or put into glorification, then instantly he should have begun his angelical obedience and course, and should have moved (as God himself did) as a loving son in the house of his Father; and that he did not. 147. But when his light was generated in him in his heart, and that his qualifying spirits were instantly affected or environed with the high light, they then became so highly rejoicing that they elevated themselves in their body against the right of nature, and presently began as it were a higher, statelier, more pompous or active qualifying or operation than God himself exercised. 148. But these spirits elevating themselves thus, and triumphing so eagerly and vehemently one in another, and rising up against the right of nature, by that means they kindled the qualifying or fountain spirits an exceeding deal too
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.
1137. So that when the seven qualities in an angel, in the centre of the heart, do generate the light and the spirit or understanding, that then that same spirit, which in the light of the heart goeth forth at the mouth of the angel, in the divine power, should, as an audible sound in the power of all the qualities in God, sing and ring forth as a melodious music, and in the forming, imaging, framing or qualifying of God, rise up as a pleasant, hearty, loving voice, in Gods forming. 138. And when the Holy Ghost formeth the heavenly fruit, then should the tone, which should rise up in the praising of God from the angels, be also together in the forming or imaging of the fruit; and so on the other side again, the fruit should be the food of the angels. 139. Therefore also we pray in Our Father, [Matt vi. 11] saying, GIB uns unser taglich Brodt (GIVE us our daily bread) so that the tone or word, GIB (GIVE), which we thrust forth from our centre of the light, through the animated, animal or soulish [psychical] spirit, out at the mouth forth from us, into the divine power, should, in the divine power, as a fellowforming [coforming] or fellowgenerating [cogenerating], help to image or frame unser taglich, Brodt (our daily bread), which afterwards Der Vater gibet Uns (the Father giveth to us) for food. 140. Then, when our tone is thus incorporated in God's tone, so that the fruit is formed, imaged or framed, it must needs be wholesome or healthful for us, and so we are in God's love, and have that food to make use of, as by the right of nature, being our spirit in God's love did help to image and form the same. 141. Herein standeth the innermost and greatest depth of God. O man, consider thyself!
2I will more largely declare it in its due place. 142. Now for such an end hath God created the angels, and they do so too: * for their spirit, which in the centre or heart goeth forth from their light in the power of all the seven qualifying or fountain spirits, that goeth forth at their mouth, as God the Holy Ghost goeth forth from the Father and Son, and helpeth to form, image or frame all in God (that is to say, in the divine nature) through the Mercurius, song and speaking and sport or scene of joy. * "and they do so too." The translation is literal; the sense is, of course, " and they work it out," that is, they work out the end for which they have been created. 143. For as God worketh in nature to the producing of all manner of forms, ideas, images, vegetations, springings, fruits and colours, so do the angels also, in very great simplicity or sincerity; and though they should scarce touch the least twig, ** or scarce rejoice in the beauteous flowers in the heavenly May, and discourse and confer never so little, weakly, meanly or simply thereof; yet nevertheless that very tone or speech riseth up together in the divine Salitter, and helpeth to coimage and frame or form all. ** " touch the least twig," lit., " ride upon a stick " = ride upon a hobbyhorse. St M. translates simply, "play as children." 144. Thou hast many examples thereof in this world, that if some creature or man look upon a thing, it perisheth because of the poison or venom in the creature: * On the other side again, some men, as also beasts and other creatures, can with their tone or words change or alter the malignity or evil of a thing, and bring it into a right form.
3* "that if some creature or man look upon a thing, it perisheth because of the poison or venom in the creature," or, " for many a creature or man cannot look upon a thing without corrupting (verdirbet) the same, because of the poison in that creature or man." 145. That now is the divine power, which all the creatures are subjected to; for all whatsoever it is that liveth and moveth is in God, and God himself is all, and all whatsoever is formed or framed, is formed out of HIM, be it either out of love or out of wrath. The HeadSpring or FountainVein of Sin. 146. Now Lucifer being so royally imaged or framed, that his spirit in his forming and imaging rose up in him, and was received or embraced of God very excellently and lovingly, and was set or put into glorification, then instantly he should have begun his angelical obedience and course, and should have moved (as God himself did) as a loving son in the house of his Father; and that he did not. 147. But when his light was generated in him in his heart, and that his qualifying spirits were instantly affected or environed with the high light, they then became so highly rejoicing that they elevated themselves in their body against the right of nature, and presently began as it were a higher, statelier, more pompous or active qualifying or operation than God himself exercised. 148. But these spirits elevating themselves thus, and triumphing so eagerly and vehemently one in another, and rising up against the right of nature, by that means they kindled the qualifying or fountain spirits an exceeding deal too
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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