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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.
1and set upon his seat, and his kingdom shall be restored to him again. 68. If not, then a hell or hole, burrow or dungeon shall be given to him for an everlasting prison, and there shall he together with his sons be imprisoned for ever: and you should take heed lest a Court of Justice be held, and pass upon you also. 69. Now seeing then you will plead the right of the devil's cause, wherewith shall he requite you, or with what fee shall he reward you? He hath nothing in his power but the hellish abomination; what will then be your recompense? Guess, Sir, even the best of all that he hath, the best fruits and apples in his orchard, and the best perfumes and incense of his garden. Of the First Kind or Form. 70. The first spirit is the astringent or harsh quality, which in God is a gentle attracting or drawing together, a drying and cooling or refreshing, and is made use of in and for the imaging or forming of things; and though in its depth it be somewhat sharp or tart, yet it tempereth itself with the sweet water, so that it is meek, soft, pleasant and full of joy. 71. When the light of the sweet water cometh into it, then it willingly, friendly and freely yieldeth up its birth thereunto, and maketh it [the sweet water] dry and shining bright. 72. When the tone or tune riseth up in the light, then it [the astringent quality] also giveth up its tone, tune and ringing sound very gently and brotherly thereunto.
273. Also it receiveth the love from all the spirits. 74. Also the heat favoureth it, giving way friendly, that it [the heat] may be cooled, and so the astringent quality is a friendly will in and with all the qualities; it readily helpeth also to image or frame the spirit of nature, and to form therein all manner of shapes, figures, fruits and growths or vegetations, according to the will of all the six spirits. 75. It is a very humble father to its children, and loveth them heartily, and playeth with them friendly, for it is the right father of the other six spirits, which are generated in it, and it helps to generate them all. 76. Now when God constituted Lucifer with his host or army, he created them out of this friendly Deity, out of himself, out of the place of heaven and of this world, there was no other matter to make them of, this living Salitter was very gently and softly attracted or drawn together without any killing or slaying it, or without any great stirring or motion. 77. These spirits, thus incorporated or compacted together, had the knowledge, the skill and the eternal, infinite and unbeginning law of God, and knew full well, I. How the Deity had generated them. 78. II. They knew also well, that the Heart of God had the primacy in the whole Deity. 78a. III. They knew well also, that they had no more for their proper own, to deal with and to dispose of, than their own compacted, incorporated body; for they saw very well that the Deity generated itself without, severally, distinct, apart
3from their body, as it had done from eternity. 79. IV. They knew likewise very well that they were not the whole room or place, but were therein to increase the joy and wonderful proportion, variety and harmony of that same place, and were to accord, qualify and act friendly with that room or place of the Deity, and in a friendly manner affect the qualities that are without, distinct from their bodies. 80. V. They had also all power to dispose of all the ideas, figures and growths or vegetations, as they would; all was a hearty loveplay, sport or scene in God; they had not at all moved God their Creator to any contrary will, though they had broken all the heavenly ideas, figures or vegetations and growths, and had made of them all mere horses to ride on; * God had still always caused enough of others to come up instead of them, for it had all been but a play or scene in God. * " mere horses to ride on," that is, playthings. 81. For to that very end also they were created, that they should play and sport with the ideas, figures and growths or vegetations, and dispose of them for their own use as they pleased. 82. For the ideas or figures have in a manner 1 Th»tis, hare framed themselves thus from eternity, and have passed away and altered again [come and gone perpetually] through the qualifying or fountain spirits: For this was the eternal play, sport or scene of God, before the times of the creation of the angels. 83. Thou hast a very good example and instance of this, if thou wilt but see, and wilt not be stark blind here; viz. in the beasts, fowls and all vegetations or growths in this world: All
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.
1and set upon his seat, and his kingdom shall be restored to him again. 68. If not, then a hell or hole, burrow or dungeon shall be given to him for an everlasting prison, and there shall he together with his sons be imprisoned for ever: and you should take heed lest a Court of Justice be held, and pass upon you also. 69. Now seeing then you will plead the right of the devil's cause, wherewith shall he requite you, or with what fee shall he reward you? He hath nothing in his power but the hellish abomination; what will then be your recompense? Guess, Sir, even the best of all that he hath, the best fruits and apples in his orchard, and the best perfumes and incense of his garden. Of the First Kind or Form. 70. The first spirit is the astringent or harsh quality, which in God is a gentle attracting or drawing together, a drying and cooling or refreshing, and is made use of in and for the imaging or forming of things; and though in its depth it be somewhat sharp or tart, yet it tempereth itself with the sweet water, so that it is meek, soft, pleasant and full of joy. 71. When the light of the sweet water cometh into it, then it willingly, friendly and freely yieldeth up its birth thereunto, and maketh it [the sweet water] dry and shining bright. 72. When the tone or tune riseth up in the light, then it [the astringent quality] also giveth up its tone, tune and ringing sound very gently and brotherly thereunto.
273. Also it receiveth the love from all the spirits. 74. Also the heat favoureth it, giving way friendly, that it [the heat] may be cooled, and so the astringent quality is a friendly will in and with all the qualities; it readily helpeth also to image or frame the spirit of nature, and to form therein all manner of shapes, figures, fruits and growths or vegetations, according to the will of all the six spirits. 75. It is a very humble father to its children, and loveth them heartily, and playeth with them friendly, for it is the right father of the other six spirits, which are generated in it, and it helps to generate them all. 76. Now when God constituted Lucifer with his host or army, he created them out of this friendly Deity, out of himself, out of the place of heaven and of this world, there was no other matter to make them of, this living Salitter was very gently and softly attracted or drawn together without any killing or slaying it, or without any great stirring or motion. 77. These spirits, thus incorporated or compacted together, had the knowledge, the skill and the eternal, infinite and unbeginning law of God, and knew full well, I. How the Deity had generated them. 78. II. They knew also well, that the Heart of God had the primacy in the whole Deity. 78a. III. They knew well also, that they had no more for their proper own, to deal with and to dispose of, than their own compacted, incorporated body; for they saw very well that the Deity generated itself without, severally, distinct, apart
3from their body, as it had done from eternity. 79. IV. They knew likewise very well that they were not the whole room or place, but were therein to increase the joy and wonderful proportion, variety and harmony of that same place, and were to accord, qualify and act friendly with that room or place of the Deity, and in a friendly manner affect the qualities that are without, distinct from their bodies. 80. V. They had also all power to dispose of all the ideas, figures and growths or vegetations, as they would; all was a hearty loveplay, sport or scene in God; they had not at all moved God their Creator to any contrary will, though they had broken all the heavenly ideas, figures or vegetations and growths, and had made of them all mere horses to ride on; * God had still always caused enough of others to come up instead of them, for it had all been but a play or scene in God. * " mere horses to ride on," that is, playthings. 81. For to that very end also they were created, that they should play and sport with the ideas, figures and growths or vegetations, and dispose of them for their own use as they pleased. 82. For the ideas or figures have in a manner 1 Th»tis, hare framed themselves thus from eternity, and have passed away and altered again [come and gone perpetually] through the qualifying or fountain spirits: For this was the eternal play, sport or scene of God, before the times of the creation of the angels. 83. Thou hast a very good example and instance of this, if thou wilt but see, and wilt not be stark blind here; viz. in the beasts, fowls and all vegetations or growths in this world: All
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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