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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.
1love, shall be condemned also. Of the Sixth Species, Kind, Form or Manner of Sin's Beginning in Lucifer and his Angels. 71. The sixth qualifying or fountain spirit in the divine power is the Mercurius, or tone or tune, wherein the distinction and heavenly joy rise up. 72. This spirit taketh its original in the fireflash, that is, in the bitter quality, and riseth up in the flash through the sweet water, wherein it mitigateth itself, so that it becometh clear and bright, and is caught or held in the astringent quality, and there it toucheth or stirreth all the spirits; and from this touching or stirring riseth up the tone; its rising source or quality standeth in the flash, and its body or root standeth in the sweet water in the love. 73. Now this tone or tune is the divine joyfulness, the triumphing, wherein the divine and meek loveplay, sport or scene in God riseth up, as also the formings, imagings and all manner of ideas, shapes and figures. 74. But here thou must know that this quality penetrateth very gently and pleasantly with its touching or stirring, through all the spirits, in such a way and manner as when a pleasant and meek fire of joy riseth up in the heart of a man, in which fire of joy the animated or soulish spirit triumpheth, as if it were in heaven. 75. Now this spirit doth not belong to or concern the imaging or framing of the body, but it belongeth to the distinction, diversifying and mobility, especially to the joy, and to the distinction or difference in the imaging or shaping.
276. When the animated or soulish spirit in the centre of the heart, in the midst or centre of the seven qualifying or fountain spirits, is generated, so that the will of the seven spirits is incorporated or compacted together, then the tone bringeth it forth from the body, and is its chariot, on which the spirit rideth, and executeth that which is decreed in the council of the seven spirits. 77. For the tone goeth through the animated or soulish spirit into the nature of God, and into the Salitter of the seventh qualifying or fountain spirit in the divine power, which is its inceptive or beginning mother, and uniteth, qualifieth or cooperateth with the same in the forming or framing, and also in the distinguishing or diversifying of the imaging or shaping. 78. Therefore when king Lucifer, in the tone, changed or transmuted his highspirited horse into a fiery restiveness or motion * in all the seven spirits, that was a terrible contrary or opposite will in the Salitter of God. * " fiery restiveness or motion." St M. has, " une réaction ignée," " a fiery reaction." 79. For when his animated or soulish spirit was generated in his body, then he stung forth from his body into the Salitter of God, as a fiery serpent out of a hole. 80. But when the mouth opened to speak, that is, when the seven spirits had incorporated or compacted the word together in their will, and sent it through the tone into the Salitter of God, then it was no otherwise than if there went a fiery thunderbolt into God's nature; or as a fierce serpent, which tyrannizeth, raveth and rageth as if it would tear and rend nature all to
3pieces. 81. Hence taketh its original that the devil is called [Rev. xii. 9] the old serpent; and also, that there are adders and serpents in this corrupted world, moreover, all manner of vermin or venomous broods of worms, toads, flies, lice and fleas, and all such like things whatsoever; and from hence also tempestuous weather of lightning, thundering, flashing, and hailstones take their original in this world. Observe: 82. When the tone riseth up in the divine nature, then it riseth up gently from all the seven qualifying or fountain spirits jointly together, and generateth the word or ideas, figures and shapes very gently. 83. That is, when one qualifying or fountain spirit createth a will to the birth or geniture, then it presseth very gently through the other qualifying or fountain spirits, even into the centre of the heart, and there that will is formed and approved by all the spirits. 84. And then the other six spirits speak it forth in the tone, out from God's animated or soulish spirit; understand, out from the Heart of God, out from the Son of God, which abideth standing in the centre as a compacted incorporated Word. 85. And the flash out of that same Word, or the stirring of the Word, which is the tone, goeth forth very finely and gently from the Word, and executeth, affecteth or performeth the will of the Word. 86. And that same forthgoing from the Word is the Holy Ghost, which formeth, frameth and
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.
1love, shall be condemned also. Of the Sixth Species, Kind, Form or Manner of Sin's Beginning in Lucifer and his Angels. 71. The sixth qualifying or fountain spirit in the divine power is the Mercurius, or tone or tune, wherein the distinction and heavenly joy rise up. 72. This spirit taketh its original in the fireflash, that is, in the bitter quality, and riseth up in the flash through the sweet water, wherein it mitigateth itself, so that it becometh clear and bright, and is caught or held in the astringent quality, and there it toucheth or stirreth all the spirits; and from this touching or stirring riseth up the tone; its rising source or quality standeth in the flash, and its body or root standeth in the sweet water in the love. 73. Now this tone or tune is the divine joyfulness, the triumphing, wherein the divine and meek loveplay, sport or scene in God riseth up, as also the formings, imagings and all manner of ideas, shapes and figures. 74. But here thou must know that this quality penetrateth very gently and pleasantly with its touching or stirring, through all the spirits, in such a way and manner as when a pleasant and meek fire of joy riseth up in the heart of a man, in which fire of joy the animated or soulish spirit triumpheth, as if it were in heaven. 75. Now this spirit doth not belong to or concern the imaging or framing of the body, but it belongeth to the distinction, diversifying and mobility, especially to the joy, and to the distinction or difference in the imaging or shaping.
276. When the animated or soulish spirit in the centre of the heart, in the midst or centre of the seven qualifying or fountain spirits, is generated, so that the will of the seven spirits is incorporated or compacted together, then the tone bringeth it forth from the body, and is its chariot, on which the spirit rideth, and executeth that which is decreed in the council of the seven spirits. 77. For the tone goeth through the animated or soulish spirit into the nature of God, and into the Salitter of the seventh qualifying or fountain spirit in the divine power, which is its inceptive or beginning mother, and uniteth, qualifieth or cooperateth with the same in the forming or framing, and also in the distinguishing or diversifying of the imaging or shaping. 78. Therefore when king Lucifer, in the tone, changed or transmuted his highspirited horse into a fiery restiveness or motion * in all the seven spirits, that was a terrible contrary or opposite will in the Salitter of God. * " fiery restiveness or motion." St M. has, " une réaction ignée," " a fiery reaction." 79. For when his animated or soulish spirit was generated in his body, then he stung forth from his body into the Salitter of God, as a fiery serpent out of a hole. 80. But when the mouth opened to speak, that is, when the seven spirits had incorporated or compacted the word together in their will, and sent it through the tone into the Salitter of God, then it was no otherwise than if there went a fiery thunderbolt into God's nature; or as a fierce serpent, which tyrannizeth, raveth and rageth as if it would tear and rend nature all to
3pieces. 81. Hence taketh its original that the devil is called [Rev. xii. 9] the old serpent; and also, that there are adders and serpents in this corrupted world, moreover, all manner of vermin or venomous broods of worms, toads, flies, lice and fleas, and all such like things whatsoever; and from hence also tempestuous weather of lightning, thundering, flashing, and hailstones take their original in this world. Observe: 82. When the tone riseth up in the divine nature, then it riseth up gently from all the seven qualifying or fountain spirits jointly together, and generateth the word or ideas, figures and shapes very gently. 83. That is, when one qualifying or fountain spirit createth a will to the birth or geniture, then it presseth very gently through the other qualifying or fountain spirits, even into the centre of the heart, and there that will is formed and approved by all the spirits. 84. And then the other six spirits speak it forth in the tone, out from God's animated or soulish spirit; understand, out from the Heart of God, out from the Son of God, which abideth standing in the centre as a compacted incorporated Word. 85. And the flash out of that same Word, or the stirring of the Word, which is the tone, goeth forth very finely and gently from the Word, and executeth, affecteth or performeth the will of the Word. 86. And that same forthgoing from the Word is the Holy Ghost, which formeth, frameth and
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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