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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.
1root, stock, branches and fruits of the tree, as an industrious and laborious servant to his master, in discovering the whole tree of this world. 4. Not with an intent to set on foot any new thing, for I have no command to do so; but my knowledge standeth in this birth or geniture of the stars, in the midst or centre, where the life is generated, and breaketh through death, and where the moving spirit existeth and breaketh through; and in the impulse or moving thereof I also write. 5. Also I know very well that the children of the flesh will scorn and mock at me, and say I should look to my own calling, and not trouble my head about these things; but rather be diligent to bring in food for my family and myself, and let those meddle with philosophy that have studied it, and are called and appointed to it. 6. With such an attempt the devil hath given me so many assaults, and hath so wearied me, that I have often resolved to let it alone; but my former purpose was too hard for me. For when I took care for the belly, and to get my living, and resolved to give over this business in hand, then the gate of heaven in my knowledge was bolted up. 7. Then my soul was so afflicted in anxiety, as if it were captivated by the devil, whereby reason gat so many checks and assaults, as if the body were presently to be destroyed or ruined, and the [my] spirit would not give over, till it brake through again, through the dead or mortal reason, and so hath burst open the door of darkness, and hath gotten its seat again in the stead thereof, whereby it gat new life and power again. 8. Whereby I understand that the spirit must be tried through the cross and affliction, and I have not failed of bodily temptation, but was fain
2always to stand ready for an encounter, so much hath the devil set himself against this.* * " against this." The word " this " refers to the last clause of the preceding par., " whereby it [my spirit] gat new life," etc. 9. ** But since I perceive that my eternal salvation hangeth upon this [i.e. the getting of new life and power] and that through my negligence [in case I were negligent], the gates of the light would be closed against me, which [light] is yet the firmament of my heaven wherein my soul hideth from the stormings of the devil, and which [light and heaven] also I won with great toil and hard assaults, through the love of God and by the breakingthrough of my Redeemer and King, Jesus Christ, therefore am I willing to let God have his way and take captive my fleshy reason. ** A new translation of this par. has been substituted for Sparrow's rendering. 10. And I have chosen the gate of knowledge of the light, and will follow after the impulse and knowledge of the spirit, though my bestial body should be brought to beggary, or be destroyed or ruined. I regard none of these things, but will say with the royal prophet David, [Psalm lxxiii. 26] Though my body and soul should faint and fail, yet thou, O God, art my salvation, my comfort, and the refuge of my heart. 11. In thy name I will venture it, and will not strive against thy spirit; though it may hurt the flesh, yet faith in the knowledge of the light must move and soar above reason. 12. I know also very well, that it is not fit for the disciple to fight against his Master. And I know that the high experienced masters of
3astrology do far exceed me in their way. But I labour in my calling, and they in theirs, lest I should be found a lazy idle servant to my Lord, at his coming, when he will demand the talent he hath entrusted me withal; but that I may present it to him with usury or profit and gain. 13. Therefore I will not bury his talent in the earth, but lend it out upon usury or interest, lest he should say to me at that time of his requiring it of me, Thou wicked, slothful servant, why hast thou hid my talent in the darkness, and didst not put it out upon use, and so now I might have received it with usury, gain, and profit? For then he would take it quite away from me, and give it to another, who hath gained many talents with his one. Therefore I will sow, let him water it, I leave the care to him. Now observe: 14. The whole house of this world, which standeth in a visible and comprehensible or palpable being, is the old house of God, or the old body, which stood before the time of wrath in a heavenly clarity and brightness. But when the devil stirred up the wrath therein, then it became a house of darkness and of death. 15. Therefore then also the holy birth or geniture of God, as a special body of itself, separated itself from the wrath, and made the firmament of heaven, between the love and the wrath, so that the birth or geniture of the stars standeth in the middle. Understand it thus; viz. with its outward comprehensibility and visibility it standeth in the wrath of death; and with the new birth rising up therein, which standeth in the middle or central seat, where the closure of heaven is, it standeth in the meekness of the life. 16. For meekness moveth against the wrath, 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.
1root, stock, branches and fruits of the tree, as an industrious and laborious servant to his master, in discovering the whole tree of this world. 4. Not with an intent to set on foot any new thing, for I have no command to do so; but my knowledge standeth in this birth or geniture of the stars, in the midst or centre, where the life is generated, and breaketh through death, and where the moving spirit existeth and breaketh through; and in the impulse or moving thereof I also write. 5. Also I know very well that the children of the flesh will scorn and mock at me, and say I should look to my own calling, and not trouble my head about these things; but rather be diligent to bring in food for my family and myself, and let those meddle with philosophy that have studied it, and are called and appointed to it. 6. With such an attempt the devil hath given me so many assaults, and hath so wearied me, that I have often resolved to let it alone; but my former purpose was too hard for me. For when I took care for the belly, and to get my living, and resolved to give over this business in hand, then the gate of heaven in my knowledge was bolted up. 7. Then my soul was so afflicted in anxiety, as if it were captivated by the devil, whereby reason gat so many checks and assaults, as if the body were presently to be destroyed or ruined, and the [my] spirit would not give over, till it brake through again, through the dead or mortal reason, and so hath burst open the door of darkness, and hath gotten its seat again in the stead thereof, whereby it gat new life and power again. 8. Whereby I understand that the spirit must be tried through the cross and affliction, and I have not failed of bodily temptation, but was fain
2always to stand ready for an encounter, so much hath the devil set himself against this.* * " against this." The word " this " refers to the last clause of the preceding par., " whereby it [my spirit] gat new life," etc. 9. ** But since I perceive that my eternal salvation hangeth upon this [i.e. the getting of new life and power] and that through my negligence [in case I were negligent], the gates of the light would be closed against me, which [light] is yet the firmament of my heaven wherein my soul hideth from the stormings of the devil, and which [light and heaven] also I won with great toil and hard assaults, through the love of God and by the breakingthrough of my Redeemer and King, Jesus Christ, therefore am I willing to let God have his way and take captive my fleshy reason. ** A new translation of this par. has been substituted for Sparrow's rendering. 10. And I have chosen the gate of knowledge of the light, and will follow after the impulse and knowledge of the spirit, though my bestial body should be brought to beggary, or be destroyed or ruined. I regard none of these things, but will say with the royal prophet David, [Psalm lxxiii. 26] Though my body and soul should faint and fail, yet thou, O God, art my salvation, my comfort, and the refuge of my heart. 11. In thy name I will venture it, and will not strive against thy spirit; though it may hurt the flesh, yet faith in the knowledge of the light must move and soar above reason. 12. I know also very well, that it is not fit for the disciple to fight against his Master. And I know that the high experienced masters of
3astrology do far exceed me in their way. But I labour in my calling, and they in theirs, lest I should be found a lazy idle servant to my Lord, at his coming, when he will demand the talent he hath entrusted me withal; but that I may present it to him with usury or profit and gain. 13. Therefore I will not bury his talent in the earth, but lend it out upon usury or interest, lest he should say to me at that time of his requiring it of me, Thou wicked, slothful servant, why hast thou hid my talent in the darkness, and didst not put it out upon use, and so now I might have received it with usury, gain, and profit? For then he would take it quite away from me, and give it to another, who hath gained many talents with his one. Therefore I will sow, let him water it, I leave the care to him. Now observe: 14. The whole house of this world, which standeth in a visible and comprehensible or palpable being, is the old house of God, or the old body, which stood before the time of wrath in a heavenly clarity and brightness. But when the devil stirred up the wrath therein, then it became a house of darkness and of death. 15. Therefore then also the holy birth or geniture of God, as a special body of itself, separated itself from the wrath, and made the firmament of heaven, between the love and the wrath, so that the birth or geniture of the stars standeth in the middle. Understand it thus; viz. with its outward comprehensibility and visibility it standeth in the wrath of death; and with the new birth rising up therein, which standeth in the middle or central seat, where the closure of heaven is, it standeth in the meekness of the life. 16. For meekness moveth against the wrath, 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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