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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.
1Now observe: 6. When God Almighty had decreed in his council that he would make angels or creatures out of himself, then he made them out of his eternal power and wisdom, according to the form and manner of the Ternary in his Deity, and according to the qualities in his divine being. 7. At first he made three kingly governments or dominions, answerable to the number of the Holy Trinity, and each kingdom had the order or ordinance, power and quality of the divine being. 8. Now elevate thy sense, thoughts and spirit into the deep of the Deity, for here a gate is opened. The place or space of this world, the deep of the earth, and above the earth even to heaven, as also the created heaven, which was made out of the midst [or center] of the waters, which moveth above the stars, and which we behold with our eyes, whose depth we cannot sound or reach with our sense, all this place or room together was one kingdom, and Lucifer was king therein, before his being thrust out. 9. The other two kingdoms, that of Michael and that of Uriel, are above the created heaven, and are like that other kingdom. 10. These three kingdoms together contain such a deep as is not of any human number, nor can they be measured by anything. 11. Yet you must know that these three kingdoms have a beginning and an end; but that God, who hath made these three kingdoms out of himself, is infinite, and hath no end. 12. Yet without and beyond and besides these three kingdoms there is likewise the power of the
2Holy Trinity, for God the Father hath no end. 13. But thou art to know this Mystery: that in the centre or midst of these three kingdoms is generated the splendour or Son of God. [14. " This needs explanation: Read the second (The Three Principles) and the third part (The Threefold Life) of these writings, where it is described more fundamentally: for nothing that is divisible, measurable or circumscriptive is here meant or understood, only it was in simplicity and plainness so set down at the first, because of the slow and dull apprehension."] 15. And the three kingdoms are circular round about the Son of God, neither of them is farther from or nearer to the Son of God, for one is equally as near about the Son of God as another. 16. From this fountain [or tree], and from all the powers of the Father, goeth forth the Holy Ghost, together with the light and power of the Son of God, in and through all angelical kingdoms or dominions, and without, beyond and besides all the angelical kingdoms; which no angel or man is able to dive or search into. 17. Neither have I any purpose to consider of it further, much less to write; but my revelation reacheth even into the three kingdoms, like an angelical knowledge. 18. But not in my reason or apprehension, nor in perfection like an angel, but in part, and so long only as the spirit tarrieth in me, further I know it not. 19. When he parteth from me I know nothing but the elementary and earthly things of this world: but the spirit seeth even into the depth of Deity.
3Question. 20. Now one may ask, What manner of substance or thing is it, that the Son of God is [thus] generated in the centre or midst of these three kingdoms? Surely one angelical host must needs be nearer unto him than another, seeing their kingdom hath so great a deep? 21. Then, also, the glory, clarity or brightness and power of the Son of God would not be so great without, beyond or besides those kingdoms, as in, with and among those that are near him, and as in the angelical circuit or court. Answer. 22. The holy angels were made to be creatures from God, that they should praise, sing, ring forth and jubilate before the Heart of God, (which is the Son of God), and increase the heavenly joy. 23. Where else then should the Father place them, than before the gate of his Heart? Doth not all joy of man, which is in the whole man, arise from the fountain of the heart? So then in God also there ariseth the great joy out of the fountain of his Heart. 24. Therefore hath he created the holy angels out of himself, which are as it were little gods, answerable to the being and qualities of the whole God, that in the divine power they should act forth the praise, and sing and ring forth in the power, and increase the arising joy from the Heart of God. 25. But the splendour and the power of the Son of God, or Heart of God, which is the light or source and fountain of joy, taketh up his fairest and most joyful original in the centre or midst of these kingdoms, and shineth into and through 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.
1Now observe: 6. When God Almighty had decreed in his council that he would make angels or creatures out of himself, then he made them out of his eternal power and wisdom, according to the form and manner of the Ternary in his Deity, and according to the qualities in his divine being. 7. At first he made three kingly governments or dominions, answerable to the number of the Holy Trinity, and each kingdom had the order or ordinance, power and quality of the divine being. 8. Now elevate thy sense, thoughts and spirit into the deep of the Deity, for here a gate is opened. The place or space of this world, the deep of the earth, and above the earth even to heaven, as also the created heaven, which was made out of the midst [or center] of the waters, which moveth above the stars, and which we behold with our eyes, whose depth we cannot sound or reach with our sense, all this place or room together was one kingdom, and Lucifer was king therein, before his being thrust out. 9. The other two kingdoms, that of Michael and that of Uriel, are above the created heaven, and are like that other kingdom. 10. These three kingdoms together contain such a deep as is not of any human number, nor can they be measured by anything. 11. Yet you must know that these three kingdoms have a beginning and an end; but that God, who hath made these three kingdoms out of himself, is infinite, and hath no end. 12. Yet without and beyond and besides these three kingdoms there is likewise the power of the
2Holy Trinity, for God the Father hath no end. 13. But thou art to know this Mystery: that in the centre or midst of these three kingdoms is generated the splendour or Son of God. [14. " This needs explanation: Read the second (The Three Principles) and the third part (The Threefold Life) of these writings, where it is described more fundamentally: for nothing that is divisible, measurable or circumscriptive is here meant or understood, only it was in simplicity and plainness so set down at the first, because of the slow and dull apprehension."] 15. And the three kingdoms are circular round about the Son of God, neither of them is farther from or nearer to the Son of God, for one is equally as near about the Son of God as another. 16. From this fountain [or tree], and from all the powers of the Father, goeth forth the Holy Ghost, together with the light and power of the Son of God, in and through all angelical kingdoms or dominions, and without, beyond and besides all the angelical kingdoms; which no angel or man is able to dive or search into. 17. Neither have I any purpose to consider of it further, much less to write; but my revelation reacheth even into the three kingdoms, like an angelical knowledge. 18. But not in my reason or apprehension, nor in perfection like an angel, but in part, and so long only as the spirit tarrieth in me, further I know it not. 19. When he parteth from me I know nothing but the elementary and earthly things of this world: but the spirit seeth even into the depth of Deity.
3Question. 20. Now one may ask, What manner of substance or thing is it, that the Son of God is [thus] generated in the centre or midst of these three kingdoms? Surely one angelical host must needs be nearer unto him than another, seeing their kingdom hath so great a deep? 21. Then, also, the glory, clarity or brightness and power of the Son of God would not be so great without, beyond or besides those kingdoms, as in, with and among those that are near him, and as in the angelical circuit or court. Answer. 22. The holy angels were made to be creatures from God, that they should praise, sing, ring forth and jubilate before the Heart of God, (which is the Son of God), and increase the heavenly joy. 23. Where else then should the Father place them, than before the gate of his Heart? Doth not all joy of man, which is in the whole man, arise from the fountain of the heart? So then in God also there ariseth the great joy out of the fountain of his Heart. 24. Therefore hath he created the holy angels out of himself, which are as it were little gods, answerable to the being and qualities of the whole God, that in the divine power they should act forth the praise, and sing and ring forth in the power, and increase the arising joy from the Heart of God. 25. But the splendour and the power of the Son of God, or Heart of God, which is the light or source and fountain of joy, taketh up his fairest and most joyful original in the centre or midst of these kingdoms, and shineth into and through 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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