Concerning the Three Principles of the Divine Essence

Gate passedSeeker and aboveModern transcription — not a facsimileJacob Boehme (1575–1624)PUBLIC DOMAIN as published. Boehme d. 1624; the Sparrow translation is 1656. Per-part determination MADE 2026-08-29: the eight front-matter segments carrying the 2009 electronic edition own introductory apparatus were withheld (three excised in full, five redacted in part where a public-domain title block or Boehme text shared the page). The remaining 5,022 segments are public domain and are open at seeker tier.905 of 1000 segments carry a modern register · 343 pp

Jacob Boehme — the works in English, and one in Frencheditor’s preface to the volume

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.

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1that the young man shall will [and purpose] never to copulate with this, nor any other maid [or virgin] ; and in like manner the maid [or virgin] be enjoined the same. Now, thou reason, full of misery, defects, and infirmities, how do you think you should possibly stand here ? Would you not promise fair with Adaml But you would not be able to perform it. 38. Thus, my beloved reason, I have set a gloss before you, and thus it was with Adam. God had created his work wisely and good, and extracted the one out of the other. The first ground was himself, out of which he created the world, and out of the world [he created] man, to whom he gave his spirit, and intimated to him, that without wavering or any other desire, he should live in him most perfectly. 39. But now man had also the spirit of this world, for he was [come] out of this world, and lived in the world : And Adam (understand the spirit which was breathed into him from God) was the chaste virgin ; and the spirit which he had inherited out of nature, from the world, was the young man. These were now both together, and rested in one arm. 40. Now the chaste virgin ought to be bent into the Heart of God, and to have no imagination to lust after the beauty of the comely young man ; but yet the young man was kindled with love towards the virgin, and he desired to copulate with Ch. 12] OPENING OF THE HOLY SCRIPTURE 215

2her ; for he said, Thou art my dearest spouse [or bride], my paradise, and garland of roses, let me into thy paradise : I will be impregnated in thee, that I may get thy essence, and enjoy thy pleasant love ; how willingly would I taste of the friendly sweetness of thy virtue [or power] ! If I might but receive thy glorious light, how full of joy should I be ! 41. And the chaste virgin said, Thou art indeed my bridegroom and my companion, but thou hast not my ornament ; my pearl is more l precious than costly. thou, my virtue [or power] is incorruptible [or unfadeable], and my mind is constant [or stedfast] ; thou hast an inconstant mind, and thy virtue is corruptible [or brittle]. Dwell in my 2 court, and 2 AS in the I will entertain thee friendly, and do thee much Of the temple, good : I will adorn thee with my ornaments, and I will put my garment on thee ; but I will not give thee my pearl, for thou art dark, and that is shining and bright. 42. Then said the spirit of nature (viz. the young man), My fair pearl and chastity, I pray thee let me enjoy thy comfort, if thou wilt not copulate with me, that I may impregnate in thee, yet do but enclose thy pearl in my heart, that I may have it for my own. Art thou not my golden crown ? How fain would I taste of thy fruit. 43. Then the 3 chaste spirit out of God in Adam » Or modest. (viz. the virgin) said, My dear love, and ray companion ; I plainly see thy lust, thou wouldst fain 216

3THE THREE PRINCIPLES [Ch. 12 disposing. 2 Or might. copulate with me ; but I am a virgin, and thou a man ; thou wouldst defile my pearl, and destroy my crown ; and besides, thou wouldst mingle thy sourness with my sweetness, and darken my bright light; therefore I will not [do so]. I will lend thee my pearl, and adorn thee with my garment, into thy own but I will not give it to be l thy own. 44. And the companion (viz. the spirit of the world in Adam) said, I will not leave thee, and if thou wilt not let me copulate with thee, then I will take my innermost and strongest 2 force, and use thee according to my will, according to the innermost 2 power ; I will clothe thee with the power of the sun, stars, and elements ; wherein none will know thee, [and so] thou must be mine eternally : And although (as thou sayest) I am inconstant, and that my virtue is not like to thine, and my light not like thine, yet I will keep thee well enough in my treasure, and thou must be 3 my own. 45. Then said the virgin, Why wilt thou use 4 violence? Am I not thy ornament, and thy crown ? I am bright, and thou art dark ; behold, if thou coverest me, then thou hast no glance [or lustre] ; and [then] thou art a dark [dusky or black] worm : And [then] how can I dwell with thee ? Let me alone ; I [will] not give myself to be thy own : I will give thee my ornament, and thou shalt live in my joy, thou shalt eat of my fruit, and taste

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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Commentary

whole issue ·

Cross-estate[P-V]translated_asboehme:2:1:003

This English 'Concerning the Three Principles of the Divine Essence' and boehme:11 are the same work in two languages — and the French is not just any translation. It is Louis-Claude de Saint-Martin's own: 'Des trois principes de l'essence divine', issued by the Périsse brothers of the rue Mercière. Saint-Martin learned German in his fifties expressly to read Boehme, and spent his last years translating him. The estate therefore holds, side by side, the text that formed the Unknown Philosopher and the form in which he gave it to France — the single most direct documentary link between the two founders of this corpus.

→ boehme:11