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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.
166. He can do nothing in this world, in the external [part], unless the turba Magna in the wrath of God be kindled, and there he is busy, especially when the elements are kindled [or inflamed] with tempestuous storms [of thunder and lightning] ; and then if the anger of God burneth therein, there he is a busy executioner; if he could ruin the whole world he would do it; but he hath no further room than the fierce wrath in the turba affordeth him; The turba [plague, vengeance and destruction] is his master, he is but a juggler and destroyer, so far as the anger in the turba is kindled. 67. Know also, that the devil often striveth and fighteth with the angels; and when the soul is careless and secure, he setteth upon it strongly: but he is held off, that he cannot do what he will; but so soon as the soul imagineth, and is captivated by the lust, [like Adam and Eve ], then the devil overcometh; but then again so soon as the soul casteth away that evil lust, [and entereth into repentance], then he is driven away by the angels. 68. And there is a continual strife about the soul of man; God desireth to have it; the devil also would have it; and the cause of this is, that the two kingdoms part in the cross: the one is the love of God, the kingdom in Ternario Sancto, viz. the angelical one: and the other is the fierce wrath out of the centre of nature, which is the anger and severity [or sharpness] of God.
269. And therefore it is that God manifesteth his will to us, and setteth before man light and darkness; he may endeavour after which he will: And that we might know that God would have the soul into his holy kingdom, he affordeth us teaching and instruction, and sheweth us the way to life [or light] ; he stirreth up by his spirit highly worthy teachers, who are the light of the world, that men might beware of his anger and fierce wrath, and not awaken it in themselves. 70. For the anger must indeed be in every life, [as the gall in living creatures] ; but where the love and meekness prevail over it, it is not manifested in eternity, but is only a cause of the life; for in the love, the anger maketh great exulting joy and paradise. The anger [or Mars] in the kingdom of God is the great wondrous joy, where nothing of the anger is perceived. As weeping and laughing come from one place, and the weeping is turned into joy; after such a manner is it with the love and anger of God.
371. Therefore it is, that Christ so earnestly teacheth us love, humility, and mercifulness; and the cause why God is become man, is for our salvation and happiness sake, that we should not turn back from his love: God hath spent his heart that we might be his children, and remain so eternally; when there was no remedy, neither in heaven nor in this world, then he moved himself for man's sake, that he might be delivered from the devil, and from his anger [into which he was fallen in Adam ], 72. Therefore, dearly beloved children, do not so reject and cast from you the love and grace of God, else you will lament it in eternity; for after this time [of the temporary life] there is no more
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.
166. He can do nothing in this world, in the external [part], unless the turba Magna in the wrath of God be kindled, and there he is busy, especially when the elements are kindled [or inflamed] with tempestuous storms [of thunder and lightning] ; and then if the anger of God burneth therein, there he is a busy executioner; if he could ruin the whole world he would do it; but he hath no further room than the fierce wrath in the turba affordeth him; The turba [plague, vengeance and destruction] is his master, he is but a juggler and destroyer, so far as the anger in the turba is kindled. 67. Know also, that the devil often striveth and fighteth with the angels; and when the soul is careless and secure, he setteth upon it strongly: but he is held off, that he cannot do what he will; but so soon as the soul imagineth, and is captivated by the lust, [like Adam and Eve ], then the devil overcometh; but then again so soon as the soul casteth away that evil lust, [and entereth into repentance], then he is driven away by the angels. 68. And there is a continual strife about the soul of man; God desireth to have it; the devil also would have it; and the cause of this is, that the two kingdoms part in the cross: the one is the love of God, the kingdom in Ternario Sancto, viz. the angelical one: and the other is the fierce wrath out of the centre of nature, which is the anger and severity [or sharpness] of God.
269. And therefore it is that God manifesteth his will to us, and setteth before man light and darkness; he may endeavour after which he will: And that we might know that God would have the soul into his holy kingdom, he affordeth us teaching and instruction, and sheweth us the way to life [or light] ; he stirreth up by his spirit highly worthy teachers, who are the light of the world, that men might beware of his anger and fierce wrath, and not awaken it in themselves. 70. For the anger must indeed be in every life, [as the gall in living creatures] ; but where the love and meekness prevail over it, it is not manifested in eternity, but is only a cause of the life; for in the love, the anger maketh great exulting joy and paradise. The anger [or Mars] in the kingdom of God is the great wondrous joy, where nothing of the anger is perceived. As weeping and laughing come from one place, and the weeping is turned into joy; after such a manner is it with the love and anger of God.
371. Therefore it is, that Christ so earnestly teacheth us love, humility, and mercifulness; and the cause why God is become man, is for our salvation and happiness sake, that we should not turn back from his love: God hath spent his heart that we might be his children, and remain so eternally; when there was no remedy, neither in heaven nor in this world, then he moved himself for man's sake, that he might be delivered from the devil, and from his anger [into which he was fallen in Adam ], 72. Therefore, dearly beloved children, do not so reject and cast from you the love and grace of God, else you will lament it in eternity; for after this time [of the temporary life] there is no more
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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