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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.
14. A comparison between the Holy Ghost and the spirit and life of man . 83 5. God filleth all; and seeing the Holy Ghost goeth out from the Father, the mind asketh, Whither doth it go? 9 5, How God dwelleth in heaven; also how the Holy Ghost proceedeth. 14 12. How men may get the Holy Ghost .... 41 16. It is not the Father but the Holy Ghost that meeteth the crying soul . 15 Hypocrites. 2. A warning to the hypocrites, and those that are learned in the letter 2 11. Of the generation of the false hypocrite, and of his behaviour 33 CHAP. Image. VERSE 3. We are the express image of God; wherefore the Father hath regenerated us in Christ ... 49 6. How the spirit created the substantiality into an image, and how the image stood in the angelical world . 51 6. What properties were in the image .... 52 6. How the image was a whole similitude of the eternal substance 53 6. A comparison of the Fall of Lucifer with the Fall of the image or Adam 54 6. How the image awakened the property of anger, and became the image of a serpent .... 58 6. How the regenerate put on the eternal image . . 75 7. How the image doted on this world, as Lucifer did on the matrix of nature. Adam's power before the Fall 26 7. The horrible blasphemy whereby the serpent by the image blasphemeth the spirit of God ... 61 9. What the image in the Revelation, and the Crown signifieth 7 5 11. What caused God to create his image ... 14
218. How the image attained essence or substance in the moving of the Father 19 Incomprehensible. 18. Nothing is incomprehensible to the mother of nature . 3 Joy. 1. Of the joy in the divine life 18 5. How every one shall have joy or sorrow of that which i s his 133 12. What we must choose, that we may have eternal joy therein 2 14. The anger in the kingdom of God is the great wondrous joy 70 17. How the angels and souls have joy of one another's clarity, brightness, or lustre 18 18. Of the joy of the soul that feareth God . . 29-30 Judgeth. Judgment. 6. He that seeth not, judgeth amiss .... 36 5 . What the last Judgment-Day is .... 130 8. How our bodies at the Last Day of Judgment must come forth again 74 8. The judgment of the spirits of perdition; also who shall execute the judgment 75 CHAP. Judgeth. Judgment. VERSE 8. Of those that shall be alive at the last hour of the judgment 78 11. The discourse between the wise and foolish virgins in the judgment 29 12. Clear advice to have the judgment of God before our eyes 38 15. How it shall be with the superior and inferior in judgment 12 Kingdom. 14. How we must be prepared, if we will walk in the narrow way t o the kingdom of God ... 7 Know. Knowers. Knowing. Knowledge. 18. The author telleth how he can know these things . 1-4 13. How the kingdom of heaven remaineth hidden to the knowers that are not doers 57 14. The devil is not overcome by much knowing and disputing 5
31. None can come to the knowledge of the essence of God, but by grace 20 3. Every one may find in himself the author's knowledge 1 5. The author having this knowledge, cannot be silent . 2 6. This knowledge is not born of the wisdom of this world 6 7. The author will speak from his knowledge, not opinion 54 14. Wherein our striving for the highest good consistefch, not in the sword, nor in much knowledge . . 3 16. What is requisite and necessary for us that we may attain the knowledge of the kingdom of God: Also how we are deceived in the outward reason . . 31 Lamb. 3. How the Lamb took the Book. He who understandeth not this, is under the seals 79 6. How men must go to the Lamb, and fly from the beast 15 13. How Christ gave the true Paschal Lamb to his Apostles, viz. his heavenly flesh and blood .... 12 Language. 3. What is understood in the word Ternarius in the language of nature 17 3. What is understood in the word Ternarius Sanctus in the language of nature .18 CHAP. Language. VERSE 4. What is meant by the word Schuff, or created, in the language of nature: A substance may proceed out o f a thought 3 0 5. By the language of nature he sheweth what the creation of God was 84 5. In the languages of all nations the language of nature may be understood: Adam in innocence understood the language of nature, in his Fall we lost it, and attain it again in Christ 85
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.
14. A comparison between the Holy Ghost and the spirit and life of man . 83 5. God filleth all; and seeing the Holy Ghost goeth out from the Father, the mind asketh, Whither doth it go? 9 5, How God dwelleth in heaven; also how the Holy Ghost proceedeth. 14 12. How men may get the Holy Ghost .... 41 16. It is not the Father but the Holy Ghost that meeteth the crying soul . 15 Hypocrites. 2. A warning to the hypocrites, and those that are learned in the letter 2 11. Of the generation of the false hypocrite, and of his behaviour 33 CHAP. Image. VERSE 3. We are the express image of God; wherefore the Father hath regenerated us in Christ ... 49 6. How the spirit created the substantiality into an image, and how the image stood in the angelical world . 51 6. What properties were in the image .... 52 6. How the image was a whole similitude of the eternal substance 53 6. A comparison of the Fall of Lucifer with the Fall of the image or Adam 54 6. How the image awakened the property of anger, and became the image of a serpent .... 58 6. How the regenerate put on the eternal image . . 75 7. How the image doted on this world, as Lucifer did on the matrix of nature. Adam's power before the Fall 26 7. The horrible blasphemy whereby the serpent by the image blasphemeth the spirit of God ... 61 9. What the image in the Revelation, and the Crown signifieth 7 5 11. What caused God to create his image ... 14
218. How the image attained essence or substance in the moving of the Father 19 Incomprehensible. 18. Nothing is incomprehensible to the mother of nature . 3 Joy. 1. Of the joy in the divine life 18 5. How every one shall have joy or sorrow of that which i s his 133 12. What we must choose, that we may have eternal joy therein 2 14. The anger in the kingdom of God is the great wondrous joy 70 17. How the angels and souls have joy of one another's clarity, brightness, or lustre 18 18. Of the joy of the soul that feareth God . . 29-30 Judgeth. Judgment. 6. He that seeth not, judgeth amiss .... 36 5 . What the last Judgment-Day is .... 130 8. How our bodies at the Last Day of Judgment must come forth again 74 8. The judgment of the spirits of perdition; also who shall execute the judgment 75 CHAP. Judgeth. Judgment. VERSE 8. Of those that shall be alive at the last hour of the judgment 78 11. The discourse between the wise and foolish virgins in the judgment 29 12. Clear advice to have the judgment of God before our eyes 38 15. How it shall be with the superior and inferior in judgment 12 Kingdom. 14. How we must be prepared, if we will walk in the narrow way t o the kingdom of God ... 7 Know. Knowers. Knowing. Knowledge. 18. The author telleth how he can know these things . 1-4 13. How the kingdom of heaven remaineth hidden to the knowers that are not doers 57 14. The devil is not overcome by much knowing and disputing 5
31. None can come to the knowledge of the essence of God, but by grace 20 3. Every one may find in himself the author's knowledge 1 5. The author having this knowledge, cannot be silent . 2 6. This knowledge is not born of the wisdom of this world 6 7. The author will speak from his knowledge, not opinion 54 14. Wherein our striving for the highest good consistefch, not in the sword, nor in much knowledge . . 3 16. What is requisite and necessary for us that we may attain the knowledge of the kingdom of God: Also how we are deceived in the outward reason . . 31 Lamb. 3. How the Lamb took the Book. He who understandeth not this, is under the seals 79 6. How men must go to the Lamb, and fly from the beast 15 13. How Christ gave the true Paschal Lamb to his Apostles, viz. his heavenly flesh and blood .... 12 Language. 3. What is understood in the word Ternarius in the language of nature 17 3. What is understood in the word Ternarius Sanctus in the language of nature .18 CHAP. Language. VERSE 4. What is meant by the word Schuff, or created, in the language of nature: A substance may proceed out o f a thought 3 0 5. By the language of nature he sheweth what the creation of God was 84 5. In the languages of all nations the language of nature may be understood: Adam in innocence understood the language of nature, in his Fall we lost it, and attain it again in Christ 85
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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