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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.
117. And hereby we give you earnestly to understand, that the source or property in the centre (out of which the fire goeth forth upwards in the essentiality, and where the death sinketh downwards, and the essence sideways), generateth another will, which hath a desire to put the death, as also the fire in the sharpness, with the essences of the will, into the liberty, and the will attaineth the liberty, in the fire; and maketh the fire shine bright, and maketh the joy; and this second or comprehended will is called the tincture. 18. For it is a glance or splendour in the darkness, and hath the power of life, and sprouteth through the death of the essentiality; and quieteth the anguish: yet it hath no essences in itself, it is the ornament and virtue of the essences, it the joy and habitation of the life, it cannot depart from the anxious or painful sharpness, and yet the sharpness retaineth it not; for it is free and blossom of life, it is not soft nor sweet, but it like burning brimstone, where the fire attaineth glance, which otherwise, in the centre in anguish, is black and dark. 19. Thus we distinguish to you the substance in the darkness; and though we are very hard to be understood by you, and though also little belief may be afforded to it, we yet have a very convincing proof of it; not only in the created heaven [constellations],
2but also in the centre of the earth, as also in the whole Principle of this world, which would be too long to set down here; but we will discuss, and set down a few things, to open the understanding of the Reader. 20. Consider the centre of the earth, which God hath created by his Word, even out of the centre of the deep eternity, out of the darkness, out of the centre of the desirous will; but not out of any separate place, but out of the space and depth, so far as the Word hath yielded itself unto the ether, there hath the centre been every wJiere, and is so now, and remaineth so in eternity; for it hath been so from eternity. 21. And this is the beginning, that the Word hath created [or conceived] a will in the darkness, to manifest the darkness with all its forms, of the wonders of God the Father, in his nature, which he generateth in his eternal will: and we demonstrate it to you thus: Behold the earth, stones, and metals, which are all of them as it were dead and afford weight; and also they are dark [opaque], and yet have in them the light, viz. the noble tincture, which is their light and life; wherein the ore [or mineral] stone doth grow, in which the tincture is strong.
322. Thus you see also, how the brimstone fire is the overcomer of nature, in which the tincture doth exist, and so through the death of nature springeth up, in stones and metals; and in nature bringeth forth the substantiality of the shining and glance, or brightness, which may be seen in gold, silver, and all glistering metals. Wherein also we see the poisonous anguish of the darkness, as also the sour death of the darkness, and the strong matter of conjunction [mixture or copulation]; as they understand who work and deal therein. 23. Also we see how the tincture can bring that which is lowest in the death to its highest ornament or glory, (viz. an inferior metal into gold); and all that, in respect of the great power of the eternity. And therefore also the tincture is hidden from the alchemists, because it is originally out of the eternity, and they seek only that which is earthly; if they did rightly seek, they should well find it, as we have found in the spirit. 24. But we have yet a greater knowledge of this, in the many materials or kinds of earth, which we know to be created out of the eternal essences, as an outbirth, and so are in substance as an image of the essences; where we may see the altering of the will in the essences, and the great wonders of the omnipotence of God.
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.
117. And hereby we give you earnestly to understand, that the source or property in the centre (out of which the fire goeth forth upwards in the essentiality, and where the death sinketh downwards, and the essence sideways), generateth another will, which hath a desire to put the death, as also the fire in the sharpness, with the essences of the will, into the liberty, and the will attaineth the liberty, in the fire; and maketh the fire shine bright, and maketh the joy; and this second or comprehended will is called the tincture. 18. For it is a glance or splendour in the darkness, and hath the power of life, and sprouteth through the death of the essentiality; and quieteth the anguish: yet it hath no essences in itself, it is the ornament and virtue of the essences, it the joy and habitation of the life, it cannot depart from the anxious or painful sharpness, and yet the sharpness retaineth it not; for it is free and blossom of life, it is not soft nor sweet, but it like burning brimstone, where the fire attaineth glance, which otherwise, in the centre in anguish, is black and dark. 19. Thus we distinguish to you the substance in the darkness; and though we are very hard to be understood by you, and though also little belief may be afforded to it, we yet have a very convincing proof of it; not only in the created heaven [constellations],
2but also in the centre of the earth, as also in the whole Principle of this world, which would be too long to set down here; but we will discuss, and set down a few things, to open the understanding of the Reader. 20. Consider the centre of the earth, which God hath created by his Word, even out of the centre of the deep eternity, out of the darkness, out of the centre of the desirous will; but not out of any separate place, but out of the space and depth, so far as the Word hath yielded itself unto the ether, there hath the centre been every wJiere, and is so now, and remaineth so in eternity; for it hath been so from eternity. 21. And this is the beginning, that the Word hath created [or conceived] a will in the darkness, to manifest the darkness with all its forms, of the wonders of God the Father, in his nature, which he generateth in his eternal will: and we demonstrate it to you thus: Behold the earth, stones, and metals, which are all of them as it were dead and afford weight; and also they are dark [opaque], and yet have in them the light, viz. the noble tincture, which is their light and life; wherein the ore [or mineral] stone doth grow, in which the tincture is strong.
322. Thus you see also, how the brimstone fire is the overcomer of nature, in which the tincture doth exist, and so through the death of nature springeth up, in stones and metals; and in nature bringeth forth the substantiality of the shining and glance, or brightness, which may be seen in gold, silver, and all glistering metals. Wherein also we see the poisonous anguish of the darkness, as also the sour death of the darkness, and the strong matter of conjunction [mixture or copulation]; as they understand who work and deal therein. 23. Also we see how the tincture can bring that which is lowest in the death to its highest ornament or glory, (viz. an inferior metal into gold); and all that, in respect of the great power of the eternity. And therefore also the tincture is hidden from the alchemists, because it is originally out of the eternity, and they seek only that which is earthly; if they did rightly seek, they should well find it, as we have found in the spirit. 24. But we have yet a greater knowledge of this, in the many materials or kinds of earth, which we know to be created out of the eternal essences, as an outbirth, and so are in substance as an image of the essences; where we may see the altering of the will in the essences, and the great wonders of the omnipotence of God.
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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