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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.
195. O how terrible is it to those that understand it, the soul trembleth at it, and it may well be afraid of this captivity, when the poor soul must be captivated by the devil, and must swim in [the lake of] God's anger. And this is the cause why God became man, that he might bring us again, in Ternarium Sanctum, into the angelical world. 96. And as we are all with Adam, gone out from God, for we have all Adam's soul and flesh, so God hath regenerated us all in Christ; and in Christ the divine kingdom standeth open, every one that will may enter in, whosoever putteth his will away from himself, and putteth it into Christ, and letteth all worldly reason go, though it have never so fair a lustre, shall be regenerated in Christ: and his soul attaineth the eternal flesh again, in which God became man, an incomprehensible flesh, of eternal substantiality. 97. The old Adamical [or mortal] flesh of death cometh not to be heavenly flesh: No, it belongeth to the earth, to death; but the eternal flesh is hidden in the old earthly man, and it is in the old man, as the fire in the iron, or as the gold in the [dark] stone. 98. This is the noble precious stone, (Lapis Philosophorum), the Philosopher's Stone, which the Magi [or wise men] find, which tinctureth nature, and generateth a new son in the old. He who findeth that, esteemeth more highly of it than of this [outward] world. For the Son is many thousand times greater than the Father.
299. O thou bright Crown of Pearl, art thou not brighter than the sun? There is nothing like thee; thou art so very manifest, and yet so very secret, that among many thousand in this world, thou art scarcely rightly known of any one; and yet thou art carried [about] in many that know thee not. 100. Christ saith, Seek, and thou shaltfind. It [the noble stone] must be sought for, a lazy person findeth it not, and though he carrieth it about with him, yet he knoweth it not. To whomsoever it revealeth itself, he hath all joy therein; for there is no end of its virtue [or glory] : He that hath it doth not give it away: and if he doth impart it to any, yet it is not profitable to him that is lazy, for he diveth not into its virtue, to learn that. 101. But the seeker findeth the Stone, and its virtue and benefit together, and when he findeth it, and knoweth that he is certain of it, there is greater joy in him than the world is able to apprehend, which no pen can describe, nor any tongue express, in an Adamical manner. 102. It is accounted the meanest of all stones in
3the Adamical eyes, and is trodden under foot, for it affordeth no lustre to the sight; if a man lights upon it, he casteth it away as an unprofitable thing; none enquire after it, though it be so very much sought for in this world. There is none on earth but desireth it. All the great ones and the wise seek it: Indeed they find one, and think it is the right: but they miss of it: they ascribe power and virtue to it: and think they have it, and will keep it: but it is not that: It needeth no virtue to be ascribed to it. All virtue lieth hidden in it. 103. He who hath it, and knoweth it, if he seeketh, he may find all things whatsoever are in heaven and in earth. It is the Stone which is rejected of the builders, and is the chief corner stone; upon whatsoever itfalleth, it grindeth to powder, and kindleth a fire therein. All universities seek it, but find it not by their seeking; sometimes it is found by one that seeketh it rightly. But others [that seek it in self, and for their own gain] despise it, and cast it away, and so it remaineth hidden still. THE SEVENTH CHAPTER OF THE TRUE CORNERSTONE 1. IT doth most of all concern us men, in this world, to seek that which is lost. And therefore if we would seek, we must not seek without ourselves, we need no flattering hypocrites, nor such as tickle our ears to comfort us, and promise us many golden mountains if we will but run after them, and make much of them, and reverence them.
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.
195. O how terrible is it to those that understand it, the soul trembleth at it, and it may well be afraid of this captivity, when the poor soul must be captivated by the devil, and must swim in [the lake of] God's anger. And this is the cause why God became man, that he might bring us again, in Ternarium Sanctum, into the angelical world. 96. And as we are all with Adam, gone out from God, for we have all Adam's soul and flesh, so God hath regenerated us all in Christ; and in Christ the divine kingdom standeth open, every one that will may enter in, whosoever putteth his will away from himself, and putteth it into Christ, and letteth all worldly reason go, though it have never so fair a lustre, shall be regenerated in Christ: and his soul attaineth the eternal flesh again, in which God became man, an incomprehensible flesh, of eternal substantiality. 97. The old Adamical [or mortal] flesh of death cometh not to be heavenly flesh: No, it belongeth to the earth, to death; but the eternal flesh is hidden in the old earthly man, and it is in the old man, as the fire in the iron, or as the gold in the [dark] stone. 98. This is the noble precious stone, (Lapis Philosophorum), the Philosopher's Stone, which the Magi [or wise men] find, which tinctureth nature, and generateth a new son in the old. He who findeth that, esteemeth more highly of it than of this [outward] world. For the Son is many thousand times greater than the Father.
299. O thou bright Crown of Pearl, art thou not brighter than the sun? There is nothing like thee; thou art so very manifest, and yet so very secret, that among many thousand in this world, thou art scarcely rightly known of any one; and yet thou art carried [about] in many that know thee not. 100. Christ saith, Seek, and thou shaltfind. It [the noble stone] must be sought for, a lazy person findeth it not, and though he carrieth it about with him, yet he knoweth it not. To whomsoever it revealeth itself, he hath all joy therein; for there is no end of its virtue [or glory] : He that hath it doth not give it away: and if he doth impart it to any, yet it is not profitable to him that is lazy, for he diveth not into its virtue, to learn that. 101. But the seeker findeth the Stone, and its virtue and benefit together, and when he findeth it, and knoweth that he is certain of it, there is greater joy in him than the world is able to apprehend, which no pen can describe, nor any tongue express, in an Adamical manner. 102. It is accounted the meanest of all stones in
3the Adamical eyes, and is trodden under foot, for it affordeth no lustre to the sight; if a man lights upon it, he casteth it away as an unprofitable thing; none enquire after it, though it be so very much sought for in this world. There is none on earth but desireth it. All the great ones and the wise seek it: Indeed they find one, and think it is the right: but they miss of it: they ascribe power and virtue to it: and think they have it, and will keep it: but it is not that: It needeth no virtue to be ascribed to it. All virtue lieth hidden in it. 103. He who hath it, and knoweth it, if he seeketh, he may find all things whatsoever are in heaven and in earth. It is the Stone which is rejected of the builders, and is the chief corner stone; upon whatsoever itfalleth, it grindeth to powder, and kindleth a fire therein. All universities seek it, but find it not by their seeking; sometimes it is found by one that seeketh it rightly. But others [that seek it in self, and for their own gain] despise it, and cast it away, and so it remaineth hidden still. THE SEVENTH CHAPTER OF THE TRUE CORNERSTONE 1. IT doth most of all concern us men, in this world, to seek that which is lost. And therefore if we would seek, we must not seek without ourselves, we need no flattering hypocrites, nor such as tickle our ears to comfort us, and promise us many golden mountains if we will but run after them, and make much of them, and reverence them.
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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