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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.
132. Now seeing that in the eternity there is such an eye, which is God himself (and yet is not called God, but eternity; and according to the eye, he is called A and O , before the A there is nothing, and in the O there is all, and in the A and O beginning and end) hence * we find, that there is a will in the O , and the will is the O itself, which maketh the A (viz. the eternal beginning of the 5 seeking), so that the abyss beholdeth itself, and maketh a form in itself like a globe. 1 similitude, or parable, or figure. 2 GoTtes, character T. GOTT in German is GOD. 3 Or wheel or orb. 4 God's wonder Eye. 5 drawing, or longing, or attracting. * "we find" (wir grunderi), lit., "we discover as a foundation." 33. For the eye finding no bottom, it *closeth itself, and becometh like a round globe of glass; and so it is the similitude of eternity, in that it can find itself: for there is no finding in the abyss, because there is no place or limit, but the mere abyss: and when it doth find itself in the eye, yet it findeth nothing but the eye, which is the globe. 34. Now the eye maketh the globe, and it is the globe, and all put together is l a will to seek itself, and so to see what the eternity is, which is made manifest in the eye. 35. For the eye maketh a beginning and an end; and because there is nothing that can give it, it giveth itself, and it is from eternity to eternity, the eternity itself; it toucheth nothing; for it is a nothing in itself.
236. Then if there be a wdl, which is the eye, and which keepeth the eye, that keeping is the desire of the eye; and so the desire causeth an attraction in the eye, yet nothing is there but the eye: and the desire only attracteth itself in the eye, and impregnateth the eye with that which is attracted, so that it becometh full; and yet also nothing is there but a darkening of the free eye; yet the eye is not dark, but the desire in the eye is impregnated in itself. 1 Or an eternal will. * "closeth itself (schleust sich), "foldeth itself [round]," like flood-gates. 37. For the will of the eye is still, and the desire of the will maketh itself full, and the eye continueth free in itself: For it is free in and from eternity; and this we call the eternal liberty in all our writings. The Third Form. 38. Now a desire is sharp and attractive, and that maketh the third form, viz. a moving in itself, and it is the original of the essences; and hence come the essences in the eye and in the will, and yet the will may not suffer itself to be attracted. 39. For its peculiar right is to be still, and to hold the eye in the circle in the globe, and yet it cannot defend itself from the drawing and filling, for it hath nothing wherewith it can defend itself, but the desire.
340. And here ariseth the eternal enmity and contrary will; the will will not be dark, and its desire maketh it dark; the will would suffer the motion willingly, because it is its manifestation; but the drawing in, and darkening, pleaseth it not, though indeed the will is not attracted nor darkened, but the desire in the will impregnateth itself. 41. Now when the desire thus sticketh fast in the darkness, there is a great anguish, *for it is troubled and attracted, and also darkened, and bringeth anxiety to itself in itself, and desireth liberty; and drawing so strongly at the hberty, would fain draw itself into the liberty, and so it maketh itself more eager, rough and hard, and the darkness is like a horrible consuming sharpness. 42. For it snatcheth the hberty into itself; but it is so sharp, that it appeareth in the hberty as a flash of lightning, which consumeth the darkness with its t eagerness: and hence it is that God saith, I am a l consuming fire. 43. Hereby understand, how every 2 matter consisteth in the power of the true fire, and how the floor shall one day be purged: for it is the original of the fire which hath all power; for it consumeth whatsoever the desiring hath made, whether it be stone or mineral, for it is the sharpness of the eternal hberty, and maketh the 3 centre of nature.
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.
132. Now seeing that in the eternity there is such an eye, which is God himself (and yet is not called God, but eternity; and according to the eye, he is called A and O , before the A there is nothing, and in the O there is all, and in the A and O beginning and end) hence * we find, that there is a will in the O , and the will is the O itself, which maketh the A (viz. the eternal beginning of the 5 seeking), so that the abyss beholdeth itself, and maketh a form in itself like a globe. 1 similitude, or parable, or figure. 2 GoTtes, character T. GOTT in German is GOD. 3 Or wheel or orb. 4 God's wonder Eye. 5 drawing, or longing, or attracting. * "we find" (wir grunderi), lit., "we discover as a foundation." 33. For the eye finding no bottom, it *closeth itself, and becometh like a round globe of glass; and so it is the similitude of eternity, in that it can find itself: for there is no finding in the abyss, because there is no place or limit, but the mere abyss: and when it doth find itself in the eye, yet it findeth nothing but the eye, which is the globe. 34. Now the eye maketh the globe, and it is the globe, and all put together is l a will to seek itself, and so to see what the eternity is, which is made manifest in the eye. 35. For the eye maketh a beginning and an end; and because there is nothing that can give it, it giveth itself, and it is from eternity to eternity, the eternity itself; it toucheth nothing; for it is a nothing in itself.
236. Then if there be a wdl, which is the eye, and which keepeth the eye, that keeping is the desire of the eye; and so the desire causeth an attraction in the eye, yet nothing is there but the eye: and the desire only attracteth itself in the eye, and impregnateth the eye with that which is attracted, so that it becometh full; and yet also nothing is there but a darkening of the free eye; yet the eye is not dark, but the desire in the eye is impregnated in itself. 1 Or an eternal will. * "closeth itself (schleust sich), "foldeth itself [round]," like flood-gates. 37. For the will of the eye is still, and the desire of the will maketh itself full, and the eye continueth free in itself: For it is free in and from eternity; and this we call the eternal liberty in all our writings. The Third Form. 38. Now a desire is sharp and attractive, and that maketh the third form, viz. a moving in itself, and it is the original of the essences; and hence come the essences in the eye and in the will, and yet the will may not suffer itself to be attracted. 39. For its peculiar right is to be still, and to hold the eye in the circle in the globe, and yet it cannot defend itself from the drawing and filling, for it hath nothing wherewith it can defend itself, but the desire.
340. And here ariseth the eternal enmity and contrary will; the will will not be dark, and its desire maketh it dark; the will would suffer the motion willingly, because it is its manifestation; but the drawing in, and darkening, pleaseth it not, though indeed the will is not attracted nor darkened, but the desire in the will impregnateth itself. 41. Now when the desire thus sticketh fast in the darkness, there is a great anguish, *for it is troubled and attracted, and also darkened, and bringeth anxiety to itself in itself, and desireth liberty; and drawing so strongly at the hberty, would fain draw itself into the liberty, and so it maketh itself more eager, rough and hard, and the darkness is like a horrible consuming sharpness. 42. For it snatcheth the hberty into itself; but it is so sharp, that it appeareth in the hberty as a flash of lightning, which consumeth the darkness with its t eagerness: and hence it is that God saith, I am a l consuming fire. 43. Hereby understand, how every 2 matter consisteth in the power of the true fire, and how the floor shall one day be purged: for it is the original of the fire which hath all power; for it consumeth whatsoever the desiring hath made, whether it be stone or mineral, for it is the sharpness of the eternal hberty, and maketh the 3 centre of nature.
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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