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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.
127. For the rainbow has the colour of all the three Principles, viz. the colour of the first Principle is red, and darkish-brown; which betokens the dark and fire-world, that is, the first Principle, the kingdom of God's anger. The colour of the second Principle is white, and yellow; this is the majestical colour, signifying, as a type of the holy world, God's love. The third Principle's colour is green, and blue; blue from the chaos, and green from the water or saltpetre; where, in the flagrat or crack of the fire, the Sulphur and Mercury do sever themselves, and produce distinct, various and several colours, which betoken unto us the inward spiritual worlds, 1 which are hidden in the four elements. 1 Or world. 28. This bow is a figure of the Last judgement, showing how the inward spiritual world will again manifest itself and swallow up or avail into itself this outward world of four elements.
229. And this is even the sign or token of the Covenant of grace, which sign in the Covenant betokens the Judge of the world, viz. Christ, who, at the end of days, will appear in all the three Principles, viz. according to the fire-sign as a severe Judge over the turba, and all whatsoever that shall be found therein; he will manifest the fiery judgement, and enkindle the turba, so that the first Principle shall appear in its fiery property, for all things of this world's being must be tried or purified in the fire of the first Principle, viz. in the centre of the eternal nature. And even then the turba of all beings shall be swallowed up in the fire. 30. And according to the light's sign he shall appear as a pleasant visage to all the saints, even in the midst of the fire; and defend his, in his love and meekness, from the flames of the fire. 31. And according to the kingdom of the outward nature of this world, he shall appear in his assumed humanity; and the whole outward mystery of the four elements, according to Sulphur, Mercury and Salt, even according to all the properties of the wonders of the expressed and formed Word, even all shall be made manifest before him according to light and darkness [viz. according to their good and evil] .
332. Of this the rainbow is a type and figure, for it is a reflex [antitype] or contra-glance of the sun; showing what kind of property [or virtue] there is in the deep. The sun casts its shining lustre into the four elements towards the chaos, and then the chaos, whence the four elements do proceed, does manifest itself according to the Principles, with its colours; and it denotes and points out the hidden or mystical ground of the four elements, viz. the hidden world, and also the hiddenness of the humanity. For in this hidden-ness [or secret mystery] of the creation, God did set forth his Covenant, that he would not destroy its image any more with water; that the fountains of the deep should not be any more opened in the chaos, as came to pass in the Flood, and in the creation of the world. 33. The rainbow is an opening of the chaos in nature; and it may very well, if the sun be in a good aspect in the elements, produce and bring forth a wonderful birth, both in the vegetables and animals. Also there may thereby be a creaturalliving being produced in the deep, even according to the property of the sun's powerful influence; according as it finds in the elements a property from the astrum or constellations, either to evil or good; as oftentimes to worms, flies, grasshoppers, and the like; and also to a good life, according as Saturn and Mercury are enkindled in their desire.
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.
127. For the rainbow has the colour of all the three Principles, viz. the colour of the first Principle is red, and darkish-brown; which betokens the dark and fire-world, that is, the first Principle, the kingdom of God's anger. The colour of the second Principle is white, and yellow; this is the majestical colour, signifying, as a type of the holy world, God's love. The third Principle's colour is green, and blue; blue from the chaos, and green from the water or saltpetre; where, in the flagrat or crack of the fire, the Sulphur and Mercury do sever themselves, and produce distinct, various and several colours, which betoken unto us the inward spiritual worlds, 1 which are hidden in the four elements. 1 Or world. 28. This bow is a figure of the Last judgement, showing how the inward spiritual world will again manifest itself and swallow up or avail into itself this outward world of four elements.
229. And this is even the sign or token of the Covenant of grace, which sign in the Covenant betokens the Judge of the world, viz. Christ, who, at the end of days, will appear in all the three Principles, viz. according to the fire-sign as a severe Judge over the turba, and all whatsoever that shall be found therein; he will manifest the fiery judgement, and enkindle the turba, so that the first Principle shall appear in its fiery property, for all things of this world's being must be tried or purified in the fire of the first Principle, viz. in the centre of the eternal nature. And even then the turba of all beings shall be swallowed up in the fire. 30. And according to the light's sign he shall appear as a pleasant visage to all the saints, even in the midst of the fire; and defend his, in his love and meekness, from the flames of the fire. 31. And according to the kingdom of the outward nature of this world, he shall appear in his assumed humanity; and the whole outward mystery of the four elements, according to Sulphur, Mercury and Salt, even according to all the properties of the wonders of the expressed and formed Word, even all shall be made manifest before him according to light and darkness [viz. according to their good and evil] .
332. Of this the rainbow is a type and figure, for it is a reflex [antitype] or contra-glance of the sun; showing what kind of property [or virtue] there is in the deep. The sun casts its shining lustre into the four elements towards the chaos, and then the chaos, whence the four elements do proceed, does manifest itself according to the Principles, with its colours; and it denotes and points out the hidden or mystical ground of the four elements, viz. the hidden world, and also the hiddenness of the humanity. For in this hidden-ness [or secret mystery] of the creation, God did set forth his Covenant, that he would not destroy its image any more with water; that the fountains of the deep should not be any more opened in the chaos, as came to pass in the Flood, and in the creation of the world. 33. The rainbow is an opening of the chaos in nature; and it may very well, if the sun be in a good aspect in the elements, produce and bring forth a wonderful birth, both in the vegetables and animals. Also there may thereby be a creaturalliving being produced in the deep, even according to the property of the sun's powerful influence; according as it finds in the elements a property from the astrum or constellations, either to evil or good; as oftentimes to worms, flies, grasshoppers, and the like; and also to a good life, according as Saturn and Mercury are enkindled in their desire.
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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