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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.
18. Seeing then the speaking Word is a divine manifestation, wherewith the eternal Word of God has manifested itself; and that this same speaking Word is inspired into man, we are therefore here to consider what man does manifest with this speaking Word. Understand it thus: if the human lubet and desire (which is the Fiat or the creating of the human word) does conceive the form of the word in the holy ens, viz. in the heavenly part of the humanity, then the word sounds [ Or speaks] from a holy power, and the mouth speaks truth. 9. But if it be from the vanity, from the Serpent's craft, which Eve imprinted into herself; and thereby awakened its subtlety, then the word sounds from the ens of the dark world, viz. it proceeds from the centre to the fire-word; and thereinto also it enters (in its end) [Ens] when it goes forth out of the form, viz. out of the mouth, and wherever it goes it brings forth fruit. 10. If it enters into another man's hearing, in whom the hunger of craft and vanity stands in open desire, it is soon received as into a fruitful soil, and takes deep spreading root, and brings forth such evil fruit; whence also such sharp words and stinging taunts of the devil are hatched in the devilish essence. 11. But if it proceeds forth empty and bare only, into the false imagination, then it ascends into the will of the mind, and conceives itself in the mind into a substance, for a seat of the devil's desire, even
2for his murdering fort which he has in man. 12. But if the false word be uttered against a holy man, in reviling and reproaching him, and the holy man will not let it take place in him, and not stir or move himselfin the evil part of his property with the like evil word, then the wrath of God receives it from without the man, and is thereby mightily enkindled. And not only the inward ens of God's anger according to the spiritual dark-world's property is thereby enraged, but also the outward ens of the wrath in turba magna is inflamed, and hangs over the wicked man's head, and does even encompass him; and he is therewith taken and possessed, as if he sat in the hellish [flames of ] fire. 13. of which Christ said, that when the wicked did curse us we should bless him, that is, echo forth the word of love against his fiery word, and not suffer his malicious word to enter into us, for to take root; and then it goes back again and apprehends the wicked reviler himself; for Paul said, we heap fiery coals upon his head. 14. for every word of man proceeds from an eternal ens; either from the ens of God's love, or from the ens of God's anger; and if now it be brought forth out of the ens, viz. out of its own place or mother, it will have again a place of its rest, wherein it may work.
315. Now if it cannot take rest and work in its likeness, outside the wicked man, (who has awakened and brought it forth out of his ens, and introduced it into a sound, or wordy substance), then it catches or surrounds its expressor [or author] who has brought it into a substance, and enters again with its root into its mother whence it did arise; that is, with the enkindled spirit, and with the substance (of its contrived matter) it does lay hold of and apprehend the inventor's [expressor] body; viz. the outward essence of the outward sulphur. 16. For every word, when it is expressed, is outwardly made and formed; for in the expressing or pronouncing thereof the outward spirit, viz. the outward part of the soul, receives it to its own substance; and afterwards, being enkindled in the wrath, and infected by the devil in its coming forth, in its witty glancing subtlety of the Serpent, does enter again into the soul and body of the monstrous image; and works according to its property, enkindled and infected by the devil, and continually brings forth such evil fruits and words: as we plainly see that out of many a wicked mouth nothing but vanity proceeds.
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.
18. Seeing then the speaking Word is a divine manifestation, wherewith the eternal Word of God has manifested itself; and that this same speaking Word is inspired into man, we are therefore here to consider what man does manifest with this speaking Word. Understand it thus: if the human lubet and desire (which is the Fiat or the creating of the human word) does conceive the form of the word in the holy ens, viz. in the heavenly part of the humanity, then the word sounds [ Or speaks] from a holy power, and the mouth speaks truth. 9. But if it be from the vanity, from the Serpent's craft, which Eve imprinted into herself; and thereby awakened its subtlety, then the word sounds from the ens of the dark world, viz. it proceeds from the centre to the fire-word; and thereinto also it enters (in its end) [Ens] when it goes forth out of the form, viz. out of the mouth, and wherever it goes it brings forth fruit. 10. If it enters into another man's hearing, in whom the hunger of craft and vanity stands in open desire, it is soon received as into a fruitful soil, and takes deep spreading root, and brings forth such evil fruit; whence also such sharp words and stinging taunts of the devil are hatched in the devilish essence. 11. But if it proceeds forth empty and bare only, into the false imagination, then it ascends into the will of the mind, and conceives itself in the mind into a substance, for a seat of the devil's desire, even
2for his murdering fort which he has in man. 12. But if the false word be uttered against a holy man, in reviling and reproaching him, and the holy man will not let it take place in him, and not stir or move himselfin the evil part of his property with the like evil word, then the wrath of God receives it from without the man, and is thereby mightily enkindled. And not only the inward ens of God's anger according to the spiritual dark-world's property is thereby enraged, but also the outward ens of the wrath in turba magna is inflamed, and hangs over the wicked man's head, and does even encompass him; and he is therewith taken and possessed, as if he sat in the hellish [flames of ] fire. 13. of which Christ said, that when the wicked did curse us we should bless him, that is, echo forth the word of love against his fiery word, and not suffer his malicious word to enter into us, for to take root; and then it goes back again and apprehends the wicked reviler himself; for Paul said, we heap fiery coals upon his head. 14. for every word of man proceeds from an eternal ens; either from the ens of God's love, or from the ens of God's anger; and if now it be brought forth out of the ens, viz. out of its own place or mother, it will have again a place of its rest, wherein it may work.
315. Now if it cannot take rest and work in its likeness, outside the wicked man, (who has awakened and brought it forth out of his ens, and introduced it into a sound, or wordy substance), then it catches or surrounds its expressor [or author] who has brought it into a substance, and enters again with its root into its mother whence it did arise; that is, with the enkindled spirit, and with the substance (of its contrived matter) it does lay hold of and apprehend the inventor's [expressor] body; viz. the outward essence of the outward sulphur. 16. For every word, when it is expressed, is outwardly made and formed; for in the expressing or pronouncing thereof the outward spirit, viz. the outward part of the soul, receives it to its own substance; and afterwards, being enkindled in the wrath, and infected by the devil in its coming forth, in its witty glancing subtlety of the Serpent, does enter again into the soul and body of the monstrous image; and works according to its property, enkindled and infected by the devil, and continually brings forth such evil fruits and words: as we plainly see that out of many a wicked mouth nothing but vanity proceeds.
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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