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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.
119. The desire, or will is the Father; that is, the stirring or manifestation of the Unity, whereby the Unity wills or desires itself. 20. The pleasure, or delight is the Son; and is that which the will wills and desires, viz. his love and pleasure, as may be seen at the baptism of our Lord Jesus Christ, when the Father witnessed, saying, This is my [1] beloved Son, in whom I [2] am well pleased; hear ye him. [1] or love [2] have pleasure 21. The delight is the [1] compressure in the will, whereby the will in the Unity brings itself a place and working, wherewith the will wills and works; and it is the [2] feelingness and virtue of the will. [1] or impressure of the will [2] or perception 22. The will is the Father, that is, the stirring desire; and the delight is the Son, that is, the virtue and the working in the will, with which the will works; and the Holy Ghost is the proceeding will, through the delight of the virtue, that is, a life of the will andof the virtue and delight. 23. Thus there are three sorts of workings in the eternal Unity, viz. the Unity is the will and desire of itself: the delight is the working substance of the will, and an eternal joy of perceptibility in the will; and the Holy Ghost is the proceeding of the power: the similitude of which may be seen in a [1] plant. [1] or herb
224. The [1] magnet, viz. the essential desire of nature, that is, the will of the desire of nature, [2] compresses itself into an ens or substance, to become a plant, and in this compression of the desire becomes feeling, that is, working; and in that working the power and virtue arises, wherein the magnetical desire of nature, viz. the outflown will of God, works in a natural way. [1] or loadstone [2] or forms 25. In this working perceptibility the magnetical desiring will is elevated and made joyful, and goes forth from the working power and virtue; and hence comes the growing and smell of the plant: and thus we see a representation of the Trinity of God in all [1] growing and living things. [1] vegetables and animate things 26. If there were not such a desiring perceptibility, and outgoing operation of the Trinity in the eternal Unity, the Unity were but an eternal stillness, a Nothing; and there would be no nature, nor any color, shape, or figure; likewise there would be nothing in this world; without this threefold working there could be no world at all. Of the Eternal W ord of God 27. The Holy Scripture says, God has made all things by his eternal Word; also it says, That Word is God, John 1, which we understand thus: 28. The Word is nothing else but the [1] out-breathing will, from the power and virtue; a various dividing of the power into a multitude of powers; a distributing and outflowing of the Unity, whence knowledge arises.
3[1] or out-speaking 29. For in one only substance, wherein there is no variation or division, but is only one, there can be no knowledge; and if there were knowledge, it could know but one thing, viz. itself: but if it parts itself, then the dividing will goes into multiplicity and variety; and each parting works in itself. 30. Yet because Unity cannot be divided and parted asunder,therefore the separating consists and remains in the outbreathing will in the Unity; and the separation of the breathing gives the different variety, whereby the eternal [1] Will, togetherwith the [2] Delight and [3] Proceeding, enters into the [4] knowledge or understanding of infinite forms, viz. into an eternal, perceptible, working, sensual knowledge of the powers; where always in the division of the will, in the separation, one sense or form of the will sees, feels, tastes, smells, and hears the other; and yet it is but one sensual working, viz. the great joyous band of love, and the most pleasant only eternal [5] Being. [1] Father [2] Son [3] Holy Ghost [4] or science [5] essence or substance Of the Holy Name J EH OVA 31. The ancient Rabbins among the Jews have partly understood it; for they have said that this name is the highest, and most holy name of God [1] by which they understand the working Deity in sense : and it i s true, for in this working sense lies the true life of all things in time and
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.
119. The desire, or will is the Father; that is, the stirring or manifestation of the Unity, whereby the Unity wills or desires itself. 20. The pleasure, or delight is the Son; and is that which the will wills and desires, viz. his love and pleasure, as may be seen at the baptism of our Lord Jesus Christ, when the Father witnessed, saying, This is my [1] beloved Son, in whom I [2] am well pleased; hear ye him. [1] or love [2] have pleasure 21. The delight is the [1] compressure in the will, whereby the will in the Unity brings itself a place and working, wherewith the will wills and works; and it is the [2] feelingness and virtue of the will. [1] or impressure of the will [2] or perception 22. The will is the Father, that is, the stirring desire; and the delight is the Son, that is, the virtue and the working in the will, with which the will works; and the Holy Ghost is the proceeding will, through the delight of the virtue, that is, a life of the will andof the virtue and delight. 23. Thus there are three sorts of workings in the eternal Unity, viz. the Unity is the will and desire of itself: the delight is the working substance of the will, and an eternal joy of perceptibility in the will; and the Holy Ghost is the proceeding of the power: the similitude of which may be seen in a [1] plant. [1] or herb
224. The [1] magnet, viz. the essential desire of nature, that is, the will of the desire of nature, [2] compresses itself into an ens or substance, to become a plant, and in this compression of the desire becomes feeling, that is, working; and in that working the power and virtue arises, wherein the magnetical desire of nature, viz. the outflown will of God, works in a natural way. [1] or loadstone [2] or forms 25. In this working perceptibility the magnetical desiring will is elevated and made joyful, and goes forth from the working power and virtue; and hence comes the growing and smell of the plant: and thus we see a representation of the Trinity of God in all [1] growing and living things. [1] vegetables and animate things 26. If there were not such a desiring perceptibility, and outgoing operation of the Trinity in the eternal Unity, the Unity were but an eternal stillness, a Nothing; and there would be no nature, nor any color, shape, or figure; likewise there would be nothing in this world; without this threefold working there could be no world at all. Of the Eternal W ord of God 27. The Holy Scripture says, God has made all things by his eternal Word; also it says, That Word is God, John 1, which we understand thus: 28. The Word is nothing else but the [1] out-breathing will, from the power and virtue; a various dividing of the power into a multitude of powers; a distributing and outflowing of the Unity, whence knowledge arises.
3[1] or out-speaking 29. For in one only substance, wherein there is no variation or division, but is only one, there can be no knowledge; and if there were knowledge, it could know but one thing, viz. itself: but if it parts itself, then the dividing will goes into multiplicity and variety; and each parting works in itself. 30. Yet because Unity cannot be divided and parted asunder,therefore the separating consists and remains in the outbreathing will in the Unity; and the separation of the breathing gives the different variety, whereby the eternal [1] Will, togetherwith the [2] Delight and [3] Proceeding, enters into the [4] knowledge or understanding of infinite forms, viz. into an eternal, perceptible, working, sensual knowledge of the powers; where always in the division of the will, in the separation, one sense or form of the will sees, feels, tastes, smells, and hears the other; and yet it is but one sensual working, viz. the great joyous band of love, and the most pleasant only eternal [5] Being. [1] Father [2] Son [3] Holy Ghost [4] or science [5] essence or substance Of the Holy Name J EH OVA 31. The ancient Rabbins among the Jews have partly understood it; for they have said that this name is the highest, and most holy name of God [1] by which they understand the working Deity in sense : and it i s true, for in this working sense lies the true life of all things in time and
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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