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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.
1the precious Love and Mercy of God, with the fatted Swine of the Devil in earthly Pleasures, and hath not kept the dear Cove - nant and Atonement of the innocent Death and Passion? of Jesus Christ ; which Covenant God of mere Grace hath given or put into our Humanity, and reconciled us in Dtim . He must also consider, that he hath totally forgotten the Covenant of holy Baptism , in which he had promised to be faithful and true to his Saviour , and so wholly defiled and obscured His Righteousness with Sin } (which Righteousness God had freely bestowed upon him in Christ) 9 that he now standeth before the Face of GOD, with the fair Garment of Christ's Innocency which he hath defiled, as a dirty, ragged, and patched Keeper of Swine \ that hath continually eaten the Husks of Vanity with the Devil* s Swine , and is not worthy to be called a Son of the Father , and Member of Christ Fourthly , he should earnestly consider that wrathful Death awaiteth him every Hour and Moment, and will lay hold on him in his Sins in his Garment of a Swine-herd , and throw him into the Pit of Hell as a Foresworn Person and Breaker of Faith, who ought to be reserved in the dark Dungeon of Death to the Judgment of God.
2Fifthly , he should consider the earnest and severe Day of God’s Final Judgment , when he shall be presented living with his Abominations before God’s Tribunal That all those whom he hath here offended or injured by Words and Works, and caused to do Evil, (so that by his Instigation or Compulsion they also have committed Evil), shall come in against him, cursing him before the Eyes of Christ and of all holy Angels and Men. That^ there he shall stand in great Shame and Ignominy , and also in great Terror and Desperation , and that it shall forever grieve him to reflect that he hath trifled away so glorious and eternal a State of Salvation and Happiness for the Pleasure of so short a Time ; and that he had not taken Care in that shart Time to secure to himself a Share in the Communion of the Saints , and so to have enjoyed with them eternal Light , and Divine Glory . Sixthly , he must consider that the Ungodly Man loseth his noble Image 9 God having created him in and for His Imagi or creaturely Representation, and getteth instead thereof a deformed or monstrous Shape , like a hellish Worm or uglp Beast* Whereirf he is an Enemy to God, Heaven, and all Holy Angels and Men, and that his Communion is, and will be forever, with the Devils and hellish Worms in horrible Darkness *
3Seventhly, he must earnestly consider the eternal Punishment and Torture of the damned ; how that in eternal Horror they shall suffer Torments in their Abominations which they had com7 Of "True Repentance . mitted here, and may never see the Land of the Saints to all Eternity, nor get any Ease or Refreshment, as appears by the ExamjJle.of Dives the rich Man.
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.
1the precious Love and Mercy of God, with the fatted Swine of the Devil in earthly Pleasures, and hath not kept the dear Cove - nant and Atonement of the innocent Death and Passion? of Jesus Christ ; which Covenant God of mere Grace hath given or put into our Humanity, and reconciled us in Dtim . He must also consider, that he hath totally forgotten the Covenant of holy Baptism , in which he had promised to be faithful and true to his Saviour , and so wholly defiled and obscured His Righteousness with Sin } (which Righteousness God had freely bestowed upon him in Christ) 9 that he now standeth before the Face of GOD, with the fair Garment of Christ's Innocency which he hath defiled, as a dirty, ragged, and patched Keeper of Swine \ that hath continually eaten the Husks of Vanity with the Devil* s Swine , and is not worthy to be called a Son of the Father , and Member of Christ Fourthly , he should earnestly consider that wrathful Death awaiteth him every Hour and Moment, and will lay hold on him in his Sins in his Garment of a Swine-herd , and throw him into the Pit of Hell as a Foresworn Person and Breaker of Faith, who ought to be reserved in the dark Dungeon of Death to the Judgment of God.
2Fifthly , he should consider the earnest and severe Day of God’s Final Judgment , when he shall be presented living with his Abominations before God’s Tribunal That all those whom he hath here offended or injured by Words and Works, and caused to do Evil, (so that by his Instigation or Compulsion they also have committed Evil), shall come in against him, cursing him before the Eyes of Christ and of all holy Angels and Men. That^ there he shall stand in great Shame and Ignominy , and also in great Terror and Desperation , and that it shall forever grieve him to reflect that he hath trifled away so glorious and eternal a State of Salvation and Happiness for the Pleasure of so short a Time ; and that he had not taken Care in that shart Time to secure to himself a Share in the Communion of the Saints , and so to have enjoyed with them eternal Light , and Divine Glory . Sixthly , he must consider that the Ungodly Man loseth his noble Image 9 God having created him in and for His Imagi or creaturely Representation, and getteth instead thereof a deformed or monstrous Shape , like a hellish Worm or uglp Beast* Whereirf he is an Enemy to God, Heaven, and all Holy Angels and Men, and that his Communion is, and will be forever, with the Devils and hellish Worms in horrible Darkness *
3Seventhly, he must earnestly consider the eternal Punishment and Torture of the damned ; how that in eternal Horror they shall suffer Torments in their Abominations which they had com7 Of "True Repentance . mitted here, and may never see the Land of the Saints to all Eternity, nor get any Ease or Refreshment, as appears by the ExamjJle.of Dives the rich Man.
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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