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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.
1O thou Breath of the great Love of God, quicken I beseech thee my weak Breath in me, that it may begin to Hunger and Thirst after thee. O Lord Jesus , thou sweet Strength, I beseech thee give my Soul to drink of thy Fountain of Grace, thy sweet Water of eternal Life, that it may awake from Death and thirst after thee. O how extreme fainting I am for Want of thy Strength ! O merciful God, do thou turn me I beseech thee, I cannot turn myself. O thou Vanquisher of Death, help me I pray thee to wrestle. How fast doth the Enemy hold me with his three Chains , and will not suffer the Desire of my Soul to Of True Repentance . 1*3 come before thee ! I beseech thee come and take the. Desire of my Soul into thyself. Be thou my drawing to the Father, and delivef me from the Devils Bonds ! Look not upon my Deformity in standing naked before thee, having lost thy Garment! I pray thee, do but thou clothe that Breath which yet liveth in me and panteth after thy Grace ; and so shall I yet see thy Salvation.
2O thou deep Love, I pray thee take the Desire of my Soul into thee : bring it forth out of the Bonds of Death through thy Death, in thy Resurrection, in thee. O quicken me in thy Strength, that my Desire and Will may begin to spring up and flourish anew. O thou Vanquisher of Death and of the Wrath m of God, do thou overcome in me Self; break its Will and bruise my Soul, that it may fear before thee, and be ashamed of its own Will “before „thy Judgment ', and that it may be ever obedient to thee as an Instrument ; of thine. Subdue it in the Bonds of Death; take away its Power, that it may will nothing without thee.
3Q God the Holy Ghost in Christ my Saviour, teach me, I pray thee, what I shall do, that I may turn to thee. O draw me in Christ to the Father, and help me, that now and from hence forward I may go forth from Sin and Vanity, and never any more enter into them again. Stir up in me a true Sorrow for the Sins k have committed. O keep me in thy Bonds, and let me not loose from thee, lest the Devil sift me in my wicked Flesh and Blood, and bring me again into the Death of Death. O enlighten thou my Spirit, that I may see the Divine Path, and walk in it continually. O take that away from me, which always turneth me away from thee ; and give me that which always turneth me to thee : take me wholly from myself, and give me wholly to thyself. O let me begin nothing, let me will, think, and do nothing without thee. O Lord how long ! Indeed I am not worthy of thg.t which I desire of thee, I pray thee let the Desire of my Soul dwell but in the Gates of thy Courts ; make it but a Servant of thy Servants. O preserve it from that horrible Pit, wherein there is no Comfort or Refreshment. O God in Christ Jesus! I am blind in myself, and know not myself for Vanity. Thou art hidden from me in my Blindness, and yet thou art near unto me ; but thy Wrath which my Desire hath av'akened i» me, hath made me dark. O take but the Desire of my Soul to thee? prove it, O LORD, and bruise it, that my Soul may obtain a Ray of thy sweet Grace.
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.
1O thou Breath of the great Love of God, quicken I beseech thee my weak Breath in me, that it may begin to Hunger and Thirst after thee. O Lord Jesus , thou sweet Strength, I beseech thee give my Soul to drink of thy Fountain of Grace, thy sweet Water of eternal Life, that it may awake from Death and thirst after thee. O how extreme fainting I am for Want of thy Strength ! O merciful God, do thou turn me I beseech thee, I cannot turn myself. O thou Vanquisher of Death, help me I pray thee to wrestle. How fast doth the Enemy hold me with his three Chains , and will not suffer the Desire of my Soul to Of True Repentance . 1*3 come before thee ! I beseech thee come and take the. Desire of my Soul into thyself. Be thou my drawing to the Father, and delivef me from the Devils Bonds ! Look not upon my Deformity in standing naked before thee, having lost thy Garment! I pray thee, do but thou clothe that Breath which yet liveth in me and panteth after thy Grace ; and so shall I yet see thy Salvation.
2O thou deep Love, I pray thee take the Desire of my Soul into thee : bring it forth out of the Bonds of Death through thy Death, in thy Resurrection, in thee. O quicken me in thy Strength, that my Desire and Will may begin to spring up and flourish anew. O thou Vanquisher of Death and of the Wrath m of God, do thou overcome in me Self; break its Will and bruise my Soul, that it may fear before thee, and be ashamed of its own Will “before „thy Judgment ', and that it may be ever obedient to thee as an Instrument ; of thine. Subdue it in the Bonds of Death; take away its Power, that it may will nothing without thee.
3Q God the Holy Ghost in Christ my Saviour, teach me, I pray thee, what I shall do, that I may turn to thee. O draw me in Christ to the Father, and help me, that now and from hence forward I may go forth from Sin and Vanity, and never any more enter into them again. Stir up in me a true Sorrow for the Sins k have committed. O keep me in thy Bonds, and let me not loose from thee, lest the Devil sift me in my wicked Flesh and Blood, and bring me again into the Death of Death. O enlighten thou my Spirit, that I may see the Divine Path, and walk in it continually. O take that away from me, which always turneth me away from thee ; and give me that which always turneth me to thee : take me wholly from myself, and give me wholly to thyself. O let me begin nothing, let me will, think, and do nothing without thee. O Lord how long ! Indeed I am not worthy of thg.t which I desire of thee, I pray thee let the Desire of my Soul dwell but in the Gates of thy Courts ; make it but a Servant of thy Servants. O preserve it from that horrible Pit, wherein there is no Comfort or Refreshment. O God in Christ Jesus! I am blind in myself, and know not myself for Vanity. Thou art hidden from me in my Blindness, and yet thou art near unto me ; but thy Wrath which my Desire hath av'akened i» me, hath made me dark. O take but the Desire of my Soul to thee? prove it, O LORD, and bruise it, that my Soul may obtain a Ray of thy sweet Grace.
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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