Fetching
One moment.
Fetching
One moment.
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.
14 . This happened to them both, because they had the Light of Understanding shining in Self, in which they could behold themselves, whereby the Spirit of Self went into the Imagination, (viz., into a Desire to get the Centre ,) that they might exalt themselves in Might, Power and Knowledge. Now when Lucifer sought after the Mother of Fire in his Centre, and thought to reign therewith over the Love of Qod, and all the Angels ; and when Adam Also desired to tTy in the Essence what the Mother or Root was from whence Evil and Qood did spring, and purposely brought his Desire thereinto in order to become Knowing and full of Understanding thereby : Both Lucifer and Adam were captivated in their evil or false Desire in the Mother, and broke off themselves from Resignation which proceeds from God, and so were caught 40 The JFay to Qhrist . by the Spirit of the Will, by the Desire in the Mother, ^VVhich Desire immediately got the Dominion in Nature; and so Lucifer stuck fast in the wrathful Source of Fire , and that Fire became manifest in the Spirit of his Will , whereby the Creature in its Desire became an Enemy to the Love and Meekness of GOD.
25. Adam in like Manner, was immediately caught by the earthly Mother , which is Evil and Qood, created out of the Love and Anger of God and compacted into one Substance . Whereupon the earthly Property instantly got the Dominion in Adam , and from thence Heat and Cold , Envy and Anger, and all Malice and Contrariety to Qod became manifest , and bore Rule in him. 6. But if they had not brought the Light of Knowlodge into Self then the Qlass of the Knowledge of the Centre and of the Original of the Creature , viz., of the Pozver which it had in itself , had not been manifested , from whence the Imagination and Lust did arise. ^ 7. As also we often see at this Day how the same Error bringeth Danger upon the enlightened Children of Qod ; in whom when the Sun of the great Presence of God’s Holiness shirieth , by which the Life passeth into Triumph , and Reason then beholdeth itself therein as in a Glass, and the Will goeth on in Self in its own searching, and will try what the Centre is out of which the Light shineth, and will of its own Motion and Strength force itself into it, how that from thence arise abominable Pride and Self Love ; so that its (the Creative' s) own Reason , which is but a Mirror or Qlass of the eternal Wisdom , supposeth itself to be greater than it is ; and then whatsoever it doth, it thinketh God’s
3Will doth in and by it and that it is a Prophet. Though it is moved only by itself \ and goeth on in its own Desire ; in which the Centre of Nature presently riseth up and entereth into that False Desire of Self against Qod } and so the Will entereth into Self conceit and Exaltation . 8. Then the Subtle Devil insinuateth himself into the Creature, and sifteth the Centre of Nature , and bringeth evil or false Desires into it, so that a Man becomes as it were drunken in Self ; and still persuades himself that he is driven by God ; by which means the good Beginning , wherein the Divine Light shone in Nature , cometh to be spoiled, and so the Light of Qod departeth from him. 9. Yet the outward Light of the outward Nature still remaineth shining in the Creature. For its own Self throweth itself thereinto, and supposeth that it is the first Light of Qod ; but it is not so. And into this Self Exaltation in the Light of its outward Reason the Devil throweth himself again, (though in the first $ight which was Divine> he was forced to depart), returning with Of True ‘Resignation . 4*1 » •
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.
14 . This happened to them both, because they had the Light of Understanding shining in Self, in which they could behold themselves, whereby the Spirit of Self went into the Imagination, (viz., into a Desire to get the Centre ,) that they might exalt themselves in Might, Power and Knowledge. Now when Lucifer sought after the Mother of Fire in his Centre, and thought to reign therewith over the Love of Qod, and all the Angels ; and when Adam Also desired to tTy in the Essence what the Mother or Root was from whence Evil and Qood did spring, and purposely brought his Desire thereinto in order to become Knowing and full of Understanding thereby : Both Lucifer and Adam were captivated in their evil or false Desire in the Mother, and broke off themselves from Resignation which proceeds from God, and so were caught 40 The JFay to Qhrist . by the Spirit of the Will, by the Desire in the Mother, ^VVhich Desire immediately got the Dominion in Nature; and so Lucifer stuck fast in the wrathful Source of Fire , and that Fire became manifest in the Spirit of his Will , whereby the Creature in its Desire became an Enemy to the Love and Meekness of GOD.
25. Adam in like Manner, was immediately caught by the earthly Mother , which is Evil and Qood, created out of the Love and Anger of God and compacted into one Substance . Whereupon the earthly Property instantly got the Dominion in Adam , and from thence Heat and Cold , Envy and Anger, and all Malice and Contrariety to Qod became manifest , and bore Rule in him. 6. But if they had not brought the Light of Knowlodge into Self then the Qlass of the Knowledge of the Centre and of the Original of the Creature , viz., of the Pozver which it had in itself , had not been manifested , from whence the Imagination and Lust did arise. ^ 7. As also we often see at this Day how the same Error bringeth Danger upon the enlightened Children of Qod ; in whom when the Sun of the great Presence of God’s Holiness shirieth , by which the Life passeth into Triumph , and Reason then beholdeth itself therein as in a Glass, and the Will goeth on in Self in its own searching, and will try what the Centre is out of which the Light shineth, and will of its own Motion and Strength force itself into it, how that from thence arise abominable Pride and Self Love ; so that its (the Creative' s) own Reason , which is but a Mirror or Qlass of the eternal Wisdom , supposeth itself to be greater than it is ; and then whatsoever it doth, it thinketh God’s
3Will doth in and by it and that it is a Prophet. Though it is moved only by itself \ and goeth on in its own Desire ; in which the Centre of Nature presently riseth up and entereth into that False Desire of Self against Qod } and so the Will entereth into Self conceit and Exaltation . 8. Then the Subtle Devil insinuateth himself into the Creature, and sifteth the Centre of Nature , and bringeth evil or false Desires into it, so that a Man becomes as it were drunken in Self ; and still persuades himself that he is driven by God ; by which means the good Beginning , wherein the Divine Light shone in Nature , cometh to be spoiled, and so the Light of Qod departeth from him. 9. Yet the outward Light of the outward Nature still remaineth shining in the Creature. For its own Self throweth itself thereinto, and supposeth that it is the first Light of Qod ; but it is not so. And into this Self Exaltation in the Light of its outward Reason the Devil throweth himself again, (though in the first $ight which was Divine> he was forced to depart), returning with Of True ‘Resignation . 4*1 » •
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.
No commentary for this page.