(Vol. viii., p. 13.)
Some farther particulars respecting the writings of that remarkable
character, who, according to your correspondent, "led astray William Law,
and through him tinctured the religious philosophy of Coleridge, and from
whom Schelling stole the corner-stones of his _Philosophy of Nature_,"
may perhaps interest the readers of "N. & Q."
Who Böhme, or Behmen, was, may be seen by a reference to Francis Okely's
_Memoir_ of him, and to the article in the _Penny Cyclopædia_ (vol. v.
p. 61.) written by Dr. Bialloblotzky; which, with the exception of a
few trifling errors, is carefully compiled. The true character of his
philosophy has been ably and fully described in the later writings of
William Law, especially in his _Animadversions on Dr. Trapp_ (at the end
of _An Appeal to all that Doubt or Disbelieve the Truths of Revelation_);
in _The Way to Divine Knowledge_; _The Spirit of Love_; his _Letters_;
and in the fragment of a _Dialogue_, prefixed to the first of the four
volumes in 4to. of Behmen's _Works_.
Behmen's writings first became generally known in this country by
translations of the most important of them by a gentleman of the name
of Ellistone, and of minor ones by Mr. Humphrey Blunden and others.
Ellistone dying before he had completed the translation of the great work
upon _Genesis_, it was continued by his cousin, John Sparrow, a barrister
in the Temple; who also translated and published the remainder of
Behmen's writings in the English language. Respecting these individuals,
William Law, in a letter written in reply to one received from a Mr.
Stephen Penny, speaks in the following terms:
"The translators of Jacob Behmen, Ellistone and Sparrow, are
much to be honoured for their work; they had great piety and
great abilities, and well apprehended their author, especially
Ellistone: but the translation is _too much loaded with words_,
and in many places _the sense is mistaken_.[2]
"A new translator of Jacob Behmen is not to have it in
intention to make his author more intelligible by softening
or refining his language. His style is what it is, strange
and uncommon; not because he wanted learning and skill in
words, but because what he saw and conceived was quite new and
strange, never seen or spoken of before; and therefore if he
was to put it down in writing, words must be used to signify
that which they had never done before.
"If it shall please God that I undertake this work, I shall
only endeavour to make Jacob Behmen speak as he would have
spoken, had he wrote in English. Secondly, to guard the reader
at certain places from wrong apprehensions of his meaning, by
adding here and there a note, as occasion requires. Thirdly,
and chiefly, by Prefaces or Introductions to prepare and direct
the reader in the true use of these writings. This last is most
of all necessary, and yet would be entirely needless, if the
reader would but observe Jacob Behmen's own directions. For
there is not an error, defect, or wrong turn, which the reader
can fall into, in the use of these books, but is most plainly
set before him by Jacob Behmen.
"Many persons of learning in the last century read Jacob Behmen
with great earnestness; but it was only, as it were, to steal
from him certain mysteries of Nature, and to run away with the
philosopher's stone; and yet nowhere could they see the folly
and impossibility of their attempt so fully shown them, as by
Jacob Behmen himself."
A well-engraved portrait of John Sparrow may occasionally be met with in
some of the small quarto English treatises of Behmen.
The four-volume edition of Jacob Behmen's _Works_, in large 4to.,
1764-81, is an unsatisfactory performance; having, in fact, nothing
in common with the projected edition by William Law, as expressed in
the above letter. Nevertheless, it has been useful in many respects;
especially as being instrumental in making the productions of Dion.
Andreas Freher more generally known. This edition, moreover, is
incomplete; as several important treatises, besides his Letters, are
entirely omitted. The order, too, in which the pieces are inserted from
the _Book of the Incarnation_ is altogether wrong.
It is a common, but erroneous supposition, that William Law was the
editor of this edition. From his work, _The Way to Divine Knowledge_,
printed some years after the date of the letter quoted {247} above, it
appears that he intended to publish a new and correct translation of
Behmen's _Works_; but did not survive to accomplish it. He died in 1761,
before the first of the four volumes was published; and if he were in
any way identified with it, it could only be by some one or two of his
corrections (found in his own copy of the _Works_ after his decease)
being incorporated therein; but of this there is some uncertainty.
The Symbols, or Emblems, which are stated in the title-page of this
edition to have been "left by Mr. Law," were not his production, but
merely copies of the originals themselves. These were all designed by
the above Dionysius Andreas Freher, a learned German, who had resided
in this country from about the year 1695 till his death in 1728, in
illustration of his own systematic elucidations of the ground and
principles of the central philosophy of Deity and Nature, opened as a new
original, and _final_ revelation from God, in "his chosen instrument,
Behmen." It was, I believe, from Freher, that Francis Lee (see "N. &
Q." Vol. ii., p. 355.) became so deeply versed in the scope and design
of high supersensual and mystical truth. From the year 1740, Freher,
by his writings, demonstrations and diagrams, may be considered the
_closet-tutor_ of William Law at his philosophical retreat at King's
Cliffe, in respect to the great mysteries of Truth and Nature, the origin
and constitution of things, glanced at in what are popularly called Law's
later or mystical writings.
Next to Behmen's _Works_, and coupled with those of Law, Freher's
writings and illustrations must, in regard to theosophical science, be
considered the most valuable and important in existence. Freher also
was personally acquainted with Gichtel, who was deeply imbued with the
philosophy of Jacob Behmen, viz. "_the fundamental opening of all the
powers that work both in Nature and Grace_;" and who, perhaps more than
any other individual, experimentally lived and _fathomed_ it.
Freher's original manuscripts and copies of others (besides those
formerly in the possession of William Law), as well as the manuscripts
of Law and of Francis Lee, and some original documents relating to the
Philadelphian mystic author, Mrs. Jane Lead (Lee's mother-in-law) are
now in the possession of Mr. Christopher Walton, of Ludgate Street; who,
I understand, is on the eve of completing, for private circulation, a
voluminous account of these celebrated individuals. It will also contain,
if I am correctly informed, a representation of the whole nature and
scope of mystical divinity and theosophical science, as apprehensible
from an _orthodox_ evangelical--or, in a word, a _standard_ point of
view; as likewise of the nature and relations of the modern experimental
transcendentalism of Animal Magnetism, with its inductions of the trance
and _clairvoyance_, in respect to the _astral_ as well as _Divine_ magic;
with other similar recondite, but now lost, philosophy. But to return to
Behmen.
The publication of the large edition of his _Works_ in question was
undertaken at the sole expense of Mrs. Hutcheson, one of the two ladies
who were Mr. Law's companions and friends in his retirement at King's
Cliffe, out of respect to his memory; and who furnished the books Mr.
Law left behind him relating to this object. The chief editor was a Mr.
George Ward, assisted by a Mr. Thomas Langcake, two former friends and
admirers of Law; who occasionally superintended his pieces through the
press, being then resident in London. And the reason of this edition not
being completed was, that both Mrs. Hutcheson and Mr. Ward died about the
time of the publication of the fourth volume; Mrs. Gibbon[3], the aunt of
the historian, it appears, not being willing to continue the publication.
All that these parties did as editors was, to take the original
translations, change the phraseology here and there without reference
to the German original (which language it is supposed they did not
understand), omit certain portions of the translator's Prefaces, alter
the capital letters of a few words, and conduct the treatises through the
press.
The literary productions which have commanded the admiration and
approbation of such deep thinkers as Sir Isaac Newton[4], William Law,
Schelling, Hegel, and Coleridge, may perhaps, before long, be thought
worthy of republication. What is required is a well-edited and correct
translation of Behmen's entire _Works_, coupled with {248} those of
Freher, his great illustrator, (including also the Emblems, &c. of
Gichtel's German edition), and preceded by those of Law, which treat upon
the same subject, namely:--1. Answer to Hoadley on the Sacrament of the
Lord's Supper. 2. Christian Regeneration. 3. Animadversions on Dr. Trapp.
4. The Appeal. 5. The Way to Divine Knowledge. 6. The Spirit of Love. 7.
Confutation of Warburton. 8. Letters.
To conclude. The following are the terms in which William Law speaks of
Behmen's writings in one of his letters:
"Therein is opened the true ground of the unchangeable
_distinction between God and Nature_, making all nature,
whether temporal or eternal, its own proof that it is not,
cannot be, God, but purely and solely the _want_ of God; and
can be nothing else in itself but a restless painful want, till
a supernatural God manifests himself in it. This is a doctrine
which the learned of all ages have known nothing of; not a
book, ancient or modern, in all our libraries, has so much as
attempted to open the _ground_ of nature to show its _birth_
and _state_, and its essential unalterable distinction from
the one _abyssal supernatural_ God; and how all the glories,
powers, and perfections of the hidden, unapproachable God, have
their wonderful manifestation in nature and creature."
And on another occasion:
"In the Revelation made to this wonderful man, the first
_beginning_ of _all_ things in eternity is opened; the whole
state, the _rise_, _workings_, and _progress_ of all Nature
is revealed; and every doctrine, mystery, and precept of the
Gospel is found, not to have sprung from any _arbitrary_
appointment, but to have its _eternal_, _unalterable_ ground
and reason in Nature. And God appears to save us by the methods
of the Gospel, because there was no other possible way to save
us in all the possibility of Nature."
And again:
"Now, though the difference between God and Nature has always
been supposed and believed, yet the true ground of such
distinction, or the _why_, the _how_, and in _what_ they are
essentially different, and must be so to all eternity, was to
be found in no books, till the goodness of God, in a way not
less than that of _miracle_, made a poor illiterate man, in the
simplicity of a child, to open and relate the deep mysterious
_ground of all things_."
Thus much upon the "reveries" of our "poor possessed cobbler." It may be
well to add, that Freher's writings (in sequence to those of Law above
named) are all but essential for the proper understanding of Behmen,
especially of his descriptions of the _generation of Nature_, as to its
_seven_ properties, _two_ co-eternal principles, and _three_ constituent
parts: which is the deepest and most difficult point of all others to
apprehend rightly (that is, with intellectual clearness, as well as
sensitively in our own spiritual regeneration), and indeed the key to
every mystery of truth and life.