Jakob Böhme

“ Our Meaning might seem very difficult to the Reader, in that we go so far about and shew Christ all along therein; at which let no Man Wonder, we do not seek Gold, or any temporal Goods thereby, and drive Man into vain Curiosities; we speak only with the Children whom God has chosen thereunto; for the Time is born, where that which is lost shall be again found; yea not only the Universal for the Body of this World, but also for the Soul. ”

“ This is an Universal, which also changes the Enmity or Malignity of all Diseases in the human Body into one Will [into unity] ; so that the raging and raving, viz. the seven Forms of Life in their Enmity become unanimous; and then the Hunger of the Disease ceases, and the Process to the Universal is as has been already mentioned. It is not my Intention to mention a clear Declaration thereof; it is clear enough; he that will not seek thereby a new Man born in God, and apply himself diligently thereto, let him not meddle with my writings. ”

“ The Soul of the Earth, viz. the Property of the Fire of the first Principle is entered into its Self-hood, viz. into God's Anger; now the Heaven is hidden in it; therefore the Artist must in his Work reduce the Soul in the Curse and the Heaven again into one: He must introduce the Soul again into Heaven, or else there is no Possibility: Now he cannot bring the Soul in its Iniquity into Heaven, for it will not, and therefore he must bring the Heaven into the Soul, and wholly give in the Heaven to the Soul, that the Soul may eat of Heaven, whether she will or no ”

“ Therefore let the Artist but consider how he may give Death to the Death with the pure Life, and how he may awaken the dead and disappeared Life, which is heavenly, and lies hidden and captivated in the Curse, so that it may again receive the Fire-Soul ”

“ But seeing the Verbum Fiat stands yet to this Day creating of the corporal Essence, it does again make a fixed perfect Essence; as the like is brought to pass in the philosophic Work, where a new Life arises out of Death, as God does raise us up in himself in Christ, if we die to Self-hood, and wholly resign up ourselves to him. ”

“ I have not written anything for such a Seeker, and also he shall not be able to apprehend our Meaning fundamentally, though he strives never so much about it, unless he enters into the Resignation in Christ; there he may apprehend the Spirit of the Universal, otherwise all is to no Purpose; and we faithfully warn the curious Critic not to amuse himself, for he will not effect anything in this Way, unless he himself enters thereinto, and then it will be shewn him without much seeking ”

“ Thus the Artist's Work is exactly and throughout no otherwise: For Man was created out of all Beings, out of the Heaven and Earth; but when he became wholly earthly, and the Curse seized on him, the Curse also came over the earthly Being, from whence Man was made: Thus the Heaven was shut up from Man, and the Heaven also was shut up in the Earth, as Metals, Trees, and Herbs, in the Food of Man, and whatever belonged to his Ornament and Delight. ”

“ He was a Death to Death, and brought forth the Life out of Death into the eternal Liberty: He arose in the divine Omnipotence in the Essence of the first Adam: God's Spirit in the speaking eternal Word brought forth Adam out of Death in Christ's Humanity. Adam arose in Christ's Humanity, and all the Children of Adam, which are Partakers of Christ's Kingdom, arise in Christ; all in Christ's Flesh and Blood, Soul and Spirit, but every one in his Creature which he has had here, and mortified in Christ's Death.
9. Every one is a particular Twig ”

“ Now the Creature of Christ does it not alone, but God in his Image through the Creature in the Dominion of his Eternal Spirit of all the three Principles, which is the Life and Dominion of every Being, in each Thing according to its Property.
3. And understand us right, when Christ died on the Cross, the Name Jesus did not also die, which destroyed Death, and tinctured the expressed Word, viz. the Form of the Deity (or the formed Word) , viz. the Soul with Love: No, it cannot be, the Eternity does not die, only the spoken Word, which stands again in the Desire of the Speaking, viz. ”

“ The Artist must well observe this; in the Blood of the young Man, when his Pearl gives itself to the three Murtherers, that it also sheds its Blood in and with the young Man's, then the Champion stands in Hell, and disclaims the human Self-hood: Then the white Lion appears upon his crimson-coloured Beast; even there lies the Cure of Sickness, and the Death of Death. ”

“ Thus when the heavenly Essence gives its Desire to the Murtherer, the Murtherer is dismayed at the dear Love-Life, and arises in the Flagrat in the heavenly Essentiality; thus the disappeared Essence does again receive the Fire Flagrat into itself, and wholly unites itself with the Fire-Life; and so the Fire must burn in Love and Meekness, and forego its Right in the Centre, as the Light which shines from the Fire; thus and no otherwise the heavenly Essence obtains its Life ”

“ And thus when the expressed Mercury in the Sulphur of Saturn resigns its Selfhood into Venus, then the Verbum Fiat changes it again into such an Essence according to the Lubet of the Liberty; the Death arises in a new Body out of the Darkness of Death, in a white fair Colour, but as an hidden Lustre, wherein the Colour is not rightly and distinctly known, till it dissolves itself, and the Materia becomes desiring ”

“ The outward working sensitive Life wherein the Anger of God was set on Fire did wholly die away, not that it should be a Nothing, but it fell into the Nothing, viz. into God's Will, into God's Working and Feeling, quite from the Will of the outward World, which is Evil and Good, so that it might no longer live to the World, viz. ”