Write to Walton, the British Boehmist, whose letters interest by the
information they contain of himself and of his literary ventures. Any
disciple of the distinguished Mystic and student of his works, living
in foggy London in these times, is as significant and noteworthy as
are students of Hegel in St. Louis.[21] Mysticism is the sacred spark
that has lighted the piety and illuminated the philosophy of all places
and times. It has kindled especially and kept alive the profoundest
thinking of Germany and of the continent since Boehme's first work,
"The Aurora," appeared. Some of the deepest thinkers since then have
openly acknowledged their debt to Boehme, or secretly borrowed without
acknowledgment their best illustrations from his writings. It is
conceded that his was one of the most original and subtlest of minds,
and that he has exercised a deeper influence on the progress of thought
than any one since Plotinus. Before Bacon, before Newton, Swedenborg,
Goethe, he gave theories of nature, of the signatures of colors and
forms, of the temperaments, the genesis of sex, the lapse of souls, and
of the elementary worlds. He stripped life of its husk, and delivered
its innermost essence. Instead of mythology, he gave, if not science,
the germs, if nothing more. And when the depths of his thinking have
been fathomed by modern observers it will be soon enough to speak of
new revelations and arcana. His teeming genius is the genuine mother
of numberless theories since delivered, from whose trunk the natural
sciences have branched forth and cropped out in scientific systems.
And like Swedenborg, it has borne a theology, cosmology, illustrious
theosophists and naturalists,--Law, Leibnitz, Oken, Schelling, Goethe,
Baader, and other philosophers of Germany.
[Footnote 21: A mystic book entitled "Quinquenergia, or Proposals for a
new Practical Theology," by Henry S. Sutton, was published in London in
1854. Mr. Sutton is plainly tinctured with Boehme's theosophy, if not
a disciple of his as appears from his book. It is a volume of singular
originality, and the latest modern attempt at a Genesis from First
Principles that I have met with. It seems to have attracted few readers
in England or in this country.]
His learned English disciple and translator, Rev. William Law, an
author once highly esteemed and much read by a former generation of
pietists, says of him in his Introduction to Boehme's Works:--
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
Reviews
Reviews
No reviews yet
Be the first to share your thoughts on this work.
Elsewhere in the archive
Join the Discussion
Join the discussion
Sign in to leave a comment or review.
Sign InorCreate an account