[9] Paracelsus and others used the term _Mysterium magnum_ to denote the original, but unoriginated, matter out of which all things were made. "Mysterium" is anything out of which something germinally contained in it can be developed. [10] _Mysterium magnum_, xxix. 1-2. [11] _Forty Questions_, i. 57. [12] _Sig. re._ ii. 4-15, and iii. 1-10. [13] _The Threefold Life of Man_, iii. 2. [14] _Aurora_, iii. 35-39. [15] _Ibid._ vi. 6-8; _Clavis_, 18-29. [16] _Sig. re._ xvi. i. [17] _Aurora_, xiii. 48-57; _Myst. mag._ viii. 31; _The Three Principles_, iv. 66. [18] _Sig. re._ xv. 38. [19] _Myst. mag._ viii. 27. [20] _Myst. mag._ xxix. 1-10. [21] _The Three Principles_, iv. 68-74; _The Threefold Life_, iv. 33. [22] _Myst. mag._ ix. 3-8. [23] _Aurora_, Preface 84. [24] Christopher Walton, _Notes and Materials for a Biography of Wm. Law_ (London, 1854), 55. [25] The great passages in which Boehme expounds the seven qualities are found in the _Aurora_, chaps. viii.-xi.; _Sig. re._ chap. xiv.; _The Clavis_, 54-132; though they are more or less definitely stated or implied in nearly everything he wrote. Seven "qualities" or "principles" or "sources" appear and reappear in ever shifting forms throughout the entire literature of Gnosticism, alchemy, and nature-mysticism. [26] _Aurora_, viii. 32-35. [27] Some of Boehme's enthusiastic friends insist that Sir Isaac Newton, who was an admirer of Boehme, "ploughed with Boehme's heifer," _i.e._ got his suggestion of the law of universal gravitation from the philosopher of Goerlitz. See Walton, _Notes_, p. 46 and _passim_. [28] _Sig. re._ iv. _passim_. [29] _Sig. re._ xiii. [30] For fuller treatment of this point see Boutroux, _Historical Studies in Philosophy_, chapter on "Jacob Boehme, the German Philosopher," pp. 199-201. [31] _Third Epistle_, 33. [32] _Twenty-fourth Epistle_, 7; _Sig. re._ i. [33] _The Threefold Life_, vi. 47. [34] _The Three Princ._ xiv. 89; _First Epistle_, 42. [35] _The Three Princ._ x. 26; xvi. 50. [36] _Ibid._ x. 13. [37] _Aurora_, xviii. 49. [38] _Myst. mag._ xxii. 41. [39] _Ibid._ xviii. 31-43, given in substance. [40] _Ibid._ xxvi. 19. The place of Christ in Boehme's system will be given in the next chapter. [41] _Myst. mag._ xxvi. 5. [42] _Incarnation_, part ii. ix. 12-14. [43] _Aurora_, x. 100-103. [44] _Ibid._ xix. 56-59. [45] _The Supersensual Life_, 36. [46] _The Three Princ._ ix. 25-27 and xix. 33. [47] _Myst. mag._ viii. 28. [48] _The Supersensual Life_, 38. Every reader will naturally be reminded of Milton's great lines: "The mind is its own place, and in itself Can make a heaven of hell, a hell of heaven." There were no doubt many _sources_ in Milton's time for such a conception, but the poet surely would read the translations of Boehme which were coming from the press all through the period of his literary activity. [49] _The Threefold Life_, xi. 106. [50] _Election_, i. 10-17. [51] _Aurora_, ii. 63.