Het derde boeck des auteurs, zynde hooge ende diepe gronden van 't drievoudigh leven des menschen

13. Then the thin will and the desire in the will / their operation.

13. For the will is as thin as a nothing / and entirely still: but the desire makes it full original: "ofte bezucht," meaning burdened or sighing / and the breaking forth original: "upt-vloepen," meaning to pop out or erupt in the desire / those are the essences the fundamental building blocks of spiritual matter like a sting of perception original: "bevindelijckheydt," referring to experiential knowledge [or a spark of feeling] (which is against perception:) which the desire also cannot tolerate / and it pulls much more vehemently [or powerfully] upon it: thus the sting [then] becomes greater / and rages against the pulling / and yet it cannot come out of it: for the desire births it / and yet cannot [tolerate] it: for it is an enmity / just like heat and cold.

14. Where the contrary anguish / and the cold arises / and how the wheel becomes whirling like a wheel.

14. Thus then the desire (which is an earnest longing in itself) through its longing works such a raging (which thus sticks [or stings] in that same will) so the longing becomes thus astringent original: "amper," meaning tart, harsh, or sharp [bitter] and severely pulling to hold the sting fast / from which it gives a life of stirring movement / in which the longing receives the first shock of trembling / from which a contrary anguish arises: for in the anguish of the longing (in the pulling of the heart /) the severe cold causes itself: and the pulling is harsh / bitter / stinging / so that it thus gives [or causes] a terrifyingly severe power / which cannot tolerate the sting / and wants to tear [above] and out / and yet cannot: for it is held by its own mother (who births it) / and since it then cannot tear itself out [above] / it becomes whirling like a wheel / and divides [or scatters] the contractedness / from which the essences spiritual forces of multiplicity arise.

15. Wherein the nature of movement and of the essences arises / what has closed the still breadth into a narrowness.

15. And that is the true center the spiritual core of manifestation: for in the wheel arises the nature of movement and of the essences: and it is a band of the Spirit; although without feeling or understanding: yet in this form it is merely called / the center; for it is the circle of life which the desire (out of the still breadth) has closed into a narrowness: although it is not tangible / but everywhere thus nothing else than spirit and form of nature.

16. Of the breaking and building up of life.

16. Since then the Rager [or the Ranter] makes such a stinging bitter wheel (in the harsh [contracting] cold) / so the center is thus terrifying like a great anguish / where life is continuously broken / and also (in such a manner) is built up through the essences / and it is like life and death.

17. The present-day Philistines understand nothing of the center.

17. The Philistines Böhme's term for those without spiritual insight and high scholars of Nature / who write how nature stands in three things / such as in Sulfur, Mercury, and Salt the three alchemical principles, that same is entirely correct: but the simple person shall understand nothing at all in it: and even if it has stood open in the comprehensibility of the Wise [or that it was grasped by their understanding]

Sulfur, Mercury and Salt, also theology the spirit of the Holy Scripture.

[become open] / so the present time understands the least part of the center: but they have it in the Histories / just as also the Theology from the mouth of the Apostles / which currently goes as nothing else but a History (without power or living Spirit) (which yet was present with the Apostles) as such appears from their strife / mouth-clatter and dead letter / and convicts them.

18. Here the Author writes of his knowledge / admonishes the simple not to be offended.

18. Since we then through the grace of God reach the light / and may know the center / which is the birth of our life: so we have power to point out [to know] what is understood and grasped in those words Sulfur, Mercury, and Salt: not / that we mock the blindness of the ignorant thereby: but [that we] (as a Christian) would gladly grant and show them the light. And even if our reasons appear very simple / yet our knowledge / sense / and understanding / are very deep: no one needs to be offended by the simple speech: as if we did not have the deep understanding. Let him only read it with upright earnestness / and seriously reflect upon it (in the fear of God) / he shall well find / whose Spirit's child we have been in this description / we want to have him faithfully warned against the mockers and Hypocrites.

19. Explanation of the word Sulfur.

19. As has been told of the Sulfur, so the center is rightly called phur the fiery, dark core: but if the light is born / so the shining light (out of the phur) is called sul the soul or solar light, for it is its soul: just as I spoke of the dark center original: "centro" (where the Divine light is born) / so also of nature: although it is the same: but we must speak thus: so that we might bring the reader into the sense / that he might incline his mind to the light and thus receive [it].

20. How the two first forms hold the center.

20. For the two forms: as harsh cold: and bitter stinging / which birth themselves (through the longing) in the eternal will, they hold the center, and make the wheel of the essences where the senses / and also the feeling with the movement continuously arises eternally.

21. How the two forms / outside the others / are in great terrifying anguish.

21. Now so are these two forms in very great terrifying anguish / in themselves / outside the other forms that are born out of them. For the [contracting] harshness compares to the hard stones / and the sting of the attraction is the breaker of the harshness: thus it goes like a wheel / and is rightly called / phur: just as the language of nature points out in the same syllable.

22. How the will of the two forms may not be cap...

22. Since then those two forms go so terrifyingly in themselves in the will / and hold the will in the darkness / so it may [yet] not be captured / for its own right is to be soft and still / and that same [right] it may not