DOI Page / Citation link:
https://doi.org/10.11588/diglit.6656#0055
XXI.
Portrait Statuette in ivory. A Shoemaker.
Height 3\ in.
This carefully executed statuette is the portrait of Jacob Boehme, the shoemaker and celebrated
Theosoph and mystic. He was born in Silesia in 1575, of poor parents. His childhood was spent in herding
cattle, and up to his tenth year he had received no instruction whatever; yet, at this early period, we find
the germs of the rich forcible imagination, the devout contemplative temper and the leaning to the supernatural,
which bore such abundant fruits in his later life. To this temperament, to his solitary life, and to his morbidly
sensitive organization he was indebted, perhaps, for the visions and reveries, which he himself regarded as
miraculous. When he was 10 years of age, with a view to qualify him for a trade, his parents sent him to
school. Here he learnt to read and write, and was instructed in the fundamental principles of Christianity. The
latter found a congenial soil, and struck deep root into his heart; and in the Sacred writings, more particularly
in the Apocalyptical books, he found nourishment for his excitable imagination and his love of the supernatural.
The trade selected for him, that of a shoemaker, gave scope for his love of contemplation, and contributed
to foster it. During his apprenticeship and the years, which, in accordance with the custom of his country,
he spent in travelling as a journeyman before commencing the practice of his trade as a master, he led
a solitary life, given up to lonely musings upon the loftiest and most abstract subjects. The religious
disputes, which were raging at that time in Saxony, excited to a certain extent his attention, but his
eminently devout and Christian temper raised him above sectarian strife. The severity of his morals, and,
if we may so term it, his religious consciousness contributed to increase his isolation. He was exceedingly
tolerant, and neither attacked the religious opinions of others, nor was anxious to propagate his own. His
extreme ignorance acted most unfavorably upon his religious, philosophical and poetical development, and,
combined with his lonely dreamy life, subjected him to many delusions. In 1594 he settletl at Gorlitz in
his native country, to practise his trade, and soon afterwards he married the daughter of a butcher, with
whom he lived there for 30 years in great happiness. It would be out of place here to narrate the
occurrences, in his judgement miraculous, which led him into authorship, and made him the founder of
a sect of which there was a branch even in England, or to do more than allude to his supposed revelations
and to his >peculations, concerning God, man, nature, sin, repentance etc. etc. We find in his first writings
traces of an intimate acquaintance with the Holy Scriptures, of some knowledge of a few learned authors,
and of his familiarity with the >peculations of the mystics and alchymists. His first work was published
in 1G12, his last in 1624. He was a voluminous writer, and there have been several collected, and some
comparatively recent, editions of his works. For the general reader they are either unintelligible or without
Portrait Statuette in ivory. A Shoemaker.
Height 3\ in.
This carefully executed statuette is the portrait of Jacob Boehme, the shoemaker and celebrated
Theosoph and mystic. He was born in Silesia in 1575, of poor parents. His childhood was spent in herding
cattle, and up to his tenth year he had received no instruction whatever; yet, at this early period, we find
the germs of the rich forcible imagination, the devout contemplative temper and the leaning to the supernatural,
which bore such abundant fruits in his later life. To this temperament, to his solitary life, and to his morbidly
sensitive organization he was indebted, perhaps, for the visions and reveries, which he himself regarded as
miraculous. When he was 10 years of age, with a view to qualify him for a trade, his parents sent him to
school. Here he learnt to read and write, and was instructed in the fundamental principles of Christianity. The
latter found a congenial soil, and struck deep root into his heart; and in the Sacred writings, more particularly
in the Apocalyptical books, he found nourishment for his excitable imagination and his love of the supernatural.
The trade selected for him, that of a shoemaker, gave scope for his love of contemplation, and contributed
to foster it. During his apprenticeship and the years, which, in accordance with the custom of his country,
he spent in travelling as a journeyman before commencing the practice of his trade as a master, he led
a solitary life, given up to lonely musings upon the loftiest and most abstract subjects. The religious
disputes, which were raging at that time in Saxony, excited to a certain extent his attention, but his
eminently devout and Christian temper raised him above sectarian strife. The severity of his morals, and,
if we may so term it, his religious consciousness contributed to increase his isolation. He was exceedingly
tolerant, and neither attacked the religious opinions of others, nor was anxious to propagate his own. His
extreme ignorance acted most unfavorably upon his religious, philosophical and poetical development, and,
combined with his lonely dreamy life, subjected him to many delusions. In 1594 he settletl at Gorlitz in
his native country, to practise his trade, and soon afterwards he married the daughter of a butcher, with
whom he lived there for 30 years in great happiness. It would be out of place here to narrate the
occurrences, in his judgement miraculous, which led him into authorship, and made him the founder of
a sect of which there was a branch even in England, or to do more than allude to his supposed revelations
and to his >peculations, concerning God, man, nature, sin, repentance etc. etc. We find in his first writings
traces of an intimate acquaintance with the Holy Scriptures, of some knowledge of a few learned authors,
and of his familiarity with the >peculations of the mystics and alchymists. His first work was published
in 1G12, his last in 1624. He was a voluminous writer, and there have been several collected, and some
comparatively recent, editions of his works. For the general reader they are either unintelligible or without