Blaise Pascal Quotes
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The past and present are only our means; the future is always our end. Thus we never really live, but only hope to live.
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Man is so made that by continually telling him he is a fool he believes it, and by continually telling it to himself he makes himself believe it. For man holds an inward talk with himself, which it pays him to regulate.
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Clarity of mind means clarity of passion, too.
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Don't try to add more years to your life. Better add more life to your years.
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Eloquence is the painting of thought.
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If man made himself the first object of study, he would see how incapable he is of going further. How can a part know the whole?
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Man's grandeur is that he knows himself to be miserable.
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It is superstitious to put one's hopes in formalities, but arrogant to refuse to submit to them.
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It is not certain that everything is uncertain.
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There would be too great darkness, if truth had not visible signs.
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If you do not love too much, you do not love enough.
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Kind words produce their own image in men's souls; and a beautiful image it is. They soothe and quiet and comfort the hearer. They shame him out of his sour, morose, unkind feelings. We have not yet begun to use kind words in such abundance as they ought to be used.
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I rather live as if God exists to find out that He doesn't than live as if he doesn't exist to find out He does.
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The gist is that good and evil are foreordained. What is foreordained comes necessarily to be after a prior act of divine volition...Rather, everything small and large is written and comes to be in a known and expected measure.
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The serene, silent beauty of a holy life is the most powerful influence in the world, next to the night of God.
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Nobody is publicly accepted as an expert on poetry unless he displays the sign of poet, mathematician, etc., but universal men want no sign and make hardly any distinction between the crafts of poet and embroiderer. Universal men are not called poets or mathematicians, etc. But they are all these things and judges of them too. No one could guess what they are, and they will talk about whatever was being talked about when they came in. One quality is not more noticeable in them than another, unless it becomes necessary to put it into practice, and then we remember it.
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Silence is the greatest persecution; never do the saints keep themselves silent.
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When malice has reason on its side, it looks forth bravely, and displays that reason in all its luster. When austerity and self-denial have not realized true happiness, and the soul returns to the dictates of nature, the reaction is fearfully extravagant.
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The Fall is an offense to human reason, but once accepted, it makes perfect sense of the human condition.
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If a man loves a woman for her beauty, does he love her? No; for the smallpox, which destroys her beauty without killing her, causes his love to cease. And if any one loves me for my judgment or my memory, does he really love me? No; for I can lose these qualities without ceasing to be.
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Man's greatness is great in that he knows himself wretched. A tree does not know itself wretched. It is then being wretched to know oneself wretched; but it is being great to know that one is wretched.
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Vanity is so anchored in the heart of man that a soldier, a soldier's servant, a cook, a porter brags and wishes to have his admirers. Even philosophers wish for them. Those who write against vanity want to have the glory of having written well; and those who read it desire the glory of having read it. I who write this have perhaps this desire, and perhaps those who will read it.
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If we examine our thoughts, we shall find them always occupied with the past or the future.
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L'homme n'est ni ange ni be" te, et le malheur veut que qui veut faire l'ange fait la be" te. Man is neither angel nor beast.Unfortunately, he who wants to act the angel often acts the beast.