Blaise Pascal Quotes
-
There are plenty of maxims in the world; all that remains is to apply them.
-
Rules for Definitions. I. Not to undertake to define any of the things so well known of themselves that the clearer terms cannot be had to explain them. II. Not to leave any terms that are at all obscure or ambiguous without definition. III. Not to employ in the definition of terms any words but such as are perfectly known or already explained.
-
A little thing comforts us because a little thing afflicts us.
-
Rules for Axioms. I. Not to omit any necessary principle without asking whether it is admittied, however clear and evident it may be. II. Not to demand, in axioms, any but things that are perfectly evident in themselves.
-
How I hate this folly of not believing in the Eucharist, etc.! If the gospel be true, if Jesus Christ be God, what difficulty is there?
-
A few rules include all that is necessary for the perfection of the definitions, the axioms, and the demonstrations, and consequently of the entire method of the geometrical proofs of the art of persuading.
-
We run heedlessly into the abyss after putting something in front of us to stop us from seeing it.
-
Passion cannot be beautiful without excess; one either loves too much or not enough.
-
Thus he had a double thought: the one by which he acted as king, the other by which he recognized his true state, and that it was accident alone that had placed him in his present condition.
-
These eight rules above contain all the precepts for solid and immutable proofs.
-
Justice is what is established; and thus all our established laws will necessarily be regarded as just without examination, since they are established.
-
I make no doubt... that these rules are simple, artless, and natural.
-
We have so exalted a notion of the human soul that we cannot bear to be despised, or even not to be esteemed by it. Man, in fact, places all his happiness in this esteem.
-
Nothing fortifies scepticism more than that there are some who are not sceptics; if all were so, they would be wrong.
-
The mind has its arrangement; it proceeds from principles to demonstrations. The heart has a different mode of proceeding.
-
God is surrounded with people full of love who demand of him the benefits of love which are in his power: thus he is properly the king of love.
-
This right which you have, is not founded any more than his upon any quality or any merit in yourself which renders you worthy of it. Your soul and your body are, of themselves, indifferent to the state of boatman or that of duke; and there is no natural bond that attaches them to one condition rather than to another.
-
If you act externally with men in conformity with your rank, you should recognize, by a more secret but truer thought, that you have nothing naturally superior to them.
-
Nature has some perfections to show that she is the image of God, and some defects to show that she is only His image.
-
The only shame is to have none.
-
The principles of pleasure are not firm and stable. They are different in all mankind, and variable in every particular with such a diversity that there is no man more different from another than from himself at different times.
-
Without [diversion] we would be in a state of weariness, and this weariness would spur us on to seek a more solid means of escaping from it. But diversion amuses us, and leads us unconsciously to death.
-
The exterior must be joined to the interior to obtain anything from God, that is to say, we must kneel, pray with the lips, and soon, in order that proud man, who would not submit himself to God, may be now subject to the creature.
-
At the centre of every human being is a God-shaped vacuum which can only be filled by Jesus Christ.