Blaise Pascal Quotes
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If we do not know ourselves to be full of pride, ambition, lust, weakness, misery, and injustice, we are indeed blind. And if, knowing this, we do not desire deliverance, what can we say of a man...?
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Our senses will not admit anything extreme. Too much noise confuses us, too much light dazzles us, too great distance or nearness prevents vision, too great prolixity or brevity weakens an argument, too much pleasure gives pain, too much accordance annoys.
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Excuse me, pray." Without that excuse I would not have known there was anything amiss.
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The eternal silence of these infinite spaces frightens me.
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Unable to make what is just strong, we have made what is strong just.
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The only shame is to have none.
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Bless yourself with holy water, have Masses said, and so on; by a simple and natural process this will make you believe, and will dull you - will quiet your proudly critical intellect.
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The last thing we decide in writing a book is what to put first.
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We run heedlessly into the abyss after putting something in front of us to stop us from seeing it.
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Man governs himself more by impulse than reason.
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Most of man's trouble comes from his inability to be still.
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All the unhappiness of men arises from one single fact, that they cannot stay quietly in their own chamber.
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Passion cannot be beautiful without excess; one either loves too much or not enough.
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The last function of reason is to recognize that there are an infinity of things which surpass it.
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Great and small suffer the same mishaps.
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Evil is easily discovered; there is an infinite variety; good is almost unique. But some kinds of evil are almost as difficult to discover as that which we call good; and often particular evil of this class passes for good. It needs even a certain greatness of soul to attain to this, as to that which is good.
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If the public thought elevates you above the generality of men, let the other humble you, and hold you in a perfect equality with all mankind, for this is your natural condition.
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The captain of a ship is not chosen from those of the passengers who comes from the best family.
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If he exalts himself, I humble him. If he humbles himself, I exalt him. And I go on contradicting him Until he understands That he is a monster that passes all understanding.
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Men are so completely fools by necessity that he is but a fool in a higher strain of folly who does not confess his foolishness.
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To ridicule philosophy is really to philosophize.
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A little thing comforts us because a little thing afflicts us.
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It is dangerous to tell the people that the laws are unjust; for they obey them only because they think them just. Therefore it isnecessary to tell them at the same time that they must obey them because they are laws, just as they must obey superiors, not because they are just, but because they are superiors. In this way all sedition is prevented.
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The gospel to me is simply irresistible.