Blaise Pascal, Pensées
20 quotes
"There are three sources of belief: reason, custom, inspiration."
"He no longer loves the person whom he loved ten years ago. I quite believe it. She is no longer the same, nor is he. He was young, and she also; she is quite different. He would perhaps love her yet, if she were what she was then."
"Men spend their time in following a ball or a hare it is the pleasure even of kings."
"What a Chimera is man! What a novelty, a monster, a chaos, a contradiction, a prodigy! Judge of all things, an imbecile worm; depository of truth, and sewer of error and doubt; the glory and refuse of the universe."
"All of humanity's problems stem from man's inability to sit quietly in a room alone."
"Lust is the source of all our actions, and humanity."
"Nature has made all her truths independent of one another. Our art makes one dependent on the other."
"Those honor nature well, who teach that she can speak on everything."
"All things can be deadly to us, even the things made to serve us; as in nature walls can kill us, and stairs can kill us, if we do not walk circumspectly."
"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...?"
"The knowledge of God without that of man's misery causes pride. The knowledge of man's misery without that of God causes despair. The knowledge of Jesus Christ is the middle course, because in Him we find both God and our misery."
"If man studied himself, he would see how incapable he is of going further."
"Curiosity is only vanity. We usually only want to know something so that we can talk about it."
"Finally, let them recognise that there are two kinds of people one can call reasonable; those who serve God with all their heart because they know Him, and those who seek Him with all their heart because they do not know Him."
"Men seek rest in a struggle against difficulties; and when they have conquered these, rest becomes insufferable."
"This dog is mine," said those poor children; "that is my place in the sun." Here is the beginning and the image of the usurpation of all the earth."
"The art of opposition and of revolution is to unsettle established customs, sounding them even to their source, to point out their want of authority and justice."
"I do not admire the excess of a virtue like courage unless I see at the same time an excess of the opposite virtue, as in Epaminondas, who possessed extreme courage and extreme kindness. We show greatness not by being at one extreme, but by touching both at once and occupying all the space in between."
"Knowing God without knowing our wretchedness leads to pride. Knowing our wretchedness without knowing God leads to despair. Knowing Jesus Christ is the middle course, because in him we find both God and our wretchedness."
"We must keep our thought secret, and judge everything by it, while talking like the people."