BLAISE PASCAL

rom Modern Philosophy: Essential Selections, by James Fieser

Home: https://storage.googleapis.com/jfieser/315/Index.html

2008, updated 1/1/2024, CC BY-NC-ND 4.0

 

CONTENTS

Introduction

Ancient Authorities and Modern Science

Epictetus vs. Montaigne

The Limitations of Human Reasoning

Boredom and Diversion

Justice, Custom and Force

Skeptical vs. Dogmatic Sides of Human Nature

Wagering on Belief in God

Prophecies and Miracles as Proofs

The Value of Suffering

Noblemen not intrinsically Better than Ordinary People

Study Questions

 

INTRODUCTION

Blaise Pascal (1623-1662) was born in Clermont-Ferrand France into a family of prominent government officials. From infancy he suffered from health problems that continued throughout his life. His mother died when he was three, and at eight his father left his government position and moved his family of three children to Paris where the father could pursue studies in science and mathematics. Through his father's influence, Blaise too studied these areas and the two became associated with a circle of European scholars. At 17, the family moved again, where his father resumed government work as a tax official. Blaise then published works in mathematics and invented a calculating machine to aid his father's work. At age 23 he and his family converted to the Jansenist movement within Catholicism, after which he moved back to Paris where for five years he continued writing in science and mathematics. He abandoned this scholarly work at age 32 after having a second conversion, where he shifted focus to theology. In 1658 he began writing a defense, or "Apology", of Christianity, but health problems prevented this, and what remains of his effort are notes which were published eight years after his death with the title "Thoughts" (Pens es). He continued writing short pieces, but in 1662 succumbed to his lingering illness and died at the age of 39. The selections below are from his Thoughts, his principal philosophical contribution, and four shorter works, which appear in order of their composition.

The first selection is from the "Preface" to his Treatise on the Vacuum (1651), which discusses the tension between ancient authorities and modern science. On the one extreme, respect for ancient authority is sometimes so strong that the text of an ancient author is used as proof in scientific matters, completely undermining reasoning and experimentation. Others go the reverse direction and dismiss ancient authorities even in matters of religion and elevate reason alone. Pascal seeks a balance: we need to respect ancient authorities, but at the same time add to their knowledge.

The second is "Conversations with M. de Saci" which, though not composed by Pascal himself, is an account of a discussion that Pascal had with his spiritual mentor Isaac de Saci, in 1655. The topic concerns why Pascal found value in the writings of Epictetus the ancient Stoic and Michel Montaigne the modern skeptic, both of whom de Saci found harmful to religion. Pascal argues here that the combined views of these two authors created the perfect assess point for Christian belief. Epictetus correctly emphasized the need for us to submit to God's governance, yet he maintained that, by ourselves, we can know and obey God. Epictetus's flaw, then, was the vice of pride. Montaigne, on the other hand, correctly emphasized the failures of human reasoning, yet he essentially gave up on any pursuit of truth. Montaigne's flaw, then, was the vice of idleness. Pascal explains that the differences between Epictetus and Montaigne arise from their ignorance of the two states of humanity. Epictetus's view represents humanity's original perfect state of creation, and Montaigne's view represents humanity after the fall of Adam. Pascal argues that these two aspects of human nature are united in the incarnation of Jesus Christ. Thus, by recognizing the correct and incorrect aspects of both Epictetus and Montaigne, we may find resolution through Christianity.

The third is his Thoughts, which expands on the key themes of the "Conversations". His approach follows a disease-cure model. The disease is that there is not much we can confidently say about the physical world or social justice, just as Montaigne maintained. The cure for this despair is Christianity which, while not overtly provable, is nevertheless inwardly compelling because of prophesies and miracles. The discussion begins with an assessment of the limitations of human reason where Pascal is every bit as pessimistic as Montaigne. We can know almost nothing about the physical world because we are trapped within a tiny sliver of space between the infinitely large and the infinitely small. Our senses do not allow us to perceive the extremes of light, sound, length, heat and cold, which prevent us from ever attaining certainty. The relation between our human minds and or physical bodies is beyond our capacity to understand. There is, then, as Pascal says, "a natural poverty of our weak and mortal condition". This creates within us a nagging drive to distract ourselves from our unhappiness through any activity we can find, regardless how trivial. When we slow down for a moment, boredom instantly sets in. With moral issues, all we ever see in societies around us are differing conceptions of virtue and justice. True justice is unknown, and there are no natural laws common to every country. For Pascal, the problems with human reason exposed by skeptics are indeed genuine, but, as noted in the "Conversations", they only represent human nature after the fall. Christianity is the solution to both the vice of pride that goes along with the residue of our pre-fallen state, and the vice of idleness that goes along with our fallen state.

The most famous part of Pascal's Thoughts is the "Wager" where he shows us the path from skepticism to belief through faith. He presents this in an imaginary dialogue between himself and an anonymous skeptic. Pascal argues that the proofs for God's existence fail, and reason is ultimately neutral on the issue of God's existence. However, even in the absence of such proofs, there are still psychologically compelling reasons to believe in God: if our belief turns out to be correct, then we gain infinite joy in the afterlife. If our belief is not correct, then we are out nothing. Belief, then, is the more compelling wager. The wager alone, though, cannot create a sincere belief, and it is just the first step in a process whereby we begin to go to Church, participate in the traditions, and God will spark within us a genuine faith belief.

Turning next to his defense of Christianity, he argues that of all ancient histories, the Old Testament is the one that is historically trustworthy. The most compelling evidence for Christianity, then, is from prophesies and miracles described in the Bible. Concerning prophesies, he argues that these are the strongest proofs that Jesus is the messiah since, for over four thousand years, prophets uniformly proclaimed that a messiah would arise who would convert the nations. In Jesus own day, however, he needed to perform miracles to convince people that he indeed was the messiah that the prophets spoke about, so that the conversion of the nations could in fact take place. As to miracles themselves, Pascal argues that we need a test or rule to distinguish true miracles from false ones. That rule is that a given miracle must not undermine the central point that the miracle intends to prove, namely, that Jesus is the Messiah. False miracles themselves presuppose that there are true ones, in the same way that quack remedies would not be believed unless there were true ones.

The fourth selection below is from "Prayer to Ask of God the Proper Use of Sickness" composed 1660 when Pascal's health was in serious decline. In this he stresses the importance of conforming his will to God's and accepting his physical suffering as part of God's plan for him, perhaps as a punishment or method of instruction.

The fifth selection is from "Three Discourses on the Condition of the Nobility". This is another work that, while not composed by Pascal himself, was transcribed from a conversation between Pascal and a 14 year old nobleman, Charles-Honor d'Albert, the future Duke of Chevreuse. In this, Pascal emphasizes to d'Albert that his noble status arose purely by chance and that, while he should conduct himself according to his rank, he must at the same time recognize that he has no natural advantage over others.

ANCIENT AUTHORITIES AND MODERN SCIENCE ("A Preface to the Treatise on Vacuum, c. 1651)

Extreme Attitudes about Authority vs. Reasoning

The respect that we show to antiquity is at the present day carried to such a point on subjects in which it ought to have less weight, that oracles are made of all its thoughts and mysteries, even of its obscurities; that novelties can no longer be advanced without peril, and that the text of an author suffices to destroy the strongest reasons . It is not my intention to correct one error by another, and to not respect the ancients at all because others have respected them too much. I do not pretend to reject their authority in order to elevate reasoning alone, although others have sought to establish their authority alone to the prejudice of reasoning .

To make this important distinction with care, it is necessary to consider that authority depends solely on memory and is purely historical, having nothing for their object except to know what the authors have written. Reason depends solely on reasoning and is entirely dogmatic, having for their object to seek and discover concealed truths. Those from authority are limited, inasmuch as the books in which they are contained . It is according to this distinction that we must regulate differently the extent of this respect. . . .

Benefits of both Authority and Reason

In matters in which we only seek to know what the authors have written, as in history, geography, jurisprudence, languages, and especially in theology; and, in short in all those which have for their principle either simple facts or divine or human institutions, we must necessarily have recourse to their books, since all that we can know of them is therein contained, hence it is evident that we can have full knowledge of them, and that it is not possible to add anything to them.

If it is in question to know who was the first king of the French; in what spot geographers place the first meridian; what words are used in a dead language, and everything of this nature; what other means than books can guide us to them? Who can add anything new to what they teach us, since we wish only to know what they contain?

Authority alone can enlighten us on these. But the subject in which authority has the principal weight is theology, because there she is inseparable from truth, and we know it only through her. Accordingly, to give full certainty to matters incomprehensible to reason, it is sufficient to show them in the sacred books. To show the uncertainty of the most probable things, it is only necessary to show that they are not included in them. For, its principles are superior to nature and reason, and since, the mind of man being too weak to attain them by its own efforts, he cannot reach these lofty conceptions if he is not carried thither by an omnipotent and superhuman power.

It is not the same with subjects that fall under the senses and under reasoning; authority here is useless; it belongs to reason alone to know them. They have their separate rights: there the one has all the advantage, here the other reigns in turn. But as subjects of this kind are proportioned to the grasp of the mind, it finds full liberty to extend them; its inexhaustible fertility produces continually, and its inventions may be multiplied altogether without limit and without interruption .

It is thus that geometry, arithmetic, music, physics, medicine, architecture, and all the sciences that are subject to experiment and reasoning, should be enlarged to become perfect. The ancients found them merely outlined by those who preceded them; and we will leave them to those who will come after us in a more finished state than we received them. As their perfection depends on time and pains, it is evident that although our pains and time may have acquired less than their labors separate from ours, both joined together must nevertheless have more effect than each one alone.

Abuses of both Authority and Reasoning

The clearing up of this difference should make us pity the blindness of those who bring authority alone as proof in physical matters, instead of reasoning or experiments; and inspire us with horror for the wickedness of others who make use of reasoning alone in theology, instead of the authority of the scripture and the Fathers. We must raise the courage of those timid people who dare not invent anything in physics, and confuse the audacity of those rash persons who produce novelties in theology. Nevertheless the misfortune of the age is such, that we see many new opinions in theology, unknown to all antiquity, maintained with obstinacy and received with applause; while those that are produced in physics, though small in number, should, it seems, be convicted of falsehood as soon as they shock the already received opinions in the slightest degree; as if the respect that we have for the ancient philosophers were a duty, and that which we bear to the most ancient of the Fathers solely a matter of courtesy! I leave it to judicious persons to remark the importance of this abuse which perverts the order of the sciences with so much injustice; and I think that there will be few who will not wish that this liberty might be applied to other matters, since new inventions are infallible errors in the matters which we profane with impunity; and since they are absolutely necessary for the perfection of so many other subjects incomparably lower, which nevertheless we dare not approach.

Respect the Ancients but Add to their Knowledge

Let us divide our gullibility and suspicion with more justice, and limit this respect we have for the ancients. As reason gives it birth, she should also measure it; and let us consider that if they had continued in this restraint of not daring to add anything to the knowledge which they had received, or if those of their times had made the similar difficulty in receiving the novelties which they offered them, they would have deprived themselves and their posterity of the fruit of their inventions.

As they only made use of that which had been handed down to them as a means whereby to gain more, and as this fortunate daring opened to them the way to great things, we should take that which they acquired in the same manner, and by their example, make of it the means and not the end of our study, and thus strive while imitating to surpass them.

For what is more unjust than to treat our ancestors with more respect than they showed to those who preceded them, and to have for them that inviolable respect which they have only merited from us because they had not the same for those who possessed the same advantage over them? . . .

The secrets of nature are concealed. Although she is continually working, we do not always discover her effects: time reveals them from age to age, and although always alike in herself she is not always alike known.

The experiments that give us the knowledge of these secrets [of nature] are multiplied continually; and since they are the sole principles of physics, the consequences are multiplied in proportion.

It is in this manner that we may at the present day adopt different sentiments and new opinions, without despising the ancients and without ingratitude, since the first knowledge which they have given us has served as a stepping-stone to our own, and since in these advantages we are indebted to them for our ascendency over them; because being raised by their aid to a certain degree, the slightest effort causes us to climb still higher, and with less pains and less glory we find ourselves above them. Thus it is that we are enabled to discover things were impossible for them to perceive. Our view is more extended, and although they knew as well as we all that they could observe in nature, they did not, nevertheless, know it so well, and we see more than they.

Yet it is marvelous in what manner their sentiments are revered. It is made a crime to contradict them and an act of treason to add to them, as though they had left no more truths to be known.

Is not this to treat unworthily the reason of man and to put it on a level with the instinct of animals, since we take away the principal difference between them, which is that the effects of reason accumulate without ceasing, while instinct remains always in the same state? The cells of the bees were as correctly measured a thousand years ago as today, and each formed a hexagon as exactly the first time as the last. It is the same with all that the animals produce by this occult impulse. Nature instructs them in proportion as necessity impels them; but this fragile science is lost with the wants which give it birth: as they received it without study, they have not the happiness of preserving it; and every time it is given them it is new to them, since the nature having for her object nothing but the maintenance of animals in a limited order of perfection, she inspires them with this necessary science . . . always the same, otherwise they may fall into decay, and does not permit them to add to it, otherwise they would not exceed the limits that she has prescribed to them. It is not the same with man, who is formed only for infinity. He is ignorant at the earliest age of his life; but he is instructed unceasingly in his progress; for he derives advantage, not only from his own experience, but also from that of his predecessors; since he always retains in his memory the knowledge which he himself has once acquired, and since he has that of the ancients ever present in the books which they have bequeathed to him. As he preserves this knowledge, he can also add to it easily; so that men are at the present day in some sort in the same condition in which those ancient philosophers would have been found, could they have survived till the present time, adding to the knowledge which they possessed that which their studies would have acquired by the aid of so many centuries. Thus it is that by a special right, not only does each man advance from day to day in the sciences, but all humankind together make continual progress in proportion as the world grows older, since the same thing happens in the succession of men as in the different ages of single individuals. So that the whole succession of men, during the course of many ages, should be considered as a single man who subsists forever and learns continually. From this we see with what injustice we respect antiquity in philosophers; for as old age is that period of life most remote from infancy, who does not see that old age in this universal man ought not to be sought in the times nearest his birth, but in those the most remote from it? Those whom we call ancient were really new in all things, and properly constituted the infancy of humankind; and as we have joined to their knowledge the experience of the centuries which have followed them, it is in ourselves that we should find this antiquity that we revere in others.

Scientific Mistakes by the Ancients are Excusable

They should be admired for the results which they derived from the very few principles they possessed, and they should be excused for those in which they failed from the lack of the advantage of experience rather than the strength of reasoning. For, were they not excusable in the idea that they entertained of the milky way, when, the weakness of their vision not having yet received the assistance of art, they attributed this color to a greater density in that part of the heavens which reflected the light more strongly? But would we not be inexcusable for remaining in the same opinion, now that, by the aid of the advantages gained to us by the telescope, we have discovered in it an infinite number of small stars, whose more abundant splendor has revealed to us the true cause of this whiteness.

Did they not also have cause for saying that all corruptible bodies were enclosed within the orbit of the moon, when, during the course of so many ages, they had not yet observed either corruption or generation outside of this space? But ought we not to be assured of the contrary, when the whole world has clearly seen comets light up and disappear far beyond the limits of that sphere? In the same way, with respect to a vacuum, they had a right to say that nature would not permit it, since all their experiments had always made them remark that she abhorred, and could not permit it.

But if the modern experiments had been known to them, perhaps they would have found cause for affirming what they found cause for denying, for the reason that a vacuum had not yet appeared. Thus, in the judgment they formed that nature would not permit a vacuum, they only heard nature spoken of in the condition in which they knew her. For, to speak in general terms, it would not have been sufficient to have seen it constantly in a hundred cases, a thousand, or any other number, however great it may have been; since, if a single case remained unexamined, this alone would suffice to prevent the general definition, and if a single one was contrary, this alone. . . .

Scientific Conclusions are Provisional and relative to Current Experiments

For in all matters the proof of which consists in experiments, and not in demonstrations, we can make no universal assertion, except by the general enumeration of all the parts and all the different cases. Thus it is that when we say that the diamond is the hardest of all bodies, we mean of all the bodies with which we are acquainted, and we neither can nor ought to comprehend in this assertion those with which we are not acquainted; and when we say that gold is the heaviest of all bodies, we would be presumptuous to understand by this general proposition those which have not yet come to our knowledge, although it is not impossible that they may exist in nature.

In the same way, when the ancients affirmed that nature would not permit a vacuum, they meant that she would not permit it in any of the experiments they had seen, and they could not, without brazenness, comprehend in it those experiments which had not come to their knowledge. Had they done so, they would doubtless have drawn from them the same conclusions, and would, by their acknowledgment, have approved them by this antiquity which it is sought at present make the sole principle of the sciences.

Thus, it is that, without contradicting them, we can affirm the contrary of what they say. In short, whatever authority this antiquity may have, truth should always have more, although newly discovered, since she is always older than all the opinions that we have had of her, and it would be showing ourselves ignorant of her nature to imagine that she may have begun to be at the time when she began to be known.

EPICTETUS VS. MONTAIGNE (Conversations with M. de Saci, 1655)

(M. Pascal told M. de Saci that his two most familiar books had been Epictetus and Montaigne, and highly eulogized these two finds. M. de Saci, who had always thought it an obligation to read but little of these two authors, urged M. Pascal to discuss them with him at length.)

Epictetus's Strengths and Weaknesses

Epictetus (Pascal says) is among the philosophers of the world who have best understood the duties of man. He requires, before anything else, that he should regard God as his principal object; that he should be persuaded that he governs everything with justice; that he should submit to him cheerfully, and that he should follow him voluntarily in everything, as doing nothing except with the utmost wisdom. This disposition will thus safeguard against all complaints and murmurs, and will prepare his mind to tranquilly endure the most troublesome events. Never say, says he, I have lost this; instead, say I have restored it. My son is dead, I have restored him. My wife is dead, I have restored her. So with property and with everything else. But, you say, he who has deprived me of it is a wicked man. Why does it trouble you by whom the one who has lent it to you demands it of you again? While he permits you the use of it, take care of it as property belonging to another, as a man who is travelling would do in an inn. Epictetus says you ought not desire that things be should done as you wish, but instead you ought to wish that they should be done as they are done. Remember, he says elsewhere, that you are here as an actor, and that you play the part in a drama that it pleases the manager to give you. If he gives you a short one, play a short one; if he gives you a long one, play a long one; if he wishes you to assume the beggar, you should do it with all the simplicity possible to you. So too with the rest. It is your business to play well the part that is given you; but to choose it is the business of another. Have every day before your eyes death and the evils which seem the most intolerable; you will then never think of anything lower and will desire nothing with excess.

He shows, too, in a thousand ways what man should do. He requires that he should be humble, that he should conceal his good decisions, especially in the beginning, and that he should accomplish them in secret, for, nothing destroys them more than to reveal them. He never tires of repeating that the whole study and desire of man should be to perceive the will of God and to pursue it.

Such sir (said M. Pascal to M. de Saci) was the enlightenment of this great mind that so well understood the duties of man. I venture to say that he would have deserved to be worshiped if he had also known his weakness as well, since, to be a god, it is necessary to teach both to men. Accordingly, while he was clay and ashes, having so well understood what was deserved, observe next how he destroys himself by presuming what we have the capacity to do. He says that God has given to every man the ability of freeing himself of all his obligations; that these abilities are always in our power; that we must seek happiness through the things that are in our power, since God has given them to us for this purpose. We must see what there is in us that is free; that wealth, life, esteem, are not in our power, and therefore do not lead to God; but that the mind cannot be forced to believe what it knows to be false, nor the will to love what it knows will make it unhappy; that these two powers are therefore free, and that it is through them that we can make ourselves perfect; that man can by these powers perfectly know God, love him, obey him, please him, cure himself of all his vices, acquire all the virtues, make himself holy, and thus the companion of God. These principles of a wicked pride lead him to other errors, such as that the soul is a portion of the divine substance; that sorrow and death are not evils; that one may kill himself when he is persecuted to such a degree that he has reason to believe that God calls him, and others.

Montaigne's Skeptical attack on Reason without Faith

As for Montaigne, about whom you also wish that I should speak to you, being born in a Christian State, he made profession of the Catholic religion, and in this there was nothing peculiar. But as he wished to discover what morals reason would dictate without the light of faith, he based his principles upon this supposition. Accordingly, considering man as deprived of all revelation, he discourses in the following manner.

He puts everything in a universal doubt, so general that this doubt carries itself away. That is, he doubts whether he doubts, and even doubting this latter proposition, his uncertainty turns upon itself in a perpetual and restless circle. It is equally opposed to those who affirm that everything is uncertain and to those who affirm that everything is not so, because he will affirm nothing. It is in this doubt-which-doubts-itself, and in this ignorance-which-is-ignorant-of-itself, and which he calls his master-form, that lies the essence of his opinion, which he was unable to express by any positive term. For if he says that he doubts, he exposes himself in affirming at least that he doubts. Since this is formally against his intention, he could only explain it through questioning. Thus, not wishing to say: "I do not know," he instead says, "What do I know?" Of this he makes his weight scale, placing it under the pans, weighing contradictories, are found in perfect balance: that is, it is pure Pyrrhonism. All his discourses and all his essays rest upon this principle; and it is the only thing that he pretends really to establish, although he does not always point out his intention. He destroys in them insensibly all that passes for the most certain among men, not indeed to establish the contrary with a certainty to which alone he is the enemy, but merely to show that, appearances being equal on both sides, one knows not where to fix his belief.

In this spirit he ridicules all affirmations. For example, he combats those who have thought to establish in France a great remedy against lawsuits by the multitude and the pretended justice of the laws. It is as if one could cut off the root of the doubts from which arise these lawsuits, and as if there were dikes that could stop the torrent of uncertainty and take conjectures captive! Thus it is that, when he says that he would rather submit his cause to the first passerby than to judges armed with such a number of ordinances, he does not pretend that we should change the order of the State. He has not so much ambition, nor that his advice may be better. He believes none are good. It is only to prove the vanity of the most accepted opinions; showing that the exclusion of all laws would rather diminish the number of disputants while the multiplicity of laws serves only to increase them, since difficulties grow in proportion as they are weighed; since obscurities are multiplied by commentaries; and since the surest way to understand the meaning of a discourse is not to examine it, and to take it on its face value: as soon as it is scrutinized, all its clearness becomes dissipated. In the like manner he judges by chance of all the acts of men and the points of history, sometimes in one way, sometimes in another. He freely follows his first impression, and, without constraining his thought by the rules of reason (which are only false measures), he delights to show, by his example, the contrarieties of the same mind. In this free genius, it is all the same to him whether he gets the better in the dispute or not. By either example, he always has a means of showing the weakness of opinions. By being sustained with so much advantage in this universal doubt, he is strengthened in it equally by his triumph and his defeat.

Montaigne's Attack on Rational Theology and Advocacy for Faith

It is from this position, floating and wavering as it is, that he combats with an invincible firmness the heretics of his times in respect to their affirmation of alone knowing the true sense of the Scripture. It is also from this that he most vigorously thunders forth against the horrible impiety of those who dare to affirm that God is not. He attacks them especially in the "Apology of Raimond de Sebonde". Finding them [i.e., rational theologians] voluntarily deprived of all revelation, and abandoned to their natural intelligence, all faith set aside, he demands of them upon what authority they undertake to judge of this sovereign Being who is infinite by his own definition, they who know truly none of the things of nature! He asks them upon what principles they rest; he presses them to show them. He examines all that they can produce, and penetrates them so deeply, by the talent in which he excels, that he demonstrates the vanity of all those that pass for the firmest and the most natural.

He asks whether the soul knows anything; whether she knows herself; whether she is substance or accident, body or spirit, what is each of these things, and whether there is anything that does not belong to one of these orders; whether she knows her own body, what is matter and whether she can discern among the innumerable variety of bodies from which it is produced; how she can reason if she is material; and how she can be united to a particular body and feel its passions if she is spiritual; when she commenced to be; with the body or before; and whether she will end with it or not; whether she is never mistaken; whether she knows when she errs, seeing that the essence of contempt consists in not knowing it; whether in her obscurity she does not believe as firmly that two and three make six as she knows afterwards that they make five; whether animals reason, think, talk; and who can determine what is time, what is space or extent, what is motion, what is unity, what are all the things that surround us and are wholly inexplicable to us; what is health, sickness, life, death, good, evil, justice, sin, of which we constantly speak; whether we have within us the principles of truth, and whether those which we believe, and which are called axioms or common notions, because they are common to all men, are in conformity with the essential truth.

Since we know only by faith alone that an all-good Being has given these [principles] to us truly in creating us to know the truth, who can know without this light whether, being formed by chance, they are not uncertain, or whether, being formed by a lying and malicious being, he has not given them to us falsely in order to lead us astray? Showing by this that God and truth are inseparable, and that if the one is or is not, if it is certain or uncertain, the other is necessarily the same. Who knows then whether common-sense, that we take for the judge of truth, can be the judge of that which has created it? Besides, who knows what truth is, and how can we be sure of having it without understanding it? Who knows even what is being which it is impossible to define, since there is nothing more general, and since it would be necessary at first, to explain it, to use the word itself: It is being ? And since we do not know what is soul, body, time, space, motion, truth, good, nor even being, nor how to explain the idea that we form within ourselves, how can we assure ourselves that it is the same in all men, seeing that we have no other token than the uniformity of consequences, which is not always a sign of that of principles; for they may indeed be very different, and lead nevertheless to the same conclusions, every one knowing that the true is often inferred from the false.

Lastly, he profoundly examines the sciences, including geometry, of which he shows the uncertainty in the axioms and the terms that she does not define, such as center, motion, etc., and physics in many more ways, and medicine in an infinity of methods, and history, politics, ethics, jurisprudence, and the rest. Thus, we remain convinced that we think no better at present than in a dream from which we will awaken only at death, and during which we have the principles of truth as little as during natural sleep. It is in this manner that he attacks reason divested of faith so strongly and so cruelly. He thus makes reason doubt whether she is rational, and whether animals are so or not, or in a greater or less degree, he makes her descend from the excellence which she has attributed to herself, and places her through grace on a level with the brutes. He does not permit reason to quit this inquiry until she is instructed by her Creator himself with respect to her rank, of which she is ignorant; threatening, if she grumbles, to place her beneath everything, which is as easy as the opposite, and nevertheless giving her power to act only in order to remark her weakness with sincere humility, instead of exalting herself by a foolish overconfidence. . . .

[M. de Saci next offers his view that the study of Epictetus and Montaigne is useless to Christians. Pascal then continues.]

Epictetus errs from Pride, Montaigne errs from Idleness

I cannot hide from you, sir, that in reading Montaigne and comparing him with Epictetus, I have found that they are certainly the two greatest defenders of the two most celebrated sects of the world, and the only ones conformable to reason. For, we can only follow one of these two roads, namely: either that there is a God, and then we place in him the sovereign good; or that he is uncertain, and that then the true good is also uncertain, since he is incapable of it. I have taken extreme pleasure in remarking in these different reasonings wherein both have reached some conformity with the true wisdom which they have labored to understand. For if it is pleasing to observe in nature her desire to paint God in all his works, in which we see some traces of him because they are his images, how much more just is it to consider in the productions of minds the efforts which they make to imitate the essential truth, even in shunning it, and to remark wherein they attain it and wherein they wander from it, as I have endeavored to do in this study.

It is true, sir, that you have just shown me, in an admirable manner, the little value that Christians can draw from these philosophical studies. However, with your permission, I shall not refrain from telling you still further my thoughts on the subject. But I am ready to renounce all light that does not come from you, in which I shall have the advantage either of having encountered truth by good fortune or of receiving it from you with certainty.

It appears to me that the source of the errors of these two sects, is in not having known that the state of man at the present time differs from that of his creation [i.e., before and after the fall of Adam]. Thus, the one [i.e., Epictetus] observing some traces of man's first greatness and being ignorant of man's corruption, has treated nature as sound and without need of redemption, which leads him to the height of pride. The other [i.e., Montaigne] feeling the present wretchedness and being ignorant of the original dignity, treats nature as necessarily infirm and irreparable, which pushes it into despair of arriving at genuine good, and subsequently into extreme idleness. Thus, these two states which it is necessary to know together in order to see the whole truth, being known separately, lead necessarily to one of these two vices, pride or idleness, in which all men are invariably before grace. For, if they do not remain in their disorders through idleness, they abandon them through vanity. Thus, so true is that which you have just repeated to me from St. Augustine, and which I find to a great extent; for in fact homage is paid to them in many ways.

Therefore, from this imperfect enlightenment [concerning the fall of Adam], it happens that the one [i.e., Epictetus], knowing the duties of man and being ignorant of his weakness, is lost in presumption; the other [i.e., Montaigne], knowing the weakness and being ignorant of the duty, falls into idleness. From this it seems that since the one leads to truth, the other to error, there might be formed from their alliance a perfect system of morals. But instead of this peace, nothing but war and a general ruin might result from their union. For, the one establishing certainty, the other doubt, the one the greatness of man, the other his weakness, they would destroy the truths as well as the falsehoods of each other. Thus, they cannot subsist alone because of their defects, nor unite because of their opposition, and thus they break and destroy each other to give place to the truth of the Gospel. This is what harmonizes the contrarieties by a wholly divine act; it unites all that is true and expels all that is false, and thus makes of them a truly celestial wisdom in which those opposites agree that were otherwise incompatible in human doctrines. The reason for this is that these philosophers of the world place contrarieties in the same subject. For the one attributed greatness to nature and the other weakness to this same nature, which could not subsist. But faith teaches us to place them in different subjects: all that is infirm belongs to nature, all that is powerful belongs to grace. Such is the marvelous and novel union which God alone could teach, and which he alone could make, and which is only a type and an effect of the ineffable union of two natures in the single person of a Man-God [i.e., through the incarnation of God in Jesus Christ]. . . .

The Benefits and Dangers of Epictetus and Montaigne

As to the value of these readings (said M. Pascal) I will simply tell you my thoughts. I find in Epictetus an incomparable art for troubling those who seek tranquility in external things, and for forcing them to acknowledge that they are in fact slaves and miserable blind men. It is impossible that they will find anything other than the error and pain from which they fly, unless they give themselves without reserve to God alone. Montaigne is incomparable for defeating the pride of those who, outside of faith, interest themselves in genuine justice. He corrects those who cling to their opinions, and who think they find impregnable truths in the sciences. He so effectively convicts reason of its lack of light and its aberrations, that it is difficult, when one makes a good use of its principles, to be tempted to find inconsistency in mysteries [of faith]. For the mind is so overwhelmed by him, that it is far from wishing to judge whether the Incarnation or the mystery of the Eucharist are possible, which the generality of mankind discuss but too often.

But if Epictetus combats idleness, he leads to pride, and thus he may greatly harm those who are not persuaded of the corruption of the most perfect justice which is not from faith. But Montaigne is very harmful to those who have any leaning to impiety or vice. Consequently, their writings should be regulated with great care, discretion, and regard to the condition and disposition of those to whom they are recommended. It seems to me that only by joining them together will they produce no harm, since the one is opposed to the evil of the other, and thus, they will inspire only virtue and not vice. not that they could bestow virtue but only disturb vice. Thus, the soul will find itself combated by contrarieties, where the one expels pride and the other idleness, and is unable to be tranquil in any of these vices by their reasonings, or to shun them all.

THE LIMITATIONS OF HUMAN REASONING (from Thoughts, 1670)

Preface to Part 1: Conceptions of Human Nature proposed by Skeptics

60. First part: Misery of man without God. Second part: Happiness of man with God. Or, First part: That nature is corrupt. Proved by nature itself. Second part: That there is a Redeemer. Proved by Scripture.

62. Preface to the first part. To speak of (1) those who have examined knowledge of self; (2) of the divisions [of human intelligence] by [French atheist Pierre] Charron, which sadden and weary us; (3) of the confusion of Montaigne; that he was quite aware of his lack of method and avoided it by jumping from subject to subject; that he tried to be fashionable.

His foolish project of describing himself! And this not casually and against his maxims, since everyone makes mistakes, but by his maxims themselves, and by first and chief design. For to say silly things by chance and weakness is a common misfortune, but to say them intentionally is intolerable, and to say such as that. . . .

64. It is not in Montaigne, but in myself, that I find all that I see in him.

65. What good there is in Montaigne can only have been acquired with difficulty. The evil that is in him, I mean apart from his morality, could have been corrected in a moment, if he had been informed that he made too much of trivial things and spoke too much of himself.

Reason's Confusion about Nature: Trapped between two Infinities

72. . . . Returning to himself, let man consider what he is in comparison with all existence; let him regard himself as lost in this remote corner of nature; and from the little cell in which he finds himself lodged, I mean the universe, let him estimate at their true value the earth, kingdoms, cities, and himself. What is a man in the Infinite?

But to show him another wonder equally astonishing, let him examine the most delicate things he knows. Let a mite be given him, with its minute body and parts incomparably more minute, limbs with their joints, veins in the limbs, blood in the veins, humors in the blood, drops in the humors, vapors in the drops. Dividing these last things again, let him exhaust his powers of conception, and let the last object at which he can arrive be now that of our discourse. Perhaps he will think that here is the smallest point in nature. I will let him see therein a new abyss. I will paint for him not only the visible universe, but all that he can conceive of nature's immensity in the womb of this abridged atom. Let him see therein an infinity of universes, each of which has its firmament, its planets, its earth, in the same proportion as in the visible world; in each earth animals, and in the last mites, in which he will find again all that the first had, finding still in these others the same thing without end and without cessation. Let him lose himself in wonders as amazing in their littleness as the others in their vastness. For who will not be astounded at the fact that our body, which a little while ago was imperceptible in the universe, itself imperceptible in the bosom of the whole, is now a colossus, a world, or rather a whole, in respect of the nothingness which we cannot reach? He who regards himself in this light will be afraid of himself, and observing himself sustained in the body given him by nature between those two abysses of the Infinite and Nothing, will tremble at the sight of these marvels; and I think that, as his curiosity changes into admiration, he will be more disposed to contemplate them in silence than to examine them with presumption.

For, in fact, what is man in nature? A Nothing in comparison with the Infinite, an All in comparison with the Nothing, a mean between nothing and everything. Since he is infinitely removed from comprehending the extremes, the end of things and their beginning are hopelessly hidden from him in an impenetrable secret; he is equally incapable of seeing the Nothing from which he was made, and the Infinite in which he is swallowed up.

What will he do then, but perceive the appearance of the middle of things, in an eternal despair of knowing either their beginning or their end. All things proceed from the Nothing, and are borne towards the Infinite. Who will follow these marvellous processes? The Author of these wonders understands them. None other can do so.

Through failure to contemplate these Infinites, men have rashly rushed into the examination of nature, as though they bore some proportion to her. It is strange that they have wished to understand the beginnings of things, and thence to arrive at the knowledge of the whole, with a presumption as infinite as their object. For surely this design cannot be formed without presumption or without a capacity infinite like nature.

If we are well informed, we understand that, as nature has graven her image and that of her Author on all things, they almost all partake of her double infinity. Thus we see that all the sciences are infinite in the extent of their researches. For who doubts that geometry, for instance, has an infinite infinity of problems to solve? They are also infinite in the multitude and fineness of their premises; for it is clear that those which are put forward as ultimate are not self-supporting, but are based on others which, again having others for their support, do not permit of finality. But we represent some as ultimate for reason, in the same way as in regard to material objects we call that an indivisible point beyond which our senses can no longer perceive anything, although by its nature it is infinitely divisible.

Of these two Infinites of science, that of greatness is the most palpable, and hence a few persons have pretended to know all things. "I will speak of the whole," said Democritus.

But the infinitely little is the least obvious. Philosophers have much oftener claimed to have reached it, and it is here they have all stumbled. This has given rise to such common titles as First Principles, Principles of Philosophy, and the like, as pretentious in fact, though not in appearance, as that one which blinds us, De omni scibili ["On Everything Knowable", the title of one of Pico's 900 Theses].

We naturally believe ourselves far more capable of reaching the center of things than of embracing their circumference. The visible extent of the world visibly exceeds us; but as we exceed little things, we think ourselves more capable of knowing them. Yet we need no less capacity for attaining the Nothing than the All. Infinite capacity is required for both, and it seems to me that whoever will have understood the ultimate principles of being might also attain to the knowledge of the Infinite. The one depends on the other, and one leads to the other. These extremes meet and reunite by force of distance and find each other in God, and in God alone.

Let us, then, take our compass; we are something, and we are not everything. The nature of our existence hides from us the knowledge of first beginnings which are born of the Nothing; and the littleness of our being conceals from us the sight of the Infinite.

Reason's Incapacity to Comprehend Extremes

Our intellect holds the same position in the world of thought as our body occupies in the expanse of nature.

Limited as we are in every way, this state which holds the mean between two extremes is present in all our powerlessness. Our senses perceive no extreme. Too much sound deafens us; too much light dazzles us; too great distance or proximity hinders our view. Too great length and too great brevity of discourse tend to obscurity; too much truth is paralyzing (I know some who cannot understand that to take four from nothing leaves nothing). First principles are too self-evident for us; too much pleasure disagrees with us. Too many concords are annoying in music; too many benefits irritate us; we wish to have the wherewithal to overpay our debts. "Kindnesses are agreeable so long as one thinks them possible to do; further, recognition makes way for hatred" [Tacitus]. We feel neither extreme heat nor extreme cold. Excessive qualities are prejudicial to us and not perceptible by the senses; we do not feel but suffer them. Extreme youth and extreme age hinder the mind, as also too much and too little education. In short, extremes are for us as though they were not, and we are not within their notice. They escape us, or we them.

This is our true state; this is what makes us incapable of certain knowledge and of absolute ignorance. We sail within a vast sphere, ever drifting in uncertainty, driven from end to end. When we think to attach ourselves to any point and to fasten to it, it wavers and leaves us; and if we follow it, it eludes our grasp, slips past us, and vanishes forever. Nothing stays for us. This is our natural condition and yet most contrary to our inclination; we burn with desire to find solid ground and an ultimate sure foundation whereon to build a tower reaching to the Infinite. But our whole groundwork cracks, and the earth opens to abysses.

Let us, therefore, not look for certainty and stability. Our reason is always deceived by shifting shadows; nothing can fix the finite between the two Infinites, which both enclose and fly from it.

If this be well understood, I think that we will remain at rest, each in the state wherein nature has placed him. As this sphere which has fallen to us as our lot is always distant from either extreme, what matters it that man should have a little more knowledge of the universe? If he has it, he but gets a little higher. Is he not always infinitely removed from the end, and is not the duration of our life equally removed from eternity, even if it lasts ten years longer?

Reason's Incapacity to Understand the Parts of Human Nature without Knowledge of the Whole

In comparison with these Infinites, all finites are equal, and I see no reason for fixing our imagination on one more than on another. The only comparison which we make of ourselves to the finite is painful to us.

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? But he may perhaps aspire to know at least the parts to which he bears some proportion. But the parts of the world are all so related and linked to one another that I believe it impossible to know one without the other and without the whole.

Man, for instance, is related to all he knows. He needs a place wherein to live, time through which to live, motion in order to live, elements to compose him, warmth and food to nourish him, air to breathe. He sees light; he feels bodies; in short, he is in a dependent alliance with everything. To know man, then, it is necessary to know how it happens that he needs air to live, and, to know the air, we must know how it is thus related to the life of man, etc. Flame cannot exist without air; therefore, to understand the one, we must understand the other.

Since everything, then, is cause and effect, dependent and supporting, mediate and immediate, and all is held together by a natural though imperceptible chain which binds together things most distant and most different, I hold it equally impossible to know the parts without knowing the whole and to know the whole without knowing the parts in detail.

The eternity of things in itself or in God must also astonish our brief duration. The fixed and constant immobility of nature, in comparison with the continual change which goes on within us, must have the same effect.

Reason's Confusion about Mind and Body

And what completes our incapability of knowing things is the fact that they are simple and that we are composed of two opposite natures, different in kind, soul and body. For it is impossible that our rational part should be other than spiritual; and if any one maintain that we are simply corporeal, this would far more exclude us from the knowledge of things, there being nothing so inconceivable as to say that matter knows itself. It is impossible to imagine how it should know itself.

So, if we are simply material, we can know nothing at all; and if we are composed of mind and matter, we cannot know perfectly things which are simple, whether spiritual or corporeal. Hence it comes that almost all philosophers have confused ideas of things, and speak of material things in spiritual terms, and of spiritual things in material terms. For they say boldly that bodies have a tendency to fall, that they seek after their center, that they fly from destruction, that they fear the void, that they have inclinations, sympathies, antipathies, all of which attributes pertain only to mind. In speaking of minds, they consider them as in a place, and attribute to them movement from one place to another; and these are qualities which belong only to bodies.

Instead of receiving the ideas of these things in their purity, we color them with our own qualities, and stamp with our composite being all the simple things which we contemplate.

Who would not think, seeing us compose all things of mind and body, but that this mixture would be quite intelligible to us? Yet it is the very thing we least understand. Man is to himself the most wonderful object in nature; for he cannot conceive what the body is, still less what the mind is, and least of all how a body should be united to a mind.

Reason's Confusion about the Highest Good

73. But perhaps this subject goes beyond the capacity of reason. Let us therefore examine her solutions to problems within her powers. If there be anything to which her own interest must have made her apply herself most seriously, it is the inquiry into her own sovereign good. Let us see, then, wherein these strong and clear-sighted souls have placed it and whether they agree.

One says that the sovereign good consists in virtue, another in pleasure, another in the knowledge of nature, another in truth: "Fortunate is he, who is able to know the hidden causes of things"; another in total ignorance, another in idleness, others in neglect of appearances, another in the lack of wonder: "To be astonished at nothing is nearly the only thing which can give and conserve happiness", the true sceptics in their indifference, doubt and perpetual suspense, and others, more wise, think they can find a better way. This is all we get from them!

We must see if this fine philosophy has gained nothing certain from a research so lengthy and so wide, at least perhaps the soul has learned to know herself. We will hear the rulers of the world on this matter. What have they thought of her substance? Have they been luckier in fixing her seat? What have they discovered about her origin, duration and departure?

DIVERSION AND BOREDOM

Pointless Activities Divert us from Our Unhappiness with Ourselves

139. Diversion. When I have occasionally set myself to consider the different distractions of people, the pains and hazards to which they expose themselves at court or in war, from which arise so many quarrels, passions, bold and often bad ventures, etc., I have discovered that all the people's unhappiness arises from one single fact, that they cannot stay quietly in their own room. A man who has enough to live on, if he knew how to stay with pleasure at home, would not leave it to go to sea or to besiege a town. A commission in the army would not be bought so dearly, but that it is found unbearable not to budge from the town. People only seek conversation and play games, because they cannot remain with pleasure at home.

But, on further consideration, when, after finding the cause of all our ills, I have sought to discover the reason for it, I have found that there is one very real reason, namely, the natural poverty of our weak and mortal condition, so miserable that nothing can comfort us when we think of it closely.

Whatever condition we picture to ourselves, if we muster all the good things which it is possible to possess, royalty is the finest position in the world. Yet, when we imagine a king attended with every pleasure he can feel, if he is without diversion and is left to consider and reflect on what he is, this feeble happiness will not sustain him. He will necessarily fall into suspicions of dangers, of revolutions which may happen, and, finally, of death and inevitable disease. Thus, if he is without what is called diversion, he is unhappy and more unhappy than the least of his subjects who plays and diverts himself.

Because of this play and the society of women, war and high posts, are so sought after. Not that there is in fact any happiness in them, or that men imagine true bliss to consist in money won at play, or in the rabbit which they hunt. We would not take these as a gift. We do not seek that easy and peaceful destiny which permits us to think of our unhappy condition, nor the dangers of war, nor the labor of jobs, but the activity which diverts these thoughts of ours and amuses us.

Reasons why we like the chase better than the prey.

Because of this people so much love noise and commotion. Because of this the prison is so horrible a punishment. Because of this the pleasure of solitude is a thing incomprehensible. It is, in fact, the greatest source of happiness in the condition of kings that men try incessantly to divert them and to obtain for them every kind of pleasure.

The king is surrounded by people whose only thoughts are to divert the king and to prevent his thinking of self. For he is unhappy, king though he is, if he thinks of himself.

This is all that people have been able to discover to make themselves happy. Those who philosophize on the matter, and who think someone unreasonable for spending a whole day in chasing a rabbit which he would not have even bought, scarcely know our nature. The rabbit in itself would not shield us from the sight of death and calamities. But the chase, which turns away our attention from these, does shield us.

The advice given to [the Greek general] Pyrrhus, to take the rest which he was about to seek with so much effort, was full of difficulties.

To tell a someone to live quietly is to tell him to live happily. It is to advise him to be in a state perfectly happy, in which he can think at leisure without finding therein a cause of distress. This is to misunderstand nature.

As men who naturally understand their own condition avoid nothing so much as rest, so there is nothing they leave undone in seeking commotion. Not that they have an instinctive knowledge of true happiness. . . .

So we are wrong in blaming them. Their error does not rest in seeking excitement, if they seek it only as a diversion. The evil is that they seek it as if the possession of the objects of their quest would really make them happy. In this respect it is right to call their quest a futile one. Hence in all this both the critic and the criticized do not understand true human nature.

Thus, when we make the objection against them, that what they seek with such enthusiasm cannot satisfy them, if they replied (as they should do if they considered the matter thoroughly) that they sought in it only a intense and impulsive occupation which turned their thoughts from self, and that they therefore chose an attractive object to charm and passionately attract them, they would leave their opponents without a reply. But they do not make this reply, because they do not know themselves. They do not know that it is the chase, and not the quarry, which they seek.

Dancing: We must properly consider where to place our feet. - A gentleman sincerely believes that hunting is a great and royal sport, but his whipper does not share this opinion.

They imagine that, if they obtained such a position, they would then rest with pleasure and are insensible of the insatiable nature of the if desire. They think they are truly seeking peace, and they are only seeking excitement.

They have a secret instinct which impels them to seek amusement and occupation abroad, and which arises from the sense of their constant unhappiness. They have another secret instinct, a remnant of the greatness of our original nature, which teaches them that happiness in reality consists only in rest and not in agitation. Of these two contrary instincts they form within themselves a confused idea, which hides itself from their view in the depths of their soul, inciting them to aim at rest through excitement, and always to imagine that the satisfaction which they have not will come to them, if, by surmounting whatever difficulties confront them, they can thereby open the door to rest.

Boredom Results from Lack of Excitement

Thus passes away all man's life. Men seek rest in a struggle against difficulties. When they have conquered these, rest becomes insufferable. For we think either of the misfortunes we have or of those which threaten us. Even if we should see ourselves sufficiently sheltered on all sides, boredom of its own accord would not fail to arise from the depths of the heart wherein it has its natural roots and to fill the mind with its poison.

Thus so wretched is man that he would be bored even without any cause for boredom from the particular state of his disposition. So trivial is he that, though full of a thousand reasons for boredom, the smallest thing, such as playing billiards or hitting a ball, is sufficient to amuse him.

But will you say what purpose does he have in all this? The pleasure of bragging tomorrow among his friends that he has played better than another. Others sweat in their own rooms to show to the learned that they have solved a problem in algebra, which no one had previously been able to solve. Many more expose themselves to extreme perils, in my opinion as foolishly, to boast afterwards that they have captured a town. Lastly, others wear themselves out in studying all these things, not to become wiser, but only to prove that they know them; and these are the most senseless of the group, since they are so knowingly, whereas one may suppose of the others that, if they knew it, they would no longer be foolish.

This man spends his life without boredom in playing every day for a small stake. Give him each morning the money he can win each day, on condition he does not play; you make him miserable. It will perhaps be said that he seeks the amusement of play and not the winnings. Make him, then, play for nothing. He will not become excited over it and will feel bored. It is, then, not the amusement alone that he seeks. A relaxed and passionless amusement will bore him. He must get excited over it and deceive himself by the thought that he will be happy to win what he would not have as a gift on condition of not playing. He must make for himself an object of passion, and excite over it his desire, his anger, his fear, to obtain his imagined end, as children are frightened at the face they have blackened.

Why is it that the man, who lost his only son a few months ago, or who this morning was in such trouble through being distressed by lawsuits and quarrels, now no longer thinks of them? Do not wonder; he is quite taken up in looking out for the boar which his dogs have been hunting so hotly for the last six hours. He requires nothing more. However full of sadness a man may be, he is happy for the time, if you can prevail upon him to enter into some amusement; and however happy a man may be, he will soon be discontented and wretched, if he be not diverted and occupied by some passion or pursuit which prevents boredom from overcoming him. Without amusement there is no joy; with amusement there is no sadness. This also constitutes the happiness of people in high positions, that they have a number of people to amuse them and have the power to keep themselves in this state.

Consider this. What is it to be superintendent, chancellor, first president, but to be in a condition where from early morning a large number of people come from all quarters to see them, so as not to leave them an hour in the day in which they can think of themselves? And when they are in disgrace and sent back to their country homes, where they lack neither wealth nor servants to help them on occasion, they do not fail to be wretched and desolate, because no one prevents them from thinking of themselves.

JUSTICE, CUSTOM AND FORCE

Customary Justice is Arbitrary, True Unchanging Justice is Unknown

294. On what will man found the order of the world which he would govern? Will it be on the caprice of each individual? What confusion! Will it be on justice? Man is ignorant of it.

Certainly, had he known it, he would not have established this maxim, the most general of all that obtain among men, that each should follow the custom of his own country. The glory of true equity would have brought all nations under subjection, and legislators would not have taken as their model the fancies and caprice of Persians and Germans instead of this unchanging justice. We would have seen it set up in all the States on earth and in all times; whereas we see neither justice nor injustice which does not change its nature with change in climate. Three degrees of latitude reverse all jurisprudence; a meridian decides the truth. Fundamental laws change after a few years of possession; right has its epochs; the entry of Saturn into the Lion marks to us the origin of such and such a crime. A strange justice that is bounded by a river! Truth on this side of the Pyrenees, error on the other side.

Men admit that justice does not consist in these customs, but that it resides in natural laws, common to every country. They would certainly maintain it obstinately, if reckless chance which has distributed human laws had encountered even one which was universal; but the farce is that the caprice of men has so many vagaries that there is no such law.

Theft, incest, infanticide, parricide, have all been included among virtuous actions. Can anything be more ridiculous than that a man should have the right to kill me because he lives on the other side of the water, and because his ruler has a quarrel with mine, though I have none with him?

Doubtless there are natural laws; but good reason once corrupted has corrupted all.

The result of this confusion is that one affirms the essence of justice to be the authority of the legislator; another, the interest of the sovereign; another, present custom, and this is the most sure. Nothing, according to reason alone, is just itself; all changes with time. Custom creates the whole of equity, for the simple reason that it is accepted. It is the mystical foundation of its authority; whoever carries it back to first principles destroys it. Nothing is so faulty as those laws which correct faults. He who obeys them because they are just obeys a justice which is imaginary and not the essence of law; it is quite self-contained, it is law and nothing more. He who will examine its motive will find it so feeble and so trifling that, if he be not accustomed to contemplate the wonders of human imagination, he will marvel that one century has gained for it so much pomp and reverence. 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. We must, it is said, get back to the natural and fundamental laws of the State, which an unjust custom has abolished. It is a game certain to result in the loss of all; nothing will be just on the balance. Yet people readily lend their ear to such arguments. They shake off the yoke as soon as they recognize it; and the great profit by their ruin and by that of these curious investigators of accepted customs. But from a contrary mistake men sometimes think they can justly do everything which is not without an example. That is why the wisest of legislators said that it was necessary to deceive men for their own good; and another, a good politician, "As he has ignored the truth which frees, it is right he is mistaken" [Augustine]. We must not see the fact of usurpation; law was once introduced without reason, and has become reasonable. We must make it regarded as authoritative, eternal, and conceal its origin, if we do not wish that it should soon come to an end.

Customary Justice Secured through Force and obedience to Law

297. "Concerning true law" [Cicero] we have it no more. If we had it, we should take conformity to the customs of a country as the rule of justice. It is here that, not finding justice, we have found force, etc.

298. Justice, might. It is right that what is just should be obeyed; it is necessary that what is strongest should be obeyed. Justice without might is helpless; might without justice is tyrannical. Justice without might is gainsaid, because there are always offenders; might without justice is condemned. We must then combine justice and might and, for this end, make what is just strong, or what is strong just.

Justice is subject to dispute; might is easily recognized and is not disputed. So we cannot give might to justice, because might has gainsaid justice and has declared that it is she herself who is just. Thus, being unable to make what is just strong, we have made what is strong just.

299. The only universal rules are the laws of the country in ordinary affairs and of the majority in others. Where does this come from? From the might which is in them. Thus it happens that kings, who have power of a different kind, do not follow the majority of their ministers.

No doubt equality of goods is just. But, being unable to cause might to obey justice, men have made it just to obey might. Unable to strengthen justice, they have justified might; so that the just and the strong should unite, and there should be peace, which is the sovereign good.

325. Montaigne is wrong. [According to Montaigne,] custom should be followed only because it is custom, and not because it is reasonable or just. But people follow it for this sole reason, that they think it just. Otherwise they would follow it no longer, even though it were the custom; for they will only submit to reason or justice. Custom without this would pass for tyranny; but the sovereignty of reason and justice is no more tyrannical than that of desire. They are principles natural to man.

It would, therefore, be right to obey laws and customs, because they are laws; but we should know that there is neither truth nor justice to introduce into them, that we know nothing of these, and so must follow what is accepted. By this means we would never depart from them. But people cannot accept this doctrine; and, as they believe that truth can be found, and that it exists in law and custom, they believe them and take their antiquity as a proof of their truth, and not simply of their authority apart from truth. Thus they obey laws, but they are liable to revolt when these are proved to be valueless; and this can be shown of all of them when looked at from a certain aspect.

326. Injustice. It is dangerous to tell the people that the laws are unjust; for they obey them only because they think them just. Therefore it is necessary 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, if this can be made intelligible and it be understood what is the proper definition of justice.

375. I have passed a great part of my life believing that there was [true] justice, and in this I was not mistaken; for there is [true] justice according as God has willed to reveal it to us. But I did not take it so, and this is where I made a mistake. For I believed that our [customary] justice was essentially just, and that I had that whereby to know and judge of it. But I have so often found my right judgment at fault, that at last I have come to distrust myself and then others. I have seen changes in all nations and men, and thus, after many changes of judgment regarding [what is] true justice, I have recognized that our nature was but in continual change, and I have not changed since; and if I changed, I would confirm my opinion.

SKEPTICAL VS DOGMATIC SIDES OF HUMAN NATURE (Thoughts)

Main Arguments of the Skeptics: Wicked Demon, Dreaming

434. The chief arguments of the sceptics while I pass over the minor ones are that we have no certainty of the truth of these [first] principles apart from faith and revelation, except in so far as we naturally perceive them in ourselves. Now this natural intuition is not a convincing proof of their truth; since, having no certainty, apart from faith, whether man was created by a good God, or by a wicked demon, or by chance, it is doubtful whether these principles given to us are true, or false, or uncertain, according to our origin. Again, no person is certain, apart from faith, whether he is awake or sleeps, seeing that during sleep we believe that we are awake as firmly as we do when we are awake; we believe that we see space, figure, and motion; we are aware of the passage of time, we measure it; and in fact we act as if we were awake. So that half of our life being passed in sleep, we have on our own admission no idea of truth, whatever we may imagine. As all our intuitions are, then, illusions, who knows whether the other half of our life, in which we think we are awake, is not another sleep a little different from the former, from which we awake when we suppose ourselves asleep?

And who doubts that, if we dreamt in company, and the dreams happened to agree, which is common enough, and if we were always alone when awake, we should believe that matters were reversed? In short, as we often dream that we dream, heaping dream upon dream, may it not be that this half of our life, wherein we think ourselves awake, is itself only a dream on which the others are grafted, from which we wake at death, during which we have as few principles of truth and good as during natural sleep, these different thoughts which disturb us being perhaps only illusions like the flight of time and the vain fancies of our dreams?

These are the chief arguments on one side and the other.

I omit minor ones, such as the skeptical talk against the influence of custom, education, manners, country and the like. Though these influence the majority of common folk, who dogmatize only on shallow foundations, they are upset by the least breath of the sceptics. We have only to see their books if we are not sufficiently convinced of this, and we will very quickly become so, perhaps too much.

Failure of both Skepticism and Dogmatism

I notice the only strong point of the dogmatists, namely, that, speaking in good faith and sincerely, we cannot doubt natural principles. Against this the sceptics set up in one word the uncertainty of our origin, which includes that of our nature. The dogmatists have been trying to answer this objection ever since the world began.

So there is open war among men, in which each must take a part and side either with dogmatism or skepticism. For he who thinks to remain neutral is above all a sceptic. This neutrality is the essence of the sect; he who is not against them is essentially for them. In this appears their advantage. They are not for themselves; they are neutral, indifferent, in suspense as to all things, even themselves being no exception.

What, then, will man do in this state? Will he doubt everything? Will he doubt whether he is awake, whether he is being pinched, or whether he is being burned? Will he doubt whether he doubts? Will he doubt whether he exists? We cannot go so far as that; and I lay it down as a fact that there never has been a real complete sceptic. Nature sustains our feeble reason and prevents it raving to this extent.

Will he, then, say, on the contrary, that he certainly possesses truth he who, when pressed ever so little, can show no title to it and is forced to let go his hold?

What a chimera, then, is man! What a novelty! What a monster, what a chaos, what a contradiction, what a prodigy! Judge of all things, imbecile worm of the earth; depositary of truth, a sink of uncertainty and error; the pride and refuse of the universe!

Who will unravel this tangle? Nature confutes the sceptics, and reason confutes the dogmatists. What, then, will you become, O men! who try to find out by your natural reason what is your true condition? You cannot avoid one of these sects, nor adhere to one of them.

The Mystery of Original Sin Necessary for Understanding the Human Condition

Know then, proud man, what a paradox you are to yourself. Humble yourself, weak reason; be silent, foolish nature; learn that man infinitely transcends man, and learn from your Master your true condition, of which you are ignorant. Hear God.

For in fact, if man had never been corrupt, he would enjoy in his innocence both truth and happiness with assurance; and if man had always been corrupt, he would have no idea of truth or bliss. But, wretched as we are, and more so than if there were no greatness in our condition, we have an idea of happiness and cannot reach it. We perceive an image of truth and possess only a lie. Incapable of absolute ignorance and of certain knowledge, we have thus been manifestly in a degree of perfection from which we have unhappily fallen.

It is, however, an astonishing thing that the mystery furthest removed from our knowledge, namely, that of the transmission of sin, should be a fact without which we can have no knowledge of ourselves. For it is beyond doubt that there is nothing which more shocks our reason than to say that the sin of the first man has made guilty those who, being so removed from this source, seem incapable of participation in it. This transmission does not only seem to us impossible, it seems also very unjust. For what is more contrary to the rules of our miserable justice than to damn eternally an infant incapable of will, for a sin wherein he seems to have so little a share that it was committed six thousand years before he was in existence? Certainly nothing offends us more rudely than this doctrine; and yet without this mystery, the most incomprehensible of all, we are incomprehensible to ourselves. The knot of our condition takes its twists and turns in this abyss, so that man is more inconceivable without this mystery than this mystery is inconceivable to man.

From this it seems that God, willing to make the difficulty of our existence unintelligible to ourselves, has concealed the knot so high, or, better speaking, so low, that we are quite incapable of reaching it; so that it is not by the proud exertions of our reason, but by the simple submissions of reason, that we can truly know ourselves.

These foundations, solidly established on the inviolable authority of religion, make us know that there are two truths of faith equally certain: the one, that man, in the state of creation, or in that of grace, is raised above all nature, made like God and sharing in his divinity; the other, that in the state of corruption and sin, he is fallen from this state and made like the beasts. These two propositions are equally sound and certain. . . . From this it clearly seems that man by grace is made like God, and a partaker in His divinity, and that without grace he is like the brute beasts.

Christianity the Solution to the Vices of Pride and Idleness

435. Without this divine knowledge [of the two truths of faith] what could men do but either become elated by the inner feeling of their past greatness which still remains to them, or become despondent at the sight of their present weakness? For, not seeing the whole truth, they could not attain perfect virtue. Some considering nature as incorrupt, others as incurable, they could not escape either pride or idleness, the two sources of all vice; since they cannot but either abandon themselves to it through cowardice, or escape it by pride. For if they knew the excellence of man, they were ignorant of his corruption; so that they easily avoided idleness, but fell into pride. And if they recognized the infirmity of nature, they were ignorant of its dignity; so that they could easily avoid vanity, but it was to fall into despair. Thence arise the different schools of the Stoics and Epicureans, the Dogmatists, Academicians, etc.

The Christian religion alone has been able to cure these two vices, not by expelling the one through means of the other according to the wisdom of the world, but by expelling both according to the simplicity of the Gospel. For it teaches the righteous that it raises them even to a participation in divinity itself; that in this lofty state they still carry the source of all corruption, which makes them during all their life subject to error, misery, death, and sin; and it proclaims to the most ungodly that they are capable of the grace of their Redeemer. So making those tremble whom it justifies, and consoling those whom it condemns, religion so justly tempers fear with hope through that double capacity of grace and of sin, common to all, that it humbles infinitely more than reason alone can do, but without despair. It also exalts infinitely more than natural pride, but without inflating. It thus makes it evident that, alone being exempt from error and vice, it alone fulfils the duty of instructing and correcting men.

Who, then, can refuse to believe and adore this heavenly light? For is it not clearer than day that we perceive within ourselves ineffaceable marks of excellence? Is it not equally true that we experience every hour the results of our deplorable condition? What does this chaos and monstrous confusion proclaim to us but the truth of these two states, with a voice so powerful that it is impossible to resist it?

THE WAGER (Thoughts)

Failure of Proofs for God's Existence

242. To speak of those who have treated this matter [of proving God's existence]. I admire the boldness with which these persons assume to speak of God. In addressing their argument to infidels, their first chapter is to prove Divinity from the works of nature. I should not be astonished at their enterprise, if they were addressing their argument to the faithful; for it is certain that those who have the living faith in their hearts see at once that all existence is none other than the work of the God whom they adore. But for those in whom this light is extinguished, and in whom we purpose to rekindle it, persons destitute of faith and grace, who, seeking with all their light whatever they see in nature that can bring them to this knowledge, find only obscurity and darkness; to tell them that they have only to look at the smallest things which surround them, and they will see God openly, to give them, as a complete proof of this great and important matter, the course of the moon and planets, and to claim to have concluded the proof with such an argument, is to give them ground for believing that the proofs of our religion are very weak. I see by reason and experience that nothing is more calculated to arouse their contempt.

It is not after this manner that Scripture speaks, which has a better knowledge of the things that are of God. It says, on the contrary, that God is a hidden God, and that, since the corruption of nature, He has left men in a darkness from which they can escape only through Jesus Christ, without whom all communion with God is cut off. "Neither knows any man the Father, except the Son, and he to whomsoever the Son will reveal him" [Matt 11:27].

This is what Scripture points out to us, when it says in so many places that those who seek God find Him. It is not of that light, "like the noonday sun," that this is said. We do not say that those who seek the noonday sun, or water in the sea, will find them; and hence the evidence of God must not be of this nature. So it tells us elsewhere: "Truly, you are a God that hides yourself" [Is. 45:15].

243. It is an astounding fact that no canonical writer has ever made use of nature to prove God. They all strive to make us believe in Him. David, Solomon, etc., have never said, "There is no void, therefore there is a God." They must have had more knowledge than the most learned people who came after them, and who have all made use of this argument. This is worthy of attention.

244. "Why! Do you not say yourself that the heavens and birds prove God?" No. "And does your religion not say so"? No. For although it is true in a sense for some souls to whom God gives this light, yet it is false with respect to the majority of men.

245. There are three sources of belief: reason, custom, inspiration. The Christian religion, which alone has reason, does not acknowledge as her true children those who believe without inspiration. It is not that she excludes reason and custom. On the contrary, the mind must be opened to proofs, must be confirmed by custom and offer itself in humbleness to inspirations, which alone can produce a true and saving effect. "Lest the cross of Christ should be made of none effect" [I Cor. 1:17].

543. The metaphysical proofs of God are so remote from the reasoning of men, and so complicated, that they make little impression; and if they should be of service to some, it would be only during the moment that they see such demonstration; but an hour afterwards they fear they have been mistaken. "What they have found by their curiosity, they have lost by their pride" [Augustine, Sermon 141]. This is the result of the knowledge of God obtained without Jesus Christ; it is communion without a mediator with the God whom they have known without a mediator. Whereas those who have known God by a mediator know their own wretchedness.

Reason is Neutral Concerning God's Existence and Nature

233. We know then the existence and nature of the finite, because we also are finite and have extension. We know the existence of the infinite and are ignorant of its nature, because it has extension like us, but not limits like us. But we know neither the existence nor the nature of God, because He has neither extension nor limits.

By faith we know God's existence. In the glorious state of heaven we will know his nature. Now, I have already shown that we may easily know the existence of a thing without knowing its nature. Let us speak now according to the light of nature. If there is a God he is infinitely incomprehensible, since, having neither parts nor limits, he has no proportion to us. We are then incapable of knowing either what he is, or whether he is. This being true, who will dare to undertake to resolve this question? It cannot be we who have no proportion to him.

Who, then, will blame those Christians who are not able to give a reason for their belief insofar as they profess a religion for which they can give no reason? In exposing it to the world, they declare that it is foolishness (1 Corinthians, 1:18). Then you complain that they do not prove it! If they proved it, they would not keep their word. It is in lacking proofs that they do not lack sense. Yes, but though this may excuse those who offer it such, and take away the blame for producing it without reason, this does not excuse those who receive it.

Let us examine this point then, and say "God is, or he is not." But to which side will we incline? Reason cannot decide it at all. There is an infinite chaos that separates us. A game is being played at the extremity of this infinite distance in which heads or tails must come up. Which will you take? By reason you can wager on neither. By reason you can hinder neither from winning.

Do not, then, charge those with falsehood who have made a choice. For you know nothing about it.

"No. But I blame them for having made, not this choice, but a choice. For although he who takes heads, and the other, are in the same fault, they are both in fault. The proper way is simply not to wager."

High Stakes of the Wager Compel a Decision

Yes, but you must wager. This is not voluntary. You have set sail. Which will you take? Let's see. Since a choice must be made, let's see which interests you the least. You have two things to lose: the true and the good. You also have two things to stake: your reason and your will; that is, your knowledge and your complete happiness. Your nature has two things to shun: error and misery. Your reason is not more wounded, since a choice must necessarily be made in choosing one rather than the other. Here a point is eliminated. But what about your happiness? Let us weigh the gain and the loss in taking heads that God exists. Let us weigh these two cases. If you gain, you gain all. If you lose, you lose nothing. Wager without hesitation, then, that he is.

"This is admirable. Yes, it is necessary to wager, but perhaps I wager too much."

Let us see. Since there is equal risk of gaining or losing, if you had to gain but two lives for one, still you might wager. But if there were three lives to gain, it would be required to play (since you are under the necessity of playing). When you are forced to play, you would be imprudent not to risk your life in order to gain three in a play where there is equal hazard of loss and gain. But there is an eternity of life and happiness. This being true, even if there were an infinity of chances (only one of which might be for you) you would still be right in wagering one in order to have two. Being obliged to play, if there was an infinity of life infinitely happy to gain, you would act foolishly to refuse to play one life against three in a game where among an infinity of chances there is one for you. But there is here an infinity of life infinitely happy to gain. There is a chance of gain against a finite number of chances of loss, and what you play is finite.

This [i.e., the balance of gain over loss] is quite settled. Wherever the infinite is, and where there is not an infinity of chances of loss against the chance of gain, there is nothing to weigh, and we must give all. Thus, when we are forced to play, we must renounce reason in order to keep life, rather than to risk it for the infinite gain, which is as likely to occur as the loss of annihilation.

Possible Criticism: Happiness now is Certain, but Infinite Gain in the Afterlife is Infinitely Uncertain

For there is no use in saying that it is uncertain whether we will gain, and that it is certain that we risk. There is no use in saying that, [a] the infinite distance between the certainty of what we risk and, [b] the uncertainty of what we will gain, raises the finite good which we certainly risk to a level of equality with the uncertain infinite gain. It is not so. Every player, without violating reason, risks a certainty to gain uncertainty, and nevertheless he risks a finite certainty to gain a finite uncertainty. The distance is not infinite between this certainty of what we risk, and the uncertainty of gain. This is false. There is, in truth, an infinity between the certainty of gaining and the certainty of losing. But the uncertainty of gaining is proportioned to the certainty of what we risk, according to the proportion of the chances of gain and loss. It follows from this that if there are as many chances on one side as there are on the other, the game is playing even. Then the certainty of what we risk is equal to the uncertainty of the gain. This is quite far from being infinitely distant. Thus our proposition [of infinite gain] is of infinite force when there is the finite to hazard in a play where the chances of gain and loss are equal, and the infinite to gain. This is demonstrative, and if people are capable of any truths, this is one of them.

If Belief and Faith are Difficult, then Reduce Passion and Act Religiously

"I confess it, I admit it. But, still, are there no means of seeing the truth behind the game?"

Yes, the scriptures and the rest.

"Yes, but my hands are tied and my mouth is dumb. I am forced to wager, yet I am not free. I am chained and so constituted that I cannot believe. What will you have me do then?"

That is true. But at least learn your inability to believe, since reason brings you to such belief [given the above reasoning], and yet you cannot believe. Try then to convince yourself not by the addition of proofs for the existence of God, but by the reduction of your own passions. You would have recourse to faith, but don't know the ways. You wish to be cured of infidelity, and you ask for the remedy. Learn it from those who have been bound like yourself, and who would wager now all their goods. These know the road that you wish to follow, and are cured of a disease that you wish to be cured of. Follow their course, then, from its beginning. It consisted in doing all things as if they believed in them, in using holy water, in having masses said, etc. Naturally this will make you believe and stupefy you at the same time.

"But this is what I fear."

And why? What have you to lose? But to show you that this leads you there, it is this which will lessen the passions, which are your greatest obstacles.

Religious Commitment Creates no Loss in this Life

End of this Discourse

Now, what harm will come to you in taking this course? You would be faithful, virtuous, humble, grateful, beneficent, a sincere friend, truthful. Indeed, you would not be given up to poisonous pleasures, to false glory, or false joys. But would you not have other pleasures?

I tell you that you will gain by it in this life. Each step you take in this direction, you will see so much of the certainty of gain, and so much of the nothingness of what you risk, that you will acknowledge in the end that you have wagered something certain, infinite for which you have given nothing.

"Ah! This discourse moves me, charms me," etc.

If this discourse pleases you and seems impressive, know that it is made by a man who has knelt, both before and after it, in prayer to that Being, infinite and without parts, before whom he lays all he has, for you also to lay before Him all you have for your own good and for His glory, that so strength may be given to lowliness.

Experiencing God through Faith, not Reason

278. It is the heart which experiences God, and not the reason. This, then, is faith: God felt by the heart, not by the reason.

Faith is a gift of God; do not believe that we said it was a gift of reasoning. Other religions do not say this of their faith. They only give reasoning in order to arrive at it, and yet it does not bring them to it.

282. We know truth, not only by the reason, but also by the heart, and it is in this last way that we know first principles; and reason, which has no part in it, tries in vain to impugn them. The sceptics, who have only this for their object, labor to no purpose. We know that we do not dream, and, however impossible it is for us to prove it by reason, this inability demonstrates only the weakness of our reason, but not, as they affirm, the uncertainty of all our knowledge. For the knowledge of first principles, as space, time, motion, number, is as sure as any of those which we get from reasoning. Reason must trust these intuitions of the heart, and must base them on every argument. (We have intuitive knowledge of the tri-dimensional nature of space and of the infinity of number, and reason then shows that there are no two square numbers one of which is double of the other. Principles are intuited, propositions are inferred, all with certainty, though in different ways.) It is as useless and absurd for reason to demand from the heart proofs of her first principles, before admitting them, as it would be for the heart to demand from reason an intuition of all demonstrated propositions before accepting them.

This inability ought, then, to serve only to humble reason, which would judge all, but not to challenge our certainty, as if only reason were capable of instructing us. Would to God, on the contrary, that we had never need of it, and that we knew everything by instinct and intuition! But nature has refused us this advantage. On the contrary, she has given us only very little knowledge of this kind; and all the rest can be acquired only by reasoning.

Therefore, those to whom God has imparted religion by intuition are very fortunate and justly convinced. But to those who do not have it, we can give it only by reasoning, waiting for God to give them spiritual insight, without which faith is only human and useless for salvation.

PROPHECIES AND MIRACLES (Thoughts)

Preface to Part 2: The Falsity of Non-Biblical Ancient Histories

Antiquity of the Jews. What a difference there is between one book and another! I am not astonished that the Greeks made the Iliad, nor the Egyptians and the Chinese their histories.

We have only to see how this originates. These fabulous historians are not contemporaneous with the facts about which they write. Homer composes a romance, which he gives out as such, and which is received as such. For nobody doubted that Troy and Agamemnon no more existed than did the golden apple. Accordingly, he did not think of making a history, but solely a book to amuse; he is the only writer of his time; the beauty of the work has made it last, everyone learns it and talks about it, it is necessary to know it, and each one knows it by heart. Four hundred years afterwards the witnesses of these facts are no longer alive, no one knows of his own knowledge if it is a fable or a history; one has only learnt it from his ancestors, and this can pass for truth.

Every history which is not contemporaneous, as the books of the Sibyls and Trismegistus, and so many others which have been believed by the world, are false, and found to be false in the course of time. It is not so with contemporaneous writers.

There is a great difference between a book which an individual writes and publishes to a nation [i.e., non-biblical ancient histories], and a book which itself creates a nation [i.e., biblical history]. We cannot doubt that the book is as old as the people.

Prophecies

693. When I see the blindness and the wretchedness of man, when I regard the whole silent universe and man without light, left to himself and, as it were, lost in this corner of the universe, without knowing who has put him there, what he has come to do, what will become of him at death, and incapable of all knowledge, I become terrified, like a man who should be carried in his sleep to a dreadful desert island and should awake without knowing where he is and without means of escape. And thereupon I wonder how people in a condition so wretched do not fall into despair. I see other persons around me of a like nature. I ask them if they are better informed than I am. They tell me that they are not. And thereupon these wretched and lost beings, having looked around them and seen some pleasing objects, have given and attached themselves to them. For my own part, I have not been able to attach myself to them, and, considering how strongly it appears that there is something else than what I see, I have examined whether this God has not left some sign of Himself.

I see many contradictory religions, and consequently all false except one. Each wants to be believed on its own authority, and threatens unbelievers. I do not therefore believe them. Everyone can say this; everyone can call himself a prophet. But I see that Christian religion wherein prophecies are fulfilled; and that is what everyone cannot do.

564. The prophecies, the very miracles and proofs of our religion, are not of such a nature that they can be said to be absolutely convincing. But they are also of such a kind that it cannot be said that it is unreasonable to believe them. Thus there is both evidence and obscurity to enlighten some and confuse others. But the evidence is such that it surpasses, or at least equals, the evidence to the contrary. Thus, it is not reason which can determine men not to follow it, and thus it can only be lust or malice of heart. And by this means there is sufficient evidence to condemn, and insufficient to convince. So it appears in those who follow it that it is grace, and not reason, which makes them follow it; and in those who shun it, that it is lust, not reason, which makes them shun it.

588. Our religion is wise and foolish. Wise, because it is the most learned and the most founded on miracles, prophecies, etc. Foolish, because it is not all this which makes us belong to it. This makes us, indeed, condemn those who do not belong to it; but it does not cause belief in those who do belong to it. It is the cross that makes them believe, ne evacuata sit crux ["so that the cross should not be emptied of its power," 1 Cor. 1:17]. So Saint Paul, who came with wisdom and signs, says that he has come neither with wisdom nor with signs; for he came to convert. But those who come only to convince can say that they come with wisdom and with signs.

706. The prophecies are the strongest proof of Jesus Christ. It is for them also that God has made most provision; for the event which has fulfilled them is a miracle existing since the birth of the Church to the end. So God has raised up prophets during sixteen hundred years, and, during four hundred years afterwards, He has scattered all these prophecies among all the Jews, who carried them into all parts of the world. Such was the preparation for the birth of Jesus Christ, and, as His Gospel was to be believed by all the world, it was not only necessary that there should be prophecies to make it believed, but that these prophecies should exist throughout the whole world, in order to make it embraced by the whole world.

710. Prophecies. If one man alone had made a book of predictions about Jesus Christ, as to the time and the manner, and Jesus Christ had come in conformity to these prophecies, this fact would have infinite weight. But there is much more here. Here is a succession of men during four thousand years, who, consequently and without variation, come, one after another, to foretell this same event. Here is a whole people who announce it and who have existed for four thousand years, in order to give corporate testimony of the assurances which they have and from which they cannot be diverted by whatever threats and persecutions people may make against them. This is far more important.

737. Therefore I reject all other religions. In that way I find an answer to all objections. It is right that a God so pure should only reveal Himself to those whose hearts are purified. Hence this religion is lovable to me, and I find it now sufficiently justified by so divine a morality. But I find more in it.

I find it convincing that, since the memory of man has lasted, it was constantly announced to men that they were universally corrupt, but that a Redeemer should come; that it is not one man who said it, but innumerable men, and a whole nation expressly made for the purpose and prophesying for four thousand years. This is a nation which is more ancient than every other nation. Their books, scattered abroad, are four thousand years old.

The more I examine them, the more truths I find in them: an entire nation foretell Him before His advent, and an entire nation worship Him after His advent; what has preceded and what has followed; in short, people without idols and kings, this synagogue which was foretold, and these wretches who frequent it and who, being our enemies, are admirable witnesses of the truth of these prophecies, wherein their wretchedness and even their blindness are foretold.

829. Jesus Christ says that the Scriptures testify of Him. But He does not point out in what respect.

Even the prophecies could not prove Jesus Christ during His life; and so men would not have been culpable for not believing in Him before His death had the miracles not sufficed without doctrine. Now those who did not believe in Him, when He was still alive, were sinners, as He said himself, and without excuse. Therefore they must have had proof beyond doubt, which they resisted. Now, they had not the prophecies, but only the miracles. Therefore the latter suffice, when the doctrine is not inconsistent with them; and they ought to be believed.

838. Jesus Christ performed miracles, then the apostles, and the first saints in great number; because the prophecies not being yet accomplished, but in the process of being accomplished by them, the miracles alone bore witness to them. It was foretold that the Messiah should convert the nations. How could this prophecy be fulfilled without the conversion of the nations? And how could the nations be converted to the Messiah, if they did not see this final effect of the prophecies which prove Him? Therefore, till He had died, risen again, and converted the nations, all was not accomplished; and so miracles were needed during all this time. Now they are no longer needed against the Jews; for the accomplished prophecies constitute a lasting miracle.

843. The proofs which Jesus Christ and the apostles draw from Scripture are not conclusive; for they say only that Moses foretold that a prophet should come. But they do not thereby prove that this is He; and that is the whole question. These passages, therefore, serve only to show that they are not contrary to Scripture and that there appears no inconsistency, but not that there is agreement. Now this is enough, namely, exclusion of inconsistency, along with miracles.

Miracles

803. Miracles enable us to judge doctrine, and doctrine enables us to judge miracles. There are false miracles and true. There must be a distinction in order to know them; otherwise they would be useless. Now they are not useless; on the contrary, they are fundamental. Now the rule which is given to us must be such that it does not destroy the proof which the true miracles give of the truth, which is the chief end of the miracles. Moses has given two rules: that the prediction does not come to pass (Deut. 18.), and that they do not lead to idolatry (Deut. 13.); and Jesus Christ [has given us] one.

804. Miracle. It is an effect, which exceeds the natural power of the means which are employed for it. What is not a miracle is an effect, which does not exceed the natural power of the means which are employed for it. Thus, those who heal by invocation of the devil do not work a miracle; for that does not exceed the natural power of the devil. . . .

815. It is not possible to have a reasonable belief against miracles.

816. Unbelievers the most gullible. They believe the miracles of Vespasian, in order not to believe those of Moses.

817. Having considered how it happens that so great credibility is given to so many impostors who say they have remedies, often to the length of men putting their lives into their hands, it has appeared to me that the true cause is that there are true remedies. For it would not be possible that there should be so many false remedies and that so much faith should be placed in them, if there were none true. If there had never been any remedy for any in, and all ills had been incurable, it is impossible that men should have imagined that they could give remedies, and still more impossible that so many others should have believed those who boasted of having remedies; in the same way as did a man boast of preventing death, no one would believe him, because there is no example of this. But as there were a number of remedies found to be true by the very knowledge of the greatest men, the belief of men is thereby induced; and, this being known to be possible, it has been therefore concluded that it was. For people commonly reason thus: "A thing is possible, therefore it is"; because the thing cannot be denied generally, since there are particular effects which are true, the people, who cannot distinguish which among these particular effects are true, believe them all. In the same way, the reason why so many false effects are credited to the moon is that there are some true, as the tide.

It is the same with prophecies, miracles, divination by dreams, sorceries, etc. For if there had been nothing true in all this, men would have believed nothing of them; and thus, instead of concluding that there are no true miracles because there are so many false, we must, on the contrary, say that there certainly are true miracles, since there are false, and that there are false miracles only because some are true. We must reason in the same way about religion; for it would not be possible that men should have imagined so many false religions, if there had not been a true one. The objection to this is that savages have a religion; but the answer is that they have heard the true spoken of, as appears by the Deluge, circumcision, the cross of Saint Andrew, etc.

818. Having considered how it happens that there are so many false miracles, false revelations, sorceries, etc., it has seemed to me that the true cause is that there are some true. For it would not be possible that there should be so many false miracles, if there were no true ones, nor so many false revelations, if there were no true ones, nor so many false religions, if there were not one true. For if there had never been all this, it is almost impossible that men should have imagined it, and still more impossible that so many others should have believed it. But as there have been very great things true, and as they have been believed by great men, this impression has been the cause that nearly everybody is made capable of believing also the false. And thus, instead of concluding that there are no true miracles, since there are so many false, it must be said, on the contrary, that there are true miracles, since there are so many false; and that there are false ones only because there are true; and that in the same way there are false religions because there is one true.- Objection to this: savages have a religion. But this is because they have heard the true spoken of, as appears by the cross of Saint Andrew, the Deluge, circumcision, etc. This arises from the fact that the human mind, finding itself inclined to that side by the truth, becomes thereby susceptible of all the falsehoods of this.

823. If there were no false miracles, there would be certainty. If there were no rule to judge them, miracles would be useless and there would be no reason for believing. Now there is, humanly speaking, no human certainty, but we have reason.

832. Miracles are no longer necessary, because we have had them already. But when tradition is no longer minded; when the Pope alone is offered to us; when he has been imposed upon; and when the true source of truth, which is tradition, is thus excluded; and the Pope, who is its guardian, is biased; the truth is no longer free to appear. Then, as men speak no longer of truth, truth itself must speak to men. This is what happened in the time of Arius. (Miracles under Diocletian and under Arius.)

THE VALUE OF SUFFERING ("Prayer to Ask of God the Proper Use of Sickness" 1660)

Lord, whose spirit is so good and so gentle in all things, and who are so merciful that not only the prosperity but the very disgrace that happens to your elect is the effect of your mercy, grant me the favor not to act towards me as towards a heathen in the condition to which your justice has reduced me. So like a true Christian, I may recognize you for my Father and my God, in whatever condition I may find myself, since the change of my condition brings none to yours; as you are always the same, however subject I may be to change, and as you are none the less God when you afflict and punish, than when you comfort and show leniency.

You gave me health to serve you, and I made wicked use of it. You now send me sickness to correct me; do not permit me to use it to irritate you by my impatience. I made a bad use of my health, and you have justly punished me for it. Do not permit me to make a bad use of my punishment. Since the corruption of my nature is such that it makes your favors harm to me, grant, my God! that your all-powerful grace may makes your punishments helpful. If my heart was full of affection for the world while it retained its vigor, destroy this vigor for my salvation; and makes me incapable of enjoying the world, either through weakness of body or through zeal of charity, that I may enjoy only you. . . .

Grant, my God, that in a constantly equal uniformity of spirit I may receive all kinds of events, since we do not know what we should ask, and since I cannot desire one more than another without presumption, and without making myself the judge of and responsible for the results that your wisdom has rightly been pleased to hide from me. Lord, I know only that I know but one thing, that it is good to follow you and that it is evil to offend you. After this, I do not know which is the better or worse of anything; I do not know which is more profitable to me, health or sickness, wealth or poverty, nor of all the things of the world. This is a judgment that exceeds the power of men or of angels, and that is hidden in the secrets of your providence which I adore, and which I wish not to fathom.

Grant then, Lord, that such as I am I may conform myself to your will; and that being sick as I am, I may glorify you in my sufferings. Without them I could not arrive at glory; and you, too, my Savior, have only wished to attain it through them. It was by the tokens of your suffering that you were recognized by your disciples; and it is by suffering also that you will recognize your disciples. Acknowledge me then as your disciple in the evils which I endure both in my body and my mind, for the offences that I have committed. Since nothing is pleasing to God if it be not offered through you, unite my will to yours, and my sorrows to those which you have suffered. Grant that mine may become yours. Unite me to you; fill me with yourself and with your Holy Spirit. Enter into my heart and soul, to bear in them my sufferings, and to continue to endure in me what remains to you to suffer of your passion, that you may complete in your members even the perfect consummation of your body, so that being full of you, it may no longer be that I live and suffer, but that it may be you that lives and suffer in me, my Savior! And that thus having some small part in your suffering, you will fill me entirely with the glory that they have acquired for you, in which you will live with the Father and the Holy Spirit through ages upon ages. So be it.

NOBLEMEN NOT INTRINSICALLY BETTER THAN ORDINARY PEOPLE ("Three on the Condition of the Nobility" 1660)

Noble Heritage results from Chance and Human Regulation

Imagine that a man was cast by a storm upon an unknown island, whose inhabitants were at that moment in trouble, owing to the sudden disappearance of their King; and, as he happened to bear a strong resemblance in person and countenance to the lost Sovereign, he is supposed to be actually himself, and is immediately received, as such, by the whole population. He was at first perplexed, what part he ought to act on the occasion; but, quickly resolved to avail himself of the advantage which fortune presented to him. He received, therefore, all the considerations offered to him, and allowed himself at once to be treated by the deceived population as their King. But, as he was unable to forget his former condition, his reflections were, while receiving the people's homage, that he was not really the Sovereign of whom they were in search, and that the kingdom was no property of his. Thus, a double train of thought occupied his mind: the one, how he was to conduct himself as King; the other, what had been his original state, and by what strange accident he had become a Sovereign. The latter, however, he kept to himself; the former alone, he revealed to others: by the one, be governed the people; by the other, he regulated his own conduct.

Now, I would not have you imagine, that it is less an accident that you are in possession of your wealth and distinction, than that the man we have imagined found himself a King. You have no superiority in yourself, and by virtue of your own nature, any more than he. It is to a multitude of chances you owe it, not only that you are the son of a duke, but that you are born into this world at all. Your birth depended upon a marriage, or rather, upon the marriages of your whole line of ancestors. From where does the marriage tie arise? From an accidental visit, from a fleeting conversation, from a hundred unforeseen contingencies! You hold, you will say, your revenues from your ancestors; but is it not the result of numberless accidents, that your ancestors acquired, and have retained, the possession of them?

Can you suppose it to be by any necessary order of things, that these possessions have been handed down from your ancestors to yourself? Far is this from being the case. That order is founded alone on legislative enactments, originating, perhaps, in the soundest reasons, but none of which assume any natural right on your part to these things. Had our forefathers thought fit to enact that the possessions, after being enjoyed by your predecessors during life, should revert to the commonwealth after their death, you would have had no ground of complaint. Thus, then, is the whole title by which you hold your property not one conferred by natural right, but by human regulation. A different determination of judgment on the part of those who had the making of laws, might have made you poor; and it is only the concurrence of circumstances in which your birth originated, and the accident of laws favorable to your interests, that have put you in possession of all that you enjoy.

Noble Heritage not from Merit or Natural Superiority

I do not say that they do not belong legitimately to you, or that any other could be permitted to take them from you. God, who is the proprietor of all things, has permitted societies to make laws for the distribution of property; and when these laws are once enacted, it becomes a crime to violate them. This constitutes some distinction between your case, and that of the man who obtained his kingdom by the mistake of the people: God had not sanctioned his possession of the sovereignty, and might have compelled him to renounce it; while yours he has sanctioned. But what assimilates you with him is, that your rights are not founded, any more than his, in any qualification and merit in yourself, by which you obtain a title to them.

Your mind and your body might have been indifferently, those of a laborer, or of a duke; and there is no natural superiority in them, that should assign them to the one, rather than to the other. What is the inference, then, from this ? -That you ought, like the man of whom we have been speaking, to entertain a double habit of thought; and that, if among men you conduct yourself in a manner conformable to your rank, a deeper, but not less true conviction, should suggest, that by nature you possess no advantages over them. If the avowed thought elevates you above the generality of mankind, let the inward reflection humble you, by showing you the perfect equality, in your natural state, between yourself and all your fellow-men. The crowds who admire you know, perhaps, nothing of the secret. They deem nobility a real elevation, and regard the great as almost of a different species from their own. I advise that you should not deprive them of this illusion; but, on the other hand, do not abuse your elevation to the point of arrogance. Most importantly, do not mistake yourself so much as to suppose that you, in reality, possess a nature in any respect different from theirs.

What would you have said, if the man who was installed into royalty by the mistake of the people, had at once so far forgotten his former condition, as to imagine the kingdom was his due; that he had obtained it by desert, and enjoyed it of right? You would have marveled at his ignorance and foolishness. But is it greater than that of persons of high condition, who fall into so strange a forgetfulness of their natural and original state? Most important is this caution! Believe me, all the excesses, all the follies, all the outrages of the great, arise from their ignorance of what they really are. Difficult would it be for those who regarded themselves as intrinsically on a level with all men, and were convinced that in themselves they had no claim to those petty advantages which God confers upon them, in preference to others. Difficult, indeed, would it be for such to conduct themselves toward their fellow-men with arrogance. It is those only who forget these things, and believe themselves to possess real advantages over others, that can fall into such conduct; and this is the illusion against which I would now desire to caution you.

STUDY QUESTIONS

Please answer all of the following questions.

1. In Pascal's "Preface" to the Treatise on Vacuum, what are the benefits and abuses of authority and reason?

2. In Pascal's "Preface" to the Treatise on Vacuum, why should we excuse the ancients for their mistakes?

3. In "Conversations with M. de Saci", what are the strengths and weaknesses of Epictetus's and Montaigne's views?

4. In "Conversations with M. de Saci", how do the vices of pride and idleness arise from the two states of humanity before and after the fall of Adam?

5. In "Conversations with M. de Saci", what are the values and dangers of Epictetus and Montaigne?

6. In Pascal's Thoughts, what are the two infinites between which humans are trapped?

7. In Pascal's Thoughts, what are the extremes that humans cannot comprehend?

8. In Pascal's Thoughts, why are people confused about mind and body, and what are the incorrect theories that this leads people to?

9. In Pascal's Thoughts, what are the main arguments of the skeptics, and why do both skepticism and dogmatism fail?

10. In Pascal's Thoughts, what are the differing conceptions that people have of the highest good?

11. In Pascal's Thoughts, what are the key features of diversion and boredom?

12. In Pascal's Thoughts, what is the difference between true justice and customary justice, and what must society do to keep people following customary justice and laws.

13. In Pascal's Thoughts, describe the skeptical and dogmatic sides of human nature and how it is resolved.

14. In Pascal's Thoughts, what value do proofs of God's existence have for believers and non-believers respectively?

15. In Pascal's Thoughts, describe the Wager and Pascal's advice to those who are incapable of making a belief decision?

16. In Pascal's Thoughts, what are the key features of prophesies?

17. In Pascal's Thoughts, what are the key features of miracles?

18. What are the key features of Pascal's "Prayer to Ask of God the Proper Use of Sickness"?

19. In "Three Discourses on Nobility", what is the thought experiment about the castaway man, and what is the double train of thought he must have?

20. In Pascal's "Three Discourses on Nobility", how does nobility arise, and what is the double train of thought that noblemen should have?

21. Short essay: please select one of the following and answer it in a minimum of 100 words.

a. Explain Pascal's view of ancient authorities in his "Preface" to the Treatise on a Vacuum, and discuss whether he is correct.

b. In the "Conversations", Pascal notes the weaknesses and dangers of both Epictetus and Montaigne. Discuss how either of these philosophers might respond to Pascal.

c. In Pascal's discussion of the limits of human reason, his key argument is this: understanding the parts of nature requires understanding the whole upon which the parts depend; but we do not understand the whole, and thus not the parts. Analyze the soundness of this argument.

d. Pascal argues that since human nature is a composite combination of matter and spirit, we cannot properly know simple things, either spiritual or material. Is he right with either his assumption that we are composite or with his conclusion about our inability to know simple things?

e. Pascal argues that both skepticism and dogmatism fail. He also argues that neutrality is not an option since this gives in to skepticism. So, is Pascal himself a skeptic or does he offer some other way that is neither skeptical nor dogmatic? Explain.

f. Discuss Pascal's view of customary justice vs. true justice, and how he thinks his position differs from Montaigne's.

g. Voltaire makes the following criticism of Pascal's wager: "It is a false assertion that the not laying a wager that God exists is laying that he does not exist. For, certainly that man whose mind is in a state of doubt, and is desirous of being informed, assuredly does not lay on either side" ("Remarks on Pascal's Thoughts" 1734). Explain Voltaire's point and how Pascal might respond.

h. Voltaire also makes the following criticism of Pascal's wager: "The first step you should take (one might say to M. Pascal) would be to convince my reason. It is certainly in my interest to believe that there is a God. But if, according to the system, God came only to so very few, if the number of the elect is so alarmingly small; and if I am unable, from my own impulse, to do anything, be so good as to tell me what interest I can have in believing you? Is it not visibly to my interest to believe the direct contrary? With what face can you talk to me of infinite bliss, to which scarce one man among a million has the least claim? If you would really convince me, you must take a different course, and not at one time talk to me of gaming, staking heads or tails" ("Remarks on Pascal's Thoughts" 1734). Explain Voltaire's point and how Pascal might respond.

i. Mary Wollstonecraft Shelley, the author of Frankenstein, makes the following criticism of Pascal's wager: "This thought, however, is founded on misapprehension, and a want [i.e., lack] of knowledge of the human mind. Belief is not a voluntary act--it is the result of conviction; and we have it not in our choice to be convinced. Besides, love of truth is a passion of the human soul; and there are men who, perceiving truth in disbelief, cling to it as tenaciously as a religionist to his creed. The method of convincing infidels by commenting on the beauty of the morality of the gospel, and its necessity for the happiness of man, is far more conclusive" ("Pascal", Lives France, 1838). Explain Shelly's point and how Pascal might respond.

j. Nineteenth-century mathematician Augustus De Morgan makes the following criticism of Pascal's wager: "a person who elects to believe in God, as the best chance of gain, is not one who, according to Pascal's creed, or any other worth naming, will really secure that gain. I wonder whether Pascal's curious imagination ever presented to him in sleep his [skeptical] convert, in the future state, shaken out of a red-hot dice-box upon a red-hot hazard-table [i.e., dice table], as perhaps he might have been, if Dante had been the later of the two [i.e., as Dante might have described Pascal's convert if Dante lived after Pascal]" ("The Late Professor De Morgan", Spectator, 1871). Explain De Morgan's point and how Pascal might respond.

k. William James criticized Pascal's wager arguing that it was too cold and impersonal because the wager cannot produce sincere belief. James writes, "We feel that a faith in masses and holy water adopted willfully after such a mechanical calculation would lack the inner soul of faith's reality; and if we were ourselves in the place of the Deity, we should probably take particular pleasure in cutting off believers of this pattern from their infinite reward. It is evident that unless there be some pre-existing tendency to believe in masses and holy water, the option offered to the will by Pascal is not a living option" ("The Will to Believe"). How might Pascal respond to James's criticism?

l. William James also criticized Pascal's wager on the grounds that the same type of wager could be used to compel belief in other deities since different religions claim to give eternal life. Scholars refer to this as the "the many-gods" criticism. James writes, "As well might the Mahdi write to us, saying, 'I am the Expected One whom God has created in his effulgence. You shall be infinitely happy if you confess me; otherwise you shall be cut off from the light of the sun. Weigh, then, your infinite gain if I am genuine against your finite sacrifice if I am not!' ("The Will to Believe")" How might Pascal respond to this?

m. James Franklin gives the following defense of Pascal's wager: "When Pascal speaks as if there are only two hypotheses, strict Catholicism and atheism, he is giving a fair picture of the choices actually confronting his interlocutor, the Parisian 'man of the world' of 1660. If someone in the 1990s [i.e., today] faces a different range of options, that does not make the Pascalian game-theoretic perspective irrelevant. On the contrary, the richer the choice of options considered reasonable, the more the need for careful calculation" ("Two Caricatures" 1998). Discuss whether Franklin's argument is a successful response to William James's "many-gods" criticism.

n. Contemporary philosopher George Schlesinger has two arguments defending Pascal against James's "many-gods criticism". First, Schlesinger argues, at minimum Pascal's wager can show that belief in the theistic God is a better gamble than in non-theistic Gods. For, the happiness we receive in heaven is in proportion to the greatness of God, and an infinitely great being will give us more happiness than one who isn't infinitely great. Second, Schlesinger argues that while proofs for the theistic God are not conclusive, they still provide some evidence in favor of theism rather than non-theism, which makes theism a better gamble. Are either of these arguments by Schlesinger successful defenses of Pascal?

o. Pascal argues that false miracles presuppose that there are true miracles, in the same way that quack remedies would not be believed unless there were true remedies. Voltaire gives the following criticism: "In my opinion humankind are not obliged necessarily, in order to examine what is fact, to be acquainted with what is true: a thousand false influences were ascribed to the moon, before we had the least conception of the true reason of the ebbing and flowing of the sea" ("Remarks on Pascal's Thoughts" 1734). Explain Voltaire's point and discuss how Pascal might respond.

p. Pascal seems to offer two different paths to religious faith. The first is the wager when reason is neutral, and the second is the compelling nature of prophesies and miracles. Discuss whether these two paths are in conflict with each other.

q. In his "Discourse on the Condition of the Great", Pascal argues that noblemen are not intrinsically better than ordinary people, and thus they should accept their privileged positions with humility. How might a nobleman with a sense of entitlement respond to Pascal?