Blaise Pascal Quotes & Sayings

If a soldier or labourer complain of the hardship of his lot, set him to do nothing. — Blaise Pascal

Since we cannot be universal and know all that is to be known of everything, we ought to know a little about everything. For it is far better to know something about everything than to know all about one thing. — Blaise Pascal

Men are so inevitably mad that not to be mad would be to give a mad twist to madness. — Blaise Pascal

Let a man choose what condition he will, and let him accumulate around him all the goods and gratifications seemingly calculated to make him happy in it; if that man is left at any time without occupation or amusement, and reflects on what he is, the meagre, languid felicity of his present lot will not bear him up. He will turn necessarily to gloomy anticipations of the future; and unless his occupation calls him out of himself, he is inevitably wretched. — Blaise Pascal

There was once in man a true happiness of which there now remain to him only the mark and empty trace, which he in vain tries to fill from all his surroundings, seeking from things absent the help he does not obtain in things present. — Blaise Pascal

There is nothing we can now call our own, for what we call so is the effect of art; crimes are made by decrees of the senate, or by the votes of the people; and as here-to-fore we are burdened by vices, so now we are oppressed by laws. — Blaise Pascal

If it is an extraordinary blindness to live without investigating what we are, it is a terrible one to live an evil life, while believing in God — Blaise Pascal

One-half of the ills of life come because men are unwilling to sit down quietly for thirty minutes to think through all the possible consequences of their acts. — Blaise Pascal

Nothing is more dastardly than to act with bravado toward God. — Blaise Pascal

Knowing God without knowing our own wretchedness makes for pride.
Knowing our own wretchedness without knowing God makes for despair.
Knowing Jesus Christ strikes the balance because he shows us both God and our own wretchedness. — Blaise Pascal

Few men speak humbly of humility, chastely of chastity, skeptically of skepticism. — Blaise Pascal

Jesus Christ came to tell men that they have no enemies but themselves. — Blaise Pascal

There is a God-shaped hole in the life of every man ... — Blaise Pascal

What a Chimera is man! What a novelty, a monster, a chaos, a contradiction, a prodigy! Judge of all things, an imbecile worm; depository of truth, and sewer of error and doubt; the glory and refuse of the universe. — Blaise Pascal

Let man then contemplate nature in full and lofty majesty, and turn his eyes away from the mean objects which surround him. Let him look at the dazzling light hung aloft as an eternal lamp to lighten the universe; let him behold the earth, a mere dot compared with the vast circuit which that orb describes, and stand amazed to find that the vast circuit itself is but a very fine point compared with the orbit traced by the starts as they roll their course on high. — Blaise Pascal

Contradiction is not a sign of falsity, nor the lack of contradiction a sign of truth. — Blaise Pascal

(Man,) the glory and the scandal of the universe. — Blaise Pascal

Reason's last step is the recognition that there are an infinite number of things which are beyond it. — Blaise Pascal

If our condition were truly happy, we would not seek diversion from it in order to make ourselves happy. — Blaise Pascal

There are only three types of people; those who have found God and serve him; those who have not found God and seek him, and those who live not seeking, or finding him. The first are rational and happy; the second unhappy and rational, and the third foolish and unhappy. — Blaise Pascal

The more intelligence one has, the more people one finds original. Commonplace people see no difference between men. — Blaise Pascal

Concupiscence and force are the source of all our actions; concupiscence causes voluntary actions, force involuntary ones. — Blaise Pascal

There should be in eloquence that which is pleasing and that which is real; but that which is pleasing should itself be real. — Blaise Pascal

Time heals griefs and quarrels, for we change and are no longer the same persons. Neither the offender nor the offended are any more themselves. — Blaise Pascal

If we submit everything to reason our religion will be left with nothing mysterious or supernatural. If we offend the principles of reason our religion will be absurd and ridiculous ... There are two equally dangerous extremes: to exclude reason, to admit nothing but reason. — Blaise Pascal

The last advance of reason is to recognize that it is surpassed by innumerable things; it is feeble if it cannot realize that. — Blaise Pascal

I have made this letter longer than usual, only because I have not had the time to make it shorter. — Blaise Pascal

Silence. All human unhappiness comes from not knowing how to stay quietly in a room. — Blaise Pascal

If a man loves a woman for her beauty, does he love her? No; for the smallpox, which destroys her beauty without killing her, causes his love to cease. And if any one loves me for my judgment or my memory, does he really love me? No; for I can lose these qualities without ceasing to be. — Blaise Pascal

Knowledge has two extremes. The first is the pure natural ignorance in which all men find themselves at birth. The other extreme is that reached by great minds, who, having run through all that men can know, find they know nothing, and come back again to that same natural ignorance from which they set out; this is a learned ignorance which is conscious of itself. — Blaise Pascal

I ask you neither for health nor for sickness, for life nor for death; but that you may dispose of my health and my sickness, my life and my death, for your glory ... You alone know what is expedient for me; you are the sovereign master, do with me according to your will. Give to me, or take away from me, only conform my will to yours. I know but one thing, Lord, that it is good to follow you, and bad to offend you. Apart from that, I know not what is good or bad in anything. I know not which is most profitable to me, health or sickness, wealth or poverty, nor anything else in the world. That discernment is beyond the power of men or angels, and is hidden among the secrets of your providence, which I adore, but do not seek to fathom. — Blaise Pascal

Human life is thus only a perpetual illusion; men deceive and flatter each other. No one speaks of us in our presence as he does of us in our absence. Human society is founded on mutual deceit; few friendships would endure if each knew what his friend said of him in his absence, although he then spoke in sincerity and without passion. — Blaise Pascal

I lay it down as a fact that if all men knew what others say of them, there would not be four friends in the world. — Blaise Pascal

Let them at least learn what is the religion they attack, before attacking it. If this religion boasted of having a clear view of God, and of possessing it open and unveiled, it would be attacking it to say that we see nothing in the world which shows it with this clearness. But since, on the contrary, it says that men are — Blaise Pascal

Evil is easily discovered; there is an infinite variety; good is almost unique. But some kinds of evil are almost as difficult to discover as that which we call good; and often particular evil of this class passes for good. It needs even a certain greatness of soul to attain to this, as to that which is good. — Blaise Pascal

We run carelessly over the precipice after having put something in front of us to prevent us seeing it. — Blaise Pascal

The consciousness of the falsity of present pleasures, and the ignorance of the vanity of absent pleasures, cause inconstancy. — Blaise Pascal

Our nature consists in motion; complete rest is death. — Blaise Pascal

If man should commence by studying himself, he would see how impossible it is to go further. — Blaise Pascal

Look somewhere else for someone who can follow you in your researches about numbers. For my part, I confess that they are far beyond me, and I am competent only to admire them. — Blaise Pascal

That which makes us go so far for love is that we never think that we might have need of anything besides that which we love. — Blaise Pascal

All the maxims have been written. It only remains to put them into practice. — Blaise Pascal

Silence is the greatest persecution; never do the saints keep themselves silent. — Blaise Pascal

Perfect clarity would profit the intellect but damage the will. — Blaise Pascal

Finally, let them recognise that there are two kinds of people one can call reasonable; those who serve God with all their heart because they know Him, and those who seek Him with all their heart because they do not know Him. — Blaise Pascal

It is dangerous to explain too clearly to man how like he is to the animals without pointing out his greatness. It is also dangerous to make too much of his greatness without his vileness. It is still more dangerous to leave him in ignorance of both, but it is most valuable to represent both to him. Man must not be allowed to believe that he is equal either to animals or to angels, nor to be unaware of either, but he must know both. — Blaise Pascal

All the excesses, all the violence, and all the vanity of great men, come from the fact that they know not what they are: it being difficult for those who regard themselves at heart as
equal with all men ... For this it is necessary for one to forget himself, and to believe that he has some real excellence above them, in which consists this illusion that I am endeavoring to
discover to you. — Blaise Pascal

To ridicule philosophy is really to philosophize. — Blaise Pascal

[Unbelievers] think they have made great efforts to get at the truth when they have spent a few hours in reading some book out of Holy Scripture, and have questioned some cleric about the truths of the faith. After that, they boast that they have searched in books and among men in vain. — Blaise Pascal

In faith there is enough light for those who want to believe and enough shadows to blind those who don't. — Blaise Pascal

Human life is thus only an endless illusion. Men deceive and flatter each other. No one speaks of us in our presence as he does when we are gone. Society is based on mutual hypocrisy. — Blaise Pascal

Faith is a gift of God. — Blaise Pascal

If man were happy, he would be the more so, the less he was diverted, like the saints and God. — Blaise Pascal

What matters it that man should have a little more knowledge of the universe? If he has it, he gets 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? — Blaise Pascal

Losses are comparative; imagination only makes them of any moment. — Blaise Pascal

All the trouble in the world is due to the fact that man cannot sit still in a room. — Blaise Pascal

Our reason is always disappointed by the inconstancy of appearances. — Blaise Pascal

The Stoics say, " Retire within yourselves; it is there you will find your rest." And that is not true. Others say, "Go out of yourselves; seek happiness in amusement." And this is not true. Illness comes. Happiness is neither without us nor within us. It is in God, both without us and within us. — Blaise Pascal

Everyone, without exception, is searching for happiness. — Blaise Pascal

The immortality of the soul is a matter which is of so great consequence to us, and which touches us so profoundly, that we must have lost all feeling to be indifferent as to knowing what it is. — Blaise Pascal

The only shame is to have none. — Blaise Pascal

The imagination enlarges little objects so as to fill our souls with a fantastic estimate; and, with rash insolence, it belittles the great to its own measure, as when talking of God. — Blaise Pascal

If I had more time I would write a shorter letter. — Blaise Pascal

We are so presumptuous that we wish to be known to all the world, even to those who come after us; and we are so vain that the esteem of five or six persons immediately around us is enough to amuse and satisfy us. — Blaise Pascal

It is better to know something about everything then everything about something — Blaise Pascal

Attachment to the same thought wearies and destroys the mind of man. Hence for the solidity and permanence of the pleasure of love, it is sometimes necessary not to know that we love; and this is not to be guilty of an infidelity, for we do not therefore love another; it is to regain strength in order to love the better. This happens without our thinking of it; the mind is borne hither of itself; nature wills it, commands it. It must however be confessed that this is a miserable consequence of human weakness, and that we should be happier of we were not forced to change of thought; but there is no remedy. — Blaise Pascal

By thought I embrace the universe. — Blaise Pascal

The best defense against logic is ignorance. — Blaise Pascal

I do not know whether God exists, but I know that I have nothing to gain from being an atheist if he does not exist, whereas I have plenty to lose if he does. Hence, this justifies my belief in God. — Blaise Pascal

As men are not able to fight against death, misery, ignorance, they have taken it into their heads, in order to be happy, not to think of them at all. — Blaise Pascal

No one is ignorant that there are two avenues by which opinions are received into the soul, which are its two principal powers: the understanding and the will. — Blaise Pascal

Nature, which alone is good, is wholly familiar and common. — Blaise Pascal

When intuition and logic agree, you are always right. — Blaise Pascal

We must kill them in war, just because they live beyond the river. If they lived on this side, we would be called murderers. — Blaise Pascal

Let man reawake and consider what he is compared with the reality of things; regard himself lost in this remote corner of Nature; and from the tiny cell where he lodges, to wit the Universe, weigh at their true worth earth, kingdoms, towns, himself. What is a man face to face with infinity? — Blaise Pascal

For after all, what is man in creation? Is he not a mere cipher compared with the infinite, a whole compared to the nothing, a mean between zero & all, infinitely remote from understanding of either extreme? Who can follow these astonishing processes? The Author of these wonders understands them, but no one else can. — Blaise Pascal

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. — Blaise Pascal

It is of dangerous consequence to represent to man how near he is to the level of beasts, without showing him at the same time his greatness. It is likewise dangerous to let him see his greatness without his meanness. It is more dangerous yet to leave him ignorant of either; but very beneficial that he should be made sensible of both. — Blaise Pascal

The motions of Grace, the hardness of heart; external circumstances. — Blaise Pascal

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, [if we were to show them our proofs of the existence of God] nothing is more calculated to arouse their contempt ... — Blaise Pascal

God only pours out his light into the mind after having subdued the rebellion of the will by an altogether heavenly gentleness which charms and wins it. — Blaise Pascal

The war existing between the senses and reason. — Blaise Pascal

Each one is all in all to himself; for being dead, all is dead to him. — Blaise Pascal

It's not those who write the laws that have the greatest impact on society. It's those who write the songs. — Blaise Pascal

I can readily conceive of a man without hands or feet; and I could conceive of him without a head, if experience had not taught me that by this he thinks, Thought then, is the essence of man, and without this we cannot conceive of him. — Blaise Pascal

A town, a landscape are when seen from afar a town and a landscape; but as one gets nearer, there are houses, trees, tiles leaves, grasses, ants, legs of ants and so on to infinity. All this is subsumed under the name of landscape. — Blaise Pascal

Our soul is cast into a body, where it finds number, time, dimension. Thereupon it reasons, and calls this nature, necessity, and can believe nothing else.
If there is a God, He is infinitely incomprehensible, since, having neither parts nor limits, He has no affinity to us. We are then incapable of knowing either what He is or if He is. This being so, who will dare to undertake the decision of the question? Not we, who have no affinity to Him. — Blaise Pascal

To think well; this is the principle of morality. — Blaise Pascal

The Church limits her sacramental services to the faithful. Christ gave Himself upon the cross a ransom for all. — Blaise Pascal

Muhammad established a religion by putting his enemies to death; Jesus Christ by commanding his followers to lay down their lives. — Blaise Pascal

We show greatness, not by being at one extreme, but by touching both at once and occupying all the space in between. — Blaise Pascal

By space the universe encompasses me and swallows me up like an atom; by thought I comprehend the world. — Blaise Pascal

The Christian religion alone has been able to cure these twin vices, not by using one to expel the other according to worldly wisdom, but by expelling both through the simplicity of the Gospel. For it teaches the righteous, whom it exalts, even to participation in divinity itself, that in this sublime state they still bear the source of all corruption, which exposes them throughout their lives to error, misery, death and sin; and it cries out to the most ungodly that they are capable of the grace of their redeemer. Thus, making those whom it justifies tremble and consoling those whom it condemns, it so nicely tempers fear with hope through this dual capacity, common to all men, for grace and sin, that it causes infinitely more dejection than mere reason, but without despair, and infinitely more exaltation than natural pride, but without puffing us up. — Blaise Pascal

The weather and my mood have little connection. I have my foggy and my fine days within me; my prosperity or misfortune has little to do with the matter. — Blaise Pascal

We run carelessly to the precipice, after we have put something before us to prevent us seeing it. — Blaise Pascal

All our reasoning comes down to surrendering to feeling. — Blaise Pascal

Man is obviously made for thinking. Therein lies all his dignity and his merit; and his whole duty is to think as he ought. — Blaise Pascal

Symmetry is what we see at a glance; based on the fact that there is no reason for any difference ... — Blaise Pascal

When we would think of God, how many things we find which turn us away from Him, and tempt us to think otherwise. All this is evil, yet it is innate. — Blaise Pascal

I can well conceive a man without hands, feet, head. But I cannot conceive man without thought; he would be a stone or a brute. — Blaise Pascal