Blaise Pascal

Men never do evil so completely and cheerfully as when they do it from religious conviction.

Even those who write against fame wish for the fame of having written well, and those who read their works desire the fame of having read them.

The heart has its reasons which reason knows not.

Kind words produce their images on men's souls.

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

God instituted prayer to communicate to creatures the dignity of causality.

If we examine our thoughts, we shall find them always occupied with the past and the future.

The last thing we discover in composing a work is what to put down first.

Fire. God of Abraham, God of Isaac, God of Jacob, not of the philosophers and the scholars. I will not forget thy word. Amen.

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

We do not content ourselves with the life we have in ourselves and in our own being; we desire to live an imaginary life in the mind of others, and for this purpose we endeavour to shine. We labour unceasingly to adorn and preserve this imaginary existence, and neglect the real. And if we possess calmness, or generosity, or truthfulness, we are eager to make it known, so as to attach these virtues to that imaginary existence. We would rather separate them from ourselves to join them to it; and we would willingly be cowards in order to acquire the reputation of being brave. A great proof of the nothingness of our being, not to be satisfied with the one without the other, and to renounce the one for the other! For he would be infamous who would not die to preserve his honour.

He that takes truth for his guide, and duty for his end, may safely trust to God's providence to lead him aright

The infinite distance between the mind & the body is a symbol of the distance that is infinitely more, between the intellect & love, for love is divine.

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

Knowlege of God without knowledge of man's wretchedness leads to pride. Knowledge of man's wretchedness without knowledge of God leads to despair. Knowledge of Jesus Christ is the middle course, because by it we discover both God and our wretched state.

It is man's natural sickness to believe that he possesses the truth.

Truth is so obscure in these times, and falsehood so established, that, unless we love the truth, we cannot know it.

The heart has its order, the mind has its own, which uses principles and demonstrations. The heart has a different one. We do not prove that we ought to be loved by setting out in order the causes of love; that would be absurd.