Blaise Pascal
Blaise Pascal
Blaise Pascalwas a French mathematician, physicist, inventor, writer and Christian philosopher. He was a child prodigy who was educated by his father, a tax collector in Rouen. Pascal's earliest work was in the natural and applied sciences where he made important contributions to the study of fluids, and clarified the concepts of pressure and vacuum by generalising the work of Evangelista Torricelli. Pascal also wrote in defence of the scientific method...
NationalityFrench
ProfessionPhilosopher
Date of Birth19 June 1623
CityClermont-Ferrand, France
CountryFrance
Reason's last step is to acknowledge that there are infinitely many things beyond it.
La dernie' re chose qu'on trouve en faisant un ouvrage, est de savoir celle qu'il faut mettre la premie' re. The last thing one discovers in composing a work iswhat to put first.
The last advance of reason is to recognize that it is surpassed by innumerable things; it is feeble if it cannot realize that.
The last function of reason is to recognize that there are an infinity of things which surpass it.
Most of the evils of life arise from man's being unable to sit still in a room.
[Christianity] endeavors equally to establish these two things: that God has set up in the Church visible signs to make himself known to those who should seek him sincerely, and that he has nevertheless so disguised them that he will only be perceived by those who seek him with all their heart.
Thus so wretched is man that he would weary even without any cause for weariness... and so frivolous is he that, though full of a thousand reasons for weariness, the least thing, such as playing billiards or hitting a ball, is sufficient enough to amuse him.
All evil stems from this-that we do. Know how to handle your solitude.
Extremes are for us as if they were not, and as if we were not in regard to them; they escape from us, or we from them.
To scorn philosophy is truly to philosophize.
To ridicule philosophy is truly philosophical. [Fr., Se moquer de la philosophie c'est vraiment philosophe.]
Faith embraces many truths which seem to contradict each other.
True eloquence scorns eloquence.
There should be in eloquence that which is pleasing and that which is real; but that which is pleasing should itself be real.