1660
PENSEES
by Blaise Pascal
translated by W. F. Trotter
SECTION I
THOUGHTS ON MIND AND ON STYLE
1. The difference between the mathematical and the intuitive
mind.- In the one, the principles are palpable, but removed from
ordinary use; so that for want of habit it is difficult to turn
one's mind in that direction: but if one turns it thither ever so
little, one sees the principles fully, and one must have a quite
inaccurate mind who reasons wrongly from principles so plain that it
is almost impossible they should escape notice.
But in the intuitive mind the principles are found in common use
and are before the eyes of everybody. One has only to look, and no
effort is necessary; it is only a question of good eyesight, but it
must be good, for the principles are so subtle and so numerous that it
is almost impossible but that some escape notice. Now the omission
of one principle leads to error; thus one must have very clear sight
to see all the principles and, in the next place, an accurate mind not
to draw false deductions from known principles.
All mathematicians would then be intuitive if they had clear
sight, for they do not reason incorrectly from principles known to
them; and intuitive minds would be mathematical if they could turn
their eyes to the principles of mathematics to which they are unused.
The reason, therefore, that some intuitive minds are not
mathematical is that they cannot at all turn their attention to the
principles of mathematics. But the reason that mathematicians are
not intuitive is that they do not see what is before them, and that,
accustomed to the exact and plain principles of mathematics, and not
reasoning till they have well inspected and arranged their principles,
they are lost in matters of intuition where the principles do not
allow of such arrangement. They are scarcely seen; they are felt
rather than seen; there is the greatest difficulty in making them felt
by those who do not of themselves perceive them. These principles
are so fine and so numerous that a very delicate and very clear
sense is needed to perceive them, and to judge rightly and justly when
they are perceived, without for the most part being able to
demonstrate them in order as in mathematics, because the principles
are not known to us in the same way, and because it would be an
endless matter to undertake it. We must see the matter at once, at one
glance, and not by a process of reasoning, at least to a certain
degree. And thus it is rare that mathematicians are intuitive and that
men of intuition are mathematicians, because mathematicians wish to
treat matters of intuition mathematically and make themselves
ridiculous, wishing to begin with definitions and then with axioms,
which is not the way to proceed in this kind of reasoning. Not that
the mind does not do so, but it does it tacitly, naturally, and
without technical rules; for the expression of it is beyond all men,
and only a few can feel it.
Intuitive minds, on the contrary, being thus accustomed to judge
at a single glance, are so astonished when they are presented with
propositions of which they understand nothing, and the way to which is
through definitions and axioms so sterile, and which they are not
accustomed to see thus in detail, that they are repelled and
disheartened.
But dull minds are never either intuitive or mathematical.
Mathematicians who are only mathematicians have exact minds,
provided all things are explained to them by means of definitions
and axioms; otherwise they are inaccurate and insufferable, for they
are only right when the principles are quite clear.
And men of intuition who are only intuitive cannot have the
patience to reach to first principles of things speculative and
conceptual, which they have never seen in the world and which are
altogether out of the common.
2. There are different kinds of right understanding; some have
right understanding in a certain order of things, and not in others,
where they go astray. Some draw conclusions well from a few
premises, and this displays an acute judgment.
Others draw conclusions well where there are many premises.
For example, the former easily learn hydrostatics, where the
premises are few, but the conclusions are so fine that only the
greatest acuteness can reach them.
And in spite of that these persons would perhaps not be great
mathematicians, because mathematics contain a great number of
premises, and there is perhaps a kind of intellect that can search
with ease a few premises to the bottom and cannot in the least
penetrate those matters in which there are many premises.
There are then two kinds of intellect: the one able to penetrate
acutely and deeply into the conclusions of given premises, and this is
the precise intellect; the other able to comprehend a great number
of premises without confusing them, and this is the mathematical
intellect. The one has force and exactness, the other comprehension.
Now the one quality can exist without the other; the intellect can
be strong and narrow, and can also be comprehensive and weak.
3. Those who are accustomed to judge by feeling do not
understand the process of reasoning, for they would understand at
first sight and are not used to seek for principles. And others, on
the contrary, who are accustomed to reason from principles, do not
at all understand matters of feeling, seeking principles and being
unable to see at a glance.
4. Mathematics, intuition.- True eloquence makes light of
eloquence, true morality makes light of morality; that is to say,
the morality of the judgement, which has no rules, makes light of
the morality of the intellect.
For it is to judgement that perception belongs, as science belongs
to intellect. Intuition is the part of judgement, mathematics of
intellect.
To make light of philosophy is to be a true philosopher.
5. Those who judge of a work by rule are in regard to others as
those who have a watch are in regard to others. One says, "It is two
hours ago"; the other says, "It is only three-quarters of an hour."
I look at my watch, and say to the one, "You are weary," and to the
other, "Time gallops with you"; for it is only an hour and a half ago,
and I laugh at those who tell me that time goes slowly with me and
that I judge by imagination. They do not know that I judge by my
watch.
6. Just as we harm the understanding, we harm the feelings also.
The understanding and the feelings are moulded by intercourse; the
understanding and feelings are corrupted by intercourse. Thus good
or bad society improves or corrupts them. It is, then, all-important
to know how to choose in order to improve and not to corrupt them; and
we cannot make this choice, if they be not already improved and not
corrupted. Thus a circle is formed, and those are fortunate who escape
it.
7. The greater intellect one has, the more originality one finds
in men. Ordinary persons find no difference between men.
8. There are many people who listen to a sermon in the same way as
they listen to vespers.
9. When we wish to correct with advantage and to show another that
he errs, we must notice from what side he views the matter, for on
that side it is usually true, and admit that truth to him, but
reveal to him the side on which it is false. He is satisfied with
that, for he sees that he was not mistaken and that he only failed
to see all sides. Now, no one is offended at not seeing everything;
but one does not like to be mistaken, and that perhaps arises from the
fact that man naturally cannot see everything, and that naturally he
cannot err in the side he looks at, since the perceptions of our
senses are always true.
10. People are generally better persuaded by the reasons which
they have themselves discovered than by those which have come into the
mind of others.
11. All great amusements are dangerous to the Christian life;
but among all those which the world has invented there is none more to
be feared than the theatre. It is a representation of the passions
so natural and so delicate that it excites them and gives birth to
them in our hearts, and, above all, to that of love, principally
when it is represented as very chaste and virtuous. For the more
innocent it appears to innocent souls, the more they are likely to
be touched by it. Its violence pleases our self-love, which
immediately forms a desire to produce the same effects which are
seen so well represented; and, at the same time, we make ourselves a
conscience founded on the propriety of the feelings which we see
there, by which the fear of pure souls is removed, since they
imagine that it cannot hurt their purity to love with a love which
seems to them so reasonable.
So we depart from the theatre with our heart so filled with all
the beauty and tenderness of love, the soul and the mind so
persuaded of its innocence, that we are quite ready to receive its
first impressions, or rather to seek an opportunity of awakening
them in the heart of another, in order that we may receive the same
pleasures and the same sacrifices which we have seen so well
represented in the theatre.
12. Scaramouch, who only thinks of one thing.
The doctor, who speaks for a quarter of an hour after he has
said everything, so full is he of the desire of talking.
13. One likes to see the error, the passion of Cleobuline, because
she is unconscious of it. She would be displeasing, if she were not
deceived.
14. When a natural discourse paints a passion or an effect, one
feels within oneself the truth of what one reads, which was there
before, although one did not know it. Hence one is inclined to love
him who makes us feel it, for he has not shown us his own riches,
but ours. And thus this benefit renders him pleasing to us, besides
that such community of intellect as we have with him necessarily
inclines the heart to love.
15. Eloquence, which persuades by sweetness, not by authority;
as a tyrant, not as a king.
16. Eloquence is an art of saying things in such a way (1) that
those to whom we speak may listen to them without pain and with
pleasure; (2) that they feel themselves interested, so that
self-love leads them more willingly to reflection upon it.
It consists, then, in a correspondence which we seek to
establish between the head and the heart of those to whom we speak, on
the one hand, and, on the other, between the thoughts and the
expressions which we employ. This assumes that we have studied well
the heart of man so as to know all its powers and, then, to find the
just proportions of the discourse which we wish to adapt to them. We
must put ourselves in the place of those who are to hear us, and
make trial on our own heart of the turn which we give to our discourse
in order to see whether one is made for the other, and whether we
can assure ourselves that the hearer will be, as it were, forced to
surrender. We ought to restrict ourselves, so far as possible, to
the simple and natural, and not to magnify that which is little, or
belittle that which is great. It is not enough that a thing be
beautiful; it must be suitable to the subject, and there must be in it
nothing of excess or defect.
17. Rivers are roads which move, and which carry us whither we
desire to go.
18. When we do not know the truth of a thing, it is of advantage
that there should exist a common error which determines the mind of
man, as, for example, the moon, to which is attributed the change of
seasons, the progress of diseases, etc. For the chief malady of man is
restless curiosity about things which he cannot understand; and it
is not so bad for him to be in error as to be curious to no purpose.
The manner in which Epictetus, Montaigne, and Salomon de Tultie
wrote is the most usual, the most suggestive, the most remembered, and
the oftenest quoted, because it is entirely composed of thoughts
born from the common talk of life. As when we speak of the common
error which exists among men that the moon is the cause of everything,
we never fail to say that Salomon de Tultie says that, when we do
not know the truth of a thing, it is of advantage that there should
exist a common error, etc.; which is the thought above.
19. The last thing one settles in writing a book is what one
should put in first.
20. Order.- Why should I undertake to divide my virtues into
four rather than into six? Why should I rather establish virtue in
four, in two, in one? Why into Abstine et sustine* rather than into
"Follow Nature," or, "Conduct your private affairs without injustice,"
as Plato, or anything else? But there, you will say, everything is
contained in one word. Yes, but it is useless without explanation, and
when we come to explain it, as soon as we unfold this maxim which
contains all the rest, they emerge in that first confusion which you
desired to avoid. So, when they are all included in one, they are
hidden and useless, as in a chest, and never appear save in their
natural confusion. Nature has established them all without including
one in the other.
* "Abstain and uphold." Stoic maxim.
21. Nature has made all her truths independent of one another. Our
art makes one dependent on the other. But this is not natural. Each
keeps its own place.
22. Let no one say that I have said nothing new; the arrangement
of the subject is new. When we play tennis, we both play with the same
ball, but one of us places it better.
I had as soon it said that I used words employed before. And in
the same way if the same thoughts in a different arrangement do not
form a different discourse, no more do the same words in their
different arrangement form different thoughts!
23. Words differently arranged have a different meaning, and
meanings differently arranged have different effects.
24. Language.- We should not turn the mind from one thing to
another, except for relaxation, and that when it is necessary and
the time suitable, and not otherwise. For he that relaxes out of
season wearies, and he who wearies us out of season makes us
languid, since we turn quite away. So much does our perverse lust like
to do the contrary of what those wish to obtain from us without giving
us pleasure, the coin for which we will do whatever is wanted.
25. Eloguence.- It requires the pleasant and the real; but the
pleasant must itself be drawn from the true.
26. Eloquence is a painting of thought; and thus those who,
after having painted it, add something more, make a picture instead of
a portrait.
27. Miscellaneous. Language.- Those who make antitheses by forcing
words are like those who make false windows for symmetry. Their rule
is not to speak accurately, but to make apt figures of speech.
28. Symmetry is what we see at a glance; based on the fact that
there is no reason for any difference, and based also on the face of
man; whence it happens that symmetry is only wanted in breadth, not in
height or depth.
29. When we see a natural style, we are astonished and
delighted; for we expected to see an author, and we find a man.
Whereas those who have good taste, and who, seeing a book, expect to
find a man, are quite surprised to find an author. Plus poetice quam
humane locutus es.* Those honour Nature well who teach that she can
speak on everything, even on theology.
* Petronius, 90. "You have spoken more as a poet than as a man."
30. We only consult the ear because the heart is wanting. The rule
is uprightness.
Beauty of omission, of judgement.
31. All the false beauties which we blame in Cicero have their
admirers, and in great number.
32. There is a certain standard of grace and beauty which consists
in a certain relation between our nature, such as it is, weak or
strong, and the thing which pleases us.
Whatever is formed according to this standard pleases us, be it
house, song, discourse, verse, prose, woman, birds, rivers, trees,
rooms, dress, etc. Whatever is not made according to this standard
displeases those who have good taste.
And as there is a perfect relation between a song and a house
which are made after a good model, because they are like this good
model, though each after its kind; even so there is a perfect relation
between things made after a bad model. Not that the bad model is
unique, for there are many; but each bad sonnet, for example, on
whatever false model it is formed, is just like a woman dressed
after that model.
Nothing makes us understand better the ridiculousness of a false
sonnet than to consider nature and the standard and, then, to
imagine a woman or a house made according to that standard.
33. Poetical beauty.- As we speak of poetical beauty, so ought
we to speak of mathematical beauty and medical beauty. But we do not
do so; and the reason is that we know well what is the object of
mathematics, and that it consists in proofs, and what is the object of
medicine, and that it consists in healing. But we do not know in
what grace consists, which is the object of poetry. We do not know the
natural model which we ought to imitate; and through lack of this
knowledge, we have coined fantastic terms, "The golden age," "The
wonder of our times," "Fatal," etc., and call this jargon poetical
beauty.
But whoever imagines a woman after this model, which consists in
saying little things in big words, will see a pretty girl adorned with
mirrors and chains, at whom he will smile; because we know better
wherein consists the charm of woman than the charm of verse. But those
who are ignorant would admire her in this dress, and there are many
villages in which she would be taken for the queen; hence we call
sonnets made after this model "Village Queens."
34. No one passes in the world as skilled in verse unless he has
put up the sign of a poet, a mathematician, etc. But educated people
do not want a sign and draw little distinction between the trade of
a poet and that of an embroiderer.
People of education are not called poets or mathematicians,
etc.; but they are all these and judges of all these. No one guesses
what they are. When they come into society, they talk on matters about
which the rest are talking. We do not observe in them one quality
rather than another, save when they have to make use of it. But then
we remember it, for it is characteristic of such persons that we do
not say of them that they are fine speakers, when it is not a question
of oratory, and that we say of them that they are fine speakers,
when it is such a question.
It is therefore false praise to give a man when we say of him,
on his entry, that he is a very clever poet; and it is a bad sign when
a man is not asked to give his judgement on some verses.
35. We should not be able to say of a man, "He is a
mathematician," or "a preacher," or "eloquent"; but that he is "a
gentleman." That universal quality alone pleases me. It is a bad
sign when, on seeing a person, you remember his book. I would prefer
you to see no quality till you meet it and have occasion to use it (Ne
quid minis),* for fear some one quality prevail and designate the man.
Let none think him a fine speaker, unless oratory be in question,
and then let them think it.
* "Nothing in excess."
36. Man is full of wants: he loves only those who can satisfy them
all. "This one is a good mathematician," one will say. But I have
nothing to do with mathematics; he would take me for a proposition.
"That one is a good soldier." He would take me for a besieged town.
I need, then, an upright man who can accommodate himself generally
to all my wants.
37. 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. This universality is the best. If we can have both,
still better; but if we must choose, we ought to choose the former.
And the world feels this and does so; for the world is often a good
judge.
38. A poet and not an honest man.
39. If lightning fell on low places, etc., poets, and those who
can only reason about things of that kind, would lack proofs.
40. If we wished to prove the examples which we take to prove
other things, we should have to take those other things to be
examples; for, as we always believe the difficulty is in what we
wish to prove, we find the examples clearer and a help to
demonstration.
Thus, when we wish to demonstrate a general theorem, we must
give the rule as applied to a particular case; but if we wish to
demonstrate a particular case, we must begin with the general rule.
For we always find the thing obscure which we wish to prove and that
clear which we use for the proof; for, when a thing is put forward
to be proved, we first fill ourselves with the imagination that it is,
therefore, obscure and, on the contrary, that what is to prove it is
clear, and so we understand it easily.
41. Epigrams of Martial.- Man loves malice, but not against
one-eyed men nor the unfortunate, but against the fortunate and proud.
People are mistaken in thinking otherwise.
For lust is the source of all our actions, and humanity, etc. We
must please those who have humane and tender feelings. That epigram
about two one-eyed people is worthless, for it does not console them
and only gives a point to the author's glory. All that is only for the
sake of the author is worthless. Ambitiosa recident ornamenta.*
* Horace, Epistle to the pisos, 447. "They curtailed pretentious
ornaments."
42. To call a king "Prince" is pleasing, because it diminishes his
rank.
43. Certain authors, speaking of their works, say: "My book,"
"My commentary," "My history," etc. They resemble middle-class
people who have a house of their own and always have "My house" on
their tongue. They would do better to say: "Our book," "Our
commentary," "Our history," etc., because there is in them usually
more of other people's than their own.
44. Do you wish people to believe good of you? Don't speak.
45. Languages are ciphers, wherein letters are not changed into
letters, but words into words, so that an unknown language is
decipherable.
46. A maker of witticisms, a bad character.
47. There are some who speak well and write badly. For the place
and the audience warm them, and draw from their minds more than they
think of without that warmth.
48. When we find words repeated in a discourse and, in trying to
correct them, discover that they are so appropriate that we would
spoil the discourse, we must leave them alone. This is the test; and
our attempt is the work of envy, which is blind, and does not see that
repetition is not in this place a fault; for there is no general rule.
49. To mask nature and disguise her. No more king, pope, bishop-
but august monarch, etc.; not Paris- the capital of the kingdom. There
are places in which we ought to call Paris, "Paris," others in which
we ought to call it the capital of the kingdom.
50. The same meaning changes with the words which express it.
Meanings receive their dignity from words instead of giving it to
them. Examples should be sought....
51. Sceptic, for obstinate.
52. No one calls another a Cartesian but he who is one himself,
a pedant but a pedant, a provincial but a provincial; and I would
wager it was the printer who put it on the title of Letters to a
Provincial.
53. A carriage upset or overturned, according to the meaning. To
spread abroad or upset, according to the meaning. (The argument by
force of M. le Maitre over the friar.)
54. Miscellaneous.- A form of speech, "I should have liked to
apply myself to that."
55. The aperitive virtue of a key, the attractive virtue of a
hook.
56. To guess: "The part that I take in your trouble." The Cardinal
did not want to be guessed.
"My mind is disquieted." I am disquieted is better.
57. I always feel uncomfortable under such compliments as these:
"I have given you a great deal of trouble," "I am afraid I am boring
you," "I fear this is too long." We either carry our audience with us,
or irritate them.
58. You are ungraceful: "Excuse me, pray." Without that excuse I
would not have known there was anything amiss. "With reverence be it
spoken..." The only thing bad is their excuse.
59. "To extinguish the torch of sedition"; too luxuriant. "The
restlessness of his genius"; two superfluous grand words.
SECTION II
THE MISERY OF MAN WITHOUT GOD
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.
61. Order.- I might well have taken this discourse in an order
like this: to show the vanity of all conditions of men, to show the
vanity of ordinary lives, and then the vanity of philosophic lives,
sceptics, stoics; but the order would not have been kept. I know a
little what it is, and how few people understand it. No human
science can keep it. Saint Thomas did not keep it. Mathematics keep
it, but they are useless on account of their depth.
62. Preface to the first part.- To speak of those who have treated
of the knowledge of self; of the divisions of Charron, which sadden
and weary us; of the confusion of Montaigne; that he was quite aware
of his want of method and shunned it by jumping from subject to
subject; that he sought to be fashionable.
His foolish project of describing himself! And this not casually
and against his maxims, since every one 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...
63. Montaigne.- Montaigne's faults are great. Lewd words; this
is bad, notwithstanding Mademoiselle de Gournay. Credulous; people
without eyes. Ignorant; squaring the circle, a greater world. His
opinions on suicide, on death. He suggests an indifference about
salvation, without fear and without repentance. As his book was not
written with a religious purpose, he was not bound to mention
religion; but it is always our duty not to turn men from it. One can
excuse his rather free and licentious opinions on some relations of
life; but one cannot excuse his thoroughly pagan views on death, for a
man must renounce piety altogether, if he does not at least wish to
die like a Christian. Now, through the whole of his book his only
conception of death is a cowardly and effeminate one.
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 trifles and spoke too much of
himself.
66. One must know oneself. If this does not serve to discover
truth, it at least serves as a rule of life, and there is nothing
better.
67. The vanity of the sciences.- Physical science will not console
me for the ignorance of morality in the time of affliction. But the
science of ethics will always console me for the ignorance of the
physical sciences.
68. Men are never taught to be gentlemen and are taught everything
else; and they never plume themselves so much on the rest of their
knowledge as on knowing how to be gentlemen. They only plume
themselves on knowing the one thing they do not know.
69. The infinites, the mean.- When we read too fast or too slowly,
we understand nothing.
70. Nature... - Nature has set us so well in the centre, that if
we change one side of the balance, we change the other also. This
makes me believe that the springs in our brain are so adjusted that he
who touches one touches also its contrary.
71. Too much and too little wine. Give him none, he cannot find
truth; give him too much, the same.
72. Man's disproportion.- This is where our innate knowledge leads
us. If it be not true, there is no truth in man; and if it be true, he
finds therein great cause for humiliation, being compelled to abase
himself in one way or another. And since he cannot exist without
this knowledge, I wish that, before entering on deeper researches into
nature, he would consider her both seriously and at leisure, that he
would reflect upon himself also, and knowing what proportion there
is... Let man then contemplate the whole of nature in her full and
grand majesty, and turn his vision from the low objects which surround
him. Let him gaze on that brilliant light, set like an eternal lamp to
illumine the universe; let the earth appear to him a point in
comparison with the vast circle described by the sun; and let him
wonder at the fact that this vast circle is itself but a very fine
point in comparison with that described by the stars in their
revolution round the firmament. But if our view be arrested there, let
our imagination pass beyond; it will sooner exhaust the power of
conception than nature that of supplying material for conception.
The whole visible world is only an imperceptible atom in the ample
bosom of nature. No idea approaches it. We may enlarge our conceptions
beyond an imaginable space; we only produce atoms in comparison with
the reality of things. It is an infinite sphere, the centre of which
is everywhere, the circumference nowhere. In short, it is the greatest
sensible mark of the almighty power of God that imagination loses
itself in that thought.
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 prodigy 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, humours in the
blood, drops in the humours, vapours 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 ostentatious in
fact, though not in appearance, as that one which blinds us, De omni
scibili.*
* Title given by Pico della Mirandola to one of his proposed
nine hundred theses, in 1486.
We naturally believe ourselves far more capable of reaching the
centre 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. And 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 shall
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.
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 impotence. 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 paralysing (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. Beneficia eo usque laeta sunt
dum videntur exsolvi posse; ubi multum antevenere, pro gratia odium
redditur.* 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.
* Tacitus, Annals, iv. "Kindnesses are agreeable so long as one
thinks them possible to render; further, recognition makes way for
hatred."
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 for ever. 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 fickle 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 shall 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?
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 abide, 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.
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 centre, that they fly from
destruction, that they fear the void, that they have inclinations,
sympathies, antipathies, all of which attributes pertain only to mind.
And 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
colour 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. This is the consummation of his difficulties, and
yet it is his very being. Modus quo corporibus adhaerent spiritus
comprehendi ab hominibus non potest, et hoc tamen homo est.*
Finally, to complete the proof of our weakness, I shall conclude
with these two considerations...
* St. Augustine, City of God, xxi. 10. "The manner in which the
spirit is united to the body can not be understood by man; and yet
it is man."
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,
Felix qui potuit rerum cognoscere causas,* another in total ignorance,
another in indolence, others in disregarding appearances, another in
wondering at nothing, nihil admirari prope res una quae possit
facere et servare beatum,*(2) and the true sceptics in their
indifference, doubt, and perpetual suspense, and others, wiser,
think to find a better definition. We are well satisfied.
* Virgil, Georgics, ii. "Happy is he who is able to know the
causes of things."
*(2) Horace, Epistles, I. vi. 1. " To be astonished at nothing
is nearly the only thing which can give and conserve happiness."
We must see if this fine philosophy has gained nothing certain
from so long and so intent study; perhaps at least the soul will
know itself. Let us hear the rulers of the world on this subject. What
have they thought of her substance? 394.* Have they been more
fortunate in locating her? 395.* What have they found out about her
origin, duration, and departure? Harum sententiarum,* 399.*(2)
* Cicero, Disputationes Tusculanae, i, ii Harum sententiarum
quae vera sit, Deus aliquis viderit. "Which of these opinions in the
truth, a god will see."
*(2) Montaigne, Essays, ii.
Is, then, the soul too noble a subject for their feeble lights?
Let us, then, abase her to matter and see if she knows whereof is made
the very body which she animates and those others which she
contemplates and moves at her will. What have those great
dogmatists, who are ignorant of nothing, known of this matter? 393.*
*(2) Montaigne, Essays, ii.
This would doubtless suffice, if Reason were reasonable. She is
reasonable enough to admit that she has been unable to find anything
durable, but she does not yet despair of reaching it; she is as ardent
as ever in this search, and is confident she has within her the
necessary powers for this conquest. We must therefore conclude, and,
after having examined her powers in their effects, observe them in
themselves, and see if she has a nature and a grasp capable of
laying hold of the truth.
74. A letter On the Foolishness of Human Knowledge and Philosophy.
This letter before Diversion.
Felix qui potuit... Nihil admirari.
280 kinds of sovereign good in Montaigne.
75. Part I, 1, 2, c. 1, section 4.*
Probability.- It will not be difficult to put the case a stage
lower, and make it appear ridiculous. To begin at the very
beginning. What is more absurd than to say that lifeless bodies have
passions, fears, hatreds- that insensible bodies, lifeless and
incapable of life, have passions which presuppose at least a sensitive
soul to feel them, nay more, that the object of their dread is the
void? What is there in the void that could make them afraid? Nothing
is more shallow and ridiculous. This is not all; it is said that
they have in themselves a source of movement to shun the void. Have
they arms, legs, muscles, nerves?
* Treatise on the Vacuum.
76. To write against those who made too profound a study of
science: Descartes.
77. I cannot forgive Descartes. In all his philosophy he would
have been quite willing to dispense with God. But he had to make Him
give a fillip to set the world in motion; beyond this, he has no
further need of God.
78. Descartes useless and uncertain.
79. Descartes.- We must say summarily: "This is made by figure and
motion," for it is true. But to say what these are, and to compose the
machine, is ridiculous. For it is useless, uncertain, and painful. And
were it true, we do not think all Philosophy is worth one hour of
pain.
80. How comes it that a cripple does not offend us, but that a
fool does? Because a cripple recognises that we walk straight, whereas
a fool declares that it is we who are silly; if it were not so, we
should feel pity and not anger.
Epictetus asks still more strongly: "Why are we not angry if we
are told that we have a headache, and why are we angry if we are
told that we reason badly, or choose wrongly"? The reason is that we
are quite certain that we have not a headache, or are not lame, but we
are not so sure that we make a true choice. So, having assurance
only because we see with our whole sight, it puts us into suspense and
surprise when another with his whole sight sees the opposite, and
still more so when a thousand others deride our choice. For we must
prefer our own lights to those of so many others, and that is bold and
difficult. There is never this contradiction in the feelings towards a
cripple.
81. It is natural for the mind to believe and for the will to
love; so that, for want of true objects, they must attach themselves
to false.
82. Imagination.- It is that deceitful part in man, that
mistress of error and falsity, the more deceptive that she is not
always so; for she would be an infallible rule of truth, if she were
an infallible rule of falsehood. But being most generally false, she
gives no sign of her nature, impressing the same character on the true
and the false.
I do not speak of fools, I speak of the wisest men; and it is
among them that the imagination has the great gift of persuasion.
Reason protests in vain; it cannot set a true value on things.
This arrogant power, the enemy of reason, who likes to rule and
dominate it, has established in man a second nature to show how
all-powerful she is. She makes men happy and sad, healthy and sick,
rich and poor; she compels reason to believe, doubt, and deny; she
blunts the senses, or quickens them; she has her fools and sages;
and nothing vexes us more than to see that she fills her devotees with
a satisfaction far more full and entire than does reason. Those who
have a lively imagination are a great deal more pleased with
themselves than the wise can reasonably be. They look down upon men
with haughtiness; they argue with boldness and confidence, others with
fear and diffidence; and this gaiety of countenance often gives them
the advantage in the opinion of the hearers, such favour have the
imaginary wise in the eyes of judges of like nature. Imagination
cannot make fools wise; but she can make them happy, to the envy of
reason which can only make its friends miserable; the one covers
them with glory, the other with shame.
What but this faculty of imagination dispenses reputation,
awards respect and veneration to persons, works, laws, and the
great? How insufficient are all the riches of the earth without her
consent!
Would you not say that this magistrate, whose venerable age
commands the respect of a whole people, is governed by pure and
lofty reason, and that he judges causes according to their true nature
without considering those mere trifles which only affect the
imagination of the weak? See him go to sermon, full of devout zeal,
strengthening his reason with the ardour of his love. He is ready to
listen with exemplary respect. Let the preacher appear, and let nature
have given him a hoarse voice or a comical cast of countenance, or let
his barber have given him a bad shave, or let by chance his dress be
more dirtied than usual, then, however great the truths he
announces, I wager our senator loses his gravity.
If the greatest philosopher in the world find himself upon a plank
wider than actually necessary, but hanging over a precipice, his
imagination will prevail, though his reason convince him of his
safety. Many cannot bear the thought without a cold sweat. I will
not state all its effects.
Every one knows that the sight of cats or rats, the crushing of
a coal, etc., may unhinge the reason. The tone of voice affects the
wisest, and changes the force of a discourse or a poem.
Love or hate alters the aspect of justice. How much greater
confidence has an advocate, retained with a large fee, in the
justice of his cause! How much better does his bold manner make his
case appear to the judges, deceived as they are by appearances! How
ludicrous is reason, blown with a breath in every direction!
I should have to enumerate almost every action of men who scarce
waver save under her assaults. For reason has been obliged to yield,
and the wisest reason takes as her own principles those which the
imagination of man has everywhere rashly introduced. He who would
follow reason only would be deemed foolish by the generality of men.
We must judge by the opinion of the majority of mankind. Because it
has pleased them, we must work all day for pleasures seen to be
imaginary; and, after sleep has refreshed our tired reason, we must
forthwith start up and rush after phantoms, and suffer the impressions
of this mistress of the world. This is one of the sources of error,
but it is not the only one.
Our magistrates have known well this mystery. Their red robes, the
ermine in which they wrap themselves like furry cats, the courts in
which they administer justice, the fleurs-de-lis, and all such
august apparel were necessary; if the physicians had not their
cassocks and their mules, if the doctors had not their square caps and
their robes four times too wide, they would never have duped the
world, which cannot resist so original an appearance. If magistrates
had true justice, and if physicians had the true art of healing,
they would have no occasion for square caps; the majesty of these
sciences would of itself be venerable enough. But having only
imaginary knowledge, they must employ those silly tools that strike
the imagination with which they have to deal; and thereby, in fact,
they inspire respect. Soldiers alone are not disguised in this manner,
because indeed their part is the most essential; they establish
themselves by force, the others by show.
Therefore our kings seek out no disguises. They do not mask
themselves in extraordinary costumes to appear such; but they are
accompanied by guards and halberdiers. Those armed and red-faced
puppets who have hands and power for them alone, those trumpets and
drums which go before them, and those legions round about them, make
the stoutest tremble. They have not dress only, they have might. A
very refined reason is required to regard as an ordinary man the Grand
Turk, in his superb seraglio, surrounded by forty thousand
janissaries.
We cannot even see an advocate in his robe and with his cap on his
head, without a favourable opinion of his ability. The imagination
disposes of everything; it makes beauty, justice, and happiness, which
is everything in the world. I should much like to see an Italian work,
of which I only know the title, which alone is worth many books, Della
opinione regina del mondo. I approve of the book without knowing it,
save the evil in it, if any. These are pretty much the effects of that
deceptive faculty, which seems to have been expressly given us to lead
us into necessary error. We have, however, many other sources of
error.
Not only are old impressions capable of misleading us; the
charms of novelty have the same power. Hence arise all the disputes of
men, who taunt each other either with following the false
impressions of childhood or with running rashly after the new. Who
keeps the due mean? Let him appear and prove it. There is no
principle, however natural to us from infancy, which may not be made
to pass for a false impression either of education or of sense.
"Because," say some, "you have believed from childhood that a
box was empty when you saw nothing in it, you have believed in the
possibility of a vacuum. This is an illusion of your senses,
strengthened by custom, which science must correct." "Because," say
others, "you have been taught at school that there is no vacuum, you
have perverted your common sense which clearly comprehended it, and
you must correct this by returning to your first state." Which has
deceived you, your senses or your education?
We have another source of error in diseases. They spoil the
judgement and the senses; and if the more serious produce a sensible
change, I do not doubt that slighter ills produce a proportionate
impression.
Our own interest is again a marvellous instrument for nicely
putting out our eyes. The justest man in the world is not allowed to
be judge in his own cause; I know some who, in order not to fall
into this self-love, have been perfectly unjust out of opposition. The
sure way of losing a just cause has been to get it recommended to
these men by their near relatives.
Justice and truth are two such subtle points that our tools are
too blunt to touch them accurately. If they reach the point, they
either crush it, or lean all round, more on the false than on the
true.
Man is so happily formed that he has no... good of the true, and
several excellent of the false. Let us now see how much... But the
most powerful cause of error is the war existing between the senses
and reason.
83. We must thus begin the chapter on the deceptive powers. Man is
only a subject full of error, natural and ineffaceable, without grace.
Nothing shows him the truth. Everything deceives him. These two
sources of truth, reason and the senses, besides being both wanting in
sincerity, deceive each other in turn. The senses mislead the Reason
with false appearances, and receive from Reason in their turn the same
trickery which they apply to her; Reason has her revenge. The passions
of the soul trouble the senses, and make false impressions upon
them. They rival each other in falsehood and deception.
But besides those errors which arise accidentally and through lack
of intelligence, with these heterogeneous faculties...
84. 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.
85. Things which have most hold on us, as the concealment of our
few possessions, are often a mere nothing. It is a nothing which our
imagination magnifies into a mountain. Another turn of the imagination
would make us discover this without difficulty.
86. My fancy makes me hate a croaker, and one who pants when
eating. Fancy has great weight. Shall we profit by it? Shall we
yield to this weight because it is natural? No, but by resisting it...
87. Nae iste magno conatu magnas nugas dixerit.*
* Terence, Heauton Timorumenos, III. v. 8. "There is one who
will say great foolishness with great effort."
583.* Quasi quidquam infelicius sit homini cui sua figmenta
dominantur.*(2)
* Montaigne, Essays, ii.
*(2) Pliny, ii. "As though there were anyone more unhappy than a
man dominated by his imagination."
88. Children who are frightened at the face they have blackened
are but children. But how shall one who is so weak in his childhood
become really strong when he grows older? We only change our
fancies. All that is made perfect by progress perishes also by
progress. All that has been weak can never become absolutely strong.
We say in vain, "He has grown, he has changed"; he is also the same.
89. Custom is our nature. He who is accustomed to the faith
believes in it, can no longer fear hell, and believes in nothing else.
He who is accustomed to believe that the king is terrible... etc.
Who doubts, then, that our soul, being accustomed to see number,
space, motion, believes that and nothing else?
90. Quod crebro videt non miratur, etiamsi cur fiat nescit; quod
ante non viderit, id si evenerit, ostentum esse censet.*
* Cicero, De Divinatione ii. 22. "A common happening does not
astonish, even though the cause is unknown; an event such as one has
never seen before passes for a prodigy."
91. Spongia solis.- When we see the same effect always recur, we
infer a natural necessity in it, as that there will be a tomorrow,
etc. But Nature often deceives us, and does not subject herself to her
own rules.
92. What are our natural principles but principles of custom? In
children they are those which they have received from the habits of
their fathers, as hunting in animals. A different custom will cause
different natural principles. This is seen in experience; and if there
are some natural principles ineradicable by custom, there are also
some customs opposed to nature, ineradicable by nature or by a
second custom. This depends on disposition.
93. Parents fear lest the natural love of their children may
fade away. What kind of nature is that which is subject to decay?
Custom is a second nature which destroys the former. But what is
nature? For is custom not natural? I am much afraid that nature is
itself only a first custom, as custom is a second nature.
94. The nature of man is wholly natural, omne animal.*
There is nothing he may not make natural; there is nothing natural
he may not lose.
* Allusion to Gen. 7. 14. Ipsi et omne animal secundus genus suum.
"And every beast after his kind."
95. Memory, joy, are intuitions; and even mathematical
propositions become intuitions, for education produces natural
intuitions, and natural intuitions are erased by education.
96. When we are accustomed to use bad reasons for proving
natural effects, we are not willing to receive good reasons when
they are discovered. An example may be given from the circulation of
the blood as a reason why the vein swells below the ligature.
97. The most important affair in life is the choice of a
calling; chance decides it. Custom makes men masons, soldiers,
slaters. "He is a good slater," says one, and, speaking of soldiers,
remarks, "They are perfect fools." But others affirm, "There is
nothing great but war; the rest of men are good for nothing." We
choose our callings according as we hear this or that praised or
despised in our childhood, for we naturally love truth and hate folly.
These words move us; the only error is in their application. So
great is the force of custom that, out of those whom nature has only
made men, are created all conditions of men. For some districts are
full of masons, others of soldiers, etc. Certainly nature is not so
uniform. It is custom then which does this, for it constrains
nature. But sometimes nature gains the ascendancy and preserves
man's instinct, in spite of all custom, good or bad.
98. Bias leading to error.- It is a deplorable thing to see all
men deliberating on means alone, and not on the end. Each thinks how
he will acquit himself in his condition; but as for the choice of
condition, or of country, chance gives them to us.
It is a pitiable thing to see so many Turks, heretics, and
infidels follow the way of their fathers for the sole reason that each
has been imbued with the prejudice that it is the best. And that fixes
for each man his condition of locksmith, soldier, etc.
Hence savages care nothing for Providence.
99. There is an universal and essential difference between the
actions of the will and all other actions.
The will is one of the chief factors in belief, not that it
creates belief, but because things are true or false according to
the aspect in which we look at them. The will, which prefers one
aspect to another, turns away the mind from considering the
qualities of all that it does not like to see; and thus the mind,
moving in accord with the will, stops to consider the aspect which
it likes and so judges by what it sees.
100. Self-love. The nature of self-love and of this human Ego is
to love self only and consider self only. But what will man do? He
cannot prevent this object that he loves from being full of faults and
wants. He wants to be great, and he sees himself small. He wants to be
happy, and he sees himself miserable. He wants to be perfect, and he
sees himself full of imperfections. He wants to be the object of
love and esteem among men, and he sees that his faults merit only
their hatred and contempt. This embarrassment in which he finds
himself produces in him the most unrighteous and criminal passion that
can be imagined; for he conceives a mortal enmity against that truth
which reproves him and which convinces him of his faults. He would
annihilate it, but, unable to destroy it in its essence, he destroys
it as far as possible in his own knowledge and in that of others; that
is to say, he devotes all his attention to hiding his faults both from
others and from himself, and he cannot endure either that others
should point them out to him, or that they should see them.
Truly it is an evil to be full of faults; but it is a still
greater evil to be full of them and to be unwilling to recognise them,
since that is to add the further fault of a voluntary illusion. We
do not like others to deceive us; we do not think it fair that they
should be held in higher esteem by us than they deserve; it is not,
then, fair that we should deceive them and should wish them to
esteem us more highly than we deserve.
Thus, when they discover only the imperfections and vices which we
really have, it is plain they do us no wrong, since it is not they who
cause them; they rather do us good, since they help us to free
ourselves from an evil, namely, the ignorance of these
imperfections. We ought not to be angry at their knowing our faults
and despising us; it is but right that they should know us for what we
are and should despise us, if we are contemptible.
Such are the feelings that would arise in a heart full of equity
and justice. What must we say then of our own heart, when we see it in
a wholly different disposition? For is it not true that we hate
truth and those who tell it us, and that we like them to be deceived
in our favour, and prefer to be esteemed by them as being other than
what we are in fact? One proof of this makes me shudder. The
Catholic religion does not bind us to confess our sins
indiscriminately to everybody; it allows them to remain hidden from
all other men save one, to whom she bids us reveal the innermost
recesses of our heart and show ourselves as we are. There is only this
one man in the world whom she orders us to undeceive, and she binds
him to an inviolable secrecy, which makes this knowledge to him as
if it were not. Can we imagine anything more charitable and
pleasant? And yet the corruption of man is such that he finds even
this law harsh; and it is one of the main reasons which has caused a
great part of Europe to rebel against the Church.
How unjust and unreasonable is the heart of man, which feels it
disagreeable to be obliged to do in regard to one man what in some
measure it were right to do to all men! For is it right that we should
deceive men?
There are different degrees in this aversion to truth; but all may
perhaps be said to have it in some degree, because it is inseparable
from self-love. It is this false delicacy which makes those who are
under the necessity of reproving others choose so many windings and
middle courses to avoid offence. They must lessen our faults, appear
to excuse them, intersperse praises and evidence of love and esteem.
Despite all this, the medicine does not cease to be bitter to
self-love. It takes as little as it can, always with disgust, and
often with a secret spite against those who administer it.
Hence it happens that, if any have some interest in being loved by
us, they are averse to render us a service which they know to be
disagreeable. They treat us as we wish to be treated. We hate the
truth, and they hide it from us. We desire flattery, and they
flatter us. We like to be deceived, and they deceive us.
So each degree of good fortune which raises us in the world
removes us farther from truth, because we are most afraid of
wounding those whose affection is most useful and whose dislike is
most dangerous. A prince may be the byword of all Europe, and he alone
will know nothing of it. I am not astonished. To tell the truth is
useful to those to whom it is spoken, but disadvantageous to those who
tell it, because it makes them disliked. Now those who live with
princes love their own interests more than that of the prince whom
they serve; and so they take care not to confer on him a benefit so as
to injure themselves.
This evil is no doubt greater and more common among the higher
classes; but the lower are not exempt from it, since there is always
some advantage in making men love us. 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.
Man is, then, only disguise, falsehood, and hypocrisy, both in
himself and in regard to others. He does not wish any one to tell
him the truth; he avoids telling it to others, and all these
dispositions, so removed from justice and reason, have a natural
root in his heart.
101. I set it down as a fact that if all men knew what each said
of the other, there would not be four friends in the world. This is
apparent from the quarrels which arise from the indiscreet tales
told from time to time. I say, further, all men would be...
102. Some vices only lay hold of us by means of others, and these,
like branches, fall on removal of the trunk.
103. The example of Alexander's chastity has not made so many
continent as that of his drunkenness has made intemperate. It is not
shameful not to be as virtuous as he, and it seems excusable to be
no more vicious. We do not believe ourselves to be exactly sharing
in the vices of the vulgar when we see that we are sharing in those of
great men; and yet we do not observe that in these matters they are
ordinary men. We hold on to them by the same end by which they hold on
to the rabble; for, however exalted they are, they are still united at
some point to the lowest of men. They are not suspended in the air,
quite removed from our society. No, no; if they are greater than we,
it is because their heads are higher; but their feet are as low as
ours. They are all on the same level, and rest on the same earth;
and by that extremity they are as low as we are, as the meanest
folk, as infants, and as the beasts.
104. When our passion leads us to do something, we forget our
duty; for example, we like a book and read it, when we ought to be
doing something else. Now, to remind ourselves of our duty, we must
set ourselves a task we dislike; we then plead that we have
something else to do and by this means remember our duty.
105. How difficult it is to submit anything to the judgement of
another, without prejudicing his judgement by the manner in which we
submit it! If we say, "I think it beautiful," "I think it obscure," or
the like, we either entice the imagination into that view, or irritate
it to the contrary. It is better to say nothing; and then the other
judges according to what really is, that is to say, according as it
then is and according as the other circumstances, not of our making,
have placed it. But we at least shall have added nothing, unless it be
that silence also produces an effect, according to the turn and the
interpretation which the other will be disposed to give it, or as he
will guess it from gestures or countenance, or from the tone of the
voice, if he is a physiognomist. So difficult is it not to upset a
judgement from its natural place, or, rather, so rarely is it firm and
stable!
106. By knowing each man's ruling passion, we are sure of pleasing
him; and yet each has his fancies, opposed to his true good, in the
very idea which he has of the good. It is a singularly puzzling fact.
107. Lustravit lampade terras.* - 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. I sometimes
struggle against luck, the glory of mastering it makes me master it
gaily; whereas I am sometimes surfeited in the midst of good fortune.
* Homer, Odyssey, xviii.
108. Although people may have no interest in what they are saying,
we must not absolutely conclude from this that they are not lying; for
there are some people who lie for the mere sake of lying.
109. When we are well we wonder what we would do if we were ill,
but when we are ill we take medicine cheerfully; the illness persuades
us to do so. We have no longer the passions and desires for amusements
and promenades which health gave to us, but which are incompatible
with the necessities of illness. Nature gives us, then, passions and
desires suitable to our present state. We are only troubled by the
fears which we, and not nature, give ourselves, for they add to the
state in which we are the passions of the state in which we are not.
As nature makes us always unhappy in every state, our desires
picture to us a happy state; because they add to the state in which we
are the pleasures of the state in which we are not. And if we attained
to these pleasures, we should not be happy after all; because we
should have other desires natural to this new state.
We must particularise this general proposition....
110. The consciousness of the falsity of present pleasures, and
the ignorance of the vanity of absent pleasures, cause inconstancy.
111. Inconstancy.- We think we are playing on ordinary organs when
playing upon man. Men are organs, it is true, but, odd, changeable,
variable with pipes not arranged in proper order. Those who only
know how to play on ordinary organs will not produce barmonies on
these. We must know where are.
112. Inconstancy.- Things have different qualities, and the soul
different inclinations; for nothing is simple which is presented to
the soul, and the soul never presents itself simply to any object.
Hence it comes that we weep and laugh at the same thing.
113. Inconstancy and oddity.- To live only by work, and to rule
over the most powerful State in the world, are very opposite things.
They are united in the person of the great Sultan of the Turks.
114. Variety is as abundant as all tones of the voice, all ways of
walking, coughing, blowing the nose, sneezing. We distinguish vines by
their fruit, and call them the Condrien, the Desargues, and such and
such a stock. Is this all? Has a vine ever produced two bunches
exactly the same, and has a bunch two grapes alike, etc.?
I can never judge of the same thing exactly in the same way. I
cannot judge of my work, while doing it. I must do as the artists,
stand at a distance, but not too far. How far, then? Guess.
115. Variety.- Theology is a science, but at the same time how
many sciences? A man is a whole; but if we dissect him, will he be the
head, the heart, the stomach, the veins, each vein, each portion of
a vein, the blood, each humour in the blood?
A town, a country-place, is from afar a town and a
country-place. But, as we draw near, there are houses, trees, tiles,
leaves, grass, ants, limbs of ants, in infinity. All this is contained
under the name of country-place.
116. Thoughts.- All is one, all is different. How many natures
exist in man? How many vocations? And by what chance does each man
ordinarily choose what he has heard praised? A well-turned heel.
117. The heel of a slipper.- "Ah! How well this is turned! Here is
a clever workman! How brave is this soldier!" This is the source of
our inclinations and of the choice of conditions. "How much this man
drinks! How little that one"! This makes people sober or drunk,
soldiers, cowards, etc.
118. Chief talent, that which rules the rest.
119. Nature imitates herself A seed grown in good ground brings
forth fruit. A principle instilled into a good mind brings forth
fruit. Numbers imitate space, which is of a different nature.
All is made and led by the same master, root, branches, and
fruits; principles and consequences.
120. Nature diversifies and imitates; art imitates and
diversifies.
121. Nature always begins the same things again, the years, the
days, the hours; in like manner spaces and numbers follow each other
from beginning to end. Thus is made a kind of infinity and eternity.
Not that anything in all this is infinite and eternal, but these
finite realities are infinitely multiplied. Thus it seems to me to
be only the number which multiplies them that is infinite.
122. 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. It is like a nation which we have provoked, but
meet again after two generations. They are still Frenchmen, but not
the same.
123. He no longer loves the person whom he loved ten years ago.
I quite believe it. She is no longer the same, nor is he. He was
young, and she also; she is quite different. He would perhaps love her
yet, if she were what she was then.
124. We view things not only from different sides, but with
different eyes; we have no wish to find them alike.
125. Contraries.- Man is naturally credulous and incredulous,
timid and rash.
126. Description of man: dependency, desire of independence, need.
127. Condition of man: inconstancy, weariness, unrest.
128. The weariness which is felt by us in leaving pursuits to
which we are attached. A man dwells at home with pleasure; but if he
sees a woman who charms him, or if he enjoys himself in play for
five or six days, he is miserable if he returns to his former way of
living. Nothing is more common than that.
129. Our nature consists in motion; complete rest is death.
130. Restlessness.- If a soldier, or labourer, complain of the
hardship of his lot, set him to do nothing.
131. Weariness.- Nothing is so insufferable to man as to be
completely at rest, without passions, without business, without
diversion, without study. He then feels his nothingness, his
forlornness, his insufficiency, his dependence, his weakness, his
emptiness. There will immediately arise from the depth of his heart
weariness, gloom, sadness, fretfulness, vexation, despair.
132. Methinks Caesar was too old to set about amusing himself with
conquering the world. Such sport was good for Augustus or Alexander.
They were still young men and thus difficult to restrain. But Caesar
should have been more mature.
133. Two faces which resemble each other make us laugh, when
together, by their resemblance, though neither of them by itself makes
us laugh.
134. How useless is painting, which attracts admiration by the
resemblance of things, the originals of which we do not admire!
135. The struggle alone pleases us, not the victory. We love to
see animals fighting, not the victor infuriated over the vanquished.
We would only see the victorious end; and, as soon as it comes, we are
satiated. It is the same in play, and the same in the search for
truth. In disputes we like to see the clash of opinions, but not at
all to contemplate truth when found. To observe it with pleasure, we
have to see it emerge out of strife. So in the passions, there is
pleasure in seeing the collision of two contraries; but when one
acquires the mastery, it becomes only brutality. We never seek
things for themselves, but for the search. Likewise in plays, scenes
which do not rouse the emotion of fear are worthless, so are extreme
and hopeless misery, brutal lust, and extreme cruelty.
136. A mere trifle consoles us, for a mere trifle distresses us.
137. Without examining every particular pursuit, it is enough to
comprehend them under diversion.
138. Men naturally slaters and of all callings, save in their
own rooms.
139. Diversion.- When I have occasionally set myself to consider
the different distractions of men, the pains and perils to which
they expose themselves at court or in war, whence arise so many
quarrels, passions, bold and often bad ventures, etc., I have
discovered that all the unhappiness of men arises from one single
fact, that they cannot stay quietly in their own chamber. 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
insufferable not to budge from the town; and men only seek
conversation and entering 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 of it, I have found
that there is one very real reason, namely, the natural poverty of our
feeble 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 be without diversion and be left to
consider and reflect on what he is, this feeble happiness will not
sustain him; he will necessarily fall into forebodings of dangers,
of revolutions which may happen, and, finally, of death and inevitable
disease; so that, if he be without what is called diversion, he is
unhappy and more unhappy than the least of his subjects who plays
and diverts himself.
Hence it comes that 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 hare which they hunt; we would not take these as a
gift. We do not seek that easy and peaceful lot which permits us to
think of our unhappy condition, nor the dangers of war, nor the labour
of office, but the bustle which averts these thoughts of ours and
amuses us.
Reasons why we like the chase better than the quarry.
Hence it comes that men so much love noise and stir; hence it
comes that the prison is so horrible a punishment; hence it comes that
the pleasure of solitude is a thing incomprehensible. And it is, in
fact, the greatest source of happiness in the condition of kings
that men try incessantly to divert them and to procure for them all
kinds of pleasures.
The king is surrounded by persons whose only thought is to
divert the king and to prevent his thinking of self. For he is
unhappy, king though he be, if he think of himself.
This is all that men have been able to discover to make themselves
happy. And those who philosophise on the matter, and who think men
unreasonable for spending a whole day in chasing a hare which they
would not have bought, scarce know our nature. The hare in itself
would not screen us from the sight of death and calamities; but the
chase, which turns away our attention from these, does screen us.
The advice given to Pyrrhus, to take the rest which he was about
to seek with so much labour, was full of difficulties.
To bid a man live quietly is to bid him 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 turmoil. Not that they have an instinctive knowledge of true
happiness...
So we are wrong in blaming them. Their error does not lie 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 make them really happy. In this respect it is right to call
their quest a vain one. Hence in all this both the censurers and the
censured do not understand man's true nature.
And thus, when we take the exception against them, that what
they seek with such fervour cannot satisfy them, if they replied- as
they should do if they considered the matter thoroughly- that they
sought in it only a violent and impetuous occupation which turned
their thoughts from self, and that they therefore chose an
attractive object to charm and ardently 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 consider rightly where to place our feet.- A
gentleman sincerely believes that hunting is great and royal sport;
but a beater is not of this opinion.
They imagine that, if they obtained such a post, they would then
rest with pleasure and are insensible of the insatiable nature of
the if desire. They think they are truly seeking quiet, 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 stir. And 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
fancy 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.
Thus passes away all man's life. Men seek rest in a struggle
against difficulties; and when they have conquered these, rest becomes
insufferable. For we think either of the misfortunes we have or of
those which threaten us. And even if we should see ourselves
sufficiently sheltered on all sides, weariness 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 weary even without any cause
for weariness from the peculiar state of his disposition; 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 to amuse him.
But will you say what object has he in all this? The pleasure of
bragging tomorrow among his friends that he has played better than
another. So others sweat in their own rooms to show to the learned
that they have solved a problem in algebra, which no one had
hitherto been able to solve. Many more expose themselves to extreme
perils, in my opinion as foolishly, in order to boast afterwards
that they have captured a town. Lastly, others wear themselves out
in studying all these things, not in order to become wiser, but only
in order to prove that they know them; and these are the most
senseless of the band, 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 weariness 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 languid and passionless amusement will weary him. He
must get excited over it and deceive himself by the fancy that he will
be happy to win what he would not have as a gift on condition of not
playing; and 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.
Whence comes it that this 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 weariness from overcoming
him. Without amusement there is no joy; with amusement there is no
sadness. And this also constitutes the happiness of persons in high
position, 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 wherein 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 houses, 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.
140. How does it happen that this man, so distressed at the
death of his wife and his only son, or who has some great lawsuit
which annoys him, is not at this moment sad, and that he seems so free
from all painful and disquieting thoughts? We need not wonder; for a
ball has been served him, and he must return it to his companion. He
is occupied in catching it in its fall from the roof, to win a game.
How can he think of his own affairs, pray, when he has this other
matter in hand? Here is a care worthy of occupying this great soul and
taking away from him every other thought of the mind. This man, born
to know the universe, to judge all causes, to govern a whole state, is
altogether occupied and taken up with the business of catching a hare.
And if he does not lower himself to this and wants always to be on the
strain, he will be more foolish still, because he would raise
himself above humanity; and after all, he is only a man, that is to
say capable of little and of much, of all and of nothing; he is
neither angel nor brute, but man.
141. Men spend their time in following a ball or a hare; it is the
pleasure even of kings.
142. Diversion- Is not the royal dignity sufficiently great in
itself to make its possessor happy by the mere contemplation of what
he is? Must he be diverted from this thought like ordinary folk? I see
well that a man is made happy by diverting him from the view of his
domestic sorrows so as to occupy all his thoughts with the care of
dancing well. But will it be the same with a king, and will he be
happier in the pursuit of these idle amusements than in the
contemplation of his greatness? And what more satisfactory object
could be presented to his mind? Would it not be a deprivation of his
delight for him to occupy his soul with the thought of how to adjust
his steps to the cadence of an air, or of how to throw a ball
skilfully, instead of leaving it to enjoy quietly the contemplation of
the majestic glory which encompasses him? Let us make the trial; let
us leave a king all alone to reflect on himself quite at leisure,
without any gratification of the senses, without any care in his mind,
without society; and we will see that a king without diversion is a
man full of wretchedness. So this is carefully avoided, and near the
persons of kings there never fail to be a great number of people who
see to it that amusement follows business, and who watch all the
time of their leisure to supply them with delights and games, so
that there is no blank in it. In fact, kings are surrounded with
persons who are wonderfully attentive in taking care that the king
be not alone and in a state to think of himself, knowing well that
he will be miserable, king though he be, if he meditate on self.
In all this I am not talking of Christian kings as Christians, but
only as kings.
143. Diversion.- Men are entrusted from infancy with the care of
their honour, their property, their friends, and even with the
property and the honour of their friends. They are overwhelmed with
business, with the study of languages, and with physical exercise; and
they are made to understand that they cannot be happy unless their
health, their honour, their fortune and that of their friends be in
good condition, and that a single thing wanting will make them
unhappy. Thus they are given cares and business which make them bustle
about from break of day. It is, you will exclaim, a strange way to
make them happy! What more could be done to make them miserable?-
Indeed! what could be done? We should only have to relieve them from
all these cares; for then they would see themselves: they would
reflect on what they are, whence they came, whither they go, and
thus we cannot employ and divert them too much. And this is why, after
having given them so much business, we advise them, if they have
some time for relaxation, to employ it in amusement, in play, and to
be always fully occupied.
How hollow and full of ribaldry is the heart of man!
144. I spent a long time in the study of the abstract sciences,
and was disheartened by the small number of fellow-students in them.
When I commenced the study of man, I saw that these abstract
sciences are not suited to man and that I was wandering farther from
my own state in examining them than others in not knowing them. I
pardoned their little knowledge; but I thought at least to find many
companions in the study of man and that it was the true study which is
suited to him. I have been deceived; still fewer study it than
geometry. It is only from the want of knowing how to study this that
we seek the other studies. But is it not that even here is not the
knowledge which man should have and that for the purpose of
happiness it is better for him not to know himself.?
145. One thought alone occupies us; we cannot think of two
things at the same time. This is lucky for us according to the
world, not according to God.
146. Man is obviously made to think. It is his whole dignity and
his whole merit; and his whole duty is to think as he ought. Now,
the order of thought is to begin with self, and with its Author and
its end.
Now, of what does the world think? Never of this, but of
dancing, playing the lute, singing, making verses, running at the
ring, etc., fighting, making oneself king, without thinking what it is
to be a king and what to be a man.
147. 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.
148. We are so presumptuous that we would wish to be known by
all the world, even by people who shall come after, when we shall be
no more; and we are so vain that the esteem of five or six
neighbours delights and contents us.
149. We do not trouble ourselves about being esteemed in the towns
through which we pass. But if we are to remain a little while there,
we are so concerned. How long is necessary? A time commensurate with
our vain and paltry life.
150. Vanity is so anchored in the heart of man that a soldier, a
soldier's servant, a cook, a porter brags and wishes to have his
admirers. Even philosophers wish for them. Those who write against
it want to have the glory of having written well; and those who read
it desire the glory of having read it. I who write this have perhaps
this desire, and perhaps those who will read it...
151. Glory.- Admiration spoils all from infancy. Ah! How well
said! Ah! How well done! How well-behaved he is! etc.
The children of Port-Royal, who do not receive this stimulus of
envy and glory, fall into carelessness.
152. Pride.- Curiosity is only vanity. Most frequently we wish
to know but to talk. Otherwise we would not take a sea voyage in order
never to talk of it, and for the sole pleasure of seeing without
hope of ever communicating it.
153. Of the desire of being esteemed by those with whom we are.-
Pride takes such natural possession of us in the midst of our woes,
errors, etc. We even lose our life with joy, provided people talk of
it.
Vanity: play, hunting, visiting, false shame, a lasting name.
154. I have no friends to your advantage.
155. A true friend is so great an advantage, even for the greatest
lords, in order that he may speak well of them and back them in
their absence, that they should do all to have one. But they should
choose well; for, if they spend all their efforts in the interests
of fools, it will be of no use, however well these may speak of
them; and these will not even speak well of them if they find
themselves on the weakest side, for they have no influence; and thus
they will speak ill of them in company.
156. Ferox gens, nullam esse vitam sine armis rati.* - They prefer
death to peace; others prefer death to war.
* Livy, xxxiv. 17. "A brutal people, for whom, when they have
not armour, there is not life."
Every opinion may be held preferable to life, the love of which is
so strong and so natural.
157. Contradiction: contempt for our existence, to die for
nothing, hatred of our existence.
158. Pursuits.- The charm of fame is so great that we like every
object to which it is attached, even death.
159. Noble deeds are most estimable when hidden. When I see some
of these in history, they please me greatly. But after all they have
not been quite hidden, since they have been known; and though people
have done what they could to hide them, the little publication of them
spoils all, for what was best in them was the wish to hide them.
160. Sneezing absorbs all the functions of the soul, as well as
work does; but we do not draw therefrom the same conclusions against
the greatness of man, because it is against his will. And although
we bring it on ourselves, it is nevertheless against our will that
we sneeze. It is not in view of the act itself; it is for another end.
And thus it is not a proof of the weakness of man and of his slavery
under that action.
It is not disgraceful for man to yield to pain, and it is
disgraceful to yield to pleasure. This is not because pain comes to us
from without, and we ourselves seek pleasure; for it is possible to
seek pain, and yield to it purposely, without this kind of baseness.
Whence comes it, then, that reason thinks it honourable to succumb
under stress of pain, and disgraceful to yield to the attack of
pleasure? It is because pain does not tempt and attract us. It is we
ourselves who choose it voluntarily, and will it to prevail over us.
So that we are masters of the situation; and in this man yields to
himself. But in pleasure it is man who yields to pleasure. Now only
mastery and sovereignty bring glory, and only slavery brings shame.
161. Vanity.- How wonderful it is that a thing so evident as the
vanity of the world is so little known, that it is a strange and
surprising thing to say that it is foolish to seek greatness?
162. He who will know fully the vanity of man has only to consider
the causes and effects of love. The cause is a je ne sais quoi
(Corneille), and the effects are dreadful. This je ne sais quoi, so
small an object that we cannot recognise it, agitates a whole country,
princes, armies, the entire world.
Cleopatra's nose: had it been shorter, the whole aspect of the
world would have been altered.
163. Vanity.- The cause and the effects of love: Cleopatra.
164. He who does not see the vanity of the world is himself very
vain. Indeed who do not see it but youths who are absorbed in fame,
diversion, and the thought of the future? But take away diversion, and
you will see them dried up with weariness. They feel then their
nothingness without knowing it; for it is indeed to be unhappy to be
in insufferable sadness as soon as we are reduced to thinking of
self and have no diversion.
165. Thoughts.- In omnibus requiem quaesivi.* If our condition
were truly happy, we not need diversion from thinking of it in order
to make ourselves happy.
* Ecclus. 24. 11. "With all these I have sought rest."
166. Diversion.- Death is easier to bear without thinking of it
than is the thought of death without peril.
167. The miseries of human life has established all this: as men
have seen this, they have taken up diversion.
168. Diversion.- 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.
169. Despite these miseries, man wishes to be happy, and only
wishes to be happy, and cannot wish not to be so. But how will he
set about it? To be happy he would have to make himself immortal; but,
not being able to do so, it has occurred to him to prevent himself
from thinking of death.
170. Diversion.- If man were happy, he would be the more so, the
less he was diverted, like the Saints and God. Yes; but is it not to
be happy to have a faculty of being amused by diversion? No; for
that comes from elsewhere and from without, and thus is dependent, and
therefore subject to be disturbed by a thousand accidents, which bring
inevitable griefs.
171. Misery.- The only thing which consoles us for our miseries is
diversion, and yet this is the greatest of our miseries. For it is
this which principally hinders us from reflecting upon ourselves and
which makes us insensibly ruin ourselves. Without this we should be in
a state of weariness, and this weariness would spur us to seek a
more solid means of escaping from it. But diversion amuses us, and
leads us unconsciously to death.
172. We do not rest satisfied with the present. We anticipate
the future as too slow in coming, as if in order to hasten its course;
or we recall the past, to stop its too rapid flight. So imprudent
are we that we wander in the times which are not ours and do not think
of the only one which belongs to us; and so idle are we that we
dream of those times which are no more and thoughtlessly overlook that
which alone exists. For the present is generally painful to us. We
conceal it from our sight, because it troubles us; and, if it be
delightful to us, we regret to see it pass away. We try to sustain
it by the future and think of arranging matters which are not in our
power, for a time which we have no certainty of reaching.
Let each one examine his thoughts, and he will find them all
occupied with the past and the future. We scarcely ever think of the
present; and if we think of it, it is only to take light from it to
arrange the future. The present is never our end. The past and the
present are our means; the future alone is our end. So we never
live, but we hope to live; and, as we are always preparing to be
happy, it is inevitable we should never be so.
173. They say that eclipses foretoken misfortune, because
misfortunes are common, so that, as evil happens so often, they
often foretell it; whereas if they said that they predict good
fortune, they would often be wrong. They attribute good fortune only
to rare conjunctions of the heavens; so they seldom fail in
prediction.
174. Misery.- Solomon and Job have best known and best spoken of
the misery of man; the former the most fortunate, and the latter the
most unfortunate of men; the former knowing the vanity of pleasures
from experience, the latter the reality of evils.
175. We know ourselves so little that many think they are about to
die when they are well, and many think they are well when they are
near death, unconscious of approaching fever, or of the abscess
ready to form itself.
176. Cromwell was about to ravage all Christendom; the royal
family was undone, and his own for ever established, save for a little
grain of sand which formed in his ureter. Rome herself was trembling
under him; but this small piece of gravel having formed there, he is
dead, his family cast down, all is peaceful, and the king is restored.
177. Three hosts. Would he who had possessed the friendship of the
King of England, the King of Poland, and the Queen of Sweden, have
believed he would lack a refuge and shelter in the world?
178. Macrobius: on the innocents slain by Herod.
179. When Augustus learnt that Herod's own son was amongst the
infants under two years of age, whom he had caused to be slain, he
said that it was better to be Herod's pig than his son. Macrobius,
Saturnalia, ii. 4.
180. The great and the humble have the same misfortunes, the
same griefs, the same passions; but the one is at the top of the
wheel, and the other near the centre, and so less disturbed by the
same revolutions.
181. We are so unfortunate that we can only take pleasure in a
thing on condition of being annoyed if it turn out ill, as a
thousand things can do, and do every hour. He who should find the
secret of rejoicing in the good, without troubling himself with its
contrary evil, would have hit the mark. It is perpetual motion.
182. Those who have always good hope in the midst of
misfortunes, and who are delighted with good luck, are suspected of
being very pleased with the ill success of the affair, if they are not
equally distressed by bad luck; and they are overjoyed to find these
pretexts of hope, in order to show that they are concerned and to
conceal by the joy which they feign to feel that which they have at
seeing the failure of the matter.
183. We run carelessly to the precipice, after we have put
something before us to prevent us seeing it.
SECTION III
OF THE NECESSITY OF THE WAGER
184. A letter to incite to the search after God.
And then to make people seek Him among the philosophers, sceptics,
and dogmatists, who disquiet him who inquires of them.
185. The conduct of God, who disposes all things kindly, is to put
religion into the mind by reason, and into the heart by grace. But
to will to put it into the mind and heart by force and threats is
not to put religion there, but terror; terorrem potius quam
religionem.*
* "Terror which is more powerful than religion."
186. Nisi terrerentur et non docerentur, improba quasi dominatio
videretur (St. Augustine, Epistle 48 or 49),* Contra Mendacium ad
Consentium.
* "From fear that they are being led by terror, without
guidance, domination appears tyrannical."
187. Order.- Men despise religion; they hate it and fear it is
true. To remedy this, we must begin by showing that religion is not
contrary to reason; that it is venerable, to inspire respect for it;
then we must make it lovable, to make good men hope it is true;
finally, we must prove it is true.
Venerable, because it has perfect knowledge of man; lovable
because it promises the true good.
188. In every dialogue and discourse, we must be able to say to
those who take offence, "Of what do you complain?"
189. To begin by pitying unbelievers; they are wretched enough
by their condition. We ought only to revile them where it is
beneficial; but this does them harm.
190. To pity atheists who seek, for are they not unhappy enough?
To inveigh against those who make a boast of it.
191. And will this one scoff at the other? Who ought to scoff? And
yet, the latter does not scoff at the other, but pities him.
192. To reproach Milton with not being troubled, since God will
reproach him.
193. Quid fiet hominibus qui minima contemnunt, majora non
credunt?*
* "What will become of men who mistake small things and do not
believe in greater?"
194. ... 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 in darkness and estranged from God, that He has hidden Himself
from their knowledge, that this is in fact the name which He gives
Himself in the Scriptures, Deus absconditus;* and finally, if it
endeavours 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; what advantage can they obtain, when, in the negligence
with which they make profession of being in search of the truth,
they cry out that nothing reveals it to them; and since that
darkness in which they are, and with which they upbraid the Church,
establishes only one of the things which she affirms, without touching
the other, and, very far from destroying, proves her doctrine?
* Is. 45. 15. "Thou art a God that hidest thyself."
In order to attack it, they should have protested that they had
made every effort to seek Him everywhere, and even in that which the
Church proposes for their instruction, but without satisfaction. If
they talked in this manner, they would in truth be attacking one of
her pretensions. But I hope here to show that no reasonable person can
speak thus, and I venture even to say that no one has ever done so. We
know well enough how those who are of this mind behave. They believe
they have made great efforts for their instruction when they have
spent a few hours in reading some book of Scripture and have
questioned some priests on the truths of the faith. After that, they
boast of having made vain search in books and among men. But,
verily, I will tell them what I have often said, that this
negligence is insufferable. We are not here concerned with the
trifling interests of some stranger, that we should treat it in this
fashion; the matter concerns ourselves and our all.
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. All our
actions and thoughts must take such different courses, according as
there are or are not eternal joys to hope for, that it is impossible
to take one step with sense and judgment unless we regulate our course
by our view of this point which ought to be our ultimate end.
Thus our first interest and our first duty is to enlighten
ourselves on this subject, whereon depends all our conduct.
Therefore among those who do not believe, I make a vast difference
between those who strive with all their power to inform themselves and
those who live without troubling or thinking about it.
I can have only compassion for those who sincerely bewail their
doubt, who regard it as the greatest of misfortunes, and who,
sparing no effort to escape it, make of this inquiry their principal
and most serious occupation.
But as for those who pass their life without thinking of this
ultimate end of life, and who, for this sole reason that they do not
find within themselves the lights which convince them of it, neglect
to seek them elsewhere, and to examine thoroughly whether this opinion
is one of those which people receive with credulous simplicity, or one
of those which, although obscure in themselves, have nevertheless a
solid and immovable foundation, I look upon them in a manner quite
different.
This carelessness in a matter which concerns themselves, their
eternity, their all, moves me more to anger than pity; it astonishes
and shocks me; it is to me monstrous. I do not say this out of the
pious zeal of a spiritual devotion. I expect, on the contrary, that we
ought to have this feeling from principles of human interest and
self-love; for this we need only see what the least enlightened
persons see.
We do not require great education of the mind to understand that
here is no real and lasting satisfaction; that our pleasures are
only vanity; that our evils are infinite; and, lastly, that death,
which threatens us every moment, must infallibly place us within a few
years under the dreadful necessity of being for ever either
annihilated or unhappy.
There is nothing more real than this, nothing more terrible. Be we
as heroic as we like, that is the end which awaits the world. Let us
reflect on this and then say whether it is not beyond doubt that there
is no good in this life but in the hope of another; that we are
happy only in proportion as we draw near it; and that, as there are no
more woes for those who have complete assurance of eternity, so
there is no more happiness for those who have no insight into it.
Surely then it is a great evil thus to be in doubt, but it is at
least an indispensable duty to seek when we are in such doubt; and
thus the doubter who does not seek is altogether completely unhappy
and completely wrong. And if besides this he is easy and content,
professes to be so, and indeed boasts of it; if it is this state
itself which is the subject of his joy and vanity, I have no words
to describe so silly a creature.
How can people hold these opinions? What joy can we find in the
expectation of nothing but hopeless misery? What reason for boasting
that we are in impenetrable darkness? And how can it happen that the
following argument occurs to a reasonable man?
"I know not who put me into the world, nor what the world is,
nor what I myself am. I am in terrible ignorance of everything. I know
not what my body is, nor my senses, nor my soul, not even that part of
me which thinks what I say, which reflects on all and on itself, and
knows itself no more than the rest. I see those frightful spaces of
the universe which surround me, and I find myself tied to one corner
of this vast expanse, without knowing why I am put in this place
rather than in another, nor why the short time which is given me to
live is assigned to me at this point rather than at another of the
whole eternity which was before me or which shall come after me. I see
nothing but infinites on all sides, which surround me as an atom and
as a shadow which endures only for an instant and returns no more. All
I know is that I must soon die, but what I know least is this very
death which I cannot escape.
"As I know not whence I come, so I know not whither I go. I know
only that, in leaving this world, I fall for ever either into
annihilation or into the hands of an angry God, without knowing to
which of these two states I shall be for ever assigned. Such is my
state, full of weakness and uncertainty. And from all this I
conclude that I ought to spend all the days of my life without
caring to inquire into what must happen to me. Perhaps I might find
some solution to my doubts, but I will not take the trouble, nor
take a step to seek it; and after treating with scorn those who are
concerned with this care, I will go without foresight and without fear
to try the great event, and let myself be led carelessly to death,
uncertain of the eternity of my future state."
Who would desire to have for a friend a man who talks in this
fashion? Who would choose him out from others to tell him of his
affairs? Who would have recourse to him in affliction? And indeed to
what use in life could one put him?
In truth, it is the glory of religion to have for enemies men so
unreasonable; and their opposition to it is so little dangerous that
it serves, on the contrary, to establish its truths. For the Christian
faith goes mainly to establish these two facts: the corruption of
nature, and redemption by Jesus Christ. Now I contend that, if these
men do not serve to prove the truth of the redemption by the
holiness of their behaviour, they at least serve admirably to show the
corruption of nature by sentiments so unnatural.
Nothing is so important to man as his own state, nothing is so
formidable to him as eternity; and thus it is not natural that there
should be men indifferent to the loss of their existence, and to the
perils of everlasting suffering. They are quite different with
regard to all other things. They are afraid of mere trifles; they
foresee them; they feel them. And this same man who spends so many
days and nights in rage and despair for the loss of office, or for
some imaginary insult to his honour, is the very one who knows without
anxiety and without emotion that he will lose all by death. It is a
monstrous thing to see in the same heart and at the same time this
sensibility to trifles and this strange insensibility to the
greatest objects. It is an incomprehensible enchantment, and a
supernatural slumber, which indicates as its cause an all-powerful
force.
There must be a strange confusion in the nature of man, that he
should boast of being in that state in which it seems incredible
that a single individual should be. However, experience has shown me
so great a number of such persons that the fact would be surprising,
if we did not know that the greater part of those who trouble
themselves about the matter are disingenuous and not, in fact, what
they say. They are people who have heard it said that it is the
fashion to be thus daring. It is what they call "shaking off the
yoke," and they try to imitate this. But it would not be difficult
to make them understand how greatly they deceive themselves in thus
seeking esteem. This is not the way to gain it, even I say among those
men of the world who take a healthy view of things and who know that
the only way to succeed in this life is to make ourselves appear
honourable, faithful, judicious, and capable of useful service to a
friend; because naturally men love only what may be useful to them.
Now, what do we gain by hearing it said of a man that he has now
thrown off the yoke, that he does not believe there is a God who
watches our actions, that he considers himself the sole master of
his conduct, and that he thinks he is accountable for it only to
himself.? Does he think that he has thus brought us to have henceforth
complete confidence in him and to look to him for consolation, advice,
and help in every need of life? Do they profess to have delighted us
by telling us that they hold our soul to be only a little wind and
smoke, especially by telling us this in a haughty and self-satisfied
tone of voice? Is this a thing to say gaily? Is it not, on the
contrary, a thing to say sadly, as the saddest thing in the world?
If they thought of it seriously, they would see that this is so
bad a mistake, so contrary to good sense, so opposed to decency, and
so removed in every respect from that good breeding which they seek,
that they would be more likely to correct than to pervert those who
had an inclination to follow them. And, indeed, make them give an
account of their opinions, and of the reasons which they have for
doubting religion, and they will say to you things so feeble and so
petty, that they persuade you of the contrary. The following is what a
person one day said to such a one very appositely: "If you continue to
talk in this manner, you will really make me religious." And he was
right, for who would not have a horror of holding opinions in which he
would have such contemptible persons as companions!
Thus those who only feign these opinions would be very unhappy, if
they restrained their natural feelings in order to make themselves the
most conceited of men. If, at the bottom of their heart, they are
troubled at not having more light, let them not disguise the fact;
this avowal will not be shameful. The only shame is to have none.
Nothing reveals more an extreme weakness of mind than not to know
the misery of a godless man. Nothing is more indicative of a bad
disposition of heart than not to desire the truth of eternal promises.
Nothing is more dastardly than to act with bravado before God. Let
them then leave these impieties to those who are sufficiently ill-bred
to be really capable of them. Let them at least be honest men, if they
cannot be Christians. 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.
But as for those who live without knowing Him and without
seeking Him, they judge themselves so little worthy of their own care,
that they are not worthy of the care of others; and it needs all the
charity of the religion which they despise, not to despise them even
to the point of leaving them to their folly. But because this religion
obliges us always to regard them, so long as they are in this life, as
capable of the grace which can enlighten them, and to believe that
they may, in a little time, be more replenished with faith than we
are, and that, on the other hand, we may fall into the blindness
wherein they are, we must do for them what we would they should do for
us if we were in their place, and call upon them to have pity upon
themselves, and to take at least some steps in the endeavour to find
light. Let them give to reading this some of the hours which they
otherwise employ so uselessly; whatever aversion they may bring to the
task, they will perhaps gain something, and at least will not lose
much. But as for those who bring to the task perfect sincerity and a
real desire to meet with truth, those I hope will be satisfied and
convinced of the proofs of a religion so divine, which I have here
collected, and in which I have followed somewhat after this order...
195. Before entering into the proofs of the Christian religion,
I find it necessary to point out the sinfulness of those men who
live in indifference to the search for truth in a matter which is so
important to them, and which touches them so nearly.
Of all their errors, this doubtless is the one which most convicts
them of foolishness and blindness, and in which it is easiest to
confound them by the first glimmerings of common sense and by
natural feelings.
For it is not to be doubted that the duration of this life is
but a moment; that the state of death is eternal, whatever may be
its nature; and that thus all our actions and thoughts must take
such different directions, according to the state of that eternity,
that it is impossible to take one step with sense and judgement,
unless we regulate our course by the truth of that point which ought
to be our ultimate end.
There is nothing clearer than this; and thus, according to the
principles of reason, the conduct of men is wholly unreasonable, if
they do not take another course.
On this point, therefore, we condemn those who live without
thought of the ultimate end of life, who let themselves be guided by
their own inclinations and their own pleasures without reflection
and without concern, and, as if they could annihilate eternity by
turning away their thought from it, think only of making themselves
happy for the moment.
Yet this eternity exists, and death, which must open into it and
threatens them every hour, must in a little time infallibly put them
under the dreadful necessity of being either annihilated or unhappy
for ever, without knowing which of these eternities is for ever
prepared for them.
This is a doubt of terrible consequence. They are in peril of
eternal woe and thereupon, as if the matter were not worth the
trouble, they neglect to inquire whether this is one of those opinions
which people receive with too credulous a facility, or one of those
which, obscure in themselves, have a very firm, though hidden,
foundation. Thus they know not whether there be truth or falsity in
the matter, nor whether there be strength or weakness in the proofs.
They have them before their eyes; they refuse to look at them; and
in that ignorance they choose all that is necessary to fall into
this misfortune if it exists, to await death to make trial of it,
yet to be very content in this state, to make profession of it, and
indeed to boast of it. Can we think seriously of the importance of
this subject without being horrified at conduct so extravagant?
This resting in ignorance is a monstrous thing, and they who
pass their life in it must be made to feel its extravagance and
stupidity, by having it shown to them, so that they may be
confounded by the sight of their folly. For this is how men reason,
when they choose to live in such ignorance of what they are and
without seeking enlightenment. "I know not," they say...
196. Men lack heart; they would not make a friend of it.
197. To be insensible to the extent of despising interesting
things, and to become insensible to the point which interests us most.
198. The sensibility of man to trifles, and his insensibility to
great things, indicates a strange inversion.
199. Let us imagine a number of men in chains and all condemned to
death, where some are killed each day in the sight of the others,
and those who remain see their own fate in that of their fellows and
wait their turn, looking at each other sorrowfully and without hope.
It is an image of the condition of men.
200. A man in a dungeon, ignorant whether his sentence be
pronounced and having only one hour to learn it, but this hour enough,
if he knew that it is pronounced, to obtain its repeal, would act
unnaturally in spending that hour, not in ascertaining his sentence,
but in playing piquet. So it is against nature that man, etc. It is
making heavy the hand of God.
Thus not only the zeal of those who seek Him proves God, but
also the blindness of those who seek Him not.
201. All the objections of this one and that one only go against
themselves, and not against religion. All that infidels say ...
202. From those who are in despair at being without faith, we
see that God does not enlighten them; but as to the rest, we see there
is a God who makes them blind.
203. Fascinatio nugacitatis.* - That passion may not harm us,
let us act as if we had only eight hours to live.
* Wisd. of Sol. 4. 12. "Bewitching of naughtiness."
204. If we ought to devote eight hours of life, we ought to devote
a hundred years.
205. When I consider the short duration of my life, swallowed up
in the eternity before and after, the little space which I fill and
even can see, engulfed in the infinite immensity of spaces of which
I am ignorant and which know me not, I am frightened and am astonished
at being here rather than there; for there is no reason why here
rather than there, why now rather than then. Who has put me here? By
whose order and direction have this place and time been allotted to
me? Memoria hospitis unius diei praetereuntis.*
* Wisd. of Sol. 5. 15. "The remembrance of a guest that tarrieth
but a day."
206. The eternal silence of these infinite spaces frightens me.
207. How many kingdoms know us not!
208. Why is my knowledge limited? Why my stature? Why my life to
one hundred years rather than to a thousand? What reason has nature
had for giving me such, and for choosing this number rather than
another in the infinity of those from which there is no more reason to
choose one than another, trying nothing else?
209. Art thou less a slave by being loved and favoured by thy
master? Thou art indeed well off, slave. Thy master favours thee; he
will soon beat thee.
210. The last act is tragic, however happy all the rest of the
play is; at the last a little earth is thrown upon our head, and
that is the end for ever.
211. We are fools to depend upon the society of our fellow-men.
Wretched as we are, powerless as we are, they will not aid us; we
shall die alone. We should therefore act as if we were alone, and in
that case should we build fine houses, etc. We should seek the truth
without hesitation; and, if we refuse it, we show that we value the
esteem of men more than the search for truth.
212. Instability.- It is a horrible thing to feel all that we
possess slipping away.
213. Between us and heaven or hell there is only life, which is
the frailest thing in the world.
214. Injustice.- That presumption should be joined to meanness
is extreme injustice.
215. To fear death without danger, and not in danger, for one must
be a man.
216. Sudden death alone is feared; hence confessors stay with
lords.
217. An heir finds the title-deeds of his house. Will he say,
"Perhaps they are forged" and neglect to examine them?
218. Dungeon.- I approve of not examining the opinion of
Copernicus; but this...! It concerns all our life to know whether
the soul be mortal or immortal.
219. It is certain that the mortality or immortality of the soul
must make an entire difference to morality. And yet philosophers
have constructed their ethics independently of this: they discuss to
pass an hour.
Plato, to incline to Christianity.
220. The fallacy of philosophers who have not discussed the
immortality of the soul. The fallacy of their dilemma in Montaigne.
221. Atheists ought to say what is perfectly evident; now it is
not perfectly evident that the soul is material.
222. Atheists.- What reason have they for saying that we cannot
rise from the dead? What is more difficult, to be born or to rise
again; that what has never been should be, or that what has been
should be again? Is it more difficult to come into existence than to
return to it? Habit makes the one appear easy to us; want of habit
makes the other impossible. A popular way of thinking!
Why cannot a virgin bear a child? Does a hen not lay eggs
without a cock? What distinguishes these outwardly from others? And
who has told us that the hen may not form the germ as well as the
cock?
223. What have they to say against the resurrection, and against
the child-bearing of the Virgin? Which is the more difficult, to
produce a man or an animal, or to reproduce it? And if they had
never seen any species of animals, could they have conjectured whether
they were produced without connection with each other?
224. How I hate these follies of not believing in the Eucharist,
etc.! If the Gospel be true, if Jesus Christ be God, what difficulty
is there?
225. Atheism shows strength of mind, but only to a certain degree.
226. Infidels, who profess to follow reason, ought to be
exceedingly strong in reason. What say they then? "Do we not see," say
they, "that the brutes live and die like men, and Turks like
Christians? They have their ceremonies, their prophets, their doctors,
their saints, their monks, like us," etc. (Is this contrary to
Scripture? Does it not say all this?)
If you care but little to know the truth, here is enough of it
to leave you in repose. But if you desire with all your heart to
know it, it is not enough; look at it in detail. This would be
sufficient for a question in philosophy; but not here, where it
concerns your all. And yet, after a trifling reflection of this
kind, we go to amuse ourselves, etc. Let us inquire of this same
religion whether it does not give a reason for this obscurity; perhaps
it will teach it to us.
227. Order by dialogues.- What ought I to do? I see only darkness
everywhere. Shall I believe I am nothing? Shall I believe I am God?
"All things change and succeed each other." You are mistaken;
there is...
228. Objection of atheists: "But we have no light."
229. This is what I see and what troubles me. I look on all sides,
and I see only darkness ever