Pascal's Pensées
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 quæsivi._[77] If our condition were
truly happy, we would not need diversion from thinking of it in order to
make ourselves happy.
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 have 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 it 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.[78] 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[79] 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,[80] or of the abscess ready to form
itself.
176
Cromwell[81] 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.[82]] 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:[83] 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, _Sat._, book ii,
chap. 4.
180
The great and the humble have the same misfortunes, the same griefs, the
same passions;[84] 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_.
186
_Nisi terrerentur et non docerentur, improba quasi dominatio videretur_
(Aug., Ep. 48 or 49), _Contra Mendacium ad Consentium_.
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 Miton[85] with not being troubled, since God will reproach
him.
193
_Quid fiet hominibus qui minima contemnunt, majora non credunt?_
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_;[86] 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?
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 priest 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
occupations.
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;