Pascal Quotes

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

If we do not know ourselves to be full of pride, ambition, lust, weakness, misery, and injustice, we are indeed blind. And if, knowing this, we do not desire deliverance, what can we say of a man...?

Dull minds are never either intuitive or mathematical.

Eloquence is a painting of the thoughts.

Two things control men's nature, instinct and experience.

All our life passes in this way: we seek rest by struggling against certain obstacles, and once they are overcome, rest proves intolerable because of the boredom it produces.

Who can doubt that we exist only to love? Disguise it, in fact, as we will, we love without intermission... We live not a moment exempt from its influence.

To be mistaken in believing that the Christian religion is true is no great loss to anyone; but how dreadful to be mistaken in believing it to be false!

God has given us evidence sufficiently clear to convince those with an open heart and mind.

Those who are clever in imagination are far more pleased with themselves than prudent men could reasonably be.

When a soldier complains of his hard life (or a labourer, etc.) try giving him nothing to do.

We run heedlessly into the abyss after putting something in front of us to stop us from seeing it.

Justice is what is established; and thus all our established laws will necessarily be regarded as just without examination, since they are established.

Curiosity is nothing more than vanity. More often than not we only seek knowledge to show it off.

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

Everything that is written merely to please the author is worthless.

If we regulate our conduct according to our own convictions, we may safely disregard the praise or censure of others.

What a strange vanity painting is; it attracts admiration by resembling the original, we do not admire.

The last proceeding of reason is to recognize that there is an infinity of things which are beyond it. There is nothing so conformable to reason as this disavowal of reason.

The majority is the best way, because it is visible, and has strength to make itself obeyed. Yet it is the opinion of the least able.

The heart has arguments with which the logic of mind is not aquainted.

We like to be deceived.

Vanity is so secure in the heart of man that everyone wants to be admired: even I who write this, and you who read this.

No soul of high estate can take pleasure in slander. It betrays a weakness.

The best defense against logic is ignorance.

We view things not only from different sides, but with different eyes; we have no wish to find them alike.

A man does not show his greatness by being at one extremity, but rather by touching both at once.

Mutual cheating is the foundation of society.

And is it not obvious that, just as it is a crime to disturb the peace when truth reigns, it is also a crime to remain at peace when the truth is being destroyed?

There's so much more to Colombia than drug trafficking, you have no idea. They're a bit worn out by the association.

All the unhappiness of men arises from one single fact, that they cannot stay quietly in their own chamber.

The multitude which is not brought to act as a unity, is confusion. That unity which has not its origin in the multitude is tyranny.

Our lives are rivers, gliding free to that unfathomed, boundless sea, the silent grave!

What is it that we call loneliness. It can’t simply be the absence of others, you can be alone and not lonely, and you can be among people and yet be lonely. So what is it?

Sometimes, we are afraid of something because we're afraid of something else.

If we must not act save on a certainty, we ought not to act on religion, for it is not certain. But how many things we do on an uncertainty, sea voyages, battles!

Continuity in everything is unpleasant.

Instinct teaches us to look for happiness outside ourselves.

The charm of fame is so great that we like every object to which it is attached, even death.

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.

Since we cannot know all that there is to be known about anything, we ought to know a little about everything.

Love was more than blind. It was deaf and dumb, too. It was catatonic. It was vegetative.

Good deeds, when concealed, are the most admirable.

The stream is always purer at its source. [Fr., Les choses valent toujours mieux dans leur source.]

Excuse me, pray." Without that excuse I would not have known there was anything amiss.

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

Habit is a second nature, which destroys the first.

How vain is painting, which is admired for reproducing the likeness of things whose originals are not admired.

We sail within a vast sphere, ever drifting in uncertainty, driven from end to end.

Vanity is but the surface.