Top quotes by Blaise Pascal

Belief is a wise wager. Granted that faith cannot be proved, what harm will come to you if you gamble on its truth and it proves false? If you gain, you gain all; if you lose, you lose nothing. Wager, then, without hesitation, that He exists. Votes: 33

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. Votes: 24

Man's greatness lies in his power of thought. Votes: 24

He that takes truth for his guide, and duty for his end, may safely trust to God's providence to lead him aright. Votes: 17

It is the heart which perceives God and not the reason. That is what faith is: God perceived by the heart, not by the reason. Votes: 17

Jesus is the God whom we can approach without pride and before whom we can humble ourselves without despair. Votes: 16

The finite is annihilated in the presence of the infinite, and becomes a pure nothing. So our spirit before God, so our justice before divine justice. Votes: 13

The knowledge of God is very far from the love of Him. Votes: 11

Imagination disposes of everything; it creates beauty, justice, and happiness, which are everything in this world. Votes: 10

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. Votes: 10

The strength of a man's virtue should not be measured by his special exertions, but by his habitual acts. Votes: 10

Atheism shows strength of mind, but only to a certain degree. Votes: 10

Truth is so obscure in these times, and falsehood so established, that, unless we love the truth, we cannot know it. Votes: 10

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. Votes: 9

In faith there is enough light for those who want to believe and enough shadows to blind those who don't. Votes: 9

Two things control men's nature, instinct and experience. Votes: 9

The least movement is of importance to all nature. The entire ocean is affected by a pebble. Votes: 8

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? Votes: 8

Happiness is neither without us nor within us. It is in God, both without us and within us. Votes: 8

Justice and truth are too such subtle points that our tools are too blunt to touch them accurately. Votes: 8

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 recognize them, since that is to add the further fault of a voluntary illusion. Votes: 7

Can anything be stupider than that a man has the right to kill me because he lives on the other side of a river and his ruler has a quarrel with mine, though I have not quarrelled with him? Votes: 7

Habit is a second nature that destroys the first. But what is nature? Why is habit not natural? I am very much afraid that nature itself is only a first habit, just as habit is a second nature. Votes: 5

Our nature consists in motion; complete rest is death. Votes: 5

I have discovered that all human evil comes from this, man's being unable to sit still in a room. Votes: 5

Men despise religion. They hate it and are afraid it may be true. Votes: 5

When we see a natural style, we are astonished and charmed; for we expected to see an author, and we find a person. Votes: 4

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. Votes: 4

Justice and power must be brought together, so that whatever is just may be powerful, and whatever is powerful may be just. Votes: 2

Chance gives rise to thoughts, and chance removes them; no art can keep or acquire them. Votes: 2

Vanity of science. Knowledge of physical science will not console me for ignorance of morality in time of affliction, but knowledge of morality will always console me for ignorance of physical science. Votes: 0

Nothing is so intolerable to man as being fully at rest, without a passion, without business, without entertainment, without care. Votes: 0

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 about it. Votes: 0

Faith embraces many truths which seem to contradict each other. Votes: 0

Faith is different from proof; the latter is human, the former is a Gift from God. Votes: 0

Too much and too little wine. Give him none, he cannot find truth; give him too much, the same. Votes: 0

Between us and heaven or hell there is only life, which is the frailest thing in the world. Votes: 0

It is good to be tired and wearied by the futile search after the true good, that we may stretch out our arms to the Redeemer. Votes: 0

There are only two kinds of men: the righteous who think they are sinners and the sinners who think they are righteous. Votes: 0

The gospel to me is simply irresistible. Votes: 0

The sensitivity of men to small matters, and their indifference to great ones, indicates a strange inversion. Votes: 0

Faith indeed tells what the senses do not tell, but not the contrary of what they see. It is above them and not contrary to them. Votes: 0

Man's true nature being lost, everything becomes his nature; as, his true good being lost, everything becomes his good. Votes: 0

Human beings must be known to be loved; but Divine beings must be loved to be known. Votes: 0

Our soul is cast into a body, where it finds number, time, dimension. Thereupon it reasons, and calls this nature necessity, and can believe nothing else. Votes: 0

Words differently arranged have a different meaning, and meanings differently arranged have different effects. Votes: 0

We view things not only from different sides, but with different eyes; we have no wish to find them alike. Votes: 0

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! Votes: 0

Love has reasons which reason cannot understand. Votes: 0

Man is but a reed, the most feeble thing in nature, but he is a thinking reed. Votes: 0

We never love a person, but only qualities. Votes: 0

Through space the universe encompasses and swallows me up like an atom; through thought I comprehend the world. Votes: 0

To have no time for philosophy is to be a true philosopher. Votes: 0

Knowlege of God without knowledge of man's wretchedness leads to pride. Knowledge of man's wretchedness without knowledge of God leads to despair. Knowledge of Jesus Christ is the middle course, because by it we discover both God and our wretched state. Votes: 0

Just as all things speak about God to those that know Him, and reveal Him to those that love Him, they also hide Him from all those that neither seek nor know Him. Votes: 0

This is how the whole of our life slips by. We seek repose by battling against certain obstacles, and once they are overcome we find rest is unbearable because of the boredom it generates. We can't imaging a condition that is pleasant without fun and noise. Votes: 0

The heart has its reasons which reason knows not. Votes: 0

The heart has its order, the mind has its own, which uses principles and demonstrations. The heart has a different one. We do not prove that we ought to be loved by setting out in order the causes of love; that would be absurd. Votes: 0

Small minds are concerned with the extraordinary, great minds with the ordinary. Votes: 0

Continuous eloquence wearies. Grandeur must be abandoned to be appreciated. Continuity in everything is unpleasant. Cold is agreeable, that we may get warm. Votes: 0

Kind words do not cost much. Yet they accomplish much. Votes: 0

We must learn our limits. We are all something, but none of us are everything. Votes: 0

You always admire what you really don't understand. Votes: 0

You're basically killing each other to see who's got the better imaginary friend. Votes: 0

St. Augustine teaches us that there is in each man a Serpent, an Eve, and an Adam. Our senses and natural propensities are the Serpent; the excitable desire is the Eve; and reason is the Adam. Our nature tempts us perpetually; criminal desire is often excited; but sin is not completed till reason consents. Votes: 0

Caesar was too old, it seems to me, to go off and amuse himself conquering the world. Such a pastime was all right for Augustus and Alexander; they were young men, not easily held in check, but Caesar ought to have been more mature. Votes: 0

Quand on voit le style naturel, on est tout e tonne et ravi, car on s'attendait de voir un auteur, et on trouve un homme. When we see a natural style we are quite amazed and delighted, because we expected to see an author and find a man. Votes: 0

A jester, a bad character. Votes: 0

Anyone who found the secret of rejoicing when things go well without being annoyed when they go badly would have found the point. Votes: 0

Men despise religion. They hate it and are afraid it may be true. The cure for this is first to show that religion is not contrary to reason, but worthy of reverence and respect. Next make it attractive, make good men wish it were true and then show that it is. Votes: 0

The captain of a ship is not chosen from those of the passengers who comes from the best family. Votes: 0

Thus so wretched is man that he would weary even without any cause for weariness... and so frivolous is he that, though full of a thousand reasons for weariness, the least thing, such as playing billiards or hitting a ball, is sufficient enough to amuse him. Votes: 0

If ignorance were bliss, he'd be a blister Votes: 0

Kind words do not cost much. They never blister the tongue or lips. They make other people good-natured. They also produce their own image on men's souls, and a beautiful image it is. Votes: 0

The last act is bloody, however pleasant all the rest of the play is: a little earth is thrown at last upon our head, and that is the end forever. Votes: 0

I can well conceive a man without hands, feet, head. But I cannot conceive man without thought; he would be a stone or a brute. Votes: 0

Chess is the gymnasium of the mind. Votes: 0

What a chimera then is man. What a novelty! What a monster... what a contradiction, what a prodigy Votes: 0

Clarity of mind means clarity of passion, too; this is why a great and clear mind loves ardently and sees distinctly what it loves. Votes: 0

That dog is mine said those poor children; that place in the sun is mine; such is the beginning and type of usurpation throughout the earth. [Fr., Ce chien est a moi, disaient ces pauvres enfants; c'est la ma place au soleil. Voila le commencement et l'image de l'usurpation de toute la terre.] Votes: 0

If God exists, not seeking God must be the gravest error imaginable. If one decides to sincerely seek for God and doesn't find God, the lost effort is negligible in comparison to what is at risk in not seeking God in the first place. Votes: 0

Continuity in everything is unpleasant. Votes: 0

Men never do evil so completely and cheerfully as when they do it from religious conviction. Votes: 0

Noble deeds that are concealed are most esteemed. Votes: 0

From whence comes it that a cripple in body does not irritate us, and that a crippled mind enrages us? It is because a cripple sees that we go right, and a distorted mind says that it is we who go astray. But for that we should have more pity and less rage. Votes: 0

All men seek happiness. This is without exception. Whatever different means they employ, they all tend to this end. The cause of some going to war, and of others avoiding it, is the same desire in both, attended with different views. The will never takes the least step but to this object. This is the motive of every action of every man, even of those who hang themselves. Votes: 0

We are only falsehood, duplicity, contradiction; we both conceal and disguise ourselves from ourselves. Votes: 0

Reason commands us far more imperiously than a master; for in disobeying the one we are unfortunate, and in disobeying the other we are fools. Votes: 0

If our condition were truly happy, we would not seek diversion from it in order to make ourselves happy. Votes: 0

Man finds nothing so intolerable as to be in a state of complete rest, without passions, without occupation, without diversion, without effort. Then he feels his nullity, loneliness, inadequacy, dependence, helplessness, emptiness. Votes: 0

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. Votes: 0

We sail within a vast sphere, ever drifting in uncertainty, driven from end to end. Votes: 0

Dull minds are never either intuitive or mathematical. Votes: 0

Earnestness is enthusiasm tempered by reason. Votes: 0

Nature is an infinite sphere of which the center is everywhere and the circumference nowhere. Votes: 0

The method of not erring is sought by all the world. The logicians profess to guide it, the geometricians alone attain it, and apart from science, and the imitations of it, there are no true demonstrations. Votes: 0

Our own interests are still an exquisite means for dazzling our eyes agreeably. Votes: 0

Love knows no limit to its endurance, no end to its trust, no fading of its hope; it can outlast anything. Love still stands when all else has fallen. Votes: 0

The two principles of truth, reason and senses, are not only both not genuine, but are engaged in mutual deception. The senses deceive reason through false appearances, and the senses are disturbed by passions, which produce false impressions. Votes: 0

Contradiction is not a sign of falsity, nor the lack of contradiction a sign of truth. Votes: 0

The consciousness of the falsity of present pleasures, and the ignorance of the vanity of absent pleasures, cause inconstancy. Votes: 0

All of our reasoning ends in surrender to feeling. Votes: 0

There is a God shaped vacuum in the heart of every man which cannot be filled by any created thing, but only by God, the Creator, made known through Jesus. Votes: 0

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. Votes: 0

I maintain that, if everyone knew what others said about him, there would not be four friends in the world. Votes: 0

I take it as a matter not to be disputed, that if all knew what each said of the other, there would not be four friends in the world. This seems proved by the quarrels and disputes caused by the disclosures which are occasionally made. Votes: 0

All men naturally hate one another. I hold it a fact, that if men knew exactly what one says of the other, there would not be four friends in the world. Votes: 0

The greater intellect one has, the more originality one finds in men. Ordinary persons find no difference between men. Votes: 0

If I believe in God and life after death and you do not, and if there is no God, we both lose when we die. However, if there is a God, you still lose and I gain everything. Votes: 0

I rather live as if God exists to find out that He doesn't than live as if he doesn't exist to find out He does. Votes: 0

Let it not be imagined that the life of a good Christian must be a life of melancholy and gloominess; for he only resigns some pleasures to enjoy others infinitely better. Votes: 0

Quelque e tendue d'esprit que l'on ait, l'on n'est capable que d'une grande passion. However vast a man's spirit, he is only capable of one great passion. Votes: 0

If a soldier or labourer complain of the hardship of his lot, set him to do nothing. Votes: 0

If you gain, you gain all. If you lose, you lose nothing. Wager then, without hesitation, that He exists. Votes: 0

Cold words freeze people, and hot words scorch them, and bitter words make them bitter, and wrathful words make them wrathful. Kind words also produce their own image on men's souls; and a beautiful image it is. They smooth, and quiet, and comfort the hearer. Votes: 0

Necessity, that great refuge and excuse for human frailty, breaks through all law; and he is not to be accounted in fault whose crime is not the effect of choice, but force. Votes: 0

To go beyond the bounds of moderation is to outrage humanity. The greatness of the human soul is shown by knowing how to keep within proper bounds. There are two equally dangerous extremes- to shut reason out, and not to let nothing in. Votes: 0

Do you wish people to think well of you? Don't speak well of yourself. Votes: 0

I bring you the gift of these four words: I believe in you. Votes: 0

I can readily conceive of a man without hands or feet; and I could conceive of him without a head, if experience had not taught me that by this he thinks, Thought then, is the essence of man, and without this we cannot conceive of him. Votes: 0

We are not satisfied with real life; we want to live some imaginary life in the eyes of other people and to seem different from what we actually are. Votes: 0

We do not content ourselves with the life we have in ourselves and in our being; we desire to live an imaginary life in the mind of others, and for this purpose we endeavor to shine. We labor unceasingly to adorn and preserve this imaginary existence and neglect the real. Votes: 0

How shall one who is so weak in his childhood become really strong when he grows older? We only change our fancies. Votes: 0

All human evil comes from a single cause, man's inability to sit still in a room. Votes: 0

The eternal silence of these infinite spaces frightens me. Votes: 0

Le silence e ternel de ces espaces infinis m'effraie. The eternal silence of these infinite spaces fills me with dread. Votes: 0

[I feel] engulfed in the infinite immensity of spaces whereof I know nothing, and which know nothing of me, I am terrified The eternal silence of these infinite spaces alarms me. Votes: 0

Man's sensitivity to the little things and insensitivity to the greatest are the signs of a strange disorder. Votes: 0

Our nature lies in movement; complete calm is death. Votes: 0

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. Votes: 0

Desire and force between them are responsible for all our actions; desire causes our voluntary acts, force our involuntary. Votes: 0

Concupiscence and force are the source of all our actions; concupiscence causes voluntary actions, force involuntary ones. Votes: 0

Lord, help me to do great things as though they were little, since I do them with your power; And little things as though they were great, since I do them in your name! Votes: 0

There are two types of mind . . . the mathematical, and what might be called the intuitive. The former arrives at its views slowly, but they are firm and rigid; the latter is endowed with greater flexibility and applies itself simultaneously to the diverse lovable parts of that which it loves. Votes: 0

What a vast difference there is between knowing God and loving Him. Votes: 0

Man is equally incapable of seeing the nothingness from which he emerges and the infinity in which he is engulfed. Votes: 0

Nothing is as approved as mediocrity, the majority has established it and it fixes it fangs on whatever gets beyond it either way. Votes: 0

Great and small suffer the same mishaps. Votes: 0

To go beyond the bounds of moderation is to outrage humanity. Votes: 0

Kind words produce their own image in men's souls; and a beautiful image it is. They soothe and quiet and comfort the hearer. They shame him out of his sour, morose, unkind feelings. We have not yet begun to use kind words in such abundance as they ought to be used. Votes: 0

Muhammad established a religion by putting his enemies to death; Jesus Christ by commanding his followers to lay down their lives. Votes: 0

It is not only old and early impressions that deceive us; the charms of novelty have the same power. Votes: 0

The greatest single distinguishing feature of the omnipotence of God is that our imagination gets lost thinking about it. Votes: 0

The world is satisfied with words. Few appreciate the things beneath. [Fr., Le monde se paye de paroles; peu approfondissement les choses.] Votes: 0

The heart has its reasons which reason knows nothing of... We know the truth not only by the reason, but by the heart." - Blaise Pascal Votes: 0

The present is never the mark of our designs. We use both past and present as our means and instruments, but the future only as our object and aim. Votes: 0

In each action we must look beyond the action at our past, present, and future state, and at others whom it affects, and see the relations of all those things. And then we shall be very cautious. Votes: 0

There are people who lie simply for the sake of lying. Votes: 0

If they [Plato and Aristotle] wrote about politics it was as if to lay down rules for a madhouse. And if they pretended to treat it as something really important it was because they knew that the madmen they were talking to believed themselves to be kings and emperors. They humored these beliefs in order to calm down their madness with as little harm as possible. Votes: 0

Rivers are roads that move and carry us whither we wish to go. [Fr., Les rivieres sont des chemins qui marchant et qui portent ou l'on veut aller.] Votes: 0

Our achievements of today are but the sum total of our thoughts of yesterday. You are today where the thoughts of yesterday have brought you and you will be tomorrow where the thoughts of today take you. Votes: 0

Justice without force is powerless; force without justice is tyrannical. Votes: 0

The art of subversion, of revolution, is to dislodge established customs by probing down to their origins in order to show how they lack authority and justice. Votes: 0

The stream is always purer at its source. Votes: 0

In order to enter into a real knowledge of your condition, consider it in this image: A man was cast by a tempest upon an unknown island, the inhabitants of which were in trouble to find their king, who was lost; and having a strong resemblance both in form and face to this king, he was taken for him, and acknowledged in this capacity by all the people. Votes: 0

The heart has its reasons of which reason knows nothing. Votes: 0

No one is discontented at not being a king except a discrowned king ... unhappiness almost invariably indicates the existence of a road not taken, a talent undeveloped, a self not recognized. Votes: 0

E? loquence quipersuade par douceur, non par empire, en tyran, non en roi. Eloquence should persuade gently, not by force or like a tyrant or king. Votes: 0

Force rules the world, and not opinion; but opinion is that which makes use of force Votes: 0

Earnestness is enthusiasm tempered by reason Votes: 0

Brave deeds are wasted when hidden Votes: 0

For as old age is that period of life most remote from infancy, who does not see that old age in this universal man ought not to be sought in the times nearest his birth, but in those most remote from it? Votes: 0

It is not in space that I must seek my human dignity, but in the ordering of my thought. It will do me no good to own land. Through space the universe grasps me and swallows me up like a speck; through thought I grasp it. Votes: 0

The charm of fame is so great, that we like every object to which it is attached, even death. Votes: 0

What a chimera then is man! What a novelty, what a monster, what a chaos, what a contradiction, what a prodigy! Judge of all things, feeble earthworm, repository of truth, sewer of uncertainty and error, the glory and the scum of the universe. Votes: 0

If we examine our thoughts, we shall find them always occupied with the past and the future. Votes: 0

Curiosity is only vanity. We usually only want to know something so that we can talk about it. Votes: 0

The virtue of a man ought to be measured not by his extraordinary exertions, but by his every-day conduct. Votes: 0

Vanity is but the surface. Votes: 0

It is not the length of years but a multitude of generations that makes things obscure. For truth is only perverted when men change. Votes: 0

People often mistake their imagination for their heart, & so often are convinced they are converted as soon as they start thinking of becoming converted. Votes: 0

To make a man a saint, it must indeed be by grace; and whoever doubts this does not know what a saint is, or a man. Votes: 0

I would prefer an intelligent hell to a stupid paradise. Votes: 0

He that takes truth for his guide, and duty for his end, may safely trust to God's providence to lead him aright Votes: 0

If we submit everything to reason our religion will be left with nothing mysterious or supernatural. If we offend the principles of reason our religion will be absurd and ridiculous . . . There are two equally dangerous extremes: to exclude reason, to admit nothing but reason. Votes: 0

All men's miseries derive from not being able to sit quiet in a room alone. Votes: 0

Since we cannot know all there is to be known about anything, we ought to know a little about everything. Votes: 0

It is man's natural sickness to believe that he possesses the truth. Votes: 0

Nature has made all her truths independent of one another. Our art makes one dependent on the other. Votes: 0

Those honor nature well, who teach that she can speak on everything. Votes: 0

Kind words produce their images on men's souls. Votes: 0

Nothing fortifies scepticism more than the fact that there are some who are not sceptics; if all were so, they would be wrong. Votes: 0

Discourses on humility are a source of pride in the vain and of humility in the humble. So those on scepticism cause believers to affirm. Few men speak humbly of humility, chastely of chastity, few doubtingly of scepticism. Votes: 0

Nothing gives rest but the sincere search for truth. Votes: 0

Everyone, without exception, is searching for happiness. Votes: 0

The only shame is to have none. Votes: 0

Once your soul has been enlarged by a truth, it can never return to its original size. Votes: 0

We do not weary of eating and sleeping every day, for hunger and sleepiness recur. Without that we should weary of them. So, without the hunger for spiritual things, we weary of them. Hunger after righteousness--the eighth beatitude. Votes: 0

The sole cause of man's unhappiness is that he does not know how to stay quietly in his room. Votes: 0

In difficult times carry something beautiful in your heart. Votes: 0

All of humanity's problems stem from man's inability to sit quietly in a room alone. Votes: 0

When we are in love we seem to ourselves quite different from what we were before. Votes: 0

Symmetry is what we see at a glance; based on the fact that there is no reason for any difference... Votes: 0

Symmetry is what we see at a glance. Votes: 0

Thinking too little about things or thinking too much both make us obstinate and fanatical. Votes: 0

A town, a landscape are when seen from afar a town and a landscape; but as one gets nearer, there are houses, trees, tiles leaves, grasses, ants, legs of ants and so on to infinity. All this is subsumed under the name of landscape. Votes: 0

Generally we are occupied either with the miseries which now we feel, or with those which threaten; and even when we see ourselves sufficiently secure from the approach of either, still fretfulness, though unwarranted by either present or expected affliction, fails not to spring up from the deep recesses of the heart, where its roots naturally grow, and to fill the soul with its poison. Votes: 0

Fuller believed human societies would soon rely mainly on renewable sources of energy, such as solar- and wind-derived electricity,. envisioned an age of "universal education and sustenance of all humanity". "The heart has reasons that reason does not understand." Votes: 0

I have made this letter longer than usual, only because I have not had the time to make it shorter. Votes: 0

There is a God-shaped vacuum in every heart. Votes: 0

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. Votes: 0

Who confers reputation? who gives respect and veneration to persons, to books, to great men? Who but Opinion? How utterly insufficient are all the riches of the world without her approbation! Votes: 0

People are generally better persuaded by the reasons which they have themselves discovered than by those which have come in to the mind of others. Votes: 0

God is, or He is not." But to which side shall we incline? Reason can decide nothing here. There is an infinite chaos which separated us. A game is being played at the extremity of this infinite distance where heads or tails will turn up. What will you wager? Votes: 0

Therefore, those to whom God has imparted religion by intuition are very fortunate and justly convinced. But to those who do not have it, we can give it only by reasoning, waiting for God to give them spiritual insight, without which faith is only human and useless for salvation. Votes: 0

Little things console us because little things afflict us. Votes: 0

We run carelessly to the precipice, after we have put something before us to prevent us seeing it. Votes: 0

We like security: we like the pope to be infallible in matters of faith, and grave doctors to be so in moral questions so that we can feel reassured. Votes: 0

All men's miseries derive from not being able to sit in a quiet room alone. Votes: 0

A trifle consoles us, for a trifle distresses us. Votes: 0

We only consult the ear because the heart is wanting. Votes: 0

Men often take their imagination for their heart; and they believe they are converted as soon as they think of being converted. Votes: 0

Imagination decides everything. Votes: 0

Eloquence is a painting of the thoughts. Votes: 0

That we must love one God only is a thing so evident that it does not require miracles to prove it. Votes: 0

Justice is what is established; and thus all our established laws will necessarily be regarded as just without examination, since they are established. Votes: 0

Few friendships would survive if each one knew what his friend says of him behind his back. Votes: 0

We conceal it from ourselves in vain - we must always love something. In those matters seemingly removed from love, the feeling is secretly to be found, and man cannot possibly live for a moment without it. Votes: 0

The self is hateful. Votes: 0

Even those who write against fame wish for the fame of having written well, and those who read their works desire the fame of having read them. Votes: 0

Custom is our nature. What are our natural principles but principles of custom? Votes: 0

It is incomprehensible that God should exist, and it is incomprehensible that he should not exist. Votes: 0

All the trouble in the world is due to the fact that man cannot sit still in a room. Votes: 0

There are only three types of people; those who have found God and serve him; those who have not found God and seek him, and those who live not seeking, or finding him. The first are rational and happy; the second unhappy and rational, and the third foolish and unhappy. Votes: 0

Distraction is the only thing that consoles us for miseries and yet it is itself the greatest of our miseries. Votes: 0

Knowing God without knowing our own wretchedness makes for pride. Knowing our own wretchedness without knowing God makes for despair. Knowing Jesus Christ strikes the balance because he shows us both God and our own wretchedness. Votes: 0

Faith is a gift of God. Votes: 0

The Christian religion teaches me two points-that there is a God whom men can know, and that their nature is so corrupt that they are unworthy of Him. Votes: 0

People almost invariably arrive at their beliefs not on the basis of proof but on the basis of what they find attractive. Votes: 0

What can be seen on earth points to neither the total absence nor the obvious presence of divinity, but to the presence of a hidden God. Everything bears this mark. Votes: 0

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. Votes: 0

Let man reawake and consider what he is compared with the reality of things; regard himself lost in this remote corner of Nature; and from the tiny cell where he lodges, to wit the Universe, weigh at their true worth earth, kingdoms, towns, himself. What is a man face to face with infinity? Votes: 0

Human beings do not know their place and purpose. They have fallen from their true place, and lost their true purpose. They search everywhere for their place and purpose, with great anxiety. But they cannot find them because they are surrounded by darkness. Votes: 0

Happiness is neither within us only, or without us; it is the union of ourselves with God Votes: 0

If god does not exist, one loses nothing by believing in him anyway, while if he does exist, one stands to lose everything by not believing. Votes: 0

We can only know God well when we know our own sin. And those who have known God without knowing their wretchedness have not glorified Him but have glorified themselves. Votes: 0

When one does not love too much, one does not love enough. Votes: 0

No man ever believes with a true and saving faith unless God inclines his heart; and no man when God does incline his heart can refrain from believing. Votes: 0

[Unbelievers] think they have made great efforts to get at the truth when they have spent a few hours in reading some book out of Holy Scripture, and have questioned some cleric about the truths of the faith. After that, they boast that they have searched in books and among men in vain. Votes: 0

It is dangerous to explain too clearly to man how like he is to the animals without pointing out his greatness. It is also dangerous to make too much of his greatness without his vileness. It is still more dangerous to leave him in ignorance of both, but it is most valuable to represent both to him. Man must not be allowed to believe that he is equal either to animals or to angels, nor to be unaware of either, but he must know both. Votes: 0

Continuous eloquence wearies. Votes: 0

Fear not, provided you fear; but if you fear not, then fear. Votes: 0

We implore the mercy of God, not that He may leave us at peace in our vices, but that He may deliver us from them. Votes: 0

The more intelligent a man is, the more originality he discovers in others. Votes: 0

There is enough light for those who only desire to see, and enough obscurity for those who have a contrary disposition Votes: 0

Don't try to add more years to your life. Better add more life to your years. Votes: 0

One of the greatest artifices the devil uses to engage men in vice and debauchery, is to fasten names of contempt on certain virtues, and thus fill weak souls with a foolish fear of passing for scrupulous, should they desire to put them in practice. Votes: 0

We run heedlessly into the abyss after putting something in front of us to stop us from seeing it. Votes: 0

Jesus was in a garden, not of delight as the first Adam, in which he destroyed himself and the whole human race, but in one of agony, in which he saved himself and the whole human race. Votes: 0

Reflect on death as in Jesus Christ, not as without Jesus Christ. Without Jesus Christ it is dreadful, it is alarming, it is the terror of nature. In Jesus Christ it is fair and lovely, it is good and holy, it is the joy of saints. Votes: 0

Apart from Jesus Christ, we do not know what is our life, nor our death, nor God, nor ourselves. Votes: 0

We know that there is an infinite, and we know not its nature. As we know it to be false that numbers are finite, it is therefore true that there is a numerical infinity. But we know not of what kind; it is untrue that it is even, untrue that it is odd; for the addition of a unit does not change its nature; yet it is a number, and every number is odd or even (this certainly holds of every finite number). Thus we may quite well know that there is a God without knowing what He is. Votes: 0

Our senses perceive no extreme. Too much sound deafens us; too much light dazzles us; too great distance or proximity hinders ourview. Too great length and too great brevity of discourse tends to obscurity; too much truth is paralyzing.... In short, extremes are for us as though they were not, and we are not within their notice. They escape us, or we them. Votes: 0

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 theater. 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. Votes: 0

Excuse me, pray." Without that excuse I would not have known there was anything amiss. Votes: 0

If we let ourselves believe that man began with divine grace, that he forfeited this by sin, and that he can be redeemed only by divine grace through the crucified Christ, then we shall find peace of mind never granted to philosophers. He who cannot believe is cursed, for he reveals by his unbelief that God has not chosen to give him grace. Votes: 0

A man does not show his greatness by being at one extremity, but rather by touching both at once. Votes: 0

Jesus Christ came to tell men that they have no enemies but themselves. Votes: 0

Mankind suffers from two excesses: to exclude reason, and to live by nothing but reason. Votes: 0

It is not certain that everything is uncertain. Votes: 0

We think very little of time present; we anticipate the future, as being too slow, and with a view to hasten it onward, we recall the past to stay it as too swiftly gone. We are so thoughtless, that we thus wander through the hours which are not here, regardless only of the moment that is actually our own. Votes: 0

The supreme function of reason is to show man that some things are beyond reason. Votes: 0

Silence. All human unhappiness comes from not knowing how to stay quietly in a room. Votes: 0

All the troubles of life come upon us because we refuse to sit quietly for a while each day in our rooms. Votes: 0

To ridicule philosophy is really to philosophize. Votes: 0

Habit is the second nature which destroys the first. Votes: 0

Do little things as if they were great, because of the majesty of the Lord Jesus Christ who dwells in thee. Votes: 0

If a man is not made for God, why is he happy only in God? Votes: 0

Unable to make what is just strong, we have made what is strong just. Votes: 0

Since we cannot know all that there is to be known about anything, we ought to know a little about everything. Votes: 0

Men are so necessarily mad, that not to be mad would amount to another form of madness. Votes: 0

It is not good to be too free. It is not good to have everything one wants. Votes: 0

Evil is easy, and has infinite forms. Votes: 0

The struggle alone pleases us, not the victory. Votes: 0

The property of power is to protect. Votes: 0

The heart has its reasons of which reason knows nothing. We feel it in a thousand things. I say that the heart naturally loves the Universal Being, and naturally loves itself; and it gives itself to one or the other, and hardens itself against one or the other, as it chooses...it is the heart that feels God, not the reason; this is faith. Votes: 0

The stream is always purer at its source. [Fr., Les choses valent toujours mieux dans leur source.] Votes: 0

If you want others to have a good opinion of you, say nothing. Votes: 0

Having been unable to strengthen justice, we have justified strength. Votes: 0

If there is a God, He is infinitely incomprehensible, since, having, neither parts nor limits, He has no affinity to us. We are then incapable of knowing either what He is or if He is. [So] you must wager. Let us weigh the gain and the loss in wagering that God is. Let us estimate these two chances. If you gain, you gain all; if you lose, you lose nothing. Wager then without hesitation that he is. Votes: 0

It has pleased God that divine verities should not enter the heart through the understanding, but the understanding through the heart. Votes: 0

Those who are clever in imagination are far more pleased with themselves than prudent men could reasonably be. Votes: 0

Il est non seulement impossible, mais inutile de conna|"tre Dieu sans Je sus-Christ. It is not only impossible, but also useless to recognize God without Jesus. Votes: 0

Il n'y a que deux sortes d'hommes: les uns justes, qui se croient pe cheurs; les autres pe cheurs, qui se croient justes. There are only two types of people: the virtuous who believe themselves to be sinners and the sinners who believe themselves to be virtuous. Votes: 0

There is a God-shaped hole in the life of every man ... Votes: 0

God has given us evidence sufficiently clear to convince those with an open heart and mind... Votes: 0

To doubt is a misfortune, but to seek when in doubt is an indispensable duty. So he who doubts and seeks not is at once unfortunate and unfair. Votes: 0

There is nothing that we can see on earth which does not either show the wretchedness of man or the mercy of God. One either sees the powerlessness of man without God, or the strength of man with God. Votes: 0

We know then the existence and nature of the finite, because we also are finite and have extension. We know the existence of the infinite and are ignorant of its nature, because it has extension like us, but not limits like us. But we know neither the existence nor the nature of God, because he has neither extension nor limits. Votes: 0

There is a virtuous fear, which is the effect of faith; and there is a vicious fear, which is the product of doubt. The former leads to hope, as relying on God, in whom we believe; the latter inclines to despair, as not relying on God, in whom we do not believe. Persons of the one character fear to lose God; persons of the other character fear to find Him. Votes: 0

Nature, which alone is good, is wholly familiar and common. Votes: 0

The mind has its arrangement; it proceeds from principles to demonstrations. The heart has a different mode of proceeding. Votes: 0

We make an idol of truth itself, for truth apart from charity is not God, but his image and an idol that we must not love or worship. Votes: 0

Our achievements of today are but the sum total of our thoughts of yesterday. Votes: 0

All the unhappiness of men arises from one single fact, that they cannot stay quietly in their own chamber. Votes: 0

It is much better to know something about everything than to know everything about one thing. Votes: 0

Rivers are roads which move, and which carry us whither we desire to go. Votes: 0

If I had more time I would write a shorter letter. Votes: 0

Those are weaklings who know the truth and uphold it as long as it suits their purpose, and then abandon it. Votes: 0

It's not those who write the laws that have the greatest impact on society. It's those who write the songs. Votes: 0

There are two equally dangerous extremes-to shut reason out, and to let nothing else in. Votes: 0

One-half of the ills of life come because men are unwilling to sit down quietly for thirty minutes to think through all the possible consequences of their acts. Votes: 0

It is not from space that I must seek my dignity, but from the government of my thought. I shall have no more if I possess worlds. By space the universe encompasses and swallows me up like an atom; by thought I comprehend the world. Votes: 0

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. Votes: 0

All man's troubles come from not knowing how to sit still in one room. Votes: 0

Instead of complaining that God had hidden himself, you will give Him thanks for having revealed so much of Himself. Votes: 0

The present letter is a very long one, simply because I had no leisure to make it shorter. Votes: 0

The last function of reason is to recognize that there are an infinity of things which surpass it. Votes: 0

He who cannot believe is cursed, for he reveals by his unbelief that God has not chosen to give him grace. Votes: 0

Fashion is a tyrant from which nothing frees us. We must suit ourselves to its fantastic tastes. But being compelled to live under its foolish laws, the wise man is never the first to follow, nor the last to keep it. Votes: 0

The law required what it could not give. Grace gives that which it requires. Votes: 0

It is certain that those who have the living faith in their hearts see at once that all existence is none other than the work of the God whom they adore. But for those in whom this light is extinguished, [if we were to show them our proofs of the existence of God] nothing is more calculated to arouse their contempt. . . . Votes: 0

The man who knows God but does not know his own misery, becomes proud. The man who knows his own misery but does not know God, ends in despair...the knowledge of Jesus Christ constitutes the middle course because in him we find both God and our own misery. Jesus Christ is therefore a God whom we approach without pride, and before whom we humble ourselves without despair. Votes: 0

To understand is to forgive. Votes: 0

Imagination magnifies small objects with fantastic exaggeration until they fill our soul, and with bold insolence cuts down great things to its own size, as when speaking of God. Votes: 0

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. Votes: 0

Beauty is a harmonious relation between something in our nature and the quality of the object which delights us. Votes: 0

When I have occasionally set myself to consider the different distractions of men, the pains and perils to which they expose themselves I have discovered that all the unhappiness of men arises from one single fact, that they cannot stay quietly in their own chamber. Votes: 0

The greatness of man is so evident that it is even proved by his wretchedness. For what in animals is nature, we call in man wretchedness--by which we recognize that, his nature being now like that of animals, he has fallen from a better nature which once was his. Votes: 0

How can anyone lose who chooses to become a Christian? If, when he dies, there turns out to be no God and his faith was in vain, he has lost nothing...If, however, there is a God and a heaven and a hell. then he has gained heaven and his skeptical friends have lost everything... Votes: 0

Not the zeal alone of those who seek Him proves God, but the blindness of those who seek Him not. Votes: 0

Few men speak humbly of humility, chastely of chastity, skeptically of skepticism. Votes: 0

Nothing is so intolerable to man as being fully at rest, without passion, without business, without entertainment, without care. It is then that he recognizes that he is empty, insufficient, dependent, ineffectual. From the depths of his soul now comes at once boredom, gloom, sorrow, chagrin, resentment and despair. Votes: 0

Il y a deux sortes d'esprits, l'un ge ome trique, et l'autre que l'on peut appeler de finesse. Le premier a des vues lentes, dures et inflexibles; mais le dernier a une souplesse de pense e. There are two kinds of mind, one mathematical, the other what one might call the intuitive. The first takes a slow, firm, inflexible view, but the latter has flexibility of thought. Votes: 0

Either Christianity is true or it's false. If you bet that it's true, and you believe in God and submit to Him, then if it IS true, you've gained God, heaven, and everything else. If it's false, you've lost nothing, but you've had a good life marked by peace and the illusion that ultimately, everything makes sense. If you bet that Christianity is not true, and it's false, you've lost nothing. But if you bet that it's false, and it turns out to be true, you've lost everything and you get to spend eternity in hell. Votes: 0

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. Votes: 0

Parents fear the destruction of natural affection in their children. What is this natural principle so liable to decay? Habit is a second nature, which destroys the first. Why is not custom nature? I suspect that this nature itself is but a first custom, as custom is a second nature. Votes: 0

There is no arena in which vanity displays itself under such a variety of forms as in conversation. Votes: 0

We never do evil so effectually as when we are led to do it by a false principle of conscience. Votes: 0

If we regulate our conduct according to our own convictions, we may safely disregard the praise or censure of others. Votes: 0

Christian piety annihilates the egoism of the heart; worldly politeness veils and represses it. Votes: 0

The incredulous are the more credulous. They believe the miracles of Vespasian that they may not believe those of Moses. [Fr., Incredules les plus credules. Ils croient les miracle de Vespasien, pour ne pas croire ceux de Moise.] Votes: 0

The statements of atheists ought to be perfectly clear of doubt. Now it is not perfectly clear that the soul is material. Votes: 0

All the dignity of man consists in thought. Thought is therefore by its nature a wonderful and incomparable thing. It must have strange defects to be contemptible. But it has such, so that nothing is more ridiculous. How great it is in its nature! How vile it is in its defects! But what is this thought? How foolish it is! Votes: 0

Instinct teaches us to look for happiness outside ourselves. Votes: 0

The Church limits her sacramental services to the faithful. Christ gave Himself upon the cross a ransom for all. Votes: 0

To find recreation in amusements is not happiness; for this joy springs from alien and extrinsic sources, and is therefore dependent upon and subject to interruption by a thousand accidents, which may minister inevitable affliction. Votes: 0

Those we call the ancients were really new in everything. Votes: 0

When we would show any one that he is mistaken, our best course is to observe on what side he considers the subject,--for his view of if is generally right on this side,--and admit to him that he is right so far. He will be satisfied with this acknowledgment, that he was not wrong in his judgment, but only inadvertent in not looking at the whole case. Votes: 0

The last advance of reason is to recognize that it is surpassed by innumerable things; it is feeble if it cannot realize that. Votes: 0

All that tends not to charity is figurative. The sole aim of the Scripture is charity. Votes: 0

There should be in eloquence that which is pleasing and that which is real; but that which is pleasing should itself be real. Votes: 0

True eloquence scorns eloquence. Votes: 0

To scorn philosophy is truly to philosophize. Votes: 0

To ridicule philosophy is truly philosophical. [Fr., Se moquer de la philosophie c'est vraiment philosophe.] Votes: 0

Pride counterbalances all our miseries, for it either hides them, or, if it discloses them, boasts of that disclosure. Pride has such a thorough possession of us, even in the midst of our miseries and faults, that we are prepared to sacrifice life with joy, if it may but be talked of. Votes: 0

The mind naturally makes progress, and the will naturally clings to objects; so that for want of right objects, it will attach itself to wrong ones. Votes: 0

Our senses will not admit anything extreme. Too much noise confuses us, too much light dazzles us, too great distance or nearness prevents vision, too great prolixity or brevity weakens an argument, too much pleasure gives pain, too much accordance annoys. Votes: 0

The authority of reason is far more imperious than that of a master; for he who disobeys the one is unhappy, but he who disobeys the other is a fool. Votes: 0

The weakness of human reason appears more evidently in those who know it not than in those who know it. Votes: 0

The last thing that we find in making a book is to know what we must put first. Votes: 0

We desire truth, and find within ourselves only uncertainty. We seek happiness, and find only misery and death. We cannot but desire truth and happiness, and are incapable of certainty or happiness. Votes: 0

When we do not know the truth of a thing, it is good 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 a 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. Votes: 0

When malice has reason on its side, it looks forth bravely, and displays that reason in all its luster. When austerity and self-denial have not realized true happiness, and the soul returns to the dictates of nature, the reaction is fearfully extravagant. Votes: 0

There is nothing so insupportable to man as to be in entire repose, without passion, occupation, amusement, or application. Then it is that he feels his own nothingness, isolation, insignificance, dependent nature, powerless, emptiness. Immediately there issue from his soul ennui, sadness, chagrin, vexation, despair. Votes: 0

Our imagination so magnifies this present existence, by the power of continual reflection on it, and so attenuates eternity, by not thinking of it at all, that we reduce an eternity to nothingness, and expand a mere nothing to an eternity; and this habit is so inveterately rooted in us that all the force of reason cannot induce us to lay it aside. Votes: 0

Extremes are for us as if they were not, and as if we were not in regard to them; they escape from us, or we from them. Votes: 0

We feel neither extreme heat nor extreme cold; qualities that are in excess are so much at variance with our feelings that they are impalpable: we do not feel them, though we suffer from their effects. Votes: 0

There are three means of believing--by inspiration, by reason, and by custom. Christianity, which is the only rational institution, does yet admit none for its sons who do not believe by inspiration. Nor does it injure reason or custom, or debar them of their proper force; on the contrary, it directs us to open our minds by the proofs of the former, and to confirm our minds by the authority of the latter. Votes: 0

That queen, of error, whom we call fancy and opinion, is the more deceitful because she does not always deceive. She would be the infallible rule of truth if she were the infallible rule of falsehood; but being only most frequently in error, she gives no evidence of her real quality, for she marks with the same character both that which is true and that which is false. Votes: 0

Mediocrity makes the most of its native possessions. Votes: 0

The sweetness of glory is so great that, join it to what we will, even to death, we love it. Votes: 0

It is a dangerous experiment to call in gratitude as an ally to love. Love is a debt which inclination always pays, obligation never. Votes: 0

Seeing too much to deny and too little to be sure, I am in a state to be pitied. Votes: 0

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? Votes: 0

According to the doctrine of chance, you ought to put yourself to the trouble of searching for the truth; for if you die without worshiping the True Cause, you are lost. "But," say you, "if He had wished me to worship Him, He would have left me signs of His will." He has done so; but you neglect them. Seek them, therefore; it is well worth it. Votes: 0

Nature confuses the skeptics and reason confutes the dogmatists Votes: 0

Faith affirms many things, respecting which the senses are silent, but nothing that they deny. It is superior, but never opposed to their testimony Votes: 0

Some vices only lay hold of us by means of others, and these, like branches, fall on removal of the trunk. Votes: 0

The more intelligence one has, the more people one finds original. Commonplace people see no difference between men. Votes: 0

Nothing is good but mediocrity. The majority has settled that, and finds fault with him who escapes it at whichever end... To leave the mean is to abandon humanity. Votes: 0

How vain painting is, exciting admiration by its resemblance to things of which we do not admire the originals. Votes: 0

How vain is painting, which is admired for reproducing the likeness of things whose originals are not admired. Votes: 0

It is not our task to secure the triumph of truth, but merely to fight on its behalf. Votes: 0

Our reason is always disappointed by the inconstancy of appearances. Votes: 0

When intuition and logic agree, you are always right. Votes: 0

The eternal Being is forever if he is at all. Votes: 0

May God never abandon me. Votes: 0

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. Votes: 0

Opinion is the queen of the world. Votes: 0

Without Jesus Christ man must be in vice and misery with Jesus Christ man is free from vice and misery in Him is all our virtue and all our happiness. Apart from Him there is but vice, misery, darkness, death, despair. Votes: 0

The pagans do not know God, and love only the earth. The Jews know the true God, and love only the earth. The Christians know the true God, and do not love the earth. Votes: 0

Christianity is strange. It bids man recognise that he is vile, even abominable, and bids him desire to be like God. Without such a counterpoise, this dignity would make him horribly vain, or this humiliation would make him terribly abject. Votes: 0

Man is nothing but insincerity, falsehood, and hypocrisy, both in regard to himself and in regard to others. He does not wish that he should be told the truth, he shuns saying it to others; and all these moods, so inconsistent with justice and reason, have their roots in his heart. Votes: 0

Continued eloquence is wearisome. Votes: 0

Two similar faces, neither of which alone causes laughter, use laughter when they are together, by their resemblance. Votes: 0

Amusement allures and deceives us and leads us down imperceptibly in thoughtlessness to the grave Votes: 0

All mankind's unhappiness derives from one thing: his inability to know how to remain in repose in one room. Votes: 0

The whole title by which you possess your property, is not a title of nature but of a human institution. Votes: 0

En un mot, l'homme conna|"t qu'il est mise rable: il est donc mise rable, puisqu'il l'est; mais il est bien grand, puisqu'il le conna|"t. In one word, man knows that he is miserable and therefore he is miserable because he knows it; but he is also worthy, because he knows his condition. Votes: 0

Je ne crois que les histoires dont les te moins se feraient e gorger. I only believe in histories told by witnesses who would have had their throats slit. Votes: 0

Le silence est la plus grande perse cution: jamais les saints ne se sont tus. Silence is the greatest of all persecutions: no saint was ever silent. Votes: 0

That something so obvious as the vanity of the world should be so little recognized that people find it odd and surprising to be told that it is foolish to seek greatness; that is most remarkable. Votes: 0

Making fun of philosophy is really philosophising. Votes: 0

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. Votes: 0

Nobody is publicly accepted as an expert on poetry unless he displays the sign of poet, mathematician, etc., but universal men want no sign and make hardly any distinction between the crafts of poet and embroiderer. Universal men are not called poets or mathematicians, etc. But they are all these things and judges of them too. No one could guess what they are, and they will talk about whatever was being talked about when they came in. One quality is not more noticeable in them than another, unless it becomes necessary to put it into practice, and then we remember it. Votes: 0

Nothing is so conformable to reason as to disavow reason. Votes: 0

Notwithstanding the sight of all our miseries, which press upon us and take us by the throat, we have an instinct which we cannot repress, and which lifts us up. Votes: 0

One has followed the other in an endless circle, for it is certain that as man's insight increases so he finds both wretchedness and greatness within himself. In a word man knows he is wretched. Thus he is wretched because he is so, but he is truly great because he knows it. Votes: 0

One must have deeper motives and judge everything accordingly, but go on talking like an ordinary person. Votes: 0

Tout notre raisonnement se re duit a' ce der au sentiment. All our reasoning comes down to surrendering to feeling. Votes: 0

La dernie' re chose qu'on trouve en faisant un ouvrage, est de savoir celle qu'il faut mettre la premie' re. The last thing one discovers in composing a work iswhat to put first. Votes: 0

L'homme n'est qu'un sujet plein d'erreur, naturelle et ineffa c° able sans la gra" ce. Man is nothing but a subject full of natural error that cannot be eradicated except through grace. Votes: 0

Condition de l'homme: inconstance, ennui, inquie tude. Man's condition. Inconstancy, boredom, anxiety. Votes: 0

Notre nature est dans le mouvement; le repos entier est la mort. Our nature consists in movement; absolute rest is death. Votes: 0

Le nez de Cle opa" tre: s'il e u" t e te plus court, toute la face de la terre aurait change . Cleopatra'snose: if it had beenshorter the whole face of the earth would have been different. Votes: 0

Le moi est ha|«s sable. The self is hateful. Votes: 0

La chose la plus importante a' toute la vie est le choix du me tier: le hasard en dispose. The most important thing in life is to choose a profession: chance arranges for that. Votes: 0

L'homme n'est ni ange ni be" te, et le malheur veut que qui veut faire l'ange fait la be" te. Man is neither angel nor beast.Unfortunately, he who wants to act the angel often acts the beast. Votes: 0

Console-toi, tu ne me chercherais pas si tu ne m'avais trouve . Comfort yourself.You would not seek me if you had not found me. Votes: 0

Dans une grande a" me tout est grand. In a great soul everything isgreat. Votes: 0

L'on a beau se cacher a' soi-me" me, l'on aime toujours. We vainly conceal from ourselves the fact that we are always in love. Votes: 0

Admiration spoils all from infancy. Votes: 0

The principles of pleasure are not firm and stable. They are different in all mankind, and variable in every particular with such a diversity that there is no man more different from another than from himself at different times. Votes: 0

Bless yourself with holy water, have Masses said, and so on; by a simple and natural process this will make you believe, and will dull you - will quiet your proudly critical intellect. Votes: 0

Curiosity is nothing more than vanity. More often than not we only seek knowledge to show it off. Votes: 0

Discourses on humility are a source of pride in the vain and of humility in the humble. Votes: 0

Equality of possessions is no doubt right, but, as men could not make might obey right, they have made right obey might. Votes: 0

How hollow is the heart of man, and how full of excrement! Votes: 0

Imagination cannot make fools wise, but it makes them happy, as against reason, which only makes its friends wretched: one covers them with glory, the other with shame. Votes: 0

It is not possible to have reasonable grounds for not believing in miracles. Votes: 0

It is not shameful for a man to succumb to pain and it is shameful to succumb to pleasure. Votes: 0

Justice is as much a matter of fashion as charm is. Votes: 0

Man governs himself more by impulse than reason Votes: 0

An advocate who has been well paid in advance will find the cause he is pleading all the more just. Votes: 0

All our reasoning boils down to yielding to sentiment. Votes: 0

Man lives between the infinitely large and the infinitely small. Votes: 0

There are hardly any truths upon which we always remain agreed, and still fewer objects of pleasure which we do not change every hour, I do not know whether there is a means of giving fixed Votes: 0

What is it, in your opinion, to be a great nobleman? It is to be master of several objects that men covet, and thus to be able to satisfy the wants and the desires of many. It is these wants and these desires that attract them towards you, and that make them submit to you: were it not for these, they would not even look at you; but they hope, by these services... to obtain from you some part of the good which they desire, and of which they see that you have the disposal. Votes: 0

Whilst in speaking of human things, we say that it is necessary to know them before we love can them...the saints on the contrary say in speaking of divine things that it is necessary to love them in order to know them, and that we only enter truth through charity. Votes: 0

You are in the same manner surrounded with a small circle of persons... full of desire. They demand of you the benefits of desire... You are therefore properly the king of desire. ...equal in this to the greatest kings of the earth... It is desire that constitutes their power; that is, the possession of things that men covet. Votes: 0

The God of the infinite is the God of the infinitesimal. Votes: 0

Mutual cheating is the foundation of society. Votes: 0

It is an appalling thing to feel all one possesses drain away. Votes: 0

Reason's last step is to acknowledge that there are infinitely many things beyond it. Votes: 0

If you do not love too much, you do not love enough. Votes: 0

Eloquence; it requires the pleasant and the real; but the pleasant must itself be drawn from the true. Votes: 0

Let us now speak according to natural lights. If there is a God, He is infinitely incomprehensible. . . . We are then incapable of knowing of either what He is or if He is. . . . Votes: 0

Man is so made that by continually telling him he is a fool he believes it, and by continually telling it to himself he makes himself believe it. For man holds an inward talk with himself, which it pays him to regulate. Votes: 0

Man is so made that if he is told often enough that he is a fool he believes it. Votes: 0

Put the world's greatest philosopher on a plank that is wider than need be; if there is a precipe below, although his reason may convince him that he is safe, his imagination will prevail. Votes: 0

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! Votes: 0

Description of man: dependence, longing for independence, need. Votes: 0

All men naturally hate each other. We have used concupiscence as best we can to make it serve the common good, but this is mere sham and a false image of charity, for essentially it is just hate. Votes: 0

Do they think that they have given us great pleasure by telling us that they hold our soul to be no more than wind or smoke, and saying it moreover in tones of pride and satisfaction? Is this then something to be said gaily? Is it not on the contrary something to be said sadly, as being the saddest thing in the world? Votes: 0

True eloquence makes light of eloquence. True morality makes light of morality. Votes: 0

At the centre of every human being is a God-shaped vacuum which can only be filled by Jesus Christ. Votes: 0

There are two excesses: to exclude reason, to admit nothing but reason. The supreme achievement of reason is to realise that there is a limit to reason. Reason's last step is the recognition that there are an infinite number of things which are beyond it. It is merely feeble if it does not go as far as to realise that. Votes: 0

Let man then contemplate nature in full and lofty majesty, and turn his eyes away from the mean objects which surround him. Let him look at the dazzling light hung aloft as an eternal lamp to lighten the universe; let him behold the earth, a mere dot compared with the vast circuit which that orb describes, and stand amazed to find that the vast circuit itself is but a very fine point compared with the orbit traced by the starts as they roll their course on high. Votes: 0

Montaigne is wrong in declaring that custom ought to be followed simply because it is custom, and not because it is reasonable or just. Votes: 0

How I hate this folly of not believing in the Eucharist, etc.! If the gospel be true, if Jesus Christ be God, what difficulty is there? Votes: 0

Human life is thus only an endless illusion. Men deceive and flatter each other. No one speaks of us in our presence as he does when we are gone. Society is based on mutual hypocrisy. Votes: 0

I would have far more fear of being mistaken, and of finding that the Christian religion was true, than of not being mistaken in believing it true. Votes: 0

Man is neither angel nor beast. Votes: 0

All men seek happiness. There are no exceptions.... This is the motive of every act of every man, including those who go and hang themselves. Votes: 0

Silence is the greatest persecution; never do the saints keep themselves silent. Votes: 0

That which makes us go so far for love is that we never think that we might have need of anything besides that which we love. Votes: 0

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. Votes: 0

Who dispenses reputation? Who makes us respect and revere persons, works, laws, the great? Who but this faculty of imagination? All the riches of the earth are inadequate without its approval. Votes: 0

Who knows if this other half of life where we think we're awake is not another sleep a little different from the first. Votes: 0

It is the conduct of God, who disposes all things kindly, to put religion into the mind by reason, and into the heart by grace. Votes: 0

Unless we love the truth we cannot know it. Votes: 0

If you want to be a real seeker of truth, you need to, at least once in your lifetime, doubt in, as much as it's possible, in everything. Votes: 0

The truth about nature we discover with our brains. The truth about religion we discover with our hearts. Votes: 0

The entire ocean is affected by a single pebble. Votes: 0

The Fall is an offense to human reason, but once accepted, it makes perfect sense of the human condition. Votes: 0

All the maxims have been written. It only remains to put them into practice. Votes: 0

We must know where to doubt, where to feel certain, where to submit. He who does not do so, understands not the force of reason. Votes: 0

There was once in man a true happiness of which there now remain to him only the mark and empty trace, which he in vain tries to fill from all his surroundings, seeking from things absent the help he does not obtain in things present. Votes: 0

[Christianity] endeavors equally to establish these two things: that God has set up in the Church visible signs to make himself known to those who should seek him sincerely, and that he has nevertheless so disguised them that he will only be perceived by those who seek him with all their heart. Votes: 0

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 vanity 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. Votes: 0

Those great efforts of intellect, upon which the mind sometimes touches, are such that it cannot maintain itself there. It only leaps to them, not as upon a throne, forever, but merely for an instant. Votes: 0

It is not in Montaigne, but in myself, that I find all that I see in him. Votes: 0

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. Votes: 0

We sail within a vast sphere, ever drifting in uncertainty, driven from end to end. When we think to attach ourselves to any pointand 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. Votes: 0

The great mass of people judge well of things, for they are in natural ignorance, which is man's true state. Votes: 0

Knowledge has two extremes. The first is the pure natural ignorance in which all men find themselves at birth. The other extreme is that reached by great minds, who, having run through all that men can know, find they know nothing, and come back again to that same natural ignorance from which they set out; this is a learned ignorance which is conscious of itself. Votes: 0

Since [man] 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. Votes: 0

What matters it that man should have a little more knowledge of the universe? If he has it, he gets 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? Votes: 0

If we dreamed the same thing every night, it would affect us much as the objects we see every day. And if a common workman were sure to dream every night for twelve hours that he was a king, I believe he would be almost as happy as a king who should dream every night for twelve hours on end that he was a common workman. Votes: 0

If man were happy, he would be the more so, the less he was diverted, like the saints and God. Votes: 0

Man is clearly made to think. It is his whole dignity and his whole merit; and his whole duty is to think as he ought. And the order of thought is to begin with ourselves, and with our Author and our end. Votes: 0

Eloquence is a painting of thought; and thus those who, after having painted it, add something more, make a picture instead of a portrait. Votes: 0

Clarity of mind means clarity of passion, too. Votes: 0

What part of us feels pleasure? Is it our hand, our arm, our flesh, or our blood? It must obviously be something immaterial. Votes: 0

You gave me health that I might serve you; and so often I failed to use my good health in your service. Now you send me sickness in order to correct me Grant that, having ignored the things of spirit when my body was vigorous, I may now enjoy spiritual sweetness while my body groans with pain. Votes: 0

Something incomprehensible is not for that reason less real. Votes: 0

All our troubles come from not being able to be alone. Votes: 0

[On vanity:] The nose of Cleopatra: if it had been shorter, the face of the earth would have changed. Votes: 0

The world is satisfied with words, few care to dive beneath the surface. Votes: 0

As we speak of poetical beauty, so ought we to speak of mathematical beauty and medical beauty. But we do not do so; and that 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. Votes: 0

The exterior must be joined to the interior to obtain anything from God, that is to say, we must kneel, pray with the lips, and soon, in order that proud man, who would not submit himself to God, may be now subject to the creature. Votes: 0

Which is the more believable of the two, Moses or China? Votes: 0

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, room, dress, and so on. Whatever is not made according to this standard displeases those who have good taste. Votes: 0

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 man. Votes: 0

We need not have the loftiest mind to understand that here is no lasting and real 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 forever either annihilated or unhappy. Votes: 0

Without [diversion] we would be in a state of weariness, and this weariness would spur us on to seek a more solid means of escaping from it. But diversion amuses us, and leads us unconsciously to death. Votes: 0

The God of Christians is a God of love and comfort, a God who fills the soul and heart of those whom he possesses, a God who makes them conscious of their inward wretchedness, and his infinite mercy; who unites himself to their inmost soul, who fills it with humility and joy, with confidence and love, who renders them incapable of any other end than himself. Votes: 0

All the miseries of mankind come from one thing, not knowing how to remain alone. Votes: 0

Thought makes the whole dignity of man; therefore endeavor to think well, that is the only morality. Votes: 0

A few rules include all that is necessary for the perfection of the definitions, the axioms, and the demonstrations, and consequently of the entire method of the geometrical proofs of the art of persuading. Votes: 0

All men are almost led to believe not of proof, but by attraction. This way is base, ignoble, and irrelevant; every one therefore disavows it. Each one professes to believe and even to love nothing but what he knows to be worthy of belief and love. Votes: 0

All the excesses, all the violence, and all the vanity of great men, come from the fact that they know not what they are: it being difficult for those who regard themselves at heart as equal with all men... For this it is necessary for one to forget himself, and to believe that he has some real excellence above them, in which consists this illusion that I am endeavoring to discover to you. Votes: 0

All who say the same things do not possess them in the same manner; and hence the incomparable author of the Art of Conversation pauses with so much care to make it understood that we must not judge of the capacity of a man by the excellence of a happy remark that we heard him make. ...let us penetrate, says he, the mind from which it proceeds... it will oftenest be seen that he will be made to disavow it on the spot, and will be drawn very far from this better thought in which he does not believe, to plunge himself into another, quite base and ridiculous. Votes: 0

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. Votes: 0

I would inquire of reasonable persons whether this principle: Matter is naturally wholly incapable of thought, and this other: I think, therefore I am, are in fact the same in the mind of Descartes, and in that of St. Augustine, who said the same thing twelve hundred years before. Votes: 0

No one is ignorant that there are two avenues by which opinions are received into the soul, which are its two principal powers: the understanding and the will. Votes: 0

We are never in search of things, but always in search of the search. Votes: 0

There is a lot of difference between tempting and leading into error. God tempts but does not lead into error. To tempt is to provide opportunities for us to do certain things if we do not love God, but putting us under no necessity to do so. To lead into error is to compel a man necessarily to conclude and follow a falsehood. Votes: 0

Nothing is so important to man as his own state; nothing is so formidable to him as eternity. And thus it is unnatural that thereshould be men indifferent to the loss of their existence and to the perils of everlasting suffering. Votes: 0

We do not rest satisfied with the present.... So imprudent we are that we wander in the times which are not ours and do not thinkof 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. Votes: 0

Nothing is more dastardly than to act with bravado toward God. Votes: 0

Eloquence is a way of saying things in such a way, first, that those to whom we speak may listen to them without pain and with pleasure, and second, that they feel themselves interested, so that self-love leads them more willingly to reflection upon it. Votes: 0

True eloquence makes light of eloquence, true morality makes light of morality; that is to say, the morality of the judgment, which has no rules, makes light of the morality of the intellect.... To make light of philosophy is to be a true philosopher. Votes: 0

Sneezing absorbs all the functions of the soul just as much as the [sexual] act, but we do not draw from it the same conclusions against the greatness of man, because it is involuntary; although we bring it about, we do so involuntarily. It is not for the sake of the thing in itself but for another end, and is therefore not a sign of man's weakness, or his subjection to this act. Votes: 0

The only thing which consoles 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 imperceptibly ruin ourselves. Votes: 0

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. Votes: 0

Undoubtedly equality of goods is just; but, being unable to cause might to obey justice, men has made it just to obey might. Unable to strengthen justice, they have justified might--so that the just and the strong should unite, and there should be peace, which is the sovereign good. Votes: 0

How comes it that a cripple does not offend us, but a fool does? Because a cripple recognizes 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. Votes: 0

Those who profess contempt for men, and put them on a level with beasts, yet wish to be admired and believed by men, and contradict themselves by their own feelings--their nature, which is stronger than all, convincing them of the greatness of man more forcibly than reason convinces them of his baseness. Votes: 0

It is dangerous to tell the people that the laws are unjust; for they obey them only because they think them just. Therefore it isnecessary to tell them at the same time that they must obey them because they are laws, just as they must obey superiors, not because they are just, but because they are superiors. In this way all sedition is prevented. Votes: 0

The mind must not be forced; artificial and constrained manners fill it with foolish presumption, through unnatural elevation and vain and ridiculous inflation, instead of solid and vigorous nutriment. Votes: 0

All evil stems from this-that we do. Know how to handle your solitude. Votes: 0

It is the heart which perceives God and not the reason. Votes: 0

Men blaspheme what they do not know. Votes: 0

Nothing is surer than that the people will be weak. Votes: 0

What amazes me the most is to see that everyone is not amazed at his own weakness. Votes: 0

We are so presumptuous that we should like to be known all over the world, even by people who will only come when we are no more. Such is our vanity that the good opinion of half a dozen of the people around us gives us pleasure and satisfaction. Votes: 0

Brave deeds are wasted when hidden. Votes: 0

However vast a man's spiritual resources, he is capable of but one great passion. Votes: 0

All err the more dangerously because each follows a truth. Their mistake lies not in following a falsehood but in not following another truth. Votes: 0

The art of revolutionizing and overturning states is to undermine established customs, by going back to their origin, in order to mark their want of justice. Votes: 0

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. Votes: 0

The heart has arguments with which the logic of mind is not aquainted. Votes: 0

Lust is the source of all our actions, and humanity. Votes: 0

The serene, silent beauty of a holy life is the most powerful influence in the world, next to the night of God. Votes: 0

Fire. God of Abraham, God of Isaac, God of Jacob, not of the philosophers and the scholars. I will not forget thy word. Amen. Votes: 0

The multitude which does not reduce itself to unity is confusion. Votes: 0

We must keep our thought secret, and judge everything by it, while talking like the people. Votes: 0

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? Votes: 0

Man's grandeur is that he knows himself to be miserable. Votes: 0

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 itself be venerable enough. Votes: 0

No animal admires another animal. Votes: 0

The manner in which Epictetus, Montaigne, and Salomon de Tultie wrote, is the most usual, the most suggestive, the most remembered, and the oftener quoted; because it is entirely composed of thoughts born from the common talk of life. Votes: 0

Any unity which doesn't have its origin in the multitudes is tyranny. Votes: 0

We are usually convinced more easily by reasons we have found ourselves than by those which have occurred to others. Votes: 0

Curiosity is only vanity. Most frequently we wish not to know, but to talk. We would not take a sea voyage for the sole pleasure of seeing without hope of ever telling. Votes: 0

It is not permitted to the most equitable of men to be a judge in his own cause. Votes: 0

Reason is the slow and torturous method by which those who do not know the truth discover it Votes: 0

The sum of a man's problems come from his inability to be alone in a silent room. Votes: 0

If it is an extraordinary blindness to live without investigating what we are, it is a terrible one to live an evil life, while believing in God Votes: 0

Losses are comparative; imagination only makes them of any moment. Votes: 0

Amusement that is excessive and followed only for its own sake, allures and deceives us. Votes: 0

This is what I see, and what troubles me. I look on all sides, and everywhere I see nothing but obscurity. Nature offers me nothing that is not a matter of doubt and disquiet. Votes: 0

We must make good people wish that the Christian faith were true, and then show that it is. Votes: 0

To speak freely of mathematics, I find it the highest exercise of the spirit; but at the same time I know that it is so useless that I make little distinction between a man who is only a mathematician and a common artisan. Also, I call it the most beautiful profession in the world; but it is only a profession; Votes: 0

Il n'est pas certain que tout soit incertain. (Translation: It is not certain that everything is uncertain.) Votes: 0

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. Votes: 0

By a peculiar prerogative, not only each individual is making daily advances in the sciences, and may make advances in morality (which is the science, by way of eminence, of living well and being happy), but all mankind together is making a continual progress in proportion as the universe grows older. So that the whole human race, during the course of so many ages, may be considered as one man who never ceases to live and learn. Votes: 0

Those who are accustomed to judge by feeling do not understand the process of reasoning, because they want to comprehend at a glance and are not used to seeking for first principles. Those, on the other hand, who are accustomed to reason from first principles do not understand matters of feeling at all, because they look for first principles and are unable to comprehend at a glance. Votes: 0

Let us weigh the gain and the loss, in wagering that God is. Consider these alternatives: if you win, you win all, if you lose you lose nothing. Do not hesitate, then, to wager that he is. Votes: 0

It is your own assent to yourself, and the constant voice of your own reason, and not of others, that should make you believe. Votes: 0

To deny, to believe, and to doubt well are to a man as the race is to a horse. Votes: 0

What use is it to us to hear it said of a man that he has thrown off the yoke that he does not believe there is a God to watch over his actions, that he reckons himself the sole master of his behavior, and that he does not intend to give an account of it to anyone but himself? Votes: 0

When I see the blind and wretched state of men, when I survey the whole universe in its deadness, and man left to himself with no light, as though lost in this corner of the universe without knowing who put him there, what he has to do, or what will become of him when he dies, incapable of knowing anything, I am moved to terror, like a man transported in his sleep to some terrifying desert island, who wakes up quite lost, with no means of escape. Then I marvel that so wretched a state does not drive people to despair. Votes: 0

Let man then contemplate the whole of nature in her full and grand majesty... No idea approaches it. We may enlarge our conceptions beyond all imaginable space; we only produce atoms in comparison with the reality of things. It is an infinite sphere, the center of which is everywhere, the circumference nowhere. Votes: 0

For nature is an image of Grace, and visible miracles are images of the invisible. Votes: 0

When we see an effect happen always in the same manner, we infer that it takes place by a natural necessity; as, for instance, that the sun will rise to morrow; but nature often deceives us, and will not submit to its own rules. Votes: 0

I am in the utmost perplexity, yand have wished a hundred times, that if there is a A God, nature would manifest him without ambiguity, and that if there is not, every imaginary sign of his existence might vanish : in short, let nature speak distinctly, or be totally silent, and I shall know what course to take. Votes: 0

The secrets of nature are concealed; her agency is perpetual, but we do not always discover its effects; time reveals them from age to age; and although she is always the same in herself, she is not always equally well known. Votes: 0

We never live, but we hope to live; and as we are always arranging to be happy, it must be that we never are so. Votes: 0

We do not worry about being respected in towns through which we pass. But if we are going to remain in one for a certain time, we do worry. How long does this time have to be? Votes: 0

God instituted prayer to communicate to creatures the dignity of causality. Votes: 0

Now, if the passions had no hold on us, a week and a hundred years would amount to the same. Votes: 0

Imagination is the deceptive part in man, the mistress of error and falsehood. Votes: 0

Love has no age as it is always renewing itself. Votes: 0

What reason have atheists for saying that we cannot rise again? That what has never been, should be, or that what has been, should be again? Is it more difficult to come into being than to return to it. Votes: 0

No soul of high estate can take pleasure in slander. It betrays a weakness. Votes: 0

In proportion as our own mind is enlarged we discover a greater number of men of originality. Commonplace people see no difference between one man and another. Votes: 0

When a soldier complains of his hard life (or a labourer, etc.) try giving him nothing to do. Votes: 0

Man is only a reed, the weakest in nature, but he is a thinking reed. There is no need for the whole universe to take up arms to crush him: a vapour, a drop of water is enough to kill him. but even if the universe were to crush him, man would still be nobler than his slayer, because he knows that he is dying and the advantage the universe has over him. The universe knows none of this. Votes: 0

If he exalts himself, I humble him. If he humbles himself, I exalt him. And I go on contradicting him Until he understands That he is a monster that passes all understanding. Votes: 0

Let each of us examine his thoughts; he will find them wholly concerned with the past or the future. We almost never think of the present, and if we do think of it, it is only to see what light is throws on our plans for the future. The present is never our end. The past and the present are our means, the future alone our end. Thus we never actually live, but hope to live, and since we are always planning how to be happy, it is inevitable that we should never be so. Votes: 0

It is right that what is just should be obeyed. It is necessary that what is strongest should be obeyed. Votes: 0

For after all what is man in nature? A nothing in relation to infinity, all in relation to nothing, a central point between nothing and all and infinitely far from understanding either. The ends of things and their beginnings are impregnably concealed from him in an impenetrable secret. He is equally incapable of seeing the nothingness out of which he was drawn and the infinite in which he is engulfed. Votes: 0

Anyone who does not see the vanity of the world is very vain himself. So who does not see it, apart from young people whose lives are all noise, diversions, and thoughts for the future? But take away their diversion and you will see them bored to extinction. Then they feel their nullity without recognizing it, for nothing could be more wretched than to be intolerably depressed as soon as one is reduced to introspection with no means of diversion. Votes: 0

Between us, and Hell or Heaven, there is only life between the two, which is the most fragile thing in the world. Variant: Between us and heaven or hell there is only life, which is the frailest thing in the world. Votes: 0

Each man is everything to himself, for with his death everything is dead for him. That is why each of us thinks he is everything to everyone. We must not judge nature by ourselves, but by its own standards. Votes: 0

...for the truth is always older than all the opinions men have held regarding it; and one should be ignoring the nature of truth if we imagined that the truth began at the time it came to be known. Votes: 0

We have so exalted a notion of the human soul that we cannot bear to be despised, or even not to be esteemed by it. Man, in fact, places all his happiness in this esteem. Votes: 0

I know whom I have believed. Votes: 0

La vraie e loquence se moque de l'e loquence, la vraie morale se moque de la morale. True eloquence has notime foreloquence, true morality has no time for morality. Votes: 0

What a chimaera then is man, what a novelty, what a monster, what chaos, what a subject of contradiction, what a prodigy! Judge of all things, yet an imbecile earthworm; depository of truth, yet a sewer of uncertainty and error; pride and refuse of the universe. Who shall resolve this tangle? Votes: 0

Let a man choose what condition he will, and let him accumulate around him all the goods and gratifications seemingly calculated to make him happy in it; if that man is left at any time without occupation or amusement, and reflects on what he is, the meagre, languid felicity of his present lot will not bear him up. He will turn necessarily to gloomy anticipations of the future; and unless his occupation calls him out of himself, he is inevitably wretched. Votes: 0

When I consider the small span of my life absorbed in the eternity of all time, or the small part of space which I can touch or see engulfed by the infinite immensity of spaces that I know not and that know me not, I am frightened and astonished to see myself here instead of there … now instead of then. Votes: 0

Extremes are for us as though they were not, and we are not within their notice. They escape us, or we them. This is our true state; this is what makes us incapable of certain knowledge and of absolute ignorance... 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. Votes: 0

The state of man is inconstancy, ennui, anxiety. Votes: 0

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. ...such community of intellect that we have with him necessarily inclines the heart to love. Votes: 0

The heart has its reasons, which Reason does not know. We feel it in a thousand things. It is the heart which feels God, and not Reason. This, then, is perfect faith: God felt in the heart. Votes: 0

Nature has perfections, in order to show that she is the image of God; and defects, to show that she is only his image. Votes: 0

Nature imitates herself. A grain thrown into good ground brings forth fruit; a principle thrown into a good mind brings forth fruit. Everything is created and conducted by the same Master-the root, the branch, the fruits-the principles, the consequences. Votes: 0

The more I see of Mankind, the more I prefer my dog. Votes: 0

To find recreation in amusement is not happiness. Votes: 0

Men seek rest in a struggle against difficulties; and when they have conquered these, rest becomes insufferable. Votes: 0

We know the truth not only through our reason but also through our heart. It is through the latter that we know first principles, and reason, which has nothing to do with it, tries in vain to refute them. Votes: 0

The origins of disputes between philosophers is, that one class of them have undertaken to raise man by displaying his greatness, and the other to debase him by showing his miseries. Votes: 0

The war existing between the senses and reason. Votes: 0

I have spent much time in the study of the abstract sciences; but the paucity of persons with whom you can communicate on such subjects disgusted me with them. When I began to study man, I saw that these abstract sciences are not suited to him, and that in diving into them, I wandered farther from my real object than those who knew them not, and I forgave them for not having attended to these things. I expected then, however, that I should find some companions in the study of man, since it was so specifically a duty. I was in error. There are fewer students of man than of geometry. Votes: 0

The Christian's God does not consist merely of a God who is the author of mathematical truths and the order of elements... But a God of love and consolation. Votes: 0

Everything that is written merely to please the author is worthless. Votes: 0

We know the truth, not only be the reason, but also be the heart. Votes: 0

If you believe in God you are at no disadvantage in this life, and at considerable advantage in the next. If you do not believe, but find in the next that there was a next, you are most unfortunate! Votes: 0

they do not know that they seek only the chase and not the quarry. Votes: 0

We are troubled only by the fears which we, and not nature, give ourselves. Votes: 0

Just as I do not know where I came from, so I do not know where I am going. All I know is that when I leave this world I shall fall forever into oblivion, or into the hands of an angry God, without knowing which of the two will be my lot for eternity. Such is my state of mind, full of weakness and uncertainty. The only conclusion I can draw from all this is that I must pass my days without a thought of trying to find out what is going to happen to me. Votes: 0

Continuous eloquence is tedious. Votes: 0

The past and present are only our means; the future is always our end. Thus we never really live, but only hope to live. Votes: 0

We must kill them in war, just because they live beyond the river. If they lived on this side, we would be called murderers. Votes: 0

Passion cannot be beautiful without excess; one either loves too much or not enough. Votes: 0

Happiness can be found neither in ourselves nor in external things, but in God and in ourselves as united to him. Votes: 0

Things are always at their best in their beginning. Votes: 0

All mankind's troubles are caused by one single thing, which is their inability to sit quietly. Votes: 0

No religion except ours has taught that man is born in sin; none of the philosophical sects has admitted it; none therefore has spoken the truth Votes: 0

The parts of the universe ... all are connected with each other in such a way that I think it to be impossible to understand any one without the whole. Votes: 0

What a strange vanity painting is; it attracts admiration by resembling the original, we do not admire. Votes: 0

We like to be deceived. Votes: 0

Man is obviously made for thinking. Therein lies all his dignity and his merit; and his whole duty is to think as he ought. Votes: 0

It is impossible on reasonable grounds to disbelieve miracles. Votes: 0

Law, without force, is impotent. Votes: 0

The world is ruled by force, not by opinion; but opinion uses force. Votes: 0

Not only do we know God through Jesus Christ, we only know ourselves through Jesus Christ. Votes: 0

It is of dangerous consequence to represent to man how near he is to the level of beasts, without showing him at the same time his greatness. It is likewise dangerous to let him see his greatness without his meanness. It is more dangerous yet to leave him ignorant of either; but very beneficial that he should be made sensible of both. Votes: 0

Our natures lie in motion, without which we die. Votes: 0

The charm of fame is so great that we like every object to which it is attached, even death. Votes: 0

Everything that is incomprehensible does not cease to exist. Votes: 0

Being unable to cure death, wretchedness, and ignorance, men have decided, in order to be happy, not to think about such things. Votes: 0

Education produces natural intuitions, and natural intuitions are erased by education. Votes: 0

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. Votes: 0

Look for the truth, it wants to be found.... Votes: 0

Good deeds, when concealed, are the most admirable. Votes: 0

All this visible world is but an imperceptible point in the ample bosom of nature. Votes: 0

By thought I embrace the universe. Votes: 0

Vanity is illustrated in the cause and effect of love, as in the case of Cleopatra. Votes: 0

Either God exists or He doesn't. Either I believe in God or I don't. Of the four possibilities, only one is to my disadvantage. To avoid that possibility, I believe in God. Votes: 0

If there were only one religion, God would indeed be manifest. Votes: 0

Force rules the world-not opinion; but it is opinion that makes use of force. Votes: 0

Eloquence is the painting of thought ... Votes: 0

I condemn equally those who choose to praise man, those who choose to condemn him and those who choose to divert themselves, and I can only approve of those who seek with groans. Votes: 0

Faith is a sounder guide than reason. Reason can only go so far, but faith has no limits. Votes: 0

Those whom we call ancient were really new in all things, and properly constituted the infancy of mankind. Votes: 0

When everyone is moving towards depravity, no one seems to be moving, but if someone stops he shows up the others who are rushing on, by acting as a fixed point. Votes: 0

Most of man's trouble comes from his inability to be still. Votes: 0

The last thing we decide in writing a book is what to put first. Votes: 0

The sole cause of all human misery is the inability of people to sit quietly in their rooms. Votes: 0

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. Votes: 0

Jurisdiction is not given for the sake of the judge, but for that of the litigant. Votes: 0

The Stoics say, "Retire within yourselves; it is there you will find your rest." And that is not true. Others say, "Go out of yourselves; seek happiness in amusement." And this is not true. Illness comes. Happiness is neither without us nor within us. It is in God, both without us and within us. Votes: 0

Those who do not hate their own selfishness and regard themselves as more important than the rest of the world are blind because the truth lies elsewhere Votes: 0

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...? Votes: 0

It is superstitious to put one's hopes in formalities, but arrogant to refuse to submit to them. Votes: 0

Ugly deeds are most estimable when hidden. Votes: 0

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. Votes: 0

When some passion or effect is described in a natural style, we find within ourselves the truth of what we hear, without knowing it was there. Votes: 0

When we read too fast or too slowly, we understand nothing. Votes: 0

Without the knowledge of our wretchedness, the knowledge of God creates pride. With it, the knowledge of God creates despair. The knowledge of Christ offers a third way, because in him we find both God and our wretchedness. Votes: 0

All I know is that I must soon die, but what I know least is this very death which I cannot escape. Votes: 0

I cannot judge my work while I am doing it. I have to do as painters do, stand back and view it from a distance, but not too great a distance. How great? Guess. Votes: 0

When a man who accepts the Christian doctrine lives unworthily of it, it is much clearer to say he is a bad Christian than to say he is not a Christian. Votes: 0

Our notion of symmetry is derived form the human face. Hence, we demand symmetry horizontally and in breadth only, not vertically nor in depth. Votes: 0

Custom determines what is agreeable. Votes: 0

Custom creates the whole of equity, for the simple reason that it is accepted. Votes: 0

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. Votes: 0

Reverend Fathers, my letters did not usually follow each other at such close intervals, nor were they so long.... This one would not be so long had I but the leisure to make it shorter. Votes: 0

The best defense against logic is ignorance. Votes: 0

What a difficult thing it is to ask someone's advice on a matter without coloring his judgment by the way in which we present our problem. Votes: 0

Religion is so great a thing that it is right that those who will not take the trouble to seek it if it be obscure, should be deprived of it. Votes: 0

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. Votes: 0

Each one is all in all to himself; for being dead, all is dead to him. Votes: 0

To call a king "Prince" is pleasing, because it diminishes his rank. Votes: 0

You corrupt religion either in favour of your friends, or against your enemies. Votes: 0

That a religion may be true, it must have knowledge of our nature. Votes: 0

There are plenty of maxims in the world; all that remains is to apply them. Votes: 0

Philosophers.-We are full of things which take us out of ourselves. Votes: 0

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. Votes: 0

How vain painting is-we admire the realistic depiction of objects which in their original state we don't admire at all. Votes: 0

If men knew themselves, God would heal and pardon them. Votes: 0

There would be too great darkness, if truth had not visible signs. Votes: 0

We have an idea of truth, invincible to all scepticism. Votes: 0

Flies are so mighty that they win battles, paralyse our minds, eat up our bodies. Votes: 0

I do not admire a virtue like valour when it is pushed to excess, if I do not see at the same time the excess of the opposite virtue, as one does in Epaminondas, who displayed extreme valour and extreme benevolence. For otherwise it is not an ascent, but a fall. We do not display our greatness by placing ourselves at one extremity, but rather by being at both at the same time, and filling up the whole of the space between them. Votes: 0

Not to be mad is another form of madness Votes: 0

He who does not know his way to the sea should take a river for his guide. Votes: 0

On the occasions when I have pondered over men's various activities, the dangers and worries they are exposed to at court or at war, from which so many quarrels, passions, risky, often ill-conceived actions and so on are born, I have often said that man's unhappiness springs from one thing alone, his incapacity to stay quietly in one room. A man wealthy enough for life's needs would never leave home to go to sea or beseige some fortress if he knew how to stay at home and enjoy it... Votes: 0

Meanings receive their dignity from words instead of giving it to them. Votes: 0

Plurality which is not reduced to unity is confusion; unity which does not depend on plurality is tyranny. Votes: 0

I should not be a Christian but for the miracles. Votes: 0

(Man,) the glory and the scandal of the universe. Votes: 0

Look somewhere else for someone who can follow you in your researches about numbers. For my part, I confess that they are far beyond me, and I am competent only to admire them. Votes: 0

Rivers are highways that move on and bear us whither we wish to go. Votes: 0

The end point of rationality is to demonstrate the limits of rationality. Votes: 0

We see neither justice nor injustice which does not change its nature with change in climate. Three degrees of latitude reverse all jurisprudence; a meridian decides the truth. Votes: 0

All sorrow has its root in man's inability to sit quiet in a room by himself. Votes: 0

Those who write against vanity want the glory of having written well, and their readers the glory of reading well, and I who write this have the same desire, as perhaps those who read this have also. Votes: 0

Law was once introduced without reason, and has become reasonable. Votes: 0

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. Votes: 0

Must we kill to prevent there being any wicked? This is to make both parties wicked instead of one. Votes: 0

All men have happiness as their object: there is no exception. However different the means they employ, they all aim at the same end. Votes: 0

The arithmetical machine produces effects that approach nearer to thought than all the actions of animals. But it does nothing that would enable us to attribute will to it, as to the animals. Votes: 0

The greatness of man is great in that he knows himself to be wretched. A tree does not know itself to be wretched. Votes: 0

Men are so completely fools by necessity that he is but a fool in a higher strain of folly who does not confess his foolishness. Votes: 0

Voluptuousness, like justice, is blind, but that is the only resemblance between them. Votes: 0

Death is easier to bear without thinking of it, than the thought of death without peril. Votes: 0

Opinion is, as it were, the queen of the world, but force is its tyrant. Votes: 0

We are so presumptuous that we wish to be known to all the world, even to those who come after us; and we are so vain that the esteem of five or six persons immediately around us is enough to amuse and satisfy us. Votes: 0

There are vices which have no hold upon us, but in connection with others; and which, when you cut down the trunk, fall like the branches. Votes: 0

It is the contest that delights us, and not the victory. Votes: 0

Civil wars are the greatest of evils. They are inevitable, if we wish to reward merit, for all will say that they are meritorious. Votes: 0

Wisdom leads us back to childhood. Votes: 0

All of our miseries prove our greatness. They are the miseries of a dethroned monarch. Votes: 0

Let each of us examine his thoughts Votes: 0

Most of the evils of life arise from man's being unable to sit still in a room. Votes: 0

If a man loves a woman for her beauty, does he love her? No; for the smallpox, which destroys her beauty without killing her, causes his love to cease. And if any one loves me for my judgment or my memory, does he really love me? No; for I can lose these qualities without ceasing to be. Votes: 0

A little thing comforts us because a little thing afflicts us. Votes: 0

The mind of the greatest man on earth is not so independent of circumstances as not to feel inconvenienced by the merest buzzing noise about him; it does not need the report of a cannon to disturb his thoughts. The creaking of a vane or a pully is quite enough. Do not wonder that he reasons ill just now; a fly is buzzing by his ear; it is quite enough to unfit him for giving good counsel. Votes: 0

Orthodoxy on one side of the Pyrenees may be heresy on the other. Votes: 0

Force and not opinion is the queen of the world; but it is opinion that uses the force. [Fr., La force est la reine du monde, et non pas l'opinion; mais l'opinion est celle qui use de la force.] Votes: 0

All the good maxims which are in the world fail when applied to one's self. Votes: 0

One-half of life is admitted by us to be passed in sleep, in which, however, it may appear otherwise, we have no perception of truth, and all our feelings are delusions; who knows but the other half of life, in which we think we are awake, is a sleep also, but in some respects different from the other, and from which we wake when we, as we call it, sleep. As a man dreams often that he is dreaming, crowding one dreamy delusion on another. Votes: 0

It is certain that the soul is either mortal or immortal. The decision of this question must make a total difference in the principles of morals. Yet philosophers have arranged their moral system entirely independent of this. What an extraordinary blindness! Votes: 0

Do you wish people to speak well of you? Then do not speak at all yourself. [Fr., Voulez-vous qu'on croie du bien de vous? N'en dites point.] Votes: 0

Those who make antitheses by forcing the sense are like men who make false windows for the sake of symmetry. Their rule is not to speak justly, but to make accurate figures. Votes: 0

Piety is different from superstition. To carry piety to the extent of superstition is to destroy it. The heretics reproach us with this superstitious submission. It is doing what they reproach us with. Votes: 0

I can approve of those only who seek in tears for happiness. Votes: 0

All our dignity lies in our thoughts. Votes: 0

If man should commence by studying himself, he would see how impossible it is to go further. Votes: 0

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. Votes: 0

You see, if the height of the mercury [barometer] column is less on the top of a mountain than at the foot of it (as I have many reasons for believing, although everyone who has so far written about it is of the contrary opinion), it follows that the weight of the air must be the sole cause of the phenomenon, and not that abhorrence of a vacuum, since it is obvious that at the foot of the mountain there is more air to have weight than at the summit, and we cannot possibly say that the air at the foot of the mountain has a greater aversion to empty space than at the top. Votes: 0

The married should not forget that to speak of love begets love. Votes: 0

When we would think of God, how many things we find which turn us away from Him, and tempt us to think otherwise. All this is evil, yet it is innate. Votes: 0

Evil is easily discovered; there is an infinite variety; good is almost unique. But some kinds of evil are almost as difficult to discover as that which we call good; and often particular evil of this class passes for good. It needs even a certain greatness of soul to attain to this, as to that which is good. Votes: 0

Is it courage in a dying man to go, in weakness and in agony, to affront an almighty and eternal God? Votes: 0

Death itself is less painful when it comes upon us unawares than the bare contemplation of it, even when danger is far distant. Votes: 0

Man is so great that his greatness appears even in the consciousness of his misery. A tree does not know itself to be miserable. It is true that it is misery indeed to know one's self to be miserable; but then it is greatness also. In this way, all man's miseries go to prove his greatness. They are the miseries of a mighty potentate, of a dethroned monarch. Votes: 0

Man is full of desires: he loves only those who can satisfy them all. "This man is a good mathematician," someone will say. But I have no concern for mathematics; he would take me for a proposition. "That one is a good soldier." He would take me for a besieged town. I need, that is to say, a decent man who can accommodate himself to all my desires in a general sort of way. Votes: 0

Perfect clarity would profit the intellect but damage the will. Votes: 0

All of our dignity consists in thought. Let us endeavor then to think well; this is the principle of morality. Votes: 0

We sometimes learn more from the sight of evil than from an example of good; and it is well to accustom ourselves to profit by the evil which is so common, while that which is good is so rare. Votes: 0