Inspirational Quotes by Blaise Pascal
“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.”
“Continuous eloquence wearies. Grandeur must be abandoned to be appreciated. Continuity in everything is unpleasant. Cold is agreeable, that we may get warm.”
topics: Philosophy
“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!”
topics: Philosophy
“It is the fight alone that pleases us, not the victory.”
“Nature is an infinite sphere of which the center is everywhere and the circumference nowhere.”
“The least movement is of importance to all nature. The entire ocean is affected by a pebble.”
“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.”
topics: Philosophy
“To have no time for philosophy is to be a true philosopher.”
topics: Philosophy
“When we see a natural style, we are astonished and charmed; for we expected to see an author, and we find a person.”
topics: Philosophy
“Let it not be said that I have said nothing new. The arrangement of the material is new.”
topics: Philosophy
“The serene, silent beauty of a holy life is the most powerful influence in the world, next to the might of God.”
topics: Piety
“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.”
“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?”
topics: Pride
“The charm of fame is so great that we like every object to which it is attached, even death.”
topics: Pride
“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.”
topics: Pride
“The world is ruled by force, not by opinion; but opinion uses force.”
topics: Reasoning
“A trifle consoles us, for a trifle distresses us.”
“Chance gives rise to thoughts, and chance removes them; no art can keep or acquire them.”
topics: Reasoning
“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.”
topics: Reasoning
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Among the contemporaries of Descartes none displayed greater natural genius than Pascal, but his mathematical reputation rests more on what he might have done than on what he actually effected, as during a considerable part of his life he deemed it his duty to devote his whole time to religious exercises.
At 16, Pascal began designing a calculating machine, which he finally perfected when he was thirty, the pascaline, a beautiful handcrafted box about fourteen by five by three inches. The first accurate mechanical calculator was born.
Pascal was dismayed and disgusted by society's reactions to his machine and completely renounced his interest in science an mathematics, devoting the rest of his life to God. He is best known for his collection of spiritual essays, Les Pensees.
Ironically, Pascal, who was a genius by any measure, with one of the finest brains of all time, died of a brain hemorrhage at the age of 39.
Among the contemporaries of Descartes none displayed greater natural genius than Pascal, but his mathematical reputation rests more on what he might have done than on what he actually effected, as during a considerable part of his life he deemed it his duty to devote his whole time to religious exercises.
He was a child prodigy who was educated by his father, a Tax Collector in Rouen. Pascal's earliest work was in the natural and applied sciences where he made important contributions to the study of fluids, and clarified the concepts of pressure and vacuum by generalizing the work of Evangelista Torricelli.
In 1646, he and his sister Jacqueline identified with the religious movement within Catholicism known by its detractors as Jansenism. Following a mystical experience in late 1654, he had his "second conversion", abandoned his scientific work, and devoted himself to philosophy and theology. His two most famous works date from this period: the Lettres provinciales and the Pensees.
In honor of his scientific contributions, the name Pascal has been given to the SI unit of pressure, to a programming language, and Pascal's law (an important principle of hydrostatics), and as mentioned above, Pascal's triangle and Pascal's wager still bear his name.