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

Blaise Pascal

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Blaise Pascal
Age: 39 †
Born: 1623
Born: June 19
Died: 1662
Died: August 19
French Moralist
Mathematician
Philosopher
Physicist
Statistician
Theologian
Writer
Clarmont-Ferrand
Pascal
Louis de Montalte
Amos Dettonville
Dettonville
Paskal Blez
History
Reason
Surpass
Things
Infinity
Logic
Recognize
Function
Lasts
Last

More quotes by Blaise Pascal

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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.
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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.
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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!
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True eloquence makes light of eloquence. True morality makes light of morality.
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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.
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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.
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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.
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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!
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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.
Blaise Pascal
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To ridicule philosophy is truly philosophical. [Fr., Se moquer de la philosophie c'est vraiment philosophe.]
Blaise Pascal
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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.
Blaise Pascal
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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.
Blaise Pascal
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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?
Blaise Pascal
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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.
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Eloquence is the painting of thought.
Blaise Pascal
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Description of man: dependence, longing for independence, need.
Blaise Pascal
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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.
Blaise Pascal
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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.
Blaise Pascal
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Force rules the world-not opinion but it is opinion that makes use of force.
Blaise Pascal
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Education produces natural intuitions, and natural intuitions are erased by education.
Blaise Pascal