Pascal I

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 (II.49).

Description of man. Dependence, desire for independence, needs (IV.78).

I have put up two completely unrelated passages. Concerning the first: I found this passage extremely funny, and while this surely outs me as a nerd, I also wonder if Pascal was trying to be somewhat amusing. This is a question that I often ask the PLS thinkers, and this was the occasion that I found that Pascal was making a humorous attempt. Was he? As for the second passage: Is this truly the state of man? And if so, how does the compare to the view that Hobbes puts forth, in that all men desire to be peaceful, so that all men desire to join in community? These two viewpoints see to be opposed to each other. Are they? What does this do to ones view of Hobbes and to ones view of Pascal?

Believing in God

Do not be astonished to see simple people believing without argument.  God makes them love him and hate themselves.  He inclines their hearts to believe.  We shall never believe, with an effective belief and faith, unless God inclines our hearts, and we shall believe as soon as he does so. (380)

I was most interested in Pascal's final thoughts on the way in which we come to know God.  Until this point, the discourse had stressed the sound proofs of Christ's existence in terms of Scripture passages and prophecies that have been fulfilled.  Now, Pascal tells us that the truest way of knowing God is via some internal inclination.  While this certainly seems to be the most genuine form of religion, it is entirely separate from the other methods that had been described.  Are they alone sufficient ways of knowing God?  Is the man whose heart is inclined by God more religious than he who believes due to Scripture and prophecies? (These may seem like questions that Pascal has answered in the conclusion. I'm wondering if in doing so he has rejected or built on and perfected his earlier thoughts?)

Pascal I

"The only good thing for men therefore is to be diverted from thinking of what they are . . . but they do not answer like that because they do not know themselves" (#136, second part is much further on)

"One must know oneself. Even if that does not help in finding truth, at least it helps in running one's life, and nothing is more proper . . ." (#72)

"We know the truth not only through our reason but also through our heart . . . principles are felt, propositions proved . . ." (#110)

". . . it is most valuable to represent both to him. Man must . . . know both [animals and angels, to which his nature is related]." (#121)

"Thus we can know God properly only by knowing our own iniquities." (#189)

"I want him to consider nature just once, seriously and at leisure, and to look at himself as well . . ." (#199)

"The Christian religion alone is appropriate for all, being a blend of external and internal." (#219)

As I read, I was most interested in whether or not Pascal thought truth should be found by looking inside oneself. I have a bias towards this view, so I was on the lookout for quotes concerning this issue, which is why I have so many... sorry! But anyway. First Pascal seemed to agree, then he very clearly said the opposite, and finally he seemed to return to his original point of view. Does he mean that it is not enough to only look at oneself? I can agree with that, but isn't looking inwards still the proper starting point? Isn't this what Pascal himself did? But he also said that to consider oneself, to be alone with one's thoughts, is to be unhappy. Is worldly happiness so important then? Are we really unhappy when we think of ourselves? Should't we have a dual feeling to fit our dual natures, both exultation and despair?

Pascal and Doubt

It is clear that Pascal finds much at issue with Descartes both in his strong language ("I cannot forgive Descartes" 77) and in his writing (his rejection of studies of oneself, e.g. Montaigne, as frivolous, &c.).

I cannot help drawing a connection between the two, however:

...this is what makes us incapable of certain knowledge and of absolute ignorance. We sail within a vast sphere, ever drifting in uncertainty, driven from end to end. When we think we attach ourselves to any point and 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. 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.
(72)

As a result of this uncertainty "we hate truth and those who tell it to us" (100), and we fear solitude or lack of diversion (cf. 139). Our reason, our senses, and our imagination all become forces of self-delusion. Descartes's doubt had a methodological purpose, and by and large proceeded somewhat calmly even as he razed down his beliefs; similarly, he resolved his problems with a divine 'finger snap.'

Pascal's unflinching look at humanity, however, places humans in an uncomfortable middle position, tangled between skepticism and dogmatism, between knowledge and doubt, reason and nature. How does this view of humanity compare and contrast with Descartes's doubt? In which aspects does it provide for less certainty and in which for more? What do you make of the ever-increasing hunger in the authors we've read thus far to really get at the nature of humanity, to strip away any and all pretense?

Pascal's Heart

We know the truth not only through our reason but 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 . . . Our inability must therefore serve only to humble reason, which would like to be the judge of everything, but not to confute our certainty (Pensees 110).

It is intriguing to discover the personality of Pascal, who I previously knew as an international unit of pressure.

Here again is a discussion of truth and the human method of grasping it. Aquinas delineated three avenues of obtaining Truth (with a capital "T") - knowledge, opinion, and faith. Hobbes claimed there is no avenue to obtain Truth since all our knowledge is conditional; something is true if it follows a logical deduction from "if this is, then this is" constructions dependent on an agreed definition, and we can never know something that simply "is." Blaise advocates a separate avenue, the "heart." As the introduction states, the heart comprehends "pre-rational first principle and assenting to supra-rational propositions" (xxiii). As a further element that differentiates the heart from any other avenue, the heart is not controlled by us (100). What exactly does he mean by the heart? Is it closely analogous to Descartes' clear and distinct perception? How does it reconcile with Pascal's Hobbesian belief that true (perhaps True) justice is following the customs of one's country, a first principle seemingly derived from observing the inconsistent beliefs of humanity (86).

Modern Pascal

The whole of faith consists in Jesus Christ and Adam and the whole of morality in concupiscence and grace. # 226 (p. 72)

Perpetuity. This religion consists in believing that man has fallen from a state of glory and communion with God into a state of gloom, penitence and estrangement from God, but that after this life we shall be restored by a promised Messiah, and it has always existed on earth. # 281 (p. 90)

The first sentence concerned me. We now, as Christians, accept that the story of Adam and Eve is a figurative tale intended to explain why mankind isn't perfect. However, I feel that Pascal's proofs of Christianity are so much tidier because he has a firm belief that the world is 6,000 years old and that Adam was a flesh and blood individual. Once we start saying Adam and Eve is figurative, the Flood is figurative, Sodom and Gomorrah are figurative, all the way down the line, I feel we need to ask "Then why should the prophecies be taken literally?" and Pascal also claims that "The most weighty proofs of Jesus are the prophecies (# 335). If Pascal were to hear the modern take that we hold (more or less) the entire Old Testament figuratively, would he still hold onto his proof by prophecy?

I take his second quote to be Pascal's "Thesis of Christianity." I feel that it boils all the elements of his theology into its base components (it's like a dorm party that way). This sentence seems equally legitimate whether or not Adam or Noah were literal human beings - he even puts the language more passively. Does this Pensee hold up if the same critical interpretation of the Bible is applied to it?