{"collection":"scripture-revelation","full_text_available":true,"graph_url":"https://unchartedknowledge.5gfusion.net/v2/api/page/gutenberg_26726/graph","html_url":"https://unchartedknowledge.5gfusion.net/v2/page/gutenberg_26726","id":"gutenberg_26726","license":"Public Domain (US)","rights_basis":"gutenberg_metadata_copyright_false","source":"gutenberg","source_url":"https://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/26726","summary":null,"tags":["Category: Biographies","Category: Mathematics","Category: Philosophy & Ethics","Category: Religion/Spirituality","Pascal, Blaise, 1623-1662"],"text":"This ebook was transcribed by Les Bowler.\n\n\n\n\n\nPASCAL\n\n\n                                    BY\n                            PRINCIPAL TULLOCH\n\n                        WILLIAM BLACKWOOD AND SONS\n                           EDINBURGH AND LONDON\n                           1878.\u2014REPRINT, 1882\n\n                          _All Rights reserved_\n\n\n\n\nPREFATORY NOTE.\n\n\nThe translations in this volume are chiefly my own; but I have also taken\nexpressions and sentences freely from others\u2014and especially from Dr\nM\u2019Crie, in his translation of the \u2018Provincial Letters\u2019\u2014when they seemed\nto convey well the sense of the original.  It would be impossible to\ndistinguish in all cases between what is my own and what I have borrowed.\nThe \u2018Provincial Letters\u2019 have been translated at least four times into\nEnglish.  The translation of Dr M\u2019Crie, published in 1846, is the most\nspirited.  The \u2018Pens\u00e9es\u2019 were translated by the Rev. Edward Craig, A.M.\nOxon., in 1825, following the French edition of 1819, which again\nfollowed that of Bossut in 1779.  A new translation, both of the\n\u2018Letters\u2019 and \u2018Pens\u00e9es,\u2019 by George Pearce, Esq.\u2014the latter after the\nrestored text of M. Faug\u00e8re\u2014appeared in 1849 and 1850.\n\n                                                                     J. T.\n\n\n\n\nCONTENTS.\n\n      CHAP.                                                           PAGE\n\n             INTRODUCTION                                                1\n\n         I.  PASCAL\u2019S FAMILY AND YOUTH                                   5\n\n        II.  PASCAL\u2019S SCIENTIFIC DISCOVERIES                            25\n\n       III.  PASCAL IN THE WORLD                                        52\n\n        IV.  PORT ROYAL AND PASCAL\u2019S LATER YEARS                        74\n\n         V.  THE \u2018PROVINCIAL LETTERS\u2019                                  103\n\n        VI.  THE \u2018PENS\u00c9ES\u2019                                             157\n\nINTRODUCTION.\n\n\nThere are few names which have become more classical in modern literature\nthan that of Blaise Pascal.  There is hardly any name more famous at once\nin literature, science, and religion.  Cut off at the early age of\nthirty-nine\u2014the fatal age of genius\u2014he had long before attained\npre-eminent distinction as a geometer and discoverer in physical science;\nwhile the rumour of his genius as the author of the \u2018Provincial Letters,\u2019\nand as one of the chiefs of a notable school of religious thought, had\nspread far and wide.  His writings continue to be studied for the\nperfection of their style and the vitality of their substance.  As a\nwriter, he belongs to no school, and is admired simply for his greatness\nby Encyclopedist and Romanticist, by Catholic and Protestant alike,\u2014by\nmen like Voltaire and Condorcet and Sainte-Beuve, no less than by men\nlike Bossuet, Vinet, and Neander.  His \u2018Pens\u00e9es\u2019 have been carefully\nrestored, and re-edited with minute and loving faithfulness in our time\nby editors of such opposite tastes and tendencies as M. Prosper Faug\u00e8re,\nM. Havet, and M. Victor Rochet.  Cousin considered it one of the glories\nof his long intellectual career that he had first led the way to the\nremarkable restoration of Pascal\u2019s remains.  Of all the illustrious names\nwhich group themselves around Port Royal, it is Pascal alone, and\nRacine\u2014who was more its pupil, but less its representative\u2014whose genius\ncan be said to survive, and to invest it with an undying lustre.\n\nPascal\u2019s early death, the reserve of his friends under the assaults which\nthe \u2018Provincial Letters\u2019 provoked, and his very fame, as a writer, have\nserved in some degree to obscure his personality.  To many a modern\nreader he is little else than a great name.  The man is hidden away\nbehind the author of the \u2018Pens\u00e9es,\u2019 or the defender of Port Royal.  Some\nmight even say that his writings are now more admired than studied.  They\nhave been so long the subject of eulogy that their classical character is\ntaken for granted, and the reader of the present day is content to look\nat them from a respectful distance rather than spontaneously study them\nfor himself.  There may be some truth in this view.  Pascal is certainly,\nlike many other great writers, far more widely known than he is\nunderstood or appreciated.  The old, which are still the common, editions\nof the \u2018Pens\u00e9es,\u2019 have also given a certain commonplace to his\nreputation.  It were certainly a worthy task to set him more clearly\nbefore our age both as a man and as a writer.\n\nIt is no easy task, however, to do this; and to tell the full story of\nPascal\u2019s life is no longer possible.  Its records, numerous as they are,\nare incomplete; all fail more or less at an interesting point of his\ncareer.  They leave much unexplained; and the most familiar confidences\nof his sisters and niece, who have preserved many interesting details\nregarding him, have not entirely removed the veil from certain aspects of\nhis character.  The well-known life by Madame P\u00e9rier, his elder sister,\nis of course the chief authentic source of his biography.  It was written\nshortly after his death, although not published for some time later; and\nnothing can be more lively, graphic, and yet dignified, than its\nportraiture of his youthful precocity, and, again, of the devotions and\nausterities of his later years.  But it leaves many gaps unsupplied.\nLike other memoirs of the kind, it is written from a somewhat\nconventional point of view.  No one, as M. Havet says, was nearer to him\nin all senses of the expression, or could have given a more true and\ncomplete account of all the incidents in his life; but she was not only\nhis sister, but his enthusiastic friend and admirer, in whose eyes he was\nat once a genius and a saint\u2014a man of God, called to a great mission.  It\nwas from a consciousness of this mission, and the full glory of his\nreligious fame, that she looked back upon all his life; and the lines in\nwhich she draws it are coloured, in consequence, too gravely and\nmonotonously.  Certain particulars she drops out of sight altogether.\nThese are to be found scattered here and there, sometimes in his own\nletters, more frequently in the letters of his younger sister,\nJacqueline, and in a supplementary memoir, written by his niece,\nMarguerite P\u00e9rier, all of which have been carefully published in our\ntime, and made accessible to any reader. {3}  The researches of M.\nCousin, M. Faug\u00e8re, and M. Havet, the curious and interesting monograph\nof M. L\u00e9lut, {4a} have thrown light on various points; while the copious\nportraiture of Sainte-Beuve {4b} has given to the whole an animation and\na desultory charm which no English pen need strive to imitate.\n\nMy only hope, as my aim, will be in this little volume to set before the\nEnglish reader perhaps a more full and connected account of the life and\nwritings of Pascal than has yet appeared in our language, freely availing\nmyself of all the sources I have indicated.  And if long and loving\nfamiliarity with a subject\u2014an intimacy often renewed both with the\n\u2018Provincial Letters\u2019 and the \u2018Pens\u00e9es\u2019\u2014form any qualification for such a\ntask, I may be allowed to possess it.  It is now nearly thirty years\nsince the study of Neander first drew me to the study of Pascal; and I\nventured, with the confidence of youth, to draw from the \u2018Pens\u00e9es,\u2019 which\nhad then recently appeared in the new and admirable edition of M.\nFaug\u00e8re, the outlines of a Christian Philosophy. {4c}  I shall venture on\nno such ambition within the bounds of this volume; but I trust I may be\nable to bring together the story of Pascal\u2019s life, controversy, and\nthought in such a manner as to lead others to the study of a writer truly\ngreat in the imperishable grandeur and elevation of his ideas, no less\nthan in the exquisite finish and graces of his style.\n\n\n\n\nCHAPTER I.\nPASCAL\u2019S FAMILY AND YOUTH.\n\n\nBlaise Pascal was born at Clermont-Ferrand on the 19th June 1623.  He\nbelonged to an old Auvergne family, Louis XI. having ennobled one of its\nmembers for administrative services as early as 1478, although no use was\nmade of the title, at least in the seventeenth century.  The family\ncherished with more pride its ancient connection with the legal or\n\u2018Parliamentary\u2019 institutions of their country. {5}  Pascal\u2019s grandfather,\nMartin Pascal, was treasurer of France; and his father, \u00c9tienne, after\ncompleting his legal studies in Paris, acquired the position of Second\nPresident of the Court of Aides at Clermont.  In the year 1618 he married\nAntoinette Begon, who became the mother of four children, of whom three\nsurvived and became distinguished.  Madame Pascal died in 1626 or 1628;\n{6a} and two years afterwards (in 1630) \u00c9tienne Pascal abandoned his\nprofessional duties, and came to Paris, in order that he might devote\nhimself to the education of his children.\n\nSoon after the Pascal family settled in Paris, their character and\nendowments seem to have attracted a widespread interest.  If not superior\nto the Arnaulds, they were no less remarkable.  They did not escape the\npenetrating eye of Richelieu, who, as he looked upon the father with his\nson, then fifteen years of age, and his two daughters, was so struck by\ntheir beauty that he exclaimed, without waiting for their formal\nintroduction to him, that he _would like to make something great of\nthem_. {6b}  \u00c9tienne Pascal was a man not only of official capacity, but\nof keen intellectual instincts and aspirations.  He shared eagerly in the\nscientific enthusiasm of his time.  A letter by him addressed to the\nJesuit No\u00ebl shows that the vein of satire, half pleasant, half severe,\nwhich reached such perfection in the famous \u2018Letters\u2019 of his son, was not\nunknown to the father.  The careful and systematic education which he\ngave to his son would alone have stamped him as a man of remarkable\nintelligence.\n\nGilberte, Pascal\u2019s elder sister and biographer, exerted an influence upon\nhis character only second to that of his father.  She married her cousin,\nM. P\u00e9rier, also of a Parliamentary family, and Counsellor of the Court of\nAides at Clermont.  She was alike beautiful and accomplished, a student\nof mathematics, philosophy, and history. {7}  For a time she shared in\nthe enjoyments of the world, like other persons of her age and condition;\nbut the same impulses of religious enthusiasm which animated the rest of\nher family led to her practical abandonment of the world while still\nyoung.  The memoirs which she composed, both of her brother and sister,\nand her letters, all indicate a high intelligence and a mingled dignity,\nsweetness, and restraint of character, which made her their best\ncounsellor and friend.\n\nThe younger sister, Jacqueline, has been made a special study by M.\nCousin amongst the \u2018Illustrious Women of the Seventeenth Century.\u2019  She\nwas beautiful as her sister, and a child of genius like her brother.  She\nbegan to compose verses at the age of eight, and in her eleventh year\nassisted in the composition and the acting of a comedy in five acts,\nwhich was a subject of universal talk in Paris.  Her powers, both as an\nactor and a verse-maker, made a wonderful reputation at the time, which,\nas we shall see, was highly serviceable to her after.  Her verses, it\nmust be confessed, are somewhat artificial and hollow; but her letters,\nand, more remarkable than either her verses or her letters, her\n\u2018Thoughts\u2019 on the \u2018Mystery of the Death of Christ,\u2019 are in some respects\nvery fine, and might even claim a place beside some of those of her\nbrother.  They are equally elevated in tone, and pervaded by the same\nsubtle, penetrating, radiant mysticism, the same rapture of\nself-sacrificing aspiration, though lacking the glow of inward fire and\nexquisite charm of style which marked the author of the \u2018Pens\u00e9es.\u2019\nNoble-minded and full of genius, she was yet without his depth and power\nof feeling, or his skill and finish as an author.  In 1646 she came,\nalong with her brother, and greatly through his influence, strongly under\nthe power of religion; and in 1652, after her father\u2019s death, she\nrenounced the world, and became one of the Sisters of Port Royal.  She\ndied amidst the persecution of the Sisters in 1661, a year before her\nbrother.\n\nIn Paris the elder Pascal became a centre of men of congenial\nintellectual tastes with himself, and his house a sort of rendezvous for\nthe mathematicians and the physicists of the time.  Among them were\nDescartes, Gassendi, Mersenne, Roberval, Carcavi, and Le Pailleur; and\nfrom the frequent reunion of these men is said to have sprung the Academy\nof Sciences founded in 1666.  It is interesting to notice that it was\ninto this same society that Hobbes was introduced on his first and second\nvisits to France, when he accompanied the future Duke of Devonshire there\nas tutor.  With Father Mersenne and Gassendi especially he formed a warm\nfriendship, which sheds an interest over his life.  Possibly in some of\nthese reunions the author of the \u2018Leviathan\u2019 may have encountered the\nyoung Pascal, and joined in the half admiration and half incredulity\nwhich his wonderful powers had begun to excite.\n\nThere never certainly was a more singular story of youthful precocity\nthan that which Madame P\u00e9rier has given of her brother, accustomed as we\nhave become to such stories in the lives of eminent men.  Detecting the\nremarkable powers of the boy, his father had formed very definite\nresolutions as to his education.  His chief maxim, Madame P\u00e9rier says,\nwas always \u201cto keep the boy above his work.\u201d  And for this reason he did\nnot wish him to learn Latin till he was twelve years of age, when he\nmight easily acquire it.  In the meantime, he sought to give him a\ngeneral idea of grammar\u2014of its rules, and the exceptions to which these\nrules are liable\u2014and so to fit him to take up the study of any language\nwith intelligence and facility.  He endeavoured further to direct his\nson\u2019s attention to the more marked phenomena of nature, and such\nexplanations as he could give of them.  But here the son\u2019s perception\noutstripped the father\u2019s power of explanation.  He wished \u201cto know the\nreason of everything;\u201d and when his father\u2019s statements did not appear to\nhim to give the reason, he was far from satisfied.\n\n    \u201cFor he had always an admirable perspicacity in discerning what was\n    false; and it may be said that in everything and always truth was the\n    sole object of his mind.  From his childhood he could only yield to\n    what seemed to him evidently true; and when others spoke of good\n    reasons, he tried to find them for himself.  He never quitted a\n    subject until he had found some explanation which satisfied him.\u201d\n\nOnce, among other occasions, he was so interested in the fact that the\nsound emitted by a plate lying on a table when struck, suddenly ceased on\nthe plate being touched by the hand, that he made an inquiry into sound\nin general, and drew so many conclusions that he embodied them in a\n\u201cwell-reasoned\u201d treatise.  At this time he was only twelve years of age.\n\nAt the same age he gave still more astonishing evidence of his precocious\nscientific capacities.  His father, perceiving his strong scientific\nbent, and desirous that he should first of all acquaint himself with\nlanguages before the absorption of the severer, but more engrossing,\nstudy seized him, had withdrawn from his sight all mathematical books,\nand carefully avoided the subject in the presence of his son when his\nfriends were present.  This, as might be expected, only quickened the\ncuriosity of the boy, who frequently begged his father to teach him\nmathematics, and the father promised to do so as a reward when he knew\nLatin and Greek, which he was then learning.  Piqued by this resistance,\nthe boy asked one day, \u201cWhat mathematical science was, and of what it\ntreated?\u201d  He was told that its aim was to make figures correctly, and to\nfind their right relations or proportions to one another.  He began, says\nhis sister, to meditate during his play-hours on the information thus\ncommunicated to him.\n\n    \u201cAnd being alone in a room where he was accustomed to amuse himself,\n    he took a piece of charcoal and drew figures upon the boards, trying,\n    for example, to make a circle perfectly round, a triangle of which\n    the sides and angles were equal, and similar figures.  He succeeded\n    in his task, and then endeavoured to determine the proportion of the\n    figures, although so careful had his father been in hiding from him\n    all knowledge of the kind, that he did not even know the names of the\n    figures.  He made names for himself, then definitions, then axioms,\n    and finally demonstrations; and in this way had pushed his researches\n    as far as the thirty-second proposition of the first book of Euclid.\u201d\n    {10}\n\nAt this point a \u2018surprise\u2019 visit of his father arrested him in his task,\nalthough so absorbed was he in it, that he did not at first recognise his\nfather\u2019s presence.  The older Pascal, having satisfied himself of the\nastonishing achievement which the youthful mathematician had worked out\nfor himself in solitude, ran with tears of joy to communicate the fact to\nhis friend M. le Pailleur.  It was agreed betwixt them that such an\naptitude for science should no longer be balked, and the lad was\nfurnished with the means of pursuing his mathematical studies.  Before he\nhad completed his sixteenth year he had written the famous treatise on\nConic Sections which excited the \u201cmingled incredulity and astonishment\u201d\nof Descartes. {11}\n\nThe happiness of Pascal\u2019s home was suddenly interrupted by an unforeseen\ncalamity.  On coming to Paris, his father had invested his savings in\nbonds upon the Hotel de Ville.  The Government, impoverished by wars and\nextravagance, reduced the value of these revenues, with the result of\ncreating discontent and calling forth expostulation from the disappointed\nannuitants.  Some of them met together, and, among others, \u00c9tienne\nPascal, and gave such vent to their feelings as to alarm the Government.\nRichelieu took summary means of asserting his authority and silencing the\ndisturbers.  The meeting was denounced as seditious, and a warrant issued\nto arrest the offenders and throw them into the Bastille.  \u00c9tienne\nPascal, having become apprised of the hostile designs of the Cardinal,\ncontrived to conceal himself at first in Paris, and afterwards took\nrefuge in the solitude of his native district.  His children were left\nwithout his care, and plunged in the greatest sorrow.  At intervals,\nindeed, he contrived to see them in secret, and is said even to have\nnursed Jacqueline through a severe attack of the smallpox, which impaired\nher hitherto remarkable beauty.  But all the pleasant companionship which\nhe had enjoyed as their instructor, and the centre of a group of\nintellectual friends, was at an end.  He could only visit his home by\nstealth.\n\nAt this crisis (February 1639) Richelieu took a fancy to have Scud\u00e9ry\u2019s\ntragi-comedy of \u201cL\u2019Amour Tyrannique\u201d acted before him by young girls.\nThe Court lady who undertook the management of the piece appealed to\nJacqueline Pascal, whose accomplishments as a girl-actor were well known,\nto assist in its performance.  She was then thirteen years of age.  The\nelder sister, who, in the enforced absence of the father, was acting as\nthe head of the family, replied, with feeling, that \u201cthey did not owe any\nfavour to M. le Cardinal, who had not acted kindly towards them.\u201d  The\nrequest, however, was pressed, in the hope that some good might come out\nof the affair to the family, and Jacqueline was allowed to appear.  The\nresult was all that could be anticipated.  The Cardinal, charmed by the\ngrace and accomplishment of her acting, received her cordially when she\nventured to approach him with a petition on behalf of her father, thrown\ninto a form of verses similar to many which she had already composed.\nThe verses have been preserved with her other pieces, and have been thus\nrendered:\u2014{12}\n\n    \u201cO marvel not, Armand, the great, the wise,\n    If I have failed to please thine ear, thine eyes;\n    My sorrowing spirit, torn by countless fears,\n    Each sound forbiddeth save the voice of tears.\n    With power to please thee wouldst thou me inspire?\u2014\n    Recall from exile now my hapless sire.\u201d\n\nShe has herself described, in an interesting letter to her father, {13}\nthe whole incident, and the result of her intercession.  Having told how\nthe Cardinal had been previously well prepared, and had the true state of\nthe case explained in reference to her father, who appears to have been\nin no degree to blame in the agitation which called forth the displeasure\nof the Government, she says that\u2014\n\n    \u201cM. le Cardinal appeared to take great pleasure in the\n    representation, especially when I spoke.  He laughed very much, as\n    did the whole company.  When the comedy was finished, I descended\n    from the theatre with the design of speaking to Madame d\u2019Aiguillon\n    [the same lady who had already interested herself in the business].\n    But as the Cardinal seemed about to leave, I approached him directly,\n    and recited to him the verses I send you.  He received them with\n    extraordinary affection and caresses more than you can imagine; for\n    at first, when I approached, he cried, \u2018Voil\u00e0 la petite Pascal!\u2019\n    Then he embraced me and kissed me, and while I said my verses he\n    continued to hold me in his arms, and kissed me each moment with\n    great satisfaction.  And then when I was done he said, \u2018Yes; I grant\n    to you all that you ask; write to your father that he may return with\n    safety.\u2019  Thereupon Madame d\u2019Aiguillon approached, and addressed the\n    Cardinal.  \u2018It is truly well, sir, that you do something for this\n    man.  I have heard him spoken of as a thoroughly honest and learned\n    man, and it is a pity he should remain unemployed.  Then he has a son\n    who is very learned in mathematics, although as yet only fifteen\n    years of age.\u2019  The Cardinal assured me once more that I might tell\n    you to return in all safety; and as he seemed in such good humour, I\n    asked him further that you might be allowed yourself to pay your\n    thanks and respects to his Eminence.  He said you would be welcome;\n    and then, with other discourse, repeated, \u2018Tell your father, when he\n    returns, to come and see me.\u2019  This he said three or four times.\n    After this, as Madame d\u2019Aiguillon was going away, my sister went\n    forward to salute her.  She received her with many caresses, and\n    inquired for our brother, whom she said she wished to see.  It was\n    this that led to his introduction to the Duchess, who paid him many\n    compliments on his scientific attainments.  We were then conducted to\n    a room, where we had a magnificent collation of dried sweetmeats,\n    fruits, lemonade, and such things.  Here the Duchess renewed her\n    caresses in a manner you will hardly believe.  In short, I cannot\n    tell how much honour I received, for I am obliged to write as\n    succinctly as possible.  I am greatly obliged to M. de Moudroy for\n    all the trouble he has taken, and I beg you will be so good as write\n    to him by the first post to thank him, for he well deserves it.  As\n    for me, I esteem myself extremely happy to have in any way assisted\n    in a result which must give you satisfaction.\u201d\n\nThis letter was written from Paris on the 4th April 1639, when Jacqueline\nPascal was therefore only fourteen years of age.  It is in all respects a\nremarkable and interesting production, both for the glimpse it gives of\nthe great Cardinal in his hours of ease, and its revelation of\nJacqueline\u2019s own character,\u2014her dramatic cleverness, her firmness and\nwisdom in assailing the Cardinal with her prepared verses at the right\nmoment, her self-conscious importance as the chief actor of such a scene,\nand all the same, her girlish enjoyment of the sweetmeats provided for\nher.  It is a pleasant enough picture; and it deserves especially to be\nnoticed how prominently the scientific reputation of her brother, only\ntwo years older than herself, is already recognised.\n\nThe sequel was all that could have been desired.  The father hastened, at\nthe summons of his daughter, to pay his respects to Richelieu, who gave\nhim a welcome reception.  \u201cI know all your merit,\u201d he said.  \u201cI restore\nyou to your children, and commend them to you.  I desire to do something\nconsiderable for you.\u201d  Within two years \u00c9tienne Pascal was, in\nconsequence, appointed Intendant of Rouen, where he settled with his\nfamily in 1641.  Disturbances had arisen in Normandy at this time in\nconnection with the payment of taxes, and the Government, believing that\nthe Parliament at Rouen had not acted with sufficient vigour, took the\nmatter into their own hands, and sent their officers to collect the\nrevenues of the province. {15}  \u00c9tienne Pascal\u2019s character and previous\nlabours in this capacity, no less than his restoration to the Cardinal\u2019s\nfavour, pointed him out as a man specially fitted for this work, which in\nthe circumstances was not unattended with danger.  The work in itself was\nalso harassing and troublesome; and the youthful Pascal, anxious to\nassist his father, had busied himself in the invention of a machine for\nperforming arithmetical calculations, which made a great sensation at the\ntime.  Ingenious as the machine was, it came to little, as we shall see\nin the next chapter, which will be devoted to a brief account of Pascal\u2019s\nscientific discoveries.  In the meantime it will be better to confine\nourselves to the thread of his personal history up to the important epoch\nwhich is known as his first conversion.\n\nSettled at Rouen, he pursued his studies with unremitting devotion, and\nwith only too little regard for his health.  His elder sister, who might\nhave won him occasionally to lighter pursuits, was married to her cousin\nM. P\u00e9rier in 1641, and two years afterwards went with him to Clermont,\nwhere her husband was appointed a Counsellor in the Court of Aides.\nJacqueline was absorbed in her own poetical studies, which received a\nspecial impetus from the friendship of Corneille, who had returned at\nthis time to his native town.  The illustrious dramatist speedily sought\nout the Pascal family, and became one of their most intimate associates.\nA prize being given every year for the best copy of verses on the\n\u201cConception of the Virgin,\u201d it was awarded to certain verses of\nJacqueline\u2019s for the year 1640.  When the announcement of the result was\nmade she was absent, but a friend of the family rose and returned thanks\nin verse in the name of the youthful poetess\u2014_Pour une jeune muse\nabsente_.  The friend was Corneille, whose impromptu lines on the\noccasion, along with those of Jacqueline, are still preserved. {16}\nNeither have much poetic merit, but they recall an interesting incident.\n\nA bright atmosphere of intellectual emulation and cheerful prospects\nsurrounds the family at this time.  But all the while it is evident, from\nMadame P\u00e9rier\u2019s account, that her brother was injuring his health greatly\nin his undue assiduity in his scientific pursuits.  The attempts to\nperfect the construction of his arithmetical machine seem especially to\nhave worn out his delicate frame, and to have laid the foundation of the\nnervous prostration from which he more or less suffered all his life\nafterwards.  \u201cFrom the age of eighteen,\u201d she says in a significant\npassage that her brother \u201chardly ever passed a day without pain.  In the\nintermissions of his sufferings, however, his spirit was such that he was\nconstantly bent on some new discovery.\u201d {17}\n\nIn the beginning of 1646 an accident happened which had important\nconsequences both to Pascal and his sisters.  \u00c9tienne Pascal fell upon\nthe ice and severely sprained his foot.  During his confinement he was\nattended by two brothers who had acquired repute in the treatment of such\ninjuries.  They were gentlemen of family in the neighbourhood, who had\ndevoted themselves to medicine and anatomy from benevolent instincts and\nthe love of these studies.  Both were disciples of a clergyman at\nRouville, who was an enthusiastic pietist and friend of St Cyran.  Crowds\nflocked to hear Pastor Guillebert whenever he preached, and many were\nstirred by his eloquence to devote themselves to pious and\nphilanthropical labours.  One of the brothers under this inspiring\nguidance built a hospital at the end of his park, and gave his children\nto the service of the Church in various capacities.  The other brother,\nwho had no children, provided beds in the hospital and attended the sick\npoor.\n\nThe character and conversation of these men made a deep impression upon\nthe Pascal family.  Hitherto esteemed pious, they had not yet made\nreligion an anxious concern in their lives.  Madame P\u00e9rier says expressly\nof her brother that he had been \u201cpreserved by the special protection of\nGod from all youthful vices, and, what was still more remarkable in the\ncase of a mind of such strength and pride, he had never yielded to any\nlibertinism of thought, but had always limited his curiosity to natural\ninquiries.\u201d  He attributed, according to her statement, this religious\nsobriety of mind to the instructions and example of his father, who had a\ngreat respect for religion, and who had impressed upon him from his\ninfancy the maxim, \u201cthat whatever is the object of faith cannot be the\nobject of reason, and still less the subject of it.\u201d  He had seen, in his\nfather, the combination of scientific attainment with a strong reasoning\npower, and the maxim therefore fell with weight from his lips.  And so,\nwhen he listened to the discourses of free-thinkers, young as he was\u2014\n\n    \u201cHe remained unmoved by them, and simply looked upon them as men who\n    had adopted the false principle that the human reason is above\n    everything, and who know nothing of the real nature of faith; so that\n    this spirit, so great and inquisitive, which searched so carefully\n    for the reason of everything, was at the same time submissive as a\n    child to all the truths of religion, and this submissive simplicity\n    predominated in him through his whole life.\u201d {18}\n\nThis is a significant extract in more ways than one.  In the meantime we\nquote it as indicating the religious atmosphere of Pascal\u2019s home, and the\npious temper which marked him from the first.  But as yet religion had\nnot taken hold of him with an absorbing enthusiasm.  It had its place in\nhis thoughts, and this a deeply respectful place; but now, about his\ntwenty-third year, in communication with the two friends we have\nmentioned, and under the same influence which had moved them so deeply,\nit began to lay hold of him more powerfully.  He and his father and\nsisters read eagerly the books of St Cyran, and of Jansen, the Bishop of\nYpres, whose name became so conspicuous in connection with Port Royal.  A\ndiscourse by the latter on \u201cThe Reformation of the Inward Man,\u201d and also\nArnauld\u2019s \u201cManual on Frequent Communion,\u201d are supposed to have specially\nimpressed him.  In the language of his sister\u2014\n\n    \u201cProvidence led him to the study of such pious writings while he was\n    not yet twenty-four years of age; and God so enlightened him by this\n    course of reading, that he came to realise that the Christian\n    religion obliges us to live only for God, and to have no other object\n    besides Him.  So clear and necessary appeared this truth to him, that\n    he gave up for a time all his researches, renounced all other\n    knowledge, and applied himself alone to the \u2018one thing needful\u2019\n    spoken of by our Lord.\u201d\n\nThis event is spoken of by Pascal\u2019s biographers as his \u201cfirst\nconversion,\u201d and it appears to have been attended not only with a zealous\nconsecration of his own powers to the service of religion, but moreover,\nas often happens in the case of youthful enthusiasm, with a warm\ndetermination against all who seemed to him to be acting at variance with\nthe true faith.  \u201cAlthough,\u201d as his sister says, \u201che had made no special\nstudy of scholastic theology, he was not ignorant of the judgments of the\nChurch against the heresies invented by human subtlety.  All indications\nof heretical opinion excited his indignation, and God gave him at this\ntime an opportunity of testifying his zeal on behalf of religion.\u201d  She\nthen adds in illustration the following story:\u2014\n\n    \u201cThere was at Rouen at this time a man who taught a new philosophy\n    which attracted the curious.  My brother, pressed by two of his young\n    friends, accompanied them to hear this man; but they were greatly\n    surprised when they found, in conversation with him, that he drew\n    consequences from his philosophy at variance with the decisions of\n    the Church.  He sought to prove by his arguments that the body of\n    Jesus Christ was not formed of the blood of the Holy Virgin, but of\n    some other matter specially created, and several other like subjects.\n    They pointed out to him his error, but he remained firm in his\n    opinions.  Thereupon, taking into consideration how dangerous it was\n    to leave the instruction of youth in the hands of a man with such\n    erroneous opinions, they resolved, after previously informing him of\n    their intention, to denounce him if he continued in his errors.  So\n    it happened; for he despised their advice, and in such a manner, as\n    to leave them no alternative but to denounce him to M. du Bellay,\n    {20} who was then discharging episcopal functions in the diocese of\n    Rouen for the Archbishop.  M. du Bellay sent for the man, and having\n    interrogated him, was deceived by an equivocal confession of faith\n    which he wrote and subscribed.  Otherwise he made little account of\n    the affair as reported by the three young men.  However, when they\n    saw the confession of faith, they at once recognised its defects, and\n    entered into communication with the Archbishop himself, who, having\n    examined into the matter, saw its gravity, and sent in writing a\n    special order to M. du Bellay to make the man retract all the points\n    of which he was accused, and to receive nothing from him except by\n    communication of his accusers.  The order was carried out, and the\n    result was that he appeared in the council of the Archbishop and\n    renounced all his errors\u2014it may be said sincerely, for he never\n    showed any anger towards those who had engaged in the affair, so as\n    to lead one to suppose that he had been himself deceived by the false\n    conclusions which he had drawn from false principles.  It was made\n    plain that his accusers had no design of injuring him, but only of\n    undeceiving him, and so preventing him from seducing the young, who\n    were incapable of distinguishing the true from the false in such\n    subtle questions.\u201d\n\nThis story reflects somewhat doubtfully on Pascal\u2019s fairness and good\nsense, even as told by Madame P\u00e9rier.  But it has not been left in the\nvagueness in which it stands in her narrative.  M. Cousin published for\nthe first time full details regarding it in the volume by which he may be\nsaid to have initiated the new researches into the life and writings of\nPascal.  These details, which fill more than forty pages of appendix to\nM. Cousin\u2019s volume, {21} are no longer of any interest in themselves; but\nthey enable us to understand more clearly the conduct of Pascal and his\ntwo friends.  Unhappily they deepen rather than lighten the shade which\nthe story throws upon Pascal\u2019s intemperate zeal.  The name of the accused\nteacher was Jacques Forton, a Capucin monk, known as the P\u00e8re St Ange.\nHe taught no new philosophy; but he had communicated to Pascal or his\nfriends, in private conversation specially desired by them, certain\ntheological opinions which he had espoused.  These, as given in the\nstatement of the case signed by Pascal and his two friends, mainly\nconcern such abstruse subjects as the relation of reason and faith, and\nthe possibility of demonstrating the doctrine of the Trinity as the\nsource of all other knowledge.  The curious question as to the\nconstitution of the body of Jesus occupies only a subordinate place.  The\nmonk, as shown in the whole proceedings, was evidently more of a\nspeculative dreamer than a heretic\u2014a man fond of disputation about\nmatters beyond his comprehension.  It is mentioned by the three youthful\nzealots, in the _r\u00e9cit_ bearing their signature, that as they were about\nto part with him, \u201cafter the accustomed civilities,\u201d he was careful to\nlet them know that he advanced the points in dispute, not as dogmas, but\nmerely as propositions or thoughts for discussion, the fruit of his own\nreasonings.\n\nThere is no reason to doubt that Pascal\u2019s conduct on this occasion arose\nentirely from honest zeal.  He thought religion compromised by the\nstrange reasonings which he had heard.  There is as little doubt,\nhowever, that his zeal outran his discretion.  He showed a determination\nto pursue the matter amounting to persecution.  The worthy priest had\nevidently no intention of promulgating heresy; for he is glad, when\ncalled upon, of an opportunity of proving his orthodoxy.  With this view\nhe produced, side by side with the articles of accusation, passages from\na former volume of his which had been printed with official sanction.\nPascal still demurred, even with this evidence before him.  A second\ndeclaration was obtained from the priest, and the bishop refused to go\nfurther.  The sympathies of the community were evidently against the\nyouthful zealots; and finally Pascal\u2019s father, convinced that enough had\nbeen done to vindicate the truth, successfully interposed as mediator.\n{23a}\n\nPascal\u2019s health about this period appears to have undergone a change for\nthe worse.  He suffered from excessive headache and great internal heat\nand pain.  A singular characteristic of his malady was his inability to\nswallow water unless it was heated, and even then only drop by drop.  He\nwas the subject, also, of a remarkable paralytic seizure thus described\nby his niece:\u2014\n\n    \u201cHe fell,\u201d she says, \u201cinto a very extraordinary state, as the result\n    of his great application to his scientific studies; for the senses\n    (_les esprits_) having mounted strongly to the brain, he became in a\n    manner paralysed from the waist downwards.  His legs and feet grew\n    cold as marble; and they were obliged every day to put on socks\n    soaked in brandy in order to try and restore heat in his feet.  At\n    the same time the physician interdicted him from all study.\u201d {23b}\n\nM. L\u00e9lut {23c} explains at length this attack of Pascal\u2019s as a well-known\nform of dynamical paralysis, of a similar nature with hypochondria and\nhysteria, proceeding from a disordered state of the nervous affections,\nthe result of overwork acting upon a delicate organisation.  The result\nis temporary, as distinguished from the paralysis arising from organic\nlesion, but indicates a highly susceptible constitution, the ready prey\nof melancholy and imaginative exaggeration, to which, in M. L\u00e9lut\u2019s\nopinion, Pascal was more or less liable during the remaining years of his\nlife.\n\n\n\n\nCHAPTER II.\nPASCAL\u2019S SCIENTIFIC DISCOVERIES.\n\n\nPascal\u2019s scientific studies may be said to have begun with the remarkable\nincident of his youth already related, when he elaborated for himself, in\na solitary chamber without books, thirty-two propositions of the first\nbook of Euclid.  On the other hand, these studies may be said to have\nextended to his closing years, when (in 1658 and 1659) he reverted to the\nabstruser mathematics, and made the _cycloid_ a subject of special\nthought.  But his scientific labours were in the main concentrated in the\neight or ten years of his life which followed the removal of the family\nto Rouen.  It will be convenient, therefore, to notice these labours and\ndiscoveries in a single chapter here, which will, at the same time, carry\non the main history of his life during these years.  All that can be\nexpected from the present writer is a slight sketch of this part of the\nsubject, which indeed is all that would be interesting to the general\nreader.\n\nAt the age of sixteen Pascal had already acquired a scientific\nreputation.  He is spoken of by the Duchess d\u2019Aiguillon, in the interview\nwith Richelieu in which she pleaded the cause of the exiled father, as\n\u201cvery learned in mathematics;\u201d and when his sister presented him after\nthe dramatic representation on that occasion, the Duchess gave him \u201cgreat\ncommendation for his scientific attainments.\u201d {26a}  When allowed by his\nfather to pursue the natural bent of his genius, he made extraordinary\nprogress.  He was still only twelve years of age, but Euclid\u2019s Elements,\nas soon as put into his hands, were mastered by him without any\nexplanation.  By-and-by he began to take an active part in the scientific\ndiscussions which took place at his father\u2019s house; and his achievement\nin Conic Sections has been already narrated.\n\nDescartes\u2019s incredulity was not without reason; but there is no room to\ndoubt the fact.  The little treatise, \u2018Pour les Coniques,\u2019 still\nsurvives.  It bears the date of 1640, and occupies only six pages. {26b}\nAfter a very clear statement of his subject, the writer modestly\nconcludes:\u2014\n\n    \u201cWe have several other problems and theorems, and several\n    consequences deducible from the preceding; but the mistrust which I\n    have of my slight experience and capacity does not permit me to\n    advance more till my present effort has passed the examination of\n    able men who may oblige me by looking at it.  Afterwards, if they\n    think it has sufficient merit to be continued, we shall endeavour to\n    push our studies as far as God will give the power to conduct them.\u201d\n\nIt is interesting to notice the beginning of relations betwixt Descartes\nand Pascal, considering the jealousy that afterwards arose betwixt them.\nThere is something of this feeling from the first in the older\nphilosopher, who was now in the forty-fourth year of his age, and in the\nfull zenith of his great reputation.  He appears to have been greatly\nfascinated by Pascal\u2019s peculiar powers; but the men were of too marked\nindividuality of character, and too divergent in intellectual sympathy\nand personal aspiration, to appreciate each other fully.\n\nPascal\u2019s next achievement was the invention of an arithmetical machine,\nchiefly prompted by a desire to assist his father in his official duties\nat Rouen.  He has given us no description of this machine from his own\npen.  In the \u201cAvis\u201d addressed to all whose curiosity was excited by it,\nhe excuses himself from this task by the natural remark that such a\ndescription would be useless without entering into a number of technical\ndetails unintelligible to the general reader; and that an actual\ninspection of it, combined with a brief _viv\u00e2 voce_ explanation, would be\nfar more satisfactory than any lengthened account in writing.  There is\nan elaborate description, however, of the machine, by Diderot, in the\nfirst volume of the \u2018Encyclop\u00e9die,\u2019 which is reprinted in the collection\nof Pascal\u2019s scientific works.  Pascal\u2019s main difficulties occurred, not\nin connection with the invention itself, which he seems to have very soon\nperfected according to his own conception, but with the construction of\nthe instrument after he had mentally worked it out in all its details.\nThese difficulties proved so great, and so many imperfect specimens of\nthe instrument were made, that, in order to secure both his reputation\nand his interest, he acquired in 1649 a special \u201cprivil\u00e9ge du Roi,\u201d which\nconfined the manufacture of the machine to himself, and such workmen as\nhe should employ and sanction.  All others, \u201cof whatever quality and\ncondition,\u201d were prohibited from \u201cmaking it, or causing it to be made, or\nselling it.\u201d  But neither these precautions nor the merits of the\ninvention itself, which were admitted by all competent judges, were of\navail to make the instrument a practical success.  Many men of\nmathematical and mechanical genius in different countries have applied\nthemselves to the same task.  The celebrated Leibnitz is said to have\nconstructed a machine excelling Pascal\u2019s in ingenuity and power.  In our\nown time, Mr Babbage\u2019s wonderful achievement in the same direction\nattracted wide attention, and has been lavishly eulogised by Sir David\nBrewster and others:\u2014\n\n    \u201cWhile all previous contrivances,\u201d says Sir David, {28a} \u201cperformed\n    only particular arithmetical operations, under a sort of copartnery\n    between the man and the machine, the extraordinary invention of Mr\n    Babbage actually substitutes mechanism in the place of man.  A\n    problem is given to the machine, and it solves it by computing a long\n    series of numbers following some given law.  In this manner it\n    calculates astronomical, logarithmic, and navigation tables, as well\n    as tables of the powers and products of numbers.  It can integrate,\n    too, innumerable equations of finite differences; and, in addition to\n    these functions, it does its work cheaply and quickly; _it corrects\n    whatever errors are accidentally committed_, _and it prints all its\n    calculations_.\u201d\n\nNotwithstanding this brilliant picture, the great expense and the\ncomplications involved in the construction of such an instrument have\nseriously interfered with its success.  It is said that Mr Babbage\u2019s\nmachine, much more his marvellous analytic engine, have never yet been\nproperly constructed. {28b}\n\nPascal fortunately turned his thoughts into a new and more fruitful\nchannel.  We have now to contemplate him as one of an illustrious band\nassociated in a great discovery in physical science.  Before his time\nconsiderable progress had been made towards a knowledge of atmospheric\npressure.  Galileo and his pupil Torricelli had both been busy with the\nsubject.  To Pascal, however, remains the glory of carrying successfully\nto a conclusion the suggestion of Torricelli, and of verifying the\nresults which he had indicated.  Here, as in almost all such discoveries,\nit is found that different minds have been actively pursuing the same or\nsimilar lines of thought and observation, and controversy has arisen as\nto the exact merits of each; but Pascal has himself so candidly explained\n{29a} how far he was indebted to his great Italian predecessors, and how\nfar he made original experiments of his own, that both his relation to\nthem and his own work stand clearly apparent.\n\nIt had been found by the engineers engaged in the construction of\nfountains for Cosmo dei Medici in Florence that they could not raise\nwater in an ordinary pump more than thirty-two feet above the reservoir.\nThe water, having reached this height, would rise no higher.  Galileo was\nappealed to for a solution of the difficulty. {29b}  Imbued with the\nancient notion that Nature abhors a vacuum, and that this was, as then\nprevalently believed, the explanation of the water following the\nelevation of the piston in the pump, the philosopher replied in effect\nthat there were limits to the action of this principle, and that Nature\u2019s\nabhorrence of a vacuum did not extend beyond thirty-two feet.  He was\nhimself, it need hardly be said, dissatisfied with such a reply, and\naccordingly he invited his pupil, Torricelli, to investigate the subject.\nThe latter very soon found that the weight of the water was concerned in\nthe result.  He made experiments with a heavier fluid\u2014mercury\u2014and\nascertained that a column of mercury enclosed in a tube three feet in\nlength hermetically sealed at the lower end, and closed with the finger\nat the top, on being inserted in a basin of the same liquid and the\nfinger withdrawn, stood at a height of about 28 inches in the basin.  As\nthe specific gravities of water and mercury were in the ratio of 32 feet\nand 28 inches, he was led to the conclusion that the water in the pump\nand the mercury in the tube at these respective heights exerted the same\npressure on the same base, and that both were of course counterbalanced\nby a determinate force.  But what was this force?  He had learned from\nGalileo that the air was a heavy fluid, and he was carried, therefore,\ndirectly to the further conclusion that the weight of the atmosphere was\nthe counteracting cause in both cases; in the one, pressing upon the\nreservoir from which the water was drawn\u2014and in the other, on the\nsurrounding mercury in the basin.  He published his experiments and\nresearches in 1645, but dying soon afterwards, his conclusions remained\nunverified.\n\nThe fame of Torricelli\u2019s experiments had reached Paris as early as 1644,\nbefore their formal publication.  Some one, Pascal says, had communicated\nthem to Father Mersenne\u2014both a religious and scientific intimate, as we\nhave already seen, of the Pascal family.  Mersenne had tried the\nexperiments for himself, at first without success, but soon with better\nfortune, after he had been to Rome and had learned more fully about them.\n\u201cThe news of these having reached Rouen in 1646, where I then was,\u201d says\nPascal, {31} \u201cI made the Italian experiment, founding on Mersenne\u2019s\naccount, with great success.  I repeated it several times, and in this\nmanner satisfying myself of its accuracy, I drew certain conclusions from\nit, for the proof of which I made new and very different experiments in\npresence of four or five hundred people of all sorts, and amongst others,\nfive or six Jesuit fathers of the College of Rouen.\u201d  When his\nexperiments became known in Paris, he adds, they were confounded with\nthose which had been made in Italy, and the result was that some\nattributed to him a credit which was not his due, while others, \u201cby a\ncontrary injustice,\u201d were disposed to take away the credit of what he had\nreally done.\n\nIt was with the view of placing the matter in a clear light, and\nvindicating his own share in the train of experiments which had been\nmade, that he published in 1647 his \u201cNouvelles Exp\u00e9riences touchant le\nVide,\u201d the first of his hydrostatical treatises.  He was at pains to\nexplain the distinction betwixt his own experiments and those which had\nbeen made in Italy; and not content with this, he added in express words,\nin an \u201cavis au lecteur,\u201d that he \u201cwas not the inventor of the original\nexperiment, but that it had been made in Italy four years before.\u201d  So\nlittle, indeed, did Pascal borrow directly from Torricelli, or seek to\nappropriate the fruits of his researches, that he was as yet ignorant of\nthe explanation which the Italian had suggested of the phenomenon so\nfully established.  He saw, of course, that the old maxim of Nature\nabhorring a vacuum had no solid foundation; but he tried to account for\nthe vacuum above the water and the mercury by such a supposition as the\nfollowing:\u2014\n\n    \u201cThat it contained no portion of either of these fluids, or of any\n    matter appreciable by the senses; that all bodies have a repugnance\n    to separate from a state of continuity, and admit a vacuum between\n    them; that this repugnance is not greater for a large vacuum than a\n    small one; that its measure is a column of water about 32 feet in\n    height, and that beyond this limit a great or small vacuum is formed\n    above the water with the same facility, provided that no foreign\n    obstacle interfere to prevent it.\u201d\n\nPascal\u2019s treatise, while still retaining so much of the old traditional\nphysics, was made an object of lively attack by the Jesuit Rector of the\nCollege of Paris, Stephen No\u00ebl.  Pascal replied to him at first directly;\nand then in answer to a second attack\u2014and so far also in answer to a\ntreatise by the Jesuit, entitled \u201cLe Plein du Vide,\u201d published in 1648\u2014he\nmade a more elaborate statement in a letter addressed to M. le Pailleur,\nand in a further letter addressed to Father No\u00ebl in the same year.  There\ncan hardly be any doubt that this was the commencement of Pascal\u2019s\nhostile relations with the Jesuits.  On their part, they failed not to\nremember in after years, and in a more serious struggle, that he was an\nold enemy; whilst he on his part probably drew something of the\ncontemptuous scorn which he poured upon them from the recollection of\ntheir obstinate ignorance in matters of science.\n\nMeanwhile, in defending himself from the attacks of ignorance, Pascal did\nnot fail to open his own mind to fuller scientific light.  As soon as the\nexplanation of Torricelli was communicated to him, he accepted it without\nhesitation, and resolved to carry out a further series of experiments\nwith the view of verifying this explanation, and of banishing for ever\nthe scholastic nonsense of Nature\u2019s abhorrence of a vacuum.  If the\nweight of the air was really the cause which sustained the height of the\nmercury in the Torricellian tube, he saw at once that this height would\nvary at different elevations, according to the varying degree of\natmospheric pressure at these elevations.  He proceeded accordingly to\ntest the result; but the higher levels around Rouen were too\ninsignificant to enable him to draw any decisive inference.  Accordingly,\nhe communicated with his brother-in-law in Auvergne with the view of\nhaving an adequate experiment made during an ascent of the Puy de D\u00f4me,\nwhich rises in the neighbourhood of Clermont to a height of about 3000\nfeet.  The state of his own health prevented him from conducting the\nexperiment personally, and M. P\u00e9rier was detained by professional\navocations from undertaking it immediately.  But at length, in September\n1648, the experiment was carried out successfully, and the results\ncommunicated to Pascal.  I cannot do better than quote the account of\nthis important event as rendered by an eminent scientific authority, {33}\nfrom M. P\u00e9rier\u2019s own recital of the facts in his letter to Pascal:\u2014\n\n    \u201cOn the morning of Saturday, the 19th September, the day fixed for\n    the interesting observation, the weather was unsettled; but about\n    five o\u2019clock the summit of the Puy de D\u00f4me began to appear through\n    the clouds, and P\u00e9rier resolved to proceed with the experiment.  The\n    leading characters in Clermont, whether ecclesiastics or laymen, had\n    taken a deep interest in the subject, and had requested P\u00e9rier to\n    give them notice of his plans.  He accordingly summoned his friends,\n    and at eight in the morning there assembled in the garden of the\n    P\u00e8res Minimes, about a league below the town, M. Bannier, of the\n    P\u00e8res Minimes; M. Mosnier, canon of the cathedral church; along with\n    MM. la Ville and Begon, counsellors of the Court of Aides, and M. la\n    Porte, doctor and professor of medicine in Clermont.  These five\n    individuals were not only distinguished in their respective\n    professions, but also by their scientific acquirements; and M. P\u00e9rier\n    expresses his delight at having been on this occasion associated with\n    them.  M. P\u00e9rier began the experiment by pouring into a vessel 16 lb.\n    of quicksilver, which he had rectified during the three preceding\n    days.  He then took two glass tubes, four feet long, of the same\n    bore, and hermetically sealed at one end and open at the other; and\n    making the ordinary experiment of a vacuum with both, he found that\n    the mercury stood in each of them at the same level and at the height\n    of 26 inches 3\u00bd lines.  This experiment was repeated twice, with the\n    same result.  One of these glass tubes, with the mercury standing in\n    it, was left under the care of M. Chastin, one of the Religious of\n    the House, who undertook to observe and mark any changes in it that\n    might take place during the day; and the party already named set out\n    with the other tube for the summit of the Puy de D\u00f4me, about 500\n    toises (a toise is about six feet in length) above their first\n    station.  Before arriving there, they found that the mercury stood at\n    the height of 23 inches and 2 lines\u2014no less than 3 inches and 1\u00bd line\n    lower than it stood at the Minimes.  The party were \u2018struck with\n    admiration and astonishment at this result;\u2019 and \u2018so great was their\n    surprise that they resolved to repeat the experiment under various\n    forms.\u2019  The glass tube, or the barometer, as we may call it, was\n    placed in various positions on the summit of \u2018the mountain\u2019\u2014sometimes\n    in the small chapel which is there; sometimes in an exposed and\n    sometimes in a sheltered position; sometimes when the wind blew, and\n    sometimes when it was calm; sometimes in rain, and sometimes in a\n    fog: and under all these various influences, which fortunately took\n    place during the same day, the quicksilver stood at the same height\n    of 23 inches 2 lines.  During their descent of the mountain they\n    repeated the experiment at _Lafon-de-l\u2019Arbre_, an intermediate\n    station, nearer the Minimes than the summit of the Puy, \u2018and they\n    found the mercury to stand at the height of 25 inches\u2014a result with\n    which the party was greatly pleased,\u2019 as indicating the relation\n    between the height of the mercury and the height of the station.\n    Upon reaching the Minimes, they found that the mercury had not\n    changed its height, notwithstanding the inconstancy of the weather,\n    which had been alternately clear, windy, rainy, and foggy.  M. P\u00e9rier\n    repeated the experiments with both the glass tubes, and found the\n    height of the mercury to be still 26 inches 3\u00bd lines.  On the\n    following morning M. de la Marc, priest of the Oratory, to whom M.\n    P\u00e9rier had mentioned the preceding results, proposed to have the\n    experiment repeated at the top and bottom of the towers of Notre Dame\n    in Clermont.  He accordingly yielded to his request, and found the\n    difference to be 2 lines.  Upon comparing these observations, M.\n    P\u00e9rier obtained the following results, showing the changes in the\n    altitude of the mercurial column corresponding to certain differences\n    of altitude of position:\u2014\n\n    Difference of altitude.        Changes in the height of the mercury.\n\n    Toises.                        Lines.\n\n    500                            37\u00bd\n\n    150                            15\u00bd\n\n    27                             2\u00bd\n\n    7                              \u00bd\n\n    When Pascal received these results, all the difficulties were\n    removed; and perceiving from the two last observations in the\n    preceding table that 20 toises, or about 120 feet, produce a change\n    of 2 lines, and 7 toises, or 42 feet, a change of \u00bd a line, he made\n    the observation at the top and bottom of the tower of St Jacques de\n    la Boucherie, which was about 24 or 25 toises, or about 150 feet\n    high, and he found a difference of more than 2 lines in the mercurial\n    column; and in a private house 90 steps high he found a difference of\n    \u00bd a line. . . .  After this important experiment was made, Pascal\n    intimated to M. P\u00e9rier that different states of the weather would\n    occasion differences in the barometer, according as it was cold, hot,\n    dry, or moist; and in order to put this opinion to the test of\n    experiment, M. P\u00e9rier instituted a series of observations, which he\n    continued from the beginning of 1649 till March 1651.  Corresponding\n    observations were made at the same time at Paris and at Stockholm by\n    the French ambassador, M. Chanut, and Descartes; and from these it\n    appeared that the mercury rises in weather which is cold, cloudy, and\n    damp, and falls when the weather is hot and dry, and during rain and\n    snow, but still with such irregularities that no general rule could\n    be established.  At Clermont the difference between the highest and\n    the lowest state of the mercury was 1 inch 3\u00bd lines; at Paris the\n    same; and at Stockholm 2 inches 2\u00bd lines.\u201d\n\nFrom the account here presented of these researches, there is no\ndifficulty in determining the exact credit due to Pascal on the one hand,\nand his Italian predecessors on the other.  He completed what they had\nbegun, and verified what they had indicated.  As the Abb\u00e9 Bossut has\nexpressed it, Galileo proved that air was a heavy fluid; Torricelli\nconceived that its weight was the cause of the suspension of the water in\na pump and the mercury in a tube.  Pascal demonstrated that this was the\nfact.  No one was more anxious than Pascal himself that Torricelli should\nbe acknowledged as the real discoverer of the principle which it was left\nto him to establish by the test of experiment.  He claimed, however, his\nown definite share in the discovery, both as having carried on a series\nof independent experiments, and as having converted what he himself calls\nthe \u201cconjecture\u201d of Torricelli into an established fact.  It was painful\nto him, therefore, to have this share denied, and even open accusations\nmade against him that he had appropriated, without acknowledgment, the\nresults of Torricelli\u2019s researches.  This accusation was made in certain\ntheses of philosophy maintained in the Jesuit College of Montferrand in\n1651, and dedicated to Pascal\u2019s own friend, M. de Ribeyre, first\npresident at the Court of Aides at Clermont.  Pascal\u2019s name was not\nindeed mentioned in these theses; but there could be no doubt of the\nallusion made to \u201ccertain persons loving novelty\u201d who claimed to be the\ninventors of a definite experiment of which Torricelli was the real\nauthor.  It was this accusation which drew from Pascal his letter to M.\nRibeyre, bearing the date of 12th July of the same year, in which he has\ndescribed, with admirable lucidity and temper, his relations to the whole\nsubject.  In this letter he distinctly says that the Italian experiments\nwere known in France from the year 1644; that they were repeated in\nFrance by several persons in several places during 1646; that he himself\nhad made, as we have already seen, definite experiments in 1647, and\npublished the results in the same year; and that he had then not\nmentioned the name of Torricelli, because, while he knew that the\nexperiments were made in Italy four years before, he did not then know\nthat the experimenter was Torricelli; but that so soon as he learned this\nfact\u2014which he and his friends were so eager to know, that they sent a\nspecial letter of inquiry to Rome\u2014he was \u201cravished with the idea that the\nexperimenter was so illustrious a genius, whose mathematical writings,\nalready well known, surpassed those of all antiquity.\u201d  He says, in\nconclusion, that it was only in the same year (1647), after the\npublication of his own researches, that he learned \u201cthe very fine\nthought\u201d of Torricelli concerning the cause of all the effects which had\nbeen attributed to the horror of a vacuum.  But \u201cas this was only a\nconjecture as yet unverified,\u201d he then, with the view of ascertaining the\ntruth or falsehood of it, conceived the plan of the experiments carried\nout by M. P\u00e9rier at the top and the foot of the Puy de D\u00f4me.  \u201cIt is\ntrue, sir,\u201d he adds, \u201cand I say it boldly, that this series of\nexperiments was my own invention; and therefore I may say that the new\nknowledge thus acquired is entirely due to me.\u201d\n\nTo this letter M. Ribeyre made a satisfactory and touching reply.  He\nexpresses disapproval of the allusion of the Jesuit father, but as the\ndiscourse was otherwise free from offence, he was willing to attribute it\nto a \u201cpardonable emulation among _savants_,\u201d rather than to any intention\nof assailing Pascal.  He makes, in short, the best excuse he can for the\nJesuit, and hastens to assure Pascal that his reputation needed no\njustification:\u2014\n\n    \u201cYour candour and your sincerity are too well known to admit any\n    belief that you could do anything inconsistent with the virtuous\n    profession apparent in all your actions and manner.  I honour and\n    revere your virtue more than your science; and as in both the one and\n    the other you equal the most famous of the age, do not think it\n    strange if, adding to the common esteem which all have of you, a\n    friendship contracted many years ago with your father, I subscribe\n    myself yours,\u201d etc.\n\nBut Pascal had to sustain suspicion and attack in a quarter more\nformidable than that of the Jesuit fathers at Montferrand.  We have\nalready spoken of the rather unhappy commencement of relations between\nhim and Descartes.  Farther on we get a more pleasant glimpse of these\nrelations, in a letter from Jacqueline Pascal to Madame P\u00e9rier, dated\n25th September 1647, and apparently shortly after Pascal had retired to\nParis, along with his younger sister, leaving their father for some time\nstill at Rouen.  This letter is so interesting, both in its bearing on\nthe question which arose between Descartes and Pascal, and in itself, as\ngiving the only account we have of personal intercourse between these two\nillustrious men, that we present it almost entire:\u2014\n\n    \u201cI have delayed writing to you,\u201d Jacqueline says, addressing her\n    sister, {39a} \u201cbecause I wished to tell to you at length of the\n    interview of M. Descartes and my brother, and I had no leisure\n    yesterday to say that on the evening of Sunday last M. Habert {39b}\n    came, accompanied by M. de Montigny, a gentleman of Brittany, with\n    the view of letting me know, in the absence of my brother, who was at\n    church, that M. Descartes, his compatriot and good friend, had\n    expressed a strong desire to see my brother, for the sake of the\n    great esteem in which both he and my father were everywhere held, and\n    that he begged to be allowed to wait upon him next day at nine\n    o\u2019clock in the morning, if this would not inconvenience him, whom he\n    knew to be an invalid.  When M. de Montigny proposed this, I felt\n    hindered from giving a definite answer, because I knew that my\n    brother was reluctant to force himself to conversation, especially in\n    the morning.  Nevertheless, I did not think it right to refuse, so we\n    arranged that he should come at half-past ten next day.  Along with\n    M. Habert and M. de Montigny there were also a young man in the dress\n    of a priest, whom I did not know, M. de Montigny\u2019s son, and two or\n    three other young people.  M. de Roberval, whom my brother had\n    informed of the intended visit, was also present.  After some\n    civilities, talk fell upon the instrument [probably that which Pascal\n    had used in the experiments], which was very much admired, while M.\n    de Roberval showed it.  Then they spoke of the idea of a vacuum; and\n    M. Descartes, on hearing of the experiments, and being asked what he\n    thought was within the tube (_dans la seringue_), said with great\n    seriousness that it was some subtle matter, to which my brother\n    replied what he could.  M. Roberval, believing that my brother had\n    difficulty in speaking, took up the reply to M. Descartes with some\n    heat, yet with perfect civility.  M. Descartes answered with some\n    harshness that he would talk to my brother as much as he wished,\n    because he spoke with reason, but not to any one who spoke with\n    prejudice.  Thereupon, finding from his watch it was mid-day, he\n    rose, being engaged to dine at the Faubourg Saint Germain.  M.\n    Roberval also rose, in such a way that M. Descartes conducted him to\n    a carriage, where the two were alone, and battled at one another more\n    strongly than playfully, as M. Roberval, who returned here after\n    dinner, told us. . . .  I have forgotten to tell you that M.\n    Descartes, annoyed at seeing so little of my brother, promised to\n    return next day at eight o\u2019clock. . . .  He desired this, partly to\n    consult regarding my brother\u2019s illness, as to which, however, he did\n    not communicate anything of importance, only he counselled him to\n    remain in bed every day as long as he could till he was tired, and to\n    take plenty of soup.  They spoke of many other things, for he was\n    here till eleven o\u2019clock, but I cannot tell you more particularly\n    what they said, as I was not present on this occasion.  We were\n    prevented during the whole day from making him take his early bath.\n    He had found it give him a little headache, but that was because he\n    had taken it too late; and I believe the bleeding at the foot on\n    Sunday had done him good, for on Monday he conversed freely and\n    strongly all day\u2014in the morning with M. Descartes, and after dinner\n    with M. de Roberval, with whom he argued for a long time on many\n    things, both belonging to theology and physics, and yet he took no\n    further harm than perspiring much, and slept rather sound during the\n    night.\u201d\n\nThe revelations of this letter are very curious.  The respectful desire\nof Descartes, already so distinguished, to make Pascal\u2019s acquaintance,\nand to enter into conversation with him; his resentment of Roberval\u2019s\ninterference, and their earnest altercation, prolonged in the carriage\nafter leaving Pascal\u2019s house; the evidently serious character of Pascal\u2019s\nmaladies, and the watchful attention of his sister.  It is clear through\nall that Descartes had been busily occupied with the same physical\nproblems as Pascal, and that he was somewhat jealous of the results\ntowards which Pascal and his friends were tending.  Evidently there was a\ncertain measure of unfriendliness between Roberval and Descartes.  I am\nunable, however, to see any traces of a coterie surrounding Pascal and\ninimical to Descartes, as M. Cousin suggests. {41}  If such a coterie\nexisted at this time in Paris, of which the \u201chasty and jealous Roberval\u201d\nwas the centre, and which delighted in \u201cabusing Descartes, and attacking\nhim on all sides,\u201d Jacqueline\u2019s frank and lively letter seems enough to\nshow that while Roberval was Pascal\u2019s friend and Descartes\u2019s disputant,\nthere was nothing in the meantime between Descartes and Pascal but\ncourteous friendliness and a cordial feeling of mutual respect.\n\nDescartes, however, in his retirement at Stockholm, plainly cherished the\nimpression that Roberval\u2019s intimacy with Pascal prevented the latter from\ndoing full justice to his scientific position and suggestions; and having\nas yet heard nothing, in June 1649, of the special results of Pascal\u2019s\nexperiments on the Puy de D\u00f4me in the preceding year, he wrote to his\nfriend Carcavi to let him know about these.\n\n    \u201cI pray you, let me know of the success of an experiment which Pascal\n    is said to have made on the mountains of Auvergne. . . .  I had the\n    right to expect this of him rather than of you, because it was I who\n    advised him two years ago to make the experiment, and who assured him\n    that, although I had not made it, I had no doubt of its success.  But\n    _as he is the friend of M. Roberval_, _who professes not to be mine_,\n    _I have some reason to think he follows the passions of his friend_.\u201d\n    {42a}\n\nThat letter was immediately communicated to Pascal by Carcavi, who was\nhis intimate associate no less than Roberval.  But it seems to have\nelicited no reply.  Bossut {42b} says that he despised it.  On the other\nhand, Descartes\u2019s biographer and eulogist, Baillet, blames Pascal for\nhaving carefully kept out of view Descartes\u2019s name in all the accounts of\nhis discoveries; and produces an array of passages from Descartes\u2019s\nletters, showing plainly that his mind was in the line of discovery\nfinally verified by the experiments in Auvergne. {43a}  It may be granted\nbeyond doubt this was the case.  It would ill become any admirer of\nPascal to detract from the glory of Descartes.  But it must be held no\nless firmly, that in the personal question raised by Descartes\u2019s letter,\nthe balance of evidence is all in favour of Pascal.  There are no\nindications that the two men ever met save on the occasion so frankly\ndescribed by his sister Jacqueline.  Before this Pascal had not only been\nbusy with the subject, but says distinctly that he had meditated the\nexperiment finally made on the Puy de D\u00f4me from the time that he\npublished his first researches. {43b}  It was not, indeed, till about six\nweeks after Descartes\u2019s visit, or on the 15th December 1647, that he\ncommunicated with M. P\u00e9rier regarding these experiments, and his earnest\ndesire that they should be made; and it was not till the following\nSeptember, or about a year after Descartes\u2019s visit, that they were\nactually made.  But it is incredible that Pascal could have written as he\ndid if he had really, for the first time, been indebted to Descartes for\nthe suggestion.  Descartes\u2019s name is not mentioned in his correspondence\nwith M. P\u00e9rier, nor in any of his writings on the subject; and the delay\nin making the experiments is sufficiently explained by the facts stated\nby himself, that they could only be made effectually at some place of\ngreater elevation than he could command\u2014such as \u201cClermont, at the foot of\nthe Puy de D\u00f4me\u201d\u2014and by some person, such as M. P\u00e9rier, on whose\nknowledge and accuracy he could rely.  If we add to this the force of the\nstatement already quoted from his letter to M. Ribeyre, four years\nafterwards, or in 1651, that he claimed the experiments as entirely \u201chis\nown invention,\u201d and that he did so \u201cboldly,\u201d the case seems put beyond\nall doubt\u2014unless we are to suppose the author of the \u2018Provincial Letters\u2019\nand the \u2018Thoughts\u2019 capable of wilful suppression of the truth.  On the\nother hand, it is unnecessary to attribute to Descartes anything beyond a\nmistaken opinion of the value of certain statements which he had no doubt\nmade to Pascal, and possibly some confusion of memory.  And that this is\nnot an unwarranted view appears from what he says in a subsequent letter\nto M. Carcavi, on the 17th August of the same year, 1649\u2014that he was\ngreatly interested in hearing of the success of the experiments, having\ntwo years before besought Pascal to make them, and assured him of\nsuccess\u2014because the supposed explanation was one, he adds, \u201centirely\nconsistent with the principles of my philosophy, apart from which he\n[Pascal], would not have thought of it, his own opinion being quite\ncontrary.\u201d {44}  This may or may not be true.  Pascal certainly held as\nlong as he could to the old maxim of \u201cNature\u2019s abhorrence of a vacuum.\u201d\n\u201cI do not think it allowable,\u201d he says in his letter to M. P\u00e9rier, \u201cto\ndepart lightly from maxims handed down to us by antiquity, unless\ncompelled by invincible proofs.\u201d  But the notions of Descartes on the\nsubject of a vacuum were at least as confused as those originally held by\nPascal. {45a}  It is absurd, therefore, to suppose that the latter could\nhave been indebted to the principles of the Cartesian philosophy\u2014not to\nsay that this is a very different suggestion from that of the former\nletter, that Descartes himself had advised the experiment to be made.\nEvidently the older philosopher wrote under vague and somewhat inflated\nideas of the value of his labours and his conversation with Pascal; while\nthe latter, again, absorbed in his own thoughts on the subject, and\nunconscious that he had received any special impulse from Descartes or\nhis philosophy, naturally made no mention of his name.  His silence when\nDescartes\u2019s accusation was communicated to him indicates the same\nsomewhat lofty reserve and confidence in the independence of his own\nresearches, rather than any contempt.  He felt too sure of his position\nto think of defending himself, or of repelling what he no doubt regarded\nas not so much a deliberate assault on the value of his own work, as an\nexaggerated estimate by the other of his share in that work.\n\nPascal\u2019s researches regarding atmospheric pressure conducted him\ngradually to the examination of the general laws of the equilibrium of\nfluids. {45b}  It had been already determined that the pressure of a\nfluid on its base is as the product of the base multiplied by the height\nof the fluid, and that all fluids press equally on all sides of the\nvessels enclosing them.  But it still remained to determine exactly the\nmeasure of the pressure, in order to deduce the general conditions of\nequilibrium.  With the view of ascertaining this, Pascal made two unequal\napertures in a vessel filled with fluid, and enclosed on all sides.  He\nthen applied two pistons to these apertures, pressed by forces\nproportional to the respective apertures, and the fluid remained _in\nequilibrio_.  \u201cHaving established this truth by two methods equally\ningenious and satisfactory, he deduced from it the different cases of the\nequilibrium of fluids, and particularly with solid bodies, compressible\nand incompressible, when either partly or wholly immersed in them.\u201d\n\n    \u201cBut the most remarkable part of his treatise on the \u2018Equilibrium of\n    Fluids,\u2019\u201d continues Sir David Brewster, from whose exposition we\n    quote, {46a} \u201cand one which of itself would have immortalised him, is\n    his application of the general principle to the construction of what\n    he calls the \u2018mechanical machine for multiplying forces,\u2019 {46b}\u2014an\n    effect which, he says, may be produced to any extent we choose, as\n    one may by means of this machine raise a weight of any magnitude.\n    This new machine is the _Hydrostatic Press_, first introduced by our\n    celebrated countryman, Mr Bramah.\n\n    \u201cPascal\u2019s treatise on the weight of the whole mass of air forms the\n    basis of the modern science of Pneumatics.  In order to prove that\n    the mass of air presses by its weight on all the bodies which it\n    surrounds, and also that it is elastic and compressible, a balloon\n    half filled with air was carried to the top of the Puy de D\u00f4me.  It\n    gradually inflated itself as it ascended, and when it reached the\n    summit it was quite full and swollen, as if fresh air had been blown\n    into it; or what is the same thing, it swelled in proportion as the\n    weight of the column of air which pressed upon it diminished.  When\n    again brought down, it became more and more flaccid, and, when it\n    reached the bottom, it resumed its original condition.  In the nine\n    chapters of which the treatise consists, he shows that all the\n    phenomena or effects hitherto ascribed to the horror of a vacuum,\n    arise from the weight of the mass of air; and after explaining the\n    variable pressure of the atmosphere in different localities, and in\n    its different states, and the rise of the water in pumps, he\n    calculates that the whole mass of air round our globe weighs\n    8,983,889,440,000,000,000 French pounds.\n\n    \u201cHaving thus completed his researches respecting elastic and\n    incompressible fluids, Pascal seems to have resumed with a fatal\n    enthusiasm his mathematical studies: but, unfortunately for science,\n    several of the works which he composed have been lost.  Others,\n    however, have been preserved, which entitle him to a high rank\n    amongst the greatest mathematicians of the age.  Of these, his\n    \u2018Trait\u00e9 du Triangle Arithm\u00e9tique,\u2019 his \u2018Tractatus de Numericis\n    Ordinibus,\u2019 and his \u2018Problemata de Cycloide,\u2019 are the chief.  By\n    means of the _Arithmetical Triangle_, an invention equally ingenious\n    and original, he succeeded in solving a number of theorems which it\n    would have been difficult to demonstrate in any other way, and in\n    finding the coefficients of different terms of a binomial raised to\n    an even and positive power.  The same principles enabled him to lay\n    the foundation of the doctrine of probabilities, an important branch\n    of mathematical science, which Huyghens, a few years afterwards,\n    improved, and which the Marquis la Place and M. Poisson have so\n    greatly extended.  These treatises, with the exception of that on the\n    Cycloid, were composed and printed in the year 1654, but were not\n    published till 1668, after the death of the author.\u201d\n\nPascal\u2019s discoveries as to the cycloid belong to a later period of his\nlife, after he had long forsaken the scientific studies which engrossed\nhim at this time, and had become an inmate of Port Royal.  But, as we\nhave already said, it is well to complete our view of his scientific\nlabours in a single chapter.\n\nDuring an access of severe toothache which, in 1658, deprived him of\nsleep, his thoughts fastened on certain problems connected with the\ncycloid.  Fermat, Roberval, and Torricelli had all been occupied with the\nsubject, and made some definite progress in ascertaining its properties.\nBut much still remained to be done, and especially to resolve the\nproblems connected with it in a \u201cgeneral and uniform manner.\u201d  \u201cPascal,\u201d\nsays Bossut, \u201cdevised within eight days, and in the midst of cruel\nsufferings, a method which embraced all the problems\u2014a method founded\nupon the summation of certain series, of which he had given the elements\nin his writings accompanying his \u2018Trait\u00e9 du Triangle Arithm\u00e9tique.\u2019  From\nthis discovery there was only a step to that of the Differential and\nIntegral Calculus; and it may be confidently presumed that, if Pascal had\nproceeded with his mathematical studies, he would have anticipated\nLeibnitz and Newton in the glory of their great invention.\u201d\n\nHaving communicated the result of his geometrical meditation to the Duc\nde Roannez and some of his other religious friends, they conceived the\ndesign of making it subservient to the triumph of religion.  Pascal\nhimself was an illustrious example that the highest mathematical genius\nand the humblest Christian piety might be united; but in order to give\n_\u00e9clat_ to such an example, his friends proposed to propound publicly the\nquestions solved by the great Port Royalist in his moments of suffering,\nand to offer prizes for the best solutions given of them.  This they did\nin June 1658.  A programme was published making the offer of prizes of\nforty and twenty pistoles, for the best determination of the area and the\ncentre of gravity of any segment of the cycloid, and the dimensions and\ncentres of gravity of solids and half and quarter solids which the same\ncurve would generate by revolving round an abscissa and an ordinate.  The\nprogramme was put forth in the name of Amos Dettonville, the anagram of\nPascal\u2019s assumed name as the writer of the \u2018Provincial Letters.\u2019\nHuyghens, Sluzsius, a canon of the Cathedral of Li\u00e8ge, and Wren, the\narchitect of St Paul\u2019s, sent in partial solutions of the problems\u2014those\nof Wren especially attracting the interest of both Fermat and Roberval.\nBut Wallis, of Oxford, and Lallou\u00e8re, a Jesuit of Toulouse, were the only\ntwo competitors who treated all the problems proposed.  It was held that\nthey had not completely succeeded in solving them; and Dettonville\npublished his own solution in an elaborate letter addressed to M.\nCarcavi, and in a treatise on the subject.  Carcavi was an old friend of\nPascal\u2019s father as well as of himself; and being a lawyer as well as a\nmathematician, the arrangement of the affair seems to have been intrusted\nto him.  This did not save him, however, from attacks by the disappointed\ncandidates, who accused him of unfairness; and Leibnitz has given his\ndecision that both Wallis and Lallou\u00e8re, in the treatises which they\npublished,\u2014which did not, however, appear till after Pascal\u2019s,\u2014had\nsucceeded in solving the problems.  Upon such a point we cannot pretend\nto judge; but it may be safely said that the design of the Duc de Roannez\nwas hardly realised in the issue.  It was sufficiently proved, indeed,\nthat Pascal, in the midst of all his austerities and devotional\nexercises, was the same Pascal who had held his own both with Descartes\nand with the Jesuits.  But the life of thought which survived in him no\nsooner touched the outer world of intellectual ambition, than it flamed\nforth into something of the passion of controversy which his pen had\nalready kindled in another direction.  Religion is best vindicated, not\nin the strifes of science, but by the beauty of its own activities.\n\nPascal\u2019s labours on the cycloid may be said to bring to a close his\nscientific career.  There is still one invention, however, of a very\npractical kind, associated with the very last months of his life.\nAmongst the letters of Madame P\u00e9rier, there is one of date March 24,\n1662, addressed to M. Arnauld de Pompone {50}\u2014a nephew of the great\nArnauld\u2014in which she gives a lively description of the success of an\nexperiment \u201cdans l\u2019affaire des carrosses.\u201d  The affair was nothing less\nthan the trial on certain routes in Paris of what is now known as an\n\u201comnibus;\u201d and the idea of such conveyances for the public\u2014\u201ccarrosses \u00e0\ncinq sols,\u201d as they were called\u2014is attributed to Pascal.  It is certain\nthat the privilege of running \u201ccarrosses \u00e0 cinq sols\u201d was granted to\nPascal\u2019s friend, the Duc de Roannez, and to other noblemen, by royal\npatent, in January 1662,\u2014and that the experiment, as described by Madame\nP\u00e9rier, was made with great success in the following March, and that\nPascal had an active interest in the undertaking.  His sister tells that\nhe had mortgaged his share of its first year\u2019s profits in order to\nprovide for the poor at Blois; {51} and a note from his own hand,\nappended to his sister\u2019s letter, shows with what eagerness he entered\ninto the affair and hailed its success.  It is singular to connect the\nname of Pascal, and that, too, during the last sad months of his life,\nwith so world-wide a commonplace as the omnibus.\n\n\n\n\nCHAPTER III.\nPASCAL IN THE WORLD.\n\n\nPascal\u2019s health, we have seen, was very delicate.  His labours to perfect\nhis arithmetical machine had seriously impaired it.  The attack of\npartial paralysis, described by his niece, seems to have taken place in\nthe early summer of 1647.  As soon as he was able, he removed to Paris,\nwhere we find him settled with his younger sister in September of the\nsame year.  It was on the twenty-fifth of this month that Jacqueline\nwrites from Paris of Descartes\u2019s memorable visits.  One of the motives of\nhis change of residence was no doubt to consult the best physicians of\nthe day; and Descartes, who, amongst his other numerous gifts, had some\nskill in medicine, made his second visit to him partly as a physician.\n\u201cHe came in part,\u201d says Jacqueline, \u201cto consult as to my brother\u2019s\nillness.\u201d  He appears to have given him very sound advice, which,\nunfortunately, Pascal did not follow\u2014\u201cto lie in bed as much as he could,\nand take strong soup.\u201d  On the contrary, he was \u201cbled, bathed, and\npurged,\u201d after the usual medical routine of the time, apparently without\nany good effects, or any alleviation of his sufferings.\n\nThe father also returned to Paris in May 1648.  The Provincial\nParliament, with regained authority, had exacted the recall of the\nIntendants appointed by the Court.  \u00c9tienne Pascal\u2019s services were\nremunerated by the dignity of a Counsellor of State, and he was set at\nliberty to rejoin his children.  It was at this period that the struggle\ntook place betwixt father and daughter as to the latter\u2019s determination\nto choose a religious life.  Encouraged by her brother after his access\nof zeal at Rouen, Jacqueline was gradually more and more drawn towards\npiety.  After their settlement in Paris they went frequently together to\nthe Church of Port Royal de Paris, to listen to the sermons of M.\nSinglin, whose touching pictures of the beauty and perfection of the\nChristian life awoke in the youthful enthusiast the desire of entering\nPort Royal.  She opened personal communications with the sainted head of\nthe House, the M\u00e8re Ang\u00e9lique, and also with M. Singlin, who recognised\nin her all the marks of a true vocation, but who would not allow her to\nproceed further without her father\u2019s consent and approval.  The brother\nat this time strongly sympathised with her aspirations, and favoured\nthem.  On the father\u2019s arrival in Paris, the design of his daughter was\nimparted to him.  He was greatly surprised and moved by the\nproposition\u2014pleased, on the one hand, by his daughter\u2019s devotion, and yet\ndeeply wounded by the idea of parting with her.  He took time for\nconsideration, and at length made up his mind that it was impossible to\ngive his consent.  Not only so, but he strongly blamed his son, who had\nbroken the matter to him, for encouraging his sister\u2019s design without\nfirst ascertaining whether it would be agreeable to himself, and he seems\nfor the time to have felt so much distrust in them both, that he\ninstructed an old domestic, who had been with them from their youth, to\nwatch over their actions.  This is the narrative of Madame P\u00e9rier; {54a}\nand the unpleasantness which arose out of this event appears also implied\nin Jacqueline\u2019s letter to her sister in the spring of the same year.\n{54b}\n\nIn 1649 the Pascal family left Paris for Auvergne, and seem to have\nremained there for about a year and a half.  Madame P\u00e9rier says nothing\nof this visit, so far as her brother is concerned, beyond the fact that\nhe accompanied Jacqueline and her father.  The likelihood, however, is,\nthat the visit was in some degree prompted by a regard for Pascal\u2019s\nhealth.  He had made in Paris some progress towards recovery,\nnotwithstanding the severity of his treatment.  But he was still far from\nwell, and it was judged necessary, \u201cin order to re-establish him\nentirely, that he should abandon every sort of mental occupation, and\nseek, as much as he could, opportunities of amusing himself.\u201d  Her\nbrother, she adds, was very reluctant to take this advice, \u201cbecause he\nsaw its danger.\u201d  At length, however, he yielded, \u201cconsidering himself\nobliged to do all he could to restore his health, and because he thought\nthat trivial amusements could not harm him.  So he set himself on the\nworld.\u201d  When this definite change in Pascal\u2019s life began is left\nuncertain, but there are indications that he had largely abandoned his\nstudies in 1649 and the following year.  During these years there is\nnothing from his pen.  The interval between the \u201crecital\u201d of the\nexperiments on the Puy de D\u00f4me (1648), and his letter to M. Ribeyre, 12th\nJuly 1651, is blank in any record of scientific or literary labour.  This\nis not conclusive, of course, that he was idle; but taken in connection\nwith the remarks of his sister, and the retirement to Auvergne, it\nsuggests that the family may have sought there, in rural isolation and\ndomestic reunion, the means of entirely withdrawing Pascal from his\nseverer studies, and the scientific companions who were constantly\nprompting them in Paris.  It may be, also, that the father sought the\nmeans of withdrawing Jacqueline from the neighbourhood of Port Royal, and\nfrom the equally exciting associations to her connected with that\nneighbourhood.\n\nOf Pascal\u2019s life at this time in Auvergne we know nothing, or next to\nnothing.  There is, indeed, a single trace, of which the most has been\nmade, in the Memoirs of Fl\u00e9chier, describing his stay at Clermont in 1665\nand 1666, a few years after Pascal\u2019s death.  In these Memoirs, Fl\u00e9chier\nrelates an anecdote of a young lady \u201cwho was the Sappho of the country,\u201d\nand greatly beloved by all the _beaux esprits_ of the time.  Amongst\nothers, \u201cM. Pascal, who had then acquired so much reputation, and another\n_savant_, were continually with this _belle savante_.\u201d  It is difficult\nto know what to make of this vague if piquant anecdote.  Some of Pascal\u2019s\nmore religious admirers have even been scandalised by it, and have tried\nto show that it could not refer to the author of the \u2018Pens\u00e9es.\u2019  M.\nCousin and other parties have emphasised it too much. {55}  There seems\nno reason to doubt that the anecdote relates to the younger Pascal\u2014it\ncannot reasonably be supposed to relate to his father.  Nor is there any\nground to suppose that Pascal was less likely to be interested in a\nbeautiful and accomplished _demoiselle_ than any other young man of his\nage.  On the contrary, there is some reason to think him at this time\npeculiarly susceptible to the charms of female companionship.  The\npassing glimpse which the story gives of his occupations in Auvergne, and\nthe comparative brightness and leisure in which it seems to set his life\nfor a little, are pleasing.  It suggests the idea that the change to the\ncountry had worked successfully, and that with rest and retirement from\nParis his health had greatly benefited.\n\nIt is a very different picture we get of the once brilliant Jacqueline.\nIf her father had cherished any hopes of restoring her again to the\nworld, he was destined to disappointment.  With her conversion at Rouen,\nand her association with M. Singlin and Port Royal, her old life seems\nentirely to have died out.  Even her old pleasure in making verses was\nrenounced at the bidding of Port Royal.  She was told \u201cthat it was a\ntalent of which God would not take any account\u2014it was necessary to bury\nit,\u201d and this although she only exerted it now in the service of religion\nand the Church.  While Madame P\u00e9rier has given us no details, and,\nindeed, no facts whatever, of her brother\u2019s life at this time, she has\ngiven us a minute picture of Jacqueline\u2019s austerities.  In everything\nsave in name she had already become a nun.  She wore a dress approaching\nas nearly as possible to a religious habit; she fasted and kept vigils;\nshe spent her whole time either in the house alone, absorbed in religious\necstasy, or abroad in works of active charity; in every way she made it\nplainly to be known that it was only her father\u2019s wish that kept her in\nthe world at all.\n\nAfter a stay in Auvergne of seventeen months, the family returned to\nParis in November 1650.  There we still read of the pious labours and\ndevotion of Jacqueline\u2014little or nothing of her brother.  How far the\nleisure of country life may have weaned him from his old pursuits, how\nfar the world had begun to exercise a new attraction over him, we learn\nnothing.  It is evident from his letter to M. P\u00e9rier on his father\u2019s\ndeath, nearly a year after this, that he still cherished strongly his\nreligious convictions.  Yet there is nothing in all this time to tell of\nhis religious profession; and Madame P\u00e9rier plainly does not care to\ndwell upon it, but hurries forward to the later and more edifying period\nof his career.  The impression is left upon us that worldly distractions\nhad already begun to influence his life.\n\nThese distractions rapidly acquired force after the father\u2019s death in the\nautumn of 1651 (September).  The devoted Jacqueline attended his last\nmoments with assiduous tenderness; but no sooner was the event over than\nshe renewed her determination to enter Port Royal.  The issue cannot be\nso well described as in Madame P\u00e9rier\u2019s words:\u2014\n\n    \u201cBeing ill,\u201d she says, \u201cI was unable to leave Paris till the end of\n    November.  In this interval, my brother, who was greatly afflicted,\n    and had received much consolation from my sister, imagined that her\n    affection would make her remain with him at least a year. . . .  He\n    spoke to her on the subject, but in such a manner as to convey the\n    impression that she would not so far contradict him for fear of\n    redoubling his grief.  This led her to dissemble her intention till\n    our arrival.  Then she told me that her resolution was fixed to adopt\n    a religious life as soon as our respective shares [of the father\u2019s\n    property] were arranged.  She would, however, spare my brother by\n    leading him to suppose she only meditated a retreat!  With this view,\n    she disposed of everything in my presence; our shares were settled on\n    the last day of December; and she fixed upon the 4th of January for\n    carrying out her decision.  On the evening before, she begged me to\n    say something to my brother, that he might not be taken by surprise.\n    I did so with all the precaution I could; but although I hinted that\n    it was only a retreat, with the view of knowing something of the sort\n    of life, he did not fail to be deeply touched.  He withdrew very sad\n    to his chamber without seeing my sister, who was then in a small\n    cabinet where she was accustomed to retire for prayer.  She did not\n    come out till my brother had left, as she feared his look would go to\n    her heart.  I told her for him what words of tenderness he had\n    spoken; and after that we both retired.  Though I consented with all\n    my heart to what my sister was doing, because I thought it was for\n    her the highest good, the greatness of her resolution astonished and\n    occupied my mind so that I could not sleep all night.  At seven\n    o\u2019clock, when I saw that my sister was not up, I concluded that she\n    was no longer sleeping, and feared that she might be ill.\n    Accordingly, I went to her bed, where I found her still fast asleep.\n    The noise I made awoke her; she asked me what o\u2019clock it was.  I told\n    her; and having inquired how she was, and if she had slept well, she\n    said she was very well, and that she had slept excellently.  So she\n    rose, dressed, and went away, doing this, as everything else, with a\n    tranquillity and equanimity inconceivable.  We said no adieu for fear\n    of breaking down.  I only turned aside when I saw her ready to go.\n    In this manner she quitted the world on the 4th January 1652, being\n    then exactly twenty-six years and three months old.\u201d {58}\n\nOur readers will not grudge this extract, so touching in its simplicity.\nWhat a living picture does it give us of this remarkable family!\u2014the\nelder sister\u2019s wakeful anxiety\u2014the younger\u2019s calm determination\u2014the\nbrother\u2019s half-suppressed yet deeply-moved tenderness\u2014the proud and\nsensitive reserve of all the three.  Jacqueline\u2019s firmness was heroic,\nbut her heart was full of concern.  She had escaped the\nhalf-authoritative, half-supplicating entreaties of her brother, and\nfound refuge for her long-cherished solicitudes of heart in the bosom of\nPort Royal, and the strong counsels both of the M\u00e8re Ang\u00e9lique and the\nM\u00e8re Agn\u00e8s.  But after a while this did not satisfy her.  When the time\ncame to make her profession, she was anxious to do so, not merely with\nher own consent, but with her brother\u2019s.  And accordingly, she addressed\nhim in the following March a remarkable letter, in which, while reminding\nhim that she was her own mistress to do as she wished in a matter so\nseriously affecting her life, she yet prayed him to give her a kindly\ngreeting in her solemn act, and to come to the ceremony of her taking the\nvows.  The letter breathes at once the affection of a sister and the\npassion of a saint,\u2014the proud firmness so characteristic of the family,\nwith a charming sweetness, blending entreaty with command.  She signs\nherself already \u201cSister of Sainte Euph\u00e9mie,\u201d the name which she adopted\nas an inmate of Port Royal, addressing her brother for the most part with\nthe grave formal \u201cyou,\u201d but now and then relapsing into the old familiar\n\u201cthou,\u201d as if she were still in the family home.\n\n    \u201cDo not take that away,\u201d she says, {59} \u201cwhich you cannot give.  If\n    it is true that the world has preserved some impressions of the\n    friendship which it showed for me when I was with it, please God this\n    should not turn me from quitting it, nor you from consenting to my\n    doing so.  This ought rather to be my glory, and your joy, and that\n    of all my true friends, as showing the strength of my God, and that\n    it is not the world which quits me, but I that quit the world, and\n    that the effort which it makes to retain me is to be regarded as only\n    a visible punishment of the complacency with which I formerly\n    regarded it, and which it now pleases God to give me power to resist.\n    . . .  Do not hinder those who do well; and do well yourself; or if\n    you have not the strength to follow me, at least do not hold me back.\n    Do not render me ungrateful to God for the grace which He has given\n    to one whom you love. . . .  I wait this proof of your brotherly\n    friendship, and pray you to come to my divine betrothal, which will\n    take place, God helping, on Trinity Sunday.  I wrote also to my\n    faithful one [her sister Gilberte].  I beg you to console her, if\n    there is need, and encourage her.  It is only for the sake of form\n    that I ask you to be present at the ceremony; for I do not believe\n    you have any thought of failing me.  Be assured that I must renounce\n    you if you do.\u201d\n\nThe result of this moving appeal was to bring her brother to her side.\n\n    \u201cHe came the following day very much put out,\u201d she says, \u201cwith a bad\n    headache, the result of my letter, yet also very much softened, for\n    instead of the two years which he had formerly insisted on, he wished\n    me merely to wait till All Saints\u2019 Day.  But seeing me firm not to\n    delay, yet willing to give him some further time to think over the\n    matter, he melted entirely, and expressed pity for the trouble which\n    had made me delay so long a result which I had so long and so\n    ardently desired.  He did not return at the appointed time; but M.\n    d\u2019Andilly, at my request, had the goodness to send for him on\n    Saturday, and undertook the matter with so much warmth, and yet\n    skill, that he consented to everything we wished.\u201d {60}\n\nJacqueline gained her point so far; but painful difficulties still\nremained, the story of which she herself has also told us. {61}  While\neager to be admitted to the full privileges of her vocation, she did not\nwish to enter Port Royal empty-handed.  She thought herself free to endow\nit with the share of her father\u2019s fortune which had fallen to her, and\nseems not to have doubted her brother\u2019s and sister\u2019s concurrence in this\nact of liberality.  But they, on the contrary, were both for a time\ndeeply offended that she should apparently prefer strangers to her own\nkindred.  They took the matter \u201cin an entirely secular manner.\u201d  This\ngreatly grieved her in turn; and, balked at once in her wishes and her\nsisterly trust, she pictures in the most lively colours the distress she\nendured.  La M\u00e8re Agn\u00e8s consoled her in her disappointment, and sought to\ncarry her thoughts beyond the mere chagrin which so obviously mingled\nwith her higher feeling.  Her own somewhat resentful obstinacy gradually\nyielded to the pure passivity of resignation\u2014so strong in its seeming\nweakness\u2014which the sister of Arnauld preached to her.  At length she is\ncontent to make no further demands upon her brother.  He and Madame\nP\u00e9rier shall do as they wish; the money would not be blessed unless it\ncame from free hearts, and was given for the love of God.  She is willing\neven to be received gratuitously as a sister\u2014a feeling evidently not\nwithout its bitterness.  Her submission became, as may be guessed, her\ntriumph; a result probably not unforeseen by the deeper experience of La\nM\u00e8re Agn\u00e8s and M. Singlin.\n\nWhen her brother\u2014\u201che who had most interest in the affair\u201d\u2014at last came to\nsee her, she endeavoured to meet him as the Mother advised.  \u201cBut, with\nall her effort\u201d she could not hide the sadness of her heart.\n\n    \u201cThis,\u201d she says, \u201cwas so unlike my usual manner, that he perceived\n    it at once; and there was no need of an interpreter to explain the\n    cause, for though I put on the best face I could, he easily guessed\n    that it was his own conduct which was the cause of my uneasiness.\n    All the same, he was desirous of making the first complaint; and then\n    I learned that both he and my sister felt themselves much aggrieved\n    by what I had written.  He dwelt on this, but could hardly go on,\n    seeing I made no complaint on my side.  Otherwise, I could have\n    destroyed by a single word all his reasons!\u201d\n\nA true family trait!  The result of all was, that Pascal yielded to the\ntender resignation of his sister what he had refused to her arguments.\nHe was so \u201ctouched,\u201d she says, \u201cwith confusion, that he resolved to put\nthe whole affair in order,\u201d and to undertake himself any risks or charges\nthat it might involve.\n\nBut the heads of the House required to be satisfied, no less than\nJacqueline.  They were not disposed to accept any gift which was not\nfreely and piously given.  Accordingly, before the final disposition of\nthe property was made, La M\u00e8re Ang\u00e9lique took care that Pascal should\nunderstand the matter anew from the Port-Royalist point of view.  St\nCyran had taught them that they were never \u201cto receive anything for the\nhouse of God but that which came from God.\u201d  Even he was not a little\nsurprised, according to the statement of his sister, at all this\nscrupulousness\u2014\u201cthe manner in which we deal with such matters;\u201d and the\nmen of business whose presence was necessary on the occasion are\nrepresented as astonished beyond measure.  \u201cThey had never seen business\ndone in such a way.\u201d  At length, however, all was completed.  Pascal\nprofessed the genuineness of his motives, and only regretted that it was\nnot in his power to do more.\n\nIf this narrative mainly concerns Jacqueline Pascal, it serves to throw\nlight upon the character and life of her brother at this time.  In the\ncourse of her \u201crelation,\u201d Jacqueline, or her interlocutor La M\u00e8re Agn\u00e8s,\nmakes frequent allusion to Pascal\u2019s \u201cworldly life.\u201d  When she is vexed\nthat he will not carry out her desires in the matter of the dowry, she is\nreminded that she had far more reason to be distressed by the \u201cfaults and\ninfidelities\u201d into which he had fallen towards God. {63a}  He is\nrepresented as being so much engrossed with the vanities and amusements\nof the world as to prefer his own pleasure and advantage to the good of a\nreligious community or the pious gratification of his sister.  It was\nonly by some miracle that it could be otherwise; and there was no reason\nto \u201cexpect a miracle of grace in a person like him.\u201d {63b}  All the means\nat his command were hardly sufficient to enable him to live in the world\n\u201clike others of his condition,\u201d and the associates with whom he was known\nto be mingling. {63c}\n\nPlainly at this time Pascal was abandoned by Port Royal.  He had \u201cset\nhimself,\u201d as his sister briefly says, \u201con the world.\u201d  As his niece more\nparticularly indicates, {63d} he had given himself up to the amusements\nof life.  Unable to study, the love of leisure and of fashionable society\nhad gradually gained upon him.  At first he was moderate in his worldly\nenjoyments; but a taste for them insensibly sprang up and carried him far\naway from his old associations and the pious severities of his former\nlife.  After his father\u2019s death this change was more clearly marked.  He\nwas master of his own affairs, and he plunged more freely into the\npleasures of society, although always, it is distinctly said, \u201cwithout\nany vice or licentiousness.\u201d  All this, his niece adds, was very grievous\nto her aunt Jacqueline, who grieved in spirit at seeing him who had been\nthe means of making her learn the nothingness of the world return to its\nvanities.\n\nToo much is not to be made of such statements, or the still stronger\nexpressions of Jacqueline herself in her letters regarding her brother\u2019s\nfinal conversion.  When she speaks of \u201cwretched attachments\u201d binding him\nto the world, and of his being still \u201chaunted by the smell of the mud\nwhich he had embraced with such _empressement_,\u201d {64} we are to remember\nthat she speaks not only out of the severity of her own youthful\njudgment, (and what judgment is so severe at times as that of youth?) but\nout of the mouth of Port Royal.  She condemns a world which was no doubt\nbad enough, but of which she knew nothing.  Her allusions to the\n\u201cgrandeur\u201d of her brother\u2019s life and similar indications have led\nSainte-Beuve and others to speak of his extravagance at this time.  He is\nsupposed not only to have lived in the world, but to have lived in a\nstyle above his means\u2014the companion of men of higher social position than\nhimself, profuse in their habits and expenditure.  That he lived in the\nmidst of society of this kind can hardly be doubted.  It is more doubtful\nhow far his own habits had become those of an extravagant man of the\nworld.  His chief companion was one who remained bound to him through all\nthe rest of his life, Pascal\u2019s influence having drawn him also from the\nworld when the time of his own change came.  This was the Duc de Roannez,\na young man of fewer years than himself, who seems to have possessed many\nattractive qualities.  He was devoted to Pascal\u2014could hardly \u201cbear him\nout of his sight,\u201d as Marguerite P\u00e9rier says\u2014and Pascal warmly returned\nhis friendship.  It seems as if they had lived together a good deal, or\nat least that Pascal spent the most of his time with the young Duke; and\nit was in his house and society no doubt that he tasted the joys and\nperils of that fashionable and luxurious life of which his sister speaks\nso bitterly. {65a}  It was a life, after all, of thoughtless enjoyment\nrather than of any deeper folly.  Both men were as yet very young\u2014the\nDuke only twenty-two years of age, and Pascal twenty-eight.  After his\nsimple and severe training, and the society of his Jansenist friends, it\nmust have been a change full of excitement, possibly of moral danger, to\nthe once enthusiastic student; for the society of the time was charged\nwith the elements both of sceptical and moral indifference.  It has been\neven said that \u201cno society was ever more grandly dissolute\u201d than that of\nthe Fronde, \u201cwhen women like La Barette {65b} and La Couronne took the\nlead in the least discreet pleasures.\u201d\n\nAmong the men whom Pascal evidently met at the hotel of the Duc de\nRoannez, and with whom he formed something of a friendship, was the\nwell-known Chevalier de M\u00e9r\u00e9, whom we know best as a tutor of Madame de\nMaintenon, and whose graceful but flippant letters still survive as a\npicture of the time.  He was a gambler and libertine, yet with some\ntincture of science and professed interest in its progress.  In his\ncorrespondence there is a letter to Pascal, in which he makes free in a\nsomewhat ridiculous manner with the young geometrician already so\ndistinguished.  Other names still less reputable\u2014those of Miton and\nDesbarreaux, for example\u2014have been associated with Pascal during this\nperiod.  Miton was undoubtedly an intimate ally of De M\u00e9r\u00e9, and amidst\nall his dissoluteness, made pretensions to scientific knowledge and\nattainments as a writer.  Desbarreaux was a companion of both, but of a\nstill lower grade\u2014a man of open profligacy, and a despiser of the rites\nof the Church.  Along with Miton and other boon companions, he is spoken\nof as betaking himself to St Cloud for carnival during the Holy Week.\n{66}  The truth would seem to be that all these men came across Pascal\u2019s\npath at this time, and were more or less known to him.  His allusions to\nboth Miton and Desbarreaux in the Pens\u00e9es imply this.  There is a certain\nfamiliarity of knowledge indicated in the very heartiness with which he\nassails them\u2014speaking of Miton as \u201chateful,\u201d {67a} and of Desbarreaux as\nhaving renounced reason and made himself a \u201cbrute.\u201d  {67b}  But it is\nagainst all probability, no less than against all the facts known to us,\nto suppose that Pascal had more connection with such men than meeting\nthem in the society in which he moved during these years, and becoming\nwell acquainted with the intellectual and moral atmosphere which they\nbreathed.  It may be too much to say, with Faug\u00e8re, that he was then\nconsciously imbibing the experience to be afterwards utilised in his\ngreat work, or that it was the principles professed by these men which\ngave him the first idea of such a work; but we may certainly say that the\nknowledge of them, as well as all the knowledge he acquired at this time,\nserved to deepen and extend his moral intuitions, and to give a finer\npoint to many of his Thoughts.  And no student of Pascal can doubt that\n\u201cif his feet touched for a moment the dirt of this dissolute society, his\ndivine wings remained unsoiled.\u201d {67c}\n\nA more interesting point than any, however, still remains in connection\nwith this period of his life.  It was now, or soon after, that Pascal\nmust have composed the \u201cDiscours sur les Passions de l\u2019Amour,\u201d one of the\nmost exquisite fragments which have come from his pen,\u2014remarkable both in\nitself and in the circumstances of its discovery by M. Cousin about\nthirty years ago.  M. Cousin has himself related these circumstances in\nminute detail, and with a certain self-elation. {67d}  According to M.\nFaug\u00e8re, there was no particular difficulty, and therefore no particular\nmerit, in the discovery.  The fragment was clearly indexed in a catalogue\nof the Pascal MSS. in the well-known State library of Paris as follows:\n\u201cDiscours sur les Passions de l\u2019Amour, par M. Pascal,\u201d and again in the\nbody of the volume the fragment was entitled, \u201cDiscours, etc., on\nl\u2019attribue \u00e0 M. Pascal.\u201d  The genuineness of the fragment seems admitted\non all hands.  \u201cIn the first line,\u201d says Cousin, \u201cI felt Pascal, and my\nconviction of its authorship grew as I proceeded\u2014his ardent and lofty\nmanner, half thought, half passion, and that speech so fine and grand, an\naccent which I would recognise amongst a thousand.\u201d {68a}  \u201cThe soul and\nthought of Pascal,\u201d says Faug\u00e8re, \u201cshine everywhere in the pages, steeped\nin a melancholy at once chaste and ardent.\u201d  {68b}\n\nThe following extracts may give some idea of this remarkable paper.  It\ncommences in an abstract, aphoristic manner not uncommon with Pascal:\u2014\n\n    \u201cMan is born to think; he is never a moment without thinking.  But\n    pure thought, which, if it could be sustained, would make him happy,\n    fatigues and prostrates him.  He could not live a life of mere\n    thought; movement and action are necessary to him.  He must be\n    agitated by the passions, whose sources he feels deep and strong in\n    his heart.  The passions most characteristic of man, and which\n    embrace most others, are love and ambition.  They have no affinity,\n    yet they are often united; together, they tend to weaken if not\n    destroy each other.  For however grand the human spirit, it is only\n    capable at once of one great passion.  When love and ambition meet,\n    each therefore falls short of what it would otherwise be.  Age\n    determines neither the beginning nor the end of these two passions.\n    They are born with the first years, they continue often to the last.\u201d\n\n    \u201cMan finds no full scope for love in himself, yet he loves.  It is\n    necessary, therefore, for him to seek an object of love elsewhere.\n    This he can only find in beauty.  But as he himself is the most\n    beautiful creature that God has made, he must find in himself the\n    type of that beauty which he seeks elsewhere.  This defines and\n    embodies itself in the difference of sex.  A woman is the highest\n    form of beauty.  Endowed with mind, she is its living and marvellous\n    personation.  If a beautiful woman wishes to please, she will always\n    succeed.  The fascinations of beauty in such a case never fail to\n    captivate, whatever man may do to resist them.  There is a spot in\n    every heart which they reach.\u201d\n\n    \u201cLove is of no age; it is always being born.  The poets tell us so,\n    and hence we represent it as a child.  It creates intelligence, and\n    feeds upon intelligence. . . .  We exhaust our power of gratifying it\n    every day, and yet every day it is necessary to renew its\n    gratification.\u201d\n\n    \u201cMan in solitude is an incomplete being; he needs companionship for\n    happiness.  He seeks this commonly in a like condition with his own,\n    because habits of desire and opportunity in such a case are most\n    readily found by him.  But _sometimes he fixes his affections on an\n    object far beyond his rank_, and the flame burns the more intensely\n    that he is forced to conceal it in his own bosom.  When we love one\n    of elevated condition, ambition may at first coexist with affection.\n    But love soon becomes the master.  It is a tyrant which suffers no\n    rival; it must reign alone.  Every other emotion must subserve and\n    obey its dictates.  A high attachment fills the heart more completely\n    than a common and equal one.  Small things are carried away in the\n    great capacity of love.\u201d\n\n    \u201cThe pleasure of loving, without daring to say anything of one\u2019s\n    love, has its pains, but also its sweetnesses.  With what transport\n    do we regulate all our actions with the view of pleasing one whom we\n    infinitely value! . . .  The fulness of love sometimes languishes,\n    receiving no succour from the beloved object.  Then we fall into\n    misery; and hostile passions, lying in wait for the heart, tear it in\n    a thousand pieces.  But anon a ray of hope\u2014the very least it may\n    be\u2014raises us as high as ever.  Sometimes this comes from mere\n    dalliance, but sometimes also from an honest pity.  How happy such a\n    moment when it comes!\u201d\n\n    \u201cThe first effect of love is to inspire a great respect.  We revere\n    whom we really love.  This is right, and we know nothing in the world\n    so grand as this. . . .  In love we forget fortune, parents, friends,\n    and the reason of this is that we imagine we need nothing else than\n    the object of our love.  The heart is full; there is no room for care\n    nor disquietude.  Passion is then necessarily in excess; there is a\n    plenitude in it which resists the commencement of reflection.  Yet\n    love and reason are not to be opposed, and love has always reason\n    with it, although it implies a precipitation of thought which carries\n    us away without due examination.  Otherwise we should be very\n    disagreeable machines.  Do not exclude reason from love, therefore;\n    they are truly inseparable.  The poets are wrong in representing love\n    as blind.  It is necessary to take away his veil, and give him\n    henceforth the joy of sight.\u201d\n\n    \u201cIt is not merely the result of custom, but a dictate of nature, that\n    man should make the first advances in love. . . .  Great souls\n    require an inundation of passion to disturb and fill them; but when\n    they begin to love, they love supremely. . . .  When we are away from\n    the object of our love we resolve to do and say many things, but when\n    we are present we hesitate.  The explanation is, that at a distance\n    the reason is undisturbed, but in presence of the beloved object it\n    is strangely moved.  In love we fear to hazard lest we lose all.  It\n    is necessary to advance, yet who can tell to what point?  We tremble\n    always till we reach this point, and yet prudence does not help us to\n    keep it when we have found it. . . .  There is nothing so\n    embarrassing as to be in love, and see something in our favour\n    without daring to believe in it.  Hope and fear rage within us, and\n    the last too often triumphs.\u201d\n\nThe question arises, What interpretation are we to put on these chaste\nyet glowing sentences?  It seems hardly possible to believe that they\nwere not penned out of some real experience.  Pascal was not the man to\nbusy himself in writing an imaginary essay on such a subject.  Nothing\ncan be conceived less like the sketch of a mere moral analyst standing\noutside the passion he describes.  There may be a tendency here and there\nto over-analysis, and to the balancing of antitheses now on one side and\nnow on the other; but there is the breath of true passion all through the\npiece, and touching, as with fire, many of its many fine utterances.  Who\nwas then, conceivably, the object of Pascal\u2019s affections?  We have it on\nthe authority of his niece that at this time, when he lived so much as\nthe companion of the Duc de Roannez, he contemplated marrying and\nsettling in the world. {71}  This, and the indications of the piece\nitself, have led to the conjecture that he was in love with the sister of\nhis friend.  Charlotte Gouffier de Roannez was then about sixteen years\nof age, endowed with captivating graces of form and manner, animated by a\nsweet intelligence and by that charm of spiritual sympathy so likely to\nprove attractive to a man like Pascal.  Occupying rooms in the house of\nhis friend, who, we have seen, could not bear him out of his sight,\nPascal and Mademoiselle de Roannez were necessarily much in each other\u2019s\nsociety.  What so natural as that he should fall in love, and overlooking\nall disparity of rank, cherish the secret hope of a union with one so\ngifted and beautiful?\u2014or why may not ambition have mingled with his love,\nas he himself implies, and carried him for a time into a dreamland from\nwhich all shadows fell away?\n\nIt is impossible to do more than form conjectures in such a matter.  To\nM. Faug\u00e8re nothing seems more probable.  M. Cousin resents the\nsupposition as derogatory to Pascal, and as utterly inconsistent with the\nusages of the age of Louis XIV.  But even were it impossible, according\nto the usages of the time, that Pascal should have ever married\nMademoiselle de Roannez, this is no proof that he may not have fallen in\nlove with her.  There is much in this paper that favours the idea, that\nwhile Pascal loved deeply he yet never told his love; and the social\nobstacles, which for a time may have seemed to him surmountable, at last\nmay have shut out all hope from his heart.  Many causes might unite to do\nthis, even supposing his love was returned.  It is certain that he\ncontinued the warm friend, not only of the Duc de Roannez, but of his\nsister; and in after-years a correspondence was established betwixt them\nimplying the highest degree of mutual esteem and confidence.  We have\nonly the letters of Pascal; nothing is known of those of Mademoiselle de\nRoannez; the rigidity of the Jansenist copyists have given us only\nextracts even of the former.  All trace of earthly passion, if it ever\nexisted, has gone from the pious page in which the Jansenist saint sets\nforth his exhortations.  Yet it argues no common interest, that Pascal\nshould pause in the midst of his conflict with the Jesuits to advise and\ndirect his former companion; and Faug\u00e8re professes that even before he\nhad read the \u2018Discours\u2019 he could trace a \u201ctender solicitude\u201d\u2014more than\nthe mere impulse of Christian charity\u2014beneath all the grave severity of\nhis religious phrases.\n\nThe fate of Mademoiselle de Roannez was not a happy one.  After\nvacillating for some time between the cloister and the world\u2014obeying the\nguidance of Pascal, either directly or through Madame P\u00e9rier, and even\npassing through her novitiate at Port Royal with \u201cextraordinary\nfervour\u201d\u2014she was persuaded to marry and become the Duchesse de la\nFeuillade.  But her marriage proved unfortunate.  Her children died\nyoung; her own health broke down; she herself at length died under an\noperation, bequeathing a legacy to Port Royal, which had remained\nentwined with all dearest associations.  Whether Pascal and she had loved\neach other or not, this sacred Home bound their best thoughts together,\nand serves to recall their highest aspirations.\n\nIt falls to us now to describe how Port Royal claimed the heart of\nPascal, and called forth the chief activities of his remaining years.\n\n\n\n\nCHAPTER IV.\nPORT ROYAL AND PASCAL\u2019S LATER YEARS.\n\n\nWhatever day-dreams Pascal may have cherished, \u201cGod called him,\u201d as his\nsister says, \u201cto a great perfection.\u201d  It was not in his nature to be\nsatisfied with either the enchantments or the ambitions of the world.\nAll the while that he mixed in the luxurious society of Paris, and seemed\nmerely one of its thoughtless throng, there were throbs within him of a\nhigher life which could not be stilled.  His conscience reproached him\ncontinually amidst all his amusements, and left him uneasy even in the\nmost exulting moments of the love that filled his heart.  This is no\nhypothetical picture, but one suggested by himself in conversation with\nhis sister.  She tells us from her retreat how her brother came to see\nher, fascinated by the steadfastness of her faith, in contrast with his\nown indifference and vacillation.  Formerly it was his zeal which had\ndrawn her to higher thoughts.  Now it is the attraction of her piety\nwhich sways him, and leaves him unhappy amidst all the seductions of the\nsociety in which he mingles.  \u201cGod made use of my sister,\u201d says Madame\nP\u00e9rier, \u201cfor the great design, as He had formerly made use of my brother,\nwhen He desired to withdraw my sister from her engagements in the world.\u201d\n\nThe severe Jacqueline tells with unfaltering breath the story of her\nbrother\u2019s spiritual anxieties.  She had ceased herself to have any\nworldly thoughts.\n\n    \u201cShe led,\u201d says Madame P\u00e9rier, \u201ca life so holy, that she edified the\n    whole house: and in this state it was a special pain to her to see\n    one to whom she felt herself indebted, under God, for the grace which\n    she enjoyed, no longer himself in possession of these graces: and as\n    she saw my brother frequently, she spoke to him often, and finally\n    with such force and sweetness, that she persuaded him, as he had at\n    first persuaded her, absolutely to abandon the world.\u201d\n\nWriting to her sister on the 25th of January 1655, she says that Pascal\ncame to see her at the end of the previous September.\n\n    \u201cAt this visit he opened himself to me in such a manner as moved my\n    pity, confessing that in the midst of his exciting occupations, and\n    of so many things fitted to make him love the world\u2014to which we had\n    every reason to think him strongly attached\u2014he was yet forcibly moved\n    to quit all; both by an extreme aversion to its follies and\n    amusements, and by the continual reproach made by his conscience.  He\n    felt himself detached from his surroundings in such a manner as he\n    had never felt before, or even approaching to it; yet, otherwise, he\n    was in such abandonment that there was no movement in his heart to\n    God.  Though he sought Him with all his power, he felt that it was\n    more his own reason and spirit that moved him towards what he knew to\n    be best, than any movement of the Divine Spirit.  If he only had the\n    Divine sentiments he once had, he believed himself, in his present\n    state of detachment, capable of undertaking everything.  It must be,\n    therefore, some wretched ties {76} which still held him back, and\n    made him resist the movements of the Divine Spirit.  The confession\n    surprised me as much as it gave me joy; and thenceforth I conceived\n    hopes that I had never had, and thought I must communicate with you\n    in order to induce you to pray on his behalf.  If I were to relate\n    all the other visits in detail, I should be obliged to write a\n    volume; for since then they have been so frequent and so long, that I\n    was wellnigh engrossed by them.  I confined myself to watching his\n    mood without attempting unduly to influence him; and gradually I saw\n    him so growing in grace that I would hardly have known him.  I\n    believe you will have the same difficulty, if God continues His work;\n    especially in such wonderful humility, submission, diffidence,\n    self-contempt, and desire to be nothing in the esteem and memory of\n    men.  Such he is at present.  God alone knows what a day will bring\n    forth.\u201d\n\nFinally, after many visits and struggles with himself, especially as to\nhis choice of a spiritual guide, he became an inmate of Port Royal des\nGranges, under the guidance of M. de Saci.  The questions betwixt him and\nhis sister as to his selection of a confessor or director are very\ncurious, revealing, as they do, the quiet self-possessed decision of the\none, the scruples of the other, and the proud self-respect of both.  As\nto one of Pascal\u2019s difficulties, she says, without misgiving\u2014\u201cI saw\nclearly that this was only a remnant of independence hidden in the depth\nof his heart, which armed itself with every weapon to ward off a\nsubmission which yet in his state of feeling must be perfect.\u201d  M.\nSinglin was willing to assist the sister with his advice, but was\nreluctant himself, in his weak state of health, to assume full\nresponsibilities towards the brother.  Jacqueline herself appeared to him\nthe best director her brother could have for the time; and there is a\ncharming blending of humility and yet assumption in the manner in which\nshe relates this, and speaks of \u201cour new convert.\u201d  But finally there is\nfound in M. de Saci a director \u201cwith whom he is delighted, for he comes\nof a good stock\u201d (dont it est tout ravi, aussi est-il de bonne race).\n\nPascal first sought retirement in a residence of his own in the country.\nIt is particularly mentioned amongst the reasons for his withdrawal from\nParis, that the Duc de Roannez, \u201cwho engaged him almost entirely,\u201d was\nabout to return there.  Unable to find everything to his wish, however,\nin his own house, \u201che obtained a chamber or little cell among the\nSolitaries of Port Royal,\u201d from which he wrote to his sister with extreme\njoy that he was lodged and treated like a prince, \u201caccording to St\nBernard\u2019s judgment of what it was to be a prince.\u201d  It is still\nJacqueline\u2019s pen which reports all this to Madame P\u00e9rier.  She continues\nin the same letter:\u2014\n\n    \u201cHe joins in every office of the Church from Prime to Compline,\n    without feeling the slightest inconvenience in rising at five o\u2019clock\n    in the morning; and as if it was the will of God that he should join\n    fasting to watching, in defiance of all the medical prescriptions\n    which had forbidden him both the one and the other, he found that\n    supper disagreed with him, and was about to give it up.\u201d {77}\n\nSuch is the story of Pascal\u2019s final conversion and retirement from the\nworld.  Jacqueline\u2019s details fill in the briefer sketch of Madame P\u00e9rier,\nand both tell the story at first hand.  None could have known so well as\nthey did all the circumstances.  It is remarkable, therefore, that\nneither of them says anything of the well-known incident, emphasised by\nBossut as the mainly exciting cause of his great change:\u2014\n\n    \u201cOne day,\u201d it is said, \u201cin the month of October 1654, when he went,\n    according to his habit, to take his drive to the bridge of Neuilly\n    _in a carriage and four_, the two leading horses became restive at a\n    part of the road where there was a parapet, and precipitated\n    themselves into the Seine.  Fortunately, the first strokes of their\n    feet broke the traces which attached them to the pole, and the\n    carriage was stayed on the brink of the precipice.  The effect of\n    such a shock on one of Pascal\u2019s feeble health may be imagined.  He\n    swooned away, and was only restored with difficulty, and his nerves\n    were so shattered that long afterwards, during sleepless nights and\n    during moments of weakness, he seemed to see a precipice at his\n    bedside, over which he was on the point of falling.\u201d\n\nThis alarming incident, which comes from nearly contemporary tradition,\nno doubt contributed to Pascal\u2019s retirement from the world, and no less\nprobably also a strange vision he had at this time, to which we shall\nafterwards advert.  But it is peculiarly interesting to trace the inner\nhistory of Pascal\u2019s great change.  Evidently, from what his sister says,\nhis mind had been for some time very ill at ease in the great world in\nwhich he lived.  How far this was the working of his old religious\nconvictions continually renewing their influence through the conversation\nof his sister, how far it was mere weariness and disgust with the\nfrivolities of fashionable life, and how far it may have been baffled\nhope and the disenchantments of a broken dream of love, we cannot clearly\ntell.  All may have moved him, and brought him to that strange state of\nisolation which she describes from his own account.  But plainly the\nworld-weariness preceded the fresh dawn of divine strength in his heart;\nand there is a tone of hopelessness in speaking of his detachment from\nall the things surrounding him, which favours the thought that some new\nand unwonted smart had entered into his life, and driven him forth to the\nquiet shelter, where at length he found his old peace with God, and the\ngreat mission to which God had called him.\n\n                                * * * * *\n\nThe monastery of Port Royal, in which his sister had already found a\nhome, remains indelibly associated with Pascal.  It was founded in the\nbeginning of the thirteenth century, in the reign of Philip Augustus; and\na later tradition claimed this magnificent monarch as the author of its\nfoundation and of its name.  It is said that one day he wandered into the\nfamous valley during the chase, and became lost in its woods, when he was\nat length discovered near to an ancient chapel of St Lawrence, which was\nmuch frequented by the devout of the neighbourhood, and that, grateful\nbecause the place had been to him a Port Royal or royal refuge, he\nresolved to build a church there.  But this is the story of a time when,\nas it has been said, \u201croyal founders were in fashion.\u201d  More truly, the\nname is considered to be derived from the general designation of the fief\nor district in which the valley lies, _Porrois_\u2014which, again, is supposed\nto be a corruption of _Porra_ or _Borra_, meaning a marshy and woody\nhollow.\n\nThe valley of Port Royal presents to this day the same natural features\nwhich attracted the eye of the devout solitary in the seventeenth\ncentury.  Some years ago I paid a long-wished-for visit to it.  It lies\nabout eighteen miles west of Paris, and seven or eight from Versailles,\non the road to Chevreuse.  As the traveller approaches it from\nVersailles, the long lines of a level and somewhat dreary road, only\nrelieved by rows of tall poplar-trees, break into a more picturesque\ncountry.  An antique mouldering village, with quaint little church, its\ngrey lichen-marked stones brightened by the warm sunshine of a September\nday, and the straggling vines drooping their pale dusty leaves over the\ncottage-doors, made a welcome variety in the monotonous landscape.  How\nhazy yet cheerful was the brightness in which the poor mean houses seemed\nto sleep!  After this the road swept down a long declivity, crowned on\none side by an irregular outline of wood, and presenting here and there\nbroken and dilapidated traces of former habitations.  The famous valley\nof Port Royal lay before us.  It was a quiet and peaceful yet gloomy\nscene.  The seclusion was perfect.  No hum of cheerful industry enlivened\nthe desolate space.  An air rather as of long-continued neglect rested on\nruined garden and terraces, on farmhouse and dovecot, and the remains as\nof a chapel nearer at hand.  The more minutely the eye took in the scene,\nthe more sad seemed its wasted recesses and the few monuments of its\ndeparted glories.  The stillness as of a buried past lay all about, and\nit required an effort of imagination to people the valley with the sacred\nactivities of the seventeenth century.\n\nA rough wooden enclosure has been erected on the site of the high altar\nsurmounted by a cross.  It contained a few memorials, amongst the most\ntouching of which were simple portraits of Arnauld, Le Maitre, De Saci,\nQuesnel, Nicole, Pascal, the M\u00e8re Ang\u00e9lique, the M\u00e8re Agn\u00e8s, Jacqueline\nPascal, and Dr Hanlon the physician.  Two portraits of the M\u00e8re Agn\u00e8s\nparticularly impressed me.  The lines of the face were exquisitely\ntouching in their gentle bravery and patience.  As I looked at the noble\nand sweet countenances grouped on the bare unadorned walls, the sacred\nmemories of the place rose vividly before my mind.  It was here alone\nthat the recluses from the neighbouring Grange met the sainted\nsisterhood, and mingled with them the prayers and tears of penitence.\nOtherwise they dwelt apart, each in diligent privacy, intent on their\nworks of education or of charity.  All the ruin and decay and somewhat\ndreary sadness of the scene could not weaken my sense of the beautiful\nlife of thought and faith and hope and love that had once breathed there;\nand never before had I felt so deeply the enduring reality of the\nspiritual heroism and self-sacrifice, the glory of suffering and of\ngoodness, that had made the spot so memorable.\n\nThe monastery was founded, not by Philip Augustus, but by Matthieu, first\nLord of Marli, a younger son of the noble house of Montmorency.  Having\nformed the design of accompanying the crusade proclaimed by Innocent III.\nto the Holy Land, he left at the disposal of his wife, Mathilde de\nGarlande, and his kinsman, the Bishop of Paris, a sum of money to devote\nto some pious work in his absence.  They agreed to apply it to the\nerection of a monastery for nuns in this secluded valley, that had\nalready acquired a reputation for sanctity in connection with the old\nchapel dedicated to St Lawrence, which attracted large numbers of\nworshippers.  The foundations of the church and monastery were laid in\n1204.  They were designed by the same architect who built the Cathedral\nof Amiens, and ere long the graceful and beautiful structures were seen\nrising in the wilderness.  The nuns belonged to the Cistercian order.\nTheir dress was white woollen, with a black veil; but afterwards they\nadopted as their distinctive badge a large scarlet cross on their white\nscapulary, as the symbol of the \u201cInstitute of the Holy Sacrament.\u201d\n\nThe abbey underwent the usual history of such institutions.\nDistinguished at first by the strictness of its discipline and the piety\nof its inmates, it became gradually corrupted with increasing wealth,\ntill, in the end of the sixteenth century, it had grown notorious for\ngross and scandalous abuses.  The revenues were squandered in luxury; the\nnuns did what they liked; and the extravagances and dissipations of the\nworld were repeated amidst the solitudes which had been consecrated to\ndevotion.  But at length its revival arose out of one of the most obvious\nabuses connected with it.  The patronage of the institution, like that of\nothers, had been distributed without any regard to the fitness of the\noccupants, even to girls of immature age.  In this manner the abbey of\nPort Royal accidentally fell to the lot of one who was destined by her\nardent piety to breathe a new life into it, and by her indomitable and\nlofty genius to give it an undying reputation.\n\nJacqueline Marie Arnauld\u2014better known by her official name, La M\u00e8re\nAng\u00e9lique\u2014was appointed abbess of Port Royal when she was only eight\nyears of age.  She was descended from a distinguished family belonging\noriginally to the old _noblesse_ of Provence, but which had migrated to\nAuvergne and settled there.  Of vigorous healthiness, both mental and\nphysical, the Arnaulds had already acquired a merited position and name\nin the annals of France.  In the beginning of the sixteenth century it\nfound its way to Paris in the person of Antoine Arnauld, Seigneur de la\nMothe, the grandfather of the heroine of Port Royal.  M. de la Mothe, as\nhe was commonly called, was endowed with the energetic will, and with\nmore than the usual talents, of his family.  He was specially known as\nProcureur-g\u00e9n\u00e9ral to Catherine de M\u00e9dicis; but, as he himself said, he\nwore \u201ca soldier\u2019s coat as well as a lawyer\u2019s robe.\u201d  He was a Huguenot,\nand nearly perished in the Bartholomew massacre.  He had eight sons,\nevery one of whom more or less achieved distinction in the service of\ntheir country; but his second son and namesake peculiarly inherited his\nfather\u2019s legal talents, and became his successor in the office of\nProcureur-g\u00e9n\u00e9ral.  He more than rivalled his father\u2019s forensic success;\nand many traditions survive of his great eloquence, and of the\npre-eminent ability with which he pleaded on behalf of the University of\nParis for the expulsion of the Jesuits from France, under suspicion of\nhaving instigated an attempt on the life of Henri IV. in 1593.  This\ngreat effort has been called the \u201coriginal sin\u201d of the Arnauld family\nagainst the Jesuit order, which was never forgiven.  His eloquence\nproduced such an impression, that it is said the judges rose in their\nseats to listen to his speech, while crowds assembled at the closed doors\nof the Court to catch its partial echoes.  And yet, like some other great\nspeeches, it cannot now be read without weariness.\n\nAntoine Arnauld married the youthful daughter of M. Marion, the\nAvocat-g\u00e9n\u00e9ral, who became a mother while still only a girl of fifteen,\nbut who grew into a noble and large-hearted woman, full of deeds of piety\nand charity.  In all, the couple had twenty children, and felt, as may be\nimagined, the pressure of providing for so many.  Out of this pressure\ncame the remarkable lot of two of the daughters.  The benefices of the\nChurch were a fruitful field of provision, and the avocat-g\u00e9n\u00e9ral, the\nmaternal grandfather of the children, had large ecclesiastical influence.\nThe result was the appointment not only of one daughter to the abbey of\nPort Royal, but also of a younger sister, Agn\u00e8s, only six years of age,\nto the abbey of St Cyr, about six miles distant from Port Royal.\nDifficulties, not without reason, were found in obtaining the papal\nsanction to such appointments; but these were at last overcome by means,\nit is said, more creditable to M. Arnauld\u2019s ability than to his\nintegrity.\n\nAt the age of eleven, in the year 1602, Ang\u00e9lique was installed Abbess of\nPort Royal.  Her sister took the veil at the age of seven.  United in the\nnursery, they had also spent some months together at the abbey of St Cyr,\nin preparation for their solemn office.  They were of marked but very\ncontrasted characters.  The elder inherited the strong will and dominant\nenergy of her race.  As yet, and for some time afterwards, without any\nreligious bias, she contemplated her prospects with a quiet and proud\nconsciousness of responsibility.  The younger sister was of a softer and\nmore submissive nature.  She shrank from her high position, saying that\nan abbess had to answer to God for the souls of her nuns, and she was\nsure that she would have enough to do to take care of her own.  Ang\u00e9lique\nhad no such scruples.  She was glad to be an abbess, and was resolved\nthat her nuns should thoroughly do their duty.  These sayings have been\npreserved in the memoirs of the family, and are supposed to indicate\nhappily the firm, persistent spirit and legislative capacity of the one\nsister, in contrast with the passive rather than active strength, and\nmilder yet no less enduring purpose, of the other.\n\nThe remarkable story of Ang\u00e9lique\u2019s conversion by the preaching of a\nCapucin friar in 1608, her strange contest with her parents which\nfollowed, the strengthening impulses in different directions which her\nreligious life received, first from the famous St Francis de Sales, and\nfinally, and especially, from the no less remarkable Abb\u00e9 de St Cyran,\nall belong to the history of Port Royal, and cannot be detailed here.  It\nis a touching and beautiful story, which can never lose its interest.  It\nis only necessary that we draw attention to the temporary removal of the\nAbbess with her nuns to Paris in the year 1635, and to the settlement in\nthe valley, during their absence from it, of the band of Solitaries whose\npiety and genius, no less than the heroic devotion of the sisterhood,\nhave shed such a glory around it.  It was the spiritual influence of St\nCyran which overflowed in this direction.  The religious genius of this\nremarkable man, of whom we shall speak more particularly in the next\nchapter, laid its spell upon the social life around him, and brought to\nhis feet some of the most able and distinguished young men of the time.\nThe elder brother of Ang\u00e9lique and Agn\u00e8s Arnauld, known as M. d\u2019Andilly,\nwas amongst his devoted friends; and it was through him that St Cyran\nfirst became connected with Port Royal.  D\u2019Andilly was married, and a\ncourtier\u2014a busy man in the political circles of his day; but he had long\nbowed before the force of St Cyran\u2019s religious convictions, and finally\nhe too abandoned the world, and sought the retirement of Port Royal,\nwhither three of his nephews had preceded him; and a younger and yet more\ndistinguished brother, the namesake of his father, soon followed him.  It\nwas D\u2019Andilly who said of St Cyran, \u201cI was under such obligations to him\nthat I loved him more than life.\u201d  On the other hand, St Cyran said of\nhim, \u201cHe has not the virtue of a saint or an anchorite, but I know no man\nof his condition who is so solidly virtuous.\u201d\n\nThe brotherhood of Port Royal had its beginning in 1637 with the\nconversion of two of the nephews of D\u2019Andilly and the M\u00e8re Ang\u00e9lique,\nchildren of Arnauld\u2019s eldest daughter, who had married unhappily and been\nsoon separated from her husband.  These grandsons of Arnauld are known as\nM. le Maitre and M. de Sercourt, the former of whom, like his ancestors,\nhad greatly distinguished himself at the bar.  The latter was no less\ndistinguished as a soldier.  In the midst of worldly success, they\nforsook everything and gave themselves to a life of religious retirement,\nin which they were by-and-by joined by a younger and still more\nremarkable brother, known as M. de Saci, trained for the Church, and\nalready mentioned in connection with Pascal\u2019s conversion.  He became\nPascal\u2019s spiritual director, and held with him the famous conversation on\nEpictetus and Montaigne.  To the same group of men belonged Singlin, of\nwhom we have heard so much in former pages, and Lancelot and Fontaine;\nabove all, Antoine Arnauld, the youngest of the large Arnauld family, and\nthe most indefatigable of them all.  Singlin was a favourite of St Cyran,\nand his successor in the office of spiritual director to the monastery,\nas De Saci was again the successor of Singlin in the same capacity.  He\nwas a man of less ability and knowledge than many of the others, the son\nof a wine merchant, who did not begin his religious studies till a\ncomparatively late period, but of a very direct and simple character, and\nwell skilled in the mysteries of the conscience, which made him a\nspiritual power in the community.  He was withal of singular humility,\nand would fain have retired from the office of Confessor when St Cyran\nwas set at liberty in 1643 after his long imprisonment; but neither then\nnor afterwards, on his illustrious friend\u2019s death, was he allowed to do\nso.  St Cyran warned him that he could not fly from the duties of such a\nposition without incurring the guilt of disobedience.  De Saci seems to\nhave been especially remarkable for his quiet self-possession and\ncautious insight into character.  His brother, Le Maitre, brings out in a\ncurious manner the contrast between his own impetuous character and the\nleisurely efficiency of De Saci\u2019s temper.  As they sat at their evening\nmeal\u2014\u201ca very modest collation\u201d\u2014\n\n    \u201cHe had hardly begun his supper when mine was already half digested.\n    . . .  Of quick and warm disposition, I had seen the end of my\n    portion almost as soon as the beginning; it rapidly disappeared; and\n    as I was thinking of rising from the table, I saw my brother De Saci,\n    with his usual coolness and gravity, take a little piece of apple,\n    peel it quietly, cut it leisurely, and eat it slowly.  Then, after\n    having finished, he rose almost as light as he had sat down, leaving\n    untouched nearly all his very moderate portion.  He went away as if\n    he were quite satisfied, and even appeared to grow fat upon fasts.\u201d\n    {87}\n\nClaude Lancelot was the schoolmaster of the community, and represents to\nus perhaps more fully than any other name its famous system of education.\nFontaine was one of its chief memoir writers, from whom we derive so much\nof our knowledge of the society; while the younger Arnauld, of whom we\nshall afterwards speak, Nicole, and the subject of our present sketch,\nrepresent its philosophical and literary activity.\n\nSuch was the company to which Pascal joined himself in 1655.  They had\nbeen settled in divers places,\u2014at first, in 1637, when they were still\nonly a few disciples gathered around St Cyran, in the immediate\nneighbourhood of Port Royal de Paris; and then, when driven from this\nafter their great head\u2019s imprisonment, for a short time at a place called\nFert\u00e9 Milon; and then, finally, in 1639, at Port Royal des Champs.  Here\nthey made a great change for the better by their assiduous industry.\nThey drained the marshy valley, cleared it of its overgrowth of\nbrushwood, and converted it into a comparatively smiling and salubrious\nabode.  On the return of the sisterhood from Port Royal de Paris in 1648,\nthe nuns found the place improved beyond their expectations.  The\nconventual buildings had been repaired, and the church kept in good\npreservation.  The bells of the church tower pealed a welcome; a large\nconcourse of the neighbouring poor assembled in the courtyard to greet\nthem; while the Solitaries\u2014one of their number, a priest, bearing a\ncross\u2014waited at the church door to enter with them, and swell with their\nvoices the Te Deum with which they celebrated their return.  After this\nthey parted, a few of the brotherhood repairing to a house which had been\ntaken for them in Paris, but others retiring to the well-known farm on\nthe hill known as Les Granges.  There was, of course, the strictest\nseclusion maintained in the nunnery, as before, and the inmates of Les\nGranges were wellnigh as completely severed from it as the brethren who\nretired to Paris.\n\nThe mode of life of the Solitaries was simple in the highest degree.\nThey wore no distinctive dress.  Their wants were supplied by the barest\nnecessaries in the shape of lodging and furniture.  From early morning,\nthree A.M., to night, they were occupied in works of piety, charity, or\nindustry.  They met in the chapel after their private devotions to say\nmatins and lauds, a service which occupied about an hour and a half,\nafter which they kissed the earth in token of a common lowliness, and\nsought each his own room for a time.  The round of devotion thus\ncommenced was continued with a steady uniformity,\u2014Prime at half-past six;\nTierces at nine, and after this a daily Mass; Sexte at eleven; Nones at\ntwo; Vespers at four; and Compline closing the series at a quarter-past\nseven. {89}  The Gospel and Epistles were read daily; and sometimes\nduring or after dinner the Lives of the Saints.  They dined together; and\na walk thereafter formed the sole recreation of the day.  Two hours in\nthe morning, and two in the afternoon, were devoted to work in the fields\nor in the garden by those who were able for such tasks.  Confession and\ncommunion were frequent, but no uniform rule was enforced.  In this, as\nin fasting and austerities generally, each recluse was left to his own\nfree will; and, as will be seen in Pascal\u2019s case, there was no need to\nstimulate the morbid desire for bodily mortification.\n\n                                * * * * *\n\nIt was in the last month of 1654 that Pascal\u2019s final conversion and\nadhesion to Port Royal took place.  His mind for some time before had\nbeen greatly agitated, as already explained\u2014filled with disgust of the\nworld and all its enjoyments.  Then had come the accident at the Bridge\nof Neuilly, and about the same time, or a little later, a remarkable\nvision or ecstasy which he has himself described, and which has given\nrise to a good deal of useless speculation.  During life he never spoke\nof this matter, unless it may have been to his confessor; {90} but after\nhis death two copies of a brief writing were found upon him,\u2014the one\nwritten on parchment enclosing the other written on paper, and carefully\nstitched into the clothes that he had worn day by day.  It is beyond\nquestion that Pascal must have been deeply touched by the event, whatever\nmay have been its precise nature, the memorial of which he had thus\npreserved.  The footnote shows the writing in the original, as printed by\nM. Faug\u00e8re: there are some variations in the copies, but it seems most\ncorrectly given as below.  It may be translated as follows:\u2014\n\n                                * * * * *\n\n                         The year of grace 1654.\n  Monday 23d November, day of St Clement, pope and martyr, and others in\n                             the martyrology.\n                Vigil of St Chrysogone, martyr and others.\n   From about half-past ten o\u2019clock in the evening till about half-past\n                                 twelve.\n\n                                  Fire.\n               God of Abraham, God of Isaac, God of Jacob,\n                   Not of philosophers and of savants.\n             Certitude.  Certitude.  Sentiment.  Joy.  Peace.\n                           God of Jesus Christ\n                           My God and your God.\n                         Thy God will be my God\u2014\n                Oblivion of the world and of all save God.\n            He is found only by the ways taught in the Gospel.\n\n                       Grandeur of the human soul.\n    Just Father, the world hath not known Thee, but I have known Thee.\n                       Joy, joy, joy, tears of joy.\n                    I have separated myself from Him\u2014\n           They have forsaken Me, the fountain of living water.\n                      My God, will you forsake me?\u2014\n\n              Oh, may I not be separated from Him eternally!\n       This is life eternal, that they know Thee the only true God,\n                    and Him whom Thou hast sent, J.-C.\n                              Jesus Christ\u2014\n                              Jesus Christ\u2014\n I have separated myself from Him; I have fled, renounced, crucified Him.\n                Oh that I may never be separated from Him!\n          He is only held fast by the ways taught in the Gospel.\n\n                      Renunciation total and sweet,\n                                etc. {91}\n\n                                * * * * *\n\nIt is difficult to make much of this document.  Are we to suppose that\nPascal, on the 23d of November 1654, thought he saw a vision, revealing\nto him the truth of Christianity, and the vanity of philosophy and the\nworld?  Even if Pascal did this, our estimate of the matter could hardly\nbe much affected.  But there is no evidence that he himself attached a\nsupernatural character to the incident.  He felt, no doubt, that a real\nrevelation had come to him, that his mind had been lifted in spiritual\necstasy away from the love of all that for a time had hid from him the\npresence of God and of a higher world.  The moment of this blessed\nexperience had been sacred to him.  He had tried to trace it in these\nbroken characters, and in seasons of doubt or depression he may have\nsought to awaken a new fervour of faith and love by their contemplation.\nThis seems all the natural meaning of the incident; but, as some have\nendeavoured to attach to it a supernatural importance, so others, in whom\nthe idea not only of the supernatural but of the spiritual only excites\ncontempt, have tried to give to it a purely superstitious character.  It\nwas Condorcet who first applied to the paper the epithet of Pascal\u2019s\n\u201cAmulette;\u201d and L\u00e9lut has adopted the epithet, and written a volume more\nor less relating to it.  He supposes the vision to have occurred to\nPascal on the evening of the day when the event at Neuilly had upset his\nnervous system\u2014always easily disturbed\u2014and brought before him a frightful\npicture of his alienation from God, and the piety of his early manhood.\nFacts mingled with the dreams of his excited imagination.  He saw the\nhorses plunging over the precipice, and an abyss seemed to open beside\nhim\u2014the abyss of eternity; when, lo! from the depths of the abyss there\nappeared a globe of fire (_un globe de feu_) encircled with the Cross;\nand the irresistible impulse was stirred in him to throw aside the world\nfor ever, and embrace God,\u2014\u201cNot the God of philosophers or of savants,\u201d\nbut \u201cthe God of Abraham, of Isaac, of Jacob\u2014the God of Jesus Christ,\u201d\nfrom whom he had been severed, but from whom he felt he never more would\nbe severed; abiding in Him in \u201csweet and total renunciation\u201d of all else.\nThe idea, of course, is that Pascal\u2019s dream or vision was the result of\nphysical derangement; and it may be safely granted that if the reality at\nall corresponded to L\u00e9lut\u2019s imaginary picture, this is its natural\nexplanation.  The story of the \u201cvision\u201d and the \u201cabyss\u201d are thus made,\nnot without a certain appearance of probability, to fit into one another,\nand both into the accident at Neuilly; and a certain congruity of\nexternal and internal alarm is hence given to the great crisis of\nPascal\u2019s life.  Unhappily, however, there is a lack of evidence regarding\nthe accident itself, {94} and, still more, the accompanying story of the\nabyss seen by Pascal at his side, which must make the reader cautious who\nhas no theory to support.  Voltaire, in his usual manner, made the most\nof Pascal\u2019s supposed delusions.  \u201cIn the last years of his life,\u201d he\nsaid, \u201cPascal believed that he had seen an abyss _by the side of his\nchair_,\u2014need we on that account have the same fancy?  I, too, see an\nabyss, but it is in the very things which he believed that he had\nexplained.\u201d  He quotes also the authority of Leibnitz for the statement\nthat Pascal\u2019s melancholy had led his intellect astray\u2014a result, he adds,\nnot at all wonderful in the case of a man of such delicate temperament\nand gloomy imagination.  But Voltaire was not precise here, as in other\nmatters about Pascal.  He understood him too little to be a good judge of\nhis mental peculiarities.  All that Leibnitz really said was, that\nPascal, \u201cin wishing to fathom the depths of religion, had become\nscrupulous even to folly.\u201d {95}\n\nWhatever explanation we may give of the supposed incidents attending\nPascal\u2019s conversion, there never was a more absurd fancy than that\nPascal\u2019s mind suffered any eclipse in the great change that came to him.\nHe may have been credulous, he may have been superstitious.  The miracle\nof the Holy Thorn may be an evidence of the one, and the unnatural\nasceticism of his later years a proof of the other.  But to speak of the\nauthor of the \u2018Provincial Letters,\u2019 of the problems on the Cycloid, and\nfinally of the \u2018Pens\u00e9es,\u2019 as if his intellect had suffered from his\nconversion, is to use words without meaning.  All his noblest writings\nwere the product of his religious experience, and he never soared so high\nin intellectual and literary achievement as when moving on the wings of\nspiritual indignation or of spiritual aspiration.\n\nThe whole interest of Pascal\u2019s life from this period is concentrated in\nhis writings\u2014first the \u2018Provincials,\u2019 and then the \u2018Pens\u00e9es,\u2019 to which we\ndevote separate chapters.  There was only the interval of a year between\nhis conversion and the commencement of his great controversy, and little\nis known of how he passed his time during this interval.  He seems to\nhave remained chiefly at Port Royal under the guidance of M. de Saci, and\nto have felt an unwonted measure of happiness in his triumph over the\nworld and in the possession of his own quiet thoughts.  We have seen how\nhe spoke of being treated \u201clike a prince,\u201d and even his health seemed to\nimprove, notwithstanding the regularity and severity of his religious\ndevotions.  He communicated his feelings of elation to his sister, who\nreplied (19th January 1655) that she was delighted to find him \u201cgay in\nhis solitude,\u201d as she never was at his happiness in the world.\n\u201cNotwithstanding,\u201d she adds, \u201cI do not know how M. de Saci adapts himself\nto so light-hearted a penitent, who professes to find compensation for\nthe vain joys and amusements of the world in joys somewhat more\nreasonable, and _jeux d\u2019esprit_ more allowable, instead of expiating them\nby perpetual tears.\u201d\n\nHow long Pascal\u2019s pious elation continued is not said, nor have we any\nfurther details of his religious life at Port Royal.  He never absolutely\ntook up his abode there as one of the Solitaries, and could therefore say\nin his sixteenth Provincial Letter, without more than an innocent\nequivocation, that he \u201cdid not belong to Port Royal.\u201d  He was still found\nthere, however, in the beginning of the following year (1655), when the\naffair of M. Arnauld and the Sorbonne was approaching its crisis, and the\nidea of his famous letters was started in a meeting, to be afterwards\nmentioned, between him and Arnauld and Nicole.  After this, during the\npublication of the \u2018Letters,\u2019 Pascal seems chiefly to have resided in\nParis, probably with a view to the greater facilities he enjoyed there in\nprosecuting his assaults upon the Jesuits, which continued till the\nspring of 1657.  During the following year he was busy with the great\nidea of a work in defence of religion, suggested partly by his own\nintellectual activity, but partly also by a special incident at Port\nRoyal which made a great impression upon him.\n\nThis was the famous \u201cmiracle\u201d of the Holy Thorn.  Madame P\u00e9rier\u2019s\ndaughter, Marguerite P\u00e9rier\u2014the same to whom we are indebted for\ninteresting memorials of her uncle\u2019s life\u2014had become, with her sister, a\npupil at Port Royal.  She suffered from an apparently incurable disease\nof the eye, _fistula lachrymalis_.  On a sudden she was reported to be\nentirely cured, and the cure was attributed to the touch of a relic which\nhad been brought to the abbey by a priest,\u2014a supposed thorn from the\ncrown of Christ.  It is remarkable that the M\u00e8re Ang\u00e9lique was somewhat\nslow of belief as to the \u201cmiracle,\u201d and that she marvelled the world\nshould make so much of it.  But it secured the credence of Pascal, and\nbecame a great fact in the history of Port Royal, staying for a time the\nhand of persecution, and pointing, as its friends believed, to the\nvisible interposition of heaven.  How could the accusations against Port\nRoyal be true, seeing what God Himself had done on its behalf?  \u201cThis\nplace, which men say is the devil\u2019s temple, God makes His house.  Men\ndeclare that its children must be taken out of it, and God heals them\nthere.  They are threatened with all the furies; God loads them with His\nfavours.\u201d  This was Pascal\u2019s own language on the subject, {97} and there\ncan be no doubt that the supposed miracle deeply affected him.  He was\n\u201csensibly touched,\u201d it is said, \u201cby such a grace, regarding it as\nvirtually done to himself, seeing it was done to one so near to him in\nkindred, and who was his spiritual daughter in baptism.\u201d  He was\npenetrated by a great joy, and much occupied by the thought of what had\nhappened, and the general subject of miracles.  There was in this manner\nawakened in him \u201cthe extreme desire of employing himself on a work in\nrefutation of the principles and false reasonings of the atheists.\u201d  \u201cHe\nhad studied them,\u201d his sister continues, \u201cwith great care, and applied\nhis whole mind to search out the means of convincing them.  His last year\nof work was entirely occupied in collecting divers thoughts on this\nsubject.\u201d\n\nUnhappily, in the course of 1658 Pascal\u2019s old illness returned with\nredoubled severity, and the last four years of his life became in\nconsequence years of great languor and interruption of his projected\nwork.  The practice of continuous composition failed him.  Hitherto he\nhad been wont to develop his thoughts completely,\u2014to write them out, as\nit were, mentally before committing them to paper; but now he began the\nhabit of transferring his ideas rapidly, and sometimes imperfectly, to\nmanuscript, as they arose in his mind.  In many cases, if not in all,\nthese first sketches remained as originally made, without any revision or\nfurther reconstruction; and from the mass of papers accumulated in this\nmanner during these years the \u2018Pens\u00e9es\u2019 were formed\u2014the story of whose\npublication will be afterwards told.  Strangely, it was in this very\nyear, during a fit of severe toothache, apparently connected with his\ngeneral illness, that Pascal began his wonderful series of problems on\nthe cycloid, showing how fresh and unimpaired his scientific genius\nremained under all the changes of his health and of his main intellectual\ninterests.\n\nThe last years of Pascal\u2019s life, in their deep suffering, and in their\nmany traits of pious resignation and self-denial, have been fully\nsketched by Madame P\u00e9rier.  We do not think it necessary to repeat the\nsketch here, touching and beautiful as in some respects it is.  It is\nimpossible to read her simple and earnest narrative without emotion, and\nyet the emotion is apt to evaporate in translation.  It is impossible,\nalso, to avoid the feeling that, with all the tenderness and humility of\nPascal\u2019s later years, there mingle a strange pride in his very\nausterities, and something of the nature of religious mania, which,\nbeautiful as may be the forms it sometimes takes, is yet in its spirit,\nand in not a few of its excesses, essentially unlovely.  Pascal\u2019s care of\nthe poor, his love of them\u2014\u201cto serve the poor in a spirit of poverty\u201d was\nwhat appeared to him \u201cmost agreeable to God\u201d\u2014his wish to die among them,\nto be carried to the Hospital for Incurables, and breathe his last there;\nthe story of his rescue of the poor girl who asked alms from him on the\nstreets; his unparalleled patience, and even gladness, in suffering, so\nthat he seemed to welcome it and bind it about him as a garment; his\nwonderful humility and yet his noble courage at the last in the matter of\nthe Formulary,\u2014all this goes to the heart of the reader.  It must be a\ncold heart that is not moved by the picture of a great soul striving \u201cto\nrenounce all pleasure and all superfluities,\u201d\u2014to copy literally, like St\nFrancis, the portrait of his Master.  But here, as everywhere, the human\ncopy falls infinitely short of the divine Original.  There is the\nloveliness of a true human life beneath all the picture of suffering\npresented to us in the Gospels.  All the hues of natural feeling have\ngone out of the last years of Pascal.  He not only bore suffering\u2014he\npreferred it; and he boldly justified his preference.  \u201cSickness,\u201d he\nsaid, \u201cis the natural state of the Christian; it puts us in the condition\nin which we always ought to be.\u201d  In this spirit he strove to deaden any\nsensation of pleasure in his food, in the attentions of his relatives and\nfriends, even in his studies.  He could not bear to see his sister\ncaressing her children; there seemed to him harm in even saying that a\nwoman was beautiful; the married state was a \u201ckind of homicide or rather\nDeicide.\u201d  He thought it wrong that any one should find pleasure in\nattachment to him, for he \u201cwas not the final object of any being, and had\nnot wherewith to satisfy any.\u201d  So jealous was he of any surprise of\npleasure, of any thought of vanity or complacency in himself and his\nwork, that he wore a girdle of iron next his skin, the sharp points of\nwhich he pressed closely when he thought himself in any danger,\nespecially in such moments of intercourse with the world as he still\nsometimes allowed himself.\n\nSuch details are neither interesting in themselves nor do they present\nPascal in his highest character.  One cannot help feeling that, touching\nas Madame P\u00e9rier\u2019s narrative is, there must have been, even in the Pascal\nof later years, more than she has drawn for us.  One glimpse we get, but\nnot in her pages, of a more natural temper, when he withstood his\nJansenist friends in the matter of subscribing the Formulary demanded\nfrom the Port Royalists.  He had himself previously been willing to\nsubscribe, with certain restrictions, when his sister Jacqueline alone\nstood out in her resistance to what she deemed a treasonable betrayal of\nthe cause.  She signed at last, but against her conscience, and, so to\nspeak, with her blood.  She died immediately afterwards, the first victim\nof the signature, as she has been called, and bequeathing a letter to her\nfellow-sufferers on the subject.  Whether inspired by her words or not,\nPascal took a firm stand against any further concessions, and in a famous\ninterview with Arnauld, Nicole, and Sainte-Marthe, he argued the point\nwith such strength and vehemence that he fell fainting to the ground.\n{101}\n\nThis was in the end of 1661, when his sufferings were fast drawing to a\nclose.  In the previous summer, when at Clermont, he had written to\nFermat that he was so weak as to be \u201cunable to walk without a stick, or\nto hold himself on horseback.\u201d  His weakness had grown apace, and in June\n1662 he was seized with his last illness.  It was necessary that his\nsister should nurse him, and this could only be done by his removal to\nher house, for he had given up his own house to a poor family, one of\nwhose children had taken smallpox, and he would allow neither the child\nto be removed nor his sister to run the risk of carrying infection to her\nchildren.  He left his own home for hers, therefore, on the 27th of June,\nand never returned.  Three days after his removal he was seized with a\nviolent colic, which deprived him of all sleep.  His physicians at first\nwere not alarmed, as his pulse continued good, but gradually pain and\nsleeplessness wore him out.  He confessed both to the _cur\u00e9_ of the\nparish and to his friend Sainte-Marthe, one of the directors of the\ncommunity.  He wished, as we said, to die in the Hospital for Incurables\namongst the poor, but in his state of weakness it was impossible to\ngratify this wish.  After the administration of the last sacrament, which\nhe received with tearful emotion, he thanked the _cur\u00e9_, and exclaimed,\n\u201cMay God never leave me!\u201d  These were his last words.  Convulsions having\nreturned, he expired on the 19th of August 1662.\n\nIt is unnecessary to attempt any estimate of Pascal\u2019s character.  The\nreader must draw it for himself in the light of these pages.  With all\nenthusiasm for its grandeur and unity of purpose, and that moral and\nintellectual elevation which it everywhere shows, it may be found lacking\nin breadth and variety, and that familiar interest and charm which\nstrangely often come from the contemplation of human weakness rather than\nof human strength.  There is certainly less to love in him than to\nadmire\u2014less to call forth delight than respect.  The play of natural\nindividuality is hidden behind lines of lofty distance, and latterly of\nJansenist severity.  A proud, ascetic, and worn figure seems to rise\nbefore us; but strangely Pascal\u2019s portrait, as known to us, conveys no\nidea of asceticism.  The face is full-fleshed and expressive, like the\nface of a child, with large ripe lips and open eyes of wonder,\u2014a portrait\nwhich suggests the companion of the Duc de Roannez in his years of\npleasure, rather than the weary and pain-worn penitent of Port Royal.\n{102}\n\n\n\n\nCHAPTER V.\nTHE \u2018PROVINCIAL LETTERS.\u2019\n\n\nPascal\u2019s \u2018Letters to a Provincial\u2019 represent a great controversy, the\nnature of which it is necessary to explain.  They are, at the same time,\nthe most perfect expression of his literary genius, and touch theological\nquestions with such an inimitable grace and felicity of expression as to\nhave awakened a universal intellectual interest.  It may be hard to\njustify this interest by any analysis of their contents, or by such\nextracts as can be given from them.  No English can convey the exquisite\nfitness of French polemical expression in its highest form, its mingled\nforce and delicacy, its keenness and yet its lightness.  We shall,\nhowever, endeavour to give as clearly as we can an account, first, of the\ncontroversy out of which the \u2018Letters\u2019 originated, and then of the\nconsummate skill with which Pascal conducted it.\n\nM. de St Cyran is not merely one of the chief figures connected with Port\nRoyal: he was the fountain-head of its special power.  To his influence\nand teaching it was indebted for its chief glory and its most terrible\nsufferings.  Jean Baptist du Vergier d\u2019Hauranne, better known by the\nabove official designation, was of noble family.  He was born at Bayonne\nin 1581, and early devoted himself to the study of theology at Louvain\nand Paris.  While a student, he is supposed to have first made the\nacquaintance of Cornelius Jansen, and to have begun with him that\nco-operation which was destined to bear such remarkable fruits.  Their\nintimacy was one based on spiritual affinity and a common enthusiasm.\nFor Jansen was the son of poor peasants, without even a surname.  His\nfather is only known as Jan Ottosen, or John the son of Otto; as the son\nin his turn was Cornelius Jansen, or the son of John.  Jansen was the\nyounger of the two friends, having been born in 1585; but he appears to\nhave exercised a powerful influence over his older companion.  The great\nbond of their union and common enthusiasm was the study of St Augustine.\nFor the purpose of pursuing this study undisturbed, they retired to the\nseaside near Bayonne, and here they established themselves in scholastic\nseclusion.  Smitten with the desire of attaining theological truth, they\nfound the Schoolmen constantly appealing to St Augustine as their\nauthority, and they consequently resolved to examine this authority for\nthemselves, and so ascend to what they believed to be the source of their\nfavourite science.  Had they taken only one step further, they would have\napproached Protestantism; and as it was, the favourite charge which the\nJesuits afterwards made against them was, that they were Calvinists in\ndisguise.  Unconsciously they were so, notwithstanding all their\ndisclaimers.  The Jesuits were unscrupulous; but their penetration here,\nas in many other cases, was not at fault.  The doctrines so warmly\nespoused by Jansen and St Cyran were the old doctrines of _grace_, which\nCalvin and they alike borrowed from St Augustine, and he in his turn\nfound in the Epistles of St Paul. {105}  And the controversy which their\nlabours were destined once more to awaken in the bosom of the Catholic\nChurch was nothing else than the old dispute which, since the days of\nAugustine and Pelagius, had more than once already agitated it.\n\nThe fellow-students continued their studies near Bayonne for five years.\nSo closely did they work, that Jansen is said to have spent days and\nnights in the same chair, snatching only brief intervals of rest.  A game\nat battledore and shuttlecock occasionally relieved their vigils; but no\nserious employment divided their attention with the arduous task upon\nwhich they had entered, of mastering and digesting the principles of the\nAugustinian theology.  The Bishop of Bayonne offered preferment to\nD\u2019Hauranne, and there were projects of settling Jansen also at the head\nof a college; but it was not till some time afterwards that either of\nthem entered upon official labours.  They were left during those years to\nthe uninterrupted studies which subsequently resulted in the great work\nof Jansen.  The system of theological thought associated with his name\nwas then definitely matured.\n\nIt is beyond our province to sketch the career of these fellow-students,\none of whom became the chief spiritual director of Port Royal, and the\nother its great theological centre.  The abbey of St Cyran was the only\npreferment which D\u2019Hauranne ever accepted, notwithstanding Richelieu\u2019s\nrepeated offers of a bishopric.  He was content to exercise from his\nmonastic seclusion an influence far more powerful than that of any bishop\nof his day.  And so penetrating and dangerous did this influence seem to\nthe great Minister whose efforts to bind him to his side had so often\nfailed, that he at length shut him up in Vincennes (May 1638).  Here he\nremained in close confinement for more than four years; but even from\nthis gloomy retreat the impression of his great personal power was spread\nabroad, and felt in many quarters as steadily as before.  He survived his\nrelease only a few months.  His long imprisonment had broken down his\nhealth; and although the enthusiasm of his spirit was strong as ever, his\nweakened body was no longer able to answer to its demands.  He could\nhardly \u201chold himself up,\u201d and a slight attack of illness carried him off.\n\nSt Cyran\u2019s chief strength seems to have lain in a concentrated enthusiasm\nand quiet strength of will which enabled him to hold his own against all\nopposition, and to subdue other minds larger than his own to his\npurposes.  When the Prince de Cond\u00e9 interceded for him after his arrest,\nRichelieu\u2019s reply was: \u201cDo you know of whom you are speaking?  That man\nis more dangerous than six armies.  _I_ say that attrition with\nconfession is necessary: _he_ believes that contrition is necessary.\n{106}  And in the affair of Monsieur\u2019s marriage all France has given way\nto me, and he alone has the hardihood to oppose it.\u201d  Against all\nenticements and assaults alike he set a proud and firm faith in his own\nmission\u2014a patience sublime in its calmness, and in the unwavering\nconsciousness of Divine right on his side.  \u201cI am careful to complain of\nnothing,\u201d he said in his imprisonment.  \u201cI am ready to remain here a\nhundred years; to die here, if God will.  I am ready for whatever He\ndesigns\u2014for action or for suffering.\u201d  The same faith and quiet assurance\ngave him his marvellous influence over others, and that fascination which\nmade him a power in the cultivated society of Paris.  All the Arnauld\nfamily more or less owned his influence; and it was his teaching mainly\nthat peopled Port Royal with the Solitaries who have made it so\nillustrious.\n\nThe life and work of Jansen seem at first far removed from Port Royal.\nHe returned to Louvain after his sojourn at Bayonne, and became a\nprofessor of theology in its famous university, on whose behalf he was\nemployed in several political negotiations with the Spanish Court.\nFinally he was appointed Bishop of Ypres, in which capacity he is chiefly\nknown in the ecclesiastical world.  His fame, however, rests not on any\npolitical or ecclesiastical labours, but on the results flowing from his\noriginal studies at Bayonne.  He never forgot his devotion to St\nAugustine.  He is said to have read the whole of his writings ten times,\nand the treatises against the Pelagians not less than thirty times.  The\nfruit of all this studious devotion was his work known briefly as the\n\u2018Augustinus,\u2019 {107} published two years after his death (in 1640).\nNothing could have seemed more innocent or laudable than the attempt by a\nbishop of the Church to set forth the doctrine of St Augustine.  The book\nprofessed to have been undertaken in a humble spirit.\n\n    \u201cI have avoided error where I could,\u201d says the author; \u201cfor the cases\n    in which I could not, I implore the reader\u2019s pardon. . . .  Let the\n    knowledge of my sincerity make amends for the simplicity of my error.\n    I know that if I have erred, it is not in the assertion of Catholic\n    truth, but in the statement of the opinion of St Augustine; for I\n    have not laid down what is true or false, what is to be held or\n    rejected according to the faith of the Catholic Church, but only what\n    Augustine taught and declared was to be held.\u201d\n\nA task of such a character, carried out in such a spirit, might have\nseemed a harmless one.\n\nBut the Jesuits had long marked both St Cyran and Jansen as theological\nfoes, opposed to their special doctrines.  They endeavoured therefore,\nfirst of all, to prevent the publication of Jansen\u2019s work; and failing in\nthis, they directed all their efforts to procure a condemnation of the\nbook from the Court of Rome.  \u201cNever,\u201d it has been said, \u201cdid any book\nreceive a more stormy welcome.  Within a few weeks of its appearance the\nUniversity, the Jesuits, the executors of Jansen, the printer of the\n\u2018Augustinus,\u2019 the Spanish governor of the Low Countries, and the Papal\nNuncio were engaged in a warfare of pamphlets, treatises, pasquinades,\npleadings, synods, audiences, which it would be impossible to set forth\nin historical sequence.\u201d {108}  In the midst of all this, Jansen\u2019s old\nfellow-student received the book, in the preparation of which he also had\nhad some share, in his prison at Vincennes, as if an echo of his own\nthoughts.  \u201cIt would last as long as the Church,\u201d he said.  \u201cAfter St\nPaul and St Augustine, no one had written concerning grace like Jansen.\u201d\n\nThe Jesuits were resolved in their hostility.  They knew that the book,\nwhile assuming a historical form, and professing in the main to represent\nthe doctrine of Augustine as directed against the errorists of his own\ntime, had a side reference to the \u201copinions of certain modern authors,\u201d\nunderstood to be well-known theologians of their own school.  This was in\nfact acknowledged in an appendix.  Unable any longer to wreak their\nvengeance on the author himself, they were resolved to put his work under\nban; and accordingly, a Bull was obtained from Rome in the summer of\n1642, condemning Jansen by name, and declaring that the \u2018Augustinus\u2019\ncontained \u201cmany propositions already condemned\u201d by the Holy See.  It was\ndoubted whether the Pope, Urban VIII., designed to go the length\nannounced in the bull, and the terms of the condemnation were rumoured to\nhave been inserted by a Papal officer in the interests of the Jesuits.\nThe Universities of Louvain and Paris therefore did not take any steps to\ncarry out the condemnation.  They remained spectators of the controversy\nwhich raged around them, in which the Archbishop of Paris on one side,\nand the youngest of the Arnauld family on the other, were conspicuous.\n\nAntoine Arnauld was the last of the twenty children born to the great\nparliamentary orator and Catherine Marion his wife, of whom we have\nalready spoken.  His nephews, Le Maitre and De Saci, were so near his own\nage, that they were accustomed to call him familiarly _le petit oncle_.\nEarly consecrated to theological studies by the influence of St Cyran and\nhis mother, he espoused zealously the Augustinian doctrines.  A splendid\nprospect seemed opening before him, had he chosen to enter the Church and\npursue an ecclesiastical career in the ordinary manner.  But while\nthirsting for theological distinction, he had scruples about his vocation\nto the holy office.  He overcame his scruples so far as to become a\npriest; but not only would he not accept the benefices placed within his\nreach by powerful friends\u2014he insisted on resigning such as he held.  He\neven disposed of his patrimony for the benefit of Port Royal, preserving\nonly as much as would provide him with the bare necessaries of life.  He\nbecame a doctor in 1641, and already, in 1643, the interest of the whole\ntheological world was aroused by his treatise, \u2018Of Frequent Communion.\u2019\n\nThe aim of this treatise, as of all Arnauld\u2019s writings, was\nanti-Jesuitical.  He set forth, backed by the authority of \u201cFathers,\nPopes, and Councils,\u201d the necessity of spiritual preparation for the Holy\nCommunion, in opposition to the formula which had been boldly advanced by\nmore than one Jesuit teacher, that \u201cthe more we are devoid of divine\ngrace, the more ought we to seek Jesus Christ in the Eucharist.\u201d  The\ncommotion made by the publication shows how grave was the need for it.\nOn the one hand it was warmly welcomed, many pious bishops and doctors\ntestifying approbation of its contents; on the other hand it was\nviolently assailed.  The Jesuit pulpits resounded with abuse of it and of\nits author.  All Paris was disturbed by the noise which it made.  \u201cThere\nmust be a snake in the grass somewhere,\u201d it was wittily remarked, \u201cfor\nthe Jesuits were never so excited when only the glory of God was at\nstake.\u201d  The learned Petavius, and even the Prince de Cond\u00e9, did not\ndisdain to mingle in the combat.  For a time Arnauld seemed to triumph,\nbut finally the influence of Rome was brought against him, and he was\nglad to take refuge in concealment\u2014the first of the many concealments\ninto which his incessant polemical activity drove him in the course of\nhis long life.  He never abated his opposition.  He had no sooner retired\nfrom one controversy, than he reappeared in some other.  His energy knew\nno bounds, his love of fighting no pause.  When in his old age his friend\nand fellow-student Nicole advised him to rest.  \u201cRest!\u201d he said; \u201chave I\nnot all eternity to rest in?\u201d\n\nIt was a matter of course that when the great Jansenist controversy\nbegan, Arnauld should be found in the van of it.  \u2018An Apology for Jansen\u2019\nappeared from his pen in 1644, and a second \u2018Apology\u2019 in the following\nyear.  It seemed for a time as if the Jesuits would be foiled in their\nefforts to secure the effectual condemnation of the book.  But at length\none of their number, Nicolas Cornet, Syndic of the Faculty of Theology at\nParis, collected its essential heresy in the shape of seven propositions.\nThese propositions were afterwards reduced to five; and at length, on the\n31st of May 1653, a formal condemnation of them was obtained from the\nCourt of Rome.  There was no longer any doubt as to the attitude of the\nHoly See.  All the propositions were declared to be distinctly heretical,\nand the first and the fifth, moreover, to be blasphemous and impious.\nThis result was not reached without much debate and delay.  No sooner had\nCornet\u2019s propositions appeared than Arnauld assailed them and all who\nsupported them.  A congregation of four cardinals and eleven theological\nassessors had been appointed to examine them in the end of the year 1651.\nThey had taken, therefore, a year and a half to their work, and the\nsentence at length issued was intended to bring the long warfare to a\nclose.  In point of fact it kindled a fresh fire, and opened, if not a\nlarger, yet a more vital controversy.  Arnauld retired willingly before a\nnew writer summoned by himself into the field, and girded with his\nblessing as he went forth to the encounter.\n\nThe five propositions, which were professed to be extracted from Jansen\u2019s\nbook, and as such were condemned by the Papal Bull of 31st May 1653, are\nso intimately connected with the \u2018Provincial Letters\u2019 as to claim a place\nin our pages.  They are as follows:\u2014\n\n    I.  There are divine commandments which good men, although willing,\n    are unable to obey; and the grace by which these commandments are\n    possible is also wanting in them.\n\n    II.  No person, in the state of fallen nature, is able to resist\n    internal grace.\n\n    III.  In order to render human actions meritorious or otherwise,\n    liberty from necessity is not required, but only liberty from\n    constraint.\n\n    IV.  The semi-Pelagians, while admitting the necessity of prevenient\n    grace\u2014or grace preceding all actions\u2014were heretics, inasmuch as they\n    said that this grace was such as man could, according to his will,\n    either resist or obey.\n\n    V.  The semi-Pelagians also erred in saying that Christ died or shed\n    His blood for all men universally.\n\nIt would be needless for us to touch these propositions, even by way of\nexplanation.  We have endeavoured to state them from the original Latin\nas clearly as we can, so that they may bear some definite meaning even to\nthe non-theological reader.  But their very statement bristles with\ncontroversy, and the half-extinct meanings of old questions that go to\nthe root of Christian thought lie hid in their language.  All the\npropositions were condemned without reserve, but two points were left\nunsettled.  It was not asserted that the propositions were to be found in\nthe \u2018Augustinus,\u2019 and that they were condemned in the sense in which\nJansen held them, and in no other.  The course of the controversy and the\nfate of Port Royal in the end mainly turned upon these points.\n\nThe Papal Bull condemning the five propositions was speedily published in\nFrance, and the triumph of the Jesuits was undisguised.  A great blow had\nbeen struck, and for a time all seemed inclined to bow before it.\nPolitical reasons combined with others to give effect to the Papal\nverdict.  Cardinal Mazarin, in possession of the favour of the\nQueen-mother, had imprisoned his enemy, Cardinal de Retz, who had so long\nwaged in the intrigues and wars of the Fronde a restless conflict with\nthem; and as the latter in his prosperity had shown a certain favour for\nPort Royal, this was enough to stimulate, on the part of Mazarin, an\ninterest on behalf of the Jesuits.  Yet he was reluctant to move actively\nagainst the Jansenists.  M. d\u2019Andilly still had his ear in matters of\nState, and by his intervention and that of others the project of an\narmistice was for a time entertained.  Port Royal was to keep silence, if\nits enemies did not push their triumph to an extremity.  Even the\nindefatigable Arnauld seems to have promised to be quiet.  But the\nJesuits were too conscious of their power, and too relentless in their\nhostility, to pause in their determination to crush their opponents.\nThey had recourse both to gibes and to active persecution.  They printed\nan almanac with the figure of Jansen as frontispiece, flying in the guise\nof a winged devil before the Pope and the king into the arms of the\nHuguenots.  They assailed the Duc de Liancourt, and refused him\nabsolution in his own parish church, for no other reason but that he was\non friendly relations with Port Royal, and would not withdraw, at their\ndemand, his granddaughter from its protection.  This affair, which\nappears to have been deliberately planned, caused a great sensation, and\nbecame, strangely, the indirect occasion of the \u2018Provincial Letters.\u2019\n\nIndignant at such an outrage, Arnauld was no longer to be restrained.  He\nrushed before the public with a pamphlet under the title, \u201cLetter of a\nDoctor of the Sorbonne to a Person of Condition, concerning an event\nwhich has recently happened in a parish of Paris to a Nobleman of the\nCourt, February 24, 1655.\u201d  The Letter opened with an expression of his\nwish to dispute no more; but as Sainte-Beuve hints, the avowed desire of\npeace plunged him all the more into war.  His letter called forth\nnumerous replies.  He responded by a \u201cSecond Letter,\u201d in the shape of a\nvolume.  In this letter his enemies seemed to see his fate written.  They\nextracted from it two propositions which in their view clearly\ncontravened the Papal verdict\u2014namely, 1st, that he had expressed doubts\nwhether the five propositions condemned as heretical were in Jansen\u2019s\nbook at all; and 2d, that he had really reproduced the first of the five\ncondemned propositions in one of his own statements, that according to\nboth the Gospel and the Fathers, St Peter, a just man, was wanting in\ngrace when he fell.  This was nothing but undisguised Jansenism, and his\naccusers in the Sorbonne rallied for his overthrow.  A meeting was\nsummoned to consider the letter, and to judge it and the author.\n\nThe details of the proceedings would weary the reader.  It is sufficient\nto say that, notwithstanding the concessions wrung from Arnauld, some of\nwhich were humiliating enough, he was condemned on the first point (Jan.\n1656)\u2014the great question of \u201cfait,\u201d in contrast to the question of\n\u201cdroit,\u201d involved in the second statement as to grace being wanting to St\nPeter in his fall.  His condemnation, however, was mainly secured by the\nintroduction of a number of monks who swelled the majority against him,\nand the legality of whose vote was challenged by many members.  But, as\nPascal afterwards said, \u201cit was easier to find monks than arguments.\u201d\nThe second and doctrinal point received professedly more deliberate\ndiscussion.  The sittings regarding it were protracted till the close of\nthe month, the 29th of January.  But the result was really forestalled.\nThe restriction laid on free debate was such as to lead no fewer than\nsixty doctors to withdraw, protesting to Parliament against the\ninterference with their rights.  Their protest, however, came to nothing.\nSentence was finally passed, against not only Arnauld, but all who\nadhered to him or espoused his opinions.  The victim, with his usual\nadroitness, escaped his pursuers, and went once more into a concealment\nwhich all their vigilance could not penetrate.  Two days after the\ncensure he wrote to one of his nieces, \u201cI am in very close hiding, and by\nGod\u2019s grace without trouble or disquiet.\u201d  \u201cWould you like me to tell you\nwhere M. Arnauld is hidden?\u201d inquired a lady of the _gendarmes_ who were\nsearching her house for traces of him.  \u201cHe is safely hidden here,\u201d\npointing to her heart; \u201carrest him if you can.\u201d\n\nIt was in the interval betwixt the first and second judgment of the\nSorbonne that the first of the \u2018Provincial Letters\u2019 appeared.  The story\nis, {116a} that during the course of the process Arnauld, Nicole, and\nPascal, along with M. Vitart, the steward of the Duc de Luynes (to whom\nArnauld\u2019s second Letter had been addressed), and other friends, were met\nin secrecy at Port Royal des Champs.  Their conversation turned to the\npending case, and the misapprehensions and prejudices which prevailed in\nthe public mind regarding it.  It was felt that some effort should be\nmade to clear away these prejudices, and to diffuse right information in\na popular form.  Arnauld, ever ready with his pen, was prepared himself\nto undertake this task; and in a few days afterwards he read to his\nfriends a long and serious paper in vindication of his position.  But his\nfriends were not moved as he expected.  His pen, powerful in its own\nsphere, was not fitted to tell upon the popular mind; and his audience\nwere too honest to conceal their disappointment.  Arnauld, in his turn,\nfrankly acknowledged the truth forced upon him.  \u201cI see you do not find\nmy paper what you wished, and I believe you are right,\u201d he said; and\nthen, turning all at once to Pascal, he said, \u201cBut you, who are young,\nwho are clever, {116b} you ought to do something.\u201d  The effect was not\nlost upon Pascal.  He divined with his genuine literary instinct exactly\nwhat was required in the circumstances, although distrusting his power to\nproduce it.  He promised, however, to make an attempt, which his friends\nmight polish and put in shape as they thought fit.  Next day he produced\n\u201cA Letter written to a Provincial by one of his friends.\u201d  The Letter was\nunanimously pronounced exactly what was required, and ordered to be\nprinted.  It appeared on the 23d January 1656; and a second followed six\ndays later.\n\nNothing could have been happier or more admirably suited for their\npurpose than those Letters.  They took up the subject for the first time\nin a light intelligible to all.  They brought to play upon it not only a\npenetrating and rapid intelligence, but a brightness of wit, and a\ndramatic creativeness, which made the Sorbonne and its parties, the\nJansenists and their friends, alive before the reader.  Never was the\ntriumph of genius over mere learned labour more complete.  Arnauld, as he\nlistened to them, must have felt his own thoughts spring up before him\ninto a living shape, hardly less startling to himself than to his\nopponents.\n\nAddressing his friend in the country, the author expresses his surprise\nat what he has come to learn of the character of the disputes dividing\nthe Sorbonne:\u2014\n\n    \u201cWe have been imposed upon,\u201d he says.  \u201cIt was only yesterday that I\n    was undeceived.  Until then I had thought that the disputes of the\n    Sorbonne were really important, and deeply affected the interests of\n    religion.  The frequent convocation of an assembly so illustrious as\n    that of the Theological Faculty of Paris, attended by so many\n    extraordinary and unprecedented circumstances, induced such high\n    expectations that one could not help believing the business to be of\n    extraordinary importance.  You will be much surprised, however, when\n    you learn from this letter the upshot of the grand demonstration.  I\n    can explain the matter in a few words, having made myself perfectly\n    master of it.\u201d\n\nTwo questions, he says, were under examination\u2014\u201cthe one a question of\nfact, the other a question of right.\u201d\n\nHe explains the question of fact as consisting in the point whether M.\nArnauld was guilty of temerity in expressing his doubts as to the\npropositions being in Jansen\u2019s book after the bishops had declared that\nthey were.  No fewer than seventy-one doctors undertook his defence,\nmaintaining that all that could reasonably be asked of him was to say\nthat \u201che had not been able to find them, but that if they were in the\nbook, he condemned them there.\u201d\n\n    \u201cSome,\u201d he continues, \u201ceven went a step farther, and protested that,\n    after all the search they had made in the book, they had never\n    stumbled upon these propositions, and that they had, on the contrary,\n    found sentiments entirely at variance with them.  They then earnestly\n    begged that if any doctor present had discovered them, he would have\n    the goodness to point them out; adding that what was so easy could\n    not be reasonably refused, as that would be the surest way to silence\n    all objectors, M. Arnauld included.  But this they have always\n    refused to do.  So much for the one side.\n\n    \u201cOn the other side are eighty secular doctors, and some forty\n    mendicant friars, who have condemned M. Arnauld\u2019s proposition,\n    without choosing to examine whether he has spoken truly or\n    falsely\u2014who, in fact, have declared that they have nothing to do with\n    the veracity of his proposition, but simply with its temerity.\n    Besides these were fifteen who were not in favour of the censure, and\n    who are called Neutrals.\u201d\n\nHaving thus stated the question of fact, and the balance of parties\nregarding it, Pascal dismisses it at once, important as it proved in the\nafter-history of Port Royal.\n\n    \u201cAs to the issue of the question of fact, I own I give myself very\n    little concern.  It does not affect my conscience in the least\n    whether M. Arnauld is presumptuous or the reverse; and should I be\n    tempted from curiosity to ascertain whether these propositions are\n    contained in Jansen, his book is neither so very scarce nor so very\n    large but that I can read it all through for my own enlightenment\n    without consulting the Sorbonne at all.\u201d\n\nOnly, while himself hitherto inclined to believe with common report that\nthe propositions were in Jansen, he was now almost led to doubt that they\nwere so from the absurd refusal to point them out.  In this respect he\nfears the censure will do more harm than good.  \u201cFor, in truth, people\nhave become sceptical of late, and will not believe things till they see\nthem.\u201d\n\nBut the point being in itself so frivolous, he hastens to take up the\nquestion of right, as touching the faith.  And here the play of the\ndialogue begins:\u2014\n\n    \u201cYou and I supposed that the question here was one involving the\n    deepest principles of grace, as to whether it is given to all men, or\n    whether it is efficacious of itself.  But truly we were deceived.\n    You must know I have become a great theologian in a short time, and\n    you will see the proofs of it.\u201d\n\nHe describes, then, how he had made a visit to a doctor of the Sorbonne,\nwho was his neighbour, and one of the most zealous opponents of the\nJansenists, to inquire into the controversy.  He asked him why the\nquestion as to grace should not be set at rest by a formal decision that\n\u201cgrace is really given to all\u201d?  But he received a rude rebuff, and was\ntold that this was not the point.  \u201cThere were those on his side who held\nthat grace is not given to all, and even the examiners themselves had\ndeclared, in a full meeting of the Sorbonne, that this opinion was\nproblematical.\u201d  This was, in fact, his own view; and he confirmed it by\nwhat he said was a celebrated passage of St Augustine, \u201cWe know that\ngrace is not given to all men.\u201d  He was equally unfortunate in his second\ninquiry.  His neighbour, opposed as he was to Jansenism, would not\ncondemn the doctrine of efficacious grace.  The doctrine, on the\ncontrary, was quite orthodox, was held by the Jesuits, and had even been\ndefended by himself in his thesis at the Sorbonne.  The inquirer is\nconfounded, and ventures to ask then in what M. Arnauld\u2019s heresy\nconsisted?  \u201cIn this,\u201d replies his friend, \u201cthat he does not acknowledge\nthat the just have the power of obeying the commandments of God in the\nway in which we understand it.\u201d  Having got to what he supposes the\n\u201cheart of the affair,\u201d he posts off to a Jansenist acquaintance, \u201ca very\ndecent man notwithstanding.\u201d  But if he was puzzled before, he is still\nmore puzzled when he hears the worthy Jansenist declare that it is no\nheresy to hold that \u201call the just have always the power of obeying the\nDivine commandments.\u201d  Confounded by such a reply, he felt that he had\nbeen too plain-spoken with both Jansenist and Molinist. {120}  There must\nbe something more in this dispute than he understood; and if not, there\nwas no reason why there should not now be peace in the Church and the\nSorbonne.  He returned to the Molinist, whom he had first visited, with\nthis assurance.  The Jansenists, he said, were quite at one with the\nJesuits as to the power of the righteous always to obey the commandments\nof God.\n\n    \u201cAll very well,\u201d said he, \u201cbut you must be a theologian to see the\n    gist of the matter.  The difference between us is so subtle that we\n    can hardly make it out ourselves.  It is quite beyond _your_\n    understanding.  Suffice it for you to know that the Jansenists will\n    indeed say that the just have always the power of obeying the\n    commandments\u2014this is not the point in dispute; but they will not say\n    that this power is _proximate_.  _That_ is the point.\u201d\n\nMystified more than ever by this new and unknown expression, of which he\ncould get no explanation, the inquirer now returned to his Jansenist\nfriend to demand of him if he admitted it.  \u201cDo you admit the _proximate\npower_?\u201d was all that he could say to him.  He had charged his memory\ncarefully with the expression, all the more that he did not understand\nit.  The Jansenist smiled, and said coldly, \u201cTell me in what sense you\nuse the expression, and I will tell you what I believe about it.\u201d  But\nthis was just what he could not do.  So he gave the haphazard answer,\nthat he used it \u201cin the sense of the Molinists.\u201d  \u201cWhich of the\nMolinists?\u201d was the rejoinder.  \u201cAll of them together, as being one body,\nand having one and the same mind,\u201d was the second answer at random: upon\nwhich he is assured he is very ill informed; that the Molinists, instead\nof being at one, are hopelessly divided, but that being united in the\ndesign to ruin M. Arnauld, they have all agreed to use this term,\nunderstanding it in different senses, and so by an apparent agreement to\nform a compact body in order to crush him more confidently.\n\nThe ingenuous inquirer hesitates to believe in such wickedness.  He\nprofesses himself to be animated by a pure desire of understanding the\nsubject, and asks still that the mysterious word _proximate_ may be\nexplained to him.  His Jansenist friend professes a willingness to\nenlighten him, but says that his explanation would be liable to\nsuspicion.  He must have recourse to those who invented the expression,\nand is referred to a M. le Moine, on the one hand, as representing the\nMolinists or Jesuits; and a Father Nicolai as representing the Dominicans\nor \u201cNew Thomists.\u201d  Both of these were real characters: the former a\ndoctor of the Sorbonne, and a violent anti-Jansenist, who had written on\nthe subject of grace; the latter a Dominican, who is said, however, by\nNicole to have abandoned the principles of his order and embraced\nPelagianism.  The bewildered seeker after theological knowledge resorts,\nnot to these worthies themselves, with whom he professes to have no\nacquaintance, but to certain disciples of theirs.  In this manner he gets\na definition of \u201cproximate power,\u201d from which it is apparent that, while\nthe Jesuits and Dominicans are only agreed in using the same\nexpression\u2014the meanings they put into it being entirely different\u2014the\nJansenists and Dominicans agree in substance, while only differing in the\nuse of words.  The passage in which the result of his successive\ninterviews is described is one of the happiest in the letter.  On\nreceiving from the Dominicans, whom he terms \u201cJacobins,\u201d from their\nassociation with the Rue de St Jacques, where the first Dominican convent\nin Paris was erected, an explanation of the doctrine of grace, he\nexclaims:\u2014\n\n    \u201cCapital!  So, according to you, the Jansenists are Catholics, and M.\n    le Moine a heretic; for the Jansenists say that the just have the\n    power of praying, but that further efficacious grace is necessary\u2014and\n    this is what you also approve.  M. le Moine, however, says that the\n    just may pray without efficacious grace\u2014and this you condemn.  \u2018Ay,\u2019\n    they replied, \u2018but M. le Moine calls this power _proximate power_.\u2019\n    \u2018But what is this, my father,\u2019 I exclaimed in turn, \u2018but to play with\n    words\u2014to say that you agree as to the common terms you employ, while\n    your sense is quite different?\u2019  To this they made no reply; and at\n    this very point the disciple of M. le Moine, with whom I had\n    consulted, arrived by what seemed to me a lucky and extraordinary\n    conjuncture.  But I afterwards found that these meetings were not\n    uncommon; that, in fact, they were continually mixing the one with\n    the other.  I addressed myself immediately to M. le Moine\u2019s disciple:\n    \u2018I know one,\u2019 said I, \u2018who maintains that the just have always the\n    power of praying to God, but that nevertheless they never pray\n    without an efficacious grace which determines them, and which is not\n    always given by God to all the just.  Is such a one a heretic?\u2019\n    \u2018Wait,\u2019 said my doctor; \u2018you take me by surprise.  Come, gently.\n    _Distinguo_.  If he calls this power _proximate power_, he is a\n    Thomist, and yet a Catholic; if not, he is a Jansenist, and therefore\n    a heretic.\u2019  \u2018He calls it,\u2019 said I, \u2018neither the one nor the other.\u2019\n    \u2018He is a heretic then,\u2019 said he; \u2018ask these good fathers.\u2019  It was\n    unnecessary to appeal to them, for already they had assented by a nod\n    of their heads.  But I insisted.  \u2018He refuses to use the word\n    _proximate_, because no one can explain it to him.\u2019  Whereupon one of\n    the fathers was about to give his definition of the term, when he was\n    interrupted by M. le Moine\u2019s disciple.  \u2018What!\u2019 said he; \u2018do you wish\n    to recommence our quarrels?  Have we not agreed never to attempt an\n    explanation of this word _proximate_, but to use it on both sides\n    without saying what it means?\u2019  And to this the Jacobin assented.  I\n    saw at once into their plot, and rising to quit them, I said, \u2018Of a\n    truth, my fathers, this is nothing, I fear, but a quibble; and\n    whatever may come of your meetings, I venture to predict that when\n    the censure is passed, peace will not be restored. . .  Surely it is\n    unworthy, both of the Sorbonne and of theology, to make use of\n    equivocal and captious terms without giving any explanation of them.\n    Tell me, I entreat you, for the last time, fathers, what I must\n    believe in order to be a Catholic?\u2019  \u2018You must say,\u2019 they all cried\n    at once, \u2018that all the just have the _proximate power_.\u2019 . . .  \u2018What\n    necessity can there be,\u2019 I argued, \u2018for using a word which has\n    neither authority nor definite meaning?\u2019  \u2018You are an opinionative\n    fellow,\u2019 they replied.  \u2018You shall use the word, or you are a\n    heretic, and M. Arnauld also; for we are the majority, and if\n    necessary we can bring the Cordeliers into the field and carry the\n    day.\u2019\u201d\n\nThe second Letter, entitled \u201cOf Sufficient Grace,\u201d is exactly in the same\nvein:\u2014\n\n    \u201cJust as I had sealed my last letter,\u201d the writer opens, \u201cI received\n    a visit from our old friend, M. N---, a most fortunate circumstance\n    for the gratification of my curiosity.  For he is thoroughly informed\n    in the questions of the day, and up to all the secrets of the\n    Jesuits, at whose houses, including those of the leading men, he is a\n    constant visitor.\u201d\n\nUsing his friend conveniently as an informant, Pascal proceeds to explain\nto the Provincial the question of sufficient grace as betwixt the\nJesuits, Jansenists, and Dominicans.  The amusement of the Letter\nconsists in the manner in which he brings out, as before, the substantial\nidentity in opinion of the Dominicans and Jansenists, notwithstanding the\njunction of the former with the Jesuits to oppress the latter.  The\nJesuits hold the old Pelagian doctrine that grace is given to all,\ndependent for its efficacy upon the free will of the recipient.  This is\nwith them _sufficient grace_.  The Jansenists follow St Augustine, and\nwill not allow any grace to be _sufficient_ which is not also\nefficacious.  What is the view of the Dominican?\u2014\n\n    \u201cIt is rather an odd one,\u201d he says; \u201cfor while they agree with the\n    Jesuits in allowing a _sufficient grace_ given to all men, they\n    nevertheless hold that with this grace alone men cannot act, but\n    require further from God an _efficacious grace_ which determines\n    their will to action, and which is not given to all.\u201d\n\nIn short, _this grace_ is _sufficient_ without being so.  It bears the\nsame name as the grace of the Jesuits, but in reality the Dominican\ndoctrine is that of the Jansenists, that men require efficacious grace in\norder to pious action.  What is the meaning of all this jumble of\nopinion?  Simply, that the Dominicans are too powerful to be quarrelled\nwith.  The Jesuits are content that they should so far use the same\nlanguage with them.\n\n    \u201cThey do not insist upon their denying the necessity of efficacious\n    grace.  This would be to press them too far.  People should not\n    tyrannise over their friends; and the Jesuits have really gained\n    enough.  But the world is content with words; and so the name of\n    sufficient grace being received on all sides, though in different\n    senses, none except the most subtle theologians can dream that the\n    expression does not signify the same to the Jacobins and the Jesuits;\n    and the result will show that the latter are not the greatest dupes.\u201d\n\nThis conclusion becomes the subject of conversational by-play, similar to\nthat of the first Letter:\u2014\n\n    \u201cI went straight,\u201d adds the writer, \u201cto the Jacobins, at whose door I\n    found a good friend of mine, a great Jansenist\u2014for you must know I\n    have friends amongst all parties\u2014who was inquiring for another\n    father, different from the one I wanted.  But I persuaded him to\n    accompany me, and asked for one of my New Thomist friends.  He was\n    delighted to see me again.  \u2018Ah, well,\u2019 I said to him, \u2018it seems it\n    is not enough that all men have a _proximate power_ by which they can\n    never act with effect; they must also have a _sufficient grace_, with\n    which they can act just as little.  Is not this the opinion of your\n    school?\u2019  \u2018Yes,\u2019 said the good father, \u2018and I have this very morning\n    been maintaining this in the Sorbonne.  I spoke my full half-hour;\n    and had it not been for the sand-glass, I bade fair to reverse the\n    unlucky proverb which circulates in Paris\u2014\u201cHe votes with his cap\n    [merely by nodding his assent, without speaking] like a monk of the\n    Sorbonne.\u201d\u2019  \u2018And what about your half-hour and your sand-glass?\u2019\n    said I.  \u2018Do they shape your discourses by a certain measure?\u2019\n    \u2018Yes,\u2019 said he, \u2018for some days past.\u2019  \u2018And do they oblige you to\n    speak half an hour?\u2019  \u2018No, we may speak as shortly as we like.\u2019  \u2018But\n    not,\u2019 I said, \u2018as much as you like.  What a capital rule for the\n    ignorant\u2014what an excellent excuse for those who have nothing worth\n    saying!  But to come to the point, my father\u2014this grace which is\n    given to all, is it sufficient?\u2019  \u2018Yes,\u2019 said he.  \u2018And yet it has no\n    effect without _efficacious_ grace?\u2019  \u2018Quite true,\u2019 said he.  \u2018And\n    all men have the _sufficient_, but not all the _efficacious_?\u2019\n    \u2018Exactly so.\u2019  \u2018That is to say,\u2019 I urged, \u2018that all have enough\n    grace, and yet not enough\u2014that there is a grace which is\n    _sufficient_, and yet does not _suffice_.  In good sooth, my father,\n    that is subtle doctrine.  Have you forgotten, in quitting the world,\n    what the word _sufficient_ means?  Do you not remember that it\n    includes everything necessary for acting? . . .  How, then, do you\n    leave it to be said, that all men have _sufficient_ grace for acting,\n    while you confess that another grace is absolutely necessary for\n    acting, and that all have not this? . . .  Is it a matter of\n    indifference to say that with sufficient grace we can really act?\u2019\n    \u2018Indifference!\u2019 said he; \u2018why, it is _heresy_\u2014formal _heresy_.  The\n    necessity of efficacious grace for effective action is a point of\n    _faith_.  It is heresy to deny this.\u2019  \u2018Where, then, are we now? and\n    what side must I take?  If I deny sufficient grace, I am a Jansenist.\n    If I admit it, like the Jesuits, so that efficacious grace is no\n    longer necessary, I shall be a heretic, you say.  And if I admit it,\n    as you do, so that efficacious grace is still necessary, why I sin\n    against common-sense, I am a blockhead, say the Jesuits.  What can I\n    do in this dilemma, of being a blockhead, a heretic, or a Jansenist?\n    To what a strait are we come, if it is only Jansenists, after all,\n    who are at variance with neither faith nor reason, and who preserve\n    themselves both from folly and error?\u2019\u201d\n\nThe Dominican, in short, is made to appear very ridiculous in his union\nwith the Jesuits.  Clearly he fights on their side against the Jansenists\nat the expense of his honesty and consistency.  He is confounded by a\nparable representing the absurdity of his position.\n\n    \u201c\u2018It is all very easy to talk,\u2019 was all he could say in reply.  \u2018You\n    are an independent and private person; I am a monk, and in a\n    community.  Do you not understand the difference?  We depend upon\n    superiors; they depend upon others.  They have promised our votes,\n    and what would you have me to do?\u2019  We understood his allusion, and\n    remembered how a brother monk had been banished to Abbeville for a\n    similar cause.\u201d\n\nThe writer is disposed to pity the monk as he relates with a melancholy\ntone how the Dominicans, who had from the time of St Thomas been such\nardent defenders of the doctrine of grace, had been entrapped into making\ncommon cause with the Jesuits.  The latter, availing themselves of the\nconfusion and ignorance introduced by the Reformation, had disseminated\ntheir principles with great rapidity, and become masters of the popular\nbelief; while the poor Dominicans found themselves in the predicament of\neither being denounced as Calvinists, and treated as the Jansenists then\nwere, or of falling into the use of a common language with the Jesuits.\nWhat other course was open to them in such a case than that of saving the\ntruth at the expense of their own credit! and while admitting the name of\nsufficient grace, denying, after all, that it was sufficient!  That was\nthe real history of the business.\n\nThis pitiful story of the New Thomist awakens a respondent pity in the\nwriter.  But his Jansenist companion is roused to indignant\nremonstrance:\u2014\n\n    \u201cDo not flatter yourselves,\u201d he exclaims, \u201cthat you have saved the\n    truth.  If it had no other protector than you, it would have perished\n    in such feeble hands.  You have received into the Church the name of\n    its enemy, and this is to receive the enemy itself.  Names are\n    inseparable from things.  If the term _sufficient_ grace be once\n    admitted, you may talk finely about only understanding thereby a\n    grace insufficient; but this will be of no avail.  Your explanation\n    will be held as odious in the world, where men speak far more\n    sincerely of less important things.  The Jesuits will triumph.  It\n    will be their sufficient grace, and not yours\u2014which is only a\n    name\u2014which will be accepted.  It will be theirs, which is the reverse\n    of yours, that will become an article of faith.\u201d\n\nIn vain the New Thomist proclaims his readiness to suffer martyrdom\nrather than allow this, and to maintain the great doctrine of St Thomas\nto the death.  His allusion to the importance of the doctrine only calls\nforth more severely the indignant eloquence of the Jansenist, and he\nbrings the Letter to a close in a passage which forestalls the graver and\nloftier tone of the later Letters.\n\n    \u201cConfess, my father, that your order has received an honour which it\n    ill discharges.  It abandons that grace which has been intrusted to\n    it, and which has never been abandoned since the creation of the\n    world.  That victorious grace which was expected by patriarchs,\n    predicted by prophets, introduced by Jesus Christ, preached by St\n    Paul, explained by St Augustine, the greatest of the Fathers,\n    embraced by his followers, confirmed by St Bernard, the last of the\n    Fathers, sustained by St Thomas, the Angel of the Schools,\n    transmitted by him to your order, maintained by so many of your\n    fathers, and so gloriously defended by your monks under Popes Clement\n    and Paul\u2014that efficacious grace which was left in your hands as a\n    sacred deposit, that it might always, in a sacred and enduring order,\n    find preachers to proclaim it to the world till the end of time\u2014finds\n    itself deserted for interests utterly unworthy.  It is time that\n    other hands should arm themselves in its quarrel.  It is time that\n    God should raise up intrepid disciples to the Doctor of Grace, who,\n    strangers to the entanglements of the world, should serve God for the\n    sake of God.  Grace may no longer count the Dominicans among her\n    defenders; but she will never want defenders, for she creates them\n    for herself by her own almighty strength.  She demands pure and\n    disengaged hearts, nay, she herself purifies and delivers them from\n    worldly interests inconsistent with the truths of the Gospel.\n    Consider well, my father, and take heed lest God remove the\n    candle-stick from its place, and leave you in darkness and dishonour\n    to punish the coldness which you have shown in a cause so important\n    to His Church.\u201d\n\nThe first two Letters are closely connected.  They deal with the special\nquestion between Arnauld and the Sorbonne.  A short \u201cReply from the\nProvincial\u201d is interposed between the second and third.  This reply may\nbe supposed to be a part of the device employed by Pascal to arouse\npublic attention and circulate the Letters.  The friend in the country\ntells how they have excited universal interest.  Everybody has seen them,\nheard them, and believed them.  They are valued not merely by\ntheologians, but men of the world, and ladies, have found them\nintelligible and delightful reading.  This is no exaggerated picture of\nthe sensation which they produced.  Their success was prodigious, and\nincreased with every successive Letter.  In an atmosphere charged with\nthe theological spirit, yet wearied with the dulness of theological\ncontroversy, Pascal\u2019s mode of treating the subject came as a breath of\nnew life.  Here was one who was evidently no mere theologian\u2014who knew\nhuman nature as well as Divine truth.  His clear and penetrating\nintellect saw at once the many aspects of the dispute lying deep in the\nhuman interests and passions engaged; and as he touched these one by one,\nand by subtle and vivid strokes brought them to the front\u2014as Molinist,\nNew Thomist, and Jansenist appeared upon the scene, and showed in their\nnatural characters what play of dramatic life was moving under all the\ndulness of the debate at the Sorbonne\u2014there was a universal outcry of\nwelcome.  The Letters passed from hand to hand.  The post-office reaped a\nharvest of profit; copies went through the whole kingdom.\n\n    \u201c\u2018You can have no idea how much I am obliged to you for the Letter\n    you sent me,\u2019 writes a friend to a lady; \u2018it is so very ingenious,\n    and so nicely written.  It narrates without narrating.  It clears up\n    the most intricate matters possible; its raillery is exquisite; it\n    enlightens those who know little of the subject, and imparts double\n    delight to those who understand it.  It is an admirable apology; and\n    if they would take it, a delicate and innocent censure.  In short,\n    the Letter displays so much art, so much spirit, and so much\n    judgment, that I burn with curiosity to know who wrote it.\u2019\u201d\n\nThis is the report of the Provincial; and if it is Pascal himself who\nspeaks, he had little idea that his own _badinage_ would be echoed by\ngrave critics, in after-years, as not in excess of the actual merit of\nhis productions.  \u201cThe best comedies of Moli\u00e8re,\u201d says Voltaire, \u201chave\nnot more wit than the first Provincial Letters.\u201d  It must be admitted\nthat the brightness of the wit is somewhat dimmed after the lapse of two\ncenturies.  Even the genius of Pascal fails to lighten all the tortuous\nabsurdities of controversies so purely verbal, and there is an occasional\nbaldness in the clever device of pitting Molinist, New Thomist, and\nJansenist against one another.  The professed artlessness of the speeches\nis at times too apparent.  But nothing, upon the whole, can be finer than\nthe address with which this is done; the changes of scene and the turns\nof the dialogue are managed with admirable felicity; there is an\nexquisite fitness and Socratic point in all the evolutions of the\nargument, which we feel even now when we see so clearly behind the\nscenes, and know that Molinist and New Thomist must have had a good deal\nmore to say for themselves.  We have only to imagine the atmosphere of\nthe Sorbonne, or the wider social atmosphere throughout France in the\nseventeenth century, impregnated to its core by a subtle controversial\necclesiasticism, to realise the impression made by \u201cthe Small Letters.\u201d\nThe question everywhere was, Who could have written them?  There seems at\nfirst to have been no suspicion of Pascal.  He had previously only been\nknown as a scientific writer; and the secret was, of course, jealously\nguarded.  Although planned at Port Royal des Champs, he did not remain\nthere while engaged in their composition.  He repaired, as we have\nalready said, to Paris, and after a while took up his abode \u201cat a little\ninn opposite to the Jesuit College of Clermont, just behind the\nSorbonne.\u201d  Here he lodged with his brother-in-law, M. P\u00e9rier, who had\nlately come to Paris; and here, too, the latter was visited by P\u00e8re\nDefr\u00e9tat, a Jesuit and distant relative, who came to tell him that the\nsuspicions of the Society were beginning to point to Pascal.  All the\nwhile Pascal was busy in the room below; and, \u201cbehind the closed curtains\nof the bed by the side of which they were talking, a score of fresh\nimpressions of the seventh Letter were laid out to dry.\u201d {132}\n\nPascal rejoiced in his incognito.  It was not till the controversy had\nsomewhat advanced that he assumed the pseudonym Louis de Montalte.  The\nthird Letter he closed mysteriously with the letters E. A. A. B. P. A. F.\nD. E. P., which have been interpreted to mean \u201cEt ancien ami Blaise\nPascal, Auvergnat, fils de \u00c9tienne Pascal.\u201d  There can be no doubt that\nhe took a distinct pleasure in the anonymous wounds which he inflicted.\nHe had a certain love of controversy from the beginning, a feeling of\nself-assertion when he took up a cause, and a personal ambition to\ntriumph in it, which carried him forward, and which come out with almost\npainful vividness in the closing letters.\n\nThe rage of the Jesuits may be imagined.  At first they hardly knew\nwhether to laugh with the world or to be indignant.  The first Letter was\nread in the dining-hall of the Sorbonne itself.  Some were amused, others\ngreatly provoked.  But, as the Letters proceeded, there was no room for\nany feeling but indignation.  It was so difficult to set forth any direct\nreply to productions mingling such a subtle irony with grave attack.\nThey could only say of them, as they afterwards more formally did\u2014_Les\nmenteurs immortelles_.  Of the first Letters it is said that 6000 copies\nwere printed; but, as they were easily passed from hand to hand, this\ngives no idea of the numbers who actually read them.  Their fame grew\nwith each successive issue.  More than 10,000 copies were printed of the\nseventeenth Letter; and editions of the earlier ones were so frequently\nreprinted, that it can no longer be told which belonged really to the\nfirst edition.\n\nIt is impossible, and would be useless, for us to attempt any description\nof the whole series of Letters.  We have thought it right to dwell at\nsome length on the first two, because they enter so directly into the\ncontroversy betwixt Pascal\u2019s friends and the Sorbonne, and because they\nare really, in some respects, the cleverest, if not the most valuable.\nThe third Letter, on the \u201cCensure of M. Arnauld,\u201d and again, the three\nconcluding Letters, {133} are closely connected with the first two.\nTheir object, in one form or another, is the defence of the Jansenist\ndoctrine, and of the Port Royalists, as its supporters.  The intervening\ntwelve Letters stand quite by themselves.  They open up the whole subject\nof the moral theology of the Jesuits, and constitute the most powerful\nassault probably ever directed against it.  The subject is one which, in\na volume like this, we can only touch upon, and this more with the view\nof drawing out the marked literary features of Pascal\u2019s assault, than of\nmeddling with the merits of the controversy which he waged so\nrelentlessly.  In the meantime, we must wind up, as briefly as possible,\nthe more personal aspects of the controversy.\n\nBetween the date of the second and the third Letter, the process before\nthe Sorbonne had been finished, and M. Arnauld\u2019s censure pronounced.  The\nthird Letter deals with this censure.  The writer represents the long\npreparation for it, the manner in which the Jansenists had been denounced\nas the vilest of heretics, \u201cthe cabals, factions, errors, schisms, and\noutrages with which they have been so long charged.\u201d  Who would not have\nthought, in such circumstances, that the \u201cblackest heresy imaginable\u201d\nwould have come forth under the condemning touch of the Sorbonne?  All\nChristendom waited for the result.  It was true that M. Arnauld had\nbacked up his opinions by the clearest quotations from the Fathers,\nexpressing apparently the very things with which he had been charged.\nBut points of difference imperceptible to ordinary eyes would no doubt be\nmade clear under the penetration of so many learned doctors.  Thoughts of\nthis kind kept everybody in a state of breathless suspense waiting for\nthe result.  \u201cBut, alas! how has the expectation been balked!  Whether\nthe Molinist doctors have not deigned to lower themselves to the level of\ninstructing us, or for some other secret reason, they have done nothing\nelse than pronounce the following words: \u2018This proposition is rash,\nimpious, blasphemous, deserving of anathema, and heretical!\u2019\u201d\n\nIt was not to be wondered at, in the circumstances, that people were in a\nbad humour, and were beginning to think that after all there may have\nbeen no real heresy in M. Arnauld\u2019s proposition.  A heresy which could\nnot be defined, except in general terms of abuse, seemed at the least\ndoubtful.  The writer is puzzled, as usual, and has recourse to \u201cone of\nthe most intelligent of the Sorbonnists\u201d who had been so far neutral in\nthe discussion, and whom he asks to point out the difference betwixt M.\nArnauld and the Fathers.  The \u201cintelligent\u201d Sorbonnist is amused at the\n_na\u00efvet\u00e9_ of the inquiry.  \u201cDo you fancy,\u201d he says, \u201cthat if they could\nhave found any difference they would not have pointed it out?\u201d  But why,\nthen, pursues the ingenuous inquirer, should they in such a case pass\ncensure?\u2014\n\n    \u201c\u2018How little you understand the tactics of the Jesuits!\u2019 is the\n    answer.  \u2018How few will ever look into the matter beyond the fact that\n    M. Arnauld is condemned!  Let it be only cried in the streets, \u201cHere\n    is the condemnation of M. Arnauld!\u201d  This is enough to give the\n    Jesuits a triumph with the unthinking populace.  This is the way in\n    which they live and prosper.  Now it is by a catechism in which a\n    child is made to condemn their opponents; now by a procession, in\n    which Sufficient Grace leads Efficacious Grace in triumph; and\n    by-and-by by a comedy, in which the devils carry off Jansen;\n    sometimes by an almanac; and now by this censure.\u2019  The truth is,\n    that it is M. Arnauld himself, and not merely his opinions, that are\n    obnoxious.  Even M. le Moine himself admitted \u2018that the same\n    proposition would have been orthodox in the mouth of any other; it is\n    only as coming from M. Arnauld that the Sorbonne have condemned it.\u2019\n    . . .  Here is a new species of heresy,\u201d concludes the writer.  \u201cIt\n    is not the sentiments of M. Arnauld that are heretical, but only his\n    person.  It is a case of personal heresy.  He is not a heretic for\n    anything he has said or written, but simply because he is M. Arnauld.\n    This is all they can say against him.  Whatever he may do, unless he\n    cease to exist he will never be a good Catholic.  The grace of St\n    Augustine will never be the true grace while he defends it.  It would\n    be all right were he only to combat it.  This would be a sure stroke,\n    and almost the only means of establishing it and destroying Molinism.\n    Such is the fatality of any opinions which he embraces.\u201d\n\nIn the three concluding Letters, as we have said, Pascal reverts to the\nspecial subject of Jansenism and Port Royal.  These Letters are\nconsiderably longer than the opening ones.  It is of the sixteenth, in\nfact, that he makes the well-known remark, that \u201cit was very long because\nhe had no time to make it shorter.\u201d  Upon the whole, also, these Letters\nare less happy in style and manner.  It is evident that Pascal, if he\ngave blows which made his opponents and the opponents of Port Royal\nwince, also received some bruises in return.  The shamelessness of the\nattacks made upon his friends and himself, contemptible as they were in\ntheir nature, left scars upon a mind and temper so sensitive and reserved\nas his.  The \u201cinsufferable audacity\u201d with which \u201choly nuns and their\ndirectors\u201d had been charged with disbelieving the mysteries of the faith\nwas \u201ca crime which God alone was capable of punishing.\u201d  To bear such a\ncharge required a degree of humility equal to that of the nuns\nthemselves\u2014to believe it, \u201ca degree of wickedness equal to that of their\nwretched defamers.\u201d  As for himself, it seemed enough to say of him that\nhe belonged to Port Royal, as if it were only at Port Royal that there\ncould be found those capable of defending the purity of Christian\nmorality.  He knew and honoured the work of the pious recluses who had\nretired to that monastery, although \u201che had never had the honour of\nbelonging to them.\u201d  And in the seventeenth Letter he says:\u2014\n\n    \u201cI have no more to say than that I am not a member of that community,\n    and to refer you to my letters, in which I have declared that \u2018I am a\n    private individual;\u2019 and again in so many words that \u2018I am not of\n    Port Royal.\u2019 . . .  You may touch Port Royal if you choose, but you\n    shall not touch me.  You may turn people out of the Sorbonne, but\n    that will not turn me out of my lodging.\u201d\n\nThese statements, of course, are to be received as so far a part of the\ndisguise under which Pascal pursued his task.  It was true that he had no\nofficial connection with Port Royal, that he was under no rule to live in\nits retirements, and that he was only occasionally found there.  He was\nsingularly free, \u201cwithout engagements, entanglement, relationship, or\nbusiness of any kind.\u201d  All the same he was a Port Royalist in sympathy\nand community of opinion.  The interests of Port Royal were his\ninterests, and its friends his friends.  His own sister was one of its\nzealous inmates.  There is a certain force, therefore, in the taunt that\nPascal, in \u201cunmasking the duplicity of the Jesuits, did not hesitate to\nimitate it.\u201d  His statements are not beyond the licence accorded to those\nwho would drive an enemy off the scent, and shelter themselves within an\nanonymity which they have chosen to assume; but they are none the less\nartful and misleading.  They justify themselves as the fence of the\n_litt\u00e9rateur_, hardly as the armour of the moralist.  But the truth is,\nthat long before this Pascal had warmed to his work as a\ncontroversialist.  He was determined to give no advantage, and to spare\nno weapons within the bounds of decency, that might make the Jesuits feel\nthe force of his assault.  Their accusation of heresy especially\nexasperated him.\n\n    \u201cWhen was I ever seen at Charenton?\u201d {138} he says in the seventeenth\n    Letter, addressed to the Jesuit Father Annat.  \u201cWhen have I failed in\n    my presence at mass, or in my Christian duty to my parish church?\n    What act of union with heretics, or of schism with the Church, can\n    you lay to my charge?  What council have I contradicted?  What Papal\n    constitution have I violated?  You _must answer_, father; else\u2014you\n    know what I mean.\u201d\n\nThe Jansenist doctrine of grace, as we have already explained, approached\nindefinitely the doctrine of Calvin.  Both were derived from Augustine;\nand St Thomas, as his interpreter, handed on to the sixteenth and\nseventeenth centuries the precious deposit.  The line of thought was\ncontinuous, and it was not easy to break it at Calvin, and isolate him as\na heretic, while holding to other teachers as Catholic and orthodox.\nThis was the dilemma of the New Thomists, so pithily expressed by one of\nthemselves in the second Letter.  But it was also Pascal\u2019s own dilemma;\nand the consciousness which he and his friends had of the nearness of the\nJansenist doctrine to that of Calvin, made them all the more sensitive\nunder the charge of heresy.  The Jesuits had art enough to see the\nadvantages which came from this association.  The Port Royalists and\nPascal failed in the magnanimity which clung to a truth no less because\nit was identified with an abused name.  They insisted upon distinguishing\nbetween the tenets of Jansen and Calvinism.  If what the Papal decree\nmeant and the Sorbonne meant in the condemnation of the Jansenist\nproposition was that they condemned the doctrines of Calvin, then they\nwere all agreed.\u2014Jesuits, Jansenists, and Port Royalists.\n\n    \u201cWas that all you meant, father?\u201d asks Pascal in his concluding\n    Letter.  \u201cWas it only the error of Calvin that you were so anxious to\n    get condemned under the name of \u2018the sense of Jansen\u2019?  Why did you\n    not tell us this sooner? you might have saved yourself a world of\n    trouble; for we were all ready without the aid of bulls or briefs to\n    join with you in condemning that error. . . .  Now, when you have\n    come the length of declaring that the error which you oppose is the\n    heresy of Calvin, it must be apparent to every one that they [the\n    Port Royalists] are innocent of all error; for so decidedly hostile\n    are they to this, the only error with which you charge them, that\n    they protest by their discourses, by their books, by every mode, in\n    short, in which they can testify their sentiments, that they condemn\n    that heresy with their whole heart, and in the same manner in which\n    it has been condemned by the Thomists, whom you acknowledge without\n    scruple to be Catholics.\u201d\n\nThe professed point of difference stated in the same Letter\u2014namely, that\nthe Thomists and Sorbonnists (and of course the Port Royalists with them)\nheld that efficacious grace is resistible, while Calvin held that it was\nirresistible\u2014may or may not hold in reference to special expressions of\nCalvin.  But there is nothing, upon the whole, stronger in Calvin than\nthere is in Augustine on the subject of grace; and on the other hand, an\n\u201cefficacious grace,\u201d which is \u201cresistible\u201d\u2014which the human heart can\naccept or repel _at will_\u2014seems open to all the ironical play which\nPascal directs so skilfully in his first Letters against the Jesuit\ndoctrine of a _sufficient_ grace which is not yet sufficient.  The truth\nis, that apart from verbal subtleties, which Pascal could handle no less\nfamiliarly, only far more skilfully, than his adversaries, there is no\nrational position intermediate between the Pelagian doctrine (which is\nalso substantially the Aristotelian) of free will and moral habit, and\nthe Augustinian doctrine of Divine grace and spiritual inspiration.  The\nsource of character is either from within the character itself, which has\npower to choose good and to be good if it will, or it is from a higher\nsource\u2014the grace of God, and the power of a Divine ordination.  These are\nthe only real lines of controversy.  The Christian thinker may decline\ncontroversy on such a subject altogether, acknowledging that the mystery\nof character is in its roots beyond our ken,\u2014that we know not, and in the\nnature of the case cannot know, where the Human ends and the Divine\nbegins.  In such a case there is no room for argument.  But we cannot\nwith consistency step off one line on to the other.  In other words, we\ncannot logically abuse Calvin while we hold with Augustine, or profess to\nrevere St Thomas while we abuse Jansen.\n\nBut it is more than time to turn from this side of the \u2018Provincial\nLetters.\u2019  This was the controversy out of which they sprang\u2014which\nmingles itself most with the personality of Pascal\u2014and hence it has\nclaimed a somewhat detailed treatment.  The great subject to which the\nintervening and chief portion of the Letters is directed is not, indeed,\nmore important in itself, but it is more diversified, and more\npractically interesting.  Here, however, Pascal was more obviously\nperforming a task than in the other Letters.  He was speaking less out of\nhis heart.  Having grappled with the Jesuits, and noticed their tactics\nin the affair of the Sorbonne, he is led to look into their whole system.\nHe takes up their books and studies them, in part at least; while his\nfriends Nicole and Arnauld also study them for him.  And the result is\nthe remarkable and memorable assault contained in his thirteen\nLetters\u2014from the fourth to the sixteenth\u2014directed against all the main\nprinciples of the Jesuit system.\n\nIt would lead us quite away from our purpose to enter into the range of\nthis great controversy, or to endeavour to estimate its value, or the\nmerits of the attack and defence on particular points.  The subject is\none by itself, more or less entering into the whole question of morals,\nand especially the immense fabric of casuistry or moral theology built up\nby successive teachers in the Jesuit schools.  Trained, as he was, a\ndevout disciple of the Roman Church, enthusiastic on behalf of its\ndoctrines and preachers, Pascal had apparently no knowledge of the\ndetails of Jesuit doctrine and morality before he began his task of\ninquiry and assault.  Austere and simple in his own principles of virtue,\ndirect and unbending in his modes of action, he was evidently appalled by\nthe study of the Jesuit system, and the endless complexities of\ncompromise and evasion which it presented.  In seizing, as he did\neverywhere, upon the immoral aspects of the system, and touching them\nwith the most graphic colours of exposure, he cannot be said to be\nunfair; for the materials with which he dealt were all abundant in their\nwritings.  His quotations may be sometimes taken at random, and may set\nforth, without any of the alleviating shades surrounding them in their\nproper context, special points as parts of a general sequence of thought.\nThey were, no doubt, often furnished to him by Nicole or Arnauld, who\nhunted them through the immense volumes of casuistical divinity in which\nthey were contained.  But there is no reason to suppose that in any case\nhe has been guilty of misquotation, or that he has attributed sentiments\nto the Jesuit doctors not to be found in them.  This is very much his own\nstatement:\u2014\n\n    \u201cI have been asked if I have myself read all the books which I have\n    quoted.  I answer, No.  If I had done so, I must have passed a great\n    part of my life in reading very bad books; but I have read Escobar\n    twice through, and I have employed some of my friends in reading the\n    others.  But I have not made use of a single passage without having\n    myself read it in the book from which it is cited, without having\n    examined the subject of which it treats, and without having read what\n    went before and followed, so that I might run no risk of quoting an\n    objection as an answer, which would have been blameworthy and\n    unfair.\u201d\n\nNo doubt this is true.  There is all, and more than all, that Pascal\nquoted to be found in the Jesuit writings, and his own language is not\ntoo strong in speaking of much that he quotes as \u201cabominable.\u201d\nNotwithstanding, it may be said that the effect of his representation is\na certain unfairness towards the Jesuits.  He presses them at a cruel\nadvantage when he insists upon developing from his own point of view, or\nstill more from the mouth of some of their too simple followers, all the\npractical consequences of their special rules.  The system of casuistry\nwas one not solely of Jesuitical invention.  It was the necessary\noutgrowth of the radical Roman principle of Confession.  Nay, it\nflourished to some extent within the Protestant Church itself in the\nseventeenth century, as the writings of two very different men, Jeremy\nTaylor and Richard Baxter, show.  Once admit the principle of directing\nthe conscience by external rather than internal authority, and you lay a\nfoundation upon which any amount of folly, and even crime, may be built\nup.  This was the general principle of Jesuitism as a system of\neducation; but it came to it from the Church which Pascal, no less than\nthe Jesuits, revered.  Nay, it was in its general character a principle\nas characteristic of Port Royal as of Loyola and his followers.  There is\nthe enormous difference, no doubt, that the ethics of Port Royal were\ncomparatively faithful to the essential principles of morality which\nNature and the Gospel alike teach\u2014that its practical excesses were quite\nin a different direction from the laxity of the Jesuits.  But two things\nare to be remembered, not in favour of the Jesuits, but in explanation of\ntheir excesses: 1st, that they aimed, as Pascal himself points out, at\ngoverning the world, and not merely a sect\u2014that their whole idea of the\nChurch in relation to the world was different from that of the Port\nRoyalists; and 2d, that their system of morals not merely rested on a\nwrong and dangerous principle (which Pascal\u2019s no less did), but had been\nendlessly developed in their schools by many inferior hands.  This was\nPascal\u2019s great weapon against them, and so far it was quite a legitimate\nweapon, as he himself claimed.  As none of their books could appear\nwithout sanction, the Order was more or less responsible for all the\nfrightful principles set forth in some of these books.  All the same, it\nis not to be presumed that such a system of moral, or rather immoral,\nconsequences was deliberately designed by the Society.  Pascal himself\nexempts them from such a charge.  \u201cTheir object,\u201d he says, \u201cis not the\ncorruption of manners; . . . but they believe it for the good of religion\nthat they should _govern all consciences_, and so they have evangelical\nor severe maxims for managing some sorts of people, while whole\nmultitudes of lax casuists are provided for the multitude that prefer\nlaxity.\u201d {144a}  The Jesuit system of morality, in short, was the growth\nof the Jesuit principle of accommodation, added on to the Roman principle\nof external authority.  Looking at morality entirely from without, as an\nartificial mode of regulating life and society for the supreme good of\nthe Church, the Jesuit casuists were driven, under the necessities of\nsuch a system, from point to point, till all essential moral distinction\nwas lost in the mechanical manipulations of their schools.  Whatever\nhappened, no man or woman was to be lost to the Church; the complications\nof human interest and passion were to be brought within its fold and\nsmoothed into some sort of decent seeming, rather than cast beyond its\npale and made the prey of its enemies. {144b}  The task was a hopeless\none.  In the pages of Pascal the Jesuits too obviously make a deplorable\nbusiness both of religion and morality.  But they were as much the\nvictims as the authors of a system which Rome had sanctioned, and which\ncame directly from the claims which it made to govern the world not\nmerely by spiritual suasion, but by external influence.  Jesuitism may be\nbad, and the Jesuit morality exposed by Pascal abominable, but the one\nand the other are the natural outgrowth of a Church which had become a\nmechanism for the regulation of human conduct, rather than a spiritual\npower addressing freely the human heart and conscience.\n\nOur space will not admit of an analysis of the thirteen Letters dealing\nwith the Jesuits, and we can hardly give any quotations from them.\nSuffice it to say, that Pascal passes in the fourth Letter to a direct\nassault upon the Society.  \u201cNothing can equal the Jesuits,\u201d the Letter\nbegins.  \u201cI have seen Jacobins, doctors, and all sorts of people; but\nsuch a visit as I have made today baffles everything, and was necessary\nto complete my knowledge of the world.\u201d  He then describes his visit to a\nvery clever Jesuit, accompanied by his trusty Jansenist friend, and\ngradually unfolds from the mouth of the former the whole system of moral\ntheology which had grown up in the Jesuit schools,\u2014their notions of\n\u201cactual grace,\u201d or the necessity of a special conscious knowledge that an\nact is evil, and ought to be avoided, before we can be said to be guilty\nof sin in committing the act; their famous doctrines of _probabilism_ and\nof _directing the intention_, and all the consequences springing out of\nthem.  Nothing can be more ingenious than the manner in which the Jesuit\nis led forward to unfold point after point of his hateful system, as if\nit were one of the greatest boons which had ever been invented for\nmankind, until from concession to concession he is plunged into the most\nhorrible conclusions, and the Jansenist can stand the disclosures no\nlonger, but breaks forth in the end of the tenth Letter into a powerful\nand eloquent denunciation of the doctrines to which he has been\nlistening.\n\nAny lighter vein that may have lingered in the Letters is abandoned from\nthis point.  Pascal ceases to address his friend in the country; the\nplayful interchange that sprang from the idea of a third party, to whom\nPascal was supposed to be merely reporting what he had heard, occurs no\nmore.  He turns to the Jesuit fathers directly, and addresses them, as if\nunable any longer to restrain his indignation, commencing the eleventh\nLetter with an admirable defence of his previous tone, and of the extent\nto which he had used the weapon of ridicule in assailing them, and\npassing on to reiterate his charges, and to repel the calumnies with\nwhich they had assailed him and his Port Royalist friends.  The reader\nmay weary, perhaps, for a little, as he threads his way through the\nsuccessive accusations, and the monotonous train of evil principles which\nunderlies them all, more or less.  He may wish that Pascal had gone to\nthe roots of the system more completely, and had laid bare its germinal\nfalsehood, instead of heaping detail upon detail, and always adding a\ndarker hue to the picture which he draws.  But any such mode of treatment\nwould not half so well have served his purpose.  His audience were not\nprepared for any philosophy of exposure, still less for any attack upon\nthe essential principles of the Church; he himself did not see how the\nsuccessive laxities which he fixes with his poignant satire, or sets in\nthe light of his withering scorn, spring from a vicious conception of\nChristianity and of the office of the Church.  He does what he does,\nhowever, with exquisite effect; and the Jesuit Order, many and powerful\nas have been its opponents, never before nor since felt itself more\nkeenly and unanswerably assailed.  Many of them were forced to laugh at\nthe picture of their own follies, and the immoral nonsense which\ndistilled from the lips of Father Bauny and others, in explanation or\ndefence of their practices.  \u201cRead that,\u201d says the confidential Jesuit\nwho expounds to Pascal their system: \u201cit is \u2018The Summary of Sins,\u2019 by\nFather Bauny; the fifth edition, you see, which shows that it is a good\nbook.  \u2018In order to sin,\u2019 says Father Bauny, \u2018it is necessary to know\nthat the _thing we wish to do is not good_.\u2019\u201d  \u201cA capital commencement,\u201d\nI remarked.  \u201cYet,\u201d said he, \u201conly think how far envy will carry some\npeople.  It was on this very passage that M. Hallier, before he became\none of our friends, quizzed Father Bauny, saying of him \u2018_Ecce qui tollit\npeccata mundi_\u2014Behold the man who taketh away the sins of the world.\u2019\u201d\n{147}  Then after an elaborate description of all that goes to make a\nsin\u2014\n\n    \u201c\u2018O my dear sir,\u2019 cried I, \u2018what a blessing this will be to some\n    friends of my acquaintance!  You have never, perhaps, in all your\n    life met with people who have fewer sins to account for!  In the\n    first place, they never think of God at all, still less of praying to\n    Him; so that, according to M. le Moine, they are still in a state of\n    baptismal innocence.  They have never had a thought of loving God, or\n    of being contrite for their sins; so that, according to Father Annat,\n    they have never committed sin through the want of charity and\n    penitence. . . .  I had always supposed that the less a man thought\n    of God the more he sinned; but from what I see now, if one could only\n    succeed in bringing himself not to think of God at all, everything\n    would be peace with him in all time coming.  Away with your\n    half-and-half sinners who have some love for virtue!  They will be\n    damned every one of them.  But as for your out-and-out sinners,\n    hardened and without mixture, thorough and determined in their evil\n    courses, hell is no place for them.  They have cheated the devil by\n    stern devotion to his service!\u2019\u201d {148}\n\nIt is in hits like these, everywhere scattered throughout the earlier\nletters, to which no translation can do justice, and which lose half\ntheir edge by being separated from their context, that the wit of Pascal\nshines.  A more delicate, and at the same time more scathing irony,\ncannot be conceived.  He hits with the lightest stroke, and in the most\nnatural manner, yet his lash cuts the flesh, and leaves an intolerable\nsmart.  All that could be said in answer was, that his representations\nwere lies.  They were conscious exaggerations, no doubt, as all satirical\nrepresentations are.  This is of their very nature.  But the extent to\nwhich they told, and the bitterness of the feeling which they excited at\nthe time, and have continued to excite amongst the Jesuits and their\nfriends, show how much truth there was in them.  Nothing can be more\npitiful and less satisfactory than mere complaints of their falsehood.\nSuch complaints were hardly to have been expected from any other quarter\nthan the Jesuits themselves.  Yet even Chateaubriand, in his new-born\nzeal for the Church, could say of their author, \u201cPascal is only a\ncalumniator of genius.  He has left us an immortal lie.\u201d\n\nOf the graver part of the Letters, the following are the only extracts\nthat our space will permit:\u2014\n\n\n\nJESUIT LAXITY AND CHRISTIAN INDIGNATION.\n\n\n    \u201cSuch is the way in which our teachers have discharged men from the\n    \u2018painful\u2019 obligation of actually loving God.  And so advantageous a\n    doctrine is this, that our Fathers Annat, Pintereau, Le Moine, and A.\n    Sirmond even, have defended it vigorously when assailed by any one.\n    You have only to consult their answers in the \u2018Moral Theology;\u2019 that\n    of Father Pintereau, in particular (second part), will enable you to\n    judge of the value of this dispensation by the price which it has\n    cost, even the blood of Jesus.  This is the crown of such a\n    doctrine.\u201d  (A quotation is then given from Father Pintereau to the\n    effect that it is a characteristic of the new Evangelical law, in\n    contrast to the Judaical, that \u201cGod has lightened the troublesome and\n    arduous obligation of exercising an act of perfect contrition in\n    order to be justified.\u201d)  \u201c\u2018O father,\u2019 said I, \u2018no patience can stand\n    this any longer.  One cannot hear without horror such sentiments as I\n    have been listening to.\u2019  \u2018They are not my sentiments,\u2019 said the\n    monk.  \u2018I know that well; but you have expressed no aversion to them;\n    and far from detesting the authors of such maxims, you cherish esteem\n    for them.  Do you not fear that your consent will make you a\n    participator in their guilt?  Was it not sufficient to allow men so\n    many forbidden things under cover of your palliations?  Was it\n    necessary to afford them the occasion of committing crimes that even\n    you cannot excuse by the facility and assurance of absolution which\n    you offer them? . . .  The licence which your teachers have assumed\n    of tampering with the most holy rules of Christian conduct amounts to\n    a total subversion of the Divine law.  They violate the great\n    commandment which embraces the law and the prophets; they strike at\n    the very heart of piety; they take away the spirit which giveth life.\n    They say that the love of God is not necessary to salvation; they\n    even go the length of professing that this dispensation from loving\n    God is the special privilege which Jesus Christ has brought into the\n    world.  This is the very climax of impiety.  The price of the blood\n    of Jesus, the purchase for us of a dispensation from loving Him!\n    Before the incarnation we were under the necessity of loving God.\n    But since God has so loved the world as to give His only Son for it,\n    the world, thus redeemed by Him, is discharged from loving Him!\n    Strange theology of our time!\u2014to take away the anathema pronounced by\n    St Paul against those \u201cwho love not the Lord Jesus Christ;\u201d to blot\n    out the saying of St John, that \u201che that loveth not abideth in\n    death;\u201d and the words of Jesus Christ Himself, \u201cHe that loveth me not\n    keepeth not my commandments!\u201d  In this manner those who have never\n    loved God in life are rendered worthy of enjoying Him throughout\n    eternity.  Behold the mystery of iniquity accomplished!  Open your\n    eyes, my father; and if you have remained untouched by the other\n    distortions of your Casuists, let this last by its excess compel you\n    to abandon them.\u2019\u201d {150a}\n\n\n\nDEFENCE OF RIDICULE AS A WEAPON IN CONTROVERSY.\n\n\n    \u201cWhat, my fathers! must the imaginations of your doctors pass for\n    faithful verities?  Must we not expose the sayings of Escobar, {150b}\n    and the fantastic and unchristian statements of others, without being\n    accused of laughing at religion?  Is it possible you have dared to\n    repeat anything so unreasonable? and have you no fear that in blaming\n    me for ridiculing your absurdities, you were merely furnishing me\n    with a fresh subject of arousing attack, and of pointing out more\n    clearly that I have not found in your books any subject of laughter\n    which is not in itself intensely ridiculous; and that in making a\n    jest of your moral maxims, I am as far from making a jest of holy\n    things as the doctrine of your Casuists distant from the holy\n    doctrine of the Gospel?  In truth, sirs, there is a vast difference\n    between laughing at religion and laughing at those who profane it by\n    their extravagant opinions.  It were an impiety to fail in respect\n    for the great truths which the Divine Spirit has revealed; but it\n    would be no less impiety of another kind to fail in contempt for\n    falsehoods which the spirit of man has opposed to them. . . .  Just\n    as Christian truths are worthy of love and respect, the errors which\n    oppose them are worthy of contempt and hatred: for as there are two\n    things in the truths of our religion\u2014a divine beauty which renders\n    them lovable, and a holy majesty which renders them venerable; so\n    there are two things in such errors\u2014an impiety which makes them\n    horrible, and an impertinence which renders them ridiculous.\u201d {151a}\n\nMany examples from the Scriptures and the Fathers are then quoted in\ndefence of the practice of directing ridicule against error; and he\ncloses with a singularly appropriate passage from Tertullian: \u201cNothing is\nmore due to vanity than laughter; it is the Truth properly that has a\nright to laugh, because she is cheerful\u2014and to make sport of her enemies,\nbecause she is sure of victory.\u201d\n\n    \u201cDo you not think, my fathers, that this passage is singularly\n    applicable to our subject?  The letters which I have hitherto written\n    are \u2018only a little sport before the real combat.\u2019  As yet I have been\n    only playing with the foils, and \u2018rather indicating the wounds that\n    might be given you than inflicting any.\u2019  I have merely exposed your\n    sayings to the light, without commenting on them.  \u2018If they have\n    excited laughter, it is only because they are so laughable in\n    themselves.\u2019  These sayings come upon us with such surprise, it is\n    impossible to help laughing at them; for nothing produces laughter\n    more than surprising disproportion between what one hears and what\n    one expects.  In what other way could the most of these matters be\n    treated? for, as Tertullian says, \u2018To treat them seriously would be\n    to sanction them.\u2019\u201d {151b}\n\n\n\nAPPEAL AGAINST THE JESUITS.\n\n\n    \u201cToo long have you deceived the world, and abused the confidence\n    which men have put in your impostures.  It is high time to vindicate\n    the reputation of so many people whom you have calumniated; for what\n    innocence can be so generally acknowledged as not to suffer\n    contamination from the daring aspersion of a society of men scattered\n    throughout the world, who, under religious habits, cover irreligious\n    minds; who perpetrate crimes as they concoct slanders\u2014not against,\n    but in conformity with, their own maxims?  No one can blame me,\n    surely, for having destroyed the confidence which you might otherwise\n    have inspired, since it is far more just to vindicate for so many\n    good people whom you have decried, the reputation for piety they\n    deserved, than to leave you a reputation for sincerity which you have\n    never merited.  And as the one could not be done without the other,\n    how important was it to make the world understand what you really\n    are.  This is what I have begun to do; but it will require time to\n    complete the work.  The world, however, shall hear of you, my\n    fathers, and all your policy will not avail to shelter you.  The very\n    efforts you make to ward off the blow will only serve to convince the\n    least enlightened that you are afraid, and that, smitten in your own\n    consciences by my charges, you have had recourse to every expedient\n    to prevent exposure.\u201d  {152}\n\nThe effect of the \u2018Provincial Letters\u2019 was not only to alarm the Jesuits,\nbut the Church.  The scandal of their exposure was so deeply felt, that\nthe _cur\u00e9s_ of Paris and Rouen appointed committees to investigate the\naccuracy of Pascal\u2019s quotations, and the result of their investigation\nwas entirely in Pascal\u2019s favour.  This led ultimately to the matter being\ncarried before a General Assembly of the clergy of Paris, which, however,\ndeclined to give any formal decision.  In the meantime, an \u2018Apology for\nthe Casuists\u2019 was published by a Jesuit of the name of Pirot, of such a\ncharacter as to increase rather than abate the scandal, and a new\ncontroversy gathered around this publication.  The Sorbonne took up the\nquestion, and, after examination, condemned Pirot\u2019s Apology (July 1658)\nas they had formerly done Arnauld\u2019s propositions, and ultimately it was\nincluded by Rome in the \u2018Index Expurgatorius,\u2019 along with the \u2018Provincial\nLetters,\u2019 to which it was designed as a reply.  While the question was\nbefore the Sorbonne, the _cur\u00e9s_ of Paris published various writings,\nunder the name of \u2018Facta,\u2019 in support of the conclusions to which they\nhad come.  These writings were prepared in concert with Pascal and his\nfriends, and the second and fifth are ascribed entirely to his pen.  It\nis even said that he looked upon the latter, in which he drew a parallel\nbetwixt the Jesuits and Calvinists (to the disadvantage of the\nProtestants), as the _best thing he ever did_. {153}  Long after Pascal\u2019s\ndeath (in 1694) an elaborate answer appeared, by Father Daniel, to the\n\u2018Provincial Letters,\u2019 under the title of \u2018Entretiens de Cl\u00e9andre et\nd\u2019Eudoxe sur les Lettres au Provincial;\u2019 but notwithstanding a certain\namount of learning and apparent candour, the reply made no impression\nupon the public.  Even the Jesuits themselves felt it to be a failure.\n\u201cFather Daniel,\u201d it was said, \u201cprofessed to have reason and truth on his\nside; but his adversary had in his favour what goes much farther with\nmen,\u2014the arms of ridicule and pleasantry.\u201d  As late as 1851 an edition of\nthe \u2018Letters\u2019 appeared by the Abb\u00e9 Maynard, accompanied by a professed\nrefutation of their misstatements.  But the truth is, Pascal\u2019s work is\none of those which admit of no adequate refutation.  Even if it be\ngranted that he has occasionally made the most of a quotation, and\nbrought points together which, taken separately in their connection, have\nnot the offensive meaning attributed to them, this touches but little the\nreader who has enjoyed their exquisite raillery or has been moved by\ntheir indignant denunciation.  The real force of the Letters lies in\ntheir wit and eloquence\u2014their mingled comedy and invective.  They may be\nparried or resented\u2014they can never be refuted.\n\nWe have already quoted Voltaire\u2019s saying, \u201cThe best comedies of Moli\u00e8re\nhave not more wit than the first Provincial Letters.\u201d  \u201cBossuet,\u201d he\nadded, \u201chas nothing more sublime than the concluding ones.\u201d  They were\nregarded by him as \u201cmodels of eloquence and pleasantry,\u201d as the \u201cfirst\nwork of genius\u201d that appeared in French prose.  When Bossuet himself was\nasked of what work he would most wish to have been the author, he\nanswered, \u201cThe \u2018Provincial Letters.\u2019\u201d  Madame de S\u00e9vign\u00e9 writes of them\n(Dec. 21, 1689): \u201cHow charming they are! . . .  Is it possible to have a\nmore perfect style, an irony finer, more delicate, more natural, more\nworthy of the Dialogues of Plato? . . .  And what seriousness of tone,\nwhat solidity, what eloquence in the last eight Letters!\u201d  Our Gibbon\nattributed to the frequent perusal of them his own mastery of \u201cgrave and\ntemperate irony.\u201d  Boileau pronounced them \u201cunsurpassed\u201d in ancient or\nmodern prose.  Encomiums could hardly go higher, and yet the language of\nPerrault is in a still higher strain: \u201cThere is more wit in these\neighteen Letters than in Plato\u2019s Dialogues; more delicate and artful\nraillery than in those of Lucian; and more strength and ingenuity of\nreasoning than in the orations of Cicero.\u201d  Their style especially is\nbeyond all praise.  It has \u201cnever been surpassed, nor perhaps equalled.\u201d\nThere may be, as there is apt to be in all such concurrent verdicts, a\nstrain of excess.  The duller English sense may not catch all the finer\nedges of a style which it may yet feel to be exquisite in its general\nclearness, harmony, and point; the absurdities of verbal argument and of\nJesuit sophistry may sometimes pall upon the attention, and hardly raise\na smile at this time of day.  It is the fate of even the finest polemical\nliterature to grow dead as it grows old; yet none can doubt the\nimmortality of the genius which has so long given life to such a\ncontroversy, and charmed so many of the highest judges of literary form.\nIt is not for any Englishman to challenge the verdict of a Frenchman in a\nmatter of style.\n\nPascal himself evidently thought highly of his success.  He liked the\ncontroversy, its excitement, and the applausive echo which followed each\nLetter.  Like every true artist, he felt the joy and yet the gravity of\nhis work.  He took up his pen with a pleasurable sense of mastery, and\nyet he wrote some of the Letters six or seven times over.  He spared no\npains, yet he never wearied.  All his intellectual life for the time was\nthrown into the controversy, and his most finely-tempered strokes made\nmusic in his own mind, while they carried confusion to his adversaries\nand triumph to his friends.  The sensation made by the Letters was, of\ncourse, mainly confined to France; but the nervous Latinity of Nicole\nsoon communicated something of the same sensation to a wider circle.\n{156}  Pascal has himself told us that he never repented having written\nthem, nor \u201cthe amusing, agreeable, ironical style\u201d in which they were\nwritten.  Even the condemnation of the Papal See, abject in some respects\nas was his devotion to his Church, did not move him on this point.  He\nleft on record, amongst his Thoughts, the following solemn declaration:\n\u201cIF MY LETTERS ARE CONDEMNED IN ROME, WHAT I CONDEMN IN THEM IS CONDEMNED\nIN HEAVEN.  AD TUUM, DOMINE JESU, TRIBUNAL APPELLO.\u201d\n\n\n\n\nCHAPTER VI.\nTHE \u2018PENS\u00c9ES.\u2019\n\n\nFrom Pascal\u2019s finished work we turn to his unfinished Remains.  The one\nwill always be regarded as the chief monument of his literary skill, and\nof the executive completeness of his mind.  But the other is the worthier\nand nobler tribute to the greatness of his soul, and the depth and power\nof his moral genius.  Few comparatively now read the \u2018Provincial Letters\u2019\nas a whole; fewer still are interested in the controversy which they\ncommemorate.  But there are hardly any of higher culture\u2014none certainly\nof higher thoughtfulness\u2014to whom the \u2018Pens\u00e9es\u2019 are not still attractive,\nand who have not sought in them at one time or another some answer to the\nobstinate questionings which the deeper scrutiny of human life and\ndestiny is ever renewing in the human heart.  No answer may have been\nfound in them, but every spiritual mind must have so far met in the\nauthor of the \u2018Pens\u00e9es\u2019 a kindred spirit which, if it has seen no farther\nthan others, has yet entered keenly upon the great quest, and traversed\nwith a singular boldness the great lines of higher speculation that\n\u201cslope through darkness up to God.\u201d\n\nThe literary history of the \u2018Pens\u00e9es\u2019 is a very curious one.  They first\nappeared in the end of 1669, in a small duodecimo volume, with the\nappropriate motto, \u201cPendent opera interrupta.\u201d  Their preparation for the\npress had been a subject of much anxiety to Pascal\u2019s friends.  What is\nknown as the \u201cPeace of the Church\u201d\u2014a period of temporary quiet and\nprosperity to Port Royal\u2014had begun in 1663; and it was important that\nnothing should be done by the Port Royalists to disturb this peace.  It\nhad been agreed, therefore, that all passages bearing on the controversy\nwith the Jesuits and the Formulary should be omitted; but beyond this\nMadame P\u00e9rier desired that the volume should only contain what proceeded\nfrom her brother, and in the precise form and style in which it had left\nhis hand.  She evidently lacked full confidence in the Committee of\nEditors, of whom the Duc de Roannez was the chief, notwithstanding their\nprofessions of strict adherence to the manuscripts.  The volume at last\nappeared, with a preface by her own son, and no fewer than nine\n\u201capprobations,\u201d signed amongst others by three bishops, one archdeacon,\nand three doctors of the Sorbonne.\n\nUnhappily Madame P\u00e9rier had too much cause for alarm.  Editors and\nApprovers alike had claimed the liberty, not only of arranging but of\nmodifying both the matter and the style of the \u2018Pens\u00e9es,\u2019 and this\nnotwithstanding a statement in the preface that, in giving, as they\nprofessed to do, only \u201cthe clearest and most finished\u201d of the fragments,\nthey had given them as they found them, _without adding or changing\nanything_.  \u201cThese fragments,\u201d says M. Faug\u00e8re, \u201cwhich sickness and death\nhad left unfinished, suffered, without ceasing to be immortal, all the\nmutilation which an exaggerated prudence or a misdirected zeal could\nsuggest, with the view not only of guarding their orthodoxy, but of\nembellishing their style\u2014the style of the author of the \u2018Provincials\u2019!\u201d\n\u201cThere are not,\u201d he adds, \u201ctwenty successive lines which do not present\nsome alteration, great or small.  As for total omissions and partial\nsuppressions, they are without number.\u201d  M. Cousin is equally emphatic.\n\u201cThere are,\u201d he says, \u201cexamples of every kind of alteration\u2014alteration of\nwords, alteration of phrases, suppressions, substitutions, additions,\narbitrary compositions, and, what is worse, decompositions more arbitrary\nstill.\u201d\n\nIt is impossible to defend the first editors of the \u2018Pens\u00e9es.\u2019  But it\nshould be remembered that their task was one not only of theological\nperplexity, but of great literary difficulty.  Pascal\u2019s manuscripts were\na mere mass of confused papers, sometimes written on both sides, and in a\nhand for the most part so obscure and imperfectly formed as to be\nillegible to all who had not made it a special study.  The papers were\npasted or bundled together without any natural connection, parts\ncontaining the same piece being sometimes intersected and sometimes\nwidely separated from one another.  If the editors, therefore, did their\nwork ill, it was partly no doubt from incompetency, but partly from its\ninherent difficulty, and from the fact that being so near to Pascal they\ncould hardly appreciate the feelings of the modern critic as to the\nsacredness of his style, and of all that came from his pen.\n\nThe edition of 1669 continued to be reprinted with little alteration for\na century.  Various additional fragments were brought to light,\nespecially the famous conversation between De Saci and Pascal regarding\nEpictetus and Montaigne; but the form of the fragments remained\nunchanged.  It was not till the edition of Condorcet in 1776 that they\ncan be said to have undergone any new _r\u00e9daction_.  Unhappily Pascal\nsuffered in the hands of the Encyclopedists, as he had previously\nsuffered in the hands of the Jansenists and the Sorbonne.  The first\neditors had expunged whatever might seem at variance with orthodoxy.\nCondorcet suppressed or modified whatever partook of a too lofty\nenthusiasm or a too fervent piety.  It became a current idea among the\nEncyclopedists that the accident at Neuilly had affected Pascal\u2019s brain.\nWe have already seen how Voltaire spoke of this; and he directed an early\nattack (1734) upon the doctrine of human nature contained in the\n\u2018Pens\u00e9es.\u2019  Now, in his old age, he hailed Condorcet\u2019s edition, and\nreissued it two years later, with an Introduction and Notes by himself.\n\nIn the following year, 1779, appeared the elaborate and well-known\nedition of Pascal\u2019s works by the Abb\u00e9 Bossut, accompanied by an admirable\n\u201cDiscours sur la Vie et les Ouvrages de Pascal.\u201d  In this edition the\nremains are found for the first time in some degree of completeness.  All\nthe fragments published by Port Royal, and all those subsequently brought\nto light by Des Molets and others, are included and arranged in a new\norder.  But meritorious as were Bossut\u2019s editorial labours as a whole,\nthey did not attempt any restoration of the \u2018Pens\u00e9es\u2019 to their original\ntext; and even the new fragments published by him were not left\nuntouched.  He embodied, for example, the famous conversation with De\nSaci, but without giving De Saci\u2019s part of the dialogue.  In short, he\nreproduced, as M. Havet says, all the faults of the first editors, and\nmade others of his own.  This is the more remarkable that he is said to\nhave had in his possession a copy of the original manuscripts.\nCondorcet, however, consulted the original manuscripts themselves,\nwithout any thought of doing justice to Pascal\u2019s text.\n\nSo matters remained till 1842, when M. Cousin published his famous Report\non the subject to the French Academy.  The French public then found to\ntheir astonishment that, with so many editions of the \u2018Pens\u00e9es,\u2019 they had\nnot the \u2018Pens\u00e9es\u2019 themselves.  While philosophers had disputed as to his\nideas, and critics admired his style, the veritable Pascal of the\n\u2018Pens\u00e9es\u2019 had all the time lain concealed in a mass of manuscripts in the\nNational Library.  Such a story, it may be imagined, did not lack any\nforce in the manner in which M. Cousin told it; and an eager desire arose\nfor a new and complete edition of the fragments.  Cousin had prepared the\nway, but he did not himself undertake this task, which was reserved for\nM. Faug\u00e8re, whose great edition appeared two years later, in 1844.\nNothing can deprive M. Faug\u00e8re of the credit of being the first editor of\na _complete_ and _authentic_ text of the \u2018Pens\u00e9es.\u2019\n\nOther editions of distinctive merit have since appeared; and it may be\nadmitted that, in the natural reaction from the laxity of former\neditions, he gave a too literal transcript of the manuscripts, including\nsome things of little importance, and others more properly belonging to\nan edition of the \u2018Provincial Letters\u2019 than of the \u2018Pens\u00e9es.\u2019  But,\nwhether it be the result of early association or of greater familiarity\nwith M. Faug\u00e8re\u2019s pages, I own still a preference for this edition, while\nadmitting the admirable perspicuity and intelligence of many of M.\nHavet\u2019s notes, and the splendour of the edition of M. Victor Rochet, the\nmost recent (1873) that has come under my notice.\n\nThe principle observed by M. Faug\u00e8re is strongly defended in his preface.\nHe allowed himself no discretionary powers of emendation, because \u201cthe\nlimits of such a power might,\u201d he says, \u201cbe too easily overstepped, and\nwould have left room for belief that greater liberties had been taken\nthan was actually the case.\u201d  \u201cThe manuscripts,\u201d he adds, \u201chave been\nread, or rather studied, page by page, line by line, syllable by\nsyllable, to the end; and, with the exception of illegible words (which,\nhowever, are carefully indicated), they have passed completely into the\npresent edition.\u201d\n\nSo far, this principle has been adhered to by subsequent editors.  There\nhas been no further tampering with Pascal\u2019s words, but more or less\nlatitude has been taken in publishing all the manuscript details, and\nespecially in the arrangement of the several fragments.  Faug\u00e8re fancied\nthat he could trace in Pascal\u2019s own notes the indication of an interior\narrangement, into which the several parts of his proposed work in defence\nof religion were intended to fall; and he has grouped the fragments in\nhis second volume according to these supposed indications.  M. Havet does\nnot think that it is possible any longer to discover the true order of\nthe fragments.  He does not believe that any such order existed in the\nauthor\u2019s own mind.  He had a general design, and certain great divisions;\na preface was sketched here, and a chapter there; but in throwing his\nthoughts upon paper as they presented themselves to him, he did not stop\nto assort them, or to bring them into any fitting connection.  What\nPascal himself did not do, M. Havet does not think it possible any editor\ncan do.  Accordingly, he recurs to the old, if somewhat arbitrary,\narrangement of Bossut, as the most familiar and useful.  M. Rochet\nfollows an elaborate arrangement, professedly founded on the original\nplan of Pascal, as sketched by himself in the conversation reported by\nhis nephew in the preface to the primary edition of the fragments.  He\nconsiders that all the Thoughts find their natural place in this plan and\nin no other.  But M. Rochet\u2019s classifications are, partly at least,\ninspired by his own ecclesiastical tendencies; and he is far from just to\nthe labours of M. Faug\u00e8re, and the real light and order which these\nlabours introduced into the development of Pascal\u2019s ideas.\n\nIt is unnecessary for us to attempt to hold the balance between Pascal\u2019s\nseveral editors, or to say which of them has most justice on his side.\nOf two things there can be no doubt: first, that any special arrangement\nof the \u2018Pens\u00e9es,\u2019 so as to give the idea of a connected book in defence\nof religion, is, so far, arbitrary\u2014the work, that is to say, of the\neditor rather than of the author; and secondly, that there is no\ndifficulty, from the original preface and otherwise, of gathering the\ngeneral order of Pascal\u2019s ideas, and the method which appeared to him the\ntrue one of meeting the irreligion of his day, and vindicating the divine\ntruth of Christianity\u2014points which shall afterwards come before us.\n\nThe special question raised by M. Cousin as to Pascal\u2019s scepticism will\nalso be best discussed in its true order, in connection with such\npassages as have suggested it.  Considering Pascal\u2019s traditionary\nreputation as the defender of religion, there was a character of surprise\nin this question, that forced a lively debate, as soon as it was raised,\nin France and Germany, and even England.  Vinet and Neander both joined\nin it; and the two lectures delivered by the latter before the Royal\nAcademy of Sciences in Berlin in 1847, are highly deserving of perusal by\nall students of philosophy. {164}  But the issue is an absurd one, before\nthe combatants are agreed as to the meaning of the word Scepticism, and\nbefore the reader has before him the views of Pascal, and the manner in\nwhich he defines his own attitude in relation to what he considered the\ntwo great lines of thought opposed to Christianity.  When we are in\npossession of his own statements, we may find that much of the indignant\nrhetoric of M. Cousin is beside the question, and that, although Pascal\nwas certainly no Cartesian, and has used some strong and rash expressions\nabout the weakness of human reason, neither is he a sceptic in any usual\nsense.  He has, in fact, defined his own position with singular clearness\nand force.\n\nBut before turning to his views on these higher subjects, it will be well\nto present our readers with some of Pascal\u2019s more miscellaneous and\ngeneral Thoughts.  In doing so, it is not necessary, in such a volume as\nthis, that we indicate throughout the edition from which we take our\nquotations.  We shall quote from the editions of Faug\u00e8re or Havet, as may\nbe most convenient, and take them in such order as suits our own purpose\nof exhibiting Pascal\u2019s mind as clearly as we can.  For the same reason,\nwe shall give such passages as appear to us not always the most just or\naccurate in thought, but the most characteristic or representative of the\nveritable Pascal, whose true words were so long concealed from the world.\nWe cannot do better, in the first instance, than note what so great a\nmathematician has to say of geometry and the \u201cmathematical mind,\u201d\ncompared with the naturally _acute_ mind (\u201cl\u2019esprit de finesse\u201d), betwixt\nwhich he draws an interesting parallel.  The fragment on the\n\u201cMathematical\u201d or \u201cGeometric Mind\u201d was, with the exception of a brief\npassage given by Des Molets {165} in 1728, originally published, although\nwith numerous suppressions, in Condorcet\u2019s edition of the \u2018Pens\u00e9es.\u2019  It\nappeared for the first time in its complete form, and under its proper\ntitle, in Faug\u00e8re\u2019s edition, along with its natural pendant, the\nclosely-allied fragment, entitled \u201cL\u2019Art de Persuader.\u201d  We give a few\npassages from the first fragment:\u2014\n\n    \u201cWe may have three principal objects in the study of truth\u2014one to\n    discover it when we seek it, another to demonstrate it when we\n    possess it, and a third and last to discriminate it from the false\n    when we examine it. . . .  Geometry excels in all three, and\n    especially in the art of discovering unknown truths, which it calls\n    _analysis_. . .  There is a method which excels geometry, but is\n    impossible to man, _for whatever transcends geometry transcends us_\n    [in natural science, as he explains elsewhere].  This is the method\n    of defining everything and proving everything. . .  A fine method,\n    but impossible; since it is evident that the first terms that we wish\n    to define, suppose precedent terms necessary for their\n    explanation\u2014and that the first propositions that we wish to prove,\n    suppose others which precede them; and so it is clear we can never\n    arrive at absolutely first principles.  In pushing our researches to\n    the utmost, we necessarily reach primitive words that admit of no\n    further definition, and principles so obvious, that they require no\n    proof.  Man can never, therefore, from natural incompetency, possess\n    an absolutely complete science. . . .  But geometry, while inferior\n    in its aims, is absolutely certain within its limits.  It neither\n    defines everything, nor attempts to prove everything, and must, so\n    far, yield its pretension to be an absolute science; but it sets out\n    from things universally admitted as clear and constant, and is\n    therefore perfectly true, because in consonance with nature.  Its\n    function is not to define things universally clear and understood,\n    but to define all others; and not to attempt to prove things\n    intuitively known to men, but to attempt to prove all others.\n    Against this, the true order of knowledge, those alike err who\n    attempt to define and to prove everything, and those who neglect\n    definition and demonstration where things are not self-evident.  This\n    is what geometry teaches perfectly.  It attempts no definition of\n    such things as _space_, _time_, _motion_, _number_, _equality_, and\n    the like, because these terms designate so naturally the things which\n    they signify, that any attempt at making them more clear ends in\n    making them more obscure.  For there is nothing more futile than the\n    talk of those who would define primitive words. {166}\n\n    . . . . . . . .\n\n    \u201cIn geometry the principles are palpable, but removed from common\n    use. . . .  In the sphere of natural wit or acuteness, the principles\n    are in common use and before all eyes\u2014it is only a question of having\n    a good view of them; for they are so subtle and numerous, that some\n    are almost sure to escape observation. . . .  All geometers would be\n    men of acuteness if they had sufficient insight, for they never\n    reason falsely on the principles recognised by them.  All fine or\n    acute spirits would be geometers if they could fix their thoughts on\n    the unwonted principles of geometry.  The reason why some finer\n    spirits are not geometers is, that they cannot turn their attention\n    at all to the principles of geometry; but geometers fail in finer\n    perception, because they do not see all that is before them, and\n    being accustomed to the plain and palpable principles of geometry,\n    and never reasoning until they have well ascertained and handled\n    their principles, they lose themselves in matters of intellectual\n    subtlety, where the principles are not so easily laid hold of.  Such\n    things are seen with difficulty; they are felt rather than seen.\n    They are so delicate and multitudinous that it requires a very\n    delicate and neat sense to appreciate them. . . .  So it is as rare\n    for geometers to be men of subtle wit as it is for the latter to be\n    geometers, because geometers like to treat these nicer matters\n    geometrically, and so make themselves ridiculous; they like to\n    commence with definition, and then go on to principles\u2014a mode which\n    does not at all suit this sort of reasoning.  It is not that the mind\n    does not take this method, but it does so silently, naturally, and\n    without conscious art.  The perception of the process belongs only to\n    a few minds, and those of the highest order. . . .  Geometers, who\n    are only geometers, are sure to be right, provided the subject come\n    within their scope, and is capable of explanation by definition and\n    principles.  Otherwise they go wrong altogether, for they only judge\n    rightly upon principles clearly set forth and established.  On the\n    other hand, subtle men, who are only subtle, lack patience, in\n    matters of speculation and imagination, to reach first principles\n    which they have never known in the world, and which are entirely\n    beyond their beat. . . .\n\n    \u201cThere are different kinds of sound sense.  Some succeed in one order\n    of things, and not in another, in which they are simply extravagant.\n    . . .  Some minds draw consequences well from a few principles,\n    others are more at home in drawing conclusions from a great variety\n    of principles.  For example, some understand well the phenomena of\n    water, with reference to which the principles are few, but the\n    results extremely delicate, so that only very great accuracy of mind\n    can trace them.  Such men would probably not be great geometers,\n    because geometry involves a multitude of principles, and because the\n    mind which may penetrate thoroughly a few principles to their depth\n    may not be at all able to penetrate things which combine a multitude\n    of principles. . . .  There are two sorts of mind: the one fathoms\n    rapidly and deeply the consequences of principles\u2014this is the\n    observant and accurate mind; the other embraces a great multitude of\n    principles, without confounding them\u2014and this is the mathematical\n    mind.  The one is marked by energy and accuracy, the other by\n    amplitude.  But the one may exist without the other.  The mind may be\n    powerful and narrow, or it may be ample and weak.\u201d {168}\n\nFew of Pascal\u2019s Thoughts are more interesting than those on \u201cEloquence\nand Style.\u201d  So great a master of the art of expression had naturally\nsomething to say on these subjects.\n\n    \u201cContinued eloquence wearies.  Princes and kings amuse themselves\n    sometimes; they are not always upon their thrones\u2014they tire of these.\n    Grandeur must be laid aside in order to be realised.\n\n    \u201cEloquence is a picture of thought; and thus those who, after having\n    drawn a picture, still go on, make a tableau and not a likeness.\n\n    \u201cEloquence is the art of saying things in such a manner\u2014first, that\n    those to whom they are addressed can understand them without trouble\n    and with pleasure; and secondly, that they may be interested in them\n    in such a way that their _amour propre_ may lead them gladly to\n    reflect upon them.  It consists, therefore, in a correspondence\n    established between the mind and heart of the hearers on the one\n    side, and the thoughts and expressions used on the other, and so\n    implies a close study of the human heart in order to know all its\n    springs, and to find the due measures of speech to address to it.  It\n    must confine itself, as far as possible, to the simplicity of nature,\n    and not make great what is small, nor small what is great.  It is not\n    enough that a thing be fine, it must be fitting,\u2014neither in excess\n    nor defect.\u201d\n\n    \u201cEloquence should prevail by gentle suasion, not by constraint.  It\n    should reign, not tyrannise.\n\n    \u201cThere are some who speak well, and who do not write well.  The\n    place\u2014the assembly\u2014excites them, and draws forth their mind more than\n    they ever experience without such excitement.\u201d\n\n    \u201cThose who make antitheses by forcing the sense are like men who make\n    false windows for the sake of symmetry.  Their rule is not to speak\n    correctly, but to make correct figures.\u201d\n\n    \u201cThere should be in eloquence always what is true and real; but that\n    which is pleasing should itself be the real.\u201d\n\n    \u201cWhen we meet with the natural style we are surprised and delighted,\n    for we expected to find an author, and we find a man; whilst those of\n    good taste who in looking into a book think to find a man, are\n    altogether surprised to find an author.  _Plus poetice quam humane\n    locutus es_.  They honour nature most who teach her that she can\n    speak best on all subjects\u2014even on theology.\u201d\n\n    \u201cThere are men who always dress up nature.  No mere king with them,\n    but an august monarch.  No Paris, but the capital of the kingdom.\n    There are places in which it is necessary to call Paris Paris;\n    others, where we must call it the capital of the kingdom.\u201d\n\n    \u201cWhen in composition we find a word repeated, and on trying to\n    correct it find it so suitable that a change would spoil the sense,\n    it is better to let it alone.  This stamps it as fitting, and it is a\n    stupid feeling which does not recognise that repetition in such a\n    case is not a fault; for there is no universal rule.\n\n    \u201cThe meaning itself changes with the words which express it.  The\n    meaning derives its dignity from the words, instead of imparting it\n    to them.\u201d\n\n    \u201cThe last thing that we discover in writing a book is to know what to\n    put at the beginning.\n\n    \u201cWhen a discourse paints a passion or effect naturally, we find in\n    ourselves the truth of what we hear, which was there without our\n    knowing it, so that we are led to like the man who discovers so much\n    to us.  For he does not show us his own good, but ours; and this good\n    turn makes him lovable.  Besides that, the community of intelligence\n    we have with him necessarily inclines the heart towards him.\n\n    \u201cLet none allege that I have said nothing new.  The arrangement of\n    the matter is new.  When we play at tennis, both play with the same\n    ball; but one plays better than the other.  They might as well accuse\n    me of using old words, as if the same thoughts differently arranged\n    would not form a different discourse; just as the same words\n    differently arranged express different thoughts.\n\n    \u201cThere is a definite standard of taste and beauty, which consists in\n    a certain relation between our nature\u2014it may be weak or strong, but\n    such as it is\u2014and the thing that pleases us.  All that is formed to\n    this standard delights us,\u2014house, song, writing, verse, prose, women,\n    buds, rivers, trees, rooms, dress, etc.  All that is not formed by\n    this standard disgusts men of good taste.\n\n    \u201cI never judge of the same thing exactly in the same manner.  I\n    cannot judge of my work in the course of doing it.  I must do as\n    painters do, place myself at a distance from it, but not too far.\n    How then?  You may guess.\u201d\n\nWe do not look to Pascal especially for worldly insight, or for that\nsharp knowledge of men that make the sayings of clever social writers\nlike Rochefoucauld or Horace Walpole memorable, if not always wise or\nkind.  But there are many of the Thoughts which show that the penitent of\nPort Royal had looked with clear observant eyes below the surface of\nParis society, and that he had a deep sense not only of the moral but the\nsocial weaknesses of humanity.\n\n    \u201cWhen passion leads us towards anything, we forget duty; as we like a\n    book we read it, while we ought to be doing something else.  In order\n    to be reminded of our duty, it is necessary to propose to do\n    something that we dislike; then we excuse ourselves on the ground\n    that we have something else to do, and so we recollect our duty by\n    this means.\n\n    \u201cHow wisely are men distinguished by their exterior rather than by\n    their interior qualifications!  Which of us two shall take the lead?\n    Which shall yield precedence?  The man of less talent?  But I am as\n    clever as he.  Then we must fight it out.  But he has four lackeys\n    and I have only one.  That is a visible difference.  We have only to\n    count the numbers.  It is my place then to give way, and I am a fool\n    to contest the point.  In this way peace is kept, which is the\n    greatest of blessings.\n\n    \u201cThere is a great advantage in rank, which gives to a man of eighteen\n    or twenty a degree of acceptance, publicity, and respect which\n    another can hardly obtain by merit at fifty.  It is a gain of thirty\n    years without any trouble.\n\n    \u201cRespect for others requires you to inconvenience yourself.  This\n    seems foolish, yet it is very proper.  It seems to say, I would\n    gladly inconvenience myself if you really required me to do so,\n    seeing I am ready to do so without serving you.\n\n    \u201c\u2018This is _my_ dog,\u2019 say children; \u2018that sunny seat is mine.\u2019  There\n    is the beginning and type of the usurpation of the whole earth.\n\n    \u201cThis _I_ is hateful.  You, Miton, {171} merely cover it, you do not\n    take it away; you are therefore always hateful.  Not at all, you say;\n    for if we act obligingly to all men, they have no reason to hate us.\n    So far true, if there was nothing hateful in the _I_ itself but the\n    displeasure which it gives.  But if I hate it because it is\n    essentially unjust, because it makes itself the centre of everything,\n    I shall hate it always.  In short, this _I_ has two qualities: it is\n    unjust in itself, in that it makes itself the centre of everything;\n    it is an annoyance to others, in that it would serve itself by them.\n    Each _I_ is the enemy, and would be the tyrant, of all others.\n\n    \u201cHe who would thoroughly know the vanity of men has only to consider\n    the causes and effects of love.  The cause is a _je ne sais quoi_, an\n    indefinable trifle\u2014the effects are monstrous.  If the nose of\n    Cleopatra had been a little shorter, it would have changed the\n    history of the world.\n\n    \u201cYou have a bad manner\u2014\u2018excuse me, if you please.\u2019  Without the\n    apology I should not have known that there was any harm done.\n    Begging your pardon, the \u2018excuse me,\u2019 is all the mischief.\n\n    \u201cDo you wish men to speak well of you?  Then never speak well of\n    yourself.\n\n    \u201cThe more mind we have, the more do we observe men of original mind.\n    It is your commonplace people that find no difference betwixt one man\n    and another.\n\n    \u201cIt is the contest that delights us, and not the victory.  It is the\n    same in play, and the same in search for truth.  We love to watch in\n    argument the conflicts of opinion; but the plain truth we do not care\n    to look at.  To regard it with pleasure, we must see it gradually\n    emerging from the contest of debate.  It is the same with passions:\n    the struggle of two contending passions has great interest, but the\n    dominance of one is mere brutality.\n\n    \u201cThe example of chastity in Alexander has not availed in the same\n    degree to make men chaste, as his drunkenness has to make them\n    intemperate.  Men are not ashamed not to be so virtuous as he; and it\n    seems excusable not to be more vicious.  A man thinks he is not\n    altogether sunk in the mud when he follows the vices of great men.\n\n    \u201cI have spent much time in the study of the abstract sciences, but\n    the paucity of persons with whom you can communicate on such\n    subjects, gave me a distaste for them.  When I began to study man, I\n    saw that these abstract studies are not suited to him, and that in\n    diving into them I wandered farther from my real object than those\n    who were ignorant of them, and I forgave men for not having attended\n    to these things.  But I thought at least I should find many\n    companions in the study of mankind, which is the true and proper\n    study of man.  I was mistaken.  There are yet fewer students of man\n    than of geometry.\n\n    \u201cPeople in general are called neither poets nor geometers, although\n    they have all that in them, and are capable of being judges of it.\n    They are not specifically marked out.  When they enter a room, they\n    speak of the subject on hand.  They do not show a greater aptitude\n    for one subject than another, except as circumstances call out their\n    talents. . . .\n\n    \u201cIt is poor praise when a man is pointed out on entering a room as\n    being a clever poet; a bad mark that he should only be referred to\n    when the question is as to the merit of some verses. . . .\n\n    \u201cMan is full of wants, and likes those who can satisfy them.  \u2018Such a\n    one is a good mathematician,\u2019 it may be said.  But then I must be\n    doing mathematics; he would turn me into a proposition.  Another is a\n    good soldier; he would take me for a besieged place.  Give me your\n    true man of general talents, who can adapt himself to all my needs.\n\n    \u201cIf a man sets himself at a window to see the passers-by, and I\n    happen to pass, can I say that he set himself there to see me?  No;\n    for he does not think of me in particular.  But if a man loves a\n    woman for her beauty, does he love _her_?  No; for the smallpox,\n    which will destroy her beauty without killing her, will cause him to\n    love her no more.  And if any one loves me for my judgment or my\n    memory, does he really love _me_?  No; for I may lose those qualities\n    without ceasing to be.  Where, then, is this _me_, if it is neither\n    in soul nor body?\n\n    \u201cHow is it that a lame man does not anger us, but a blundering mind\n    does?  Is it that the cripple admits that we walk straight, but a\n    crippled mind accuses us of limping?  Epictetus asks also, Why are we\n    not annoyed if any one tells us that we are unwell in the head, and\n    yet are angry if they tell us that we reason falsely or choose\n    unwisely?  The reason is, that we know certainly nothing ails our\n    head, or that we are not crippled in body.  But we are not so certain\n    that we have chosen correctly.\n\n    \u201cAll men naturally hate one another.\n\n    \u201cDesire and force are the source of all our actions\u2014desire of our\n    voluntary, force of our involuntary actions.\n\n    \u201cMen are necessarily such fools, that it would be folly of another\n    kind not to be a fool.\n\n    \u201cTo make a man a saint, grace is absolutely necessary; and whoever\n    doubts this does not know what a saint is, nor what a man is.\n\n    \u201cThe last act is always tragedy, whatever fine comedy there may have\n    been in the rest of life\u2014We must all die alone.\u201d\n\n    \u201cThere can only be two kinds of men: the righteous, who believe\n    themselves sinners; and sinners, who believe themselves righteous.\n\n    \u201cUnbelievers are the most credulous; they believe the miracles of\n    Vespasian to escape believing the miracles of Moses.\n\n    \u201cAtheists should speak only of things perfectly clear, but it is not\n    perfectly clear that the soul is material.\n\n    \u201cAtheism indicates force of mind, but only up to a certain point.\u201d\n\nSome of the foregoing Thoughts {174} may appear to our readers sufficient\nto warrant the charge of scepticism, already adverted to.  Pascal\ncertainly speaks at times both of human life and human reason in a\ncontemptuous manner.  Even Rochefoucauld could hardly express himself\nmore bitterly than he does now and then when he fixes his clear gaze upon\nthe folly, the vanity, the weaknesses which make up man\u2019s customary life,\nand the deceits which he practises upon himself and his fellows.  All the\nworld seems to him at such times \u201cin a state of delusion.\u201d  If there is\ntruth, it \u201cis not where men suppose it to be.\u201d  The majority are to be\nfollowed, not \u201cbecause they have more reason, but because they have more\nforce.\u201d\n\n    \u201cThe power of kings is founded on the reason and on the folly of the\n    people, but chiefly on their folly.  The greatest and most important\n    thing in the world has weakness for its basis, and the basis is\n    wonderfully secure, for there is nothing more certain than that\n    people will be weak. . . .  Our magistrates well understand this\n    mystery. . . .  Save for their crimson robes, ermine, palaces of\n    justice, fleur-de-lis, they would never have duped the world.  Where\n    would the physician be without his \u2018cassock and mule,\u2019 and the\n    theologian without his \u2018square cap and flowing garments\u2019?  These vain\n    adornments impress the imagination, and secure respect.  We cannot\n    look at an advocate in his gown and wig without a favourable\n    impression of his abilities.  The soldier alone needs no disguise,\n    because he gains his authority by actual force, the others by\n    grimace.\u201d\n\nIn such sentences, as well as in some previously quoted, the cynicism of\nboth Hobbes and Montaigne seems to speak.  Man is really a fool, and\nsociety rests upon force.  The further down we go, we come, not to any\nnatural rights, or essential principles of justice, which reason is\ncapable of judging, but only to a mass of customs built up out of selfish\ninstincts, and controlled by external influence.  Pascal repeats\nMontaigne over and over again, and seems to make many of his cynicisms\nhis own.  This is not to be denied.  \u201cMontaigne is right.  Custom should\nbe followed because it is custom, and because it is found to be\nestablished, without inquiry whether it be reasonable or not.\u201d  Yet he\nputs in a caveat, as we shall see more fully afterwards, just when he\nseems most to have identified himself with the representative of\nscepticism.  In blindly following custom, he reserves \u201cthose matters\nwhich are not contrary to natural or divine right;\u201d and the root of\ncustom, even in the popular mind, he believes to be a dim sense of\njustice.  Again, in a similar vein, he asks, \u201cWhy follow ancient laws and\nancient opinions?  _Are they wiser_?  _No_.  But they stand apart from\npresent interests; and _thus take away the root of difference_.\u201d  Here,\nas so often, the moralist supplants the sceptic, and suggests a higher\nthought, while seeming to approve of a superficial Pyrrhonism.\n\nIt is easy, in one sense, to make out a case of scepticism against\nPascal.  He always writes strongly.  There is passion in all his thought.\nHe had a strong and deep sense of human weakness, and incapacity to\nattain the highest truth.  He spoke of the philosophy of Descartes\nwithout respect.  With most of the Port Royalists, indeed, he seems to\nhave concurred in the Cartesian doctrine of automata, {176} strangely\nrevived in our day by Professor Huxley.  But he repudiated the notion of\n\u201csubtle matter,\u201d and even spoke of it with contempt (_dont il se moquait\nfort_).  \u201cHe could not bear,\u201d his niece tells us, in a passage often\nquoted and emphasised, \u201cthe Cartesian manner of explaining the formation\nof all things.\u201d  \u201cI cannot forgive Descartes,\u201d he said.  \u201cHe would\nwillingly in all his philosophy have done without God, if he could; but\nhe could not get on without letting him give the world a fillip to set it\nagoing: after that, he has nothing more to do with God.\u201d  Whether he had\nstudied Descartes or not, he evidently did not share the enthusiasm of\nArnauld and others for his philosophy.  He even spoke of it as \u201cuseless,\nuncertain, and troublesome\u2014nay, as ridiculous.\u201d {177}  He has added, in\nthat brusque, rapid, forceful style characteristic of many of his\nThoughts, that \u201che did not think the whole of philosophy worth an hour\u2019s\ntrouble.\u201d  Again: \u201cTo set light by philosophy is the true philosophy.\u201d\nWhen we look at such expressions, and many others, it is not to be\nwondered at that Pascal has been accused of scepticism.  As he could not\nforgive Descartes, so Cousin cannot forgive him for his depreciation of\nDescartes.  One who saw nothing in Cartesianism or philosophy in general\nbeyond what these rash sentences, freshly restored in all their audacity,\ndeclare, could be nothing but an \u201cenemy of all philosophy.\u201d\n\nIt is impossible not to feel that there is some ground for this\naccusation, and that, if we were to draw our knowledge of Pascal merely\nfrom such passages, Cousin makes out something of a case against him.\nBut many other passages, hardly less emphatic, must make every candid\nreader pause before he comes to any definite conclusion on the subject,\nif it is necessary to come to such a conclusion at all.  It must never be\nforgotten that we have nowhere the complete mind of Pascal; that it was\nof the very nature of thoughts rapidly dashed upon paper\u2014as the very form\nof many we have quoted clearly indicates they were\u2014to be one-sided and\noften extravagant.  Pascal, of all men, is not to be measured by his\nstrong expressions.  His intellectual nature, while profound, was narrow\nand intense.  He put his whole soul into what moved him for the time; and\na certain excess of passionate intellectual emotion evidently speaks in\nsome of the most striking of the \u2018Pens\u00e9es.\u2019  We may imagine how in\nsome\u2014perhaps in many\u2014cases they would have been toned down had he lived\nto revise and refashion them into a harmonious whole.  That interior\nelaboration,\u2014\u201ca kind of second creation of genius,\u201d as M. Faug\u00e8re\nsays\u2014which no one else may venture upon,\u2014would undoubtedly have come from\nhis own masterly hand, if it had been given him to bring fragment to\nfragment, and to fit them together into a complete fabric.  It would be a\nhard thing to judge any student, and especially a student like Pascal, by\nthe scattered notes of his library table; and precious as these fragments\nare, we must remember that this is their character, and nothing else.\nThe fact that we now have them in all their native _hardiesse_ makes this\ncaution not the less but all the more necessary.\n\nIn passing on to consider more particularly Pascal\u2019s philosophical and\nreligious attitude, we shall see more fully the bearing of these remarks.\nPascal, in point of fact, embraces many points of view; and, if he leans\nsometimes to scepticism, he sees also the strong side of what he calls\ndogmatism or rational philosophy.  The very exaggerations of his\nlanguage, now on this side and now on that, show that he himself is more\nthan either, as his own words bear.  \u201cIt is necessary,\u201d he says, \u201cto have\nthree qualities\u2014those of the Pyrrhonist, of the geometrician (the\ndogmatist), and of the humble Christian.  These unite with and attemper\none another, so that we doubt when we should, we aim at certainty when we\nshould, and we submit when we should.\u201d  He certainly thought that he had\nfound a surer road to truth than either Dogmatism or Pyrrhonism.  Whether\nhe succeeded in doing so will appear as we proceed.\n\nThe famous conversation with De Saci, when he entered Port Royal, must be\ntaken as the chief key to Pascal\u2019s own philosophical attitude.  There is\nnowhere in any of the Thoughts so complete an exhibition of his point of\nview; and all the editors who have most entered into Pascal\u2019s\nspirit\u2014Sainte-Beuve, Faug\u00e8re, and Havet alike\u2014have recognised its\nimportance.  It is really, as Havet says, of the nature of an\nintroduction to the \u2018Pens\u00e9es.\u2019\n\nIn this conversation Pascal signalises what he believes to be the two\ngreat opposing systems of human philosophy at all times; the rational,\ndogmatic, or Stoical, on the one hand\u2014the sceptical, or Epicurean, on the\nother.  He takes Epictetus as the representative of the one; Montaigne as\nthe representative of the other.  In depicting dogmatism at other times,\nhe seems to have Descartes especially in view; but in speaking of\nscepticism and Pyrrhonism (which is his own expression), it is always\nMontaigne that he has before him.  Montaigne is Pyrrhonist _par\nexcellence_; and undoubtedly the famous Essays had greatly fascinated\nPascal, like many others in his generation.  He was constantly drawn to\nthem as embodying one, and that a deep, phase of his own experience.  He\nfelt his own thought expressed in many pages of Montaigne, and had that\nfavour for the Essays that every thoughtful man has for the book that\nmakes his own experience alive, and brings it clearly before him.  But he\nhas, at the same time, made plainly intelligible his own differences from\nMontaigne, and marked with his usual boldness the limitations of his\nthought.  If Pascal is Pyrrhonist, he is certainly not Pyrrhonist after\nthe manner of Montaigne, deeply as he responds to many of the notes of\nthe Essays, and at times seems to make them his own.\n\nThe conversation with De Saci took place in 1654, when Pascal first went\nto Port Royal des Champs, and De Saci became his spiritual director.  We\nowe its preservation to Fontaine, from whose manuscript \u2018Memoirs\u2019 it was\nextracted, and first published in 1728 by Des Molets.  After all the\nlabour of Faug\u00e8re, Havet believes himself to have given for the first\ntime the correct text of the conversation from the original print of Des\nMolets, based on Fontaine\u2019s manuscripts, rather than from the text of the\n\u2018Memoirs\u2019 as afterwards published.  Fontaine describes in his _na\u00efve_\nmanner the impression made by Pascal upon De Saci, and how the brilliancy\nof power which had charmed all the world could not be hidden within the\nshades of Port Royal.  Ignorant of the Fathers of the Church, he had\nfound by his own mental and spiritual penetration the very truths to be\nmet with in them; and De Saci seemed to see another St Augustine before\nhim in the wonderful talk of the gifted penitent.  It was his practice in\ndealing with his penitents to adapt his conversation to their peculiar\npowers.  If he spoke with M. Champagne, for example, he talked with him\nof painting.  If he saw M. Hamon, he inquired about the art of medicine.\nIf it was the surgeon of the place, he had something to say of surgery.\nAll was designed to lead the thoughts from all human things up to God.\nWith Pascal, therefore, it was philosophy upon which his conversation\nfell, to try the depths of his mind, and see what special direction he\nneeded.  \u201cPascal told him that the two books most familiar to him were\nEpictetus and Montaigne, and he lavished great praise on both.  M. de\nSaci had always wished to read these two authors, and asked M. Pascal to\nexplain them fully.\u201d\n\n    \u201cEpictetus,\u201d said Pascal, \u201cis one of the philosophers of the world\n    who have best known the duties of man.  Above all things, he would\n    have man regard God as his chief object\u2014to be persuaded that He\n    governs all things with righteousness\u2014to submit to Him cordially, and\n    to follow Him willingly, as having made all things with perfect\n    wisdom.  Such a disposition would stay all complaints and murmurs,\n    and prepare the human mind to bear quietly the most troublesome\n    events.  \u2018Never say,\u2019 he observes (Enchirid. 11), \u2018I have lost that;\n    say rather, I have restored it.  My son is dead; I have surrendered\n    him.  My wife is dead; I have given her up.\u2019  And so of every other\n    good. . . .  While its use is permitted, regard it as a good\n    belonging to others, as a traveller does in an inn.  You should not\n    wish,\u2019 he adds, \u2018that things be as you desire, but you should desire\n    them to be as they are.\u2019 . . .  It is your duty to play well the part\n    assigned to you, but to choose the part is the act of Another.  Have\n    always death before your eyes, and the evils which are least\n    supportable, and you would never think meanly of anything, nor desire\n    anything in excess.  He shows in a thousand ways what is the duty of\n    man.  He wishes him to be humble, to conceal his good resolutions,\n    especially in their beginnings, that he may carry them out in secret.\n    Nothing is so ruinous to them as publicity.  He never ceases to\n    repeat that the whole duty and desire of man ought to be to\n    acknowledge the will of God, and to follow it.\n\n    \u201cSuch were the lights of this great mind, who has so well understood\n    the duties of man.  I venture to say, that he would have deserved to\n    be adored if he had only known as well human weakness; but in order\n    to do this, he must have been God Himself.  Mere man as he was, after\n    having so well explained human duty, he loses himself in the\n    presumption of human capacity.  He avers that God has given to every\n    man the means of acquitting himself of all his obligations; that such\n    means are always within his own power, that happiness is to be sought\n    by things within our reach, since God has given us them for this very\n    end.  He points out in what our freedom consists: goods, life, esteem\n    are not in our power, and therefore do not lead to God; but none can\n    force the mind to believe what is false, nor the will to love that\n    which will make it miserable.  These two powers are therefore free;\n    and by these we can render ourselves perfect\u2014know God perfectly, love\n    Him, obey Him, please Him\u2014vanquish all vices, acquire all virtues,\n    and so make ourselves holy, and the fellows of God.  These\n    principles, truly diabolic in their pride, lead to other errors\u2014such\n    as that the soul is a portion of the Divine substance, that grief and\n    death are not evils, that we may kill ourselves when we are in such\n    trouble that we may believe God summons us, etc.\n\n    \u201cAs for Montaigne\u2014of whom you wish me also, my dear sir, to\n    speak\u2014being born in a Christian country, he makes profession of the\n    Catholic religion, and so far there is nothing peculiar about him.\n    But in the search for a system of morals dictated by reason without\n    the light of faith, he has to lay down his principles on this\n    supposition, and to consider man apart from revelation.  He conceives\n    things in such a universal uncertainty that doubt itself is seized\n    with uncertainty, and doubts whether it doubts.  His scepticism\n    returns upon itself in a perpetual circle without repose, opposing\n    equally those who maintain that all is uncertain, and those who\n    maintain that nothing is, so utterly indisposed is he to any fixity.\n    In this doubt which doubts itself, and this ignorance which is\n    ignorant of itself, is to be found the essence of his thought.  He\n    cannot express it by any positive term; for if he was to say that he\n    doubts, he betrays himself by making it certain that he doubts; and\n    this being formally against his intention, he can only explain\n    himself by an interrogation.  Not wishing to say, I do not know, he\n    can only ask, What do I know?  He has made this his device, putting\n    it under a pair of balances, which, weighted in each scale by a\n    contradiction, hangs in perfect equilibrium.  In other words, he is\n    pure Pyrrhonist.  This is the point round which turn all his\n    discourses and all his essays.  This is the only thing which he\n    leaves fixed, although he may not always keep it before him. . . .\n\n    \u201cIt is in this humour, fluctuating and variable as it is, that he\n    combats with an invincible firmness the heretics of his time, who\n    assumed to know the exclusive sense of Scripture.  From the same\n    point of view he thunders vigorously against the horrible impiety of\n    those who dare to be certain that there is no God!  He attacks them\n    especially in the \u2018Apology for Raymond de Sebonde.\u2019  Having\n    voluntarily set aside revelation, and abandoned themselves to their\n    natural light\u2014all faith set aside\u2014he asks them on what authority\n    they, who know not the essential reality of anything, dare to judge\n    of that Sovereign Being who is infinite by His very definition.  He\n    demands upon what principles they rest, and presses them to point\n    them out.  He examines all that they bring forward, and so searches\n    them by his wonderful penetration as to show the hollowness of what\n    passes for the most clear and established truths.  He inquires if the\n    soul knows anything whatever\u2014if it knows itself; whether it is\n    substance or accident, body or spirit; what is each of these things,\n    and if there is anything belonging to some order different from\n    either; if the soul knows its own body; if it knows what matter is,\n    or can distinguish the innumerable varieties of body produced from\n    matter; how it can reason if it is material, and how it can be united\n    to a special body, and feel its passions if it be spiritual.  When\n    did it begin to be, with the body or before, and if it ends with it\n    or not? . . . .  The ideas of God and truth are inseparable, and if\n    the one is or is not, if the one is certain or uncertain, the other\n    is necessarily the same.  Who knows if the common sense (_le sens\n    commun_) which we take as a judge of the truth is really this,\n    designed for such a purpose?  Who knows what truth is, and how can we\n    be sure of having it without knowing it?  Who knows even what Being\n    is, since it is impossible to define it; and in trying to do so, it\n    is necessary to presuppose the very idea itself, and say _it is_? . .\n    .\n\n    \u201cI confess, sir, I might look with joy upon the manner in which the\n    author invincibly crumples up proud reason with its own arms.  I\n    could love with my whole heart the minister of so mighty a vengeance\n    if, as a faithful disciple of the Church, he had followed its moral\n    guidance.  But he acts, on the contrary, like a pagan, concluding\n    that we ought to abandon care for others and dwell in peace, gliding\n    lightly over such subjects lest we lose ourselves in them, and taking\n    that to be true and good which at first appears to be so.  This is\n    why he follows everywhere the evidence of the senses and the notions\n    of the community. . . .  In this manner, he says, there is nothing\n    extravagant in his conduct.  He does as others do.  Whatever they do\n    in the foolish thought that they are following the true good, he does\n    from another principle, that as the probabilities (_vraisemblances_)\n    are equally on one side and the other, so example and convenience\n    carry the day with him.  He mounts his horse like any one else\u2014not as\n    a philosopher\u2014because the horse allows him to do so, but without\n    thinking there is any right in the matter, and not knowing whether\n    the horse, on the contrary, may not be entitled to make use of him.\n    He puts constraint to himself in order to shun certain vices; and\n    even guards marriage faithfully, merely on account of the disorder\n    which would otherwise follow. . . .\n\n    \u201cI cannot dissemble that in reading Montaigne, and comparing him with\n    Epictetus, I find in them the two greatest defenders of the most\n    celebrated sects of the world, who profess to follow reason rather\n    than revelation.  We must follow one or other.  Either there is a God\n    and a Sovereign Good, or this is uncertain, and all is\n    uncertain,\u2014whether there is any true good or not. . . .\n\n    \u201cThe error in both is, in not seeing that the present state of man\n    differs from that in which he was created.  The one, observing only\n    the traces of his primitive grandeur, and ignoring his corruption,\n    has treated human nature as if it were whole, without any need of a\n    Redeemer\u2014this leads to the height of pride; the other, sensible of\n    man\u2019s present misery, and ignorant of his original dignity, treats\n    human nature as necessarily weak and irreparable, and thus, in\n    despair of attaining any true good, plunges it into a depth of\n    baseness.\u201d {185}\n\nThese two states, Pascal goes on to argue, must be taken together before\nthe truth can be reached.  Apart, they give a false picture of man; and\ngenerate on the one hand pride, on the other hand immorality.  It is only\nthe Gospel which unites them, in a right manner, \u201cby a divine art.\u201d  It\nbrings together the opposites, and explains, by a wondrous, truly\nheavenly way, how they may coexist, not as attributes of the same\nsubject, as systems of human philosophy have made them, but as different\nendowments\u2014the one of nature, the other of grace.  \u201cBehold the new and\nsurprising union which God alone could teach and alone accomplish, and\nwhich is only an image and an effect of the ineffable union of two\nnatures in the one person of the God-man.\u201d\n\nIn these latter sentences\u2014which we have been obliged, for the sake of\nbrevity, to compress\u2014we have the suggestion of Pascal\u2019s philosophy both\nof human nature and of Divine revelation.  He recurs over and over again\nto the same idea, that man is great and yet weak, full of capacity and\nyet miserable, and that the Gospel alone holds the key to this enigma of\nhuman nature.  This, more than any other, is the pervading thought round\nwhich all the others gather.\n\n    \u201cThis twofoldness (_duplicit\u00e9_),\u201d he says, \u201cis so visible, that some\n    have conceived that man must have two souls\u2014a simple subject\n    appearing to them incapable of such and so sudden variations; an\n    immeasurable presumption on the one hand, a horrible abasement on the\n    other.  In spite of all the miseries which cleave to us, and hold us,\n    as it were, by the throat (_nous tiennent \u00e0 la gorge_), there is\n    within us an irrepressible instinct which exalts us.  The greatness\n    of man is so visible that it may be deduced from his very misery.\n    His very miseries prove his greatness.  They are the miseries of a\n    great lord, of a dethroned sovereign.  The greatness of man consists\n    in his knowledge of his misery.  A tree does not know itself to be\n    miserable. . . .  He is miserable\u2014the fact is beyond question; but he\n    is great in knowing it.\u201d {186}\n\nAgain, reverting to the very same line of thought, as in the conversation\nwith De Saci\u2014\n\n    \u201cPhilosophers have propounded sentiments not at all adapted to the\n    twofold condition of man.  They have sought to inspire emotions of\n    pure greatness; but this is not man\u2019s condition.  They have sought on\n    the other hand to inspire sentiments of mere baseness; but neither is\n    this man\u2019s condition.  Man needs abasement, not of nature, however,\n    but of penitence; not that he remain degraded, but that he may rise\n    to greatness.  He needs to feel within him the emotion of\n    greatness,\u2014not of merit, however, but of grace. . . .  Two sects have\n    sprung out of this conflict between reason and sense in man.  The\n    one, in renouncing passion, has aspired to divinity; the other, in\n    renouncing reason, has sunk to mere brutality. . . .  The principles\n    of the respective philosophies are so far true\u2014Pyrrhonism, Stoicism,\n    Atheism even.  But the conclusions are false, because the opposite\n    principles are equally true. . . .  We labour under an incapacity of\n    demonstrating all things invincible to Dogmatism.  We have an innate\n    idea of truth invincible to all Pyrrhonism. . . .  Nature confounds\n    the Pyrrhonist, and reason the Dogmatist;\u201d\u2014\n\nor, as the passage was originally written,\u2014\n\n    \u201cWe cannot be Pyrrhonists without violating nature; we cannot be\n    Dogmatists without renouncing nature.\u201d {187}\n\nThese and other passages sufficiently show Pascal\u2019s relation to\nphilosophy, and to Pyrrhonism in particular.  He is no enemy of\nphilosophy, but he certainly does not believe it capable of explaining\nthe riddle of human nature.  He is so far from being a Pyrrhonist in the\nsense of resting on Pyrrhonism, that he seeks to mount on its shoulders\nto a higher truth.  Nay, he clearly recognises that man has an inborn\nfaculty for truth which not all the contradictions of his experience can\nbelie.  We may and must doubt as to many things; but there are principles\nlying at the root of human life which are invincible to all doubt.  We\ncan demonstrate many things; but there are natural realities beyond our\npower of demonstration.  On the side of sense, all things seem to\nfluctuate and waver in uncertainty; on the side of mere intellect we soon\ncross the limit of our powers.  But Humanity is more than either sense or\nintellect.  There is, as he believes, a primitive endowment of spiritual\ninstinct in man, which looks forth upon a higher world of reality.\nRepeatedly, and in various applications, he recurs to these three radical\nsides or elements of Humanity; \u201cthe sensible\u2014the intellectual, or the\nexercise of reason left to itself\u2014and the spiritual or divine.\u201d  Pascal\ndespairs of a philosophy which is either a mere generalisation of\nsensible experience, or which aims at demonstrating everything from a\npurely rational point of view; but he is so far from resting in mere\nintellectual doubt, that he tries to find a ground for human certitude in\na deeper stratum of Humanity than either sense or what he calls \u201creason.\u201d\nNeander and others have vindicated for him a supreme position as a\nphilosopher on this very account.  With them he is not only no sceptic,\nbut he stands forth among the men who have specially vindicated the\nclaims of Humanity as endowed with the divine attributes of \u201cspirit\u201d and\n\u201cwill\u201d\u2014the men of \u201cfull mental healthiness\u201d who have recognised in man a\nfree spiritual life no less than a life of sense and intellect.  This may\nor may not be.  But the mere fact that Pascal has aimed at a deeper\nground of certitude, whether he has made it clear or not, and whether or\nnot he has spoken with undue depreciation of other sources of knowledge,\nshould be enough to vindicate him from the charge of even philosophical\nscepticism.  In the following passage he has explained his views more\nfully.  More than any other, perhaps, it may be taken as the text of his\nphilosophy.\n\n    \u201cWe discover truth,\u201d he says, \u201cnot only by reasoning, but by feeling\n    (_le c\u0153ur_); and it is in this latter manner that we discover first\n    principles\u2014and in vain does reasoning, which has no share in their\n    production, try to combat these principles.  The Pyrrhonists, who\n    attempt this, labour in vain.  We know that we are not deceived,\n    however incapable we may be of proving so by any power of reasoning.\n    This incapacity only demonstrates the weakness of our reasoning\n    faculty, and not the incertitude of all our knowledge, as they\n    pretend.  Nay, our knowledge of first principles, such as the ideas\n    of _space_, _time_, _motion_, _number_, is as certain as any obtained\n    by reasoning.  It is, in fact, upon such conclusions of feeling and\n    instinct that Reason must ultimately rest and base all its arguments.\n    We _feel_ that there are three dimensions in space, and that numbers\n    are infinite; and reason hence demonstrates that there are no two\n    square numbers the one of which is double the other.  Principles are\n    felt, propositions deduced, and both with certitude, although in\n    different ways.  And it is as absurd for the \u2018reason\u2019 to demand of\n    the \u2018heart\u2019 proofs of its first principles before asserting them, as\n    it would be for the \u2018heart\u2019 to demand of the \u2018reason\u2019 a _feeling_ of\n    all propositions that she demonstrates before accepting them.  This\n    weakness, therefore, should only serve to humble reason in its desire\n    to make itself judge of everything, but by no means to moderate the\n    certitude of our conviction, as if reason were alone capable of\n    instructing us.\u201d {189}\n\nThere may be something to object to in Pascal\u2019s mode of expression in the\nabove passage.  Cousin has made the most of his confusion of \u201creason\u201d and\n\u201creasoning\u201d\u2014\u201cla raison\u201d and \u201cle raisonnement.\u201d  The expression \u201cle c\u0153ur,\u201d\nby which he designates the higher faculty of intuition, may be inadequate\nand misleading\u2014complex and disturbing in its association.  But withal,\nhis attitude in favour of a ground of certainty in human knowledge is\nunmistakable.  So far he is not only not with Montaigne, but he is\nclearly against him.  The rights of nature, as he says, rise up against\nthe Pyrrhonist.  They make themselves good.  And however strongly Pascal\nmay draw the picture of human weakness, and all the contrarieties which\nour nature encloses, he does not mean by this to strike at the roots of\nall knowledge, and leave man a prey to helpless doubt.  He means merely\nto shake the throne of rational security, and to show that no conclusions\nof mere philosophy can reach all the exigencies of man\u2019s condition.  His\nanalysis of human nature is the analysis of a moralist, and not of a\npsychologist or rational philosopher.  He looks at man always as a\nspiritual being.  It is his spiritual capacity which alone makes him\ngreat, and yet intensifies all the lower contradictions of his nature.\nIt is \u201cthought alone which makes man\u2019s greatness.\u201d  A man can be\nconceived \u201cwithout hands or feet or head, but not without thought.\u201d\n\n    \u201cThe possession of the earth would not add to my greatness.  As to\n    space, the universe encloses and absorbs me as a mere point, but by\n    thought I embrace it. . . .  Man is but a reed, the feeblest of\n    created things\u2014but one possessing thought (_un roseau pensant_).  It\n    needs not that the universe should arm itself to crush him.  A\n    breath, a drop of water, suffices for his destruction.  But were the\n    whole universe to rise against him, man is yet greater than the\n    universe, since man _knows_ that he dies.  He knows the universe\n    prevails against him.  The universe knows nothing of its power.\u201d\n    {190}\n\nIt is hardly possible to speak more eloquently of the dignity of human\nnature.  And if it is the same voice which speaks in such pathetic or it\nmay be harsh tones of human weakness and misery, and the disproportions\nof our natural life, it is the very consciousness of greatness that\ninspires the consciousness of misery.  Looking from such a height of\nhuman dignity, he sees all the depths of human baseness.  It is this\nhigher spirit which consecrates Pascal as a moralist.  Has he rebuked the\npresumptions of humanity? has he called upon proud reason to humble\nitself? has he gibed human philosophy, and even gloried for a moment in\nthe contradictions of empiricism?  It is never that he may laugh at man,\nor that he may rest in the mere contemplation of his follies or\nextravagances, but because he himself profoundly realised the height and\nthe depth of his being\u2014the grandeur to which he could rise, or to which\nGod could raise him, and the baseness and miseries to which he could\nsink.  Doubtless, as with all concentrated and meditative natures, Pascal\ndelights to dwell on the weaker and gloomier side of humanity.  This was\npartly the result of his Jansenist leanings, but mainly it came from his\nown intense reality of feeling.  It was bred of his austere sadness of\nheart, and is found to run as a note of profound constitutional\nmelancholy through all his letters, and all his life, as well as his\nThoughts.  In the view of eternity, and of the awful issues involved in\nreligion, the common life and pursuits of man seemed to him not only\nfrivolous, but criminal.  He looked forth, therefore, on this common life\nwith eyes not only of tears, but of displeasure.  He seemed even at times\nto derive something of stern satisfaction from its very follies and\nabsurdities.  But this is only the temporary mood of the profound\nmoralist touched to his heart by pangs that he cannot resist.  His true\nview of life is never cynical,\u2014but always grave, if bitter\u2014and hopeful,\nif stern.\n\nPascal\u2019s supposed philosophical scepticism admits of something of the\nsame explanation.  He has not only no wish to disturb the fundamental\nverities of human thought, but he endeavours to fix them in an\nineradicable instinct or universal \u201csense,\u201d against which all the\nassaults of Pyrrhonism must break.  But the while he is himself deeply\nmoved by the perplexities of human reason.  Although no Pyrrhonist in\nthought, he knows too well in experience the depths of Pyrrhonism.  His\nmind is one of those to be met with in all ages, which, while it clings\nto faith, and is even strong in the assertion of faith\u2019s claims, is yet\nin certain moments utterly distracted by doubt.  Constantly searching the\nfoundations of human knowledge,\u2014sifting them as with lighted glance,\u2014they\nseemed to him at times to crumble away before him.  Nothing remained\nfixed to his piercing look.  As few minds have experienced, he felt the\nawful darkness which encloses all mortal aspiration, and the keenest\naudacities of human speculation.  The incapacities of human reason at\nsuch times overwhelmed him, and left him hopeless, or, still worse, in a\nhalf-derisive mood.  And these moods, as well as his clearer and more\nelaborate thoughts, hastily transferred to paper, are found amongst his\nnotes.  It is quite impossible to vindicate his consistency, and it is\nnot in the least necessary to do this, as already explained; while we\nfeel bound to maintain that his higher mood is his true mood, and that\nthe Pascal of the \u2018Pens\u00e9es\u2019\u2014the veritable Pascal\u2014is to be judged, not by\nhis weakness but by his strength; by his moments of clear mental sanity\nand insight, and not by his moments of despair or of derisive mockery of\nall human philosophy.\n\nThis seems to us the true light in which to regard the famous wager-essay\non the existence of God, which has been a scandal even to some of his\ngreatest admirers.  It is impossible to defend this essay on any\nprinciple of sound philosophy.  Either there is a God or there is not.\nWhich side of the question shall we take?  \u201cReason,\u201d he says, \u201ccannot\ndecide.\u201d  The fact, he means, cannot be demonstrated according to his\ncustomary use of the word reason.  But if it cannot, there must yet be a\nbalance of reason, and proof on one side or the other.  And the only fair\nand manly issue of such a question must be, On which side lies this\nbalance?  A valid theistic conclusion can be found in no other way, and\nleast of all in any calculation of chances, or balance of self-interest.\nAnd yet it is this last which Pascal has put forward with such prominence\nin this famous essay.  \u201cWager,\u201d he says.  \u201cIf you win, you win\neverything; if you lose, you lose nothing.  Wager, then, without\nhesitation, that God exists. . . .  On one side is an eternity of life,\nof infinite blessedness to be gained, and what you stake is finite. . . .\nOur proposition is, that the finite is to be vested in a wager, in which\nthere is an equal chance of gain and loss, and _infinitude to gain_.\u201d\nThe play was hardly worthy of Pascal, and the \u2018mystery of the game\u2019 could\ncertainly never be unravelled in any such way.  But not a few minds like\nPascal\u2019s\u2014with deep spiritual intuitions and yet a craving for scientific\ncertainty constantly mocking these intuitions\u2014have felt in a similar\nmanner the hazard of the great question, and may have said to themselves,\n\u201cWe must take our stand, and this is the side which weighs in the\nbalance.  We can lose nothing; we may gain everything.\u201d  The mood is not\na lofty one, and it is no higher in Pascal than in any one else; but\nthere are moments of terrible doubt, when the soul is so borne away on\nthe surge of the sceptical wave that rises from the depth of all human\nspeculation, that it can only cling to the Divine by an effort of will,\nand with something of the gamester\u2019s thought that this is the winning\nside!  The thought may be shallow and poor in itself, but in such cases\nit comes not out of the shallows but out of the depths of a mind torn by\ndistracting doubts in the face of the dreadful problems of life.\n\nOut of the same depth of spiritual experience and trenchant moral\nanalysis comes all that is true and valuable in his so-called \u2018Apology.\u2019\nThat the \u2018Pens\u00e9es\u2019 were more or less designed to form such an Apology\u2014to\nbe woven into the plan of a treatise in defence of the Christian\nreligion\u2014seems beyond doubt.  He had himself, according to the statement\nof his nephew, unfolded such a plan to his friends, in a lengthened\nconversation about the year 1657 or 1659.  They were charmed with the\nloftiness of his design, and listened to his exposition of it for two or\nthree hours with unabated interest.  He was to commence with an analysis\nof human nature, and to advance from the contemplation of its mysteries,\nobscurities, and perplexities, to the consideration of the various\nmethods, philosophical and religious, by which reason had endeavoured to\nmeet the difficulties of thought and life.  After explaining the\ninconclusiveness and absurdities of these methods\u2014represented by the\ndiverse philosophies and religions of the world\u2014he was to call attention\nto the Jewish religion, and the superiority which it presents to all\nothers, both in the extraordinary circumstances of its history, and in\nthe revelation which it gives of one God, Creator and Governor of the\nworld, and of the origin of man\u2014his primitive innocence and fall.  The\nidea of the fall, which was a central one in all Pascal\u2019s thoughts, was\nto be fully expounded, in its own character and as \u201cthe source not only\nof whatever is most inexplicable in man\u2019s nature, but also of a multitude\nof things, external to him, of which he knows not the causes.\u201d  From the\nfall he was to pass to the hopes of deliverance revealed in the Old\nTestament, and especially the lofty conception which it gives of God as a\nGod of love, a feature peculiar to it, and \u201cwhich he deemed the essence\nof true religion.\u201d\n\nFrom such general considerations\u2014of the nature of prolegomena or\n\u201cpreparation\u201d for the reader\u2019s mind\u2014he proceeded to furnish a brief view\nof \u201cthe positive proofs of the truths he wanted to establish,\u2014proofs\nderived from the authenticity of the books of Moses, especially the\nmiracles they record, the figures and types they embody.\u201d  He then went\non more at length to prove the truth of religion from prophecy, which he\nis represented as having studied deeply, and certain views of which, \u201cof\na nature wholly original,\u201d he explained with great clearness.  Finally,\n\u201cafter going through the books of the Old Testament,\u201d he advanced to\nthose of the New, \u201cand deduced from them his crowning proofs of the\ntruths of the Gospel.\u201d  He began with Christ, whose divine mission he\nalready supposed to be established by the argument from prophecy, and\nadded additional force of evidence from His resurrection, His miracles,\nHis doctrines, and the tenor of His life; then from the character and\nmission of the apostles; and lastly, from the style and manner of the New\nTestament books, and especially of the Gospels, \u201cthe multitude of\nmiracles, martyrs, and the saints,\u201d\u2014in a word, from all \u201cby which the\nChristian religion is so triumphantly established.\u201d\n\nIt is needless to say how imperfectly this design was ever accomplished;\nand no ingenuity of restoration can make of Pascal\u2019s apologetic plan\nanything but a mass of imperfect fragments.  Yet he has left us a\ndefinite series of Thoughts on the Jewish religion, on Miracles, Figures,\nand Prophecy, and also on Jesus Christ and the general character of the\nChristian religion.  In these Thoughts, it must be admitted, there is but\nlittle to reward our study in comparison with those of a more\nintroductory and philosophical nature.  Pascal\u2019s genius was in no degree\nhistorical, and but slightly critical\u2014not to mention that the very idea\nof historical criticism had not emerged in his time, nor long afterwards.\nWhile realising so profoundly the perplexities of human experience, he\nhas no conception of the difficulties that beset historical tradition;\nnor do his habits of scientific investigation, and the natural severity\nand logical rigour of his mind, seem to have suggested to him any\nmisgivings as to the prevalence of miraculous agency in the world.  The\nperfect faith with which he accepted the \u201cmiracle\u201d of the Holy Thorn is a\nsufficient indication of his state of mind in this respect, and how ready\nhe was to accept evidence the very idea of which merely excites a smile\nof wonder in the modern mind.\n\nIt cannot be said, therefore, to be any matter of regret that Pascal did\nnot live to complete the historical portion of his projected work,\u2014what\nhe seems himself, from the report of his friends, to have considered the\nmain structure of the defence he intended to rear on behalf of the\nreligion so dear to him.  He expended his real strength on the portico to\nthe designed temple.  His genius fitted him to deal with this, and with\nthis alone, in any adequate manner.  His moral analysis, at once keen and\nveracious, enabled him not only to lay bare all the \u201cdisproportions\u201d of\nhumanity, but, moreover, to unfold the adaptation of Christianity as a\nspiritual system to meet and remedy these disproportions.  This is the\nreal \u201capologetic\u201d work of the \u2018Pens\u00e9es,\u2019 and the only one for which\nPascal\u2019s mind pre-eminently fitted him.  He sees in the Gospel a Divine\nPower which is capable of ministering to man\u2019s higher wants\u2014a power of\ninfinite compassion towards human weakness and misery, of infinite help\nfor the one and remedy for the other.  The Christian religion, according\nto him, alone \u201cunderstands at once man\u2019s greatness and degradation, and\nthe reason of both the one and the other.\u201d  \u201cIt is equally important for\nman to know his capacity of being like God and his unworthiness of Him.\nTo know of God without knowing his misery, or to know his misery without\nknowing the Redeemer, who alone can deliver him from it, is alike\ndangerous.  The one knowledge constitutes the pride of the philosopher,\nthe other the despair of the atheist.  Man must therefore have the double\nexperience, and so it has pleased God to reveal it.  This the Christian\nreligion does; in this it consists.\u201d  Again: \u201cChrist is the centre in\nwhich alone we find at once God and our misery.  In Him alone we have a\nGod whom we must approach without pride, and before whom we may yet bow\nwithout despair.\u201d  In another and more lengthened passage he brings the\ntwo ideas of human corruption and divine redemption closely together, the\none as supplementary of the other, and expressly emphasises the\nperfection with which Christianity fits so to speak, into all the wards\nof the human enigma,\u2014in comparison with every system of human philosophy.\n\n    \u201cWithout divine knowledge,\u201d he says, \u201cwhat have men been able to do\n    save to exalt themselves in the consciousness of their original\n    greatness, or abase themselves in the view of their present weakness?\n    Unable to see the whole truth, they have never attained to perfect\n    virtue.  One class considering nature as incorrupt, another as\n    irreparable, they have been alternately the victims of pride or\n    sensuality\u2014the two sources of all vice. . . .  If, in one case, they\n    recognised man\u2019s excellence, they ignored his corruption; and so, in\n    escaping indulgence, they lost themselves in pride.  In the other\n    case, in acknowledging his weakness they ignored his dignity, and,\n    while escaping vanity, plunged into despair.  Hence the diverse sects\n    of Stoics and Epicureans, of Dogmatists and Academicians, etc.  The\n    Christian religion alone can reconcile these discrepancies and cure\n    both evils, not by expelling the one by the other, according to the\n    wisdom of this world, but by expelling both the one and the other by\n    the simplicity of the Gospel.  For it teaches the just that while it\n    elevates them even to be partakers of the divine nature, they still\n    carry with them in this lofty state the source of all their\n    corruption, making them during life subjects of error, misery, death,\n    and sin.  At the same time, it proclaims to the most impious that\n    they are capable of becoming partakers of a Redeemer\u2019s grace.  By\n    thus warning those whom it justifies, and consoling those whom it\n    condemns, it tempers with just measure fear and hope, through the\n    twofold capacity in all of grace and sin; so that it abases\n    infinitely more than reason, yet without producing despair, and\n    exalts infinitely more than natural pride, yet without puffing\n    up,\u2014plainly showing that it alone is exempt from all error and wrong,\n    and possesses the power at once of instructing and correcting men.\n    Who, then, can withhold his belief in this revelation, or refuse to\n    adore its celestial light?  For is it not more clear than day that we\n    feel in ourselves the ineffaceable traces of divine excellence?  And\n    it is equally clear that we experience every hour the effects of our\n    fall and ruin.  What, then, comes to us from all this chaos and wild\n    confusion, in a voice of irresistible conviction, but the\n    irrefragable truth of both those sides of humanity?\u201d {199}\n\nThis passage conveys very clearly at once the gist of Pascal\u2019s philosophy\nand the chief merit of his line of Christian apology.  The two cannot be\nseparated.  They run constantly into one another.  He was a Christian\napologist in so far as he was a Christian philosopher; and those who\nreject his line of Christian defence, will also reject his whole mode of\nthought.  To him the only solution of human perplexity in thought and\nlife is Christ.  He is the \u201cobject and centre of all things, in whom\nalone all contradictions are reconciled.\u201d  This is the conclusion of his\nintelligence, and not of his despair.  Whatever may be the traces of\nscepticism in his intellectual nature, it is doing him great injustice to\nrepresent his acceptance of Christianity as a mere refuge from\nuncertainty.  He is a totally different man from Huet, with whom Cousin\nhas ventured to compare him in this respect.  He never dallies on the\nsurface; mere traditionalism has but a slight hold of him.  He is a\nChristian not because he has been taught Christianity, or because the\nChurch as a divine institution claims his allegiance.  All these\ninfluences may have affected him, and given a turn to his mind; but they\ndo not touch the essence of his thoughts.  Anything he does say of the\nexternal claims of Christianity has but little weight.  It is out of the\ndepths of his own spiritual experience that his faith is born.  It is a\nvoice within him, a conflicting cry of weakness and aspiration going up\neverywhere from humanity, that find their answer in Christ.  There is the\nenigma of man on the one side, to him otherwise hopeless, and Christ on\nthe other, holding the keys of the enigma in His hand.  The solution\nappeared to him perfect, according to his study and analysis of the\nproblem\u2014the twofoldness that he found in man, of divine dignity on the\none hand, and frivolous, sensual degradation on the other.  Both facts,\nhe says, are equally clear and certain.  Man\u2019s fall from a state of\ndivine innocence alone explains them; and the Gospel alone recognises the\none side as well as the other of human nature, and provides a Power\ncapable of restoring its true balance and rectifying all its disorder.\nHe felt in himself the might of this power healing all the wounds of his\nown heart, and binding up the shreds of his Christian efforts \u201cto do\njustly, and love mercy, and walk humbly with God.\u201d  Whether we agree with\nall his analyses, or recognise all the adaptations which he describes, it\nis impossible not to feel that they were living to him, and that he saw\nin Christianity not merely a refuge for the disappointed heart, but a\ntrue philosophy of life\u2014the only \u201csure and sound philosophy,\u201d as Justin\nMartyr had found long before him.\n\nIt is in the same spirit that he writes in many of his later \u2018Pens\u00e9es.\u2019\nSome of the passages already quoted are in fact taken from the chapter\n\u201cOn the Christian Religion,\u201d which appears to have been intended to form\none of the concluding chapters of his Apology.  But he repeats over and\nover again the same strain\u2014that the present condition of man is only\nintelligible in the light of the Christian revelation, and that this\nrevelation alone answers to all man\u2019s necessities.  Christ has not only\nproclaimed a higher truth to man, which man is bound to accept under\npenalties of default.  This tone is also found sometimes, but\ncomparatively seldom.  The prevailing note is, that there is an admirable\nfitness between the two\u2014the mysteries of human nature witnessing to the\ndivine veracity of the Gospel, and the Gospel again holding the only key\nto these mysteries, and the only power of unravelling them and restoring\nthem to their divine original.  \u201cJesus Christ,\u201d he says, \u201cis for all men;\nMoses for one people.\u201d  \u201cThe knowledge of God without a knowledge of our\nmisery produces pride; that of our misery without God leads to despair.\nThe knowledge of Jesus is the means by which we at once find God and our\nmisery.\u201d  \u201cWithout Jesus Christ man is sunk in vice and misery. . . .  In\nHim is all our virtue and felicity.\u201d\n\nOf the more directly apologetic \u2018Pens\u00e9es\u2019 of Pascal there are many of\ngreat significance and interest, slight as may be the value of his\ngeneral historical argument, so far as this can be traced.  Wherever he\ntrusts to his own clear judgment and profound penetration, he throws out\nsentences weighty with meaning, and capable of being expanded into trains\nof argument.  Our shortening space warns us that our quotations must come\nto an end; but the reader may thank us for drawing his attention to the\nfollowing:\u2014\n\n    \u201cEven when Epictetus had discovered the right way, he could only say\n    to man, \u2018You follow a wrong one.\u2019  He shows that there is another,\n    but he does not lead to it. . . .  Jesus Christ alone leads to\n    it\u2014_via_, _veritas_.\n\n    \u201cJesus Christ has spoken great things so simply that they seem to\n    have cost Him little thought\u2014and yet so fitly that we see well what\n    His thought was.\u201d  [This combination of clearness and _na\u00efvet\u00e9_ is\n    admirable.]\n\n    \u201cThe apostles were either deceived or deceivers; either supposition\n    is full of difficulty.\n\n    \u201cWhat right have they to say, \u2018It is impossible that we should rise\n    again\u2019?  Which is the more difficult to be\u2014to be born, or to be\n    raised from the dead?  Is it less difficult to come into being than\n    to return to being?  Custom (experience) renders the one easy to us;\n    the want of custom makes the other seem impossible.  But _this is a\n    popular way of judging_.\n\n    \u201cWho taught the evangelists the qualities of a truly heroic soul,\n    that they should paint it to such perfection in Jesus Christ?  Why\n    have they made Him weak in His agony?  Did they not know how to\n    describe a death of fortitude?  Assuredly; for it is the same St Luke\n    paints St Stephen\u2019s death as so much braver than that of Jesus\n    Christ.  They have made Him capable of fear before the necessity of\n    death had come, then entirely calm and brave.  But when they show Him\n    in trouble, the trouble comes from Himself; in the face of men He\n    remains unmoved.\n\n    \u201cThe highest achievement of reason is to recognise that there is an\n    infinity of things which surpass its powers.\n\n    \u201cIf we submit everything to reason, our religion would have nothing\n    mysterious or supernatural.  If we violate the principles of reason,\n    our religion will be absurd and ridiculous.\n\n    \u201cThere are two extremes\u2014to exclude reason, and to admit only reason.\n\n    \u201cIt is your own consent, and the steady voice of your own reason, and\n    not that of others, which must make you believe.\n\n    \u201cIf antiquity was the rule of faith, the ancients were without a\n    rule.\n\n    \u201cLet them say what they will, it must be confessed that the Christian\n    religion is something astonishing.  \u2018That is because you were born in\n    it,\u2019 they say.  So far from this, I am on my guard against it on this\n    very account, lest this incline me unduly to it.  But though I was\n    born in it, the facts are not the less as I find them.\u201d\n\nTrue to his whole conception of religion as the free choice of the heart\nand will, Pascal does not find any special difficulty in the fact of so\nmany rejecting Christianity.  It is of its very nature that it cannot be\nforced on any mind.  The God of the Gospel can only be reached by faith.\nTo all without faith, or the inner eye to see Him, He is a _Deus\nabsconditus_, \u201ca God who hides himself.\u201d  In one of his letters to\nMademoiselle de Roannez, he dwells upon this idea, which also continually\nrecurs in his Thoughts:\u2014\n\n    \u201cIf God continually revealed Himself to man, faith would have no\n    value; we could not help believing.  If He did not reveal Himself,\n    there could be no such thing as faith.  While hiding Himself, He yet\n    reveals Himself to those who are willing to be His servants. . . .\n    All things hide a mystery.  All are a veil which conceal God.  The\n    Christian must recognise Him in all. . . .  There is light enough for\n    those who wish to see, but darkness enough for those who are of an\n    opposite disposition. . . .  For God would rather move the will than\n    the intellect.  Perfect clearness would cure the one, but injure the\n    other.\u201d\n\nAnd so this great mind comes round once more to its central thought, that\nreligion is born not of science, but of love and faith.  Christianity\nappeared to Pascal divine\u2014as the only true interpreter of human\nexperience; and where this experience bore no witness to it, and found no\nblessing in it, the fault and the misery were its own.  The divine light\nwas not gone because men did not see it, when they were not willing to\nsee it.  This may seem a hard saying,\u2014a paradox of faith rejoicing in its\nown illumination, rather than an utterance of reason challenging the\nworld.  But can a divine appeal ever go further?  Christian apology has\nits own sphere, no less than science; and the evidence which the one\ndesiderates is not the supreme life and power of the other.  It may not\non this account be the less satisfactory or the less rational when the\nwhole life of humanity is looked at.\n\nIf we ask ourselves, in conclusion, what is the chief charm of the\n\u2018Pens\u00e9es,\u2019 we feel inclined to answer,\u2014their touching reality.  They are\nthe utterances of one who thought not only deeply but passionately.  A\nstrange thrill of personal emotion runs through them all, animating them\nwith vitality, even when one-sided or extravagant.  One of his own\ncountrymen {204} has said of Pascal that it was his mission to do for\ntheology what Socrates did for philosophy\u2014to bring it down from heaven to\nearth.  And certainly there is the breathing movement as of a human heart\nthrough his whole writings.  More than anything else, it is this vitality\ncombined with his exquisite literary art which sets him above all his\nfriends and contemporaries\u2014Arnauld, De Saci, Le Maitre, Nicole, or\nFontaine.  Still, when we read the \u2018Provincial Letters\u2019 or the \u2018Pens\u00e9es,\u2019\nwe feel ourselves in communion with a living writer who knew how to light\nup with an immortal touch both the follies of ecclesiasticism and the\nstruggles of a solitary spirit after truth.  The tenderness of a genuine\ninsight mingles with all the sublimity and severe reserve of the thought,\nand so we get close to a true soul, distant as Pascal himself in some\nrespects remains to us.  The play of human feeling which we miss in the\nman moves in his writings, and touches our hearts with an ineffable\nsympathy, even when we remain unconvinced or unenlightened.\n\n                              END OF PASCAL.\n\n\n\n\nNOTES.\n\n\n{3}  Lettres, Opuscules, et M\u00e9moires de Madame P\u00e9rier et de Jacqueline,\nS\u0153urs de Pascal, et de Marguerite P\u00e9rier, sa ni\u00e8ce; publi\u00e9s sur les\nManuscrits originaux, par M. P. Faug\u00e8re.  Paris, 1845.\n\n{4a}  Jacqueline Pascal, par M. Victor Cousin.  Troisi\u00e8me \u00e9d.  1856.\nL\u00e9lut, L\u2019Amulette de Pascal.  Paris, 1846.\n\n{4b}  Sainte-Beuve.  Port Royal.  Tom. ii. iii.  Mr Beard, in his two\nvolumes on Port Royal, gives an excellent sketch of Blaise and Jacqueline\nPascal, in which he has made a diligent use of all the recent French\nauthorities on the subject.\n\n{4c}  British Quarterly Review, August 1850.\n\n{5}  The Provincial Parliaments in France before the Revolution\ndischarged within a definite area the same judicial and administrative\nfunctions as the Parliament of Paris; but they were always regarded as\noffshoots of the latter, and subordinate to its supreme direction.  They\npossessed no lawful political powers.  Lalanne, Dictionnaire Historique,\nArt. \u201cParl.,\u201d p. 1421.  The \u201cCourt of Aides,\u201d according to the same\nauthority, p. 32, decided in the last resort civil and criminal processes\nrelating to subsidies, assessments, and taxes in general, and\nsuperintended the collection of the royal revenues.\n\n{6a}  Gilberte Pascal\u2014Madame P\u00e9rier\u2014says, in her life of her brother,\n1626.  Marguerite P\u00e9rier, her daughter, Pascal\u2019s niece, says 1628.\nCousin (B. Pascal), App. I. 315.  Faug\u00e8re, Lettres, Opuscules, etc., p.\n419.\n\n{6b}  Cousin, Jacqueline Pascal, p. 23.\n\n{7}  Memoir by Marguerite P\u00e9rier, her daughter, quoted by Cousin, ibid.,\np. 24.  \u201cDo not think,\u201d adds Cousin, \u201cthat this portrait is embellished:\nthe austere Marguerite flatters no one; and if she, a Jansenist, says\nthat her mother was beautiful, we may be sure that she was very much so.\u201d\n\n{10}  \u201cThe exterior angle of a triangle is equal to the two interior and\nopposite angles; and the three interior angles are together equal to two\nright angles.\u201d\n\n{11}  Baillet, Vie de Descartes, liv. V. c. v. p. 39.\n\n{12}\n\n    \u201cNe vous \u00e9tonnez pas, incomparable Armand,\n    Si j\u2019ai mal content\u00e9 vos yeux et vos oreilles;\n    Mon esprit agit\u00e9 de frayeurs sans pareilles\n    Interdit \u00e0 mon corps et voix et mouvement.\n    Mais pour me rendre ici capable de vous plaire,\n    Rappelez de l\u2019exil mon mis\u00e9rable p\u00e8re.\u201d\n\n{13}  Cousin, Jacqueline Pascal, pp. 72\u201375.\n\n{15}  The Intendant was a special Royal Commissioner, sent into the\nprovinces to watch over the administration of justice and the finances.\n\n{16}  See Cousin, Jacqueline Pascal, pp. 78\u201380.\n\n{17}  M. L\u00e9lut\u2019s volume (already referred to) deserves special attention\nin its bearing on Pascal\u2019s health, and the character of his sufferings.\nHe lays great stress on Pascal\u2019s highly-strung nervous constitution, in\nconnection both with the precocity of his genius, his physical\nsufferings, his religious susceptibility, and the profound melancholy\nwhich affected his later years.  The study is very interesting in some\nrespects, but is overstrained in its physiological details and imaginary\nanalysis.\n\n{18}  Madame P\u00e9rier, Vie de Pascal.\n\n{20}  A disciple and friend of Fran\u00e7ois de Sales, who had been bishop of\nBellay or Belley, but had at this time demitted his bishopric for the\nAbbey of Aulney-Havet.\n\n{21}  The documents containing these details are found among the Pascal\nMSS. in the National Library at Paris, having been given by Marguerite\nP\u00e9rier to one of the Guerrier family, by whose care so many interesting\nmemorials of Pascal have been preserved.  See Faug\u00e8re, Int. to Ed. of\nPens\u00e9es, xlvi.-ix.\n\n{23a}  Cousin, app. 392.\n\n{23b}  Faug\u00e8re, Lettres, Opuscules, etc., p. 452.  It is difficult to\nmake out the exact chronological sequence of some of the facts mentioned\nby Pascal\u2019s sister and niece.  But a special accession of ill-health,\naccording to both, seems to have followed his conversion at Rouen, and to\nhave been amongst the causes of his removal to Paris in 1647.\n\n{23c}  Pp. 134\u2013137.\n\n{26a}  Jacqueline Pascal, p. 73.\n\n{26b}  \u0152uvres de Blaise Pascal, t. 4.  Paris, 1819.\n\n{28a}  North British Review, August 1844, p. 296.\n\n{28b}  I owe this information to the kindness of my friend, Professor\nTait of Edinburgh.  He further informs me that \u201cof late years the\ncalculating machine of M. Scheutz has been employed in the production of\nmany valuable tables almost hopelessly beyond the power of mere mental\ncalculation;\u201d and that a very simple and ingenious machine, known as the\nArithmom\u00e8tre of M. Thomas, is to be found in the office of almost every\nengineer and actuary.\n\n{29a}  Letter to M. Ribeyre, \u0152uvres, t. iv.\n\n{29b}  The illustrious Italian was then advanced in years.  He died in\nJanuary 1642.\n\n{31}  \u0152uvres, t. iv. pp. 160,161.\n\n{33}  Sir D. Brewster, in an article on Pascal\u2019s Writings and Discoveries\nin North Brit. Rev., Aug. 1844.  Sir David\u2019s account is almost literally\ntranslated from M. P\u00e9rier\u2019s letter to Pascal, of date September 22, 1648,\nand embodied in Pascal\u2019s \u201cR\u00e9cit de la grande Exp\u00e9rience de l\u2019\u00c9quilibre\ndes Liqueurs,\u201d first published in 1648.\n\n{39a}  Cousin, Jacqueline Pascal, p. 94.\n\n{39b}  \u201cEvidently,\u201d says Cousin, \u201cM. Habert de Montmor, the M\u00e6cenas of\nthe _savants_ of the time.\u201d\n\n{41}  Blaise Pascal.  Pr\u00e9face de la nouvelle \u00e9d., P. 46.  \u0152uvres, t. i.\n1849.\n\n{42a}  Jus mihi esset hoc ipsum ab ipso potius quam a te expectare, ideo\nquod ego ipsi, jam biennium effluxit, auctor fuerim ejus experimenti\nfaciendi, eumque certum reddiderim, nec de successu non dubitare,\nquamquam id experimentum nunquam fecerim.  Verum quoniam D. R. amicitia\njunctus est qui mihi ultro adversatus . . . non sine ratione credendum\nest eum sequi passiones amici sui.\u2014Descartes, Epist.  Amstelodami, 1683.\n\n{42b}  Discours sur la Vie et les Ouvrages de Pascal, p. xviii.\n\n{43a}  Any reader curious as to how far Descartes had advanced in this\nmatter may consult Montucla, Histoire des Math\u00e9matiques, vol. vi. p. 205.\nMontucla, no less than Baillet, writes with a clear bias in Descartes\u2019s\nfavour.\n\n{43b}  R\u00e9cit de la grande Exp\u00e9rience de l\u2019\u00c9quilibre des Liqueurs.\n\u0152uvres, t. iv. p. 301\u2014\u201cJe m\u00e9ditai des lors l\u2019exp\u00e9rience dont je fais voir\nici le R\u00e9cit.\u201d\n\n{44}  Intererat mea id rescire, ipse enim petii ab illo, jam exacto\nbiennio, ut id faceret, eumque pulchri successus certum reddidi, quod\nesset omnino conforme meis Principiis, absque quo nunquam de eo\ncogitasset, eo quod contrari\u00e2 tenebatur sententi\u00e2.\u2014Ep. lxix., ibid.\n\n{45a}  Professor Tait, article \u201cVacuum,\u201d Chambers\u2019s Encyclopedia.\n\n{45b}  These further researches are expounded in two treatises, \u2018De\nl\u2019\u00c9quilibre des Liqueurs,\u2019 and \u2018De la Pesanteur de l\u2019Air,\u2019 supposed to\nhave been written in 1653, but not published till 1663, after the\nauthor\u2019s death.\n\n{46a}  North British Review, August 1844.  Sir David in the main\ntranslates from M. Bossut\u2019s \u201cDiscours.\u201d\n\n{46b}  \u0152uvres, t. iv. p. 187.\n\n{50}  Faug\u00e8re, Lettres, etc., p. 80.\n\n{51}  Vie de Pascal.\n\n{54a}  Cousin, Vie de Jacqueline, p. 43.\n\n{54b}  Ibid., p. 101.\n\n{55}  B. Pascal, app. vii. p. 491.\n\n{58}  Vie de Jacqueline.\n\n{59}  Cousin\u2019s Jacqueline, p. 189.\n\n{60}  Cousin\u2019s Jacqueline, p. 161.\n\n{61}  Relation de la S\u0153ur Jacqueline de Sainte-Euph\u00e9mie Pascal \u00e0 Port\nRoyal, 10 Juin 1653\u2014a long narrative, extending to about 50 pages of\nCousin\u2019s volume.  See also Lettres, Opuscules, etc., ed. by Faug\u00e8re, pp.\n177\u2013222.\n\n{63a}  Relation de la S\u0153ur Jacqueline, etc., p. 182.\n\n{63b}  Ibid., p. 187.\n\n{63c}  Ibid., p. 194.\n\n{63d}  M\u00e9moire, Faug\u00e8re, p. 453.\n\n{64}  Jacqueline Pascal, pp. 237, 244.\n\n{65a}  Marguerite P\u00e9rier says that Pascal had always a room at the Duc de\nRoannez\u2019s, and that he stayed there frequently, although he had a house\nof his own in Paris.\n\n{65b}  L\u00e9lut, p. 234.  Women throughout this time took the lead, and were\nnever so active, even in French politics.  \u201cBeautiful, witty, and\ndissolute, they brought into public affairs their frivolous ideas, and\nsacrificed to their vanity their honour and that of their houses.\u201d\u2014La\nVall\u00e9e, Hist. des Fran\u00e7ais, t. iii. p. 195, quoted in Kitchin\u2019s Hist. of\nFrance, vol. iii. p. 114.\n\n{66}  L\u00e9lut, p. 238.\n\n{67a}  Pens\u00e9es, \u00e9d. de M. Faug\u00e8re, t. i p. 197.\n\n{67b}  Ibid., t. ii p. 91.\n\n{67c}  Faug\u00e8re, Introduction.\n\n{67d}  Blaise Pascal, App. No. 7.\n\n{68a}  Blaise Pascal, App. No. 7.\n\n{68b}  Introd. to Ed. of Pens\u00e9es.\n\n{71}  Il prit la r\u00e9solution de suivre le train commun du monde,\nc\u2019est-\u00e0-dire de prendre une charge et se marier.\u2014Faug\u00e8re, p. 453.\n\n{76}  \u201cD\u2019horribles attaches\u201d\u2014an expression already alluded to, which has\ngiven rise to a good deal of speculation.\u2014Jacqueline Pascal, Cousin, p.\n237.\n\n{77}  Cousin, Jacqueline Pascal, pp. 236\u2013241.\n\n{87}  Fontaine, vol. i. p. 354.\n\n{89}  See Beard\u2019s Port Royal, vol. i. pp. 207, 208.\n\n{90}  Recueil d\u2019Utrecht, quoted by Maynard, vol. i. p. 78.\n\n{91}\n\n                           L\u2019an de gr\u00e2ce 1654.\n   Lundi 23 nov\u00e9mbre, jour de St Cl\u00e9ment, pape et martyr, et autres au\n                               martyrologe.\n                Veille de St Chrysogone, martyr et autres.\n   Depuis environ dix heures et demie du soir jusques environ minuit et\n                                  demi.\n                                   Feu.\n               Dieu d\u2019Abraham, Dieu d\u2019Isaac, Dieu de Jacob,\n                    Non des philosophes et de savants.\n          Certitude.  Certitude.  Sentiment.  Joie.  Paix. {92}\n                           Dieu de J\u00e9sus-Christ\n                        Deum meum et Deum vestrum.\n                         Ton Dieu sera mon Dieu\u2014\n                  Oubli du monde et de tout hormis Dieu.\n      Il ne se trouve que par les voies enseign\u00e9es dans l\u2019Evangile.\n                        Grandeur de l\u2019\u00e2me humaine.\n       P\u00e8re juste, le monde ne t\u2019a point connu, mais je t\u2019ai connu.\n                    Joie, joie, joie, pleurs de joie.\n                           Je m\u2019en suis s\u00e9par\u00e9\u2014\n                    Dereliquerunt me fontem aqu\u00e6 viv\u00e6.\n                       Mon Dieu me quitterez-vous?\u2014\n                Que je n\u2019en sois pas s\u00e9par\u00e9 \u00e9ternellement!\n          Cette est la vie \u00e9ternelle qu\u2019ils te connaissent seul\n                vrai Dieu et celui que tu as envoy\u00e9, J.-C.\n                              J\u00e9sus Christ\u2014\n                              J\u00e9sus Christ\u2014\n           Je m\u2019en suis s\u00e9par\u00e9; je l\u2019ai fui, renonc\u00e9, crucifi\u00e9.\n                     Que je n\u2019en sois jamais s\u00e9par\u00e9!\n     Il ne se conserve que par les voies enseign\u00e9es dans l\u2019Evangile.\n                      Renonciation totale et douce,\n                                   etc.\n\n{92}  In the parchment copy, \u201cCertitude, joie, certitude, sentiment, vue,\njoie.\u201d\n\n{94}  The evidence of an anonymous MS. in the collection of P. Guerrier,\ngrandnephew of Pascal, in which the story is told on the authority of two\nfriends of the Pascal family, M. Arnoul de St Victor and M. le Pierre de\nBarillon.  The evidence for the story of the abyss is not even\ncontemporaneous.  It comes from an Abb\u00e9 Boileau, unconnected with the\npoet of that name, who first told it in a volume of letters published in\n1737.\n\n{95}  Leibnitziana, quoted by Sainte-Beuve, t. iii. p. 286.\n\n{97}  Pens\u00e9es, t. ii. p 76, 2d ed., Havet.\n\n{101}  Recueil d\u2019Utrecht, Maynard, vol. i. p. 555.\n\n{102}  The most authentic portrait of Pascal is probably that prefixed by\nM. Faug\u00e8re to his edition of the \u2018Pens\u00e9es.\u2019  The sketch, in red chalk,\nwas found amongst the papers of M. Domat, an eminent advocate, and one of\nPascal\u2019s well-known friends.  It bears below an inscription by Domat\u2019s\nson\u2014\u201cPortrait de M. Pascal fait par mon p\u00e8re\u201d\u2014and is supposed to\nrepresent him in his earlier years, when he studied natural philosophy\nalong with his friend.\n\n{105}  The following genealogy, from a Jesuit source, represents not\nunfairly the origin of Jansenism and Port Royalism as a theological\nsystem: \u201cPaulus genuit Augustinum; Augustinus Calvinum; Calvinus\nJansenium; Jansenius Sancyranum; Sancyranus Arnaldum et fratres ejus.\u201d\nThe sequel will show how earnestly Pascal disclaims Calvinism.\n\n{106}  \u201cAttrition\u201d is a scholastic term for the first acute emotions of\nthe grace of repentance.  \u201cContrition\u201d denotes the grace in a more\nadvanced stage of development.\n\n{107}  The full title is, \u201cCornelii Jansenii Episcopi Iprensis\nAugustinus: seu doctrina S. Augustini de human\u00e6 natur\u00e6 sanitate,\n\u00e6gritudine, medicin\u00e2, adversus Pelagianos et Massilienses.\u201d\n\n{108}  Beard\u2019s Port Royal, vol. i. p. 243.\n\n{116a}  Recueil d\u2019Utrecht, p. 271.  See also Sainte-Beuve, vol. iii. p.\n536.\n\n{116b}  _Curieux_ in the sense, says Sainte-Beuve, of _bel-esprit_,\n_amateur_.\n\n{120}  A name applied to the Jesuits after Louis Molina, a Spanish Jesuit\n(1535\u20131600), whose \u201cScientia Media,\u201d akin to the Arminian doctrine of\nDivine foreknowledge, was very famous in its day.\n\n{132}  Beard\u2019s Port Royal, vol. i. p. 271.  Founded on Recueil d\u2019Utrecht,\np. 278, and Sainte-Beuve, t. ii. p. 555.\n\n{133}  M. Sainte-Beuve connects only the two concluding Letters with the\nfirst two, but the sixteenth Letter also, upon the whole, as a direct\ndefence of Jansen and Port Royal, may be said to connect itself with\nthese rather than with the intervening series assailing the Jesuits.\nThere were eighteen Letters in all published by Pascal, but there is a\nbrief fragment of a nineteenth Letter supposed to be also from his pen,\nand a farther Letter from the pen of M. le Maitre on the Inquisition,\ncommonly printed along with the others.\n\n{138}  After the Edict of Nantes (1598), the Protestants were permitted\nto assemble for worship at Charenton, a small town about four miles from\nParis.\n\n{144a}  Letter V.\n\n{144b}  \u201cThe grand project of our Society,\u201d Pascal makes his Jesuit\ninformant say (Letter VI.), \u201cis for the good of religion, never to\nrepulse any one, let him be what he may, and so avoid driving people to\ndespair.\u201d\n\n{147}  Letter IV.\n\n{148}  Letter IV.\n\n{150a}  Letter X.\n\n{150b}  \u201cWho is Escobar?\u201d Pascal represents himself as inquiring in the\nfifth Letter.  \u201cNot know Escobar?\u201d cries the monk; \u201cthe member of the\nSociety who compiled a Moral Theology from twenty-four of our fathers.\u201d\nThis book, which Pascal says he \u201cread twice through,\u201d was the great\nrepository from which he gathered the details of Jesuit doctrine which he\nexposes with such minuteness.  Escobar, like so many of the chief Jesuit\nwriters, was a Spaniard, born at Valladolid in 1589.  His name became a\nsort of proverb in connection with their casuistical system, and\n\u201cescobarder\u201d came to signify \u201cto palter in a double sense.\u201d\n\n{151a}  Letter XI.\n\n{151b}  Ibid.\n\n{152}  Letter XV.\n\n{153}  This is Sainte-Beuve\u2019s statement (t. iii. p. 138), repeated by Mr\nBeard, and founded apparently on Nicole.\n\n{156}  Nicole\u2019s translation into Latin of the \u2018Provincial Letters,\u2019 in\npreparation for which he is said to have read repeatedly over all the\nplays of Terence, appeared at Cologne in 1658, about a year after their\ncompletion.\n\n{164}  These lectures will be found, translated by the writer of the\npresent volume, in Kitto\u2019s Journal of Sacred Literature, April-October,\n1849.\n\n{165}  In his M\u00e9moires de Litt\u00e9rature et d\u2019Histoire.\n\n{166}  Faug\u00e8re, i. pp. 123\u2013129.\n\n{168}  Faug\u00e8re, i. pp. 149\u2013152.\n\n{171}  See p. 66.\n\n{174}  Chiefly from Pens\u00e9es Diverses.\u2014Faug\u00e8re\u2019s ed., vol. i. pp. 177\u2013242.\n\n{176}  The following passage from Fontaine\u2019s Memoirs, quoted by Cousin\n(B. Pascal, p. 132), gives an interesting and lively glimpse of the\nphilosophical discourses at Port Royal.  It may not be without some\napplication to the modern no less than the original Cartesian doctrine.\n\u201cHow many little agitations raised themselves in this desert touching the\nhuman science of philosophy and the new opinions of M. Descartes!  As M.\nArnauld in his hours of relaxation conversed on these subjects with his\nmore intimate friends, the excitement spread on every side, and the\nsolitude, in the hours of social intercourse, resounded with these\ndiscussions.  There was hardly a solitary who did not talk of \u2018automata.\u2019\nTo beat a dog was no longer a matter of any moment.  The stick was laid\non with the utmost indifference, and a great fool was made of those who\npitied the animals, _as if they had any feeling_.  They said they were\nonly clockwork, and that the cries they uttered when they were beaten\nwere no more than the noise of some little spring that had been moved,\nand that all this involved no sensation.  They nailed the poor animals\nupon boards by the fore-paws, in order to dissect them while still alive,\nand to see the circulation of the blood, which was a great subject of\ndiscussion.  The chateau of the Duc de Luynes was the source of all these\ncurious inquiries, and a source that was inexhaustible.  There they\ntalked incessantly, and with admiration, of the new system of the world\naccording to M. Descartes.\u201d\n\n{177}  Fragment sur la Philosophie de Descartes.\n\n{185}  Havet, i. pp. cxxiv-cxxxiii\n\n{186}  Faug\u00e8re, ii. pp. 81, 82.\n\n{187}  Faug\u00e8re, ii. pp. 91, 92, 99, 104.\n\n{189}  Faug\u00e8re, p. 108.\n\n{190}  Faug\u00e8re, p. 84.\n\n{199}  Faug\u00e8re, ii. pp. 136, 137.\n\n{204}  The lamented Pr\u00e9vost Paradol, \u00c9tudes sur les Moralistes Fran\u00e7ais.","title":"Pascal","tradition":"scripture-revelation","translated_text":null,"word_count":62481}