Quotes from Blaise Pascal

We are fools to depend upon the society of our fellow-men. Wretched as we are, powerless as we are, they will not aid us; we shall die alone.

There is a God-shaped vacuum in every heart.

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

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

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

All our life passes in this way: we seek rest by struggling against certain obstacles, and once they are overcome, rest proves intolerable because of the boredom it produces.

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

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

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

Justice without force is powerless; force without justice is tyrannical.

The majority is the best way, because it is visible, and has strength to make itself obeyed. Yet it is the opinion of the least able.

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

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

Law, without force, is impotent.

The struggle alone pleases us not the victory.

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

The weather and my mood have little connection. I have my foggy and my fine days within me; my prosperity or misfortune has little to do with the matter.

People are usually more convinced by reasons they discovered themselves than by those found by others.