Blaise Pascal quote: "We conceal it from ourselves in vain-- we must always love something. In those matters seemingly removed from love, the feeling is secretly to be found, and man cannot possibly live for a moment without it."

When we are in love we seem to ourselves quite different from what we were before.
BLAISE PASCAL

We sail within a vast sphere, ever drifting in uncertainty, driven from end to end.
BLAISE PASCAL

The sensitivity of men to small matters, and their indifference to great ones, indicates a strange i...
BLAISE PASCAL

Love has reasons which reason cannot understand.
BLAISE PASCAL

He no longer loves the person whom he loved ten years ago. I quite believe it. She is no longer the ...
BLAISE PASCAL

I do not admire a virtue like valour when it is pushed to excess, if I do not see at the same time t...
BLAISE PASCAL

The present letter is a very long one, simply because I had no leisure to make it shorter.
BLAISE PASCAL

On vanity: The nose of Cleopatra: if it had been shorter, the face of the earth would have changed.
BLAISE PASCAL

The last act is bloody, however fine the rest of the play. They throw earth over your head and it is...
BLAISE PASCAL

Justice is what is established; and thus all our established laws will necessarily be regarded as ju...
BLAISE PASCAL

Man is but a reed, the most feeble thing in nature, but he is a thinking reed.
BLAISE PASCAL

The immortality of the soul is a matter which is of so great consequence to us and which touches us ...
BLAISE PASCAL

People are generally better persuaded by the reasons which they have themselves discovered than by t...
BLAISE PASCAL

Do you wish people to think well of you? Don't speak well of yourself.
BLAISE PASCAL

Noble deeds that are concealed are most esteemed.
BLAISE PASCAL

I have made this letter longer than usual, only because I have not had the time to make it shorter.
BLAISE PASCAL

Truth is so obscure in these times, and falsehood so established, that, unless we love the truth, we...
BLAISE PASCAL

Man's greatness lies in his power of thought.
BLAISE PASCAL

If you gain, you gain all. If you lose, you lose nothing. Wager then, without hesitation, that He ex...
BLAISE PASCAL

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

It is not good to have too much liberty. It is not good to have all one wants.
BLAISE PASCAL

All man's miseries derive from not being able to sit quietly in a room alone.
BLAISE PASCAL

The property of power is to protect.
BLAISE PASCAL

Nature is an infinite sphere whose center is everywhere and whose circumference is nowhere.
BLAISE PASCAL

Vanity is so secure in the heart of man that everyone wants to be admired: even I who write this, ...
BLAISE PASCAL

Those are weaklings who know the truth and uphold it as long as it suits their purpose, and then aba...
BLAISE PASCAL

If we examine our thoughts, we shall find them always occupied with the past and the future.
BLAISE PASCAL

Man is obviously made for thinking. Therein lies all his dignity and his merit; and his whole duty i...
BLAISE PASCAL

Man is only a reed, the weakest in nature; but he is a thinking reed. There is no need for the whole...
BLAISE PASCAL

Men despise religion. They hate it and are afraid it may be true.
BLAISE PASCAL

Human beings must be known to be loved; but Divine beings must be loved to be known.
BLAISE PASCAL

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

Between us and heaven or hell there is only life, which is the frailest thing in the world.
BLAISE PASCAL

I have made this letter a rather long one, only because I didn't have the leisure to make it shorter...
BLAISE PASCAL

If I had more time I would write a shorter letter.
BLAISE PASCAL

The last thing we decide in writing a book is what to put first.
BLAISE PASCAL

The last thing one discovers in composing a work is what to put first.
BLAISE PASCAL

It is not good to be too free. It is not good to have everything one wants.
BLAISE PASCAL

How I hate these follies of not believing in the Eucharist, &c.! If the Gospel be true, if Jesus...
BLAISE PASCAL

Il n'est pas certain que tout soit incertain.
(Translation: It is not certain that everything i...
BLAISE PASCAL

If we let ourselves believe that man began with divine grace, that he forfeited this by sin, and tha...
BLAISE PASCAL

The charm of fame is so great that we like every object to which it is attached, even death.
BLAISE PASCAL

The pagans do not know God, and love only the earth. The Jews know the true God, and love only the ...
BLAISE PASCAL

Words differently arranged have a different meaning, and meanings differently arranged have a differ...
BLAISE PASCAL

I would prefer an intelligent hell to a stupid paradise.
BLAISE PASCAL

People almost invariably arrive at their beliefs not on the basis of proof but on the basis of what ...
BLAISE PASCAL

The heart has its reasons which reason knows not.
BLAISE PASCAL

Nothing is so intolerable to man as being fully at rest, without a passion, without business, withou...
BLAISE PASCAL

However vast a man's spiritual resources, he is capable of but one great passion.
BLAISE PASCAL

We must learn our limits. We are all something but none of us are everything.
BLAISE PASCAL

To find recreation in amusement is not happiness.
BLAISE PASCAL

To have no time for philosophy is to be a true philosopher.
BLAISE PASCAL

The origins of disputes between philosophers is, that one class of them have undertaken to raise man...
BLAISE PASCAL

People are usually more convinced by reasons they discovered themselves than by those found out by o...
BLAISE PASCAL

We like security: we like the pope to be infallible in matters of faith, and grave doctors to be so ...
BLAISE PASCAL

There are only three types of people; those who have found God and serve him; those who have not fou...
BLAISE PASCAL

The more intelligent one is, the more men of originality one finds. Ordinary people find no differen...
BLAISE PASCAL

Anyone who considers himself in this way will be seized with terror and, discovering that the mass n...
BLAISE PASCAL

Man is but a reed, the most feeble thing in nature; but he is a thinking reed. The entire universe n...
BLAISE PASCAL

What a chimera then is man. What a novelty! What a monster, what a chaos, what a contradiction, what...
BLAISE PASCAL

We only consult the ear because the heart is wanting.
BLAISE PASCAL

Law, without force, is impotent.
BLAISE PASCAL

Beauty is a harmonious relation between something in our nature and the quality of the object which ...
BLAISE PASCAL

Man finds nothing so intolerable as to be in a state of complete rest, without passions, without occ...
BLAISE PASCAL

On the occasions when I have pondered over men's various activities, the dangers and worries they ar...
BLAISE PASCAL

Men never do evil so fully and cheerfully as when we do it out of conscience.
BLAISE PASCAL

We are only falsehood, duplicity, contradiction; we both conceal and disguise ourselves from ourselv...
BLAISE PASCAL

The war existing between the senses and reason.
BLAISE PASCAL

Jesus is the God whom we can approach without pride and before whom we can humble ourselves without ...
BLAISE PASCAL

The highest order of mind is accused of folly, as well as the lowest. Nothing is thoroughly approved...
BLAISE PASCAL

Imagination disposes of everything; it creates beauty, justice, and happiness, which is everything i...
BLAISE PASCAL

The whole visible world is only an imperceptible atom in the ample bosom of nature. No idea approach...
BLAISE PASCAL

One must know oneself. If this does not serve to discover truth, it at least serves as a rule of lif...
BLAISE PASCAL

Desire and force between them are responsible for all our actions; desire causes our voluntary acts,...
BLAISE PASCAL

We like to be deceived.
BLAISE PASCAL

The charm of fame is so great that we like every object to which it is attached, even death.
BLAISE PASCAL

Even those who write against fame wish for the fame of having written well, and those who read their...
BLAISE PASCAL

Faith is different from proof; the latter is human, the former is a Gift from God.
BLAISE PASCAL

Faith embraces many truths which seem to contradict each other.
BLAISE PASCAL

Faith certainly tells us what the senses do not, but not the contrary of what they see; it is above,...
BLAISE PASCAL

It is the heart which perceives God and not the reason. That is what faith is: God perceived by the ...
BLAISE PASCAL

In faith there is enough light for those who want to believe and enough shadows to blind those who d...
BLAISE PASCAL

Two things control men's nature, instinct and experience.
BLAISE PASCAL

The heart has its reasons of which reason knows nothing: we know this in countless ways.
BLAISE PASCAL

Habit is the second nature which destroys the first.
BLAISE PASCAL

Habit is a second nature that destroys the first. But what is nature? Why is habit not natural? I am...
BLAISE PASCAL

If you would have people speak well of you, then do not speak well of yourself.
BLAISE PASCAL

Evil is easy, and has infinite forms.
BLAISE PASCAL

I have discovered that all human evil comes from this, man's being unable to sit still and quiet in ...
BLAISE PASCAL

Earnestness is enthusiasm tempered by reason.
BLAISE PASCAL

The struggle alone pleases us, not the victory.
BLAISE PASCAL

I maintain that, if everyone knew what others said about him, there would not be four friends in the...
BLAISE PASCAL

If all men knew what each said of the other, there would not be four friends in the world.
BLAISE PASCAL

Ugly deeds are most estimable when hidden.
BLAISE PASCAL

If you gain, you gain all; if you lose, you lose nothing. Wager then without hesitation, that He exi...
BLAISE PASCAL

He who does not know his way to the sea should take a river for his guide.
BLAISE PASCAL

It is superstitious to put one's hopes in formalities, but arrogant to refuse to submit to them.
BLAISE PASCAL

Nothing is as approved as mediocrity, the majority has established it and it fixes it fangs on whate...
BLAISE PASCAL

It is right that what is just should be obeyed. It is necessary that what is strongest should be obe...
BLAISE PASCAL

To go beyond the bounds of moderation is to outrage humanity.
BLAISE PASCAL

I have made this letter longer, because I have not had the time to make it shorter.
BLAISE PASCAL

The gospel to me is simply irresistible.
BLAISE PASCAL

Animals do not admire each other. A horse does not admire its companion.
BLAISE PASCAL

Contradiction is not a sign of falsity, nor the lack of contradiction a sign of truth.
BLAISE PASCAL

Nothing gives rest but the sincere search for truth.
BLAISE PASCAL

Our nature consist in motion; complete rest is death.
BLAISE PASCAL

There are only two kinds of men: the righteous who think they are sinners and the sinners who think ...
BLAISE PASCAL

The only shame is to have none
BLAISE PASCAL

It is the fight alone that pleases us, not the victory.
BLAISE PASCAL

The stream is always purer at its source. [Fr., Les choses valent toujours mieux dans leur source....
BLAISE PASCAL

The vanity of the sciences. Physical science will not console me for the ignorance of morality in th...
BLAISE PASCAL

Those who do not hate their own selfishness and regard themselves as more important than the rest of...
BLAISE PASCAL

It is in vain, 0 men, that you seek within yourselves the cure for your miseries. All your insight o...
BLAISE PASCAL

All man's miseries derive from not being able to sit quietly in a room alone.
BLAISE PASCAL

If all men knew what others say of them, there would not be four friends in the world.
BLAISE PASCAL

Men never do evil so fully and so happily as when they do it for conscience's sake.
BLAISE PASCAL

What use is it to us to hear it said of a man that he has thrown off the yoke, that he does not beli...
BLAISE PASCAL

I have made this letter longer than usual, because I lack the time to make it short.
BLAISE PASCAL

If the nose of Cleopatra had been shorter, the whole face of the earth would have been changed.
BLAISE PASCAL

Man's greatness lies in his power of thought.
BLAISE PASCAL

You always admire what you really don't understand.
BLAISE PASCAL

It is false zeal to keep truth while wounding charity
BLAISE PASCAL

Men of quality are not threatened by women of equality
BLAISE PASCAL

Justice and power must be brought together, so that whatever is just may be powerful, and whatever i...
BLAISE PASCAL

Nature is an infinite sphere whose center is everywhere and whose circumference is nowhere
BLAISE PASCAL

The power of a man's virtue should not be measured by his special efforts, but by his ordinary doing
BLAISE PASCAL

The heart has reasons that reason cannot know.
BLAISE PASCAL

Eloquence is a painting of the thoughts.
BLAISE PASCAL

Do you wish people to think well of you? Don't speak well of yourself.
BLAISE PASCAL

The eternal silence of these infinite spaces fills me with dread.
BLAISE PASCAL

Men never do evil so completely and cheerfully as when they do it from religious conviction.
BLAISE PASCAL

Men never do evil so completely and cheerfully as when they do it from a religious conviction.
BLAISE PASCAL

I have discovered that all human evil comes from this, man's being unable to sit still in a room.
BLAISE PASCAL

Our notion of symmetry is derived from the human face. Hence, we demand symmetry horizontally and in...
BLAISE PASCAL

Curiosity is only vanity. We usually only want to know something so that we can talk about it.
BLAISE PASCAL

Vanity of science. Knowledge of physical science will not console me for ignorance of morality in ti...
BLAISE PASCAL

Little things console us because little things afflict us.
BLAISE PASCAL

The least movement is of importance to all nature. The entire ocean is affected by a pebble.
BLAISE PASCAL

You always admire what you really don't understand.
BLAISE PASCAL

Justice and truth are too such subtle points that our tools are too blunt to touch them accurately.
BLAISE PASCAL

The heart has its reasons of which reason knows nothing.
BLAISE PASCAL

Belief is a wise wager. Granted that faith cannot be proved, what harm will come to you if you gambl...
BLAISE PASCAL

Small minds are concerned with the extraordinary, great minds with the ordinary.
BLAISE PASCAL

Time heals griefs and quarrels, for we change and are no longer the same persons. Neither the offend...
BLAISE PASCAL

All men's miseries derive from not being able to sit in a quiet room alone.
BLAISE PASCAL

In faith there is enough light for those who want to believe and enough shadows to blind those who d...
BLAISE PASCAL

Nature is an infinite sphere of which the center is everywhere and the circumference nowhere.
BLAISE PASCAL

Can anything be stupider than that a man has the right to kill me because he lives on the other side...
BLAISE PASCAL

Kind words do not cost much. Yet they accomplish much.
BLAISE PASCAL

In each action we must look beyond the action at our past, present, and future state, and at others ...
BLAISE PASCAL

I lay it down as a fact that if all men knew what others say of them, there would not be four friend...
BLAISE PASCAL

Atheism shows strength of mind, but only to a certain degree.
BLAISE PASCAL

We run carelessly to the precipice, after we have put something before us to prevent us seeing it.
BLAISE PASCAL

If man made himself the first object of study, he would see how incapable he is of going further. Ho...
BLAISE PASCAL

Through space the universe encompasses and swallows me up like an atom; through thought I comprehend...
BLAISE PASCAL

When we see a natural style, we are astonished and charmed; for we expected to see an author, and we...
BLAISE PASCAL

Words differently arranged have a different meaning, and meanings differently arranged have differen...
BLAISE PASCAL

Nothing is as approved as mediocrity, the majority has established it and it fixes its fangs on what...
BLAISE PASCAL

Rivers are roads that move and carry us whither we wish to go. [Fr., Les rivieres sont des chemins...
BLAISE PASCAL

He who does not know his way to the sea should take a river for his guide. [Fr., Les rivieres son...
BLAISE PASCAL

Man is but a reed, the most feeble thing in nature, but he is a thinking reed. The entire universe n...
BLAISE PASCAL

I have only made this letter rather long because I have not had time to make it shorter. [Fr., Je...
BLAISE PASCAL

Imagination disposes of everything; it creates beauty, justice, and happiness, which are everything ...
BLAISE PASCAL

If our condition were truly happy, we would not seek diversion from it in order to make ourselves ha...
BLAISE PASCAL

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

To go beyond the bounds of moderation is to outrage humanity.
BLAISE PASCAL

I have made this [letter] longer, because I have not had the time to make it shorter.
BLAISE PASCAL

A jester, a bad character. [Fr., Diseur de bon mots, mauvais caractere.]
BLAISE PASCAL

It is not only old and early impressions that deceive us; the charms of novelty have the same power.
BLAISE PASCAL

We think very little of time present; we anticipate the future, as being too slow, and with a view t...
BLAISE PASCAL

By a peculiar prerogative, not only each individual is making daily advances in the sciences, and ma...
BLAISE PASCAL

For after all what is man in nature? A nothing in relation to infinity, all in relation to nothing, ...
BLAISE PASCAL

Man is to himself the most wonderful object in nature; for he cannot conceive what the body is, stil...
BLAISE PASCAL

We know truth, not only by reason, but also by the heart.
BLAISE PASCAL

We are generally the better persuaded by the reasons we discover ourselves than by those given to us...
BLAISE PASCAL

The heart has its reasons which reason knows nothing of.
BLAISE PASCAL

Since we cannot know all that there is to be known about anything, we ought to know a little about e...
BLAISE PASCAL

People are usually more convinced by reasons they discovered themselves than by those found by other...
BLAISE PASCAL

One must know oneself, if this does not serve to discover truth, it at least serves as a rule of lif...
BLAISE PASCAL

Man is equally incapable of seeing the nothingness from which he emerges and the infinity in which h...
BLAISE PASCAL

Few men speak humbly of humility, chastely of chastity, skeptically of skepticism.
BLAISE PASCAL

Force rules the world, and not opinion; but opinion is that which makes use of force.
BLAISE PASCAL

Curiosity is only vanity. Most frequently we wish not to know, but to talk. We would not take a sea ...
BLAISE PASCAL

Vanity is so secure in the heart of man that everyone wants to be admired : even I who write this, a...
BLAISE PASCAL

The multitude which is not brought to act as a unity, is confusion. That unity which has not its ori...
BLAISE PASCAL

Any unity which doesn't have its origin in the multitudes is tyranny.
BLAISE PASCAL

Clarity of mind means clarity of passion, too; this is why a great and clear mind loves ardently and...
BLAISE PASCAL

What a strange vanity painting is; it attracts admiration by resembling the original, we do not admi...
BLAISE PASCAL

Thus so wretched is man that he would weary even without any cause for weariness... and so frivolous...
BLAISE PASCAL

The present is never our goal: the past and present are our means: the future alone is our goal. Thu...
BLAISE PASCAL

A mere trifle consoles us for a mere trifle distresses us.
BLAISE PASCAL

Noble deeds that are concealed are most esteemed
BLAISE PASCAL

Men never do evil so completely and cheerfully as when they do it from a religious conviction
BLAISE PASCAL

The consciousness of the falsity of present pleasures, and the ignorance of the vanity of absent ple...
BLAISE PASCAL

The weather and my mood have little connection. I have my foggy and my fine days within me; my prosp...
BLAISE PASCAL

Therefore, those to whom God has imparted religion by intuition are very fortunate and justly convin...
BLAISE PASCAL

It is good to be tired and wearied by the futile search after the true good, that we may stretch out...
BLAISE PASCAL

The eternal silence of these infinite spaces frightens me.
BLAISE PASCAL

We are usually convinced more easily by reasons we have found ourselves than by reasons which have o...
BLAISE PASCAL

Not only do we not know God except through Jesus Christ; We do not even know ourselves except throug...
BLAISE PASCAL

We conceal it from ourselves in vain-- we must always love something. In those matters seemingly removed from love, the feeling is secretly to be found, and man cannot possibly live for a moment without it.

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Blaise Pascal

We conceal it from ourselves in vain-- we must always love something. In those matters seemingly removed from love, the feeling is secretly to be found, and man cannot possibly live for a moment without it.

Blaise Pascal

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