Blaise Pascal
The heart has its reasons which reason knows nothing of.
Blaise Pascal (1623 – 1662, France) : augustinianism and jansenism (port-royal). A brilliant mathematician, Pascal shows the limits of reason: it cannot prove its own first principles, which the heart knows. About God, reason can settle nothing; yet we must choose, and Pascal argues it is more reasonable to wager that he exists. On AskPhilosophy: 5 reconstructed arguments, 4 quotes checked word for word against the original texts, and 3 common beliefs examined; every text carries an authenticity badge (written by the author, posthumous, student notes, reported, apocryphal).
Why he matters
He built one of the first calculating machines, laid the foundations of probability theory with Fermat and proved the existence of the vacuum. His "wager" is often seen as one of the first arguments in decision theory.
His times
After an intense religious experience in 1654, he grew close to Port-Royal, the centre of Jansenism. He prepared a defence of Christianity he never finished: the fragments found after his death became the Pensées.
His positions
click a row to see the evidenceHe believes in God, but not in a God of rational proofs: for him it is the heart, not reason, that experiences God.
Two sources of knowledge: reason demonstrates, the heart grasps first principles (space, time, number). Neither a pure rationalist nor an empiricist.
We cannot prove everything (against the dogmatists), yet we have an idea of truth that doubt cannot destroy (against the sceptics).
He distinguishes three "orders": bodies, minds and charity, separated by infinite distances.
Close to Augustine and Port-Royal on grace: the wounded human will needs grace. His Writings on Grace are not yet in our corpus.
Natural laws exist, but our corrupted reason no longer recognises them: hence the variety of customs.
Reason is good but limited: its last step is to recognise what lies beyond it.
The question of the soul's immortality should shape a whole life: indifference to it is absurd.
Wretchedness and greatness: man is the weakest of beings, but he thinks. His nature is wounded, his dignity real.
Clear-eyed about the established order: unable to make justice strong, we made strength just. Yet he advises respecting that order to avoid worse.
Morality flows from charity and grace rather than from a system: the least movement of charity is worth more than all bodies and all minds, and true morality "makes light of morality".