Thoughts

The Pensées are a posthumous work of Blaise Pascal, published in 1670 is eight years after its death. Pascal joins together there notes which it intended for the development of a Apologie for the Christian Religion. The work remained with the state of outline thus posted a fragmentary nature after its death.

In rose two different ways to publish the text after its death. The first consists in organizing the fragments according to an order presumedly wanted by the author, it is the case for example of the Brunschwig edition, which goes until proposing titles of chapter under which it joins together fragments. But one can also carry out a work on the genesis of work. Consequently one realizes that Pascal proceeded by joining together the various fragments in various “bundles”, following an either chronological scheme of work but set of themes. Saddler, by examining for example the origins of papers, thus proposes an edition in which it aims at reconstituting these various bundles such as they were to be at the time of dead of Pascal.

The misery of the Man without God

This field is that which caused the most reactions. Indeed, according to Pascal, the Man without God is impotent, this misery is caused by the size of the Man. Similar to the animals which are not pauper, the Man feels as such because it preserved the one time memory when it was in a situation much higher. There is thus a contradiction between what it is and what he aspires to being. To be extracted from this reality, it tries to rise: “the call to God”, according to Pascal. It will not be, consequently, poor wretch that distant from God.

The love of god is before all the work of a good will, i.e. the fidelity of the Man to the call of a higher being. The belief as a God is an answer to the multiple questions that the Man is posed. The belief as a God makes it possible to fight against the “misleading powers” which distort the judgment of the Man (imagination or clean love).

Entertainment

Pascal redefines the entertainment. He considers it from the point of view of the Christian faith and his convictions Jansenists. He is not to include/understand with the ludic direction of the term: to work is also an entertainment.

The Man seeks to forget his condition by the entertainment. This need for leaving its misfortune explains the scorn of the Man for the rest: when the Man does not do anything, he thinks of his sad fate: “The Men not having been able to cure death, misery, ignorance, they warned themselves, to go happy, not to think there” (thought 133).

Even if all our acts do not enable us to answer our anguishes, and it is not their role, they have the merit to air us the spirit. Activity is a happiness whose Man should not do, this one seeking it continuously.

The man is in a dead end. Agitation generates the need for rest. The rest thus generates the trouble search for agitation. The man finds happiness neither in the rest nor in the entertainment. For Pascal there is of search for happiness only as a God. As to it the Memorial testifies.

Spirit of geometry and spirit of smoothness

The Man is divided between his reason and his judgment (feeling). Thus, the Man differently conceives Justice according to the countries or even the areas because this one calls the feelings to define what is right gold the sensitivity is subjective. (thought 512).

The disproportion of the Man

Pascal addresses himself to the sensitivity of his readers to convince them, it wishes to cause a feeling of giddiness on their premises, while passing from the infinitely small to the infinitely great. He wants to reduce the Man to his condition, showing to him that he is nothing. The objective is to remove the Man from his presumption, he wants to lead it to contemplate his universe and the world which surrounds it, so that he accepts the authority and the divine superiority. (thought 199).

Comment of the passage in connection with both infinite
Comment of the passage in connection with the Man slave of the entertainment

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