Pascals Pensees | Page 4

the world to
himself, nor so greatly distressed by its disorder; nor is he generally
concerned (in modern terms) to "preserve values." He does not consider
that if certain emotional states, certain developments of character, and
what in the highest sense can be called "saintliness" are inherently and
by inspection known to be good, then the satisfactory explanation of

the world must be an explanation which will admit the "reality" of
these values. Nor does he consider such reasoning admissible; he
would, so to speak, trim his values according to his cloth, because to
him such values are of no great value. The unbeliever starts from the
other end, and as likely as not with the question: Is a case of human
parthenogenesis credible? and this he would call going straight to the
heart of the matter. Now Pascal's method is, on the whole, the method
natural and right for the Christian; and the opposite method is that
taken by Voltaire. It is worth while to remember that Voltaire, in his
attempt to refute Pascal, has given once and for all the type of such
refutation; and that later opponents of Pascal's Apology for the
Christian Faith have contributed little beyond psychological
irrelevancies. For Voltaire has presented, better than any one since,
what is the unbelieving point of view; and in the end we must all
choose for ourselves between one point of view and another.
I have said above that Pascal's method is "on the whole" that of the
typical Christian apologist; and this reservation was directed at Pascal's
belief in miracles, which plays a larger part in his construction than it
would in that, at least, of the modern liberal Catholic. It would seem
fantastic to accept Christianity because we first believe the Gospel
miracles to be true, and it would seem impious to accept it primarily
because we believe more recent miracles to be true; we accept the
miracles, or some miracles, to be true because we believe the Gospel of
Jesus Christ: we found our belief in the miracles on the Gospel, not our
belief in the Gospel on the miracles. But it must be remembered that
Pascal had been deeply impressed by a contemporary miracle, known
as the miracle of the Holy Thorn: a thorn reputed to have been
preserved from the Crown of Our Lord was pressed upon an ulcer
which quickly healed. Sainte-Beuve, who as a medical man felt himself
on solid ground, discusses fully the possible explanation of this
apparent miracle. It is true that the miracle happened at Port-Royal, and
that it arrived opportunely to revive the depressed spirits of the
community in its political afflictions; and it is likely that Pascal was the
more inclined to believe a miracle which was performed upon his
beloved sister. In any case, it probably led him to assign a place to
miracles, in his study of faith, which is not quite that which we should

give to them ourselves.
Now the great adversary against whom Pascal set himself, from the
time of his first conversations with M. de Saci at Port-Royal, was
Montaigne. One cannot destroy Pascal, certainly; but of all authors
Montaigne is one of the least destructible. You could as well dissipate a
fog by flinging hand-grenades into it. For Montaigne is a fog, a gas, a
fluid, insidious element. He does not reason, he insinuates, charms, and
influences; or if he reasons, you must be prepared for his having some
other design upon you than to convince you by his argument. It is
hardly too much to say that Montaigne is the most essential author to
know, if we would understand the course of French thought during the
last three hundred years. In every way, the influence of Montaigne was
repugnant to the men of Port-Royal. Pascal studied him with the
intention of demolishing him. Yet, in the Pensées, at the very end of his
life, we find passage after passage, and the slighter they are the more
significant, almost "lifted" out of Montaigne, down to a figure of
speech or a word. The parallels[A] are most often with the long essay
of Montaigne called Apologie de Raymond Sébond--an astonishing
piece of writing upon which Shakespeare also probably drew in Hamlet.
Indeed, by the time a man knew Montaigne well enough to attack him,
he would already be thoroughly infected by him.
[A] Cf. the use of the simile of the couvreur. For comparing parallel
passages, the edition of the Pensées by Henri Massis (A la cité des
livres) is better than the two-volume edition of Jacques Chevalier
(Gabalda). It seems just possible that in the latter edition, and also in
his biographical study (Pascal; by Jacques Chevalier, English
translation, published by Sheed & Ward), M. Chevalier is a little
over-zealous to