# Quote — Blaise Pascal, Pensees

> Our magistrates have known well this mystery. Their red robes, the ermine in which they wrap themselves like furry cats, the courts in which they administer justice, the fleurs-de-lis, and all such august apparel were necessary; if the physicians had not their cassocks and their mules, if the doctors had not their square caps and their robes four times too wide, they would never have duped the world, which cannot resist so original an appearance. If magistrates had true justice, and if physicians had the true art of healing, they would have no occasion for square caps; the majesty of these sciences would of itself be venerable enough. But having only imaginary knowledge, they must employ those silly tools that strike the imagination with which they have to deal; and thereby in fact they inspire respect.

- Author: [Blaise Pascal](https://www.leafyquotes.com/blaise-pascal.md)
- Book: [Pensees](https://www.leafyquotes.com/blaise-pascal/pensees.md)
- Source: [Wikiquote](https://en.wikiquote.org/wiki/Pens%C3%A9es#Section_II:_The_Misery_of_Man_without_God_(60-183)) ([CC BY-SA 4.0](https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0/))
- Quote page: https://www.leafyquotes.com/blaise-pascal/pensees/our-magistrates-have

## More from this book

> Man is only a subject full of error, natural and ineffaceable, without grace. Nothing shows him the truth. Everything deceives him. These two sources of truth, reason and the senses, besides being both wanting in sincerity, deceive each other in turn. The senses mislead the reason with false appearances, and receive from reason in their turn the same trickery which they apply to her; reason has her revenge. The passions of the soul trouble the senses, and make false impressions upon them. They rival each other in falsehood and deception.

[Quote page](https://www.leafyquotes.com/blaise-pascal/pensees/man-is-only.md)

> The eternal silence of these infinite spaces frightens me.

[Quote page](https://www.leafyquotes.com/blaise-pascal/pensees/the-eternal-silence.md)

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

[Quote page](https://www.leafyquotes.com/blaise-pascal/pensees/men-never-do-evil.md)