# Quote — Blaise Pascal, Pensees

> When I consider the short duration of my life, swallowed up in the eternity before and after, the little space which I fill, and even can see, engulfed in the infinite immensity of spaces of which I am ignorant, and which know me not, I am frightened, and am astonished at being here rather than there; for there is no reason why here rather than there, why now rather than then. Who has put me here? By whose order and direction have this place and time been allotted to me?

- 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_III:_On_the_Necessity_of_the_Wager_(184-241)) ([CC BY-SA 4.0](https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0/))
- Quote page: https://www.leafyquotes.com/blaise-pascal/pensees/when-i-consider

## 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)