Blaise Pascal

We do not display greatness by going to one extreme, but in touching both at once, and filling all the intervening space. But perhaps this is only a sudden movement of the soul from one to the other extreme, and in fact it is ever at one point only, as in the case of a firebrand. ...at least this indicates agility, if not expanse of soul.

Justice without might is helpless; might without justice is tyrannical.

Life is a dream a little less inconstant.

The power of flies; they win battles, hinder our soul from acting, eat our body.

According to the doctrine of chance, you ought to put yourself to the trouble of searching for the truth; for if you die without worshiping the True Cause, you are lost.—"But," say you, "if He had wished me to worship Him, He would have left me signs of His will."—He has done so; but you neglect them. Seek them, therefore; it is well worth it.

The strength of a man's virtue must not be measured by his efforts, but by his ordinary life.

All good maxims are in the world. We only need apply them.

The nourishment of the body is little by little. Fullness of nourishment and smallness of substance.

We do not sustain ourselves in virtue by our own strength, but by the balancing of two opposed vices, just as we remain upright amidst two contrary gales. Remove one of the vices, and we fall into the other.

The knowledge of God is very far from the love of Him.

When we would pursue virtues to their extremes on either side, vices present themselves insensibly there, in their insensible journeys towards the infinitely little; and vices present themselves in a crowd towards the infinitely great, so that we lose ourselves in them, and no longer see virtues.

The licentious tell men of orderly lives that they stray from nature's path, while they themselves follow it; as people in a ship think those move who are on the shore. On all sides the language is similar. We must have a fixed point in order to judge. The harbour decides for those who are in a ship; but where shall we find a harbour in morality?