Background Image
...
Jurisdiction Is Not Given For The Sake Of The Judge, But For That Of The Litigant.
-Blaise Pascal
...
Please Wait....
Translating....

Jurisdiction Is Not Given

Blaise Pascal
...
Jurisdiction Is Not Given For The Sake Of The Judge, But For That Of The Litigant.

Understanding the Quote: "jurisdiction is not given for the sake of the judge, but for..."

This quote by Blaise Pascal reflects deeply on the theme of judging. It connects to the universal human journey of purpose, motivation, and reflection. Often categorized under Judging, Sake, Authority, the quote offers insight, emotional clarity, and intellectual inspiration to readers worldwide.

Whether you’re a student exploring new ideas, a leader trying to motivate your team, or someone seeking direction in life — this quote provides value. It resonates because it’s more than words — it’s a bridge between experience and wisdom. It shows how Blaise Pascal interprets life's core challenges and triumphs.

Lessons From the Quote

This quote teaches resilience and focus. It reminds readers that no matter where they stand in life, reflection and self-awareness lead to growth. Each word has meaning, and when studied, it becomes clear how impactful thoughtful language can be.

About Blaise Pascal

Blaise Pascal is celebrated for insightful thoughts on judging and sake. Their legacy lives on through writings that guide, comfort, and inspire. Discover more on their profile page.

Actionable Takeaways

  • Reflect on how this quote applies to your current life path.
  • Share the message with someone who needs inspiration.
  • Write your thoughts on this quote in a journal or blog post.
  • Use it as a daily affirmation or reminder.

Closing Thoughts

Quotes like this endure because they capture universal truths. They comfort us in solitude and empower us in groups. Carry this quote forward — live by its wisdom, share its message, and keep its essence alive.

Views: 7
Topic
Judging
Sake
Authority
More From Blaise Pascal
Our Senses Will Not Admit Anything Extreme. Too Much Noise Confuses Us, Too Much Light Dazzles Us, Too Great Distance Or Nearness Prevents Vision, Too Great Prolixity Or Brevity Weakens An Argument, Too Much Pleasure Gives Pain, Too Much Accordance Annoys.
Pain
Distance
Light
Not To Be Mad Is Another Form Of Madness
Inspirational
Mad
Madness
It's Not Those Who Write The Laws That Have The Greatest Impact On Society. It's Those Who Write The Songs.
Song
Writing
Impact
What Use Is It To Us To Hear It Said Of A Man That He Has Thrown Off The Yoke That He Does Not Believe There Is A God To Watch Over His Actions, That He Reckons Himself The Sole Master Of His Behavior, And That He Does Not Intend To Give An Account Of It To Anyone But Himself?
Christian
Believe
Men
If Our Condition Were Truly Happy, We Would Not Need Diversion From Thinking Of It In Order To Make Ourselves Happy.
Order
Truly Happy
Diversion
The Last Proceeding Of Reason Is To Recognize That There Is An Infinity Of Things Which Are Beyond It. There Is Nothing So Conformable To Reason As This Disavowal Of Reason.
Lasts
Infinity
Reason
All Man's Troubles Come From Not Knowing How To Sit Still In One Room.
Blessing
Men
Knowing
At The Centre Of Every Human Being Is A God-shaped Vacuum Which Can Only Be Filled By Jesus Christ.
Jesus
Vacuums
Christ
Men Never Do Evil So Completely And Cheerfully As When They Do It From Religious Conviction.
Inspirational
Sad
Religious
All Men Are Almost Led To Believe Not Of Proof, But By Attraction. This Way Is Base, Ignoble, And Irrelevant; Every One Therefore Disavows It. Each One Professes To Believe And Even To Love Nothing But What He Knows To Be Worthy Of Belief And Love.
Believe
Men
And Love
We Think Very Little Of Time Present; We Anticipate The Future, As Being Too Slow, And With A View To Hasten It Onward, We Recall The Past To Stay It As Too Swiftly Gone. We Are So Thoughtless, That We Thus Wander Through The Hours Which Are Not Here, Regardless Only Of The Moment That Is Actually Our Own.
Time
Past
Thinking
Dans Une Grande A" Me Tout Est Grand. In A Great Soul Everything Isgreat.
Soul
Great Souls
The Law Required What It Could Not Give. Grace Gives That Which It Requires.
Law
Giving
Grace
Our Soul Is Cast Into A Body, Where It Finds Number, Time, Dimension. Thereupon It Reasons, And Calls This Nature Necessity, And Can Believe Nothing Else.
Time
Believe
Numbers
We Are Fools To Depend Upon The Society Of Our Fellow-men. Wretched As We Are, Powerless As We Are, They Will Not Aid Us; We Shall Die Alone.
Men
Solitude
Fellow Man
Who Knows If This Other Half Of Life Where We Think We're Awake Is Not Another Sleep A Little Different From The First.
Sleep
Thinking
Different
We View Things Not Only From Different Sides, But With Different Eyes; We Have No Wish To Find Them Alike.
Eye
Views
Two Sides
The More Intelligence One Has, The More People One Finds Original. Commonplace People See No Difference Between Men.
Men
Differences
People
Christian Piety Annihilates The Egoism Of The Heart; Worldly Politeness Veils And Represses It.
Christian
Heart
Veils
Curiosity Is Only Vanity. Most Frequently We Wish Not To Know, But To Talk. We Would Not Take A Sea Voyage For The Sole Pleasure Of Seeing Without Hope Of Ever Telling.
Vanity
Sea
Curiosity
Happiness Is Neither Within Us, Nor Without Us. It Is In The Union Of Ourselves With God.
Happiness
Unions
It Is Incomprehensible That God Should Exist, And It Is Incomprehensible That He Should Not Exist.
Should
People Are Generally Better Persuaded By The Reasons Which They Have Themselves Discovered Than By Those Which Have Come In To The Mind Of Others.
Discovery
People
Mind
We Must Learn Our Limits. We Are All Something, But None Of Us Are Everything.
Wisdom
Addiction
Limits
Tout Notre Raisonnement Se Re Duit A' Ce Der Au Sentiment. All Our Reasoning Comes Down To Surrendering To Feeling.
Feelings
Sentiments
Reasoning
All Our Reasoning Boils Down To Yielding To Sentiment.
Sentiments
Reasoning
Is It Courage In A Dying Man To Go, In Weakness And In Agony, To Affront An Almighty And Eternal God?
Death
Men
Agony
All Men Naturally Hate Each Other. We Have Used Concupiscence As Best We Can To Make It Serve The Common Good, But This Is Mere Sham And A False Image Of Charity, For Essentially It Is Just Hate.
Hate
Men
Charity
When I See The Blind And Wretched State Of Men, When I Survey The Whole Universe In Its Deadness, And Man Left To Himself With No Light, As Though Lost In This Corner Of The Universe Without Knowing Who Put Him There, What He Has To Do, Or What Will Become Of Him When He Dies, Incapable Of Knowing Anything, I Am Moved To Terror, Like A Man Transported In His Sleep To Some Terrifying Desert Island, Who Wakes Up Quite Lost, With No Means Of Escape. Then I Marvel That So Wretched A State Does Not Drive People To Despair.
Atheist
Mean
Sleep
The Arithmetical Machine Produces Effects That Approach Nearer To Thought Than All The Actions Of Animals. But It Does Nothing That Would Enable Us To Attribute Will To It, As To The Animals.
Animal
Doe
Machines
Il Y A Deux Sortes D'esprits, L'un Ge Ome Trique, Et L'autre Que L'on Peut Appeler De Finesse. Le Premier A Des Vues Lentes, Dures Et Inflexibles; Mais Le Dernier A Une Souplesse De Pense E. There Are Two Kinds Of Mind, One Mathematical, The Other What One Might Call The Intuitive. The First Takes A Slow, Firm, Inflexible View, But The Latter Has Flexibility Of Thought.
Views
Two
Mind
That We Must Love One God Only Is A Thing So Evident That It Does Not Require Miracles To Prove It.
Miracle
Doe
Prove It
How I Hate This Folly Of Not Believing In The Eucharist, Etc.! If The Gospel Be True, If Jesus Christ Be God, What Difficulty Is There?
Jesus
Hate
Believe
Undoubtedly Equality Of Goods Is Just; But, Being Unable To Cause Might To Obey Justice, Men Has Made It Just To Obey Might. Unable To Strengthen Justice, They Have Justified Might--so That The Just And The Strong Should Unite, And There Should Be Peace, Which Is The Sovereign Good.
Strong
Power
Men
I Feel Engulfed In The Infinite Immensity Of Spaces Whereof I Know Nothing, And Which Know Nothing Of Me, I Am Terrified The Eternal Silence Of These Infinite Spaces Alarms Me.
Math
Space
Silence
Justice Is As Much A Matter Of Fashion As Charm Is.
Fashion
Justice
Matter
When We Would Think Of God, How Many Things We Find Which Turn Us Away From Him, And Tempt Us To Think Otherwise. All This Is Evil, Yet It Is Innate.
God
Thinking
Evil
If Ignorance Were Bliss, He'd Be A Blister
Ignorance
Bliss
Blisters
We Conceal It From Ourselves In Vain - We Must Always Love Something. In Those Matters Seemingly Removed From Love, The Feeling Is Secretly To Be Found, And Man Cannot Possibly Live For A Moment Without It.
Love
Wedding
Men
Great And Small Suffer The Same Mishaps.
Greatness
Suffering
Mishaps
It Is Your Own Assent To Yourself, And The Constant Voice Of Your Own Reason, And Not Of Others, That Should Make You Believe.
Believe
Voice
Belief
If Man Were Happy, He Would Be The More So, The Less He Was Diverted, Like The Saints And God.
Happiness
God
Men
Unless We Love The Truth We Cannot Know It.
Truth And Falsehood
Knows
Falsehood
I Can Readily Conceive Of A Man Without Hands Or Feet; And I Could Conceive Of Him Without A Head, If Experience Had Not Taught Me That By This He Thinks, Thought Then, Is The Essence Of Man, And Without This We Cannot Conceive Of Him.
Men
Thinking
Hands
We Never Do Evil So Effectually As When We Are Led To Do It By A False Principle Of Conscience.
Evil
Principles
Conscience
Either God Exists Or He Doesn't. Either I Believe In God Or I Don't. Of The Four Possibilities, Only One Is To My Disadvantage. To Avoid That Possibility, I Believe In God.
God
Believe
Four
Those Great Efforts Of Intellect, Upon Which The Mind Sometimes Touches, Are Such That It Cannot Maintain Itself There. It Only Leaps To Them, Not As Upon A Throne, Forever, But Merely For An Instant.
Effort
Forever
Intelligence
Our Imagination So Magnifies This Present Existence, By The Power Of Continual Reflection On It, And So Attenuates Eternity, By Not Thinking Of It At All, That We Reduce An Eternity To Nothingness, And Expand A Mere Nothing To An Eternity; And This Habit Is So Inveterately Rooted In Us That All The Force Of Reason Cannot Induce Us To Lay It Aside.
Thinking
Reflection
Imagination
All Men's Miseries Derive From Not Being Able To Sit In A Quiet Room Alone.
Inspirational
Peace
Hipster
How Comes It That A Cripple Does Not Offend Us, But A Fool Does? Because A Cripple Recognizes That We Walk Straight, Whereas A Fool Declares That It Is We Who Are Silly; If It Were Not So, We Should Feel Pity And Not Anger.
Silly
Insanity
Doe
Death Itself Is Less Painful When It Comes Upon Us Unawares Than The Bare Contemplation Of It, Even When Danger Is Far Distant.
Death
Painful
Contemplation
What A Strange Vanity Painting Is; It Attracts Admiration By Resembling The Original, We Do Not Admire.
Pain
Vanity
Strange
Let Man Then Contemplate The Whole Of Nature In Her Full And Grand Majesty... No Idea Approaches It. We May Enlarge Our Conceptions Beyond All Imaginable Space; We Only Produce Atoms In Comparison With The Reality Of Things. It Is An Infinite Sphere, The Center Of Which Is Everywhere, The Circumference Nowhere.
Nature
Reality
Men
To Find Recreation In Amusement Is Not Happiness.
Happiness
Greatest Love
Amusement
Between Us, And Hell Or Heaven, There Is Only Life Between The Two, Which Is The Most Fragile Thing In The World. Variant: Between Us And Heaven Or Hell There Is Only Life, Which Is The Frailest Thing In The World.
Life
Two
Heaven
Atheism Shows Strength Of Mind, But Only To A Certain Degree.
Atheist
Mind
Atheism
Man Is Obviously Made For Thinking. Therein Lies All His Dignity And His Merit; And His Whole Duty Is To Think As He Ought.
Lying
Men
Thinking
Man Is Clearly Made To Think. It Is His Whole Dignity And His Whole Merit; And His Whole Duty Is To Think As He Ought. And The Order Of Thought Is To Begin With Ourselves, And With Our Author And Our End.
Thoughtful
Men
Thinking
When We Are In Love We Seem To Ourselves Quite Different From What We Were Before.
Love
Inspiring
Inspirational Life
Faith Is Different From Proof; The Latter Is Human, The Former Is A Gift From God.
Faith
Different
Proof
We Know Truth, Not Only By The Reason, But Also By The Heart.
Wisdom
Truth
Heart
If You Want Others To Have A Good Opinion Of You, Say Nothing.
Want
Opinion
Ifs
The Finite Is Annihilated In The Presence Of The Infinite, And Becomes A Pure Nothing. So Our Spirit Before God, So Our Justice Before Divine Justice.
Divine Justice
Spirit
Infinite
Men Despise Religion. They Hate It And Are Afraid It May Be True. The Cure For This Is First To Show That Religion Is Not Contrary To Reason, But Worthy Of Reverence And Respect. Next Make It Attractive, Make Good Men Wish It Were True And Then Show That It Is.
Hate
Men
Good Man
We Never Live, But We Hope To Live; And As We Are Always Arranging To Be Happy, It Must Be That We Never Are So.
Life
Hope To Live
Arranging
He That Takes Truth For His Guide, And Duty For His End, May Safely Trust To God's Providence To Lead Him Aright.
Truth
May
Trust In God
Nothing Is So Important To Man As His Own State; Nothing Is So Formidable To Him As Eternity. And Thus It Is Unnatural That Thereshould Be Men Indifferent To The Loss Of Their Existence And To The Perils Of Everlasting Suffering.
Death
Loss
Men
Man's True Nature Being Lost, Everything Becomes His Nature; As, His True Good Being Lost, Everything Becomes His Good.
Men
Lost Friendship
Lost Everything
The Serene, Silent Beauty Of A Holy Life Is The Most Powerful Influence In The World, Next To The Night Of God.
Powerful
Night
World
It Is Not Our Task To Secure The Triumph Of Truth, But Merely To Fight On Its Behalf.
Truth
Responsibility
Fighting
Few Friendships Would Survive If Each One Knew What His Friend Says Of Him Behind His Back.
Friendship
Emotional
Behinds
What A Chimaera Then Is Man, What A Novelty, What A Monster, What Chaos, What A Subject Of Contradiction, What A Prodigy! Judge Of All Things, Yet An Imbecile Earthworm; Depository Of Truth, Yet A Sewer Of Uncertainty And Error; Pride And Refuse Of The Universe. Who Shall Resolve This Tangle?
Truth
Pride
Men
Man Is So Great That His Greatness Appears Even In The Consciousness Of His Misery. A Tree Does Not Know Itself To Be Miserable. It Is True That It Is Misery Indeed To Know One's Self To Be Miserable; But Then It Is Greatness Also. In This Way, All Man's Miseries Go To Prove His Greatness. They Are The Miseries Of A Mighty Potentate, Of A Dethroned Monarch.
Greatness
Men
Self
The War Existing Between The Senses And Reason.
War
Conflict
Reason
When Some Passion Or Effect Is Described In A Natural Style, We Find Within Ourselves The Truth Of What We Hear, Without Knowing It Was There.
Passion
Knowing
Style
There Are Two Excesses: To Exclude Reason, To Admit Nothing But Reason. The Supreme Achievement Of Reason Is To Realise That There Is A Limit To Reason. Reason's Last Step Is The Recognition That There Are An Infinite Number Of Things Which Are Beyond It. It Is Merely Feeble If It Does Not Go As Far As To Realise That.
Two
Numbers
Achievement
Imagination Is The Deceptive Part In Man, The Mistress Of Error And Falsehood.
Truth
Lying
Men
All Is One, All Is Different. How Many Natures Exist In Man? How Many Vocations? And By What Chance Does Each Man Ordinarily Choose What He Has Heard Praised?
Men
Doe
Different
Everything That Is Written Merely To Please The Author Is Worthless.
Writing
Mathematical
Please
I Cannot Judge My Work While I Am Doing It. I Have To Do As Painters Do, Stand Back And View It From A Distance, But Not Too Great A Distance. How Great? Guess.
Work
Distance
Math
All Mankind's Troubles Are Caused By One Single Thing, Which Is Their Inability To Sit Quietly.
Life
Inability
Trouble
True Eloquence Scorns Eloquence.
Eloquence
Scorn
[unbelievers] Think They Have Made Great Efforts To Get At The Truth When They Have Spent A Few Hours In Reading Some Book Out Of Holy Scripture, And Have Questioned Some Cleric About The Truths Of The Faith. After That, They Boast That They Have Searched In Books And Among Men In Vain.
Reading
Book
Men
The Method Of Not Erring Is Sought By All The World. The Logicians Profess To Guide It, The Geometricians Alone Attain It, And Apart From Science, And The Imitations Of It, There Are No True Demonstrations.
World
Erring
Imitation
Faith Affirms Many Things, Respecting Which The Senses Are Silent, But Nothing That They Deny. It Is Superior, But Never Opposed To Their Testimony
Faith
Silent
Deny
Le Nez De Cle Opa" Tre: S'il E U" T E Te Plus Court, Toute La Face De La Terre Aurait Change . Cleopatra'snose: If It Had Beenshorter The Whole Face Of The Earth Would Have Been Different.
Different
Earth
Faces
Faith Embraces Many Truths Which Seem To Contradict Each Other.
Faith
Embrace
Seems
The Captain Of A Ship Is Not Chosen From Those Of The Passengers Who Comes From The Best Family.
Politics
Captains
Ships
Those Whom We Call Ancient Were Really New In All Things, And Properly Constituted The Infancy Of Mankind.
Ancient
Infancy
Mankind
Jesus Christ Came To Tell Men That They Have No Enemies But Themselves.
Jesus
Men
Enemy
Human Beings Must Be Known To Be Loved; But Divine Beings Must Be Loved To Be Known.
Love
Native American
Religion
Lust Is The Source Of All Our Actions, And Humanity.
Humanity
Lust
Our Actions
Perfect Clarity Would Profit The Intellect But Damage The Will.
Math
Perfect
Damage
Justice Without Force Is Powerless; Force Without Justice Is Tyrannical.
Strength
Umpires
Justice
By Thought I Embrace The Universe.
Embrace
Universe
Time Heals Griefs And Quarrels, For We Change And Are No Longer The Same Persons. Neither The Offender Nor The Offended Are Any More Themselves.
Life
Grief
Offended You
That Which Makes Us Go So Far For Love Is That We Never Think That We Might Have Need Of Anything Besides That Which We Love.
Love Is
Thinking
Needs
Evil Is Easily Discovered; There Is An Infinite Variety; Good Is Almost Unique. But Some Kinds Of Evil Are Almost As Difficult To Discover As That Which We Call Good; And Often Particular Evil Of This Class Passes For Good. It Needs Even A Certain Greatness Of Soul To Attain To This, As To That Which Is Good.
Unique
Greatness
Class
Description Of Man: Dependence, Longing For Independence, Need.
Men
Independence
Needs
The Last Act Is Bloody, However Pleasant All The Rest Of The Play Is: A Little Earth Is Thrown At Last Upon Our Head, And That Is The End Forever.
Play
Forever
Earth
Even Those Who Write Against Fame Wish For The Fame Of Having Written Well, And Those Who Read Their Works Desire The Fame Of Having Read Them.
Writing
Wish
Desire
Le Silence E Ternel De Ces Espaces Infinis M'effraie. The Eternal Silence Of These Infinite Spaces Fills Me With Dread.
Space
Silence
Infinite
Nothing Is Thoroughly Approved But Mediocrity. The Majority Has Established This, And It Fixes Its Fangs On Whatever Gets Beyond It Either Way.
Majority
Mediocrity
Way
We Do Not Worry About Being Respected In Towns Through Which We Pass. But If We Are Going To Remain In One For A Certain Time, We Do Worry. How Long Does This Time Have To Be?
Time
Math
Long
Let A Man Choose What Condition He Will, And Let Him Accumulate Around Him All The Goods And Gratifications Seemingly Calculated To Make Him Happy In It; If That Man Is Left At Any Time Without Occupation Or Amusement, And Reflects On What He Is, The Meagre, Languid Felicity Of His Present Lot Will Not Bear Him Up. He Will Turn Necessarily To Gloomy Anticipations Of The Future; And Unless His Occupation Calls Him Out Of Himself, He Is Inevitably Wretched.
Happiness
Men
Occupation
The Only Thing Which Consoles For Our Miseries Is Diversion, And Yet This Is The Greatest Of Our Miseries. For It Is This Which Principally Hinders Us From Reflecting Upon Ourselves And Which Makes Us Imperceptibly Ruin Ourselves.
Sadness
Reflecting Upon
Ruins
The Knowledge Of God Is Very Far From The Love Of Him.
Valentines Day
God
Knowledge
Nature Confuses The Skeptics And Reason Confutes The Dogmatists
Nature
Reason
Skeptic
Civil Wars Are The Greatest Of Evils. They Are Inevitable, If We Wish To Reward Merit, For All Will Say That They Are Meritorious.
War
Evil
Wish
La Dernie' Re Chose Qu'on Trouve En Faisant Un Ouvrage, Est De Savoir Celle Qu'il Faut Mettre La Premie' Re. The Last Thing One Discovers In Composing A Work Iswhat To Put First.
Lasts
Firsts
Composing
The Sensitivity Of Men To Small Matters, And Their Indifference To Great Ones, Indicates A Strange Inversion.
Men
Matter
Strange
The Mind Naturally Makes Progress, And The Will Naturally Clings To Objects; So That For Want Of Right Objects, It Will Attach Itself To Wrong Ones.
Mind
Progress
Want
You Always Admire What You Really Don't Understand.
Inspirational
Fake People
Appreciation
If There Were Only One Religion, God Would Indeed Be Manifest.
God
Religion God
Manifest
If A Man Loves A Woman For Her Beauty, Does He Love Her? No; For The Smallpox, Which Destroys Her Beauty Without Killing Her, Causes His Love To Cease. And If Any One Loves Me For My Judgment Or My Memory, Does He Really Love Me? No; For I Can Lose These Qualities Without Ceasing To Be.
Love
Memories
Men
Eloquence Is A Painting Of Thought; And Thus Those Who, After Having Painted It, Add Something More, Make A Picture Instead Of A Portrait.
Thoughtful
Thinking
Portraits
There Is A God-shaped Hole In The Life Of Every Man.
Men
Holes
Every Man
No One Is Ignorant That There Are Two Avenues By Which Opinions Are Received Into The Soul, Which Are Its Two Principal Powers: The Understanding And The Will.
Two
Understanding
Soul
Don't Try To Add More Years To Your Life. Better Add More Life To Your Years.
Death
Suicide
Years
Fuller Believed Human Societies Would Soon Rely Mainly On Renewable Sources Of Energy, Such As Solar- And Wind-derived Electricity,. Envisioned An Age Of "universal Education And Sustenance Of All Humanity". "the Heart Has Reasons That Reason Does Not Understand."
Life
Heart
Wind
When One Does Not Love Too Much, One Does Not Love Enough.
Doe
Too Much
Enough
There Is A God-shaped Vacuum In Every Heart.
Spiritual
Heart
Vacuums
There Are Hardly Any Truths Upon Which We Always Remain Agreed, And Still Fewer Objects Of Pleasure Which We Do Not Change Every Hour, I Do Not Know Whether There Is A Means Of Giving Fixed Rules For Adapting Discourse To The Inconstancy Of Our Caprices.
Mean
Giving
Hours
When We Wish To Correct With Advantage, And To Show Another That He Errs, We Must Notice From What Side He Views The Matter, For On That Side It Is Usually True.
Views
Wish
Matter
A Little Thing Comforts Us Because A Little Thing Afflicts Us.
Comfort
Littles
Little Things
Just As All Things Speak About God To Those That Know Him, And Reveal Him To Those That Love Him, They Also Hide Him From All Those That Neither Seek Nor Know Him.
Speak
All Things
Knows
The Christian's God Does Not Merely Consist Of A God Who Is The Author Of Mathematical Truths And The Order Of The Elements. The God Of Abraham, The God Of Isaac, The God Of Jacob, The God Of The Christians, Is A God Of Love And Consolation.
Christian
Order
Doe
All Err The More Dangerously Because Each Follows A Truth. Their Mistake Lies Not In Following A Falsehood But In Not Following Another Truth.
Mistake
Lying
Math
True Eloquence Makes Light Of Eloquence. True Morality Makes Light Of Morality.
Light
Morality
Eloquence
Just As I Do Not Know Where I Came From, So I Do Not Know Where I Am Going. All I Know Is That When I Leave This World I Shall Fall Forever Into Oblivion, Or Into The Hands Of An Angry God, Without Knowing Which Of The Two Will Be My Lot For Eternity. Such Is My State Of Mind, Full Of Weakness And Uncertainty. The Only Conclusion I Can Draw From All This Is That I Must Pass My Days Without A Thought Of Trying To Find Out What Is Going To Happen To Me.
Fall
Hands
Two
Wisdom Leads Us Back To Childhood.
Childhood
The Last Thing That We Find In Making A Book Is To Know What We Must Put First.
Book
Lasts
Firsts
Custom Creates The Whole Of Equity, For The Simple Reason That It Is Accepted.
Simple
Reason
Accepted
Nothing Is So Insufferable To Man As To Be Completely At Rest, Without Passions, Without Business, Without Diversion, Without Study. He Then Feels His Nothingness, His Forlornness, His Insufficiency, His Dependence, His Weakness, His Emptiness. There Will Immediately Arise From The Depth Of His Heart Weariness, Gloom, Sadness, Fretfulness, Vexation, Despair.
Passion
Heart
Sadness
Eloquence Is A Way Of Saying Things In Such A Way, First, That Those To Whom We Speak May Listen To Them Without Pain And With Pleasure, And Second, That They Feel Themselves Interested, So That Self-love Leads Them More Willingly To Reflection Upon It.
Pain
Reflection
Self
We Do Not Rest Satisfied With The Present.... So Imprudent We Are That We Wander In The Times Which Are Not Ours And Do Not Thinkof The Only One Which Belongs To Us; And So Idle Are We That We Dream Of Those Times Which Are No More And Thoughtlessly Overlook That Which Alone Exists. For The Present Is Generally Painful To Us.
Dream
Hope
Painful
Nobody Is Publicly Accepted As An Expert On Poetry Unless He Displays The Sign Of Poet, Mathematician, Etc., But Universal Men Want No Sign And Make Hardly Any Distinction Between The Crafts Of Poet And Embroiderer. Universal Men Are Not Called Poets Or Mathematicians, Etc. But They Are All These Things And Judges Of Them Too. No One Could Guess What They Are, And They Will Talk About Whatever Was Being Talked About When They Came In. One Quality Is Not More Noticeable In Them Than Another, Unless It Becomes Necessary To Put It Into Practice, And Then We Remember It.
Men
Practice
Judging
One Must Have Deeper Motives And Judge Everything Accordingly, But Go On Talking Like An Ordinary Person.
Talking
Judging
Ordinary
Muhammad Established A Religion By Putting His Enemies To Death; Jesus Christ By Commanding His Followers To Lay Down Their Lives.
Jesus
Enemy
Islam
The Immortality Of The Soul Is A Matter Which Is Of So Great Consequence To Us And Which Touches Us So Profoundly That We Must Have Lost All Feeling To Be Indifferent About It.
Soul
Feelings
Matter
Chance Gives Rise To Thoughts, And Chance Removes Them; No Art Can Keep Or Acquire Them.
Art
Destiny
Giving
You Are In The Same Manner Surrounded With A Small Circle Of Persons... Full Of Desire. They Demand Of You The Benefits Of Desire... You Are Therefore Properly The King Of Desire. ...equal In This To The Greatest Kings Of The Earth... It Is Desire That Constitutes Their Power; That Is, The Possession Of Things That Men Covet.
Kings
Men
Circles
The Stoics Say, "retire Within Yourselves; It Is There You Will Find Your Rest." And That Is Not True. Others Say, "go Out Of Yourselves; Seek Happiness In Amusement." And This Is Not True. Illness Comes. Happiness Is Neither Without Us Nor Within Us. It Is In God, Both Without Us And Within Us.
Amusement
Illness
Retiring
For Nature Is An Image Of Grace, And Visible Miracles Are Images Of The Invisible.
Nature
Miracle
Grace
When We See An Effect Happen Always In The Same Manner, We Infer That It Takes Place By A Natural Necessity; As, For Instance, That The Sun Will Rise To Morrow; But Nature Often Deceives Us, And Will Not Submit To Its Own Rules.
Nature
Sun
Deceiving
Jurisdiction Is Not Given For The Sake Of The Judge, But For That Of The Litigant.
Judging
Sake
Authority
God Only Pours Out His Light Into The Mind After Having Subdued The Rebellion Of The Will By An Altogether Heavenly Gentleness Which Charms And Wins It.
Winning
Light
Mind
...for The Truth Is Always Older Than All The Opinions Men Have Held Regarding It; And One Should Be Ignoring The Nature Of Truth If We Imagined That The Truth Began At The Time It Came To Be Known.
Truth
Men
Opinion
However Vast A Man's Spiritual Resources, He Is Capable Of But One Great Passion.
Spiritual
Passion
Math
Most Of Man's Trouble Comes From His Inability To Be Still.
Men
Inability
Trouble
Do You Wish People To Think Well Of You? Don't Speak Well Of Yourself.
Humble
Humility
Thinking
I Know Whom I Have Believed.
Faith
Knows
Each Man Is Everything To Himself, For With His Death Everything Is Dead For Him. That Is Why Each Of Us Thinks He Is Everything To Everyone. We Must Not Judge Nature By Ourselves, But By Its Own Standards.
Men
Thinking
Judging
What A Difficult Thing It Is To Ask Someone's Advice On A Matter Without Coloring His Judgment By The Way In Which We Present Our Problem.
Advice
Matter
Way
Men Despise Religion. They Hate It And Are Afraid It May Be True.
Fear
Hate
Men
It Is Superstitious To Put One's Hopes In Formalities, But Arrogant To Refuse To Submit To Them.
Arrogant
Ceremony
Submit
We Are Never In Search Of Things, But Always In Search Of The Search.
Nothing Fortifies Scepticism More Than That There Are Some Who Are Not Sceptics; If All Were So, They Would Be Wrong.
Would Be
Facts
Scepticism
Man's Greatness Lies In His Power Of Thought.
Lying
Power
Greatness
The Great Mass Of People Judge Well Of Things, For They Are In Natural Ignorance, Which Is Man's True State.
Ignorance
Knowledge
Men
If A Man Is Not Made For God, Why Is He Happy Only In God?
Faith
Men
Made
The Present Letter Is A Very Long One, Simply Because I Had No Leisure To Make It Shorter.
Long
Letters
Leisure
The Only Shame Is To Have None.
Guilt
Shame
To Scorn Philosophy Is Truly To Philosophize.
Philosophy
Scorn
Custom Determines What Is Agreeable.
Determine
Customs
He Who Does Not Know His Way To The Sea Should Take A River For His Guide.
Sea
Rivers
Doe
Good Deeds, When Concealed, Are The Most Admirable.
Deeds
Good Deeds
Admirable
No Religion Except Ours Has Taught That Man Is Born In Sin; None Of The Philosophical Sects Has Admitted It; None Therefore Has Spoken The Truth
Philosophical
Men
Taught
It Is Right That What Is Just Should Be Obeyed. It Is Necessary That What Is Strongest Should Be Obeyed.
Obedience
Should
Strongest
Truth Is So Obscure In These Times, And Falsehood So Established, That, Unless We Love The Truth, We Cannot Know It.
Love
Religion
Truth Is
Not Only Do We Know God By Jesus Christ Alone, But We Know Ourselves Only By Jesus Christ. We Know Life And Death Only Through Jesus Christ. Apart From Jesus Christ, We Do Not Know What Is Our Life, Nor Our Death, Nor God, Nor Ourselves.
Christian
Jesus
Life And Death
If A Soldier Or Labourer Complain Of The Hardship Of His Lot, Set Him To Do Nothing.
Soldier
Complaining
Hardship
Our Natures Lie In Motion, Without Which We Die.
Change
Lying
Dies
The Mind Of The Greatest Man On Earth Is Not So Independent Of Circumstances As Not To Feel Inconvenienced By The Merest Buzzing Noise About Him; It Does Not Need The Report Of A Cannon To Disturb His Thoughts. The Creaking Of A Vane Or A Pully Is Quite Enough. Do Not Wonder That He Reasons Ill Just Now; A Fly Is Buzzing By His Ear; It Is Quite Enough To Unfit Him For Giving Good Counsel.
Independent
Men
Giving
As We Speak Of Poetical Beauty, So Ought We To Speak Of Mathematical Beauty And Medical Beauty. But We Do Not Do So; And That Reason Is That We Know Well What Is The Object Of Mathematics, And That It Consists In Proofs, And What Is The Object Of Medicine, And That It Consists In Healing. But We Do Not Know In What Grace Consists, Which Is The Object Of Poetry.
Beauty
Healing
Medicine
To Find Recreation In Amusements Is Not Happiness; For This Joy Springs From Alien And Extrinsic Sources, And Is Therefore Dependent Upon And Subject To Interruption By A Thousand Accidents, Which May Minister Inevitable Affliction.
Spring
Joy
May
The Multitude Which Does Not Reduce Itself To Unity Is Confusion.
Confusion
Confusing
Unity
Fear Not, Provided You Fear; But If You Fear Not, Then Fear.
Fear Not
Ifs
Let It Not Be Imagined That The Life Of A Good Christian Must Be A Life Of Melancholy And Gloominess; For He Only Resigns Some Pleasures To Enjoy Others Infinitely Better.
Christian
Melancholy
Pleasure
I Am In The Utmost Perplexity, Yand Have Wished A Hundred Times, That If There Is A A God, Nature Would Manifest Him Without Ambiguity, And That If There Is Not, Every Imaginary Sign Of His Existence Might Vanish : In Short, Let Nature Speak Distinctly, Or Be Totally Silent, And I Shall Know What Course To Take.
Nature
Might
Speak
Voluptuousness, Like Justice, Is Blind, But That Is The Only Resemblance Between Them.
Justice
Blind
Resemblance
[on Vanity:] The Nose Of Cleopatra: If It Had Been Shorter, The Face Of The Earth Would Have Changed.
Beauty
Vanity
Noses
You Gave Me Health That I Might Serve You; And So Often I Failed To Use My Good Health In Your Service. Now You Send Me Sickness In Order To Correct Me Grant That, Having Ignored The Things Of Spirit When My Body Was Vigorous, I May Now Enjoy Spiritual Sweetness While My Body Groans With Pain.
Spiritual
Pain
Order
All Our Troubles Come From Not Being Able To Be Alone.
Modern Life
Able
Trouble
Those Who Do Not Hate Their Own Selfishness And Regard Themselves As More Important Than The Rest Of The World Are Blind Because The Truth Lies Elsewhere
Hate
Lying
Important
It Is Not In Montaigne, But In Myself, That I Find All That I See In Him.
Reading
Literature
One-half Of The Ills Of Life Come Because Men Are Unwilling To Sit Down Quietly For Thirty Minutes To Think Through All The Possible Consequences Of Their Acts.
Spiritual
Men
Thinking
Plurality Which Is Not Reduced To Unity Is Confusion; Unity Which Does Not Depend On Plurality Is Tyranny.
Confusion
Unity
Doe
When A Man Who Accepts The Christian Doctrine Lives Unworthily Of It, It Is Much Clearer To Say He Is A Bad Christian Than To Say He Is Not A Christian.
Christian
Men
Doctrine
What Is It, In Your Opinion, To Be A Great Nobleman? It Is To Be Master Of Several Objects That Men Covet, And Thus To Be Able To Satisfy The Wants And The Desires Of Many. It Is These Wants And These Desires That Attract Them Towards You, And That Make Them Submit To You: Were It Not For These, They Would Not Even Look At You; But They Hope, By These Services... To Obtain From You Some Part Of The Good Which They Desire, And Of Which They See That You Have The Disposal.
Men
Desire
Looks
There Are Vices Which Have No Hold Upon Us, But In Connection With Others; And Which, When You Cut Down The Trunk, Fall Like The Branches.
Fall
Cutting
Vices
Desire And Force Between Them Are Responsible For All Our Actions; Desire Causes Our Voluntary Acts, Force Our Involuntary.
Desire
Our Actions
Causes
So We Can Only Know God Well By Knowing Our Iniquities. Therefore Those Who Have Known God, Without Knowing Their Wretchedness, Have Not Glorified Him, But Have Glorified Themselves.
Knowing
Sin
Wells
Those Who Make Antitheses By Forcing The Sense Are Like Men Who Make False Windows For The Sake Of Symmetry. Their Rule Is Not To Speak Justly, But To Make Accurate Figures.
Men
Style
Sake
Words Differently Arranged Have A Different Meaning, And Meanings Differently Arranged Have Different Effects.
Different
Effects
Different Meanings
Law, Without Force, Is Impotent.
Law
Lawyer
Force
He Who Cannot Believe Is Cursed, For He Reveals By His Unbelief That God Has Not Chosen To Give Him Grace.
Believe
Giving
Grace
I Condemn Equally Those Who Choose To Praise Man, Those Who Choose To Condemn Him And Those Who Choose To Divert Themselves, And I Can Only Approve Of Those Who Seek With Groans.
Men
Praise
I Can
The Stream Is Always Purer At Its Source.
Purity
Source
Streams
Discourses On Humility Are A Source Of Pride In The Vain And Of Humility In The Humble.
Humble
Humility
Pride
Trending Author
Stephen Hawking
Peyton Manning
Katori Hall
Lillian Smith
William Gilmore Simms
Rick Derringer
Category
Information