Blaise Pascal

We are generally the better persuaded by the reasons we discover ourselves than by those given to us by others.

Curiosity is only vanity. We usually only want to know something so that we can talk about it.

The greater intellect one has, the more originality one finds in men. Ordinary persons find no difference between men.

There are two equally dangerous extremes: to shut reason out, and to let nothing else in.

We run carelessly to the precipice, after we have put something before us to prevent us seeing it.

The supreme function of reason is to show man that some things are beyond reason.

The only thing that consoles us for our miseries is diversion, and yet this is the greatest of our miseries.

Kind words do not cost much. Yet they accomplish much.

We are all something, but none of us are everything.

The sensitivity of men to small matters, and their indifference to great ones, indicates a strange inversion.

If we examine our thoughts, we shall find them always occupied with the past or the future.

The present is never our end. The past and the present are our means; the future alone is our end.

We are never living, but hoping to live; and, looking forward always to being happy, it is inevitable that we never are so.

To deny, to believe, and to doubt well are to a man what the race is to a horse.

The weather and my mood have little connection. I have my foggy and my fine days within me.

The more intelligence one has, the more people one finds original. Commonplace people see no difference between men.

It is not good to be too free. It is not good to have all one needs.

Man is equally incapable of seeing the nothingness from which he emerges and the infinity in which he is engulfed.

Our nature consists in motion; complete rest is death.

The strength of a man's virtue should not be measured by his special exertions, but by his habitual acts.