Pensées

Nonfiction | Book | Adult | Published in 1670

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Summary

Background

Chapter Summaries & Analyses

Section 1

Section 2

Section 3

Section 4

Key Figures

Themes

Index of Terms

Important Quotes

Essay Topics

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Discussion Questions

Section 4Chapter Summaries & Analyses

Section 4: “Fragments Not Found in the First Copy”

Subsection A Summary: “The Memorial”

This is a brief, intense meditation or prayer that Pascal wrote down after his “Night of Fire,” the mystical experience he had during the night of November 23, 1654.

Like many of the Pensées, Pascal’s vision is conveyed in fragments of thought. Pascal proclaims his belief in God as revealed in the Scriptures and known through faith in Jesus Christ rather than as discovered by the reasoning of “philosophers and scholars.” This faith creates an assurance of “certainty” in Pascal, along with an emotionally overwhelming “joy” and “peace.” Aware of his moral failings, Pascal laments that he has been “cut off” from God and “denied” and “crucified” Jesus, but prays to be united with the divinity forever. This is achieved through a “sweet and total renunciation” (286), in which Pascal abandons himself to the will of Jesus and listens to the counsels of his spiritual director or priest.

Subsection B Summary: “Fragments in the Recueil Original”

The Recueil Original refers to the original collection of Pascal’s papers from which most of the Pensées were drawn. Fragments 914-918 consist of reflections on Pascal’s disputes with the Jesuits. He insists that his own theological positions, despite being “condemned” by ecclesiastical authorities, have been correct and will be vindicated in heaven. People on Pascal’s side must continue to proclaim the truth in the face of censure, until a new pope comes into office who will “hear both sides” (287) and enact justice.

Fragment 919 Summary: “The Mystery of Jesus”

This fragment is a meditation on Jesus’s last night on earth, when he suffered his “agony” while praying in the garden of Gethsemane and was subsequently abandoned in fear by his disciples and condemned to death. In this experience, Jesus was utterly alone in his sufferings, yet had the aid of God and the angels. Although he experienced “anguish and abandonment in the horror of the night” (289), Jesus showed that only one who was “almighty” could bear such suffering. Inspired by Jesus’s strength in suffering, we ought to take courage in the various sufferings we have to undergo, knowing that Jesus will help us and grant us immortality in the end.

Fragments 920-974 Summary

These fragments contain reflections on various theological matters, especially with reference to Pascal’s disputes with the Jesuits and other ecclesiastical authorities.

Subsection C Summary: “Fragments From Other Sources”

Fragment 978 Summary: “Self-Love”

Human nature has an aversion to knowing the truth about itself, and thus an excessive self-love makes us hide our true selves from others and to flatter others by not telling them their faults. The result is a “perpetual illusion” and a “mutual deception and flattery” (326) that reveal mankind’s deeply rooted “falsehood” and “hypocrisy.”

Fragments 979-993 Summary

These fragments contain more comments on the disputes of the Jesuits and the Jansenists. Pascal bewails the fact that factions are forming in the church, which will form an obstacle to the conversion of heretics while also corrupting the faith of orthodox Catholics.

“Sayings Attributed to Pascal” Summary

This subsection contains a series of 11 sayings of, and anecdotes about, Pascal, some told in the third person and some in Pascal’s own voice.

“Additional Pensées” Summary

This final subsection contains miscellaneous reflections on religion, philosophy, and human nature.

Section 4 Analysis

The final section of the book contains some of its most private and emotionally significant parts. Sometime after he experienced his “Night of Fire,” Pascal wrote down the brief meditation known as the Memorial. A paper containing this text was found sewn into Pascal’s clothing after his death, and it appears that he carried it with him at all times.

The Memorial is a seemingly spontaneous record of the emotions Pascal felt during his mystical experience of union with God, reflecting The Value of Spiritual and Intellectual Conviction in his life and thought. Pascal draws a sharp contrast between the concrete experience of God among people of faith and the idea of God based on rational arguments of “philosophers and scholars.” Pascal affirms his allegiance to the former, the “God of Abraham, God of Isaac, God of Jacob” (285) as proclaimed in Scripture. This preference is consistent with Pascal’s arguments throughout the Pensées, where he places faith on a higher spiritual plane than rational argument, thus invoking The Importance and Limitations of Reason.

The rest of the Memorial expresses Pascal’s feelings of close union with God and Jesus, with such “renunciation” and “submission” resulting in an experience of extraordinary joy that enables him to reconcile The Greatness and Misery of Mankind. Reflecting the intense moral self-awareness fostered by the Jansenist movement, Pascal regrets having failed Jesus to the point of “crucifying” him, and expresses a desire never to be separated from him again. The intense emotion of the Memorial reflects the style of traditional Catholic devotional prayer, in which the believer identifies with the human side of Christ and expresses a desire for union with divinity tempered with awareness of, and repentance for, sin.

Of a similar emotional and religious intensity is the “Mystery of Jesus,” a longer meditation (288-292). Here Pascal reflects on Jesus’s experience of agony in the Garden of Gethsemane, where he prayed on the last night of his life before being arrested and crucified. Pascal interprets Jesus’s agony in existential terms, as an experience of absolute loneliness and abandonment reflecting the human experience at its most bleak. However, Pascal draws a message of hope from this scene, as he presents Jesus as speaking to him or humanity in general, offering words of comfort and consolation by addressing, through his own human form and experience, The Greatness and Misery of Mankind. In this way, the “Mystery of Jesus” expresses and reflects in vivid terms Pascal’s stated conviction about the human condition being balanced between earthly misery and spiritual greatness.

The essay on “Self-Love” (F 978) reiterates in a more extensive form Pascal’s themes about the corruption and foibles of human nature due to the Fall, as manifested in human beings’ unregenerate nature. Human beings have many faults, but in their vanity, they do not want to be informed of their faults and instead persist in ignorance and self-delusion. As an example, Pascal cites many people’s aversion to the Catholic sacrament of confession: Pascal defends this rite as a natural and comfortable way for human beings to unburden themselves of guilt and show the truth about themselves. In once more advocating for a turn to faith and the sacraments of the church, Pascal emphasizes The Value of Spiritual and Intellectual Conviction in seeking true happiness and peace in the midst of earthly vanity.