{"id":582,"date":"2024-07-03T14:02:49","date_gmt":"2024-07-03T11:02:49","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/planeta21vek.ru\/artemiada\/eng\/?p=582"},"modified":"2025-11-20T19:47:25","modified_gmt":"2025-11-20T16:47:25","slug":"blaise-pascal-pascals-law-the-great-fluid-equilibrium-experiment","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/planeta21vek.ru\/artemiada\/eng\/2024\/07\/03\/blaise-pascal-pascals-law-the-great-fluid-equilibrium-experiment\/","title":{"rendered":"Blaise Pascal. Pascal’s law. The Great Fluid Equilibrium Experiment"},"content":{"rendered":"

Blaise Pascal was born in 1623 in Clermont-Ferrand to the royal councilor of the financial and tax district of Auvergne, Etienne Pascal, and the daughter of a local judge, Antoinette Begon, who died when her son was only two and a half years old. Pascal’s family belonged to the judicial “nobility of the robe”. Pascal’s father, a widely educated intellectual, a gifted mathematician and a talented educator (in the spirit of Montaigne’s humanistic pedagogy), after the death of his wife devoted his life to his children (there were two more daughters in the family), who received an excellent home education (ancient Greek and Latin, grammar, mathematics, history, geography, etc.). From 1631 the family lived in Paris. Blaise grew up as a very sickly and brilliantly gifted child, who later demonstrated his gift first of all in mathematics and physics, then in invention, then in polemical writings, theology and, finally, in philosophy. Everywhere his genius left a bright and unique mark.<\/span><\/p>\n

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His first thought was science. At the age of 10 he had already created the “Treatise on Sounds”, at the age of 12, in the process of “playing at mathematics”, he rediscovered Euclidean geometry, reaching the 32nd theorem, after which he gained “access” to the “Elements of Euclid”, creatively developing them. At the age of 13, Blaise became a member of the home “mathematical academy” of the learned monk M. Mersenne, to which Descartes, Roberval, Desargues, Pascal’s father and others belonged. In it, Pascal laid the foundations of “projective geometry” (as opposed to Descartes’ “analytical geometry”) and at the age of 16 wrote “Experience on Conic Sections”, which became part of the golden fund of mathematics. In 1640, the family moved to Rouen, where the father was appointed intendant. The position required complex mathematical calculations, and to help his father, the son invented the first arithmetic machine in history. The basic principle of its operation was also used in later arithmometers. This merit of Pascal was highly appreciated by N. Wiener. In philosophical terms, Blaise realized Descartes’ idea about the automatism of some human mental functions.<\/span><\/p>\n

The intense, long-term work on improving the calculating machine undermined Pascal’s fragile health: from the age of 19, he began to suffer from severe headaches, and he no longer felt healthy. In 1646, due to his father’s illness and a visit from Jansenist doctors, Blaise’s “first conversion” to the Christian religion occurred; he became an ardent adherent and carried his entire family along with him. However, new scientific research in the field of hydrostatics and complex experiments with vacuum led Pascal away from religion. The scholastic opinion that “nature abhors a vacuum” was refuted by him in brilliant experiments with the “Torricellian vacuum”. He discovered the famous “Pascal’s law” and became one of the founders of hydrostatics. But in the summer of 1647, he became seriously ill (legs paralyzed) and was forced to leave for Paris for treatment. In September 1647, the ill Pascal was visited by Descartes, who demonstrated a calculating machine, as well as some experiments with emptiness. When asked what was in the tube above the mercury, Descartes answered: “The finest matter”, which Pascal never believed in, but did not argue with the great scientist and philosopher. In fact, the scientists were talking about different things: Descartes – about the metaphysical absolute emptiness, which he rejected and was right in this (among the ancients, emptiness in nature was rejected by Parmenides, Zeno of Elea, Empedocles, Aristotle), and Pascal – about the physical “visible emptiness”, relative, caused by air pressure, and he was also right. In October, Pascal’s brochure “New Experiments on Emptiness” was published, to which Descartes responded very dismissively in a letter to the father of X. Huygens, stating that “the young man has too much emptiness in his head”. However, when a year later Pascal carried out the “great experiment of liquid equilibrium”, which finally buried the dogma of “the fear of emptiness”, Descartes suddenly claimed priority (he allegedly gave the idea of \u200b\u200bthis experiment at their meeting). For the young scientist this was a great nuisance, but he did not enter the fight, and the history of science left priority to him. In 1651 he wrote a “Treatise on the Void” summarizing all his experiments with vacuum, which for some reason was not published: perhaps the all-powerful Jesuits of that time, led by the rector of the College of Clermont in Paris, Father Noel (former teacher of Descartes), who spoke out sharply against Pascal’s discovery, interfered; the treatise has not been found to this day, but what remains of it is the famous “Preface”, a small epistemological masterpiece in which the young author formed a kind of “Manifesto” of the science of the New Age, affirming the freedom of scientific research, independence from ancient and scholastic authorities, the fundamental role of experiments in the sciences of nature, advocating for the endless progress of scientific knowledge, proposing an original classification of the sciences. Science was Pascal’s destiny. The “social life” recommended by doctors first resulted in his new scientific research and the discovery of probability theory (in the analysis of gambling), and then ended in November 1654 with a tragic incident on the bridge over the Seine,as a result of which he miraculously remained alive. Seeing in his salvation the “finger of God”, Pascal in January 1655 went to the Port-Royal monastery (without taking monastic vows), where his beloved sister Jacqueline had been a nun for 3 years. This was his “second conversion” to religion, which turned out to be final, and the last 8 years were no longer life, but “living” with ascetic exhaustion of himself with fasts and prayers. However, this severe service to God healed and hardened him so that all these years were filled with persistent and diverse creativity. Pascal immediately joined the struggle of the Jansenists of Port-Royal, led by the “great Antoine Arnauld” against the Jesuit order, during which he wrote the famous “Letters to a Provincial” (1657), an anticlerical pamphlet, a brilliant, satirical comedy against the Jesuits, which destroyed the powerful order with laughter. Pascal also wrote a number of theological works: “A Brief History of Jesus Christ” (1656), “Works on Grace” (1658), “Prayer for the Use of Diseases for Good” (1659), etc. And most importantly, he conceived of writing “Apology of the Christian Religion”, which he worked on until the end of his days, but never managed to complete it, leaving over 1000 fragments on separate sheets, partly thematically selected in separate bundles. They were published by Port-Royal in 1669 and 1670 under the title “Thoughts on Religion and Some Other Subjects”, or simply “Thoughts”, with Voltaire’s light hand. Despite their incompleteness, many fragments are “little masterpieces” in their ideological richness and brilliant style. The best edition not only of the “Thoughts”, but also of all of Pascal’s other works, “in accordance with the manuscript”, is presented by Louis Lafume (see 1). In terms of their content, the “Thoughts” are not limited to an “apology for religion”, but represent a philosophical work by a religious thinker who posed in it both the “eternal problems” of philosophy and those relevant to his time. In Port-Royal, Pascal did not abandon his scientific research, writing a number of works on mathematics (infinitesimal analysis) in 1658-1659, which made up an entire volume, in which he came close to discovering mathematical analysis. He died at the age of “39 from old age,” according to Jean Racine, so worn out was his body by constant stress: “a martyr of science,” his biographers will say. Already in his lifetime he was called “the French Archimedes,” “the French Dante,” and “Racine in prose,” “the saint of Port-Royal.” Let us turn to his philosophical and theological views.Pascal immediately joined the struggle of the Jansenists of Port-Royal, led by the “great Antoine Arnauld” against the Jesuit order, during which he wrote the famous “Letters to a Provincial” (1657), an anticlerical pamphlet, a brilliant, satirical comedy against the Jesuits, which destroyed the powerful order with laughter. Pascal also wrote a number of theological works: “A Brief History of Jesus Christ” (1656), “Works on Grace” (1658), “Prayer for the Use of Diseases for Good” (1659), etc. And most importantly, he conceived of writing “Apology of the Christian Religion”, which he worked on until the end of his days, but never managed to complete it, leaving over 1000 fragments on separate sheets, partly thematically selected in separate bundles. They were published by Port-Royal in 1669 and 1670 under the title “Thoughts on Religion and Some Other Subjects”, or simply “Thoughts”, with Voltaire’s light hand. Despite their incompleteness, many fragments are “little masterpieces” in their ideological richness and brilliant style. The best edition not only of the “Thoughts”, but also of all of Pascal’s other works, “in accordance with the manuscript”, is presented by Louis Lafume (see 1). In terms of their content, the “Thoughts” are not limited to an “apology for religion”, but represent a philosophical work by a religious thinker who posed in it both the “eternal problems” of philosophy and those relevant to his time. In Port-Royal, Pascal did not abandon his scientific research, writing a number of works on mathematics (infinitesimal analysis) in 1658-1659, which made up an entire volume, in which he came close to discovering mathematical analysis. He died at the age of “39 from old age,” according to Jean Racine, so worn out was his body by constant stress: “a martyr to science,” his biographers will say. Already in his lifetime, he was called “the French Archimedes,” “the French Dante,” and “Racine in prose,” “the saint of Port-Royal.” Let us turn to his philosophical and theological views.Pascal immediately joined the struggle of the Jansenists of Port-Royal, led by the “great Antoine Arnauld” against the Jesuit order, during which he wrote the famous “Letters to a Provincial” (1657), an anticlerical pamphlet, a brilliant, satirical comedy against the Jesuits, which destroyed the powerful order with laughter. Pascal also wrote a number of theological works: “A Brief History of Jesus Christ” (1656), “Works on Grace” (1658), “Prayer for the Use of Diseases for Good” (1659), etc. And most importantly, he conceived of writing “Apology of the Christian Religion”, which he worked on until the end of his days, but never managed to complete it, leaving over 1000 fragments on separate sheets, partly thematically selected in separate bundles. They were published by Port-Royal in 1669 and 1670 under the title “Thoughts on Religion and Some Other Subjects”, or simply “Thoughts”, with Voltaire’s light hand. Despite their incompleteness, many fragments are “little masterpieces” in their ideological richness and brilliant style. The best edition not only of the “Thoughts”, but also of all of Pascal’s other works, “in accordance with the manuscript”, is presented by Louis Lafume (see 1). In terms of their content, the “Thoughts” are not limited to an “apology for religion”, but represent a philosophical work by a religious thinker who posed in it both the “eternal problems” of philosophy and those relevant to his time. In Port-Royal, Pascal did not abandon his scientific research, writing a number of works on mathematics (infinitesimal analysis) in 1658-1659, which made up an entire volume, in which he came close to discovering mathematical analysis. He died at the age of “39 of old age,” according to Jean Racine, so worn out was his body by constant stress: “a martyr to science,” his biographers will say. Already in his lifetime he was called “the French Archimedes,” “the French Dante,” and “Racine in prose,” “the saint of Port-Royal.” Let us turn to his philosophical and theological views.In its content, the “Thoughts” are not reduced to an “apology for religion”, but represent a philosophical work by a religious thinker, who posed in it both the “eternal problems” of philosophy and those relevant to his time. In Port-Royal, Pascal did not abandon scientific research, writing a number of works on mathematics (infinitesimal analysis) in 1658-1659, which made up an entire volume, in which he came close to discovering mathematical analysis. He died at the age of “39 from old age”, according to Jean Racine, so worn out was his body by constant stress: “a martyr to science”, biographers will say. Already in his lifetime, he was called the “French Archimedes”, “the French Dante” and “Racine in prose”, “the saint of Port-Royal”. Let us turn to his philosophical and theological views.In its content, the “Thoughts” are not reduced to an “apology for religion”, but represent a philosophical work by a religious thinker, who posed in it both the “eternal problems” of philosophy and those relevant to his time. In Port-Royal, Pascal did not abandon scientific research, writing a number of works on mathematics (infinitesimal analysis) in 1658-1659, which made up an entire volume, in which he came close to discovering mathematical analysis. He died at the age of “39 from old age”, according to Jean Racine, so worn out was his body by constant stress: “a martyr to science”, biographers will say. Already in his lifetime, he was called the “French Archimedes”, “the French Dante” and “Racine in prose”, “the saint of Port-Royal”. Let us turn to his philosophical and theological views.<\/span><\/p>\n

Pascal occupies a \u201cunique niche\u201d in European philosophy, a \u201cphilosopher outside philosophy\u201d with his philosophical credo: \u201cTo laugh at philosophy is to truly philosophize\u201d (5: 576, fr. 513)<\/span>
\n[21]<\/span><\/sup><\/a>\u00a0. As for traditional metaphysics, philosophy \u201cis not worth an hour\u2019s work\u201d (5: 510, fr. 84). Scientific studies instilled in him a \u201ctaste for the concrete\u201d, for empirical research and inspired distrust of abstract philosophy, scholastic speculation. At the same time, Pascal is a \u201cphilosopher from God\u201d with an innate philosophical intuition that directed him to the \u201cultimate foundations\u201d of being and knowledge, the \u201csupreme principles of philosophy\u201d (V. Soloviev). In the \u201cage of reason\u201d, he defends the \u201cprerogatives of the heart\u201d and creates an original \u201cmetaphysics of the heart\u201d in addition to the \u201cmetaphysics of reason\u201d. If Descartes is considered the \u201cfather\u201d of modern European philosophy, then Pascal should be called its \u201cmother\u201d, with its inherent qualities of mercy, gentleness, tolerance, and humanity.<\/span><\/p>\n

“The philosophy of the heart” is a phenomenon that had never been seen before in Europe. That is why his “voice about the heart” was “the voice of one crying in the wilderness.” Only in Russia was he heard, where their own “metaphysics of the heart” was developing (I. Kireevsky, Khomyakov, Yurkevich, Florensky, Vysheslavtsev, I. Ilyin, the Roerich couple, D. Andreyev, and others). “Pascal’s soul” is congenial to the “mysterious Russian soul.” The functions of the “heart” in Pascal are diverse and fundamental: in epistemology, the “heart” feels the “first principles” of being and knowledge and is the organ of “sensory intuition,” in anthropology – the deep foundation of personality, in ethics – the subject of moral order, in theology – “the heart feels God.”<\/span><\/p>\n

Despite Pascal’s originality, there are thinkers who had a profound influence on him. First of all, Augustine with his religious-spiritualistic interpretation of man, his doctrine of the continuity of original sin and the necessity of Divine grace, and his psychophysical parallelism. But Augustine’s religious fanaticism, his intolerance of heretics and atheists, and his reliance on the unconditional authority of the Church are completely unacceptable to him. Then Montaigne with his “sober” assessment of reason with its greatness and insignificance, his struggle for an “experimental new science” against scholasticism, his respect for the people and “folk wisdom”, but Pascal does not accept his “insidious Pyrrhonism” and “moral Epicureanism, which puts pillows under the elbows of sinners.” Finally, Descartes is his \u201ceternal ideological enemy\u201d, in whom he criticizes the concept of \u201cthe finest matter\u201d, is ironic about his physics, which he considers \u201ca novel about nature like the novel about Don Quixote\u201d (5: 641, fr. 10008), does not \u201cdigest\u201d his dogmatism, scientism, rationalism and mechanism (the idea of \u200b\u200b\u200b\u200bthe \u201cworld-machine\u201d and the \u201cautomatic organism\u201d). But, firstly, through Descartes he began to become familiar with philosophy, secondly, he learned from him the \u201cgreat principle of thought\u201d (V. Cousin) and creatively developed it, thirdly, he highly valued his axiomatic-deductive method and gave his own development of the \u201cgeometric method\u201d.<\/span><\/p>\n

Epistemology and methodology.<\/span><\/strong>Pascal’s epistemological credo sounds very strange for Western metaphysicians: “We comprehend the truth not only with the mind, but also with the heart” (5: 512, fr. 110), but it is natural for the “common sense” of man. The heart comprehends such “first principles of being” as space, time, infinity, movement, number, etc. For Descartes, this is the prerogative of “intellectual intuition”, and for Pascal – “the sensual intuition of the heart”. Thus, for him – “principles are felt, theorems are proven by reason, both with certainty, although in different ways” (ibid.). “Feelings in themselves,” Pascal believes, “never deceive,” and reason is strong in definitions and proofs, but it is not the only criterion of truth, the “highest principle” in matters of knowledge, for it can err, experiencing various influences: imagination, interests, passions, etc. Hence, reason is a “weather vane in the wind” of all these influences: it is both great and insignificant, like man himself. Pascal debunks the “absolute greatness” of reason and recognizes its “relative insignificance,” which is “smoothed out” by feelings, “the heart,” love, for in his case “truth is also comprehended by love.” He does not absolutize any of the epistemological abilities, but defines each one’s spheres and boundaries of application and reliability. Thus, the scientific power of proofs of reason is powerless in philosophical anthropology, ethics, psychology, and religion, where priority belongs to the “heart,” not the mind. All abilities are specific and do not replace one another: just as it would be ridiculous to demand from the \u201cheart\u201d proof of its \u201cfeelings\u201d, so it would be ridiculous to demand from the mind \u201cfeelings of its theorems\u201d. Pascal starts from the ancient ideal of truth, eternal, timeless and indestructible, which is not fully accessible to man. The fact is that space and the entire surrounding world are infinite in breadth and depth (\u201cinfinity in the great\u201d and \u201cinfinity in the small\u201d: a small tick is \u201cinfinite in the small\u201d, like all things in the world): \u201cThe entire visible world is only a barely distinguishable stroke in the vast bosom of nature\u201d (5: 526, fr. 199). To comprehend this infinity, one must have an infinite capacity for knowledge, which man does not have. In addition, \u201ceverything in the world is connected with everything\u201d: a part with the whole and with other parts, the whole with parts, and in order to comprehend the whole, one must know all the parts, and this is again impossible. Man occupies a middle position in the world, \u201cnothing compared to infinity, everything compared to non-existence, the middle between everything and nothing, infinitely removed from the understanding of the extreme limits; the end and the beginning of things are hidden from him in an impenetrable mystery. He is equally incapable of seeing the non-existence from which he is extracted, and the infinity that absorbs him\u201d (ibid.). To strengthen the impression of two extreme limits, Pascal introduces the image of the \u201cabyss\u201d in its two \u201cpeaks\u201d – the \u201cabyss of infinity\u201d and the \u201cabyss of non-existence\u201d, between which man is tragically \u201ccrucified\u201d. Hence, some Pascal scholars incorrectly assess his epistemological position as \u201cskeptical\u201d (Kuzin, M. Filippov) or even as \u201cagnostic\u201d (in the spirit of Kant) (A.D.Gulyaev, L. Goldman). But M. Legerne is more right, who finds something in common between Descartes and Pascal in their fight against skepticism. It is not for nothing that Pascal highly valued Descartes’ “epistemological optimism” and himself sharply opposed “insidious Pyrrhonism”, reasonably noting that if we cannot know “everything”, this does not mean that we know “nothing”. He subtly feels the dialectic of absolute and relative truth, recognizing “reliability” at the level of external feelings, reason, “intuitions of the heart”, and in addition, as the creator of probability theory, he is convinced of the objectivity and reliability of “probabilistic knowledge”. As a result, Pascal said, “we carry within ourselves the idea of \u200b\u200btruth, insurmountable for any Pyrrhonism”.<\/span><\/p>\n

In order to gain reliable knowledge, he develops an axiomatic-deductive “geometric method”. “In the study of truth, he believes, one can set three main goals: to discover the truth when one seeks it; to prove it when one has found it; and finally, to distinguish it from falsehood when one examines it” (3: 434). Since there are no general rules for heuristics, Pascal pays special attention to the method of the “Science of Proof” of truth. The idea of \u200b\u200bthe “perfect method” is very simple: to define all terms, prove all propositions and arrange them in the proper order. But it is impossible to define and prove “everything” (due to the “regress to infinity”), which means that one must act like geometers, who do not define “primary terms” and do not prove axioms, defining and proving “everything else”. And “what surpasses geometry surpasses us” (3: 435) – this famous aphorism of Pascal was very popular in the “age of reason”. For \u201cperfect\u201d definitions, axioms and proofs he developed his own rules.<\/span><\/p>\n

For definitions.<\/span><\/strong><\/p>\n

Do not define any completely known terms. Do not introduce obscure or ambiguous terms without definitions. Use only known or already explained terms in definitions.<\/span><\/p>\n

For axioms.<\/span><\/strong><\/p>\n

Do not accept any necessary principles without examination, no matter how clear they may seem.<\/span><\/p>\n

Record in axioms only completely obvious positions.<\/span><\/p>\n

For evidence.<\/span><\/strong><\/p>\n

Do not prove propositions that are obvious from themselves.<\/span><\/p>\n

Prove all not entirely clear positions using only obvious axioms or already proven positions.<\/span><\/p>\n

In the course of proof, do not abuse the ambiguity of terms by mentally substituting definitions in place of the terms being defined (see 3:453-455).<\/span><\/p>\n

Observance of the first rules in all three divisions is not as obligatory (it will not lead to gross errors) as all the others, which are absolutely necessary for strict proofs. Pascal explains that he is not talking about “definitions of essence”, but only about “nominal definitions” for “clarity and brevity of speech”. He likes to anticipate the objections of his opponents (this method is not new, trivial and applicable only in geometry) and answers in advance: “There is nothing more unknown, more difficult in practice and more useful and universal” (3: 357). Yes, the scholastics knew many rules, but they were unable to single out the main ones from them, like “precious stones among simple stones”. The universality of the method stems from the brevity of mathematical speech, its “content capacity”, which are useful in all sciences and culture as a whole. Pascal himself realized this advantage of the method in his brilliant aphorisms. His method was fully incorporated into Port-Royal’s Logic, or the Art of Thinking.<\/span><\/p>\n

The \u201cscience of proof\u201d of truth is supplemented by the \u201cart of persuasion\u201d of it, for the person who knows is not an \u201cabstraction of the epistemological subject,\u201d a \u201cspiritual automaton\u201d (Spinoza), but a living, concrete person, an \u201cexistential subject\u201d who \u201cexperiences\u201d the truth, loves or hates it, accepts it with his will and \u201cheart\u201d or rejects it, and \u201cthe heart has its own laws that reason does not know\u201d (5: 552, fr. 423). In order to \u201creach the heart\u201d of a person, the \u201cart of persuasion\u201d or \u201cart of agr\u00e9ment\u201d (\u201cto be pleasant\u201d) is necessary, which is more difficult, subtle, \u201cdelightful\u201d than the \u201cscience of proof.\u201d It is difficult, Pascal complains, because the \u201cprinciples of the heart and will\u201d vary from subject to subject, and he is unable to formulate generally valid rules. Perhaps someone else, he hopes, will be able to do this. However, Pascal himself used, if not the general rules, then some techniques of the “art of persuasion”, which gave his speech brightness, expressiveness, emotionality, passionate conviction, “reachability to the hearts” of readers. Of these, the following can be noted: 1) an abundance of impressive images and pictures (“thinking reed”, infinity-abyss, life in the face of death as a “procession of prisoners to execution”, etc.); 2) his sincerity as an author; 3) simplicity and naturalness, the absence of falsehood, false pathos, affectation: “the best books are those, when reading which people would believe that they themselves could write them” (5: 356); 4) Pascal’s emotional openness to people. He not only approves of those who “seek the truth with a sigh”, but also himself “seeks it, groaning.” Leo Tolstoy believed that Pascal wrote “with the blood of his heart”, which is how he won the “hearts” of readers; 5) the use of the techniques of “good oral conversation” in written speech with its sincerity and trust; 6) the ability to see the rightness of one’s ideological opponents, tolerance of dissent; 7) the expression of truth through contradictions in the form of paradoxes, which, “like splinters”, get stuck in the consciousness. “The art of persuasion” is a kind of “psychology of cognition”, and its subject is the existential personality.<\/span><\/p>\n

Philosophical anthropology.<\/span><\/strong>\u00a0Man is the starting point and the final goal of Pascal’s philosophical aspirations. If his “first thought” was science, then his “second thought” was man, and only his “third thought” was God, for he saw in religion a “universal key” to solving human problems. Having begun to study the “human lot” (under the influence of reading Montaigne’s “Essays”, the books of K. Jansen, especially “On the Inner Man”), he discovered the astonishing underdevelopment of the science of man and summarized: “The inability to study man forces me to study everything else.” Meanwhile, “in my moral ignorance,” Pascal is convinced, “the science of external things will not console me in a moment of sorrow, whereas the science of morality will always console me in my ignorance of external things” (5: 503, fr. 23). Thus, “one must know oneself, if this does not help to find the truth, then at least it will help to direct life well, and in this lies all justice” (5: 508, fr. 72). But in the study of man, the strict “geometric method” turns out to be powerless, because here it is impossible to give unambiguous definitions (philosophers, for example, have 288 different opinions on the Supreme Good and the same “discord” of opinions on happiness, good and evil, the meaning of life, etc.), nor to arrange everything in an axiomatic-deductive order. Then Pascal decided to proceed from empirical observations of human life, and the first thing that struck him was the “abyss of contradictions” in man, as if he had “not one soul” but “many souls” struggling with each other. “Man infinitely surpasses man.” He records the main antinomy – the “greatness” and “insignificance” of man. \u201cAll the greatness of man consists in his thought,\u201d Pascal repeats many times in his Pens\u00e9es. Here is his famous fragment: \u201cMan is the weakest reed in nature, but he is a thinking reed. There is no need for the whole universe to rise up to crush him: a drop of steam, a drop of water is enough to kill him; but if the universe were to destroy him, man is still nobler than that which kills him, for he knows that he is dying, and he knows of the superiority it has over him, while the universe knows nothing of this. Thus, all our dignity consists in thought. It alone elevates us, and not space and time, which we cannot fill. Let us strive to think well: this is the basis of morality\u201d (5: 528, fr. 200).<\/span><\/p>\n

And yet this \u201cCartesian note\u201d does not dominate his worldview, for there is a \u201cgood heart\u201d that feels God and is full of love for people, which is higher and nobler than a well-reasoning mind. It is the \u201cheart\u201d that constitutes the deep foundation of personality, the spiritual core of the \u201cinner man\u201d (sincere, sincere, \u201cgenuine\u201d), in contrast to the \u201couter man\u201d that is ruled by the \u201cweathervane mind,\u201d which does not proceed from love and mercy, but from \u201ccold\u201d arguments and proofs. Therefore, the \u201cheart\u201d is the \u201csubject of the moral order\u201d as the highest of the three orders of being that are not reducible to each other: just as from all the bodies in nature taken together one cannot obtain a \u201cgrain of mind,\u201d so from all the minds taken together one cannot obtain a \u201cgrain of love,\u201d for this is \u201canother order\u201d (see 5: 540, fr. 308). “The moral order of being” is so superior to the “intellectual” and even more so to the “physical” that Pascal considers it “supernatural”, going back to God himself. So the mature Pascal overcame his youthful rationalism and “put reason in its place”, not absolutizing it, like Descartes, but not belittling it either. Yes, “all the greatness of man is in thought”, Pascal repeats and sadly sighs: “But how stupid it is!” Sometimes he speaks ironically about the “insignificance” of reason: What a funny hero!<\/span><\/p>\n

A fly buzzes in his ear and now he is no longer able to \u201cthink well\u201d. Alas, many things \u201ctear the mind off its hinges\u201d: imagination, illness, personal interest, passions, etc. Nevertheless, thought is an attribute, an essential property of man: \u201cone can imagine a man without arms, without legs, and even without a head\u2026 but one cannot imagine a man without thought. He would be a stone or an animal\u201d (5: 513, fr. 111). But \u201cgreatness\u201d and \u201cinsignificance\u201d are just as characteristic of the \u201cheart\u201d of man, for it contains both faith in God and \u201cabysses of love and mercy for people\u201d, as well as, alas, \u201cabysses of selfishness and sin\u201d (see 5: 635-636, fr. 978). This is the moral “greatness” and “insignificance” of man. Ontological “greatness” and “insignificance” are clearly visible from the fragment about the “thinking reed”. It is also demonstrated by the high spiritual dignity of life and at the same time its brevity on the scale of the Universe: “A shadow that flashed for a moment and disappeared forever.” In the epistemological sense, “greatness” consists in the love of truth, the search for it and its acquisition, the “endless progress of knowledge”, and “insignificance” – in errors and mistakes, the impossibility of knowing the fullness of absolute truth. In a word, “greatness” and “insignificance” are so “organically intertwined” in man that they represent some kind of “mysterious paradox” of his very essence: “the greatness of man is so obvious that it follows from his insignificance”, and, conversely, “every insignificance of man itself proves his greatness. This is the insignificance of the great lord. “The insignificance of a king deprived of his throne” (5:513, fr. 117, 116). “The mystery of the human being” is not subject to either science or secular philosophy: only in the Christian religion did Pascal find the key to its solution: original sin has fundamentally damaged the original perfection, i.e. the greatness of man given by God, and has thrown him into the “abyss of insignificance”, which is why both principles in him are in eternal conflict. He understands perfectly well that such an explanation is “a scandal for reason”, but without the “mystery of original sin” man is even more incomprehensible than this “mystery” is incomprehensible to man. “The lot of man” – vanity, care, anxiety, inconstancy, mental and physical suffering – give rise to the “tragic dialectic” of his existence, both individual and social. In society, force rules, not reason, wars prevail (“the worst of evils”), not civil peace (“the greatest of goods”). Amid social ills and evils, Pascal dreams of an “empire of reason”, “enlightened absolutism” as opposed to an “empire of power”, violence and injustice. The tragedy of human life, the impossibility of achieving peace and happiness in this world force him to seek the Supreme Good not in some transient earthly goods, but in God, the absolute object of love, the source of consolation and salvation.<\/span><\/p>\n

The doctrine of God.<\/span><\/strong>\u00a0All the “dead ends” and paradoxes of Pascal’s philosophy “converge” in his religious doctrine and receive their absolute solution in it. Only the Christian religion, he is convinced, explains well the contradictions, antinomies and mysteries of the human being, therefore it is the only true religion: “The true nature of man, his good, virtue, as well as true religion, are inseparable from each other and are known only in unity” (5: 548, fr. 393). He reduces the “secret of anthropology” to the “secret of theology”, and his religious explanation of man turns into an anthropological and psychological justification of religion. Pascal, in contrast to Descartes and all deists, professes not the “religion of reason”, but the “religion of the heart”: “The heart feels God, not the mind. This is what faith is” (5: 552, fr. 424), for it is equally incomprehensible to reason that God exists and that He does not. Reason, according to Pascal, is an “external instance” in man, which does not touch his “deep essence”. At the level of reason, faith is unstable and superficial, as if “gliding over the soul”, barely touching it, fluctuating depending on the strength or “weight” of the arguments “pro and contra”. Hence, of the three paths to faith – reason, habit and “inspiration” – he considers reason the most unreliable when it determines the starting position. Meanwhile, it can play only a “secondary role” when faith is already a fact. The subtlest psychology of faith rests not on compulsory rational clarity, but on “the mystery of man’s free and absolute election of God”. “The sacrament of faith”, like the “sacrament of love”, is a gift from God: in both cases “marriages are made in heaven”, by “the inspiration of God”. And any “external inquisition” is powerless here, including the “inquisition of reason”. Any agitation for or against religious faith, personal or social agitation, is completely meaningless and even immoral, as is “agitation for or against love”. There is a kind of “antinomy of faith and evidence”: the more of the latter, the less faith, and the more faith, the less evidence is required. Later, G. Marcel will say that evidence is “a scandal for faith”. In this light, one paradoxical opinion of the believer Pascal is understandable: “Atheism is a sign (marque) of strength of mind, but only to a certain extent” (5: 522, fr. 157). The publishers from Port-Royal did not understand \u201ctheir saint\u201d and changed marque to manque (deficiency), they changed just one letter and got \u201cthe meaning they liked\u201d: \u201cAtheism is a deficiency of the mind…\u201d – but Pascal did not say this, because he believed that all the arguments of atheists against God are correct, but \u201ctheir conclusion is incorrect\u201d, because the arguments here \u201chave nothing to do with it\u201d.<\/span><\/p>\n

All rationalistic versions of religion (in the spirit of deism, the \u201creligion of the first impulse\u201d), all theology as rationalized theology are rejected by Pascal from the point of view of the \u201cantinomy of faith and reason\u201d. He perceptively saw the anti-Christian essence of deism, noting in his \u201cPens\u00e9es\u201d: \u201cDeism is as far from the Christian religion as atheism, which is completely opposed to it\u201d (5: 557, fr. 449). Despite all of Descartes\u2019 \u201cmost Christian reservations\u201d, he considers him a deist and exposes the anti-religious subtext of his philosophy, in which the \u201ccult of reason\u201d reigns over the \u201ccult of religion\u201d: \u201cI cannot forgive Descartes for his desire to get rid of God in his entire philosophy, but he could not do without Him, having resorted to the Divine first impulse to set the world in motion, after which he no longer needs God\u201d (5: 640, fr. 1001). Pascal summarizes his understanding of God with the famous “dichotomy” in the “Memorial”: “The God of Abraham, the God of Isaac, the God of Jacob, and not the God of philosophers and scientists, the creator of geometrical truths” (5: 618, fr. 913). The “personal God” is comprehended only by the paths indicated by the Gospel. The idea of \u200b\u200ba “personal God” in Pascal has several shades of meaning: 1) it is not a transcendent Absolute, “a great, powerful and eternal being” before whom they tremble and revere, but an existential God-savior, i.e. Jesus Christ; 2) the “personal God” is the teacher of humanity, a moral ideal, to follow which is the personal duty of a Christian; 3) in communication with God, man is not a \u201ctrembling creature,\u201d but an independent personality whose will interacts with the will of God: \u201cHe who created us without us cannot save us without us,\u201d is the leitmotif of the \u201cWorks on Grace\u201d; 4) such a God is comprehended in a uniquely personal way through \u201cinspiration\u201d; 5) external cult recedes into the background before the \u201cheartfelt attachment\u201d to God. God favors not temples, but the pure and meek heart of a Christian. Pascal castigates \u201cexternal faith\u201d in the spirit of the Jesuit religion, which does not affect the \u201cinner man\u201d and is focused on the ritual attributes of faith (see \u201cLetters to a Provincial\u201d).<\/span><\/p>\n

Psychological insight in interpreting the phenomenon of faith, the emphasis on the spiritual freedom of man determined Pascal’s religious tolerance, who did not allow either hatred or hostility towards non-believers and atheists, and spoke out against the practice of violence in matters of faith (the Crusades, the persecution of dissenters, the Inquisition, the “witch hunt”, etc.). He referred to the Gospels, in which “there is not a single harsh word against the enemies and tormentors of Jesus Christ” (5: 603, fr. 812). Here is the credo of Pascal’s humane position: “God, who governs everything with meekness, imputes religion to the minds, and to the heart – through Grace, but the desire to introduce religion into the mind and heart by force and threats means instilling not religion, but horror. Rather terror than religion” (5: 523, fr. 172). He identifies four groups of people according to their attitude to religion. The first group includes those who have found God and serve him faithfully, they are truly happy. The second group includes those who are looking for God but have not yet found Him, they are unhappy but not hopeless. The third group includes atheists who fundamentally do not believe in God and the immortality of the soul, they are hopeless and unhappy. Finally, the fourth group includes those who are indifferent to religion and live \u201cone day at a time\u201d, they are \u201cmad\u201d and also unhappy. Pascal pities all these \u201cunfortunates\u201d, because they have already been punished by the very fact of their unbelief.<\/span><\/p>\n

The immanentistic existential character of Pascal’s religion turns his conceived “Apology…” into a self-contradictory procedure: if faith needs justification and protection, it means that it is under threat – the paradox of the “Apology…” arises, which Pascal himself felt. “The path of reason” with its logic and arguments cannot lead to true faith, but can serve an auxiliary purpose: to disturb the peace of unbelievers, “to loosen the soil” for the emergence of interest in questions of faith, etc., if only reason does not exceed the boundaries of its competence. In vain did Voltaire – Pascal’s eternal ideological enemy – “mock” his famous “argument-wager”, considering it both “childish” and frivolous, not corresponding to the importance of the subject. This argument, of course, cannot lead to faith, but it is quite capable of \u201cshaking\u201d the position of the unbeliever: if a finite and unhappy earthly life is \u201cpitched\u201d, then one can \u201cwin\u201d the infinity of a happy life with God, and in the case of a \u201closs\u201d \u2014 nothing to lose. In addition, Pascal believes that reason saves man from \u201csuperstition\u201d, which opposes faith to reason and presents religion in an \u201cabsurd and ridiculous light\u201d, while it should be \u201csensible and understandable\u201d. There is an opinion that Pascal, as a scientist, \u201csuffered from the lack of evidence for faith\u201d and wrote the \u201cApology…\u201d for himself (see 7: 286). But he has a very well-thought-out position, in which \u201ceverything\u201d has its place. Pascal has his own \u201cspecial path\u201d to religion, although he formally belonged through Port-Royal to the Jansenist movement in Catholicism, condemned by the Vatican as \u201cheresy\u201d.<\/span><\/p>\n

Pascal’s world of thought exerted a huge influence on all subsequent culture. Leo Tolstoy considered him a “teacher of humanity” and called him “a philosopher-prophet, who foresaw the truth through the heads of the centuries.” Pascal anticipated a number of ideas of Leibniz, P. Bayle, Rousseau, Helvetius, Kant, Schopenhauer, Scheler and many others. Existentialists trace their philosophy to Pascal. His “metaphysics and religion of the heart” is especially close to Russian culture. Florensky found in Pascal “some special affinity with Orthodoxy.”<\/span><\/p>\n

Literature<\/span><\/strong><\/h5>\n

1. Pascal B.<\/span><\/em>\u00a0Thoughts \/ Trans. Ginzburg Yu. A. M., 1995.<\/span><\/p>\n

2. Pascal B.<\/span><\/em>\u00a0On the geometric mind and the art of persuasion \/\/ Streltsova G. Ya. Pascal and European culture. Appendices. Moscow, 1994.<\/span><\/p>\n

3. Pascal B.<\/span><\/em>\u00a0Conversation with de Sacy about Epictetus and Montaigne \/\/ Ibid.<\/span><\/p>\n

4. Pascal B.<\/span><\/em>\u00a0Letters to a Provincial. St. Petersburg, 1898.<\/span><\/p>\n

5. Pascal B.<\/span><\/em>\u00a0Complete works [par L. Lafuma]. P., 1963.<\/span><\/p>\n

6. Streltsova G. Ya.<\/span><\/em>\u00a0Pascal (Thinkers of the Past). M., 1979.<\/span><\/p>\n

7. Streltsova G. Ya.<\/span><\/em>\u00a0Pascal and European Culture. Moscow, 1994.<\/span><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Blaise Pascal was born in 1623 in Clermont-Ferrand to the royal councilor of the financial and tax district of Auvergne, Etienne Pascal, and the daughter of a local judge, Antoinette Begon, who died when her son was only two and a half years old. Pascal’s family belonged to the judicial “nobility of the robe”. Pascal’s father, a widely educated intellectual, a gifted mathematician and a talented educator (in the spirit of Montaigne’s humanistic pedagogy), after the death…<\/p>\n

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