Part 90

P. 58. l. 20. Brave deeds. Borrowed from Montaigne, Essais, l. i. ch. xl.

P. 61. Of Justice, etc. These fragments, now among the best known of Pascal's Thoughts, but for the most part brought to notice in the Edition of Bossut, 1779, have their present arrangement and title from Molinier.

P. 61, l. 30. Nihil amplius. These sentences, borrowed from Montaigne, are quoted, the first of them wrongly, from Cicero, De Finibus, v. 21; the second from Seneca, Ad Lucilium, Ep. 95; the third from Tacitus, Annales, iii. 25. Compare with the whole passage Montaigne, Essais, l. ii. ch. xii. and l. iii. ch. xiii.

P. 62, l. 29. Quum veritatem. S. Aug., De Civit. Dei, iv. 31. From Montaigne, Essais, l. ii. ch. iii.

P. 62, l. 27. the wisest of law givers. Socrates, in the Republic of Plato.

P. 63, l. 9. Archesilas. Born at Pitane in Æolis of a Scythian father, about 300 B.C. He was founder of the School known as the Second Academy. See Montaigne, Essais, l. ii. ch. iii.

P. 64, l. 19. For all that is here said on Custom, see Montaigne, Essais, l. i. ch. xxii.

P. 65, l. 7. Pasce oves meas. Joh. xxi. 17. The words are those taken as the foundation of papal authority. You owe me pasturage, i.e. you owe me justice.

P. 65, l. 30. the soldiers of Mahomet, thieves, heretics. Pascal boldly joins heretics and thieves, for those who did not hold his creed appeared to him as men sans foi ni loi, faithless and lawless. In his eyes a Turk was scarce a man. See the Provincial Letters, let. xiv. "Sont-ce des religieux et des prêtres qui parlent de cette sorte? Sont-ce des Chrétiens? Sont-ce des Tures? Sont-ce des demons?" And Thoughts, p. 211, l. 30. "Do we not see beasts live and die like men, and Turks like Christians."

P. 66, l. 6. The Swiss. See note on p. 56, l. 20.

P. 66, l. 10. condemning so many Spaniards to death. Possibly an allusion to the battle of the Dunes, 1659, which led to the Peace of the Pyrenees, so long desired by all but Spain, then obliged to consent.

P. 67, l. 13. Summum jus, summa injuria. Charron, Traité de la Sagesse, etc. ch. xxvii. art. 8.

P. 67, l. 26. The end of the Twelfth Provincial. The following is the passage to which Pascal alludes. "C'est une etrange et longue guerre que celle où la violence essaye d'opprimer la vérité. Tons les efforts de la violence ne peuvent affaiblir la vérité, et ne servent qu'à la relever davantage. Toutes les lumières de la vérité ne peuvent rien pour arrêter la violence et ne font que l'irriter encore plus ... la violence et la vérité ne peuvent rien l'une sur l'autre."

P. 67, l. 27. The Fronde. This was the name given to the party which rose against Mazarin and the Court during the minority of Louis XIV., and plunged France into civil war.

P. 69, l. 10. give me the strap. This is no exaggeration, since fifty years after Pascal wrote, Voltaire was beaten by the servants of the Duc de Rohan.

P. 69, l. 12. It is odd that Montaigne. Essais, l. i. ch. xlii.

P. 69, l. 16. When power attacks craft. Satyre Menippée, Harangue du Sire de Rieux: "il n'y a ny bonnet quarré, ny bourlet, que je ne face voler."

P. 69, l. 30. figmentum malum. Ps. ciii. 13. Quomodo miseretur pater filiorum, misertus est Dominus timentibus se: Quoniam ipse cognovit figmentum nostrum.

P. 70, l. 14. Savages laugh at an infant king. Pascal is alluding to the story in Montaigne, Essais, l. i. ch. xxx., of the savages presented to Charles IX. at Rouen, who were astonished to see bearded men obey a child.

P. 72, l. 16. Epictetus. See p. 45, l. 30, in order to understand this somewhat enigmatic fragment. In the next paragraph is an allusion to the passage in which Epictetus says, l. iv. ch. 7, that the philosopher may well be constant and detached from life by wisdom, as were the Galilæans by their fanaticism.

P. 73. Weakness, unrest, and defects of man. The arrangements of these fragments under this title is Molinier's.

P. 73, l. 1. We anticipate the future. Compare Montaigne, Essais, l. i. ch. iii.

P. 74, l. 28. Alexander's chastity. To attribute this virtue to Alexander is strange, but no doubt the circumstance in Pascal's thought was his generous conduct to the family of Darius, after the battle of Issus.

P. 75, l. 12. the King of England. Probably Charles II., then living in exile, rather than Charles I. The King of Poland was Jean Casimir, driven from his throne by Charles X. of Sweden, after the battle of Warsaw in 1656. The Queen of Sweden was Christina, daughter of Gustavus Adolphus, who abdicated in favour of her cousin, Charles X., in 1654.

P. 75, l. 29. we shall die alone, "on mourra seul." It is a curious instance of the fact how little Pascal is known in England, that Keble having quoted this sentence wrongly, probably from memory, in the first edition of the Christian Year, as "Je mourrai seul," it has remained uncorrected and apparently unnoticed to this day.

P. 76, l. 12. Cromwell. As Charles II. was restored in 1660, this fragment was written about that date, two years before Pascal's death. Cromwell's death did not arise from the cause stated in the text.

P. 77, l. 8. the automaton. The expression of Descartes and his school for the animal body.

P. 77, l. 25. Inclina cor meum, Deus. Ps. cxix. 36. "Inclina cor meum in testimonia tua, et non in avaritiam."