Pensées — Blaise Pascal

Pensées

Blaise Pascal · License: Public domain · Source

• _Agnus occisus est ab origine mundi._[262] A sacrificing judge. SECTION X · ¶2100
• _Contradictions._--The sceptre till the Messiah--without king or prince. SECTION X · ¶2102
• The eternal covenant--a new covenant. SECTION X · ¶2104
• Good laws--bad precepts. Ezekiel. SECTION X · ¶2105
• _Types._--When the word of God, which is really true, is false literally, it is true spiritually. _Sede a dextris meis:_[263] this is false literally, therefore it is true spiritually. SECTION X · ¶2107
• In these expressions, God is spoken of after the manner of men; and this means nothing else but that the intention which men have in giving a seat at their right hand, God will have also. It is then an indication of the intention of God, not of His manner of carrying it out. SECTION X · ¶2108
• I do not say that the _mem_ is mystical. SECTION X · ¶2112
• Moses (Deut. xxx) promises that God will circumcise their heart to render them capable of loving Him. SECTION X · ¶2114
• The Old Testament is a cipher. SECTION X · ¶2119
• Now Moses, David, and Isaiah used the same terms. Who will say then that they have not the same meaning, and that David's meaning, which is plainly iniquities when he spoke of enemies, was not the same as [_that of_] Moses when speaking of enemies? SECTION X · ¶2123
• And what crowns all this is prediction, so that it should not be said that it is chance which has done it. SECTION XI · ¶2130
• Whosoever, having only a week to live, will not find out that it is expedient to believe that all this is not a stroke of chance ... SECTION XI · ¶2131
• Now, if the passions had no hold on us, a week and a hundred years would amount to the same thing. SECTION XI · ¶2132
• _Prophecies._--Great Pan is dead.[267] SECTION XI · ¶2134
• _Susceperunt verbum cum omni aviditate, scrutantes Scripturas, si ita se haberent._[268] SECTION XI · ¶2136
• _Prodita lege._--_Impleta cerne._--_Implenda collige._ SECTION XI · ¶2138
• We understand the prophecies only when we see the events happen. Thus the proofs of retreat, discretion, silence, etc. are proofs only to those who know and believe them. SECTION XI · ¶2140
• Joseph so internal in a law so external. SECTION XI · ¶2141
• Outward penances dispose to inward, as humiliations to humility. Thus the ... SECTION XI · ¶2142
• The synagogue has preceded the church; the Jews, the Christians. The prophets have foretold the Christians; Saint John, Jesus Christ. SECTION XI · ¶2144
• It is glorious to see with the eyes of faith the history of Herod and of Cæsar. SECTION XI · ¶2146
• The zeal of the Jews for their law and their temple (Josephus, and Philo the Jew, _Ad Caïum_). What other people had such a zeal? It was necessary they should have it. SECTION XI · ¶2148
• Jesus Christ foretold as to the time and the state of the world. The ruler taken from the thigh,[269] and the fourth monarchy. How lucky we are to see this light amidst this darkness! SECTION XI · ¶2149
• How fine it is to see, with the eyes of faith, Darius and Cyrus, Alexander, the Romans, Pompey and Herod working, without knowing it, for the glory of the Gospel! SECTION XI · ¶2150
• Zeal of the Jewish people for the law, especially after there were no more prophets. SECTION XI · ¶2152
• While the prophets were for maintaining the law, the people were indifferent. But since there have been no more prophets, zeal has succeeded them. SECTION XI · ¶2154
• The devil troubled the zeal of the Jews before Jesus Christ, because he would have been their salvation, but not since. SECTION XI · ¶2156
• The Jewish people scorned by the Gentiles; the Christian people persecuted. SECTION XI · ¶2157
• _Proof._--Prophecies with their fulfilment; what has preceded and what has followed Jesus Christ. SECTION XI · ¶2159
• But it was not enough that the prophecies should exist. It was necessary that they should be distributed throughout all places, and preserved throughout all times. And in order that this agreement might not be taken for an effect of chance, it was necessary that this should be foretold. SECTION XI · ¶2163
• It is far more glorious for the Messiah that the Jews should be the spectators, and even the instruments of His glory, besides that God had reserved them. SECTION XI · ¶2164
• _Prophecies._--The time foretold by the state of the Jewish people, by the state of the heathen, by the state of the temple, by the number of years. SECTION XI · ¶2166
• One must be bold to predict the same thing in so many ways. It was necessary that the four idolatrous or pagan monarchies, the end of the kingdom of Judah, and the seventy weeks, should happen at the same time, and all this before the second temple was destroyed. SECTION XI · ¶2168
• _Prophecies._--If one man alone had made a book of predictions about Jesus Christ, as to the time and the manner, and Jesus Christ had come in conformity to these prophecies, this fact would have infinite weight. SECTION XI · ¶2170
• This same Joseph, when dying, bade his children carry his bones with them when they should go into that land, to which they only came two hundred years afterwards. SECTION XI · ¶2175
• The prophecies about particular things are mingled with those about the Messiah, so that the prophecies of the Messiah should not be without proofs, nor the special prophecies without fruit. SECTION XI · ¶2178
• _Perpetual captivity of the Jews._--Jer. xi, 11: "I will bring evil upon Judah from which they shall not be able to escape." SECTION XI · ¶2180
• "I will then wait in patience upon the Lord that hideth and concealeth Himself from the house of Jacob." SECTION XI · ¶2183
• _Prophecies. Proofs of Divinity._--Is. xli: "Shew the things that are to come hereafter, that we may know that ye are gods: we will incline our heart unto your words. Teach us the things that have been at the beginning, and declare us things for to come. SECTION XI · ¶2186
• Is. xlii: "I am the Lord, and my glory will I not give to another. I have foretold the things which have come to pass, and things that are to come do I declare. Sing unto God a new song in all the earth. SECTION XI · ¶2188

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