Pascal on Justice

Pascal on Justice, Force, and Law

A, J. Beitzinger

This paper focuses on Pascal's controversial pronouncements on justice, forceand law. It proceeds, in light of a preliminary examination of historical context,questions of textual interpretation, and Pascal's method and study of man, toshow in Pascal's thought a theory of law which (a) rejects rationalist andnaturalist explanations, (b) incorporates positivism and by implication what istoday called "historicism," and (c) transcends both positivism and historicismdialectically in a Christocentric biblical view of cosmic order.

Let no one say that I have said nothing new; the arrangement of thematerial is new. In playing tennis both players use the same ball, but oneplays it better.

- Blaise Pascal, Pensees, 696(22)

Voltaire called Blaise Pascal (1623-1662) a "sublime misan-thrope." Chateaubriand asked, "what might that great man havebecome had he not been a Christian?" More recently AndreSuares declared that Pascal, with God removed, is "the most ac-complished of nihilists"; Lester Crocker concluded that "Sade . . .is only 'a Pascal without God' "; while Jacques Maritain deploredPascal's "Christian cynicism." From another angle Karl Lowithdescribed him as "the first Existentialist of the modern age"; Lu-cien Goldmann pronounced him "the first modern man": ErnestMortimer wrote of him as a "Realist"; and Ernst Cassirer ob-served: "In him are united all the advantages of modern literatureand modern philosophy."1 Misanthrope, nihilist, cynic, existen-tialist, realist, modern man, and yet Christian. Surely there ismore than one contradiction involved here, contradictions whichbespeak a subtle, complex man whose work remains vibrantlyalive, open and instructive, while both challenging andchallenged.

This study attempts to reach an understanding of Pascal andhis contemporary relevance by focusing on his controversial pro-nouncements on justice, force, and law. This phase of his thoughthas evoked increasing attention in this century as part of thegeneral resurgence of interest in Pascalian studies which havebenefited from carefully researched and revised editions of thePensees.2 The paper begins with considerations of historical and in-tellectual context, textual interpretation, Pascal's method, and hisstudy of man. Against this background it proceeds to disclose in

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PASCAL ON JUSTICE 213

Pascal's thought the outlines of a coherent theory of law. Thistheory rejects nonhistorical rationalist and naturalist formula-tions, incorporates positivism and by implication what today iscalled "historicism," and transcends both dialectically in aChristocentric view of cosmic order.

HISTORICAL AND INTELLECTUAL CONTEXT

Pascal lived in an age of dislocation regarding man's relationto nature and the criteria of religion and philosophy. The Refor-mation, in its assertion of the primacy of individual conscience,had brought a loss of unity in religion and a diminution ofauthority. In the Catholic Counter-Reformation theologicaldispute ensued in France between the Jesuits and Jansenists con-cerning the relation between nature and grace. The Jesuits, pur-suing a modernized Thomistic naturalism, generally stressed avital though wounded nature left to man after the Fall. TheJansenists, although they attempted to avoid Lutheran andCalvinist positions, proceeded from an Augustinian foundation toemphasize man's corruption. Because their theology was one of athoroughgoing supernaturalism, the Jansenists denied the notionof a human nature. As they saw it, man, in the Fall, lost not hissupernatural goal but the means to its realization.3 (Pascal'sdefense of the Jansenist cause against the "modernism" of theJesuits came in his literary masterpiece, The Provincial Letters.)

Following upon Copernicus and Galileo the New Science ef-fected the displacement of teleological, qualitative explanations ofnature by a mechanistic conception of the universe describedmathematically. Reality was no longer seen in terms of forms andends arranged hierarchically but of forces, motions, changes ofmass in space and time, and descriptive laws. This view was com-plemented by a vogue of nominalism in philosophy. Nominalismdenied intelligible essences, discarded the Scholastic conception ofnature as reason written into things {ratio indita rebus) by divineart, and relegated meaning to a function of will with stress uponthe primacy of particulars and the artificiality of wholes. Causali-ty was thus reduced from necessary connection to mere regularsuccession.

Skepticism, the crise pyrrhonienne in religion, knowledge andmorals, came to be personified in Montaigne, whose campaignagainst dogmatism attacked human reason, exalted custom andissued in apolitical conservatism and Epicurean conduct.

214 THE REVIEW OF POLITICS

Dogmatism was best exemplified in a neo-Stoicism which em-phasized the autonomy of human reason and man's ability to at-tain self-sufficiency and tranquillity. In like vein rationalism in-volved an attempt to escape from skepticism through the Carte-sian movement from the dubito to the cogito and on to the distinc-tion between res extensa (object) and res cogitans (subject). The pro-cedure (more geometrico), entailing reduction of wholes to simpleelements, ideas or principles, and deductive reconstructiontherefrom, became a paradigm for scientific and philosophical in-quiry.

In politics the age of absolutism issued in the wake of civil andreligious wars. Raison d'etat and the assertion of the primacy andautonomy of power implied the reduction of law to a superiorkind of force. Jurisprudence was marked by attempts to regainunity and coherence through resort to a revivified natural lawepitomized in rationalist, universalist constructs. Grotius, whosework was known to Pascal, wrote: "I confess truly, that asmathematicians consider Forms abstracted from Bodies; so I, intreating of Right, have withdrawn my mind from all singularFacts." He saw the ultimate principles of law as plain and self-evident. Accordingly the will was not identified by him as thesource of law and right, but as the faculty which puts preexisting,unchangeable and universal ideas into execution (ius quia iustum).Thus Grotius pronounced: "The Law of Nature is so Immutablethat God himself cannot alter it." At the same time Hobbes, avoluntarist with whom Pascal was acquainted, proceeded moregeometrico to deduce from the primal right to self-preservation con-clusions which he called "laws of nature."4

QUESTIONS OF INTERPRETATION '

Pascal remarked in a significant fragment that "every authorhas a meaning which reconciles all contradictory passages, or elsehe has no meaning at all." To grasp Pascal's own meaning wemust understand that his main observations on justice, force andlaw were made in the Pensees, a work which constitutes thefragmentary basis for his projected but never completed "Apologyof the Christian Religion."5

The specific and restricted audience addressed by Pacal con-sisted of members of the social world he had frequented before hisown conversion: "the cultured, intelligent libertins [freethinkers]who preferred polite agnosticism to militant atheism, whose ideal


was honnetete, a gentlemanly code governed more by etiquette thanethics and whose model was Montaigne." They were generally"easygoing, heedless materialists for whom tomorrow was anotherday and self-interest the best investment." Also included werethose who relied on human reason and justice to judge adverselythe Christian biblical God and his justice. Pascal's purpose was tomove his readers, turn them around by rhetoric, logic, passionand appeal to facts. He would dethrone the goddess reason androut the demon doubt while using both in his task.6

Such a task involved first a recognition of the world as a mov-ing and inseparable admixture of the true and the false, and sec-ond a search for a fixed point. In Pascal's words: "Wheneverything is moving at once, nothing appears to be moving, ason board ship. When everyone is moving towards depravity, noone seems to be moving, but if someone stops he shows up theothers who are rushing on, by acting as a fixed point." Pascal's"fixed point" and reconciling principle was: "Jesus Christ is the ob-ject of all things, the center toward which all things tend.Whoever knows him knows the reason for everything"; in him "allcontradictions are reconciled." It followed that "everything whichdoes not lead to charity [amor dei] is figurative." Because "figure in-cludes absence and presence," while "reality excludes absence,"words such as justice and truth are equivocal unless seen from the"fixed point."7

To achieve his end, which must not be misconstrued as merefideistic assertion, Pascal accepted and proceeded from theassumptions underlying the New Science (as generally did his in-tended audience) and drew from them conclusions which he usedagainst the modern spirit. Apparently the final form of the"Apology" was to consist of letters and dialogical and dialecticalinterchanges between interlocutors whose differing perspectiveswere ultimately to be reconciled in light of the central object.Thus it is improbable that the aphoristic fragmentary form wouldhave been preserved in the finished work. It may be that it is ourgood fortune to have the Pensees as they are; Eric Voegelin hasreminded us that a writer using an aphoristic style preserves inthe presentation of his ideas the experiences and sentiments whichgave them rise. Pascal himself wrote in a key fragment: "I willwrite down my thoughts here as they come and in a perhaps notaimless confusion. This is the true order and it will always showmy aim by its very disorder." We are thus amply warned that at-


tempts to systematize Pascal's thought are at best hazardous. Forthe same reason it can readily be said that in the Pensks one en-counters more than a book; one meets a man. In any case, asLowith has remarked, Pascal reset "the compass of the Christianfaith in accordance with a changed universe." To grasp Pascal'smeaning regarding man, justice, force, and law, one must con-strue in light of the intended audience, the dialectical character ofthe work, the notion of the figurative nature of the world, and thecentral unifying, integrating and reconciling authority of the"fixed point." Ignore or remove the "fixed point" and one canreadily agree that the man one confronts in the Pensks was indeeda misanthrope, however sublime.8

PASCAL'S METHOD

In what can be regarded as a self-characterization, Pascalwrote in a fragment: "'sceptic, mathematician, Christian," maintainingthat one must know when it is right to doubt, to affirm, to submit.Men who run counter to this principle either dogmatically affirmthat all can be proved, because they know nothing about proof, ordoubt because they know not when to submit, or continually sub-mit, because they know not when judgment is called for. In con-trast to the Cartesian linear approach, Pascal distinguished threeways to knowledge. The geometric mind {esprit geometrique) pro-ceeds from a great number of principles without confoundingthem, and draws conclusions. Discriminating or intuitive mind{esprit fin) consists in seeing the thing at a glance and not throughprogressive reasoning. Experimental method appeals to ex-perience by submitting to the facts.9

Closely related to these classifications is Pascal's distinctionbetween three discontinuous orders in man's structure and in ex-istence: corps (body), the material and concupiscent sphere knownthrough the senses and involving mechanical dependence onhabit, memory and custom; esprit (mind), which works throughratiocination; and coeur (heart), which, besides being, in itshighest reaches, the seat of charite (love of God), works through thewill to bring intellectual assent and action, and is the organ of in-tuition which senses first principles. Thus experimental methodrelates to corps, geometric mind to esprit, and discriminating mindto coeur. Facts are observed and submitted to; mathematical prop-ositions are proven; first principles are felt. As a youngmathematician Pascal solved the problem of finding the principle


from which all properties of conic sections can be deduced by theinvention of what he called "the mystic hexagram," an original no-tion which renders the properties intelligible. This evidenced thathe possessed the rare combination of esprit geometrique and esprit fin.He later showed that the center of gravity of a cycloid and of thesurfaces or volumes dependent upon this curve can be foundthrough consideration of the properties of triangular numbers. Asa physicist he turned to experimental method to prove the ex-istence of the vacuum in nature which Cartesian reason haddenied. Pascal taught that for physical truth (and the study ofman), close observation and submission to facts take precedenceover deductive reasoning.. And yet, no analysis of facts alone cansuffice; interpretation and hypotheses are necessary. To prove ahypothesis, however, it requires more than that all the observedphenomena should agree with it; all rival hypotheses must beeliminated.10

There thus existed no single method for Pascal. Engulfed inthe twofold infinities of greatness and smallness, man can knowneither beginning nor end. One cannot know parts without know-ing the whole, or the whole without knowing the parts. On thispoint he stood strongly against the Cartesian (and Hobbesian)method which attempted to identify elements comprising a wholeand then reconstruct by juxtaposing the parts. Similarly, he con-tended that contradiction is no more an infallible indication offalsehood than its lack is an indication of truth. In like vein hemaintained that we have an idea of the infinite and of truth and ofjustice in the absolute sense, but we cannot know them: "Justiceand truth are two points so subtle that our instruments are tooblunt to touch them exactly." Resolution of these difficulties is"beyond dogmatism and scepticism." The ultimate reconciliationof contraries and antinomies can be effected not on the plane ofreason whether geometric (Cartesian) or, it might be added, im-manent (Hegelian), but only in a higher order; "Reason's last stepis the recognition that there are an infinite number of thingswhich are beyond it."11

STUDY OF MAN

Pascal recalled in the Pensees: "I had spent a long time studyingthe abstract sciences, and I was put off them by seeing how littleone could communicate about them. When I began the study ofman I saw that these abstract sciences are not proper to man, and


that I was straying further from my true condition by going intothem than were others by being ignorant of them. I forgave othersfor not knowing much about them, but I thought I should at leastfind many companions in my study of man, since it is his true andproper study. I was wrong. Even fewer people study man thanmathematics. It is only because they do not know how to studyman that people look into all the rest." Pascal considered ra-tionalistic or naturalistic approaches to be inapplicable to man, asubject which, because of its variety, subtlety, complexity, con-tradictions and mystery defies understanding on a purely logicalor factual analysis. In the Pensees Pascal described the facts ofman's condition which he construed as effects, the reason for whichhe found elsewhere because they do not contain it in themselves.(As in his work on conic sections he sought the one explanatoryhypothesis and showed the invalidity of alternative hypotheses.)Thus the first part concerns "Wretchedness of man without God,"or "Nature is corrupt, proved by nature itself; the second partconcerns "Happiness of man with God," or "There is a Redeemer,proved by Scripture."12

Man in the Universe. Pascal saw the universe of modern cosmologyas an infinite sphere whose center is everywhere and whose cir-cumference is nowhere. The infinity of greatness (without) is sup-plemented by the infinity of smallness (within): "The finite is an-nihilated in the presence of the infinite and becomes purenothingness." Man is cast into this cold, mute and indifferentuniverse which is no longer a cosmos informed by an immanentlogos with which his reason can feel akin. He is "a nothing com-pared to the infinite, a whole compared to nothing, a middle pointbetween the all and nothing, infinitely remote from anunderstanding of the extremes; the end of things and their prin-ciples are unattainably hidden by an impenetrable secrecy."13

Adrift in the universe, man experiences loneliness, terror,anxiety. His intelligence occupies the same rank in the order of in-tellect as does his body in the whole range of nature. He is "only areed, the weakest in nature," which can be crushed at any time bythe brute forces of nature; but he is "a thinking reed" (roseau pen-sant) who surpasses himself and transcends nature in that heknows that he is dying and that the universe has the advantageover him. As a "thinking reed" he no longer participates in themeaning of nature except through his bodily mechanism. In KarlLowith's words, all that remains to him is "radical, universal con-


tingency of existence without support." He is thus thrown backentirely upon himself in his quest for values since meaning is nolonger discovered but projected.14

Because man's grandeur lies in thought, Pascal maintainedthat "his whole duty is to think as he ought." But since he is a mix-ture of being and nonbeing, a "seeming mean" between the all andthe nothing, contradiction and incoherence are at his center.Logic and metaphysics are useless to define him since they canonly comprehend objects free from contradiction and possessed ofa consistent nature. Man is neither angel nor brute, and the un-fortunate thing is that he who would act the angel acts the brute.Pascal observed: "We are floating in a medium of vast extent,always drifting uncertainly . . . whenever we think we have afixed point to which we can cling and make fast, it shifts andleaves us behind. . . . Nothing stands still for us. This is ournatural state, and yet the state most contrary to our inclinations."Composed of mind and matter vertiginous man is incapable of aperfect knowledge of things simply spiritual or simply corporeal,much less a combination thereof.15

Finally, on a theological plane, Pascal saw the new cosmologyas presenting to man a universe incapable of showing its Creator'spurpose in its order, his perfection in its beauty, his goodness inits gifts, and his wisdom in their fitness. What remains is simply arevelation of his power in its magnitude. And, in Hans Jonas'swords, when the transcendent reference falls away, "the deusabsconditus, of whom nothing but will and power can bepredicated, leaves behind as his legacy . . . the homo absconditus, aconcept of man characterized solely by will and power." Suchwere the implications for man which Pascal derived from the NewScience.16

The Psychology of Man. Pascal described man's wretchedness interms of what he called the deceptive powers (les puissancestrompeuses) which, beyond the senses, reason and memory, in their"tricks" upon each other, include the imagination (the master oferror and falsehood), habit, vanity, pride, credulity, timidity, butabove all, self-love (amour-propre). Man's state becomes one of in-constancy, boredom and inquietude. A creature of movement("absolute rest is death"), he flees from himself to things, fromthings to himself, seeking relief in diversion {divertissement). Thediversions are worse than the boredom from which he seeksescape, because "they take us farther than anything else from the


search to cure our ills." Fallen man is plastic; custom and habitconstitute his being: "Who then can doubt that our soul, being ac-customed to see number, space, movement, believes in this andnothing else?" (Nature at large is questioned by Pascal: Might itnot be "first habit" with no necessity about it?) Man's root difficul-ty, however, is self-love. It brings him to flee the truth by makinghimself the center of all.17

Man in Society. Confronting the universe, man is frightened; con-fronting himself, he flees; confronting his fellow man he is in-sincere and manipulative. Society replicates anthropology: "Weare not satisfied with the life we have in ourselves and our own be-ing. We want to lead an imaginary life in the eyes of others, andso we try to make an impression. We strive constantly toembellish and preserve our imaginary being, and neglect the realone. . . . We would cheerfully be cowards if that would acquire usa reputation for bravery." Even men who most despise theirfellows "still want to be admired and trusted by them." Each self(moi) wills to be the tyrant of others. And yet, as Montaignebefore him, Pascal thought that such emulative approbativeness,inauthenticity, falsehood, vanity and hypocrisy provide aworkable basis for society: "I maintain that if everyone knew whatothers said about him, there would not be four friends in theworld." Society is founded "on nothing but this mutual deceit."Similarly, regarding politics, he observed: "We have establishedand developed out of concupiscence admirable rules of polity,ethics and justice, but at root, the evil root of man, this evil stuffof which we are made is only concealed." Social institutions, theproduct of man, stem from his concupiscence. They attest to hisgreatness, however, and constitute "the image of true charity."18

Reason of Effects. Pascal maintained that philosophers cannotdiscern the reason explaining both man's grandeur and hiswretchedness. Dogmatists like the Stoics emphasize grandeur andthey are right; skeptics, like Montaigne, stress wretchedness andthey are equally right. However, "knowing God without knowingour own wretchedness makes for pride," and "knowing our ownwretchedness without knowing God makes for despair." Epictetusand Montaigne are right in their premises and wrong in theirconclusions. Pascal concluded: "Knowing Jesus Christ strikes thebalance because he shows us both God and our own wretch-


edness." The Christian religion, with its central historical andsalvific doctrines of Original Sin, Incarnation, and Redemption,alone renders the incomprehensible comprehensible and suppliesmeaning which no other religion and no philosophical system cangive. Man is like "a deposed king" fallen from his original state,which remains as "a glimmering idea" in his memory. Because his"true nature has been lost, anything can become his nature;similarly, true good being lost, anything can become his truegood." The doctrine of Original Sin is, indeed, "folly in the eyes ofmen," and repellent to reason, but "this folly is wiser than allmen's wisdom . . . for without it, what are we to say man is?"Deism, a product of reason,, can no more supply an alternative toChristian revelation than can atheism. The Christian religion,rooted historically and concretely in the God of Abraham, Isaac,and Jacob and centered in the incarnate logos, Jesus Christ, isalone able to cure the pride of dogmatists and the despair of skep-tics, "not by using one to expel the other according to worldlywisdom, but by expelling both through the simplicity of theGospel." God has become man in Christ, who combines thegreatness of divinity and the misery of humanity. Man's hap-piness comes with conversion — abandoning amour-propre andfollowing his brother, Jesus Christ. Man's grandeur, then, stemsfrom his divine origin, his misery from the Fall, and his redemp-tion from Christ. Alban Krailsheimer describes the implicationsof the Pascalian view as follows: God and man are joined in theIncarnation, which sanctifies matter and removes the dualism of"the ghost in the machine"; man is joined with man in theRedemption; and mortality and immortality are reconciled in theResurrection. The true good, Pascal remarked, is such that allmen can possess it at the same time "without diminution or envy,"and "no one should be able to lose it against his will." In the Chris-tian religion the horizontal axis of conflicting egos is replaced by atranscendental axis immanentized in Christ. This axis is shared incommon by "thinking reeds" (roseaux pensants) who, thinking "asthey ought," become "thinking members" (membres pensants) of theBody of Christ. This does not mean, as Lucien Goldmann hascontended, that Pascal advocated a refusal of the world fromwithin the world; instead, as Jan Miel has written, the Pascalianposition entails "a total acceptance of the world in the knowledgethat all our aspirations are otherworldly." Thus, conversion leadsto "a reentry into human society with purified motives, an entry


into history with a fuller understanding and acceptance of its pro-cess."19

Finally, it must be remembered that Pascal saw man aspossessed less of a nature than of structural capacities. These in-clude a body inclined to habit, a mind that forms judgments, anda heart or will that must love. None of these by itself contains anyprinciple of truth or justice, although man possesses the ideasthereof. As Pascal developed his theory of the discontinuousorders he came to explain them ontologically and morally not interms of a chain of being in which one moves upward in dif-ferences of degree, but in terms of radical differences in kind. Noamount of corps can add up to or approach esprit, and no amount ofesprit can add up to or approach coeur: "The infinite distance be-tween body and mind symbolizes the infinitely more infinitedistance between mind and charity, for charity is supernatural."The supernatural order of charity (coeur) is reality; as mentionedabove, all else is figurative. A recent study of Pascal from theangle of language is instructive. Edouard Morot-Sir writes thatPascal discerned the error in Western philosophy which rendersthe verb "being" a noun and thus a subject. In correction thereof,Pascal saw God alone as substance and all without him as sub-sistence. Fallen man is subsistence outside of God pridefully andfalsely calling himself substance. The true Christian is a memberof the Church, which is permanent subsistence in history outsideof, but in proper relation to, God, and thus the bearer of truth.The self is not substance but, when separated from God, a capacitevide, a bundle of traits, an image, which seeking to impose itselfon others, carnally takes figure for reality.20

JUSTICE, FORCE, AND LAW

Pascal confessed in the Pensees: "I spent much of my life believ-ing that there was such a thing as justice, and in this I was notmistaken, for insofar as God has chosen to reveal it to us, there issuch a thing. But I did not take it in this way, and that is where Iwas wrong, for I thought that our justice was essentially just, andthat I had the means to understand and judge it, but I foundmyself so often making unsound judgments that I began todistrust myself and then others. I saw that all countries and allmen change. Thus, after many changes of mind concerning truejustice I realized that our nature is nothing but continual change


and I have never changed since. And if I were to change I shouldbe confirming my opinion."21

Why did Pascal deal closely, if not systematically, with thequestion of justice and law from the very beginning of the Pensees?A central reason can be found in an earlier recorded conversation:"Montaigne is incomparable to confound the pride of those who,outside the faith, pride themselves of a true justice." Pascal soughtto show the vanity and shifting nature of human justice and thepresumptuousness of those who, taking figure for reality, wouldjudge God in its light. All finites (human justice and law), hebelieved, are annihilated in the face of the infinite (divine justice).As part of his work of humbling human reason, he wished also toshow the "tyranny" involved in attempts to use "nature," or"reason" in the sense of esprit geometrique, to reach a universal no-tion of right from which valid conclusions could be drawn to con-stitute a juridical order. Early in his life he classifiedjurisprudence among subjects like history which concern facts towhose authority one must submit. Then, too, his study of manneccessarily led him to questions such as why men live together ininstitutions according to rules, and what are the foundations ofsuch institutions. The questions related dialectically to his beliefthat "the tendency should be towards the general, and the biastowards the self is the beginning of all disorder, in war, politics,economics, in man's individual body." Finally it should beremembered that his father was a jurist, and his fellow Jansenistsof Port Royal, Nicole and Domat, with whom he was conversant,wrote on jurisprudential questions. Through these men and byhis own studies he became acquainted with jurisprudence,although he did not pursue his father's Thomism nor did he agreewith Nicole and Domat in their acceptance of Natural Law.22

Fragment 103(298). This is the central, best-known, and most con-troversial of Pascal's statements on justice and force in theirdialectial interplay. This fragment, along with a few others on lawand human justice, was for prudential reasons (possible scandal tothe faithful and possible affront to the authorities who believed inrule by divine right) excluded after his death from the originalPort Royal edition of the Pensees. The closest analysis of itssubstance and style is thai* of Eric Auerbach. We begin bypresenting Auerbach's structural arrangement of the fragment:

It is right that what is just should be obeyed:


It is necessary that what is strongest should be obeyed.

Justice without might is helpless:Might without justice is tyrannical.

Justice without might is challenged because there arealways offenders;

Might without justice is impugned.

We must then combine justice and might and to thisend make what is just strong,

or what is strong just.

Justice is subject to dispute,Might is easily recognizable and is not disputed.

So,We cannot give might to justice,because might has challenged justice and has said, it

is I who am just

and thus,being unable to make what is just strong.we have made what is strong just.23

Auerbach's explanation is as follows: "The expression is basedon an opposition between two ideas which are assumed to beuniversally known and established — whereas the opposition itselfshows them to be problematic. Might and justice are contrasted,but at first they are neither explained nor delimited. In the con-flict between them, however, their true meaning is graduallybrought out, and in the end it becomes clear that they are not op-posites at all, but that one is merely a function of the other. Whenwe hear that it is right to obey justice, that justice without might ispowerless, that might without justice gives ground for complaint,that there are always wicked men who combat justice, we cannotbut assume that Pascal recognizes the existence of an objectivejustice that is different from might, and at least for purposes ofthought, independent of it. But when he goes on to say that justiceis always subject to dispute, that might is undisputed and im-mediately recognizable, that there is no authority able or compe-tent to arrive even at a theoretical decision in regard to a genuine


objective justice, and that we are utterly at the mercy of theprevailing justice which is in the hands of might, then it becomesclear that the first premise dealt not with a really existing objectivejustice but with a mere word, an imagination. 'It is right to obeyjustice.' Yes but is there a justice independent of might? Can werecognize it? No, we cannot. Are those who are oppressed bymight without justice justified in complaining? Certainly not, forhow do we know that they are in the right? Are the transgressorswho challenge a justice without might objectively evil? Who candecide? La justice est sujette a dispute.... And what about the mightwhich challenges justice claiming: I myself am justice. Is it in thewrong? Certainly not. For by what sign can we infalliblyrecognize justice if it does not predominate? Thus there is nojustice other than that which is in the hands of might. Is mightthen 'justice,' is it good? Yes it is justice, but it is not good, it isevil: our world is evil, but it is just that this be so."24

Auerbach maintains that behind Pascal's position was the ideahe borrowed from Montaigne that the basic factor in law isneither reason nor common agreement but custom, which isrelative to time and place and is always changeable. Pascal com-bined this conception of right as mere custom with an extremeAugustinian view of human nature and the world as evil whichresulted in the notion of custom as an emanation of might and atacit acceptance of the doctrine of raison d'etat. Pascal justifiedresignation to injustice on the Christian view that, given OriginalSin, one can commit but never suffer injustice.25

Auerbach's analysis has validity as far as it goes. It focuses,however, on one, albeit central, fragment with reference to onlythree of the over fifty other fragments in the Pensees which dealwith, or bear closely upon, the question of justice and law. Thereis a consideration neither of the related dialectical development ofperspectives on justice, nor of the discontinuous orders. Theseconsiderations are indispensable to an understanding of the placeof fragment 103(298) in Pascal's thought. This insufficiency is of apiece with the general tendency of Auerbach's analysis to viewparts without a consideration of the whole — to center, for exam-ple, on Pascal's rhetoric declaiming man's wretchedness whileneglecting the positive aspects and implications of the Pensees.

The only full-length study of Pascal's conception of law is thatof the present-day French legal scholar, Albert Brimo. Brimo ap-proaches from the angle of foundations of law and power, which


he sees as "the only perspective which permits a definition and ascientific expose" of Pascal's thought.26 Aided by Brimo's workand terminology the following sections attempt to expose Pascal'stheory of law by drawing upon the full range of relevant sources inthe Pensees and other of his works.

Pascal's Approach. As in his study of man, Pascal approached thequestion of law and justice by looking at the facts and then seekingtheir reason or meaning. A-priori considerations wereprecluded — geometric mind can reveal no valid universal justice;metaphysical references to a discernible order of essences innature are denied by the nominalism and ateleology of the NewScience, and are undercut by skeptical appraisal. Observationreveals the utter relativity and even contrariety of customs andlaws in time as well as place. Pascal's aversion to abstractions isevident not only in his methodological realism but in his use ofterms. Brimo notes that Pascal spoke of force and lots, not of droit;of moeurs and not of morale; of power and government, and neverof state. Not the concept but the fact is real. Reason creates an-tinomies; we can proceed only by submitting to the facts, "leparole de Dieu etant infallible dans les faits memes." Force,chance, and movement reign in the physical world. Similarly inregard to man: "Concupiscence and force are the source of all ouractions. Concupiscence causes voluntary, force involuntary ac-tions." Lacking an essential nature and thus a norm, man cantake anything as his good. To attempt to establish or reform ajuridical order on "normative nature" or "abstract reason" leads toits overthrow. It is necessarily established on power, chance andpopular folly. The world of forms, orders and institutions thusbecame for Pascal, as Romano Guardini has observed, one of"ossified chance, arbitrary will laid down in rules." In Pascal'swords: "The only universal rules are the law of the land in every-day matters and the will of the majority in others. Why is that?Because of the power implied." Force or might is "a palpablequality" which "we cannot handle as we like," whereas justice is "aspiritual quality" which "we manipulate at will." Thus, "the nameof right [juste] goes to the dictates of might." Pascal never relin-quished this positivistic view but, as shall be seen, transcended itdialectically in light of his conception of discontinuous orders.27

Definition of Law. Pascal followed Montaigne's lead when hewrote: "The essence of the Law . . . completely self-contained; it is


law and nothing more." Like custom, to which it is integrallyrelated, it is a positive phenomenon indicated by its generality. Ingeometric terms, it exists in the realm of unity as distinguishedfrom conscience which is in the realm of multitude. Laws must beobeyed "because they are laws . . . . that is the proper definition ofjustice." Justice is "what is established."28

Source of Law. It follows that the source of law is the authoritypossessed of power to establish it. Pascal imagined the formationof society: "It is quite certain that men will fight until the strongeroppresses the weaker, and there is finally one party on top. But,once this has been settled, then the masters, who do not want thewar to go on, ordain that the power which is in their hands shallpass down by whatever means they like." In like manner custom(which Pascal, in contrast to Montaigne, saw as ultimately rootedin force) is authoritative, insofar as people feel constrained by it.To speak of a justice and a law which lack power to effect externalcompliance is to speak without meaning. Proceeding in formal ex-pression from its power source, law has an objective validity.29

Purpose of Law. Pascal wrote: "The proper function of everything isto be sought. The proper function of power (puissance) is to pro-tect." More specifically, "the only object of peace within states is tosafeguard people's property," which includes lives. Brimo explainsthat, understood empirically, when the strong (rulers) repudiate,override, or fail to perform their function they tend to disappear.Force without legality (formality) issues in the ephemeral tyrannywhich Pascal saw as consisting in the desire of an entity fordomination outside of its order, in this case corps, the order of con-cupiscence. This point will be clarified later when the ethicalquestion of the relation of power to truth is discussed. A statementof Jacques Ellul is congruent with Pascal's view: "Law can only bethe expression of the attempt to assure the preservation ofmankind. This is the only point of reference for defining what ishumanly just."30

Efficacy of Law. Triumphant force distributes and regularizes in anexercise of power by determining a line of succession and a legalorder. It is thus joined to legality (formality) in the interest oforder and peace. Based on the "bonds of necessity" (cordes denecessite), which secure man's mutual respect because "there must


be differences of degree, since all men want to be on top and allcannot be," power employs the "bonds of the imagination" (cordesd'imaginatiori) to secure respect for a particular person or persons."Pure force" is replaced by "power maintained by imagination in acertain faction, in France, the nobles, in Switzerland, com-moners, etc.," and working upon the imagination of the people.The "bonds of imagination" operate through symbols; the morepowerful the man, the less his need of symbols, which act as apsychic surrogate for force. If the "bonds of imagination" are cutnecessity reasserts itself with civil strife, the summum malum, as thesequel. It is then necessary that a ruler not appear as a usurper:"The truth about the usurpation must not be made apparent; itcame about originally without reason and has becomereasonable." Pascal puts the point directly: "What could be lessreasonable than to choose as ruler of a state the eldest son of aqueen? We do not choose as captain of a ship the most highly bornof those aboard. Such a law would be ridiculous and unjust, butbecause men are, and always will be, as they are, it becomesreasonable and just, for who else could be chosen?" If selectionwere to be made on grounds of virtue or ability, conflict wouldresult "with everyone claiming to be the most virtuous and able."It is best and thus "reasonable" to decide on an incontestable, in-controvertible and palpable qualification such as hereditary de-scent or majority rule.31

It is in the context of power determining succession and a legalsystem that we confront Fragment 103(298). Brimo explains:"Force without the appearance of legality, without juridical for-malism, could only obtain obedience by force, that is to say inrepudiating itself. It is necessary then to include force in legality.Not being able to make what is just (popular version of justice)become strong, one makes what is strong just (juridical and legalconception of justice)."32 The criteria of justice and law are thenmerely formal; content is supplied by imagination and custom.

Dialectical Movement and the Subjective Validity of Law. The dialecticalmovement in the differing perspectives on law and justice iden-tified by Pascal must be related to his idea of the three orders ofbody, mind, and heart, and their respective ways of knowing.

(1) Fallen men are ignorant of divine justice at birth. Thisoriginal ignorance is succeeded by the view of the people at large,who accept and obey law because they rightfully deem it just, but


for the wrong reason. Moved by the "bonds of the imagination"they consider the antiquity of laws and customs "as a proof of theirtruth (and not just of their authority without truth)," and takesymbols for reality. When laws are "shown to be worth nothing,which can happen with all laws if they are looked at from a certainpoint of view," the people "are likely to revolt." This is why theymust be told that law is to be obeyed simply because it is law. Pro-ceeding from the imagination in the order of corps, the people arecorrect in concluding that there is justice and thus negating theoriginal ignorance and providing a content to law. But they can-not discern the deeper significance of the figures by probing to thereality behind the visible order. It is carnal and superficial to seethe merely figurative as real. But this insight presupposes furtherdialectical movement.33

(2) The next view is that of the half-learned {demi-habiles), whoobey law only because they are forced to do so. Standing halfwaybetween "pure natural ignorance" and "learned ignorance," they"have some smattering of adequate knowledge and pretend tounderstand everything." Their perspective, proceeding from themind but motivated by concupiscence, negates that of the peopleby denying in the name of "reason" or in the desire to return tooriginal laws, any validity to established law and any legitimacyto power. As Pascal put it: "The art of subversion, of revolution, isto dislodge established customs by probing down to their originsin order to show how they lack authority and justice. . . . There isno surer way to lose everything." Because "the people readilylisten to such arguments," society is convulsed. The demi-habiles"upset the world and get everything wrong." In this group can beincluded primitive constitutionalists of Pascal's day (members ofthe Fronde), but more especially rationalist and ideological Uto-pians who engage in total critiques of society in light of theblueprint they wish to impose in reconstruction. In any case thedemi-habiles do not add positively to the content of law.34

(3) The third perspective in the dialectical movement is that ofthe learned (habiles). These esprits forts do not proceed, as do thedemi-habiles, from abstract reason (raison raisonnante), but fromreason subordinated to experience {raison des effets). Submitting tothe facts, they are like the people in honoring the law, but differfrom them in judging by a reserved, inner, or concealed thought(lapensee de derriere la the). They judge the legal order, with its rootsin concupiscence and its establishment by force, as simply a die-


tate of necessity. Because they lack the perspective of the higherorder of coeur {charite), they can see the sham but not the figurativenature of the legal order. Consequently their attitude is an adhe-sion of the mind and not of conscience. To them the legal order issimply a dictate of necessity. Brimo conjectures that the reservedthought of the habiles involves belief in law imposing itself onsociety "as biological laws of selection impose themselves onanimate beings." The people, as worker ants, devote themselvesto the anthill without comprehending the meaning of their work;the half-learned, as reflective ants, refuse to accept their self-sacrifice; the learned ants knowingly sacrifice themselves becausesuch act allows the anthill to exist and to survive them. Amonghabiles one might group such conservative skeptics across the agesas Pyrrho, Montaigne, Hume and Holmes. More to the mark isPascal's honnete homme, a type with whom he admiringlyassociated, and which constituted the core of the intended au-dience of his "Apology." Pascal saw honnetete as a qualitytranscending specialization in both knowledge and vocationalpursuit, an "all-around excellence." It issued in social conductavoiding extremes in a manner according to man's median posi-tion between the two infinites. Based on the need for social peacehonnetete entailed civility and sound practical judgment {espritfinesse), which make social relations possible. Honnetete comprisedthe only possible morality for society separated from God. As suchit could only be the external image of true virtue, a mere secularvirtue. Unlike Christian virtue, which annihilates amour-propre,the civility of the honnete homme hid and suppressed it. Although itdid not transcend the self it required deportment recognizing notmerely the utility but the necessity of social concord. The sense ofcompliance was external in regard to the forms; the judgment{pensee de derriere) was inward in recognition of the primacy ofesprit. Outward conformity; internal questioning {intus ut libet,forisut moris est). The knee bends to the authorities; the mindtranscends and judges the external act while admitting its necessi-ty. Thus the habiles, as honnetes hommes, are like the demi-habiles, innot recognizing justice in the popular sense; unlike the demi-habilesthey recognize the need for law, a recognition which constitutesan agreement, although not an identity, with the popular posi-tion.35

(4) "Pious Christians" {les devots) present the fourth perspec-tive. Possessing more zeal than knowledge they judge by faith


alone. Just as the demi-habiles are only half-enlightened by reason,so the devots are but half-enlightened by faith and lacking inprudential judgment. Their submission to law is sometimessincere but often scornful. Unlike the habiles they obey because theChurch so orders. Like the demi-habiles they are ajuridical — sup-plying no positive content to law. If they aspire to a secularpolitical and legal order based on Christian virtues and sanctity, akingdom of God on earth, that aspiration is analogous to that ofUtopians, who, similarly ignoring Original Sin, would reconstructon the foundation of reason. The relevance of the devots lies in thefact that through them, although not in the sense of providingprogressive movement, religion appears in relation to law, and sothe stage is set for the final perspective.36

(5) "Perfect Christians" (Chretiens parfaits), proceeding from theperspective of coeur and led by a superior light, realize a synthesisof the partial truths contained in the previous perspectives. Theyobey law, Pascal remarked, "not that they respect the follies butrather the divine order which has subjected men to follies as apunishment." As Brimo puts it: "For them the law is completelyfounded. It is the order of God in the world. The law obliges themin conscience, their obedience is one consented to, reflected uponand willed; law has really a subjective validity. They perceive theapparent juridical contradictions which involve justice united toforce . . . they alone grasp the reason of effects in its plenitude."Pascal saw them possessed of learned ignorance, an ignorance ofjustice which knows itself. They do not obey an imaginary justiceas do the people. Under the influence of divine grace they are ledfrom the experience of life in the two lower orders to the infinitelysuperior order of charity: "Truth apart from charity is not God,but his image and an idol we must not love or worship." The trueChristians see law as figurative of the communal order wished byGod and an expression of divine justice. And yet, insofar as theyrespect the order of God as expressed in historical change as wellas in established order, their attitude is distinguishable from therigid conservatism of the habiles.37

Pascal's view may then be thus summarized: Separated fromdivine justice by the Fall, man figurates it in diverse juridicalorders which are effected by imagination, supported by custom,and always founded on force. The people mistakenly identify lawwith justice, which the demi-habile denies, which the habile acceptsonly as a natural necessity, and which the "perfect Christian" ac-


cepts as signs of God's order and justice and thus binding in con-science. With subjective validity established upon the full grasp ofthe idea of law and its ultimate divine source, progressive move-ment becomes possible.Limits of Law. As nuted above, Pascal regarded law, considered asa positive phenomenon touching the external forum, to be limitedonly in an empirical sense. It defeats itself if it fails in its purposeto protect lives and property and to maintain order. Law isunlimited in its essence by morality; limitations may be self-imposed by the legislator (one, few, many) in light of moral views.Thus Pascal sharply distinguished law and morals. This distinc-tion precluded speaking of law in its essence as limited by in-dividual rights. Pascal spoke of liberty, in light of his conceptionof three discontinuous orders, only in terms of interior liberty.Thus when he reached the perspective of the habiles, he implied aninterior liberty of thought; when he reached the perspective of the"perfect Christians," he spoke of the interior liberty of conscience.One looks in vain in his writings for a statement of practical in-stitutional limitations. He distinguished between king and tyrant,as well as force and tyranny, and defined in general terms the limitswithin which law must operate as follows: "Multiplicity which isnot reduced to unity is confusion. Unity which does not dependon multiplicity is tyranny." In a historical context of sedition,revolt and strong memory of civil war, he quite understandablyconsidered the disorder of anarchy a curse greater than thedisorder of tyranny and accorded no place to a right of rebellion.This position, along with his emphasis on interior liberty alone,has brought strong criticism from modern commentators fromMaritain on. We shall see that Pascal indeed saw circumstancesin which obedience must be refused and opposition is not merelypermitted but required. First, it must be understood that Pascal,in accordance with his overall apologetic purpose, was concernedwith tyranny primarily from a cosmic, metaphysical perspective,one which includes the political as genus subsumes species. Brimodescribes Pascal as raising the political conception of the tyrant tothe measure of the universe. Like Plato he saw tyranny as adisordered or unjust state of the soul comprehending subjects aswell as rulers. The frame of Pascal's analysis is that of the threediscontinuous orders in their hierarchical relation. Thus "tyrannyconsists in the desire to dominate everything regardless of order"


("La tyrannie consiste au desir de domination, universal et horsde son ordre"). Tyranny is "wanting to have by one means whatcan only be had by another." We are bound to "pay different duesto different kinds of merit." Just as it is wrong (tyrannical) not tofear strength, believe in knowledge, and love charm, so is it wrong(tyrannical) to transpose the above verbs in relation to the objects.Similarly injustice "consists in attaching natural respect toestablished greatness, or in exacting an established respect fornatural greatness."38

When force extends beyond the external forum (corps) and at-tempts to check truth (esprit), violate conscience, or hinder thefaith (coeur), it becomes tyrannical and exists as violence. Pascalbelieved that as "all violent efforts cannot weaken truth," so "allthe light of truth can do nothing to stop violence." This belief inthe invulnerability of truth to violence strikes contemporary manas not merely naive but manifestly wrong in view of the events ofthe twentieth century. In Pascal's defense it might be said that, asa mathematician, he had in mind rational truth which is open toevery being with reason. It is not the same, however, with em-pirical truth, the awareness of which is not as readily recovered,once destroyed. Of course, in the sense of truth existing eternallyover against violence which, in Pascal's words, has a courselimited by the order of God, his position is unassailable.39

Pascal did take a firm stand for active defense of truth. Thecontext concerned events in the Church (the relevant fragmentwas drafted for the earlier Provincial Letters) but the words applyequally to state violations of the religious conscience. He wrote:"It is false piety to preserve peace at the expense of truth. It is alsofalse zeal to preserve truth at the expense of charity." More direct-ly, "Just as it is a crime to disturb the peace when truth reigns, it isalso a crime to remain in peace when the truth is being destroyed.There is therefore a time when peace is just and a time when it isunjust. It is written: 'There is a time for war and a time for peace'and it is the interests of the truth which distinguish between them.But there is not a time for truth and a time for error. . . . Truth istherefore the first rule and ultimate purpose of things." By "truth"Pascal here meant the truth of Christianity which the believermust never deny internally or by external acts. Resistance beyondthe means of nonviolent remonstrance, argument and non-compliance is not specified. It is an error to read Pascal as if hewere a systematic political theorist; instead we must read and in-


terpret his specific thoughts in light of their specific context. Thus,when he prescribed obedience because "peace is the sovereigngood," he had a mind the grave evils of anarchy; when he talked of"truth as the first rule and ultimate purpose of- things" and con-cluded that it is "a crime to remain in peace when the truth is be-ing destroyed," his focus was on the situation in whichnonresistance means denial of the basis of one's existence, an of-fense not merely political but touching salvation. In light of this itis not warranted to group Pascal indiscriminately withMachiavellian apostles of raison d'etat or to conclude that his em-phasis on the interior liberty of conscience has no relevance for thepolitical and legal order.40

Classification of Law. Brimo discerns in Pascal's thought threecategories of law which form a circle to be closed only at the end oftime.41

(1) Divine Law, known to man before the Fall as themanifestation of Eternal Justice, is now unknown to him except asdivinely revealed.

(2) Human Law, proceeding from force (the caricature ofdivine grace) and the imagination, bears only a formal similitudeto divine law insofar as it is a sign or a figuration of the unity orcommunity in the order willed by God.

(3) Ideal Law (law as idea). This category touches an aspect ofPascal's thought which has been either ignored or considered asrelevant only to Pascal's conception of the "Christian republic"identified exclusively with the Church. The notion of an idea oflaw and its progressive development and manifestation is centralto Brimo's exegesis of Pascal's legal thought. The point of depar-ture is Pascal's contention that although truth and justice are inGod alone, the ideas of them are in man, beyond all skepticism.Only the "perfect Christian" who in his openness has grasped thereason of the effects and sees law from a vantage point beyond statepower as the sign of the order willed by God and thus perceives itsinner validity and transcendent, obligatory nature, can realize anidea of what law is and ought to be. With this realization,jurisprudence can go beyond its original positivistic identificationwith those sciences, which Pascal called "purely historical," and beplaced among the progressive sciences, which he described ashaving as their object "to seek and discover the hidden truths."The Christian religion, which sees truth as the concern of all and


the destiny of mankind as unity in multiplicity, provides directiveprinciples. These principles include, in Pascal's words, "the inter-pretation of the words 'good' and 'evil,' " and obedience to charitywhich has at its base love of neighbor and of the good: "Deux loissuffisent pour regler toute la republique chretienne mieux quetoutes les lois politiques." The "perfect Christian," while obedientin conscience to the existing order, asks what is the justice we seekto express in law. He draws on a moral sense, illumined by graceand epitomized in the deux lois which inform his conscience, to at-tempt to influence the holders of power, be they one, few ormany, and through them provide movement to human law.Because Pascal considered humanity during the course of the agesas one man, such movement renders possible not only individualbut racial progress toward divine law, the completion of which asrealization of absolute idea can be effected only in the comingworld (the Kingdom of God) wherein the circle of law is closed bya return on the plane of redeemed humanity to the beginnings.42

Brimo's contention that Pascal's thought implies the notion of"movement" in the "idea of law" and its realization, runs athwartthe position of Pascal's modern critics. Luc Dariosecq, for exam-ple, in an argument similar to that of the Thomist, Maritain, andthe Marxist, Goldmann, claims that Pascal allowed no middleterm between his idea of the state as a "madhouse" (Vhbpital desfois)and the idea of the City of God. Between an "infinity of corrup-tion" and an "infinity of perfection," Dariosecq concludes, therecan be no reform. In meeting this objection it cannot be deniedthat Pascal, the realist, as noted above, scorned utopianism be itrationalist or religious. Then, too, it must be conceded that his ac-ceptance of the idea of the ubiquity of Original Sin necessarily ledto pessimistic conclusions. It has also been shown, however, inthe examination of his position on tyranny that "truth" as "the firstrule and ultimate purpose of things" can stand in tension with"peace" as "the sovereign good." From this tension issued an im-plicit rule of action prescribing adherence to "truth" when in ir-reconcilable conflict with "peace." Following Miel againstGoldmann, it has also been seen that Pascal did not refuse theworld from within it. Instead, he accepted it totally in theknowledge that all our aspirations are otherworldly—that is, heawaited faithfully the coming of the Kingdom of God, alreadymanifested in Christ, and oriented his life accordingly. This ac-ceptance was rooted in the biblical sense of history which


acknowledges God's freedom and providence and man's responsesto God as well as the significance of contingency, while surmount-ing positivism (and by implication, "historicism") throughrecognition of the reason of the effects. Pascal's "true Christian"adopts differing positions toward the world depending on the con-text. In principle he is bound by the primacy of truth informed bythe transcendent laws of love which bear decidedly upon his rela-tion to his fellows and to the species, and require his active par-ticipation and commitment. These considerations undercutDariosecq's criticisms as well as Goldmann's contention thatPascal maintained a simple "all or nothing" position.43

With these points in mind a better understanding of the notion(and implications) of law as idea in Pascal's thought can be gainedby relating it to his conception of community in the context of thethree discontinuous orders. This is an aspect which Brimo leftunexplored. Beginning with the Christian acceptance of positivelaw as figurative of the order wished by God, it can be seen thatevery legal order more or less mimics true community insofar as itposits something in common and tends toward the general. Asshown above, ideal community is defined by Pascal as one inwhich all members in unity possess the "true good" at the sametime without diminution or envy, and none can lose it against hiswill. The tendency in men, however, is not "towards the general,"as it should be, but "towards the self," which is "the beginning ofall disorder, in war, politics, economics, and man's individualbody." The self, or separated member, falsely believes itself to bea whole and "tries to make itself its own center and body." Thus,"not having in itself any principle of life, it only wanders aboutand becomes bewildered at the uncertainty of its existence, quiteconscious that it is not the body and yet not seeing that it is amember of a body." Such separated selves are united providen-tially by force and imagination in juridical orders in the interest ofsecurity. The common motivation is fear; the common share ispeace and order irrespective of the mode of distribution of"goods."**

On the concupiscent level not only is a variation of formspossible but technical advancement as well. Recall Pascal's obser-vation that "we have used concupiscence as best we can to make itserve the common good" by drawing from it and building on it"admirable rules of polity, ethics and justice," even though "this ismere sham and a false image of charity." In this view, except for


the latter point, he was at one with his contemporary Hobbes,who wrote that when commonwealths "come to be dissolved, notby external violence, but intestine disorder, the fault is not in menas they are the matter, but as they are the makers, and orderers ofthem." The same note was sounded later in the words of Kant:"Hard as it may sound, the problem of establishing the state issoluble even for a nation of devils" by "a good organization of thestate, of which man is indeed capable." In his Three Discourses on theStation of a Nobleman, Pascal, the realist, advised how a ruler couldproperly become a "king of concupiscence" by not claiming todominate his subjects by force but be satisfying their "justdesires," relieving "their wants" and deriving his pleasure from"doing good," in the manner of a honnete homme. This admonitionof what might be called "fairness" in the distribution of goods in-volves a further intrusion of esprit as calculation, which does notchange the concupiscent base but manipulates it. Pascal, theChristian, hastened to add that a ruler should not stop there, butgo on further to "scorn concupiscence and its rule," and aspire tothe "kingdom of love, where all subjects breathe love alone anddesire only its blessings." In other words being a successful "kingof concupiscence" although admirable, is utterly irrelevant tosalvation for him as well as his subjects.45

It can now be seen how given his conception of the hierar-chical, discontinuous orders as indicative of reality and morality,Pascal's assignation of value becomes a question of perspective.As A.W. Baird describes it, "a thing from a given order taken byitself is real, and has value, but when compared with somethingfrom a higher order it loses both its reality and its worth." Thus"human justice" (formality), while retaining its figurative aspect,loses all value in light of "eternal justice."46 The scheme of discon-tinuous orders precludes analogy of being and value. It followsthat within the order of concupiscence there can be horizontalmovement toward unity and in technical proficiency and"fairness" of legal orders. Such movement, however, cannot becalled ideal in the sense of recognition of the divine origin of lawor in the realization of a true sense of moral obligation in light ofthe summum bonum.

Implicit in Pascal's thought is the notion of collective or cor-porate egotism built upon either "public virtue" or patriotism.Because man can make anything his good, he can identify with acorporate self as his very own. This may be admirable from theangle of corps and human justice; it is movement within that order


to the general and at its best begets civility. From the perspectiveof coeur it is at bottom intensified hate particularly when such col-lective is seen (1) in opposition to other corporate selves, and (2)as not merely provisional but as an end in itself. Pascal com-mented: "If the members of natural and civil communities tend tothe good of the whole body, the communities themselves shouldtend towards another more general body of which they are themembers."47

The conclusion can be drawn that in order to be moral andnot merely useful, the movement to the general must not simplypush to a universalized horizontal plane but extend vertically intothe higher orders. Community in the order of esprit is possible, asexemplified, for example, in those who, in accordance with com-mon procedures and tests of verifiability, seek and share in "truth"(rational or empirical). On this level, however, skepticism enterswith its offspring of irresolvable antinomies; dogmatism has butprovisional validity; power in communal relations is nottranscended and political "truth" at best is pragmatic, relative andtentative. It might be added that the present-day notion of thecommunity of "critical thinkers" in a so-called ideal speech rela-tionship indeed has value in its own order. It, however, lacksultimate and thus real value, as well as ideal movement, in theline of Pascal's thought unless, as the American philosopher,Charles Peirce, clearly saw, it is characterized in wisdom by open-ness to the transcendent order of love and man's "true good."48

Pascal observed: "But as we cannot love what is outside us, wemust love a being who is within us but is not our own self. . . .Now only the universal being is of this kind: the Kingdom of Godis within us, universal good is within us, and is both ourselves andnot ourselves." The order of coeur [charite) realizes the broadest andhighest community in which the "true good" is shared withoutdiminution by all members. Their duty consists in "consenting tothe guidance of the whole soul to which they belong, which lovesthem better than they love themselves." Accepting fully the com-mon will of the Mystical Body, the "hateful self is annihilated andreplaced by the "redeemed self which identifies with Christ andlooks to the Kingdom of God. The separated member becomes a"thinking member" who works to better the world not in the loveof power but in the power of love. He acts not as the Utopian divotsbut pragmatically and realistically in reference to concrete ac-tions. Gone then is any possibility of the self as: (1) an accidental


bundle of traits in the Humean sense; (2) a rudderless potentialitywhich can on its own powers constitute itself; (3) a constituent ofconcupiscential drives in the Freudian sense, or of power drives inthe Nietzschean sense; (4) a member of an anthill in the sense ofPascal's habiles; (5) a mere "ensemble of social relations" in theMarxian sense; and (6) an identification with such ephemeral,provisional entities as a party, a state, an ideology, or aRousseauan "general will." The community of creative love inChrist attains the true universal unity which law seeks without an-nihilating diversity or denying the inherent drive to the delectatio inthe realization of personality. Institutionally speaking, theChurch approaches this true-order of charity. And yet, it remainssubsistence outside of God while informed by and directed to fullcommunity in God through Christ.49

In sum, progress in the realization of "ideal law" (law informedby Christian morality) is possible for the "true Christian" in lightof his vision which brings him to move to the general and to unitynot only horizontally and provisionally but vertically in the ascentto the "true good" which is at once within him and yet is not him.He does not presume, as do the divots, that a secular order can beeffected upon a blueprint of a society of "perfect Christians." In-stead, proceeding in love of God and neighbor, and ever cogni-zant of the ubiquity of both Original Sin and the power factor, headdresses himself to the specific problems of life and politics. Hestrives thereby not only to improve the law but to realize in com-munal relationships a good which, though provisional, will notimpede but facilitate progress to a broader community, a move-ment that can only be fully realized at the end of time.

CONCLUSION

Pascal realized that man by himself cannot give the answer tothe question which he himself constitutes. He remarked the abili-ty of man, in contrast to the brutes, to surpass himself, acharacteristic which indicates an openness in human existenceunderlying and explaining the ubiquitous and historically diverseformations of cultures and legal orders. Openness, however, isnot an answer to the question of man but a necessary conditionwhich must not be closed off to that which transcends man. Justas man cannot be understood simply in light of his existentialopenness but only in light of the historically manifested "fixedpoint," Jesus Christ, so the source and morally binding character


of law can be comprehended only in light of the ultimate good.Such recognition allows for a transcending of positivism which isthe only approach to law fitting to homo absconditus, man removedfrom God. Thereby law is seen as prefigurative of the unity ofmankind in the coming Kingdom which has been realized amongmen in Christ. Neither "nature" nor "reason" can serve as anultimate norm. Both are subject to what we today call"historicism," which, in its attendant relativism and nihilism,simply serves to reinforce positivism. A Pascalian view leads tothe conclusion that "historicism" can be overcome neither by de-nying history through Greek metaphysics nor by hypostatizing itin an immanent Hegelian sense. Instead history must be acceptedin the biblical sense, according to which God manifests himselfprovidentially, through covenant, and finally in Christ, whodirects men to that realm wherein they will ultimately share in afulfilled unity and personality beyond "history." This Christocen-tric perspective transforms what is merely human in light of thetheory of the discontinuous orders. Thus the legal order is bindingexternally in a positivistic sense; it is binding internally only withreference to the highest order. Pascal provides a theologicalunderstanding of man which respects historicity by transcendingit and which explains law in its manifold diversity in light of itsultimate design, which in turn effects its movement. Law asnecessarily comprised in human affairs of force and legality — lawand nothing more — is succeeded not by the derivation of materialnorms from formal principles (a rationalistic extension ofpositivism), but by law influenced by Christian morality wherebycontent is supplied and the possibility of juridical progress even-tuates.

It can be concluded that a reading of Pascal which focuses on-ly on "the wretchedness of man" issues in a pessimistic view ofman and of law. A synoptic reading, regardful not only of man's"wretchedness" but his "greatness," seen from the angle of his eter-nal goal and the implications of the Christocentric perspective,and ever-cognizant of Original Sin and the folly of Utopian andideological formulations, leads to the recognition that the onlyreality beyond power preservative of society issues from God. Inthis light the Christian works pragmatically and prudentiallywithin the world to better it on the basis of his otherworldlyaspirations and destiny.


NOTES1 Voltaire, Lettres Philosophiques (1734), Lettre XXV, "Remarques sur les

pensees de M. Pascal"; Chateaubriand, Le Genie du Christianisme (Paris, 1863), p.373; Suares, Notre Pascal (Paris, 1923), p. 65; Crocker, Nature and Culture(Baltimore, 1963), p. 36; Maritain, Ransoming the Time (New York, 1946), p. 33;Lowith, "Man Between Infinities," Measure (Summer, 1950), p. 303; Goldmann,Le Dieu Cache (Paris, 1956), translated as The Hidden God (New York, 1964);Mortimer, Blaise Pascal; the Life and Work of a Realist (New York, 1959); Cassirer,An Essay on Man (New York, 1956), p. 26.

2 In referring to the Pensees in this paper, the first number listed is that of theedition of Louis Lafuma, translated by A. J. Krailsheimer, Pascal, Pensees (Lon-don, 1966); the second number refers to the traditional listing in LeonBrunschvicg, Oeuvres de Blaise Pascal, 14 vols. (Paris, 1904-21), vols. 12-14. In afew instances I have made corrections in the translation. In this paper the editionof Pascal's works which will be cited is that of Jacques Chevalier, published bythe Bibliotheque de la Pleiade in 1954 as Pascal: Oeuvres Completes. Consult thefollowing for previous writing on the subject of this paper: Jacques Maritain, "LaPolitique de Pascal" in Reflexions sur I' intelligence ei sur sa vie propre (1923), pp.160-73, published in English as cited above in Ransoming the Time, pp. 33-51.Maritain contends that in Pascal "the Jansenist theory of a corrupted nature, animperious zeal for experience, a reaction against a reason (Pascal's own) which isrationalist," conspires "to divert him from any consideration of the divine normshidden in the depths of nature." As a result "there can be here on earth only tiesof force and opinion subject to the caprice of men and to the accidents of thehistorical process." This finds its "unhappy realization in the enlighteneddespotism of the next century." Jacques Chevalier, Pascal (London, 1930), pp.198-218, 311-15, attempts to reconcile the dual notion of justice in Pascal'sthought. Romano Guardini, Pascal in Our Time (New York, 1966), stressesPascal's existentialism, its structure, the place therein of norms and law, and thesociological problem in the Christian consciousness. Albert Brimo, Pascal et leDroit (Paris, 1942), approaches Pascal not in terms of political ideas but of legaltheory, maintaining that "between St. Thomas and modern positivism, there isonly one antirationalist and antinaturalist doctrine, which is that of Pascal." E.Baudin, La Philosophic de Pascal, 3 vols. (Neuchatel, 1946-1947), is a broadThomistic, critical treatment of Pascal's thought which in reference to Pascal'sview of justice (vol. 2, part 2) holds that "he is guilty of intentionally using thesame word to signify things he plainly regards as entirely different," and that hedoes not properly appreciate philosophic dogmatism. Emil Lerch, "Pascal'sGedanken uber Recht und Gerechtigkeit" in Zeitschrift fur Schweizerisches Recht(1941), pp. 339-64. Gilbert Chinard, En Lisant Pascal (Lille, 1948), is particularlyvaluable for its discussion of the relationship of Pascal's thought to that ofHobbes. Eric Auerbach, "Uber Pascal's Politische Theorie," in Vier Unter-suchungen zur Geschichte der Franzosischen Bildung (Bern, 1951), translated as "On thePolitical Theory of Pascal" in Auerbach, Scenes from the Drama of European Literature(New York, 1959), pp. 101-129. This is a close analysis of fragment 103 (298).Lucien Goldmann, Le Dieu Cache, see particularly chapter 14. This work isrevelatory of background sociological forces and attempts to interpret the Penseesin light of Marx, but particularly Lukacs, to render Pascal an exponent of a"tragic" world view and an "all or nothing" attitude. Roland Mortier, "Les IdeesPolitiques de Pascal," Revue d'Histoire Litteraire de la France, 58 (July-Sept., 1958),289-96. Mortier attempts to answer those who criticize Pascal's thought asleading to advocacy of complete passive obedience, raison d'etat, and nosafeguards against tyranny and nihilisim, by placing in evidence the dialectical,polemical, complex character of Pascal's thought which can easily be

242 T H E R E V I E W O F POLITICS

misconstrued when interpreted unilaterally. Luc Dariosecq, "La Pensee Poli-tique de Pascal," PMLA, 86 (March, 1961) 54-62, argues that Pascal's thoughtprovides no real safeguard against tyranny and harbors disdain for the people atlarge. Nannerl O. Keohane, Philosophy and the State in France (Princeton, 1980),262-80, places Pascal in historical context, gives a good general description of hispolitical ideas, conception of man, notion of community, and relation to his con-temporaries.

3 Miel, Pascal and Theology (Baltimore, 1969), p. 134.4 Hugo Grotius, On War and Peace (London, 1982), XX 5, vi. For

background and context see, besides Keohane, Philosophy and State; R.H. Popkin,A History of Scepticism (New York, 1964); J.S. Spink, French Free-Thought fromGassendito Voltaire (New York, 1969); A J . Krailsheimer, Studies in Self-Interest fromDescartes to La Bruyere (Oxford, 1962); A. J. Krailsheimer, Pascal (New York,1980); J. H. Broome, Pascal (New York, 1964); Robert J. Nelson, Pascal: Adver-sary andAdvocate (Cambridge, Mass., 1981); Patricia Topliss The Rhetoric of Pascal(Amsterdam, 1966); Jean Mesnard, Pascal: L'Homme et L'Oeuvre (Paris, 1951);Albert Brimo, Les Grands Courants de la Philosophic du Droit et de L'Etat (Paris,1968); Wm. F. Church, "The Decline of the French Jurists as PoliticalTheorists," French Historical Studies, 5 (Spring 1967), 1-40; Heinrich Rommen,The Natural Law (St. Louis, 1947); Karl Lowith, "Man Between Infinities"; EmileBrehier, The History of Philosophy: The Seventeenth Cewtary (Chicago, 1966); Miel,Pascal and Theology.

» 257 (684).6 Krailsheimer, Pascal, pp. 43, 44.7 905 (385); 699 (382); 449 (556); 257 (684); 270 (670); 265 (677); 260 (678);

697 (383); 417 (548).8 Eric Voegelin, From Enlightenment to Revolution (Durham, N.C., 1975), 68;

532 (373); Lowith, "Man Between Infinities", p. 298.9 170 (268); 551 (2); 512 (1); 513 (4).10 933 (460); 308 (793); A.W.S. Baird, Studies in Pascal's Ethics (The Hague,

1975), 1-13, 85-95. See also Jean La Porte, Le Coeuret la Raison selon /toa/(Paris,1950).

11 199 (72); 418 (233); 406 (395); 131 (434); 188 (267); 44 (82).12 687 (144); 6 (60).13 199 (72); 68 (205); 198 (693); 201 (206); 418 (233); 131 (434).14 200 (347); 113 (348); Lowith, "Man Between Infinities," p. 302; 131 (434)." 759 (346); 620 (146); 756 (365); 678 (358); 199 (72).16 Jonas, The Gnostic Religion (Boston, 1958), p. 324.17 641 (129); 419 (419); 125 (92); 126 (93); 821 (252); 622 (131); 597 (455).

See the following divisions in the Lafuma edition (Krailsheimer, translator, Vani-ty, 13-52, Wretchedness, 53-76, Boredom, 77-79, Diversion, 132-140.

'<• 806 (147); 470 (404); 792 (101); 210 (451); 211 (453); 118 (402); 688 (323);978(100); 411 (400).

19 "Entretien de Pascal avec Saci sur Epictete et Montaigue," Oeuvres Com-pletes, pp. 560-74; 149 (430); 192 (527); 397 (426); 695 (445); 449 (556); 208(435); 148 (428); 360 (482); 372 (483); 142 (463); 143 (464); 144 (360); 145 (461);146 (350); Krailsheimer, Studies in Self-interest, pp. 144, 148; Miel, Pascal andTheology, pp. 187, 192.

20 Ibid., p . 160; Ba i rd , Studies in Pascal's Ethics, p p . 7-10, 9 3 ; E d o u a r d M o r o t -Sir , La Metaphysique de Pascal (Presses Un ive r s i t a ine s d e F r a n c e , 1973), p p . 56-58.

21 520 (375).22 "En t r e t i en , " Oeuvres Completes, p . 574; 418 (233); "Preface p o u r le T r a i t e d u

V i d e , " ibid, p . 529; 421 (477) .23 Auerbach, "On the Political Theory of Pascal," p. 102.


24 Ibid., p p . 123-25 .25 Ibid., p p . 103-114 , 122, 126.26 B r i m o , Pascal et le Droit, p . 1 1 .27 Ibid., p. 167; 60 (294); 97 (334); Guardini, Pascal in Our Time, p. 85; 81

(299); 85 (878).28 60 (294); 66 (326); 645 (312).29 828 (304); 525 (325); 60 (294).30 797 (310); 974 (949); B r i m o , Pascal et le Droit, p . 3 1 ; J a c q u e s El lul , The

Theological Foundation of Law ( N e w Y o r k , 1960), p . 9 1 .31 828 (304); 60 (294) ; 977 (320) ; 94 (313) ; 977 (320); 30 (320); 797 (310);

744 (18) .32 B r i m o , Pascal et le Droit, p . 30 .33 525 (325); 60 (294); 83 (327); 90 (337); 92 (335); 93 (328); 94 (313); 95

(316); 101 (324); Brimo, Pascal el le Droit, pp. 32, 47.34 60 (294); 83 (327).35 90 (337) ; B r i m o , Pascal et le Droit, p . 3 3 ; 647 (35 ) ; M o r o t - S i r , Metaphysique

de Pascal, p p . 100-113 ; K e o h a n e , Philosophy and State, p p . 2 8 3 - 8 9 ; S p i n k , FrenchFree-Thought, p . 9 .

36 90 (337); B r i m o , Pascal et le Droit, p p . 3 3 , 34 , 4 8 ; Da r io secq , "La Pense'ePolitique de Pascal," p. 57.

37 14 (338) ; 90 (337) ; Pascal et le Droit, p . 34 ; 9 2 6 ( 5 8 2 ) .38 797 (301); 604 (871); Brimo, Pascal et le Droit, pp. 128-29; 58 (332); "Three

Discourses," Oeuvres Completes, p. 619.39 85 (878) ; E n d of 12th P r o v i n c i a l L e t t e r , Oeuvres Completes, p p . 8 0 4 - 8 0 5 .40 949 (930); 974 (949).41 B r i m o , Pascal et le Droit, p p . 43-44.42 "Preface p o u r le T r a i t e d u V i d e , " Oeuvres Completes, p p . 529 , 530, 531ff.;

473 (500); 376 (484); B r i m o , Pascal et le Droit, p . 44 .43 Dariosecq, "Le Pense'e Poli t ique de Pascal ," p . 58; 533 (331); M a r i t a i n ,

Ransoming the Time; G o l d m a n n , Le Dieu Cache, p . 4 1 . For a recent t r ea tmen t ofthe relation of Chr i s t i an theology to law resembl ing Pascal 's Chr is tocentr ic view,see Wolfahrt P a n n e n b e r g , " O n the Theology of Law," in Ethics (Phi ladelphia ,1981), pp . 23-56.

44 148 (428); 421 (477); 372 (483).45 210 (451); 211 (453); H o b b e s , Leviathan, 29 :210 ; K a n t , Eternal Peace, ci ted

in L e o S t rauss , Natural Right and History ( C h i c a g o , 1953), p p . 193-94; " T h r e eDiscourses ," Oeuvres Completes, p p . 6 2 0 - 2 1 .

46 Ba i rd , Studies in Pascal's Ethics, p . 8.47 51 (293); 60 (294) ; 421 (477) .48 Pe i rce , Collected Papers, ed . C h a s . H a r t s h o r n e a n d P a u l W e i s s , 6 vols.

(Cambridge, Mass., 1931-1935), I: 673; IV:68; V: 317. See also Jos. P. DeMar-co, "Peirce's Concept of Community," Transactions of Charles S. Peirce Society, 7(Winter 1971), 24-36.

49 564 (485); 360 (482); 370 (480); 372 (483); 373 (476); 374 (475).

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Pascal on Justice