“was not the final object of any being, and had not wherewith to satisfy any.” So jealous was he of any surprise of pleasure, of any thought of vanity or complacency in himself and his work, that he wore a girdle of iron next his skin, the sharp points of which he pressed closely when he thought himself in any danger, especially in such moments of intercourse with the world as he still sometimes allowed himself.
Such details are neither interesting in themselves nor do they present Pascal in his highest character. One cannot help feeling that, touching as Madame Périer’s narrative is, there must have been, even in the Pascal of later years, more than she has drawn for us. One glimpse we get, but not in her pages, of a more natural temper, when he withstood his Jansenist friends in the matter of subscribing the Formulary demanded from the Port Royalists. He had himself previously been willing to subscribe, with certain restrictions, when his sister Jacqueline alone stood out in her resistance to what she deemed a treasonable betrayal of the cause. She signed at last, but against her conscience, and, so to speak, with her blood. She died immediately afterwards, the first victim of the signature, as she has been called, and bequeathing a letter to her fellow-sufferers on the subject. Whether inspired by her words or not, Pascal took a firm stand against any further concessions, and in a famous page 101interview with Arnauld, Nicole, and Sainte-Marthe, he argued the point with such strength and vehemence that he fell fainting to the ground. 10
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