It is hardly possible to speak more eloquently of the dignity of human nature. And if it is the same voice which speaks in such pathetic or it may be harsh tones of human weakness and misery, and the disproportions of our natural life, it is the very consciousness of greatness that inspires the consciousness of misery. Looking from such a height of human dignity, he sees all the depths of human baseness. It is this higher spirit which consecrates Pascal as a moralist. Has he rebuked the presumptions of humanity? has he called upon proud reason to humble itself? has he gibed human philosophy, and even gloried for a moment in the contradictions of empiricism? It is never that he may laugh at man, or that he may rest in the mere contemplation of his follies or extravagances, but because he himself profoundly realised the height and the depth of his being—the grandeur to which he could rise, or to which God could raise him, and the baseness and miseries to which he could sink. Doubtless, as with all concentrated and meditative natures, Pascal delights to dwell on the weaker and gloomier side of humanity. This was partly the result of his Jansenist leanings, but mainly it came from his own intense reality of feeling. It was bred of his austere sadness of heart, and is found to run as a note of profound constitutional melancholy through all his letters, and all his life, as well as his Thoughts. In the view of eternity, and of the awful issues involved in religion, the common life and pursuits of man seemed to him not only frivolous, but criminal. He looked forth, therefore, on this common life with eyes not only of tears, but of displeasure. He seemed even at times to derive something of stern satisfaction from its very follies and absurdities. But this is only the temporary mood of the profound moralist touched to his heart by pangs that he cannot resist. His true view of life is never cynical,—but always grave, if bitter—and hopeful, if stern.