Blaise Pascal: Reasons of the Heart

As striking and dramatic as any conversion experience recorded in history are the words of Blaise Pascal found sewn into the lining of his jacket by a servant after his death: "From about half-past ten in the evening until about half-past twelve — FIRE. God of Abraham, God of Isaac, God of Jacob, not of the philosophers and scholars. God of Jesus Christ.

Known as the memorial, these words describing Pascal's "night of fire" are all the more powerful coming from the mind of a genius of Mozar...