The provincial letters of Blaise Pascal

by Blaise Pascal

[31]. Mémoires de P. Royal, i. 13. Bayle insists that his father had twenty-two children. Dict., art. Arnauld.

[32]. Weisman, Hist. Eccl., ii. 204.

[33]. The title under which the Letters appeared when first collected into a volume was, “Lettres écrites par Louis de Montalte, a un Provincial de ses amis, et aux RR. PP. Jesuites, sur la morale et la politique de ces Peres.”

Father Bouhours, a Jesuit, ridicules the title of the Letters, and says he is surprised they were not rather entitled “Letters from a Country Bumpkin to his Friends,” and instead of “The Provincials” called “The Bumpkins”—“Campagnardes.” (Remarques sur la langue Fran., p. ii. 306. Dict. Univ., art. Provincial.)

[34]. Daniel, Entretiens, p. 19.

[35]. Petitot, Notices, p. 121.

[36]. Benoit, Hist. de l’Edit. de Nantes, iii. 198.

[37]. Daniel, Entretiens, p. 11.

[38]. Nicole, Notes sur la xi. Lettre iii. 332.

[39]. Recueil de Port-Royal, 278, 279; Petitot, pp. 122, 123.