Beşliu Maria

Faculty of Foreign Languages and Literatures, University of Bucharest

English Literature
Seminar Tutor: Sorana Corneanu

Human nature and the chain of being – the paradoxical mode

The theme of human nature was a controversial debate subject for eighteen century
philosophers and writers. Broadly speaking, the dominating viewpoints were divided into two
chief categories. On the one hand, the first conception stemmed from the Biblical narrative of the
Adamic Fall, according to which the human nature became deeply corrupted by sin. In chapter
XII of his book, “Essays”, Michel de Montaigne provides his readers with a list of vices, among
which the cardinal sin is represented by pride, man’s arrogance of considering himself equal to
God, which, after all, was the sin that caused Lucifer’s fall much time before Adam’s. In relation
to this view comes the equally controversial theory of The Great Chain of Being, which
represents a famous concept approached by some of the greatest eighteen century writers, such
as Bolingbroke, Pope, Diderot and Kant, and rejected by others, such as Voltaire and Dr.
Johnson. The concept was primarily based on the idea that the universe is created in a perfect,
well-designed order, every species being continuously related to the other, a notion explained by
Locke. Some of the most prominent writers who embraced the “Fallen Nature” perspective were
thus Montaigne and also, Blaise Pascal, who presented it from a theological point of view. The
concept has echoes in Jonathan Swift and Alexander Pope’s writings. On the other hand, the
opposite standpoint presented man as innately being endowed with qualities, with the power of
being good, a theory shared by writers such as David Hume, Samuel Johnson or Henry Fielding.
In what follows, I will approach this theme from the first perspective, presenting the
subject of human nature as depicted in some excerpts from Pascal’s work, Pensées. The writings
of the illustrious French Christian philosopher, mathematician and scientist included this
collection of notes published after his death under the title Pensées (Thoughts), representing his
most powerful theological apologetic work. Its aim was to defend the Christian faith by
combating the arguments of skepticism and stoicism. In addition, I will draw a parallel between
Pascal and Swift’s fundamental means of expressing their assumptions, with a focus on the
particular situation of Swift’s “Gulliver’s Travels”, making an attempt to place Swift in one of
the two categories designed by Pascal, on the one hand, and Pope, on the other hand.
In the first selected excerpt (“Oppositions”), Pascal identifies man’s nature as fluctuating
between two major traits: lowliness and greatness, and he claims that man should be conscious
of both: “Man must not believe that he is equal either to the beasts or to angels, nor must he be
ignorant of either, but he must know both.” (Pascal, p.33) Speaking about man’s greatness and
wretchedness, he states that man’s greatness simply lays in the fact that he is aware of his
wretched nature: “In short, man knows he is wretched. (…) But he is truly great because he
knows it” (Pascal, p.33).
Furthermore, the author deals with the subject of man’s paradoxical nature and he makes
one of his most tremendous and well-known claims regarding man’s duality: “What a chimera
then is man! What a surprise, what a monster, what chaos, what a subject of contradiction, what
a prodigy! Judge of all things, weak earthworm; repository of truth, sink of uncertainty and
error; glory and garbage of the universe.” (Pascal, p. 36). Moreover, he provides a solution for
dealing with man’s puzzling nature, stating that truth is not something we mere mortals can
possess, but it is an attribute of God made known to us by Him only by revelation: “we can know
it only to the extent it pleases him to reveal it. Let us then learn our true nature from the
uncreated and incarnate truth”, his last words being a possible reference to Jesus Christ’s
assertion regarding Himself: “I am the way, the truth and the life” (John 14:6 NKJV), as well as
the introductory words in the Gospel of John: “the Word became flesh, and dwelt among us”
(John 1:14 NKJV). He continues by directly offering the solution: “Know then, proud man, what
a paradox you are to yourself. (…) Learn that man infinitely transcends man, and hear from
your Master your true condition, of which you are ignorant. Listen to God.” (Pascal, p.36)
In addition, Pascal claims that man’s awareness of his wretchedness is possible because
of the fact that he once fell from a higher position, logically deducting this in the following
manner: “if man had never been other than corrupt, he would have no idea of truth or bliss. But,
wretched as we are (…) we have an idea of happiness and cannot reach it. (…) Being incapable
of absolute ignorance and certain knowledge, it is obvious that we once had a degree of
perfection from which we have unhappily fallen” (Pascal, p.36-37). Moreover, he claims that
only by our awareness of the initial sin because of which man has fallen can we have a genuine
knowledge of ourselves. Then, he outlines the two main constants that describe human condition:
one of them is that in his initial position, “in the state of creation” (Pascal, p. 37), man was
ruling the nature, being above it and sharing God’s divinity. The other is that after he sinned and
fell, “in the state of corruption and sin” (Pascal, p. 37), man became “similar to the beasts”.
(Pascal, p. 37) However, after that, by His supreme sacrifice (the death of his Son, Jesus), God
provided man another “state of grace” (Pascal, p. 37), allowing him to share again the divine
nature, provided that he accepts Jesus and Pascal says: “Thus it seems clear that through grace
man is rendered similar to God, participating in his divinity, and that without grace he is
considered similar to the brute beasts” (Pascal, p. 38). Therefore, at the end of the chapter
“Diversion”, Pascal makes another tremendous assertion: “Knowledge of God without
knowledge of our wretchedness makes for pride. Knowledge of our wretchedness without
knowledge of God makes for despair. Knowledge of Jesus Christ is central, because in Him we
find both God and our wretchedness” (Pascal, p. 56)
In the next excerpt (“Transition from the Knowledge of Man to That of God”), the writer
deplores the atmosphere of uncertainty that seems to govern man’s life. He confesses that he is
“frightened” (Pascal, p. 57) at seeing how man is “lost in this corner of the universe, not
knowing who put him there, what he has come to do, what will become of him at death” (Pascal,
p. 57) and moreover, “these wretched souls look around and see some pleasant objects to which
they give themselves and become attached.” (Pascal, p. 58). Furthermore, the writer urges man to
consider carefully the nature surrounding him, the earth, the sky, the moon, the stars and then he
draws the conclusion regarding man’s position in universe: “For, in the end, what is man in
nature? A nothing compared to the infinite, an everything compared to the nothing, a midpoint
between nothing and everything” (Pascal, p. 59).
 The author moves now to another important theme, that of man’s desire of knowledge.
He shares Montaigne’s view concerning man’s both vain and vainglorious attempt to attain
supreme knowledge: “It is strange that they have wanted to understand the principle of things
and in this way come to know everything, a presumption as infinite as their object” (Pascal, p.
60) He claims that only the infinite supreme Creator of all things has the supreme knowledge
about everything and we, as finite beings, simply do not have the capacity to grasp the infinite:
“All things come from nothingness and are swept towards the infinite. Who will follow these
astonishing proceedings? The author of these wonders understands them. No one else can.”
(Pascal, p. 60) In this respect, he criticizes writings of renowned authors, such as Pico della
Mirandola or Réné Descartes, entitled “Of Everything Knowable”, or “Of the Principles of
Philosophy”. He immediately draws the conclusion derived from his postulations, highlighting
man’s position in relation to the infinite: “Let us, then, understand our condition: we are
something and we are not everything. (…) The smallness of our being conceals from us the sight
of the infinite” (Pascal, p. 61).
Moreover, the author is also in favor of the fact that man should not try to get past his
condition, but we should remain “in the state where nature has placed us” (Pascal, p. 62). As far
as the problem of “The Great Chain of Being” is concerned, the writer states that “All things,
then, are caused and causing, supporting and dependent, mediate and immediate; and all
support one another in a natural, though imperceptible chain linking together things most
distant and different” (Pascal, p. 62)
In the end, Pascal draws three main important conclusions to his arguments: first and
foremost, “Man is only a reed, the weakest thing in nature, but he is a thinking reed.”, secondly,
“All our dignity consists, then, in thought,” and consequently, “Let us labor, then, to think well.
This is the principle of morality.” (Pascal, p. 64)
With respect to the means used by Pascal to convey his conception on the origin and
essence of human nature, one of the techniques he employs is the paradox. The passage that best
instantiate this method is the aforementioned one, the man as a “chimera”. Thus, we have in
front of us the image of man as a “monster”, if we take into account the etymology of “chimera”
(khímaira, female goat, or, as Greek mythology presents it, a monster with two heads, a lion
head and a goat head). In his first state, man was indeed master over nature, but in his corrupt
state, he has descended to the level of animals, dominated by his carnal desires. Also, in his
previous statement describing man equal neither to animals, nor to angels. Pascal could have had
in mind the Biblical passage taken from Psalms: “What is man that You are mindful of him, /
And the son of man that You visit him? / For You have made him a little lower than the angels, /
And You have crowned him with glory and honor. / You have made him to have dominion over
the works of Your hands; /You have put all things under his feet” (Psalms 8:4-6, NKJV), passage
also quoted in The New Testament, in Hebrews chapter 2 and interpreted as referring to Jesus
Christ. Further on, Pascal states: “Limited as we are in every respect, this condition of holding
the midpoint between two extremes is apparent in all our faculties” (Pascal, p. 61).
If one is now to make a comparison between Pascal’s means of conceiving and
explaining the human nature and Swift’s, one could notice that while Pascal employs paradox to
convey his assertions, Swift’s instrument is satire. What these methods have in common is that
both of them use antithesis as main figure of speech. Swift’s Gulliver comes into a world
dominated by Houyhnhnms, whose subjects, described in an antithetical way, are the Yahoos.
Pascal’s description of human being acquires a dualistic view – “glory”, as well as “garbage”.
The difference consists in the fact that while satire makes a clear distinction between the two
states it describes, each having its own characteristics, paradox may result in ambiguity, in an
instable perspective, a blurred image. Houyhnhnms and Yahoos are essentially separate in their
own nature, the“glory” and “garbage” reside, though, in one being. Also, satire uses irony to a
great extent so as to effectively convey the author’s view. Moreover, one clearly observes the
fideistic theological implications at Pascal, while these are missing at Swift. In addition, usually
satire conveys a clear moral message in the end, nevertheless, this does not seem to be the case
with “Gulliver’s Travels”. Although there are some similarities with Pope, the latter, however,
employs in his satires unequivocal antithesis, adopting some ideas from Pascal, but applying
them to a distinct system of thinking. “Pope’s satiric invectives are immediate responses to the
almost universal acrimony of early eighteenth-century cultural discourse, but they consistently
manage to outclass the often venomous provocations of his enemies, both real and imagined.
Pope’s poetry may be as splenetic as that of his rivals, but it has a range, a sophistication, an
energy, and a precise delicacy which is quite unmatched by that of any other poet of his time.”
(Sanders, 285). The splendid beauty of the renowned verses from the second epistle of Pope’s
“An Essay on Man” clearly reflect Pascal’s conception of human nature: “He hangs between; in
doubt to act, or rest, / In doubt to deem himself a god, or beast; / In doubt his mind or body to
prefer, / Born but to die, and reasoning but to err; / (…) Created half to rise, and half to fall; /
Great lord of all things, yet a prey to all; / Sole judge of truth, in endless error hurled: / The
glory, jest, and riddle of the world!” and one could even say that Pope transposed into verse
what Pascal had written in prose. Nevertheless, the notable difference between Pope and Pascal’s
solution to the finite nature of man is that while Pascal says that the only knowledge that saves
man is not knowledge of “our wretchedness”, but “knowledge of Jesus Christ”, the incarnate
truth, Pope claim that man should ultimately attempt to know himself: “Know then thyself,
presume not God to scan; / The proper study of mankind is Man” (The Norton Anthology of
English Literature, p. 2250, Epistle II, 1-2; 7-10;15-18).
Although the answer to the question regarding Swift’s position in the lines of thought
drawn by Pope, on the one hand, and by Pascal, on the other, is rather an ambiguous one, yet his
writings remain undoubtedly unique. As Andrew Sanders remarks, “His writings —
characterized throughout by a subtle ambiguity, by a troubled delight in oppositions and
reversals, and by a play with alternative voices, personae, and perspectives — are intimately
related to the deeply riven political, religious, and national issues of the Britain and Ireland of
his time.” (Sanders, p. 280-281).
In conclusion, after having presented Pascal’s viewpoint on human nature as falling into
the first type of perspective, the Augustinian one, or at Pascal, the paradoxical one, we have seen
that in his conception, man holds an intermediary place between the created beings, between
angels and animals and, moreover, after his fall into sin, he has even descended at the level of
animals. Therefore, the only solution for his wretched state is God’s grace: “through grace man
is rendered similar to God, participating in his divinity, and (…) without grace he is considered
similar to brute beasts” (Pascal, 38).
Bibliography
Pascal, Blaise, Pensées. Ed. Ariew, Roger, Indianapolis, IN: Hackett Pub. Co., 2004
Lovejoy, Arthur O., The Great Chain of Being, Cambridge, Massachusetts and London, England:
Harvard University Press, 2001
Sanders, Andrew, The Short Oxford History of English Literature, Oxford: Clarendon Press,
1994
Abrams, M. H., The Northon Anthology of English Literature, volume I, New York: W.W.
Norton & Co., 1962
Bible Gateway. (2018). Bible Gateway passage: Psalm 8 - New King James Version. [online]
Available at: https://www.biblegateway.com/passage/?search=Psalm+8&version=NKJV
[Accessed 19 May 2018].
Bible Gateway. (2018). Bible Gateway passage: Hebrews 2 - New King James Version. [online]
Available at: https://www.biblegateway.com/passage/?search=hebrews+2&version=NKJV
[Accessed 19 May 2018].
En.wiktionary.org. (2018). chimera - Wiktionary. [online] Available at:
https://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/chimera [Accessed 19 May 2018].
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https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Antithesis [Accessed 19 May 2018].