From 10:30 To Half Past Midnight
In 1654, the famed mathematician, Blaise Pascal had a profoundly mystical, and spiritually uplifting experience one night from 10:30PM until 12:30AM. How do we know this? He wrote it down on a piece of paper that he later sewed into the lining of his coat. We can only surmise that the reason he did this was to preserve it and keep it somewhere close to his heart. It was only after his death that the paper with his words from that night were discovered. His note began: " The Year of grace 1654... From about ten-thirty in the evening to about half an hour after Midnight... Fire." Pascal continued his note by writing: " I separated myself from [Jesus]; I fled him, renounced him, Crucified him. May I never be separated from him!" And then finally this: " Total submission to Jesus Christ and to my director. Eternally in joy for a day of trial on earth." I imagine Pascal sitting at a small seventeent...