{"id":340,"date":"2008-12-08T13:33:51","date_gmt":"2008-12-08T13:33:51","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/blog.beliefnet.com\/onecity\/2008\/12\/a-maxim-i-do-rather-like.html"},"modified":"2008-12-08T13:33:51","modified_gmt":"2008-12-08T13:33:51","slug":"a-maxim-i-do-rather-like","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/onecity\/2008\/12\/a-maxim-i-do-rather-like.html","title":{"rendered":"A Maxim I do rather like"},"content":{"rendered":"

A few weeks back I posted<\/a> a quote from Mark Twain that I found provocative. This week, an exploration of a quote I came across a few years ago:
\nI have discovered that all human evil comes from this, man\u2019s being unable to sit still in a room.<\/em>\u2014Blaise Pascal (1623 – 1662), Pens\u00e9es<\/em>, no. 72
\nSounds like a case for the necessity of meditation practice.
\nTo get a little context on this quote of his I did some quick research on Pascal and his Pens\u00e9es<\/em>. Wikipedia tells me he adhered to Jansenism, a branch of Catholic Gallican thought that emphasized original sin and human depravity. And indeed, after a brief survey of his other “Thoughts” it is apparent they aren’t terribly cheery.
\nWith that in mind, Pascal\u2019s quote underscores for me one of the greatest benefits Buddhism offers the world: the wisdom that it is possible for man to still in a room and thereby do less evil, and the instructions on how one may do so. Granted, the quick take above on Pascal or Jansenism surely doesn’t do them justice. But I wonder nonetheless if, had Pascal been introduced to meditation practice, he would perhaps have revised his assessment of mankind accordingly.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

A few weeks back I posted a quote from Mark Twain that I found provocative. This week, an exploration of a quote I came across a few years ago: I have discovered that all human evil comes from this, man\u2019s being unable to sit still in a room.\u2014Blaise Pascal (1623 – 1662), Pens\u00e9es, no. 72…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":193,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-340","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-arts-and-media"],"yoast_head":"\nA Maxim I do rather like - One City<\/title>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/onecity\/2008\/12\/a-maxim-i-do-rather-like.html\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"A Maxim I do rather like - One City\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"A few weeks back I posted a quote from Mark Twain that I found provocative. This week, an exploration of a quote I came across a few years ago: I have discovered that all human evil comes from this, man\u2019s being unable to sit still in a room.\u2014Blaise Pascal (1623 – 1662), Pens\u00e9es, no. 72…\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:url\" content=\"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/onecity\/2008\/12\/a-maxim-i-do-rather-like.html\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:site_name\" content=\"One City\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:published_time\" content=\"2008-12-08T13:33:51+00:00\" \/>\n<meta name=\"author\" content=\"Greg Zwahlen\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:card\" content=\"summary_large_image\" \/>\n<!-- \/ Yoast SEO plugin. -->","yoast_head_json":{"title":"A Maxim I do rather like - One City","robots":{"index":"index","follow":"follow","max-snippet":"max-snippet:-1","max-image-preview":"max-image-preview:large","max-video-preview":"max-video-preview:-1"},"canonical":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/onecity\/2008\/12\/a-maxim-i-do-rather-like.html","og_locale":"en_US","og_type":"article","og_title":"A Maxim I do rather like - One City","og_description":"A few weeks back I posted a quote from Mark Twain that I found provocative. 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He lives in New York City, where he is also a member of the Shambhala Meditation Center of New York. He has undertaken advanced study over the past few years at the Rime Shedra Rime of New York City, the Mipham Academy under Khenpo Gawang, and the Nitartha Institute for Higher Buddhist Studies.","url":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/onecity\/author\/gzwahlen"}]}},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/onecity\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/340","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/onecity\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/onecity\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/onecity\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/193"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/onecity\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=340"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/onecity\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/340\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/onecity\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=340"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/onecity\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=340"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/onecity\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=340"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}