Note 83 — LETTER I.

And yet “the question of fact,” which Pascal professes to treat so lightly, became the turning point of all the subsequent persecutions directed against the unhappy Port-Royalists! Those who have read the sad tale of the demolition of Port-Royal, will recollect with a sigh, the sufferings inflicted on the poor scholars and pious nuns of that establishment solely on the ground that, from respect to Jansenius and to a good conscience they would not subscribe a formulary acknowledging the five propositions to be contained in his book.—(See Narrative of the Demolition of the Monastery of Port-Royal, by Mary Anne Schimmelpenninck p. 170, &c.)