Blaise Pascal

==Last works and death==
[[File:001Paskal.JPG|thumb|[[Death mask]] of Blaise Pascal|alt=]]

[[T. S. Eliot]] described him during this phase of his life as "a man of the world among ascetics, and an ascetic among men of the world." Pascal's ascetic lifestyle derived from a belief that it was natural and necessary for a person to suffer. In 1659, Pascal fell seriously ill. During his last years, he frequently tried to reject the ministrations of his doctors, saying, "Sickness is the natural state of Christians."<ref name="m104-">Muir, Jane. [https://books.google.com/books?id=uV3rJkmnQhsC ''Of Men and Numbers''] {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20230411061236/https://books.google.com/books?id=uV3rJkmnQhsC |date=11 April 2023 }}. (New York: Dover Publications, Inc, 1996). {{isbn|0-486-28973-7}}, p. 104.</ref>

Louis XIV suppressed the Jansenist movement at Port-Royal in 1661. In response, Pascal wrote one of his final works, ''Écrit sur la signature du formulaire'' ("Writ on the Signing of the Form"), exhorting the Jansenists not to give in. Later that year, his sister Jacqueline died, which convinced Pascal to cease his [[polemics]] on [[Jansenism]]. Pascal's last major achievement, returning to his mechanical genius, was inaugurating perhaps the first bus line, the [[carrosses à cinq sols]], moving passengers within Paris in a carriage with many seats. Pascal also designated the operation principles which were later used to plan public transportation: The carriages had a fixed route, fixed price, and left even if there were no passengers.<ref>{{cite news |last1=Blinkin |first1=Mikhail |title=Это в моде: почему в мире возрождается общественный транспорт |url=https://postnauka.ru/longreads/156572 |work=Post-Nauka |date=20 August 2021 |language=ru |access-date=15 September 2021 |archive-date=15 September 2021 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20210915184104/https://postnauka.ru/longreads/156572 |url-status=live }}</ref> It is widely considered that the idea of public transportation was well ahead of time. The lines were not commercially successful, and the last one closed by 1675.<ref>{{cite news |last1=Alfred |first1=Randy |title=March 18, 1662: The Bus Starts Here ... in Paris |url=https://www.wired.com/2008/03/march-18-1662-the-bus-starts-here-in-paris/ |magazine=[[Wired (magazine)|Wired]] |date=17 March 2008 |access-date=15 September 2021 |archive-date=14 October 2021 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20211014221608/https://www.wired.com/2008/03/march-18-1662-the-bus-starts-here-in-paris/ |url-status=live }}</ref>

In 1662, Pascal's illness became more violent, and his emotional condition had severely worsened since his sister's death. Aware that his health was fading quickly, he sought a move to the hospital for incurable diseases, but his doctors declared that he was too unstable to be carried. In Paris on 18 August 1662, Pascal went into convulsions and received [[extreme unction]]. He died the next morning, his last words being "May God never abandon me," and was buried in the cemetery of [[Saint-Étienne-du-Mont]].<ref name="m104-" />

An [[autopsy]] performed after his death revealed grave problems with his stomach and other organs of his abdomen, along with [[brain damage|damage to his brain]]. Despite the autopsy, the cause of his poor health was never precisely determined, though speculation focuses on [[tuberculosis]], [[stomach cancer]], or a combination of the two.<ref name="m103">Muir, Jane. [https://books.google.com/books?id=uV3rJkmnQhsC ''Of Men and Numbers''] {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20230411061236/https://books.google.com/books?id=uV3rJkmnQhsC |date=11 April 2023 }}. (New York: Dover Publications, Inc, 1996). {{isbn|0-486-28973-7}}, p. 103.</ref> The headaches which affected Pascal are generally attributed to his brain [[lesion]].{{citation needed|date=June 2022}}