Pascal's Pensees afford a deeply penetrating view of the human condition (or predicament) as a prelude to a luminously reasoned defense of the Christian faith. His Provincial Letters are best remembered as a wickedly funny satire of -obliging and accommodating- Jesuit moral theologians who, guided by policy rather than piety, are willing to put virtue and salvation within the easy reach of all but the diabolical. Both works are landmarks of French prose that have fascinated readers of all sorts from his day to ours. The eight essays in Fire in the Dark, two of which are new and four of which...