PROLOGUE TO ACT 1: The presumption of man |
Blaise Pascal (1623-1662) in a monastery garden, circa 1658. |
ACT 1: Confusion and paradox |
John Wallis (1616-1703), Antoine Arnauld (1612-1694), Gottfried Leibniz (1646-1716), in conversation, circa 1690. Leonhard Euler (1707-1783) giving front-stage commentary as a young man, circa 1730.
PROLOGUE TO ACT 2: The courage of the quest |
Blaise Pascal, circa 1694, in the after-life. |
ACT 2: Introducing the strangers |
Scene 1 : Nicholas Saunderson (1682-1739), in a Cambridge lecture room, circa 1730.
Scene 2 : Leonhard Euler, dictating to an untutored and inexperienced scribe in his St. Petersburg house, circa 1770.
Scene 3 : Pierre-Simone Laplace (1749-1827), at the École Normale in post-Revolution Paris, circa 1796.
EPILOGUE: Forward in Faith! |
Jean d'Alembert, reading from a volume of the great Encyclopédie, in 1783 - the year of his death.
LAST WORD: The humbling of science |
The spirit of Pascal pronounces on the past and prophecies the future. |