Pascal, in his discussion — perhaps justification— of the Bible, points to the difference in figurative and literal language; it is the interplay between the two which is the key to understanding scripture and solving the contradictions that exist. For Pascal, it is necessary to solve these contradictions and Christianity is the true faith because it is the only which has succeeded in doing so through figures. Christ, for example, is figuratively a great king; it is his spirit and his eternal kingdom which make him great not what he possesses on Earth. This method of thought is central to Pascal’s work as he tries to balance his mathematical history with his faith. In passage 260, Pascal names the tool for this type on understanding as a “cipher”. For him, “a cipher has two meanings” the literal and the figurative or the spiritual. A cipher is the only way Pascal can envision the Bible with its obscurities and contradictions. The work of the prophets and the apostles was to decode this cipher, or these ciphers, to spread the truth of God to his followers: “they broke the seal, he rent the veil and revealed the spirit.”

However, Pascal does not investigate the nature of ciphers. They can be understood in two ways. Firstly, by being cracked and the true meaning being extracted and secondly, by a predetermined system between the author of the cipher and its reader or recipient. The duality attached to ciphers is complicated further by the nature of scripture. Were the ciphers first created in the Old or New Testament? Or did Christ teach in ciphers delivered to the apostles? Did they then keep the ciphered message when they wrote the scripture? Or were they in the latter type of cipher-breakers and already had the means to crack it? It is interesting to note that Pascal does little to resolve them. In 268 he claims “the letter kills […] This is the cipher St Paul gives us.” It follows that the apostles created the ciphers and it is for followers to unravel. This result is slightly unsatisfying as it just raises the question of why write contradictory scripture? Later (276) the whole of the Old Testament is labelled a cipher. Are we to presume then that the New Testament is not?

Pascal is somewhat contradictory in his guide of how to unravel contradictions. He is caught in a world of ciphers and needs to use them to escape it. This situation is one Wittgenstein believes language ties us all into. In his passage 120, Wittgenstein poses an imaginary conversation in which an unknown figure asks him to further explain his language-games and their function in our language system, and the system in which our language functions. (By this qualification I refer to Wittgenstein’s questioning of the importance of language to us as a species and our use of it to raise ourselves above the rest of the animal kingdom as he discusses in 25.) Twice in a short passage Wittgenstein notes the problem with using the tool— in this case language— being examined for the examination:“Well, your very questions were framed in this language; they had to be expressed in this language, if there was anything to ask!” and “Your questions refer to words; so I have to talk about words.” Wittgenstein, in comparison to Pascal, appears to be more aware of the limitations of his chosen tools. The difficulty of separating a word, its meaning, and, to a lesser extent, the use of  the word in the system in which they only function as a combination is an area Wittgenstein is deeply concerned with. Unlike Pascal, he does not seem to be moving towards a final truth, or to resolve the contradictions but, rather, to look at how these contradictions function in showing the limits of the system they emerge from.

Briefly, there is one significant stylistic difference between the two that is of interest to me. Opening Wittgenstein’s Philosophical Investigations on almost any page one would find frequent use of the third person plural, i.e we and us. Even page 54, where we can find the imagined conversation, has multiple uses of this address. As readers, we allow him to lead us through the steps of his logic as if he was working through them with us; his goal is “how can these observations satisfy us?” no how can they satisfy him. Reading Pascal, with his strong faith and belief in the universal truth of God, is, at least for me, more difficult. Regardless of one’s personal faith or lack thereof, the resolution of contradictions through ciphers is not as inclusive as Wittgenstein’s line of questioning. Pascal does not think of himself as one who has “unaided knowledge”(199); it is clear he has found the truth he believes we all must do.

As Dickinson writes poetry one must always read her texts as one would a cipher. The literal meaning of her poem and its figurative one, to borrow Pascal’s terms, may rarely be the same. Although, I do not believe that in poetry is something “is false literally, so it is true spiritually”(BP 272). In much of her work Dickinson makes great use of the layers of meaning this type of dual reading allows. To keep with the theme of ciphers, Dickinson’s poem 303 discusses ghostly visitors “who baffle Key”. Key here could simply be the key to the door; these visiting hosts could arrive even though the door is locked. (Even naming her visitors as hosts is playing with double meanings.) In the following stanza Dickinson states that “They have no Robes, nor Names – / No Almanacs – nor Climes – “ i.e without those items which state something about their rank, identity, customs etc. The use of key now takes another meaning. There is nothing to give a hint of who, or what, these hosts are; they cannot be read against a key for understanding. The capitalisation of the first letter of “key” helps to align the word with robes, names, almanacs and climes, all of which are similarly capitalised.

The second half of this poem is still more allusive. In what way these hosts are like gnomes is still something that alludes me. However there is certainly a strong religious slant to poem 303. “Their Coming, may be known / By Couriers within – “ is possible a reference to Christ’s coming to the Earth which is known by some (Christians) and not others (Jews). The couriers within harkens back to the use of ciphers; things can only be known to those within the predetermine system or those who break their way in. Are these couriers some reference to the apostles? It was the word of God that they were to deliver? “Their going – is not – / For they’re never gone – “ refers back to the hosts. They do not leave but what position does this ending leave the couriers in? They do not seem to have full knowledge of the movements of the hosts whereas the speaker of the poem does. Dickinson gives us no key to help our understanding, we are excluded like the couriers in the closing two lines of the poem as those with unaided knowledge.