François de Sales is, next to Pascal, the early modern French religious author whose work has for centuries reached the widest audience. Whereas Pascal conceived many of his reflections and arguments in the Pensées for persons uncommitted to the doctrines of the Roman Catholic church, de Sales aimed at a wide audience of faithful Roman Catholics. This difference of intended public (or interlocutor) explains much about the advice the two writers offer about how to think and what to think about. In his Introduction à la vie dévote, de Sales’s figurative language makes it seem that he is teaching a form of easy-going religiosity, similar to the dévotion aisée that Pascal mocks in the Provinciales. For today’s reader, the Introduction can seem a cloying confection, full of suavité. And yet, Salesian devotion promotes the radical vision of a deeply degraded humanity.

弗朗索瓦·德·萨莱斯是仅次于帕斯卡的法国早期现代宗教作家，几个世纪以来，他的作品受到了最广泛的读者的欢迎。帕斯卡在《思想录》中为那些不信奉罗马天主教教义的人构思了许多反思和论点，而德萨雷则针对的是广大忠实的罗马天主教徒。目标公众（或对话者）的这种差异在很大程度上解释了两位作者提出的关于如何思考和思考什么的建议。在德萨莱斯的《奉献生活的引言》中，他的比喻语言让人觉得他在传授一种随和的宗教信仰，类似于帕斯卡在《省》中嘲笑的奉献精神。对于今天的读者来说，介绍似乎是一种令人腻味的甜点，充满了温和的气息。然而，慈幼会的奉献却宣扬了对严重堕落的人性的激进愿景。