15.1 \par

Synopsis (note that while reading the input TeX converts any sequence of one or more blank lines to a \par, Making paragraphs):

\par

End the current paragraph. The usual way to separate paragraphs is with a blank line but the \par command is entirely equivalent. This command is robust (see \protect).

This example uses \par rather than a blank line simply for readability.

\newcommand{\syllabusLegalese}{%
  \whatCheatingIs\par\whatHappensWhenICatchYou}

In LR mode the \par command does nothing and is ignored. In paragraph mode, the \par command terminates paragraph mode, switching LaTeX to vertical mode (see Modes).

You cannot use the \par command in a math mode. You also cannot use it in the argument of many commands, such as the sectioning commands, e.g. \section (see Making paragraphs and \newcommand & \renewcommand).

The \par command is not the same as the \paragraph command. The latter is, like \section or \subsection, a sectioning command used by the LaTeX document standard classes (see \subsubsection, \paragraph, \subparagraph).

The \par command is not the same as \newline or the line break double backslash, \\. The difference is that \par ends the paragraph, not just the line, and also triggers the addition of the between-paragraph vertical space \parskip (see \parindent & \parskip).

The output from this example

xyz

\setlength{\parindent}{3in}
\setlength{\parskip}{5in}
\noindent test\indent test1\par test2 

is: after ‘xyz’ there is a vertical skip of 5 inches and then ‘test’ appears, aligned with the left margin. On the same line, there is an empty horizontal space of 3 inches and then ‘test1’ appears. Finally. there is a vertical space of 5 inches, followed by a fresh paragraph with a paragraph indent of 3 inches, and then LaTeX puts the text ‘test2’.