PASCAI's Pensees is widely considered to be a masterpiece, and a landmark in French prose. When commenting on one particular section, Sainte-Beuve praised it as the finest pages in the French language. Will Durant, in his II-volume, comprehensive The Story of Civilization series, hailed it as "the most eloquent book in French prose." In Pensees, Pascal surveys several philosophical paradoxes: infiniyndnthing, faith and reason, soul and matter, death and life, meaning and vanity- seemingly arriving at no definitive conclusions besides humility, ignorance, and grace.