on what he calls "Pascal's sad religion" of belief in a "hidden God" not reachable by reason. The conversion to Christianity of the great 17th century scientist plunged Pascal, like the modern man he prefigures, into what Kolakowski describes as "a never-ending state of suspense and doubt on the one matter that was really important."

Out of his sustained and disciplined study of philosophy, Kolakowski crafted his best known and most influential work: his three-volume Main Currents of Marxism: Its Rise, Growth and Dissolution (1976-78). Written in exile from Poland, it was, and remains, the most lucid and comprehensive history of the origins, structure and posthumous development of the system of thought that had the greatest impact on the 20th century. It was a prophetic work, written at atime when Marxism still provided the ideological glue for a Soviet system that was thought to have an indefinite life expectancy. He described with his customary objectivity the main ideas and diverse currents of Marxist thinking, but at the same time characterized Marxism as "the greatest fantasy of our century... [which] began in a Promethean humanism and culminated in the monstrous tyranny of Stalin."

His ideas informed the anti-totalitarian youth movement inside Poland, and he became an adviser and active supporter in exile of the Solidarity movement that challenged and began unraveling in a non-violent way the Soviet system in Eastern Europe. As one of the leaders of Solidarity put it:

This skeptical student of enlightenment thought, this scholar of the highest intellectual rigor, this opponent of all illusions, played