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That he was something of a pedant is probable, but Abélard's picture of him is certainly very far from doing him justice. Of these two not much is known beyond what Abélard himself tells us. ALberic, indeed, won a considerable reputation, and was highly recommended to Pope Honorius II by St. Bernard. In 1139 Alberic seems to have become archbishop of Bourges, dying two years later.
When Abelard died, like Tannhaeuser, he was on his way to Rome: what might have happened had he reached his journey's end is uncertain; and it is in this uncertain twilight that his relation to the general beliefs of his age has always remained.
It had enormous popularity, and brought the poet £5000. It also was highly popular, and increased his gains to about £8000, which placed him in a position of independence. While engaged upon these he removed to Chiswick, where he lived 1716-18, and where he issued in 1717 a coll. ed. of his works, including the Elegy on an Unfortunate Lady and the Epistle of Eloisa to Abelard.
'I start from the atom, said Abélard; and, once having started, they necessarily came into collision at some point between the two."
Citizens and students and ecclesiastics poured into the street and surrounded the house of Abelard. "Almost the entire city," says Fulques, as quoted by McCabe, "went clamoring toward his house. Women wept as if each one had lost her husband." Unmanned though he was, Abelard still retained enough of the spirit of his time to seek vengeance.
Such a man was Abélard in the Middle Ages, in spite of all his imperfections; and thence the boundless emotion and enthusiasm which Abélard excited. Such were Lessing and Herder in Germany, at the end of the last century; and their services to Germany were in this way inestimably precious.
Secretly Heloise left her uncle's house and fled through the narrow lanes of Paris to the dwelling of Abelard's sister, Denyse, where Abelard himself was living. There, presently, the young girl gave birth to a son, who was named Astrolabe, after an instrument used by astronomers, since both the father and the mother felt that the offspring of so great a love should have no ordinary name.
It is justly remarked by him, that the wish of Eloisa, for the happy passage of Abelard into the other world, is formed according to the ideas of mystick devotion.
Some day, wandering about the muddy streets, when daily material joys shall have failed, you will find yourself seated disconsolately on a deserted bench at midnight. O men of marble! sublime egoists, inimitable reasoners, who have never given way to despair or made a mistake in arithmetic, if this ever happens to you, at the hour of your ruin you will remember Abelard when he lost Heloise.
Some day, wandering about the muddy streets, when daily material joys shall have failed, you will find yourself seated disconsolately on a deserted bench at midnight. O men of marble! sublime egoists, inimitable reasoners, who have never given way to despair or made a mistake in arithmetic, if this ever happens to you, at the hour of your ruin you will remember Abelard when he lost Heloise.
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