shame. In his misery Abélard called on God for help,--his first great
advance in that piety which detractors depreciated. He wrote also to a
friend a history of his misfortunes. By accident this history fell into
the hands of Héloïse, then abbess of the Paraclete, which Abélard had
given her, and where she was greatly revered for all those virtues most
esteemed in her age. It opened her wound afresh, and she wrote a letter
to her husband such as has seldom been equalled for pathos and depth of
sentiment. It is an immortal record of her grief, her unsubdued
passion, her boundless love, not without gentle reproaches for what
seemed a cold neglect and silence for fifteen long and bitter years, yet
breathing forgiveness, admiration, affection. The salutation of that
letter is remarkable: "Héloïse to her lord, to her father, to her
husband, to her brother: his servant,--yes, his daughter; his
wife,--yes, his sister." Thus does she begin that tender and long
letter, in which she describes her sufferings, her unchanged affections,
her ardent wishes for his welfare, revealing in every line not merely
genius and sensibility, but a lofty and magnanimous soul. She glories in
what constitutes the real superiority of her old lover; she describes
with simplicity what had originally charmed her,--his songs and
conversation. She professes still an unbounded obedience to his will,
and begs for a reply, if for nothing else that she may be stimulated to
a higher life amid the asperities of her gloomy convent.
Yet write, oh, write all, that I may join
Grief to thy griefs, and echo sighs to thine!
Years still are mine, and these I need not spare,
Love but demands what else were shed in prayer;
No happier task these faded eyes pursue,--
To read and weep is all I now can do.
Abélard replies to this touching letter coldly, but religiously, calling
her his "sister in Christ," but not attempting to draw out the earthly
love which both had sought to crush. He implores her prayers in his
behalf. The only sign of his former love is a request to be buried in
her abbey, in anticipation of a speedy and violent death. Most critics
condemn this letter as heartless; yet it is but charitable to suppose
that he did not wish to trifle with a love so great, and reopen a wound
so deep and sacred. All his efforts now seem to have been directed to
raise her soul to heaven. But his letter does not satisfy her, and she
again gives vent to her passionate grief in view of the separation:--
"O inclement Clemency! O unfortunate Fortune! She has so far consumed
her weakness upon me that she has nothing left for others against whom
she rages. I am the most miserable of the miserable, the most unhappy of
the unhappy!"
This letter seems to have touched Abélard, and he replied to it more at
length, and with great sympathy, giving her encouragement and
consolation. He speaks of their mutual sufferings as providential; and
his letter is couched in a more Christian spirit than one would
naturally impute to him in view of his contests with the orthodox
leaders of the Church; and it also expresses more tenderness than can be
reconciled with the selfish man he is usually represented. He writes:--
"See, dearest, how with the strong nets of his mercy God has taken us
from the depths of a perilous sea. Observe how he has tempered mercy
with justice; compare our danger with the deliverance, our disease with
the remedy. I merit death, and God gives me life. Come, and join me in
proclaiming how much the Lord has done for us. Be my inseparable
companion in an act of grace, since you have participated with me in the
fault and the pardon. Take courage, my dear sister; whom the Lord loveth
he chastiseth. Sympathize with Him who suffered for your redemption.
Approach in spirit His sepulchre. Be thou His spouse."
Then he closes with this prayer:--
"When it pleased Thee, O Lord, and as it pleased Thee, Thou didst join
us, and Thou didst separate us. Now, what Thou hast so mercifully begun,
mercifully complete; and after separating us in this world, join us
together eternally in heaven."
No one can read this letter without acknowledging its delicacy and its
loftiness. All his desires centred in the spiritual good of her whom the
Church would not allow him to call any longer his wife, yet to whom he
hoped to be reunited in heaven. As a professed nun she could no longer,
with propriety, think of him as an earthly husband. For a priest to
acknowledge a nun for his wife would have been a great scandal. By all
the laws of the Church and the age they were now only brother and sister
in Christ. Nothing escaped from his pen which derogates from the
austere dignity of the priest.
But Héloïse was more human and less conventional. She had not conquered
her love; once given, it could not be taken back. She accepted her
dreary immolation in the convent, since she obeyed Abélard both as
husband and as a spiritual father; but she would have left the convent
and rejoined him had he demanded it, for marriage was to her more sacred
than the veil. She was more emancipated from the ideas of her
superstitious age than even the bold and rationalistic philosopher. With
all her moral and spiritual elevation, Héloïse could not conquer her
love. And, as a wedded wife, why should she conquer it? She was both nun
and wife. If fault there was, it was as wife, in immuring herself in a
convent and denying the marriage. It should have been openly avowed; the
denial of it placed her in a false position, as a fallen woman. Yet, as
a fallen woman, she regained her position in the eyes of the world. She
was a lady abbess. It was impossible for a woman to enjoy a higher
position than the control of a convent. As abbess, she enjoyed the
friendship and respect of some of the saintliest and greatest characters
of the age, even of such a man as Peter the Venerable, abbot of Cluny.
And it is impossible that she should have won the friendship of such a
man, if she herself had not been irreproachable in her own character.
The error in judging Héloïse is, that she, as nun, had no right to love.
But the love existed long before she took the veil, and was consecrated
by marriage, even though private. By the mediaeval and conventional
stand point, it is true, the wife was lost in the nun. That is the view
that Abélard took,--that it was a sin to love his wife any longer. But
Héloïse felt that it was no sin to love him who was her life. She
continued to live in him who ruled over her, and to whose desire her
will was subject and obedient, according to that eternal law declared in
the garden of Eden.
Nor could this have been otherwise so long as Abélard retained the
admiration of Héloïse, and was worthy of her devotion. We cannot tell
what changes may have taken place in her soul had he been grovelling, or
tyrannical, a slave of degrading habits, or had he treated her with
cruel harshness, or ceased to sympathize with her sorrows, or
transferred his affections to another object. But whatever love he had
to give, he gave to her to the end, so far as the ideas of his age would
permit. His fault was in making a nun of his wife, which was in the eyes
of the world a virtual repudiation; even though, from a principle of
sublime obedience and self-sacrifice, she consented to the separation.
Was Josephine to blame because she loved a selfish man after she was
repudiated? Héloïse was simply unable to conquer a powerful love. It
was not converted into hatred, because Abélard, in her eyes, seemed
still to be worthy of it. She regarded him as a saint, forced by the
ideas of his age to crush a mortal love,--which she herself could not
do, because it was a sentiment, and sentiment is eternal. She was
greater than Abélard, because her love was more permanent; in other
words, because her soul was greater. In intellect he may have been
superior to her, but not in the higher qualities which imply generosity,
self-abnegation, and sympathy,--qualities which are usually stronger in
women than in men. In Abélard the lower faculties--ambition, desire of
knowledge, vanity--consumed the greater. _He_ could be contented with
the gratification of these, even as men of a still lower type can
renounce intellectual pleasures for the sensual. It does not follow that
Héloïse was weaker than he because she could not live outside the world
of sentiment, but rather loftier and nobler. These higher faculties
constituted her superiority to Abélard. It was sentiment which made her
so pre-eminently great, and it was this which really endeared her to
Abélard. By reason and will he ruled over her; but by the force of
superior sentiment she ruled over him.
Sentiment, indeed, underlies everything that is great or lovely or
enduring on this earth. It is the joy of festivals, the animating soul
of patriotism, the bond of families, the beauty of religious,
political, and social institutions. It has consecrated Thermopylae, the
Parthenon, the Capitol, the laurel crown, the conqueror's triumphal
procession, the epics of Homer, the eloquence of Demosthenes, the muse
of Virgil, the mediaeval cathedral, the town-halls of Flanders, the
colleges of Oxford and Cambridge, the struggles of the Puritans, the
deeds of Gustavus Adolphus, the Marseilles hymn, the farewell address of
Washington. There is no poetry without it, nor heroism, nor social
banqueting. What is Christmas without the sentiments which hallow the
evergreen, the anthem, the mistletoe, the family reunion? What is even
tangible roast-beef and plum-pudding without a party to enjoy them; and
what is the life of the party but the interchange of sentiments? Why is
a cold sleigh-ride, or the ascent of a mountain, or a voyage across the
Atlantic, or a rough journey under torrid suns to the consecrated
places,--why are these endurable, and even pleasant? It is because the
sentiments which prompt them are full of sweet and noble inspiration.
The Last Supper, and Bethany, and the Sepulchre are immortal, because
they testify eternal love. Leonidas lives in the heart of the world
because he sacrificed himself to patriotism. The martyrs are objects of
unfading veneration, because they died for Christianity.
In the same way Héloïse is embalmed in the affections of all nations
because she gave up everything for an exalted sentiment which so
possessed her soul that neither scorn, nor pity, nor ascetic severities,
nor gloomy isolation, nor ingratitude, nor a living death could
eradicate or weaken it,--an unbounded charity which covered with its
veil the evils she could not remove. That all-pervading and
all-conquering sentiment was the admiration of ideal virtues and
beauties which her rapt and excited soul saw in her adored lover; such
as Dante saw in his departed Beatrice. It was unbounded admiration for
Abélard which first called out the love of Héloïse; and his undoubted
brilliancy and greatness were exaggerated in her loving eyes by her
imagination, even as mothers see in children traits that are hidden from
all other mortal eyes. So lofty and godlike did he seem, amidst the
plaudits of the schools, and his triumph over all the dignitaries that
sought to humble him; so interesting was he to her by his wit, sarcasm,
and eloquence,--that she worshipped him, and deemed it the most exalted
honor to possess exclusively his love in return, which he gave certainly
to no one else. Satisfied that he, the greatest man of the world,--as he
seemed and as she was told he was,--should give to her what she gave to
him, she exulted in it as her highest glory. It was all in all to her;
but not to him. See, then, how superior Héloïse was to Abélard in
humility as well as self-abnegation. She was his equal, and yet she
ever gloried in his superiority. See how much greater, too, she was in
lofty sentiments, since it was the majesty of his mind and soul which
she adored. He was comparatively indifferent to her when she became no
longer an object of desire; but not so with her, since she was attracted
by his real or supposed greatness of intellect, which gave permanence to
her love, and loftiness also. He was her idol, since he possessed those
qualities which most powerfully excited her admiration.
This then is love, when judged by a lofty standard,--worship of what is
most glorious in mind and soul. And this exalted love is most common
among the female sex, since their passions are weaker and their
sentiments are stronger than those of most men. What a fool a man is to
weaken this sympathy, or destroy this homage, or outrage this
indulgence; or withhold that tenderness, that delicate attention, that
toleration of foibles, that sweet appreciation, by which the soul of
woman is kept alive and the lamp of her incense burning! And woe be to
him who drives this confiding idolater back upon her technical
obligations! The form that holds these certitudes of the soul may lose
all its beauty by rudeness or neglect. And even if the form remains,
what is a mortal body without the immortal soul which animates it? The
glory of a man or of a woman is the real presence of spiritual love,
which brings peace to homes, alleviation to burdens, consolation to
sufferings, rest to labors, hope to anxieties, and a sublime repose amid
the changes of the world,--that blessed flower of perennial sweetness
and beauty which Adam in his despair bore away from Eden, and which
alone almost compensated him for the loss of Paradise.
It is not my object to present Abélard except in his connection with the
immortal love with which he inspired the greatest woman of the age. And
yet I cannot conclude this sketch without taking a parting glance of
this brilliant but unfortunate man. And I confess that his closing days
strongly touch my sympathies, and make me feel that historians have been
too harsh in their verdicts. Historians have based their opinions on the
hostilities which theological controversies produced, and on the neglect
which Abélard seemed to show for the noble woman who obeyed and adored
him. But he appears to have employed his leisure and tranquil days in
writing hymns to the abbess of the Paraclete, in preparing homilies, and
in giving her such advice as her circumstances required. All his later
letters show the utmost tenderness and zeal for the spiritual good of
the woman to whom he hoped to be reunited in heaven, and doing for
Héloïse what Jerome did for Paula, and Fénelon for Madame Guyon. If no
longer her lover, he was at least her friend. And, moreover, at this
time he evinced a loftier religious life than he has the credit of
possessing. He lived a life of study and meditation.
But his enemies would not allow him to rest, even in generous labors.
They wished to punish him and destroy his influence. So they summoned
him to an ecclesiastical council to answer for his heresies. At first he
resolved to defend himself, and Bernard, his greatest enemy, even
professed a reluctance to contend with his superior in dialectical
contests. But Abélard, seeing how inflamed were the passions of the
theologians against him, and how vain would be his defence, appealed at
once to the Pope; and Rome, of course, sided with his enemies. He was
condemned to perpetual silence, and his books were ordered to be burned.
To this sentence it would appear that Abélard prepared to submit with
more humility than was to be expected from so bold and arrogant a man.
But he knew he could not resist an authority based on generally accepted
ideas any easier than Henry IV. could have resisted Hildebrand. He made
up his mind to obey the supreme authority of the Church, but bitterly
felt the humiliation and the wrong.
Broken in spirit and in reputation, Abélard, now an old man, set out on
foot for Rome to plead his cause before the Pope. He stopped on his way
at Cluny in Burgundy, that famous monastery where Hildebrand himself had
ruled, now, however, presided over by Peter the Venerable,--the most
benignant and charitable ecclesiastical dignitary of that age. And as
Abélard approached the gates of the venerable abbey, which was the pride
of the age, worn out with fatigue and misfortune, he threw himself at
the feet of the lordly abbot and invoked shelter and protection. How
touching is the pride of greatness, when brought low by penitence or
grief, like that of Theodosius at the feet of Ambrose, or Henry II. at
the tomb of Becket! But Peter raises him up, receives him in his arms,
opens to him his heart and the hospitalities of his convent, not as a
repentant prodigal, but as the greatest genius of his age, brought low
by religious persecution. Peter did all in his power to console his
visitor, and even privately interceded with the Pope, remembering only
Abélard's greatness and his misfortunes. And the persecuted philosopher,
through the kind offices of the abbot, was left in peace, and was even
reconciled with Bernard,--an impossibility without altered opinions in
Abélard, or a submission to the Church which bore all the marks
of piety.
The few remaining days of this extraordinary man, it seems, were spent
in study, penitence, and holy meditation. So beloved and revered was he
by the community among whom he dwelt, that for six centuries his name
was handed down from father to son among the people of the valley and
town of Cluny. "At the extremity of a retired valley," says Lamartine,
"flanked by the walls of the convent, on the margin of extensive
meadows, closed by woods, and near to a neighboring stream, there exists
an enormous lime-tree, under the shade of which Abélard in his closing
days was accustomed to sit and meditate, with his face turned towards
the Paraclete which he had built, and where Héloïse still discharged the
duties of abbess."
But even this pensive pleasure was not long permitted him. He was worn
out with sorrows and misfortunes; and in a few months after he had
crossed the hospitable threshold of Cluny he died in the arms of his
admiring friend. "Under the instinct of a sentiment as sacred as
religion itself, Peter felt that Abélard above and Héloïse on earth
demanded of him the last consolation of a reunion in the grave. So,
quietly, in the dead of night, dreading scandal, yet true to his
impulses, without a hand to assist or an eye to witness, he exhumed the
coffin which had been buried in the abbey cemetery, and conveyed it
himself to the Paraclete, and intrusted it to Héloïse."
She received it with tears, shut herself up in the cold vault with the
mortal remains of him she had loved so well; while Peter, that aged
saint of consolation, pronounced the burial service with mingled tears
and sobs. And after having performed this last sad office, and given his
affectionate benediction to the great woman to whom he was drawn by ties
of admiration and sympathy, this venerable dignitary wended his way
silently back to Cluny, and, for the greater consolation of Héloïse,
penned the following remarkable letter, which may perhaps modify our
judgment of Abélard:--
"It is no easy task, my sister, to describe in a few lines the holiness,
the humility, and the self-denial which our departed brother exhibited
to us, and of which our whole collected brotherhood alike bear witness.
Never have I beheld a life and deportment so thoroughly submissive. I
placed him in an elevated rank in the community, but he appeared the
lowest of all by the simplicity of his dress and his abstinence from all
the enjoyments of the senses. I speak not of luxury, for that was a
stranger to him; he refused everything but what was indispensable for
the sustenance of life. He read continually, prayed often, and never
spoke except when literary conversation or holy discussion compelled him
to break silence. His mind and tongue seemed concentrated on
philosophical and divine instructions. Simple, straightforward,
reflecting on eternal judgments, shunning all evil, he consecrated the
closing hours of an illustrious life. And when a mortal sickness seized
him, with what fervent piety, what ardent inspiration did he make his
last confession of his sins; with what fervor did he receive the
promise of eternal life; with what confidence did he recommend his body
and soul to the tender mercies of the Saviour!"
Such was the death of Abélard, as attested by the most venerated man of
that generation. And when we bear in mind the friendship and respect of
such a man as Peter, and the exalted love of such a woman as Héloïse, it
is surely not strange that posterity, and the French nation especially,
should embalm his memory in their traditions.
Héloïse survived him twenty years,--a priestess of God, a mourner at the
tomb of Abélard. And when in the solitude of the Paraclete she felt the
approach of the death she had so long invoked, she directed the
sisterhood to place her body beside that of her husband in the same
leaden coffin. And there, in the silent aisles of that abbey-church, it
remained for five hundred years, until it was removed by Lucien
Bonaparte to the Museum of French Monuments in Paris, but again
transferred, a few years after, to the cemetery of Père la Chaise. The
enthusiasm of the French erected over the remains a beautiful monument;
and "there still may be seen, day by day, the statues of the immortal
lovers, decked with flowers and coronets, perpetually renewed with
invisible hands,--the silent tribute of the heart of that consecrated
sentiment which survives all change. Thus do those votive offerings
mysteriously convey admiration for the constancy and sympathy with the
posthumous union of two hearts who transposed conjugal tenderness from
the senses to the soul, who spiritualized the most ardent of human
passions, and changed love itself into a holocaust, a martyrdom, and a
holy sacrifice."
AUTHORITIES.
Lamartine's Characters; Berington's Middle Ages; Michelet's History of
France; Life of St. Bernard; French Ecclesiastical Historians; Bayle's
Critical Dictionary; Biographic Universelle; Pope's Lines on Abélard and
Héloïse; Letters of Abélard and Héloïse.
JOAN OF ARC.
* * * * *
A.D. 1412-1431.
HEROIC WOMEN.
Perhaps the best known and most popular of heroines is Joan of Arc,
called the Maid of Orleans. Certainly she is one of the most interesting
characters in the history of France during the Middle Ages; hence I
select her to illustrate heroic women. There are not many such who are
known to fame; though heroic qualities are not uncommon in the gentler
sex, and a certain degree of heroism enters into the character of all
those noble and strongly marked women who have attracted attention and
who have rendered great services. It marked many of the illustrious
women of the Bible, of Grecian and Roman antiquity, and especially those
whom chivalry produced in mediaeval Europe; and even in our modern times
intrepidity and courage have made many a woman famous, like Florence
Nightingale. In Jewish history we point to Deborah, who delivered Israel
from the hands of Jabin; and to Jael, who slew Sisera, the captain of
Jabin's hosts; and to Judith, who cut off the head of Holofernes. It
was heroism, which is ever allied with magnanimity, that prompted the
daughter of Jephtha to the most remarkable self-sacrifice recorded in
history. There was a lofty heroism in Abigail, when she prevented David
from shedding innocent blood. And among the Pagan nations, who does not
admire the heroism of such women as we have already noticed? Chivalry,
too, produced illustrious heroines in every country of Europe. We read
of a Countess of March, in the reign of Edward III., who defended Dunbar
with uncommon courage against Montague and an English army; a Countess
of Montfort shut herself up in the fortress of Hennebon, and
successfully defied the whole power of Charles of Blois; Jane Hatchett
repulsed in person a considerable body of Burgundian troops; Altrude,
Countess of Bertinora, advanced with an army to the relief of Ancona;
Bona Lombardi, with a body of troops, liberated her husband from
captivity; Isabella of Lorraine raised an army for the rescue of her
husband; Queen Philippa, during the absence of her husband in Scotland,
stationed herself in the Castle of Bamborough and defied the threats of
Douglas, and afterwards headed an army against David, King of Scotland,
and took him prisoner, and shut him up in the Tower of London.