e by the frailty of my sex, and
thought it was the man and not the person I loved. But he has been
guilty to no purpose. I love you more than ever, and so revenge myself
on him. I will still love you with all the tenderness of my soul till
the last moment of my life."

Formerly, she tells him, the man was the least she valued in him. It was
his heart she desired to possess. "You cannot but be entirely persuaded
of this by the extreme unwillingness I showed to marry you, though I
knew that the name of wife was honourable in the world and holy in
religion; yet the name of your mistress had greater charms because it
was more free. The bonds of matrimony, however honourable, still bear
with them a necessary engagement, and I was very unwilling to be
necessitated to love always a man who would perhaps not always love me.
I despised the name of wife that I might live happy with that of
mistress."

And then, ecstatically recalling the old happy times, she deplores that
she has nothing left but the painful memory that they are past. Beyond
that, she has no regret except that against her will she must now be
innocent. "My misfortune was to have cruel relatives whose malice
destroyed the calm we enjoyed; had they been reasonable, I had now been
happy in the enjoyment of my dear husband. Oh, how cruel were they when
their blind fury urged a villain to surprise you in your sleep! Where
was I--where was your Heloise then? What joy should I have had in
defending my lover! I would have guarded you from violence at the
expense of my life. Oh, whither does this excess of passion hurry me?
Here love is shocked, and modesty deprives me of words."

She goes on to reproach him with his neglect and silence these ten
years. When she pronounced her "sad vow," he had protested that his
whole being was hers; that he would never live but to love Heloise. But
he has proved the "unfaithful one." Though she is immured in the
convent, it was only harsh relatives and "the unhappy consequences of
our love and your disgrace" that made her put on the habit of chastity.
She is not penitent for the past. At one moment she is swayed by the
sentiment of piety, and next moment she yields up her imagination to all
that is amorous and tender. "Among those who are wedded to God I am
wedded to a man; among the heroic supporters of the Cross I am the slave
of a human desire; at the head of a religious community I am devoted to
Abelard alone. Even here I love yo