e 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: "Heloise 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.

Abelard 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 Abelard, and he replied to it more at
length, and with great sympathy, giving her encoura