a low voice," and had, from the beginning of the fourteenth century been employed as a term of reproach for particularly pious people.* Half a kingdom thus wrenched by the might of a single arm from its old Papal allegiance, is trophy enough for any heroism. Why then was there no Reformation in England till it came so shamefully misbegotten of the beastly lusts of Henry VII? It was persecution that kept it back. In 1388 it was made a penal offence to be found in possession of any writing of Wycliffe. In a few years Lollard blood began to wet the soil, and Lollard bodies to swing in the air of England. The House of Lancaster, sitting insecurely upon the throne, needed the help of Rome, and the price of that help was the extirpation of Wycliffe's heresies. The price was never fully paid; kingly power was not equal to it. Wycliffe had touched the heart of the nation too deeply for that. His writings were hid away in secret recesses in the walls of houses, and, slily read, nourished the life of many souls. So that the English Reformation when at length it came, had deep roots in the national heart, which make amends at the judgment-seat of history, for the root it had in the rotten loins of royalty.

* See Murdock's Mosheim, vol. 2, p. 392, n. 68.

ARTICLE II.

1. Petri Abaelardi Abbatis Rugensis Opera omnia. [Patrologiae, Series secunda, Tom. CLXXVIII.] Accurante J. P. MIGNE, fol. Paris. 1855. pp. 1895.

2. The History of the Lives of Abeillard and Heloisa, with their genuine Letters, from the collection of Amboise. By Rev. JOSEPH BERINGTON. New edition. 2 vols. 12 mo. Basil. 1793. 3. Abelard, sa vie, sa philosophie, et sa theologie. Par CHARLES DE REMUSAT. New edition. 2 vols. 12 mo. Paris. 1855. 4. The Romance of Abelard and Heloise. 12 mo. New York. 1853.

5. Abailard et Héloïse, Essai historique.

By O. W. WIGHT.

Par M. ET MME GUIZOT. Suivé des Lettres d'Abailard et d'Héloïse, traduites sur les manuscrits de la bibliotheque royal. Par M. ODDOUL. Nouvelle édition entièrement refondue. Paris. 1853.

[Second Article.] .

It was easy for Abelard to assume the garb, and enter the cell, but to acquire the spirit of a monk, was to be the lesson of his whole future life. For a while he could scarcely be restrained from going to Rome to invoke vengeance upon his enemies and to procure a reversal of the sentence of the Episcopal court in the case of Fulbert. But the picture drawn by his witty and judicious friend, the prior of Deuil, of the corruption of the Roman court, where only gold and worldly power could prevail,* of the danger he would incur from the resentment of the Parisian clergy, and

*"This passage," says the editor of the Patrologie, "so offensive to the holy Church and to our readers, we have not hesitated to expunge." Too many books have gone through such a process. Patrologiae, VOL. clxxviii. p. 375.

C

of the spirit suitable to his new profession, and finally the admonition, "You are now only a monk," were not without their effect. He soon convinced himself also that the step he had taken in a moment of passion was really the best within his choice. Had he not been perfectly sincere in his monastic vows, or had his continuance under them been merely a matter of necessity, he would have been less reluctant to leave his seclusion, and he would have joined his companions in accommodating the conventual life to worldly desires. The convent where he lived is described by Bernard* as more devoted to Caesar than to God, and more bound to earth than to heaven. The Paradise which Odilo, the "archangel of the monks," is said to have created there, had not been sacred enough to preserve their present abbot Adam and his holy family from a shameful fall, and an unenviable notoriety in guilt. He who in such a community, rigidly conformed to the severest discipline, and was persecuted for his efforts to bring others to their duty surely deserves our confidence. His will had seldom been crossed and he was doubtless often impatient under commands which seemed imposed only to exercise the novice in humility and patience, but all his powers were honestly directed to the fulfilment of his engagements. Whatever faults he had, he certainly was no hypocrite. Pride if not conscience, would have scorned a false part, while vanity alone would have been satisfied with a decent exterior. And yet by these regulations he had agreed to renounce all private property or aims, to clothe himself in coarse and sombre apparel, habitually to assume a downward look, to live on the simplest food, to labor industriously in some prescribed calling, to pray by instituted forms at frequent

* Patrologiae, vol. clxxxii. Bern. Op. Ep. 78. and note.

intervals of both day and night, and without permission never to leave the convent's walls. Both he and his companions however soon discovered that St. Denis was no place for him. The peace he had sought was impossible there, amid their noisy debaucheries, and the congenial spirit they had expected in him they found not. He reproved them, perhaps with acrimony, and they retorted that he had not always been an ascetic. The eclat they had anticipated from his reputation was turned against them, for in proportion as he was honorable he made them despised. Parties so unlike would soon desire and find an opportunity to separate.

The world he had left had not forgotten him. It had use for him, and as in all such cases, it demanded him. He had spoken to it in clear, if not in affectionate terms, and the young men who had heard him could endure no other one in his place. The ordinary professors proposed to open schools, but they declared they would leave the city if Abelard could not be obtained. A deputation from them waited on him in his cell, but he was in no humor to listen, and he even suspected their sincerity. Larger numbers thronged the abbey and urged his Superior to compel him to yield. They were willing he should choose subjects more appropriate to his sacred calling than those he had hitherto discussed, but they inquired if it was decent that one who had been zealous from worldly principles, to impart instruction to the wealthy and the great, should now withhold it from the lowly and the poor in the cause of God and humanity. His fellow monks, from motives be easily detected, joined their prayers, and suggested that if he scrupled to infringe upon monastic rules, and shrunk from the dissipation of the capital, he might open his school in the priory of Maisoncelle, a dependency upon St. Denis, and not distant from the city. On such terms he finally

conquered his reluctance and announced his readiness to commence his lectures.

Three thousand students were soon assembled around him. He tells us that neither lodgings to shelter, nor provisions to sustain them could be obtained. These were not capricious youths attracted by appeals to passion and imposed upon by fancies. They had been already educated in the schools, and trained in dialecties, and in after life they retained the highest respect for the instructions they now received. The Epitome which has been supposed to contain a synopsis of these lectures, gives no indication of those arts by which applause is usually secured. Abelard's style, in all his works, was remarkably destitute of ornament, his subjects were difficult, his arrangement was imperfect, his mode of treatment was subtle rather than profound, and his language was the ecclesiastical Latin of that period. Who can think of eloquence under such restraints? The only adequate account is implied in what his pupils said of him, "Abelard explains everything." Of course they must have sought and appreciated the philosophy of things, and he must have been a true philosopher. He not merely filled the memory with words and formulas, but gave ideas and reasons for his faith, and yet he proposed no new doctrines. He was not earnest enough in religion for that. His faith he accepted just as he found it in the fathers, and especially in Augustine. He was no Protestant, nor Rationalist before his time, as some have asserted, for he never opposed the authority of the Scriptures to that of the Church, nor imagined either inconsistent with reason. A decision of the Church alone, though unsustained by the Scriptures, or a decision of the Church and the Scriptures together, though transcending the province of reason, would have commanded his unqualified assent. He