ARGUMENT. ABELARD and Eloisa flourished in the twelfth century: they were two of the most distinguished persons of their age in learning and beauty, but for nothing more famous than for their unfortunate passion. After a long course of calamities, they retired each to a several Convent, and consecrated the remainder of their days to religion. It was many years after this separation, that a letter of Abelard's to a Friend, which contained the history of his misfortune, fell into the hands of Eloisa. This, awakening all her tenderness, occasioned those celebrated letters (out of which the following is partly extracted) which give so lively a picture of the struggles of grace and nature, virtue and passion.-P. A Traveller who visited the Convent about the year 1768 (see Annual Register) says, that its situation and prospects by no means resemble Pope's beautiful and romantic description of it. Father St. Romain, the officiating Priest, walked with him round the whole demesne. The Abbess, who was in her eighty-second year, desired to see our Traveller, for she said she was his countrywoman, and allied to the extinct families of Lifford and Stafford. She was aunt to the then Duke de Rochefoucault; and being fifth in succession, as Abbess of that Convent, hoped it would become a kind of patrimony. We know, alas! what has since happened both to her Family and her Convent! The community seemed to know but little of the afflicting story of their Founder. Little remains of the original building but a few pointed arches. In examining the tombs of these unfortunate lovers, he observed that Eloisa appeared much taller than Abelard.-Warton. ELOISA TO ABELARD'. In these deep solitudes and awful cells, What means this tumult in a Vestal's veins ? Dear fatal name! rest ever unreveal'd, Relentless walls! whose darksome round contains Her heart still dictates, and her hand obeys. Repentant sighs, and voluntary pains: Ye rugged rocks, which holy knees have worn; NOTES. 5 10 15 20 1 However happy and judicious the subject of this Epistle may be thought to be, as displaying the various conflicts and tumults between duty and pleasure, between penitence and passion, that agitated the mind of Eloisa; yet we must candidly own, that the principal circumstance of distress is of so indelicate a nature, that it is with difficulty disguised by the exquisite art and address of the poet. The capital and unrivalled beauties of the poem arise from the striking images and descriptions of the Convent, and from the sentiments drawn from the mystical books of devotion, particularly Madame Guion and the Archbishop of Cambray.-Warton. Tho' cold like you, unmov'd and silent grown, All is not Heaven's while Abelard has part; 25 Nor pray'rs nor fasts its stubborn pulse restrain, Soon as thy letters trembling I unclose, That well-known name awakens all my woes. 30 Oh name for ever sad! for ever dear! Still breath'd in sighs, still usher'd with a tear. I tremble too, where'er my own I find, Some dire misfortune follows close behind. Line after line my gushing eyes o'erflow, 35 Led through a sad variety of woe : Now warm in love, now with'ring in my bloom, There stern Religion quench'd th' unwilling flame, 40 Yet write, oh write me all, that I may join Griefs to thy griefs, and echo sighs to thine. Nor foes nor fortune take this pow'r away; And is my Abelard less kind than they? NOTES. Ver. 24. Forgot myself to stone.] This is an expression of Milton; as is also, caverns shagg'd with horrid thorn, and the epithets, pale-ey'd, twilight, low-thoughted care, and others, are first used in the smaller poems of Milton, which Pope seems to have been just reading. Some of these circumstances, in the scenery view of the monastery, have perhaps a little impropriety, when introduced into a place so lately founded as was the Paraclete; but are so well imagined, and so highly painted, that they demand excuse.-Warton. Ver. 41. Yet write,] This is taken from the Latin letters that passed betwixt Eloisa and Abelard, and which had been a few years before published in London by Rawlinson, and which our poet has copied and translated in many other passages: Per ipsum Christum obsecramus, quatenus ancillulas ipsius et tuas, crebris literis de his, in quibus adhuc fluctuas, naufragiis certificare digneris, ut nos saltem quæ tibi soli remansimus, doloris vel gaudii participes habeas.-Epist. Heloissæ, p. 46. From the same, also, the use of letters, ver. 51, is taken and amplified; and it is a little remarkable that this use of letters is in the fourth book of Diodorus Siculus.-Warton. IMITATIONS. Ver. 24.]"Forgot myself to marble."-Milton. Tears still are mine, and those I need not spare; 45 Then share thy pain, allow that sad relief; 50 55 They live, they speak, they breathe what love inspires, Thou know'st how guiltless first I met thy flame, When Love approach'd me under friendship's name; My fancy form'd thee of angelic kind, Some emanation of th' all-beauteous Mind. NOTES. 61 Ver. 51. Heav'n first taught letters, &c.] Enlarged from the first epistle of Eloisa to Abelard. "Si imagines nobis amicorum absentium jucundæ sunt, quæ memoriam renovant, et desiderium absentiæ falso atque inani solatio levant; quanto jucundiores sunt literæ, quæ amici absentis veras notas afferunt! Deo autem gratias, quod hoc saltem modo præsentiam tuam nobis reddere nullâ invidiâ prohiberis, nullâ difficultate præpediris ; nullâ (obsecro) negligentiâ retarderis." Ver. 63. Those smiling eyes,] Abelard was reputed the most handsome, as well as the most learned man of his time, according to the kind of learning then in vogue. An old chronicle, quoted by Andrew du Chesne, informs us, that scholars flocked to his lectures from all quarters of the Latin world; and his contemporary, St. Bernard, relates, that he numbered many principal ecclesiastics and cardinals of the court of Rome. - Abelard himself boasts, that when he retired into the country, he was followed by such immense crowds of scholars, that they could get neither lodgings nor provisions sufficient for them: "Ut nec locus hospitiis, nec terra sufficeret alimentis." (Abelardi Opera, p. 19.) He met with the fate of many learned men, to be embroiled in controversy and accused of heresy; for St. Bernard, whose influence and authority were very great, got his opinion of the Trinity condemned, at a council held at Sens, 1140. But the talents of Abelard were not confined to theology, jurisprudence, philosophy, and the thorny paths of scholasticism; he gave proofs of a lively genius by many poetical performances, insomuch that he was reputed to be Guiltless I gaz'd; heav'n listen'd while you sung; NOTES. 65 70 the author of the famous Romance of the Rose; which, however, was indisputably written by John of Meun, a little city on the banks of the Loire, about four leagues from Orleans; which gave occasion to Marot to exclaim, De Jean de Meun s'enfle le cours de Loire. It was he who continued and finished the Romance of the Rose, which William de Loris had left imperfect forty years before. If chronology did not absolutely contradict the notion of Abelard's being the author of this very celebrated piece, yet are there internal arguments sufficient to confute it. The mistake seems to have flowed from his having given Eloisa the name of Rose, in one of the many sonnets he addressed to her. In this romance there are many severe and satirical strokes on the character of Eloisa, which the pen of Abelard never would have given. In one passage she is introduced speaking with indecency and obscenity; in another, all the vices and bad qualities of women are represented as assembled together in her alone : Qui les mœurs féminins savoit, Car tres-tous en soi les avoit. In a very old Epistle-dedicatory, addressed to Philip the Fourth of France, by this same John of Meun, and prefixed to a French translation of Boetius, a very popular book at that time, it appears, that he also translated the Epistles of Abelard to Heloisa, which were in high vogue at the court. He mentions also, that he had translated Vegetius on the Art Military, and a book called the Wonders of Ireland. These works show us the taste of the age. His words are : T'envoye ores Boece de Consolation, que j'ai translaté en François, jaçoit que bien entendes le Latin." It is to be regretted that we have no exact picture of the person and beauty of Eloisa. Abelard himself says that she was "Facie non infima." Her extraordinary learning, many circumstances concur to confirm; particularly one, which is, that the Nuns of the Paraclete are wont to have the office of Whitsunday read to them in Greek, to perpetuate the memory of her understanding that language. The curious may not be displeased to be informed, that the Paraclete was built in the parish of Quincey, upon the little river of Arduzon, near Nogent, upon the Seine. A lady, learned as was Eloisa in that age, who indisputably understood the Latin, Greek, and Hebrew tongues, was a kind of prodigy. Her literature, says Abelard, "in toto regno nominatissimam fecerat ;" and, we may be sure, more thoroughly attached him to her. Bussy Rabutin speaks in high terms of commendation of the purity of Eloisa's Latinity; a judgment worthy a French Count! There is a force, but not an elegance, in her style, which is blemished, as might be expected, by many phrases unknown to the pure ages of the Roman language, and by many Hebraisms, borrowed from the translation of the Bible.-Warton. |