Page:Illustrations of the history of medieval thought and learning.djvu/154

136 Abailard dwelt at Saint Gildas, though it is difficult to understand how he could have lived there at all. Never before had he suffered such hardship, such unrelieved misery. He had now no longer any teaching to take his thoughts away from external cares. He was in the hands of violent men, unlettered, unruly, of unbridled passions and degraded lusts, robbers, would-be murderers : such were the monks of Saint Gildas. Abailard had no command over them ; it was enough if he could preserve his personal safety. A single incident consoled him in this terrible period of his career. The convent of Argenteuil, where Heloissa lived as prioress, had ceased to exist. The abbat of Saint Denis had asserted on behalf of his house a legal claim upon it : he established his suit, and in 1128 the nuns were dispersed. The news no sooner reached Abailard than he resolved to place his wife in possession of the deserted buildings of his oratory of the Paraclete. The grant was approved by the bishop of Troyes and i confirmed by pope Innocent the Second in 1131. From that day Abailard had a new interest to assuage his gloom. He visited the Paraclete frequently; he helped to remove the difficulties, even of the means of sustenance, that encompassed the infant nunnery; became the counsellor, the father, of the house. Each return to Saint Gildas made the tyranny of his own sons more unendurable : m he sought every means of escape but was arrested by bandits hired by them. He engaged the aid of superior powers and had a number of the brethren expelled ; but the act only exasperated the rest, flight became a necessity. At length he made good his escape ; but not yet to security : n he long trembled lest his refuge should be discovered, and he fall a victim to the vengeance of the monks he had deserted.

It is in this pitiable situation that the History of his Misfortunes, which has been our principal guide in the preceding narrative, was written : we do not know how long the crisis was protracted, but in the end he appears to have received permission to live free of the monastery