‘To Heloise, his sister in Christ, from Abélard, her brother in Him,’ was the characteristic opening of his reply. If he has not written to her since her conversion, he says, it is not from neglect nor want of affection, but from the thought that she needed neither counsel nor consolation. She had been prioress at Argenteuil, the consoler and instructor of others. Yet, ‘if it seems otherwise to thy humility,’ he will certainly write her on any point she may suggest. She has spoken of prayer, and so he diverges into a long dissertation on the excellence of prayer, which fills nearly the whole of his pages. On one or two occasions only does he approach that colloquy of soul to soul, for which Heloise yearned so ardently. ‘We ourselves are united not only by the sanctity of our oath, but also by the identity of our religious profession. I will pass over your holy community, in which the prayers of so many virgins and widows ever mount up to God, and speak of thee thyself, whose holiness hath much favour with God, I doubt not, and remind thee what thou owest me, particularly in this grievous peril of mine. Do thou remember, then, in thy prayers him who is so specially thine own.’ And when at length he nears the end of his edifying treatise, he once more bares the heart that still beats within him. If, he says, they hear before long that he has fallen a victim to the plots of his enemies, or has by some other chance laid down his burden of sorrow, he trusts they will have his body brought to rest in their home, his own dear Paraclete, ‘for there is no safer and more blessed spot for the rest of a sorrowing soul.’ The long letter is, on the whole, prudent and formal to a degree. Yet it is not true that Abélard had nothing but coldness and prudence to return to his wife’s devotion. It is quite obvious what Abélard would conceive to be his duty in replying to Heloise. For her sake and for his, for her happiness and his repute, he must moderate the threatening fire. But that he had a true affection and sympathy for her is made clear by the occasional failure of his pious resolution. ‘Sister, who wert once dear to me in the world and art now most dear in Christ,’ he once exclaims parenthetically; and at other moments he calls her ‘dearest sister,’ and even ‘beloved.’ When we remember the gulf that now separated them, besides his obvious duty to guide her, we shall accept the contrast of their letters without using harsh words of the distracted abbot. But the pathos and the humanity of his closing paragraph defeated his purpose, and the whole soul of the abbess flames forth in her reply.