Abelard, Or Abailard, Pierre, a French scholastic philosopher, born near Nantes, in Brittany, in 1079, died April21,1142. Havingmade early and rapid progress in the learning of the age, he relinquished his family inheritance in favor of his brothers, that he might be free from the cares of property, and have no impediment to the gratification of his thirst for knowledge. At the age of sixteen he betook himself to Paris, and inscribed himself among the pupils of William de Champeaux, a famous professor. In the public disputations which were the fashion of the day, Abelard had no superior. In a discussion on the origin and nature of ideas, he made such a brilliant display of ability, learning, and logical acuteness, that he endangered the supremacy of De Champeaux in the seat of learning where he had so long held sway; and his jealousy was at a high pitch when Abelard, though only 22 years old, opened a school of philosophy at Melun, near Paris, a favorite retreat of the court, which was well attended by students who deserted the other teachers. Abelard's failing health compelled him for a time to retire to his native air; but so soon as he bad recruited his strength, he returned to the scene of his triumphs, and resumed his place as pupil at the feet of his old master.

De Cham-peaux became a monk, but still continued his secular pursuits, and the fiery debates were renewed, in which Abelard again came off victor. De Champeaux was made bishop of Chalons, and his new power was exercised to crush his adversary with other weapons than those of argument. The canon Fulbert had a niece of whose intellectual and personal accomplishments he was justly proud. Admiring the talents and distinction of Abelard, he invited him to complete the education of his beautiful niece. Abelard boasted that he taught to Heloise the three languages necessary for the understanding of the Scriptures. The relation of master and pupil was not long preserved; a warmer sentiment than esteem seized their hearts, and the unlimited opportunities of intercourse which were afforded them by the canon, who confided in Abelard's age (he was now almost 40) and in his public character, were fatal to the peace of both. The condition of Heloise was on the point of betraying their intimacy. They fled. Fulbert pursued, and Abelard having proposed marriage, the enraged uncle consented. On account of Abelard's ecclesiastical ambition, this marriage was to be kept secret; but Fulbert divulged the fact, which Heloi'se, from a spirit of devotion to her lover, denied.

Exasperated at his niece's perverseness, Fulbert punished her, and she then fled to Abelard, who placed her in the nunnery of Argenteuil. Fulbert now abandoned himself to a transport of savage vindictiveness, and, watching his opportunity, burst into Abelard's chamber with a band of ruffians, and gratified his revenge by inflicting on him an atrocious mutilation. Fulbert was deprived of his benefice, his goods were confiscated, and his accomplices punished by undergoing the treatment they had inflicted on Abelard. In this affair, Abelard, in his memoirs, admits his own excessive culpability; he states that he was under evil influence, that he abused the confiding trust of his friend Fulbert, and that he deliberately plotted the seduction of Heloise, who, on her part, was far less blamable than he. The unhappy man, on his recovery from the outrage, sought an asylum in the monastery of St. Denis, and became a monk. Heloise took the veil at Argenteuil. But Abelard's-spirit was not crushed; he continued his public lectures. His great popularity soon drew a crowd of eager students from all parts, and this roused the malice of his old opponents. He abandoned the field of profane philosophy, and addressed himself to theology.

His writings on the Trinity, maintaining doctrines to which some of the tenets of the modern Unitarians bear a close resemblance, were made the point of attack. In 1121 he was accused of heresy, and a council being called at Soissons, in which he was not allowed to defend his doctrines, his works were adjudged heretical, and ordered to be burned. The monks of St. Denis, who were desirous of relieving themselves of a brother whose strict life was a rebuke to their own, now took offence at his opinion that Di-onysius the Areopagite was not the founder of their abbey. For this impiety they followed him up so fiercely that he was compelled to flee, and in a desert place between Nogent and Troves he built himself a rude hermitage, after the fashion of an anchoret. Many of his pupils followed him into this retreat, and with their assistance he founded the Paraclete. He was now elected abbot of the monastery of St. Gildas de Buys, in the see of Vannes, but this was a source of further trouble. The feudal lord of the monastery had deprived the monks of their territory for their irregular life, which Abelard himself was no less desirous of reforming, and thereby ran the risk of assassination within the Avails, while, in his desire to maintain the temporal rights of the convent, he was in little less danger without.

He regretted the seclusion and independence of the Paraclete. Heloi'se had been elected abbess of Argenteuil. The demesne of the convent had been claimed by the monks of St. Denis, and the nunnery suppressed. Heloise and her nuns were without home or shelter. In this emergency Abelard ottered them the Paraclete to found an institution, and went to assist personally in their establishment there, which was confirmed by a bull of Innocent II. This reunion, after a separation of eleven years, was precious to both; and he afterward made frequent visits to the Paraclete. His doctrines once more brought persecution upon him. This time St. Bernard was his opponent. Abelard was charged with dogmatizing on the power and nature of the divine essence, thereby attempting to reduce to human comprehension that which Bernard affirmed was, and ought to be, held incomprehensible by all Christians. In 1140 a council was held at Sens, in which Louis VII. in person presided. Abelard's opinions were again adjudged heretical, and he was sentenced to perpetual silence. To escape this decree, he appealed to the pope and set out for Koine, and on his road thither he was able to interest Peter the Venerable, abbot of Clunv, in his case.

This friend used his efforts on his behalf, and procured an absolution from the holy father. Abelard died at St. Marcel, near Chalon, whither he had gone from Cluny for his health. His body was delivered to Heloi'se, and by her interred at the Paraclete, where she herself was afterward buried by his side. In 1792 the Paraclete was sold, and the remains of the two lovers were removed to the church of Nogent-sur-Seine. They were exhumed in 1800 and placed in the garden of the Musee Francais in Paris, and in 1817 were deposited beneath a mausoleum in the cemetery of Pere la Chaise. - The position of Aboard in the philosophical movement of his age is well described by M. Cousin: "A hero of romance within the church, a refined spirit in a barbarous age, a founder of a school, and almost a martyr to an opinion, everything conspired to make Abelard an extraordinary personage. But of all his titles, that which gives him a separate place in the history of the human mind is his invention of a new philosophical system, and his application of this system and of philosophy in general to theology.

Doubtless before Abelard might be found some rare examples of this dangerous process, although a useful one, even in its errors, to the progress of reason; but it is Abelard who established it as a principle; who contributed more than any other to found scholasticism, for scholasticism is nothing else. After Charlemagne, and even before, there was taught in several places a little of grammar and logic; religious instruction, too, was not wanting, but this instruction was limited to a more or less regular exposition of sacred dogmas; it might suffice for faith, but did not nurture intelligence. The introduction of dialectics into theology could alone produce that spirit of controversy which is the vice and the honor of scholasticism. Abelard is the chief author of this introduction; he is, then, the principal founder of the media?val philosophy, so that France has not only given to Europe, through Abelard, the scholasticism of the 12th century, but also at the beginning of the 17th century has given, in Descartes, the destroyer of this same scholasticism, and the father of modern philosophy.

And there is no inconsistency in this; for the same spirit which had raised the ordinary religious instruction to that systematic and rational form which we call scholasticism, would alone be able to rise above that form, and to produce philosophy properly so called. Thus the same country was able to support, with an interval of a few centuries, Abelard and Descartes. "We discover also, through the many differences of these two men, some striking resemblances. Abelard sought to give an account of the only thing which could be studied in his time - theology; Descartes has given account of what it was permitted to study in his time - man and nature. The latter recognized no authority but that of reason; the former undertook to introduce reason into authority, Both doubt, both investigate; they seek to understand all that is possible to man, and to rest only in certainty. This is their spirit in common, which they borrow from the French spirit, and this fundamental feature of resemblance causes many others; as, for example, that clearness of language which springs spontaneously from definite and precise ideas, it may be added that Abelard and Descartes are not only both Frenchmen, but that they belong to the same province, to that Brittany whose inhabitants are distinguished by so lively a sense of independence and so strong a personality.

Thence, in these two illustrious compatriots, with their native originality, with dispositions to admire moderately what was done before their time and in their time, came the love of independence, pushed often into a quarrelsome spirit; confidence in their own strength and contempt of their adversaries; more of logical connection than of solidity in their opinions; more sagacity than comprehensiveness; more of vigor in the temper of their mind and character than of elevation and profoundness in their thought; more of ingenuity than of common sense, satisfied with the perfection of their own views rather than rising to universal reason." - The works of Abelard were collected by Francois Amboise and Andre Duchesne, and first published at Paris in 1016. The best edition of his works is that of Cousin (Paris, 1850), who has accompanied the principal writings of the author with admirable critical and expository notices. The narrative of his life is contained in his autobiography entitled Historia Calamitatum suarum. Pope has versified some of the supposed letters between the lovers.

The most important modern works on the biography of Abelard are by Fessler, Abalard und Heloise (2 vols., Berlin, 1806); Mme. Guizot, Essai sur la tie et les ecrits d'Abailard et d'Heloise (Paris, 1839); Remu-sat, Abelard (2 vols., Paris, 1845); Bohringer, Kirchengeschichte (vol. iv., 1854); Wilkens, Peter Abalard (Gottingen, 1855).