This flippancy, accompanied by wit and eloquence, fascinated young men.  His auditors were charmed.  “The first philosopher,” they said, “had become the first divine.”  New pupils crowded his lecture-room, and he united lectures on philosophy with lectures on divinity.  “Theology and philosophy encircled his brow with a double garland.”  So popular was he, that students came from Germany and Italy and England to hear his lectures.  The number of his pupils, it is said, was more than five thousand; and these included the brightest intellects of the age, among whom one was destined to be a pope (the great Innocent III.), nineteen to be cardinals, and one hundred to be bishops.  What a proud position for a young man!  What an astonishing success for that age!  And his pupils were as generous as they were enthusiastic.  They filled his pockets with gold; they hung upon his lips with rapture; they extolled his genius wherever they went; they carried his picture from court to court, from castle to castle, and convent to convent; they begged for a lock of his hair, for a shred of his garment.  Never was seen before such idolatry of genius, such unbounded admiration for eloquence; for he stood apart and different from all other lights,—­pre-eminent as a teacher of philosophy.  “He reigned,” says Lamartine, “by eloquence over the spirit of youth, by beauty over the regard of women, by love-songs which penetrated all hearts, by musical melodies repeated by every mouth.  Let us imagine in a single man the first orator, the first philosopher, the first poet, the first musician of the age,—­Cicero, Plato, Petrarch, Schubert,—­all united in one living celebrity, and we can form some idea of his attractions and fame at this period of his life.”

Such was that brilliant but unsound man, with learning, fame, personal beauty, fascinating eloquence, dialectical acumen, aristocratic manners, and transcendent wit, who encountered at thirty-eight the most beautiful, gracious, accomplished, generous, and ardent woman that adorned that time,—­only eighteen, thirsting for knowledge, craving for sympathy, and intensely idolatrous of intellectual excellence.  But one result could be anticipated from such a meeting:  they became passionately enamored of each other.  In order to secure a more uninterrupted intercourse, Abelard sought and obtained a residence in the house of Fulbert, under pretence of desiring to superintend the education of his niece.  The ambitious, vain, unsuspecting priest was delighted to receive so great a man, whose fame filled the world.  He intrusted Heloise to his care, with permission to use blows if they were necessary to make her diligent and obedient!

And what young woman with such a nature and under such circumstances could resist the influence of such a teacher?  I need not dwell on the familiar story, how mutual admiration was followed by mutual friendship, and friendship was succeeded by mutual infatuation, and the gradual abandonment of both to a mad passion, forgetful alike of fame and duty.