The New Abelard: A Romance, Volume 1 (of 3)

CONTENTS

The leading character in this book is represented, dramatically, as resembling, both in his strength and weakness, the great Abelard of history. For this very reason he is described as failing miserably, where a stronger man might never have foiled, in grasping the Higher Rationalism as a law for life. He is, in fact, not meant for an ideal hero, but for an ardent intellectual man, hopelessly biased against veracity both by temperament and hereditary superstition.
I make this explanation in order to be beforehand with those who will possibly hasten to explain to my readers that my philosophy of life is at best retrograde, my modern thinker an impressionable spoony, and my religious outlook taken in the shadow of the Churches and reading no farther than the cloudy horizons of Ober-Ammergau.
Robert Buchanan.
London: March 12, 1884.

Shipwreck... What succour?—
On the gnawing rocks
The ship grinds to and fro with thunder-shocks,