Then impotent of mind, with altered sense
She hugged th' offender, and forgave th' offence.—Wakefield.
[670] Abelard to Heloisa: "How can I separate from the person I love the passion I must detest? Will the tears I shed be sufficient to render it odious to me? It is difficult in our sorrow to distinguish penitence from love."
[671] Heloisa to Abelard: "A heart which has been so sensibly affected as mine cannot soon be indifferent. We fluctuate long between love and hatred before we can arrive at a happy tranquillity." Abelard to Heloisa: "In such different disquietudes I contradict myself; I hate you; I love you."
[672] Heloisa to Abelard: "God has a peculiar right over the hearts of great men. When he pleases to touch them he ravishes them, and lets them not speak nor breathe but for his glory."
[673] Heloisa to Abelard: "Yes, Abelard, I conjure you teach me the maxims of divine love. Oh! for pity's sake help a wretch to renounce her desires, herself, and, if it be possible, even to renounce you."
[674] Heloisa to Abelard: "When I shall have told you what rival hath ravished my heart from you, you will praise my inconstancy, and will pray this rival to fix it. By this you may judge that it is God alone that takes Heloise from you. What other rival could take me from you? Could you think me guilty of sacrificing the virtuous and learned Abelard to any other but God?"
[675] Horace, Epist. Lib. i. xi. 9:
Oblitusque meorum, obliviscendus et illis.
My friends forgetting, by my friends forgot.—Wakefield.
[676] Taken from Crashaw.—Pope.