d master
Abailard, just then embroiled in his famous dispute with St. Bernard.
For the abbot of Clairvaux had found out that it would never do to
allow that honest, but mistaken man to go on spreading his views any
longer unopposed, if the orthodox faith was to be preserved intact in
Christendom; and so, after more than once privately warning him of his
errors to no purpose, accepted a challenge which Abailard at last
vauntingly sent him to a public disputation. This disputation came off
at the Synod of Sens, A. D. 1140, and resulted in the total defeat of
the philosopher by the monk. But Abailard appealed from the synod to
the pope; whereupon the synod suspended its farther measures, and
advised the Holy See through St. Bernard of what had transpired. In
doing so, the latter took care to expose the fatal consequences to
revealed religion involved in Abailard's opinions, and, in one of his
letters on this subject, stated the case thus: "That inasmuch as
Abailard is prepared to explain everything by means of reason, he
combats as well Faith as Reason: for, what is so contrary to Reason,
as to wish to go beyond the limits of Reason by means of Reason? and,
what more contrary to Faith, than to be unwilling to believe that
which one is unable to reach by means of Reason?"

Abailard fared no better at Rome than at Sens. His defeat was ratified
by that authority from which there is no appeal. Moreover, he was
commanded to desist from holding any more lectures; and all persons
who should obstinately maintain his errors were excommunicated.
Foremost among these was Arnold of Brescia, who scorned to imitate
Abailard's submission to the authority of the Church, and blamed his
penitential retreat at Clugny, where he shortly died an edifying
death.

St. Bernard,--who had previously formed an ill opinion of Arnold from
the reports which preceded him out of Italy,--no sooner saw him at
Sens actively interested for Abailard, than he penetrated the entire
duplicity of his character; at the same time that he felt fully alive
to the damage, which the victory just won over error might yet suffer
from a man so able and resolute. Wherefore, as it was not his custom
to serve the cause of truth by halves, the saint resolved to include
the scholar with the master in his denunciations to the pope; who, at
his instance, ordered that Arnold too, as well as Abailard, should be
incarcerated in a convent. But the crafty Italian managed to elude hi