ABÉLARD                                       299
ing, sensual or supersensual, you can reach the conclusion that the
single form of truth — which instantly and inexorably compels our
submission to its laws — is nothing."
' Thus far, all was familiar ground; certainly at least as familiar as
the Pons Asinorum; and neither of the two champions had need to
feel ruffled in temper by the discussion. The real struggle began only at
this point; for until this point was reached, both positions were about
equally tenable. Abélard had hitherto rested quietly on the defensive,
but William's last thrust obliged him to strike in his turn, and he drew
himself up for what, five hundred years later, was called the " Coup de
Jarnac": —
"I do not deny," he begins; "on the contrary, I affirm that the
universal, whether we call it humanity, or equilateral triangle, has a
sort of reality as a concept; that it is something; even a substance, if
you insist upon it. Undoubtedly the sum of all individual men results
in the concept of humanity. What I deny is that the concept results
in the individual. You have correctly stated the essence of the point
and the line as sources of our concept of the infinite; what I deny is
that they are divisions of the infinite. Universals cannot be divided ;
what is capable of division cannot be a universal. I admit the force of
your analogy in the case of the crystal, but I am obliged to point out to
you that, if you insist on this analogy, you will bring yourself and me
into flagrant contradiction with the fixed foundations of the Church.
If the energy of the triangle gives form to the crystal, and the energy of
the line gives reality to the triangle, and the energy of the infinite gives
substance to the line, all energy at last becomes identical with the
ultimate substance, God Himself. Socrates becomes God in small;
Judas is identical with both; humanity is of the divine essence, and
exists, wholly and undivided, in each of us. The equilateral triangle
we call humanity exists, therefore, entire, identical, in you and me, as
a subdivision of the infinite line, space, energy, or substance, which is
God. I need not remind you that this is pantheism, and that if God is