[50]. Plautus, _Casina_, _Prol._ 19, 20 (Leo).
[51]. The second part, at least, of the _Antiquitates_, treating of
the “res divinae” and embracing books xxvi-xli, was addressed to
Caesar as _Pontifex Maximus_ (cf. below n. [56] and St. Aug., _De
civ. dei_, VII, 35).
[52]. In 1354, the same year in which Petrarch received a copy of
Homer from Niccoló Sigero, Boccaccio sent him a volume containing
some works of Varro and of Cicero (cf. also _Sen._, XVI, 1). Varro
may have been represented by either the _De re rustica_ or the _De
lingua latina_, or by parts of both. In a letter of thanks for this
favor, Petrarch draws a parallel between the two authors which is
well worth quoting (_Fam._, XVIII, 4):
No words that I might pen would prove equal to your
kindness, and I feel sure that I should tire of expressing
my appreciation much sooner than you of bestowing favors. I
have received yet another book from you, containing some of
the excellent and rare minor works of both Varro and Cicero.
Nothing could have pleased nor delighted me more, for there was
nothing that I more eagerly desired. What made the volume still
more precious to me was that it was written in your hand. In
my opinion, this one fact adds you as a third to the company
of those two great champions of the Latin tongue. Blush not at
being classed with such illustrious men,
“Nor blush your lips to fill the rustic pipe,”
as the poet says.
You express admiration for those writers who flourished in
the period of classical antiquity, the mother of all our
studies--and rightly so, for it is characteristic of you to
admire what the rabble despises and on the contrary to disdain
what it so highly approves of. Yet the time will come when
men will admire you perchance. Indeed, already has envy begun
to signal you out. Men of superior intellect always meet with
ungrateful contemporaries, and this ingratitude, as you are
well aware, greatly depreciated for a time the works of the
ancient authors. But fortunately succeeding generations, which
at least in this respect were more just and less corrupt,
gradually restored them to their place.
You showed, moreover, keen discrimination in gathering within
the covers of one book two authors who, in their lifetime,
were brought into such intimate relationship by their love of
country, their period, their natural inclinations, and their
thirst for knowledge. They loved each other and held each other
in great esteem; many things they wrote to each other and of
each other. They were two men with but one soul; they enjoyed
the instructions of the same master, attended the same school,
lived in the same State. And yet they did not attain the same
degree of honor--’twas Cicero who soared higher. In short, they
lived together in the best of harmony. And believe me, you
could bring together few such men from all ages and all races.
To follow common hearsay, Varro was the more learned, Cicero
the more eloquent. However, if I should dare to speak my own
say as to ultimate superiority, and if any god or man would
constitute me judge in a question of such great importance,
or rather would, without taking offense, deign to listen to a
voluntary judgment on my part, I should speak freely and as
my reason dictates. Both men are indeed great. My love and my
intimate knowledge of one of them may, perhaps, deceive me. But
the one whom I consider in every sense superior is--Cicero.
Alas, what have I said? To what yawning precipice have I
ventured? Oh well, the word has been spoken, the step taken.
And may I be accused of great rashness rather than of small
judgment. Farewell.
[53]. “Doctissimus” was as confirmed an epithet when speaking of
Varro as “crafty” of Ulysses, “aged” of Nestor, “divus” of Augustus,
etc. It is unnecessary to give here quotations from the Latin authors
bearing out Petrarch’s statement. Without seeking them at all, the
following have been encountered in the preparation of these notes.
St. Augustine, _De civ. dei_, III, 4: “vir doctissimus eorum Varro;”
IV, 1: “vir doctissimus apud eos Varro et gravissimae auctoritatis;”
IV, 31: “Dicit etiam idem auctor acutissimus atque doctissimus;”
Seneca, _ad Helviam_, viii, 1; Apuleius, _Apol._, 42.
[54]. The reference seems to be a direct one to Cicero’s _Academica
posteriora_; but the wording proves beyond doubt that our author is
quoting instead from St. Augustine. Petrarch’s words are (Vol. III,
p. 275):
doctissimus Varro est, quod sine ulla dubitatione amicus tuus
Marcus Cicero in iis ipsis libris in quibus nihil affirmandum
disputat, affirmare non timuit, ut quodammodo luce tui nominis
perstringente oculos, videatur interim dum de te loquitur suum
principale propositum non vidisse.
St. Augustine says (_De civ. dei_, VI, 2):
in eis libris, id est Academicis, ubi cuncta dubitanda esse
contendit, addidit “sine ulla dubitatione doctissimo.” Profecto
de hac re sic erat certus, ut auferret dubitationem, quam solet
in omnibus adhibere, tamquam de hoc uno etiam pro Academicorum
dubitatione disputaturus se Academicum fuisset [sic] oblitus.
The only variation between these two passages is that Petrarch has
substituted for the simpler statement of St. Augustine the figure of
the dazzling light.
Petrarch, however, did not have a first-hand acquaintance with the
_Ac. posteriora_. In _Rer. mem._, I, 2, p. 396, the chapter on Varro
gives the entire substance of the present letter. According to
Ancona-Bacci (Vol. I, p. 514), the _Liber rer. mem._ was composed
earlier than 1350--the date of this letter to Varro--which therefore
may have been modeled after the corresponding chapter of the _Rer.
mem._, in which _Ac. post._, i, 3, 9 is cited in full. Hence it
results that _Rer. mem._ I, 2 was based on St. Augustine, and _Fam._,
XXIV, 6, on _Rer. mem._
[55]. St. Augustine distinctly says, _De civ. dei_, XIX, 22: “Varro
doctissimus Romanorum;” and Quintilian, _Inst._, x, 1, 95: “Terentius
Varro, vir Romanorum eruditissimus.”
[56]. Lactantius, _Divin. Inst._, i, 6, 7: “M. Varro, quo nemo umquam
doctior ne apud Graecos quidem vixit, in libris rerum divinarum quos
ad C. Caesarem pontificem maximum scripsit....” (cf. Petrarch, Vol.
III, p. 276).
[57]. _Catonis Disticha_, III, 5 (in _Poetae latini minores_, Vol.
III):
Segnitiem fugito, quae vitae ignavia fertur;
Nam cum animus languet, consumit inertia corpus.
P. de Nolhac says (II, p. 110, n. 2) that he has not found in
Petrarch a single reference to the _Catonis Disticha_, which were so
widespread in the Middle Ages. The above, to be sure, is not actually
cited by Petrarch, but it does seem to give the thought contained in
“servata ex Catonis praecepto ratione otii” (III, p. 276).
[58]. St. Augustine, _De civ. dei_, VI, 2:
And although Varro is less pleasing in his style, he is imbued
with erudition and philosophy to such an extent that in every
branch of those studies which we today call secular and which
they were wont to call liberal, he imparts as much to him
who is in pursuit of knowledge as Cicero delights him who is
desirous of excelling in the choice of words.
This entire section (VI, 2) is a panegyric, and proves St. Augustine
a great admirer of Varro. Quintilian, _Inst._, x, 1, 95, is much
briefer: “plus tamen scientiae conlaturus quam eloquentiae.”
[59]. Petrarch (Vol. III, p. 276) quotes verbatim from St. Augustine,
_De civ. dei_, VI, 2. The sense, at any rate, is perfectly clear in
both passages, but seems to have escaped Fracassetti, who, after
correctly rendering “tanto aver letto da far meraviglia che ti
restasse tempo di scriver nulla,” continues, “e scritto aver tanto
che non s’intende come trovassi tempo per leggere alcuna cosa” (Vol.
5, p. 156).
We are reminded, too, of Cicero’s similar boast regarding his own
literary activity at Astura in 45 B. C., “Legere isti laeti qui me
reprehendunt tam multa non possunt quam ego scripsi” (_ad Att._, xii,
40, 2).
[60]. William Ramsay, in Smith’s _Dict. of Grk. and Rom. Biogr., s.
v._ “Varro,” says:
It has been concluded from some expressions in one of
Petrarch’s letters, expressions which appear under different
forms in different editions, that the Antiquities were extant
in his youth, and that he had actually seen them, although they
had eluded his eager researches at a later period of life when
he was more fully aware of their value. But the words of the
poet, although to a certain extent ambiguous, certainly do not
warrant the interpretation generally assigned to them, nor does
there seem to be any good foundation for the story that these
and other works of Varro were destroyed by the orders of Pope
Gregory the Great, in order to conceal the plagiarism of St.
Augustine.
And, to the opposite effect, J. A. Symonds, _The Revival of
Learning_, (Scribner, 1900), p. 53, n. 3: “cf. his Epistle to Varro
for an account of a MS of that author.” P. de Nolhac is of the
opinion that Petrarch’s remembrances of the _Antiquitates_ went
through the same evolution as those of the _De gloria_ (cf. the
second letter to Cicero, n. 10).
[61]. With this sentiment compare the words of another enthusiastic
humanist, John Addington Symonds, who writes (Preface, _op. cit._,
written in 1877): “To me it has been a labor of love to record even
the bare names of those Italian worthies who recovered for us in the
fourteenth and fifteenth centuries ‘the everlasting consolations’ of
the Greek and Latin classics.”