PETRARCH
THE FIRST MODERN SCHOLAR
AND MAN OF LETTERS
A Selection from his Correspondence with
Boccaccio and other Friends, Designed to Illustrate
the Beginnings of the Renaissance.
Translated from the Original Latin, together
with Historical Introductions and Notes
BY
JAMES HARVEY ROBINSON
Professor of History in Columbia University
WITH THE COLLABORATION OF
HENRY WINCHESTER ROLFE
Sometime Professor of Latin in Swarthmore College
_SECOND EDITION, REVISED AND ENLARGED_
G. P. PUTNAM'S SONS
NEW YORK AND LONDON
The Knickerbocker press
1914
[Illustration: PETRARCH.]
TO
G. R. R.
AND
B. C. R.
PREFACE TO THE SECOND EDITION
During the fifteen years which have elapsed since the appearance of
the first edition of this volume a marked changed of attitude has
taken place among scholars in regard to the "Renaissance" and the
nature and importance of the revival of classical literature. This
change is briefly explained in the opening pages of the introductory
chapter (which have been entirely rewritten), and the reasons given for
assigning to the "Renaissance" a less distinctive place in the history
of culture than it formerly enjoyed. While this does not essentially
affect the value of Petrarch's letters and the interest and importance
of the personality which they reveal, it enables us to put him and his
work in a more correct perspective.
There has, moreover, been added to Chapter VI (pp. 413 _sqq_.) a
careful analysis of Petrarch's _Secret_. These confessions must be
accorded a high place in the literature of self-revelation; they
furnish the reader a more complete and vivid impression of Petrarch's
intellectual life as well as of his strange and varied emotions than
can be formed from reading the correspondence alone. He not only
understood his complicated self but possessed in an unprecedented
degree the power of conciliating the interest of others in his own
troubles and perplexities. In short, this new edition will serve at
once to rectify certain general misapprehensions and at the same time
to give a more adequate account of the truly extraordinary person with
which it deals.
J. H. R.
COLUMBIA UNIVERSITY,
November, 1913.
PREFATORY NOTE TO THE FIRST EDITION
The purpose of this volume is essentially historical. It is not a piece
of literary criticism; it is only incidentally a biography. It has been
prepared with the single but lively hope of making a little clearer the
development of modern culture. It views Petrarch not as a poet, nor
even, primarily, as a many-sided man of genius, but as the mirror of
his age--a mirror in which are reflected all the momentous contrasts
between waning Mediævalism and the dawning Renaissance.
Petrarch knew almost everyone worth knowing in those days; consequently
few historical sources can rival his letters in value and interest;
their character and significance are discussed at length in the
introduction which follows.
We have ourselves come to love the eager, independent, clear-sighted,
sensitive soul through whose eyes we have followed the initial
spiritual struggle of modern times; we would that others might learn to
love him too.
In the preparation of this volume the editors have naturally availed
themselves of the excellent edition of Petrarch's _Epistolæ de Rebus
Familiaribus et Variæ_, by Giuseppe Fracassetti, 3 vols., 8°, Florence,
1859-63. For the _Epistolæ de Rebus Senilibus_, and the remaining Latin
works, they have necessarily relied upon the lamentably incorrect
edition of the _Opera_ printed at Basle in 1581, for in spite of its
imperfections it is the most complete collection of Petrarch's writings
that we possess. The references in the foot-notes are, therefore,
to the pages of Fracassetti's edition or of that of 1581, as the
case may be. Much aid has been derived from Körting's standard work,
_Petrarca's Leben und Werke_; from Fracassetti's elaborate notes to
his Italian version of the letters; from Voigt's masterly analysis of
Petrarch's character and career, at the opening of _Die Wiederbelebung
des classischen Alterthums;_ and especially from M. Pierre de Nolhac's
scholarly and fascinating study, _Pétrarque et l'Humanisme._
Part third of the present volume, upon Petrarch's classical studies, is
the work of Mr. Rolfe, and the whole book has had the benefit of his
acute and painstaking revision.
J. H. R.
BIRCHWOOD, JAFFREY, N. H.,
September, 1898.
CONTENTS
PREFACE TO THE SECOND EDITION
PREFATORY NOTE TO THE FIRST EDITION
LIST AND DESCRIPTION OF ILLUSTRATIONS
INTRODUCTORY
I. BIOGRAPHICAL
II. PETRARCH AND HIS LITERARY CONTEMPORARIES
III. THE FATHER OF HUMANISM
IV. TRAVELS
V. POLITICAL OPINIONS; RIENZO AND CHARLES IV
VI. THE CONFLICT OF MONASTIC AND SECULAR IDEALS
VII. PETRARCH'S CONFESSIONS
VIII. FINALE
INDEX
ILLUSTRATIONS
I.--A SKETCH OF VAUCLUSE BY PETRARCH'S HAND _Cover_
II.--PORTRAIT OF PETRARCH _Frontispiece_
III.--A PAGE FROM PETRARCH'S COPY OF THE _ILIAD_
Through the kindness of M. de Nolhac, and with the generous permission
of the École des hautes Études at Paris, the editors have been enabled
to reproduce three plates of unusual historical interest.
I.--THE SKETCH OF VAUCLUSE with the inscription, _Transalpina solitudo
mea jocundissima_--my delightsome Transalpine retreat--which appears
on the front cover of this volume, was discovered by M. de Nolhac in
Petrarch's own copy of Pliny's _Natural History._ A reference in the
book to the Fountain of the Sorgue suggested to its owner the idea of
recalling by a few strokes of the quill his memories of a spot where
he had spent so many years. This sketch, his only essay at pictorial
reproduction which has come down to us, is an interesting illustration
of the versatility of self-expression which distinguished him from his
predecessors and contemporaries.
II.--THE PORTRAIT, which forms the frontispiece, is taken from a
manuscript in the National Library at Paris, and its history has been
carefully traced by M. de Nolhac (_op. cit_., pp. 376 _sqq_.). It
adorns the first page of a copy of Petrarch's own work, _The Lives
of Illustrious Men_, which was transcribed with unusual care for his
last princely patron, the ruler of Padua, by one of the poet's most
intimate and trusted friends, Lombardo della Seta. A note at the end
of the work states that Lombardo completed his task January 25, 1379.
We may, therefore, assume that this portrait was executed _not later_
than four and a half years after Petrarch's death, in the city where he
spent much of his time during the closing period of his life, and by an
artist selected by the poet's devoted friends. It is maintained by some
modern historians of art that there was, in those days, no real feeling
for portraiture; without, however, venturing into the domain of art
criticism, we may, at least, claim for this sketch almost unimpeachable
historical authenticity.
III.--THE FACSIMILE of a page from one of Petrarch's own volumes will
give some idea, to those unfamiliar with manuscripts, of the appearance
of a book in the fourteenth century; it shows us, too, the untiring
energy of the first modern scholar in emending and elucidating the
scattered and neglected fragments of ancient literature, for which he
made such diligent search.
INTRODUCTORY
"La formule qui définit le mieux Pétrarque est celle qui le
désigne comme "le premier homme moderne." Par la direction
de sa pensée, il échappe presque entièrement à l'influence
de son siècle et de son milieu, ce qui est sans doute la
marque la moins contestable du génie."--PIERRE DE NOLHAC.
History is the memory of mankind; it far outruns the narrow range
of our own personal recollections and enables us to participate
consciously in a process of change so impressive in its vast length
and complexity as to reduce the experiences of our own generation to a
mere incident. It makes it possible for us to see not only how to-day
is growing out of yesterday, and this year out of last, but how the
nineteenth century prepared the way for the twentieth, the eighteen
for the nineteenth, and so on, back and back to the very beginnings
of man's lineage. No one of us has precisely the same experiences two
days in succession, and yet amid the most considerable vicissitudes of
life we always carry over from day to day and year to year a great part
of our habits and convictions,--which constitute what others call our
character. The life of a people, although much more stable than that
of most of its members, is always slowly and irrevocably altering; it
is in the main a perpetuation of the old but always possesses some
element of the new, since the individuals who compose a nation, as well
as the conditions under which they live, are always changing.
The historian should reckon with both the old and the new in tracing
man's past; he must show not only how things have changed but how they
have remained the same. The mass of hoary tradition and ancient custom
which enters so generously into every stage of civilisation, no matter
how progressive, often, however, escapes his observation. Successful
historians are men of letters who have something of the poet, the
dramatist or the story-teller in them, and in order to construct a
narrative which has any chance of appealing to their readers they are
forced, following the example of the playwright, to divide the past
into periods, like the scenes in a play, and assign to each a dominant
motive. In doing this they are tempted greatly to exaggerate the
exceptional and novel. Moreover, since the historian can include in his
story but a very small part of the multitudinous experiences of mankind
during the period with which he is dealing, he inevitably selects what
will fit into a coherent narrative and neglects all the rest; he must
introduce order where there is essential confusion, lucidity where
there is obscurity, and discover simplicity where their is inextricable
complexity.
As a result of this highly artificial nature of the historian's
work--of which he himself is usually unconscious--historical legends
arise, which by reason of their dramatic character and their plausible
simplicity are eagerly and widely accepted, and only reluctantly
abandoned when some of the vast number of facts which have been
neglected in their formation are given an opportunity to assert
themselves. The pretty myth of the common origin and gradual dispersion
of all those peoples whose language belongs to the Indo-European group
has been dissipated by recollecting that a common language does not
necessarily imply a common racial origin. The legend that Luther first
translated the Bible into German vanishes before a list of the numerous
editions of German Bibles printed during the fifty years previous to
his undertaking. The publication of Napoleon's letters add too many
facts to permit one longer to accept what Thiers and John S. C. Abbott
say of him. A similar fate awaits _the Renaissance_; that, too, has
assumed the form of a myth, which is threatened by a consideration of
certain obvious facts which its authors innocently, but none the less
fatally, overlooked.
As this word is used in histories of literature, art, and philosophy,
it implies a freeing of man's mind from the shackles of the Middle
Ages; he discovers himself and the world in all its beauty and
interest; he shakes off religious dependence and becomes self-reliant;
he casts aside the cowl and goes forth joyfully into the sunlight. This
awakening has been attributed to a revived interest in the neglected
works of the classical authors. They were potent, it has been assumed,
to bring new life into a paralysed world, so soon as they become the
object of passionate study and emulation. It was they, it has been
claimed, that dispelled the gloomy superstition of the Dark Ages and
aroused a buoyant spirit of Hellenism which enabled men to soar above
the fruitless subtleties of Scholastic Theology.
This conception of the Renaissance is much more recent in origin than
is usually supposed; it is scarcely more than fifty years old, and
finds its first clear presentation in the well-known _Civilisation
of the Renaissance_, which the Basel professor, Jacob Burckhardt,
published in 1860. Fifteen years later John Addington Symonds began to
issue his stately series of volumes on _The Renaissance in Italy_. The
charm of his style served to popularise the conception of a distinctive
period during which Europe awoke from its winter sleep and developed
those traits of character which we deem essentially modern. For a
generation or more the Renaissance has been the theme of innumerable
popular books and lectures and has constituted a recognised "epoch" in
manuals of historical instruction.
That it is a convenient term no one will deny! The civilisation of the
Italian city states in the fourteenth, fifteenth, and early sixteenth
centuries, from Dante to Machiavelli, from Giotto to Raphael, presents
so much of rich delight that we ought to have a suitable name for it
all. In this sense the expression, Renaissance, will probably continue
to be used; but it is safe to predict that as we gain fuller insight
into the conditions which preceded and followed this period it will be
ranked much lower than hitherto as a time of decisive progress in human
knowledge and ideals. Neither Burckhardt nor Symonds were cognisant of
the extraordinary achievements of what they called vaguely the Middle
Ages. And both of them were so classical-minded as to have but an
inadequate appreciation of how slight were the intellectual changes of
the Renaissance compared with those that developed in the seventeenth
and eighteenth centuries, the results of which make the world in which
we live what it is.
It is clear enough to historical students of to-day that the twelfth
and thirteenth centuries offer the spectacle of a far more unmistakable
awakening than does the so-called Renaissance. These centuries
witnessed the development of the towns, the revival of the Roman
Law, the founding of the universities, in which the encyclopædic
works of the most learned, penetrating, and exacting of all ancient
thinkers--Aristotle--were made the basis of a liberal education; and
they beheld the literary birth of those vernacular languages which
were one day to displace the speech of the Romans. These centuries
devised, moreover, a new, varied, and lovely style of architecture,
sculpture, and ornament, which still fills us with wonder and delight;
they carried the knowledge of natural things and the practical arts
beyond the point reached by Greeks or Romans; they sketched out the
great career of experimental and applied science, which was hidden from
the ancients and which is one of the main revolutionising forces of our
day.
When we consider these and other achievements which preceded the
Renaissance we are forced to ask what did it contribute that was
equally important and distinctive? This question is a difficult
one. Neither Burckhardt nor Symonds were in a position even to ask
it, and only recently are students in this field setting themselves
to re-examine more carefully and fully the facts, and place the
achievements of the period in proper relation to what went before and
what came after.[1]
One thing at least is clear. The knowledge of the Greek language
had died out in western Europe with the disruption of the Roman
Empire, and except in so far as Greek thought and taste had become
embodied in Latin, it was lost for several hundreds of years. In
the thirteenth century Aristotle's works were put into Latin, and
so deeply did they impress their readers that they were assigned a
supreme place, alongside the Bible and the Church and Roman Law. Two
centuries later a great part of the Greek classics, Homer, Æschylus,
Sophocles, Euripides, Herodotus, and above all Plato, were brought
from Constantinople, translated into Latin and made available for
such scholars as cared to read them. This was the great literary work
of the fifteenth century. Meanwhile every vestige of Latin literature
was being hunted out, copied, and edited. There was not a great deal
to be found that had not been known and read more or less all along,
but the sense of its preciousness increased and a conviction developed
that it was far better than anything that had been produced since the
German Barbarians broke up the Roman Empire. The scholars who carried
on this work had much to say of _humanitas_, by which they meant the
culture to which man alone, of all creatures, is able to aspire. Cicero
uses the word in this sense, and they found it defined for them by
Aulus Gellius, a compiler who lived under Marcus Aurelius. Culture to
them was in the main what it has been to the classical-minded ever
since--namely, familiar intercourse with the best authors of Greece and
Rome.
The Humanists did not, however, at once cast off the mediæval modes of
thought. They ranged on their library shelves side by side with the
pagan classics, the works of the Greek and Latin Christian fathers;
they fell under the spell of Neoplatonism and deemed Plotinus and
Porphyry legitimate interpreters of Plato. They were not even proof
against the crude superstitions and futilities of the Jewish Cabbala.
The rôle of classical literature in the development of thought and
taste is momentous, but it has served to hamper as well as to forward
the progress of knowledge and the increase of insight. The classics
have to-day worn out their welcome in many quarters. The more bigoted
among the classicists of our own time have little of the truly Hellenic
about them. Greece in its finest period owed its greatness partly to
its frank use of its own vernacular language, partly to its exceptional
freedom from tradition and routine. The classicist, on the contrary,
would have us base our education upon dead languages and adhere piously
to tradition, and routine. The Greek writers of the fifth century
before Christ were free and progressive; their modern retainers are too
often ultra-conservative and indifferent to the glowing opportunities
of their own time.
But their position in any case is very different from that of the
Humanists of the fifteenth century. To-day we can acquaint ourselves
with the best that has been said and thought without going back to the
masterpieces of antiquity. Each European people has developed its own
national literature and given birth to geniuses able to assimilate,
elaborate, and augment the older heritage in modern speech and
modern literary forms. So the importance of the revival of classical
scholarship five hundred years ago is not to be judged by the position
that Greek and Roman books occupy in our intellectual life to-day.
However conscious one may be of the limitations of classical thought
and the obstacles which its unconditional admirers have opposed to
natural and salutary intellectual readjustments, no one will have any
inclination to underrate its vast significance in the development of
modern culture.
* * * * *
Francesco Petrarch is generally accorded the distinction of being the
first great leader in the revival of classical literature. He did
not live to see the incoming of the Greek books, but he made a vain
effort to learn the language and fully realised its importance. He
was, moreover, untiring in promoting the study of Roman literature and
writes to his dearest friend Boccaccio: "I certainly will not reject
the praise which you bestow upon me for having stimulated in many
instances, not only in Italy but perchance beyond its confines, the
pursuit of studies such as ours, which have suffered neglect for so
many centuries. I am indeed one of the oldest among us who are engaged
in the cultivation of these subjects."[2]
But Petrarch's claim upon our attention as the father of Humanism
is only one--and that perhaps a minor one--among many. In his own
humanity lies perhaps his chief charm: A poor mortal like ourselves,
he tells us so persuasively and fully of his own feelings, his self
contradictions and spiritual, conflicts, that, as we read his letters
and "Confessions," we greet him across the gulf of centuries and
recognise in him a man of like passions with ourselves. We can become
more intimately acquainted with him than with any one in the whole
history of mankind before his time, not excepting Cicero and Augustine.
Those who know Petrarch, know him ordinarily only through his Italian
verses, now somewhat out of style. But Petrarch the reformer, the first
modern scholar, the implacable enemy of ignorance and superstition;
Petrarch the counsellor of princes, the leader of men, and the idol of
his time, is to be sought in his letters, of which some of the more
striking are made available in this volume.
His incomparable sonnets seemed to their author in his later years
little more than a youthful diversion. They earned for him among
the illiterate multitude a reputation which he claimed to despise;
they could never constitute the foundation for the scholar's fame to
which he aspired. Had he foreseen that posterity would brush aside the
great works in Latin which, cost him years of toil, and keep only his
"popular trifles in the mother tongue" (_nugellas meas vulgares_),
his chronic melancholy might have deepened into dark despair. Near
the close of his life, in preparing a copy of his Italian verses for
a friend, he says: "I must confess that I look with aversion upon the
silly boyish things I at one time produced in the vernacular (_vulgari
juveniles ineptias_). Of these I could wish everyone ignorant, myself
included. Although their style may testify to a certain ability
considering the period at which I composed them; their subject matter
ill comports with the gravity of age. But what am I to do? They are in
the hands of the public and are read more willingly than the serious
works which with more highly developed faculties I have written
since."[3]
A German scholar (Voigt) has gone so far as to declare that Petrarch
would be no less bright a star in the history of the human mind, had
he never written a verse of Italian. This very obvious exaggeration
is perhaps both natural and salutary. The Latin works, especially the
letters, are so fascinating and exhibit such new and important phases
of his character and ideals, that those who have enthusiastically
busied themselves with them have gradually come to accept the poet's
repeated assertion that his Italian works were mere youthful trifles,
of little interest as compared with his great Latin epic or his various
treatises.[4] Yet the world has decided otherwise, and decided rightly.
It has allowed over three hundred years to pass without demanding a
new edition of those Latin works, by which the author sought to gain
everlasting renown, while, on the other hand, hundreds of editions of
the despised Canzoniere have been published, not only in the original
but in many translations. For the poet finds his fullest expression
in his greatest literary work, the Italian lyrics. No one really
familiar with the letters will fail to recognise in them the author
of the sonnets. We find there the same strength and weakness, the
same genuine feeling, often disguised by mannerisms and traditional
conceits, the same aspirations and conflicts, the same subjectivity
and self-analysis. We have to do with a single great spirit revealing
itself with a diversity and mobility of literary form known only to
genius. Opening the _Canzoniere_, we find in the following lines
sentiments which might have been despatched in an elegant epistle to
his friend Nelli, or to "Lælius," or recorded in his Confessions.
Ma ben veggi' or sì come al popol tutto
Favola fui gran tempo: onde sovente
Di me medesmo meco mi vergogno:
E del mio vaneggiar vergogna è 'l frutto,
E 'l pentirsi, e 'l conoscer chiaramente
Che quanto piace al mondo è breve sogno.[5]
But even if it be admitted that the lyrics form Petrarch's greatest
claim to renown, and that the letters often only reflect, as might
be anticipated, sentiments familiar to the thoughtful reader of the
Italian verses, yet the poems alone can never tell the whole story of
their author's importance and influence. Literary ideals which have no
place in the sonnets are to be found in the letters; in them we may
study the reviver of a forgotten culture, and the prophet of an era of
intellectual advance the direct results of which we still enjoy.
The Middle Ages furnish us no earlier example of the psychological
analysis which we discover in both the verse and prose of Petrarch.
His writings are the first to reveal completely a human soul, with its
struggles, its sufferings, and its contradictions. "Petrarch was a
master in one respect at least, he understood how to picture himself;
through him the inner world first receives recognition; he first notes,
observes, analyses, and sets forth its phenomena."[6] The all-pervading
self-consciousness that meets us in the letters is sure to produce a
painful impression as we first open them. It may, for a time, indeed,
seem little better than common priggishness. But behind a thin veil of
vanity and morbid sensitiveness we straightway discover a great soul
grappling with the mystery of life. Baffled by the contradictions that
it feels within itself, it gropes tremblingly towards a new ideal of
earthly existence.
Petrarch was not content to live unquestioningly, adjusting his conduct
to the conventional standard. He was constantly preoccupied with his
own aims and motives. Nor was the problem that he confronted a simple
one, for the old and the new were contending for supremacy within
his breast. The mediæval conception of our mortal life was that of a
brief period of probation, during which each played his obscure rôle
in the particular group, guild, or corporation to which Providence had
assigned him, bearing his burdens patiently in the beatific vision
of a speedy reward in another and better world. Petrarch formally
assented to this view but never accepted it. The preciousness of life's
opportunity was ever before him. Life was certainly a preparation
for heaven, but, he asked himself, was it not something more? Might
there not be worthy secular aims? Might not one raise himself above
those about him and earn the approval of generations to come, as
the great writers of antiquity had done? His longing to obtain an
earthly reputation, and the temptation consciously to direct his
energies toward achieving posthumous fame, seemed to him now a noble
instinct, and again where tradition weighed heavily upon him, a godless
infatuation. In order to put the matter before himself in all its
aspects he prepared an imaginary dialogue, after the model offered by
Boëthius and Cicero, between himself and Saint Augustine. This little
book he called his _Secret_, as he did not desire to have it enumerated
among the works he had written for fame's sake: and here he recorded
his spiritual conflicts for his own personal good.[7] Of the contents
of this extraordinary confession something will be said later. Its very
existence is an historic fact of the utmost significance.[8]
Petrarch aspired to be both a poet and a scholar, and it is not easy
to determine definitely whether in his later years he looked upon
his great Latin epic or upon his historical works as his best title
to fame. He often refers to the high mission of the poet, and in the
address that he delivered at Rome, when he received the laurel crown,
he took for his subject the nature of poetry. For him poetry embraced
only Latin verse in its classical form. The popular, rhyming cadences
of the Middle Ages, in which the rhythmic accent followed not quantity
but the prose accent,[9] doubtless seemed to him no more deserving of
the name of poetry than Dante's _Commedia_ or his own Italian sonnets.
We shall have occasion later to describe his peculiar conception of
allegory.[10]
As a scholar Petrarch had no definite bent. "Among the many subjects
which have interested me," he says, "I have dwelt especially upon
antiquity, for our own age has always repelled me, so that, had it not
been for the love of those dear to me, I should have preferred to have
been born in any other period than our own. In order to forget my own
time I have constantly striven to place myself in spirit in other ages,
and consequently I have delighted in history."[11] We shall not then be
going far astray if we style Petrarch a classical philologist, using
the term in a broad sense, and always remembering that an enlightened
and enthusiastic classical philologist was just what the world much
needed in the fourteenth century.
Although the letters are by far the most interesting of Petrarch's
Latin productions, the reader may be curious to know something of the
character and extent of the other long-forgotten books which the author
trusted would earn him eternal fame. No complete edition of his works
has ever been published,[12] but were they brought together, they would
fill some seventeen volumes of the size of the present one, and we may
imagine that the publishers would issue them somewhat as follows:
Vols. I-VIII, _The Letters._
IX-X, _Phisicke against Fortune, as well Prosperous as Adverse_[13] (De
Remediis Utriusque Fortunæ).
XI, _Historical Anecdotes_ (Rerum Memorandum Libri IV).
XII, _Lives of Famous Men._
XIII, _The Life of Julius Cæsar_.[14]
XIV, _The Life of Solitude_ and _On Monastic Leisure_.
XV, Miscellany, including the Confessions (De Contemptu Mundi seu Suum
Secretum), Invectives, Addresses, and Minor Essays.
XVI, Latin Verse, comprising the _Africa_, the _Eclogues_, and
sixty-seven _Metrical Epistles_.
XVII, The Italian Verse, comprising the _Sonnets, Canzone_, and
Occasional Poems.
Of the Latin works only one can be said to have enjoyed any
considerable popularity. Of the _Antidotes for Good and Evil Fortune_
there were over twenty Latin editions issued from 1471 to 1756.[15] And
besides the Latin original, translations exist in English, Bohemian,
French, Spanish, Italian, and several in German. Yet only one or two
new editions have been demanded during the past two hundred and fifty
years. The first part of the work is destined to establish the vanity
of all earthly subjects of congratulation, from the possession of a
chaste daughter to the proprietorship of a flourishing hennery. In the
second part comfort is administered to those who have lost a wife or
child, or are suffering from toothache, a ruined reputation, the fear
of lingering death, or are painfully conscious that they are growing
too fat. What seems to us mere cant and cynical commonplace may well
have gratified a generation that delighted in the frescos of the
cemetery at Pisa, but the popularity of the book naturally waned just
as Dances of Death lost their charm. Yet the essays are not entirely
without interest,[16] and their variety and paradoxicalness, if nothing
else, may still hold the attention.
The two works upon which Petrarch probably based his literary
reputation were the long Latin epic, the _Africa_, and his _Lives
of Famous Men_. These are often referred to in his correspondence,
especially the _Africa._ This was, however, never finished, and in
his later years came to be a subject which the author could not hear
mentioned without a sense of irritation. The poem was printed half a
dozen times in the sixteenth century.[17] The biographical work fared
much worse, and was, with the exception of the _Life of Cæsar,_ not
printed until our own day.[18]
Among the lesser works, the Confessions and an essay on _The Life of
Solitude_ were each printed eight or nine times before the year 1700.
The letters also found readers. We have, however, but to glance at the
list of editions of the _Canzoniere_ to see how "these trivial verses,
filled with the false and offensive praise of women," rather than his
Latin epic and scholarly compilations, have served to keep his memory
green. Thirty-four editions of the Italian verses were printed before
1500, and one hundred and sixty-seven in the sixteenth century. Since
1600 some two hundred more have appeared.[19]
It is not, however, in his formal treatises that the source of
Petrarch's influence is to be found. They may aid us better to
understand their author, but they can never explain the charm which he
exercised over his contemporaries. He was not only an indefatigable
scholar himself, but he possessed the power of stimulating, by his
example, the scholarly ambition of those with whom he came in contact.
He rendered the study of the Latin classics popular among cultivated
persons, and by his own untiring efforts to discover the lost or
forgotten works of the great writers of antiquity he roused a new and
general enthusiasm for the formation of libraries and the critical
determination of the proper readings in the newly found manuscripts.
It is hard for us to imagine the obstacles which confronted the
scholars of the early Renaissance. They possessed no critical editions
of the classics in which the text had been established by a comparison
of all the available codices. They considered themselves fortunate to
discover a single copy of even well-known authors. And so corrupt was
the text, Petrarch declares, by reason of careless transcriptions, that
should Cicero or Livy return and stumblingly read his own writings once
more, he would promptly declare them the work of another, perhaps of a
barbarian.[20]
While copies of the _Æneid_, of Horace's _Satires_, and of certain of
Cicero's _Orations_, of Ovid, Seneca, and a few other authors, were
apparently by no means uncommon during the twelfth and thirteenth
centuries, it seemed to Petrarch, who had learned through the
references of Cicero, Quintilian, Saint Augustine, and others,
something of the original extent of Latin literature, that treasures
of inestimable value had been lost by the shameful indifference of
the Middle Ages. "Each famous author of antiquity whom I recall,"
he indignantly exclaims, "places a new offence and another cause of
dishonour to the charge of later generations, who, not satisfied
with their own disgraceful barrenness, permitted the fruit of other
minds and the writings that their ancestors had produced by toil and
application, to perish through insufferable neglect. Although they
had nothing of their own to hand down to those who were to come after,
they robbed posterity of its ancestral heritage."[21] The collection
of a library was, then, the first duty of one whose mission it was to
re-establish the world in its literary patrimony.
A man's books are not a bad measure of the man himself, provided he be
what Lowell calls a book-man, and his collections be really a genuine
expression of his preferences and not those of his grandfather or his
bookseller. If this is true to-day, with the all-pervading spirit
of commercial enterprise which constantly imposes upon our tastes,
how much more true must it have been when Petrarch, with all his
self-sacrificing enthusiasm and industry, brought together during a
long life only two hundred volumes.[22] Books in those days were of
course laboriously produced by hand. There was no device to secure
uniformity in the copies of a work as they were slowly written off by
the same or different persons. Each scribe inevitably made new mistakes
which could be safely corrected only by a comparison with the author's
manuscript. The average copyist was apparently hardly more careful
than the type-setter of to-day. A book as it came from his hands was
little better than uncorrected galley proof.
In one case, Petrarch tried for years to get one of his shorter works,
_The Life of Solitude,_ satisfactorily transcribed, so that he could
send a copy of it to the friend to whom he had dedicated it. He writes:
"I have tried ten times and more to have it copied in such a way that,
even if the style should not please either the ears or the mind,
the eyes might yet be gratified by the form of the letters. But the
faithfulness and industry of the copyists, of which I am constantly
complaining and with which you are familiar, have, in spite of all my
earnest efforts, frustrated my wishes. These fellows are verily the
plague of noble minds. What I have just said must seem incredible. A
work written in a few months cannot be copied in so many years! The
trouble and discouragement involved in the case of more important books
is obvious. At last, after all these fruitless trials, on leaving
home, I put the manuscript into the hands of a certain priest to copy.
Whether he will, as a priest, perform his duty conscientiously, or, as
a copyist, be ready to deceive, I cannot yet say. I learn from the
letters of friends that the work is done. Of its quality, knowing the
habits of this tribe of copyists, I shall continue to harbour doubts
until I actually see it. Such is the ignorance, laziness, or arrogance
of these fellows, that, strange as it may seem, they do not reproduce
what you give them, but write out something quite different."[23]
Each copy of a work had, therefore, before the invention of printing,
its own peculiar virtues and vices. A correct and clearly written codex
possessed charms which no modern "numbered" edition on wide-margined
paper can equal. We have many indications of the affection which
Petrarch felt for his books and which he instilled into others. Even
his rustic old servant at Vaucluse learned to distinguish the various
volumes, great and small. The old fellow would glow with satisfaction,
his master tells us, when a book was put into his hands to be replaced
upon the shelves; pressing it to his bosom, he would softly murmur the
name of the author.[24] Petrarch's interest was, however, no selfish
one; he fondly hoped that his collection would become the nucleus of
a great public library, such as we find a century or two after his
time. When he could no longer foster interest in his favourite studies
by his own potent presence and by his letters to his friends and
fellow-scholars, his books, with their careful annotations and textual
corrections, would form a permanent incentive to progress.
He chose Venice as the most appropriate place to establish his library.
The letter in which he offers to leave his books to that city gives us
a clear notion of his purpose. Laying aside all regard for classical
models, he addressed the Venetian Government in the current Latin of
the chancery:
"Francesco Petrarca desires, if it shall please Christ and St. Mark, to
bequeath to that blessed Evangelist the books he now possesses or may
acquire in the future, on condition that the books shall not be sold or
in any way scattered, but shall be kept in perpetuity in some appointed
place, safe from fire and rain, in honour of the said saint and as a
memorial of the giver, as well as for the encouragement and convenience
of the scholars and gentlemen of the said city who may delight in such
things. He does not wish this because his books are very numerous or
very valuable, but is impelled by the hope that hereafter that glorious
city may, from time to time, add other works at the public expense,
and that private individuals, nobles, or other citizens who love their
country, or perhaps even strangers, may follow his example and leave
a part of their books, by their last will, to the said church. Thus
it may easily fall out that the collection shall one day become a
great and famous library, equal to those of the ancients. The glory
which this would shed upon this State can be understood by learned and
ignorant alike. Should this be brought about, with the aid of God and
of the famous patron of your city, the said Francesco would be greatly
rejoiced, and glorify God that he had been permitted to be, in a way,
the source of this great benefit. He may write at greater length if the
affair proceeds. That it may be quite clear that he does not mean to
confine himself in so important a matter to mere words, he desires to
accomplish what he promises, etc.
"In the meantime he would like for himself and the said books a
house, not large, but respectable [_honestam_] in order that none of
the accidents to which mortals are subject shall interfere with the
realisation of his plan. He would gladly reside in the city if he can
conveniently do so, but of this he cannot be sure, owing to numerous
difficulties. Still he hopes that he may do so."[25]
September 4, 1362, the grand council determined to accept the offer of
Petrarch, "whose glory," the document recites, "was such throughout the
whole world that no one, in the memory of man, could be compared with
him in all Christendom, as a moral philosopher and a poet." The expense
for a suitable dwelling was to be met from the public treasury, and the
officials of St. Mark's were ready to provide a proper place for the
books.
Petrarch lived for several years, as we shall see, in the house
furnished by the Venetian Government, and it was, until recently,
believed that his books were sent to the city, and, to the disgrace of
the Republic, allowed to perish from negligence. Tommasini, the author
of a once esteemed life of Petrarch, reports the discovery in 1634,
in a room of St. Mark's, of certain stray volumes nearly destroyed
by moisture and neglect,[26] which he assumed to be the remains of
Petrarch's original collection. This has recently been shown to be a
mistake, for the books in question never belonged to Petrarch, many
indeed dating from the next century. There is, in fact, no reason to
suppose that his library ever reached Venice after his death.
M. Pierre de Nolhac has succeeded, by the most minute and painstaking
study of Petrarch's handwriting and habits of annotation, in partially
reconstructing a catalogue of his books. The fate of the poet's
collection was a matter of vital interest to the literary men of his
time. Immediately after his death, Boccaccio wrote to ask what had been
done with the _bibliotheca pretiosissima_. Some, he said, reported
one thing and some another. But the books evidently found their way
to Padua, for it was there that Coluccio Salutati and others sent
for copies, not only of Petrarch's own works, but of rare classics
which he possessed, such as Propertius and the less known orations of
Cicero. Petrarch's last tyrant-patron, Francesco di Carrara, Lord of
Padua, had for several years been upon bad terms with Venice, and it
is easy to understand why the famous library, once in his possession,
was never delivered to St. Mark's, as its owner had intended. The
prince appears to have sold many of the volumes, although he retained a
choice selection for himself. A renewal of the wars with his neighbours
brought upon him, however, a final calamity, and he was forced to
cede all of his possessions, in 1388, to Gian Galeazzo Visconti. The
latter carried off the precious books to Pavia, where he added them to
his own important collection. One volume has been discovered by M. de
Nolhac, which bears the half-obliterated name of Francesco di Carrara.
But Pavia was in turn robbed of its treasures, for in 1499 the French
seized them and transported them to Blois, whence they have found their
way to Paris. Some twenty-six volumes in the National Library have been
satisfactorily proven actually to have belonged to Petrarch, while Rome
can boast of but six, and Florence, Venice, Padua, and Milan of one
each. The rest may either have been destroyed, or be wanting in those
characteristic traits by which they could be identified.
Petrarch's habit of annotating the books in which he was most
interested[27] gives the volumes which have come down to us a certain
autobiographical value, and M. de Nolhac's study of these extempore
and informal impressions will fascinate every admirer of the _premier
humaniste._ We cannot, of course, infer from the fragments of the
library which can now be identified what the original collection
included, but a careful study of his works and of the extant marginal
glosses has led M. de Nolhac to the following conclusions. The
library doubtless contained almost all the great Latin poets except
Lucretius. Petrarch probably knew Tibullus only from an anthology.
There were serious gaps in his Latin prose, but he had an especially
good collection of the Latin historians. Tacitus, although known to
Boccaccio, was quite missing, and he had only the more important
portions of Quintiliano _Institutes_, which he much admired. Seneca was
nearly complete, and he had most of the best-known works of Cicero,
although the letters _Ad Familiares_ and a number of the _Orations_
were wanting. Of the early Christian Fathers, Ambrose, Jerome, and
Augustine were prominent, but this section of his library contained
relatively few authors, while the mediæval writers were very scarce
indeed. The _Letters_ of Abelard, some works of Hugh de Saint Victor,
Dante's _Commedia,_ and the _Decameron_ of Boccaccio were, we know,
included. Petrarch could not read Greek, but he possessed Latin
versions of the _Timæus_ of Plato, the _Ethics_ and _Politics_, at
least, of Aristotle, Josephus's _Histories_, and the translation of
the _Iliad_ and _Odyssey_ that he and Boccaccio had had made. The want
of Greek literature was the greatest weakness in his education; for,
having no means of comparison, he was led to estimate falsely the value
of the Latin classics.
In considering the powers of criticism which Petrarch exhibits in his
discussion of the Latin language and literature, the study of which
was his main occupation during a long life, we must not unconsciously
allow ourselves to judge him by the scientific standard of to-day.
Before we can give full credit to his genius we must recollect the
incredible ignorance of his time. To give but one instance--an eminent
professor in the University of Bologna, in a letter to Petrarch,
gravely ranked Cicero among the poets, and assumed that Ennius and
Statius were contemporaries.[28] A free fancy was the only prerequisite
for establishing derivations. We find no less a student than Dante
explicitly rejecting a correct etymology in order to substitute for
it one which suited him better,[29] when he claims that _nobile_ is
derived from _non vile_ instead of from _nosco._
In order to understand the deep significance of Petrarch's scholarship,
one must turn to a book like the _Etymologies_ of the saintly Isidore
of Seville, whose work was a standard treatise in the Middle Ages.
To choose an example or two at random, we find that the lamb (Latin,
_agnus_) owes its name to the fact that "it recognises [_agnoscit_]
its mother at a greater distance than other animals, so that in even a
very large herd it immediately bleats response to its parent's voice."
_Equi_ (horses) are so called because they were equal (_æquabantur_)
when hitched to a chariot.[30] It may well be that Petrarch knew but
little more about the science of language in the modern sense of the
word than Isidore or the author of the _Græcismus_, another famous
text-book of the period, but his spirit is the spirit of a scholar.
Speculations of the kind above noted seemed to him fatuous and puerile,
although he might have been entirely at a loss to suggest any more
scientific derivations to replace the currently accepted ones. He
distinguished instinctively between fact and fancy, and the reader will
discover in his letters much sound criticism and an innate sense of
fitness and proportion quite alien to the Middle Ages.