l86 EX/iMINATION of an HISTORICAL HTPOTHESIS 



Gia incornminciava a prender feciirtade 

 La mia cara nemica a poco a poco 

 He' Juoi Jofpetti ; e rivolgeva ih gioco 

 Mie pene acerbe, fua dolce honejlade : 



Prel/o era '/ tempo dov'' amor Ji Jcontra 

 Con cajlitate j e a gU amanti e data 

 Sederjt hijieme, e dir che lor^ incontra. Son. 47. Part. 2. 



Tempo era bomai da trovar pace tregua 

 Di tanta guerra ; ed erane in viaforfe. Son. 48.- Part. 2. 



Tranquillo p6rto uvea mojlrato amore 

 A la mia Itinga e torhida tempejia. — 



Gia trahieeva a' begli occhi '/ mio core, 

 E /' altafede non piii lor molejia. 

 ylhi morte ria, come a fchiantar fe'' prejla 

 Ilfrutto di moW arini in si poche bore I Son. 49. Part. 2. 



In fupplemciit of thefe authorities from the fonnete of Pe- 

 trarch, may be added that report which was current at the 

 time, or at leall among the earUeft writers who have given any 

 account of the poet's life, namely, that the Pope, who held Pe- 

 trarch in the higheft eftimation, and to whom he was indebt- 

 ed for feveral valuable ecclefiaftical preferments, was extremely 

 folicitous that he fliould be united in marriage to Laura, and 

 offered to give him, in that event, a difpenfation for retaining 

 his church-benefices. If the flory is true, the Pope of whom 

 it is recorded muft have been Clement VI., as he is the only 

 one of the Pontiffs, who were Petrarch's cotemporaries, to 

 whom thefe charaderiftics could apply. M. Fl'eury, in his 

 Ecckfiajiical Hijiory, is certainly miftaken when he attributes 

 the propofition here mentioned to Benedict XII. the prede- 

 ceffor of Clement ; for Petrarch owed no favour to that Pon- 

 tiff, whom he has fatirized in many parts of his writings, as a 



mart 



