PETRARCH THE MAN 



all, very strange in this ? Was it not quite human ? 

 In what he says, from his point of view, there is not a 

 little truth, and his position was a difficult one. Dante's 

 Latinity was not of the best, and Petrarch saw that. 

 His rival had won distinction in the vernacular, which 

 in Petrarch's eyes seemed less important than Latin. 

 This fact would of itself almost acquit Petrarch of the 

 charge of jealousy; nevertheless, Petrarch had written 

 also in Italian, had tried to write well, and his state of 

 mind was therefore not over-easy to define. In Latin, 

 Petrarch was more at home than Dante. He could not 

 help being aware of this, and could not help drawing 

 the inference (though he did not proclaim it loudly) 

 that he was Dante's superior. If anyone is disposed to 

 blame him for this private opinion, he should remember 

 that Dante himself was not a modest man. With such 

 well-grounded reservations in his mind, it was hard for 

 Petrarch to speak of his fellow-poet without seeming 

 lukewarm to the great crowd of Dante's admirers, who 

 would have been satisfied by nothing short of a shrill 

 tribute of praise exaggerated even beyond the powers 

 of the urbane Petrarch. 



Petrarch has also been accused of jealousy of his own 

 great contemporary, Boccaccio; but never was accu- 

 sation more unjust than that. The only proper answer 

 is that his critical sense was not sufficiently developed 

 for him to appreciate Boccaccio's works at their true 

 value. He has been accused also of insincerity in other 

 friendships, and his large correspondence has been 



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