Of the Abbe de BADE. 139 



grave of the church of the Cordeliers. The queftion, then, is, 

 To which of the oppofing proofs are we to give our faith ? To 

 this queftion we fhali certainly not long hefitate to give an an- 

 fwer, when we confider, that the one clafs of proofs admits of 

 no fufpicion of fabrication or impofture ; while the other is ex- 

 tremely lufpicious, and may be altogether a forgery. It is 

 impoflible to fuppofe, that numberlefs paflages, interfperfed 

 through the works of Petrarch, indicating the place of 

 Laura's birth and death, all naturally connected with the 

 fubject treated of, though fome furnifhing their evidence not 

 in pofitive terms, but only by inference, fhould every one of 

 them be fabricated ; and that the forger Iho'uld have been able 



to 



So, likevvife, fonnet 157. Part. 1. : 

 . 



Una Candida cetvafopra Verba 



Verde, m' apparve con duo coma d 'oro, 



Fra due riviere a I 'ombra d 'un alloro. 



And jet more clearly, in the 3d of his Latin eclogues :. 



Daphne, ego te jolam dejcrto m httore primum 

 Afpexi ; diibius hnmwemne Deamne viderem. 



1 he evidence arifing from thefe paffages,that Petrarch's firft interview with his mil- 

 trefs was not in a church, but in the fields, is thus controverted by the Abbe de Sade. 

 "' Jefuis perfuade que ces allegories qui prefentent des images riantes de la campagne 

 doivent etre enteridues des dehors d' Avignon, ou des charmes du printemps, qui eft 

 lafaifon dans laquelle Pet rarq^je vit Laure pour la premiere fois. Convenoil,il 

 qu'il parlat de. l'eglife de S" Claire en rapellant la premiere epoque de fon amour ? 

 Un poete qui park de ces chofes-la, eft bien-aife d'egayer la fcene ; il n'ira pas la 

 placer dins une eglife : et fur une chofe fi peu importante en elle-raeme, il ne doit 

 pas:s'affujettir a. la v^rite hiftoriqne \ il fe permet toutes les fi&ions qui peuvent 

 rendre fes vers agreables." (Notes, vol. i. p. 57.). If this mode of reafoning is to be 

 admitted, it is equally effectual againft thofe paffages which the Abbe has brought in 

 fupport of his own hypothefis, as thofe which militate againft it ; and tends, indeed, 

 'to invalidate the whole evidence brought from the poems of Petrarch in proof of 

 any part of his hiftory. 



