[27] See the preface to the Epistolæ Familiares, p. 570. 'Scribendi enim mihi vivendique unus (ut auguror) finis erit.'
[28] For his lofty conception of poetry see the two letters to Boccaccio and Benvenuto da Imola, pp. 740, 941. Epist. Rerum Senilium, lib. i. 4, lib. xiv. 11.
[29] The references to Augustine as a 'divine genius,' equal to Cicero in eloquence, superior to the classics in his knowledge of Christ, are too frequent for citation. See, however, Fam. Epist. lib. ii. 9, p. 601; the letter to Boccaccio, Variarum, 22, p. 1001; and Fam. Epist. lib. iv. 9, p. 635. The phrase describing the Confessions, quoted in my text, is from Petrarch's letter to his brother Gerard, Epist. Var. 27, p. 1012, 'Scatentes lachrymis Confessionum libros.'
[30] 'Sum sectarum negligens, veri appetens.' Epist. Rer. Sen. lib. i. 5, p. 745. 'Nam apud Horatium Flaccum, nullius jurare in verba magistri, puer valde didiceram.' Epist. Fam. lib. iv. 10, p. 637.
[31] See the letters addressed to Cicero and Seneca, pp. 705, 706.
[32] 'Ægritudo' is a phrase that constantly recurs in his epistles to indicate a restless, craving habit of the soul. See, too, the whole second book of the De Contemptu Mundi.
[33] See the treatise De Vitâ Solitariâ, pp. 223-292, and the letters on 'Vaucluse,' pp. 691-697.
[34] See the discussion of this point in Baldelli's Vita del Boccaccio, pp. 130-135.
[35] Compare the chapter in the dissertation De Remediis on troublesome notoriety, p. 177, with the letter on his reception at Arezzo, p. 918, the letter to Nerius Morandus on the false news of his death, p. 776, and the letter to Boccaccio on his detractors, p. 749.
[36] See the Epistles to Rienzi, pp. 677, 535.