[47] Salutato, writing to Francesco da Brossano, describes his conversations with Boccaccio thus:—'Nihil aliud quam de Francisco (i.e. Petrarcha) conferebamus. In cujus laudationem adeo libenter sermones usurpabat, ut nihil avidius nihilque copiosius enarraret. Et eo magis quia tali orationis generi me prospiciebat intentum. Sufficiebat enim nobis Petrarcha solus, et omni posteritati sufficiet in moralitate sermonis, in eloquentiæ soliditate atque dulcedine, in lepore prosarum et in concinnitate metrorum.' Epist. Fam. p. 45.
[48] Epist. Rer. Sen., lib. xi. 9, p. 887; lib. vi. 1, p. 806; lib. v. 4, p. 801.
[49] Petrarch's letter to Ugone di San Severino, Epist. Rer. Sen. lib. xi. 9, p. 887, deserves to be read, since it proves that Italian scholars despaired at this time of gaining Greek learning from Constantinople. They were rather inclined to seek it in Calabria. 'Græciam, ut olim ditissimam, sic nunc omnis longe inopem disciplinæ ... quod desperat apud Græcos, non diffidit apud Calabros inveniri posse.'
[50] De Gen. Deor. xv. 6, 7.
[51] Comento sopra Dante, Opp. Volg. vol. x. p. 127. After allowing for the difficulty of writing Greek, pronounced by an Italian, in Italian letters, and also for the errors of the copyist and printer, it is clear that a Greek scholar who thought Melpomene was one 'who gives fixity to meditation,' Thalia one 'who plants the capacity of growth,' Polyhymnia she 'who strengthens and expands memory,' Erato 'the discoverer of similarity,' and Terpsichore 'delightful instruction,' was on a comically wrong track.
[52] See above, [p. 53], [note 4].
[53] Vita del Boccaccio, p. 264. The autograph was probably burned with other books of Boccaccio, and some of the unintelligible passages in the above quotation may be due to the ignorance of the copyist.
[54] De Genealogiâ Deorum; De Casibus Virorum ac Feminarum Illustrium; De Claris Muliebribus; De Montibus, Silvis, Fontibus, &c.
[55] 'La teologia e la poesia quasi una cosa si possono dire ... la teologia niuna altra cosa è che una poesia d'Iddio.' Vita di Dante, p. 59. Cf. Comento sopra Dante, loc. cit. p. 45. The explanation of the Muses referred to above is governed by the same determination to find philosophy in poetry.
[56] See Petrarch's letter 'De quibusdam fictionibus Virgilii.' Ep. Rer. Sen. lib. iv. 4, p. 785.