If by chance the book escape us, which seems to be very unlikely, I will let you have mine. I have been always fond of this particular translation and of Greek literature in general, and if fortune had not frowned upon my beginnings, in the sad death of my excellent master, I should be perhaps to-day something Fondness for Greek literature more than a Greek still at his alphabet. I approve with all my heart and strength your enterprise, for I regret and am indignant that an ancient translation, presumably the work of Cicero, the commencement of which Horace inserted in his Ars Poetica,[624] should have been lost to the Latin world, together with many other works. It angers me to see so much solicitude for the bad and so much neglect of the good. But what is to be done? We must be resigned....
I wish to take this opportunity of warning you of one thing, lest later on I should regret having passed it over in silence. If, as you say, the translation is to be made literally in prose, listen for a moment to the opinion of St. Jerome as expressed in his preface to the book, De Temporibus, by Eusebius of Cæsarea, which he translated into Latin.[625] Here are the very words of this great man, well acquainted with these two languages, and indeed with many others, and of special fame for his art of translating: Difficulty of translating works of literature If any one, he says, refuses to believe that translation lessens the peculiar charm of the original, let him render Homer into Latin, word for word; I will say further, let him translate it into prose in his own tongue, and he will see a ridiculous array and the most eloquent of poets transformed into a stammerer. I tell you this for your own good, while it is yet time, in order that so important a work may not prove useless. As for me, I wish the work to be done, whether well or ill. I am so famished for literature that just as he who is ravenously hungry is not inclined to quarrel with the cook's art, so I await with a lively impatience whatever dishes are to be set before my soul. And in truth, the morsel in which the same Leo, translating into Latin prose the beginning of Homer, has Longing for the translation of Homer given me a foretaste of the whole work, although it confirms the sentiment of St. Jerome, does not displease me. It possesses, in fact, a secret charm, as certain viands, which have failed to take a moulded shape, although they are lacking in form, preserve nevertheless their taste and odor. May he continue with the aid of Heaven, and may he give us Homer, who has been lost to us!
In asking of me the volume of Plato which I have with me, and which escaped the fire at my transalpine country house, you give me proof of your ardor, and I shall hold this book at A loan of a volume of Plato your disposal, whenever the time shall come. I wish to aid with all my power such noble enterprises. But beware lest it should be unbecoming to unite in one bundle these two great princes of Greece, lest the weight of these two spirits should overwhelm mortal shoulders. Let your messenger undertake, with God's aid, one of the two, and first him who has written many centuries before the other. Farewell.
82. Petrarch's Letter to Posterity
The following is a letter of Petrarch addressed, by a curious whim, to Posterity. It gives an excellent idea of the poet's opinion of himself and reveals the sort of things that interested the typical man of culture in the early Renaissance period. It is supposed to have been written in the year 1370, when Petrarch had completed the sixty-sixth year of his life. The letter betrays a longing for individual fame which was common in classical times and during the Renaissance, but not in the Middle Ages.
Source—Franciscus Petrarca, Epistolæ de Rebus Familiaribus et Variæ ["Letters of Friendly Intercourse, and Miscellaneous Letters">[, edited by J. Fracassetti (Florence, 1869), Vol. I., pp. 1-11. Translated in James H. Robinson and Henry W. Rolfe, Petrarch, the First Modern Scholar and Man of Letters (New York, 1898), pp. 59-76 passim.
Francis Petrarch, to Posterity, greeting:
It is possible that some word of me may have come to you, though even this is doubtful, since an insignificant and obscure name will scarcely penetrate far in either time or space. If, however, you should have heard of me, you may desire to know what manner of man I was, or what was the outcome of my labors, especially those of which some description or, at any rate, the bare titles may have reached you.
To begin, then, with myself. The utterances of men concerning me will differ widely, since in passing judgment almost every one is influenced not so much by truth as by preference, and good and evil report alike know no bounds. I was, in truth, a poor Petrarch's early life mortal like yourself, neither very exalted in my origin, nor, on the other hand, of the most humble birth, but belonging, as Augustus Cæsar says of himself, to an ancient family. As to my disposition, I was not naturally perverse or wanting in modesty, however the contagion of evil associations may have corrupted me.
My youth was gone before I realized it; I was carried away by the strength of manhood. But a riper age brought me to my senses and taught me by experience the truth I had long before read in books, that youth and pleasure are vanity—nay, that the Author of all ages and times permits us miserable mortals, puffed up with emptiness, thus to wander about, until finally, coming to a tardy consciousness of our sins, we shall learn to know ourselves.