y of them as his
imperial majesty chose to select.

His treatise, "De Remediis utriusque Fortunae" (On the Remedies for both
Extremes of Fortune) was one of his great undertakings in the solitude
of Vaucluse, though it was not finished till many years afterwards, when
it was dedicated to Azzo Correggio. Here he borrows, of course, largely
from the ancients; at the same time he treats us to some observations on
human nature sufficiently original to keep his work from the dryness of
plagiarism.

His treatise on "A Solitary Life" was written as an apology for his own
love of retirement--retirement, not solitude, for Petrarch had the
social feeling too strongly in his nature to desire a perfect hermitage.
He loved to have a friend now and then beside him, to whom he might say
how sweet is solitude. Even his deepest retirement in the "shut-up
valley" was occasionally visited by dear friends, with whom his
discourse was so interesting that they wandered in the woods so long and
so far, that the servant could not find them to announce that their
dinner was ready. In his rapturous praise of living alone, our poet,
therefore, says more than he sincerely meant; he liked retirement, to be
sure, but then it was with somebody within reach of him, like the young
lady in Miss Porter's novel, who was fond of solitude, and walked much
in Hyde Park by herself, with her footman behind her.

His treatise, "De Otio Religiosorum," was written in 1353, after an
agreeable visit to his brother, who was a monk. It is a commendation of
the monastic life. He may be found, I dare say, to exaggerate the
blessing of that mode of life which, in proportion to our increasing
activity and intelligence, has sunk in the estimation of Protestant
society, so that we compare the whole monkish fraternity with the drones
in a hive, an ignavum pecus, whom the other bees are right in expelling.

Though I shall never pretend to be the translator of Petrarch, I recoil
not, after writing his Life, from giving a sincere account of the
impression which his poetry produces on my mind. I have studied the
Italian language with assiduity, though perhaps at a later period of my
life than enables the ear to be _perfectly_ sensitive to its harmony,
for it is in youth, nay, almost in childhood alone, that the melody and
felicitous expressions of any tongue can touch our deepest sensibility;
but still I have studied it with pains--I believe I can thoroughly
appreciate Dant