Those who are most intimate with Italian literature should read it for its original merits: and I believe that they will find it difficult to determine whether the author deserves most praise for his intimacy with the language of Dante, or for his extraordinary mastery over his own.
***** CRITICISMS ON THE PRINCIPAL ITALIAN WRITERS.
No.II.PETRARCH.

(April 1824.) Et vos, o lauri, carpam, et te, proxima myrte, Sic positae quoniam suaves miscetis odores.

Virgil.
It would not be easy to name a writer whose celebrity, when both its extent and its duration are taken into the account, can be considered as equal to that of Petrarch.

Four centuries and a half have elapsed since his death.

Yet still the inhabitants of every nation throughout the western world are as familiar with his character and his adventures as with the most illustrious names, and the most recent anecdotes, of their own literary history.