Note 8 — JAMES HARVEY ROBINSON

Petrarch had not only exhorted Urban V. to return to Rome, but had previously sent metrical epistles to his predecessors, Benedict XII. and Clement VI., urging them to restore the papacy to its ancient seat. The letters which Petrarch wrote to his friends in regard to the abominations of the "Babylonish Captivity" form a separate collection of his correspondence, Epistolæ sine Titulo, in which the names of those to whom they were addressed are suppressed for fear of compromising them.