Note 234 — Chapter XI
Reading edition
"Verum hoc—seu gratitudini seu ineptiæ ascribendum—non sileo, me quantulucunque conspicis, per illam esse, nec unquam ad hoc, si quid est nominis aut gloriæ fuisse venturum, nisi virtutum tenuissman sementem, quasi pectore in hoc natura locaverat, nobilissimis his affectibus coluisset." Francisci Petrarchæ, Colloquiorum Liber quem Secretum Suum Inscripsit, pp. 105-106, Berne, 1603.
In his canzone beginning with the words Perchè la vita e breve, Petrarch declares to his inspirer—
"Thus if in me is nurst Any good fruit, from you the seed came first; To you, if such appear, the praise is due, Barren myself till fertilized by you."