Petrarch Quotes & Sayings

I desire that death find me ready and writing, or if it please Christ, praying and intears. — Petrarch

Mere elegance of language can produce at best but an empty renown. — Petrarch

Books can warm the heart with friendly words and counsel, entering into a close relationship with us which is articulate and alive — Petrarch

I rejoiced in my progress, mourned my weaknesses, and commiserated the universal instability of human conduct. — Petrarch

Whyle I was abowte to chaunge myn olde lyff
What sorowe I suffred, dyseese, angre and stryff,
Cracchynge myn here, my chekys all totare,
Wrythynge my fyngres for angwysshe and care,
Watrynge the erthe with my byttre salte teres
That the crye of my syghes ascended to Goddys eres,
My knees with myn handys grasped togedyre soore,
And yitt I stode the same man I was afore
Tyl a depe profounde remembraunce att the laste
Hadd all my wrecchednesse afore myn eyn caste — Petrarch

Alack our life, so beautiful to see, With how much ease life losest, in a day, What many years with pain and toil amassed! — Petrarch

Often have I wondered with much curiosity as to our coming into this world and what will follow our departure. — Petrarch

An equal doom clipp'd Time's blest wings of peace. — Petrarch

A good death does honour to a whole life. — Petrarch

How quick the old woe follows a little bliss! — Petrarch

What name to call thee by, O virgin fair, I know not, for thy looks are not of earth And more than mortal seems thy countenances. — Petrarch

Where are the numerous constructions erected by Agrippa, of which only the Pantheon remains? Where are the splendorous palaces of the emperors? — Petrarch

For though I am a body of this earth, my firm desire is born from the stars. — Petrarch

I would have preferred to have been born in any other time than our own. — Petrarch

All pleasure in the world is a passing dream. — Petrarch

For virtue only finds eternal Fame. — Petrarch

The time will come when every change shall cease,
This quick revolving wheel shall rest in peace:
No summer then shall glow, not winter freeze;
Nothing shall be to come, and nothing past,
But an eternal now shall ever last. — Petrarch

I have taken pride in others, never in myself. — Petrarch

Nothing mortal is enduring, and there is nothing sweet which does not presently end in bitterness. — Petrarch

For style beyond the genius never dares. — Petrarch

Great errors seldom originate but with men of great minds. — Petrarch

Man has not a greater enemy than himself. — Petrarch

Man has no greater enemy than himself. — Petrarch

For death betimes is comfort, not dismay, and who can rightly die needs no delay. — Petrarch

The greater I am, the greater shall be my efforts. — Petrarch

And tears are heard within the harp I touch. — Petrarch

I looked back at the summit of the mountain, which seemed but a cubit high in comparison with the height of human contemplation, were in not too often merged in the corruptions of the earth. — Petrarch

Books come at my call and return when I desire them; they are never out of humor and they answer all my questions with readiness. Some present in review before me the events of past ages; others reveal to me the secrets of Nature. These teach me how to live, and those how to die; these dispel my melancholy by their mirth, and amuse me by their sallies of wit. Some there are who prepare my soul to suffer everything, to desire nothing, and to become thoroughly acquainted with itself. In a word, they open the door to all the arts and sciences. — Petrarch

Who over-refines his argument brings himself to grief — Petrarch

To begin with myself, then, 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. — Petrarch

Death had his grudge against me, and he got up in the way, like an
armed robber, with a pike in his hand. — Petrarch

I know and love the good, yet ah! the worst pursue. — Petrarch

How fortune brings to earth the over-sure! — Petrarch

Events appear sad, pleasant, or painful, not because they are so in reality, but because we believe them to be so and the light in which we look at them depends upon our own judgment. — Petrarch

The end of doubt is the beginning of repose. — Petrarch

And I live on, but in grief and self-contempt,
Left here without the light I loved so much,
In a great tempest and with shrouds unkempt. — Petrarch

I saw the tracks of angels in the earth: the beauty of heaven walking by itself on the world. — Petrarch

Virtue is health, vice is sickness. — Petrarch

Five enemies of peace inhabit with us - avarice, ambition, envy, anger, and pride; if these were to be banished, we should infallibly enjoy perpetual peace. — Petrarch

Books never pall on me. They discourse with us, they take counsel with us, and are united to us by a certain living chatty familiarity. And not only does each book inspire the sense that it belongs to its readers, but it also suggests the name of others, and one begets the desire of the other. — Petrarch

Life in itself is short enough, but the physicians with their art, know to their amusement, how to make it still shorter. — Petrarch

There is no lighter burden, nor more agreeable, than a pen. — Petrarch

It is more honorable to be raised to a throne than to be born to one. Fortune bestows the one, merit obtains the other. — Petrarch

Those spacious regions where our fancies roam,
Pain'd by the past, expecting ills to come,
In some dread moment, by the fates assign'd,
Shall pass away, nor leave a rack behind;
And Time's revolving wheels shall lose at last
The speed that spins the future and the past:
And, sovereign of an undisputed throne,
Awful eternity shall reign alone. — Petrarch

If a hundred or a thousand people, all of the same
age, of the same constitution and habits, were suddenly
seized by the same illness, and one half of them were to
place themselves under the care of doctors, such as they
are in our time, whilst the other half entrusted themselves
to Nature and to their own discretion, I have not the
slightest doubt that there would be more cases of death
amongst the former, and more cases of recovery among
the latter. — Petrarch

Each famous author of antiquity whom I recover places a new offence and another cause of dishonor to the charge of earlier generations, who, not satisfied with their own disgraceful barrenness, permitted the fruit of other minds, and the writings that their ancestors had produced by toil and application, to perish through insufferable neglect. Although they had nothing of their own to hand down to those who were to come after, they robbed posterity of its ancestral heritage. — Petrarch

Continued work and application form my soul's nourishment. So soon as I commenced to rest and relax I should cease to live. — Petrarch

Often on earth the gentlest heart is fain To feed and banquet on another's woe. — Petrarch

In my younger days I struggled constantly with an overwhelming but pure love affair - my only one, and I would have struggled with it longer had not premature death, bitter but salutary for me, extinguished the cooling flames. I certainly wish I could say that I have always been entirely free from desires of the flesh, but I would be lying if I did. — Petrarch

Reality is always the foe of famous names. — Petrarch

The aged love what is practical while impetuous youth longs only for what is dazzling. — Petrarch

Go, grieving rimes of mine, to that hard stone
Whereunder lies my darling, lies my dear,
And cry to her to speak from heaven's sphere. — Petrarch

Suspicion is the cancer of friendship. — Petrarch

It is better to will the good than to know the truth, — Petrarch

Do you suppose there is any living man so unreasonable that if he found himself stricken with a dangerous ailment he would not anxiously desire to regain the blessing of health? — Petrarch

Who naught suspects is easily deceived. — Petrarch

You keep to your own ways and leave mine to me. — Petrarch

My flowery and green age was passing away, and I feeling a chill in
the fires had been wasting my heart, for I was drawing near the
hillside above the grave. — Petrarch

Sameness is the mother of disgust, variety the cure. — Petrarch

Wanting is not enough, long and you attain it. — Petrarch

Hitherto your eyes have been darkened and you have looked too much, yes, far too much, upon the things of earth. If these so much delight you what shall be your rapture when you lift your gaze to things eternal! — Petrarch

How difficult it is to save the bark of reputation from the rocks of ignorance. — Petrarch

Where you are is of no moment, but only what you are doing there. It is not the place that ennobles you, but you the place, and this only by doing that which is great and noble. — Petrarch

He loves but lightly who his love can tell. — Petrarch

From thought to thought, from mountain peak to mountain. Love leads me on; for I can never still My trouble on the world's well beaten ways. — Petrarch

Hope is incredible to the slave of grief. — Petrarch

While life is in your body, you have the rein of all thoughts in your hands. — Petrarch

Love is the crowning grace of humanity, the holiest right of the soul, the golden link which binds us to duty and truth, the redeeming principle that chiefly reconciles the heart to life, and is prophetic of eternal good. — Petrarch