Petrarch Quotes

Understand me who can, for I understand myself.

Voi ch'ascoltate in rime sparse il suono
di quei sospiri ond'io nudriva 'l core
in sul mio primo giovenile errore
quand'era in parte altr'uom da quel ch'i' sono.

Ma pur sí aspre vie né sí selvagge
cercar non so ch'Amor non venga sempre
ragionando con meco, et io co llui.

What am I? A scholar? No, hardly that; a lover of woodlands, a solitary, in the habit of uttering disjointed words in the shadow of beech trees, and used to scribbling presumptuously under an immature laurel tree; fervent in toil, but not happy with the results; a lover of letters, but not fully versed in them; an adherent of no sect, but very eager for truth; and because that is hard to find, and because I am a clumsy searcher, often, out of self-distrust, I flee error and fall into doubt, which I hold in lieu of truth. Thus I have finally joined that humble band that knows nothing, holds nothing as certain, doubts everything - outside of the things that it is sacrilege to doubt.

Ei sa che 'l vero parlo:
ché legno vecchio mai non róse tarlo.

Everything else, every thought, goes fore and forever fades away into the recesses of time, and therein what remains is my soul's love for you.

Man has no greater enemy than himself. I have acted contrary to my sentiments and inclination; throughout our whole lives we do what we never intended, and what we proposed to do, we leave undone.

I had got this far, and was thinking of what to say next, and as my habit is, I was pricking the paper idly with my pen. And I thought how, between one dip of the pen and the next, time goes on, and I hurry, drive myself, and speed toward death. We are always dying. I while I write, you while you read, and others while they listen or stop their ears, they are all dying.

Song, if you find a man at peace with love,
say: 'Die while you're happy,
since early death is no grief, but a refuge:
and he who can die well, should not delay.'

Canzon, s'uom trovi in suo amor viver queto,
di': Muor' mentre se' lieto,
ché morte al tempo è non duol, ma refugio;
et chi ben pò morir, non cerchi indugio.

My Pandolfo, those works are frail in the long run, but our study is the one that makes men immortal through fame.

No one is a man of learning unless he is also a heretic and a madman, and above all , aggressively perverse.

Et del mio vaneggiar vergogna è 'l frutto,
e 'l pentersi, e 'l conoscer chiaramente
che quanto piace al mondo è breve sogno.

Voi dunque, se cercate aver la mente
anzi l'extremo dí queta già mai,
seguite i pochi, et non la volgar gente.

böyle kaçarım ölümün vuruşlarından;
ama hızlı değil kaçışım, arzumun benimle gelemeyeceği kadar,
hep geldiği gibi sessiz yürürüm,
yoksa ölü sözler ağlatır insanları,
oysa ben yalnız aksın isterim gözyaşlarım.