The Prophetic Faith of Our Fathers, vol. 2

IV. Petrarch Declares Papacy Fulfills Prophetic Terms

Appearing shortly after Dante, Francesco Petrarch (1304-1374), poet laureate at Rome in his day, is one of the celebrated names in Italian literature. His father was a notary, and destined his son for the law, sending him to study at Montpellier and Bologna. But contact with Latin classics ended his interest in law. Literary interests remained dominant. After his father’s death he studied for holy orders, serving as prior, canon, and archdeacon. Through Petrarch the spirit of the Renaissance found its initial expression in Italy, culminating finally in a revolt against Scholasticism, and the fables and superstitions that flourished under its protection. (See portrait on page 70.) PFF2 29.1

He despised scholastic and mystical learning, and went back further—to the well of antiquity. This led to his attack on astrology and his scorn of the false science of his time. Many treatises in poetic and prose form resulted. In the latter part of his career the cities of Italy vied with one another in showering honor upon him. The Roman senate and the University of Paris invited him to receive the poet’s crown, which he accepted from the former, in 1341, in a colorful celebration. ³⁹ PFF2 29.2

Petrarch formed one of a deputation from Rome, in 1342, which besought Clement VI to return to the Eternal City. Thus he had an opportunity to learn of the unsavory things of Avignon that he reveals in his Letters. He contrasts the humility and poverty of the early church with the splendor and power of the church of his time. Petrarch stresses this in his sonnet beginning Fiamma dalcielsule tuetreccie piova, in which he inveighs against the court of Rome. Here it is in quaint old English: PFF2 29.3

“Vengeaunce must fall on thee, thow filthie whore
Of Babilon, thow breaker of Christ’s fold,
That from achorns, and from the water colde,
Art riche become with making many poore.
Thow treason’s neste that in thie harte dost holde
Of cankard malice, and of myschief more
Than pen can wryte, or may with tongue be tolde, Slave to delights that chastitie hath solde;
For wyne and ease which settith all thie store
Uppon whoredome and none other lore,
In thye pallais of strompetts yonge and olde
Theare walks Plentie, and Belzebub thye Lorde;
Guydes thee and them, and doth thye raigne upholde:
It is but late, as wryting will recorde,
That poore thow weart withouten lande or goolde;
Yet how hathe golde and pryde, by one accorde,
In wickednesse so spreadd thie lyf abrode,
That it dothe stincke before the face of God.” ⁴⁰ PFF2 29.4

1. BABYLON CALLED SHAMELESS.

In wild and untaught notes, the Spirituals had sung of the doom of Rome. But now the strain is taken up by a master, and Europe listens. In eloquent words Petrarch portrayed the same picture of papal corruption as given by Dante. The depravity of the papal court especially attracted the notice of Petrarch, and though the court had taken up residence in Avignon—which Petrarch execrated ⁴¹—he pursued it thither, citing the evangelist John’s description in Revelation 17. PFF2 30.1

“Thou Babylon, seated on the wild banks of the Rhone, shall I call thee famous or infamous, O harlot, who hast committed harlotry with the kings of the earth? Truly thou art the same that the holy Evangelist saw in spirit, the same, I say, and not another, sitting upon many waters. Either literally, being surrounded by three rivers, or, in the profusion of this world’s goods, among which thou sittest wanton and secure, unmindful of eternal riches; or, in the sense laid down by him that beheld thee, that the waters on which you the harlot sit are peoples and nations and languages. Recognize thine own features. A woman clothed in purple and scarlet, decked with gold and precious stones and pearls, having a golden cup in her hand, full of abomination in the impurity of her fornication—Dost thou not know thyself, O Babylon? Unless perhaps what is written upon her forehead is wrong, Babylon the great, you indeed are Babylon the little.” ⁴² PFF2 30.2

He frequently speaks of western Babylon—that is, Avignon on the Rhone—in a number of the letters in his Book of Letters Without Title. ⁴³ PFF2 30.3

From Petrarch’s own observations of the Curia, and the sad havoc open simony had made upon the church, he drew a frightful description of the perishing, abominable, Gallic Babylon, and the Apocalyptical woman, “drunk with the blood of the saints.” ⁴⁴ PFF2 30.4

This is the word of the second of Italy’s great poets. PFF2 31.1

While Wyclif was protesting papal abuses in England, in Bohemia Milicz of Kremsier, Conrad of Waldhausen, and Matthias of Janow, canon of the Cathedral of Prague, similarly called for reformation, and appealed to the Bible as the source of Christian faith and practice. ⁴⁵ PFF2 31.2