Secretum

The Secretum, whose full title is De secreto conflictu mearum curarum ("On the Secret Conflict of My Cares"), is a work written by Francesco Petrarch in Latin. It was composed in three books sometime between 1342 and 1353 and revised afterwards. It takes the form of an imaginary dialogue between the poet and Saint Augustine of Hippo, in the presence of a woman who personifies Truth. Rather than a work intended for publication, it works as an exercise in self-examination, a private space in which Petrarch lays bare his spiritual anxieties. For this reason it circulated only after his death, and it was probably written as an aid during the crisis of his middle years.

The first book deals with evil in general. Following Augustine, it concludes that evil has no origin of its own but arises from a lack of good will, caused by earthly passions that seize the spirit. The second book reviews the seven deadly sins and dwells on sloth, the vice that most tormented the poet; the saint acknowledges that it must be uprooted completely, though at first he offers no effective remedy. In the third, Petrarch examines himself regarding two passions: his love for Laura and his craving for glory, which Augustine judges the graver of the two, advising him to renounce both without the dialogue always showing how this might be done. Augustine serves as the critical counterpart of Petrarch's own mind, probing his inner life and pointing out his weaknesses in order to spur him to overcome them.

The work imitates the method of self-scrutiny and the harsh self-criticism of Augustine's Confessions, and much of its doctrine derives from him, above all the importance of free will in reaching faith. Yet it is full of quotations from classical authors such as Cicero, Virgil and Ovid, far more often than from Scripture. For this reason it has often been read as an attempt to reconcile Renaissance humanism and admiration for the ancient world with Christian faith. Its reception was slow, but it is regarded as one of the most revealing works of modern introspection.