Pucciarello di Fiorenza. “Sonnet. Of Expediency.”

DGR clearly found this kind of cynical text interesting and must have drawn from it parallel reflections on his own age: see for example his own “On Refusal of Aid Betweeen Nations.” The translation is quite close. DGR's source was Poeti del Primo Secolo (II. 218)

The sonnet is probably an early work, from the late 40s or early 50s.

The translation was first published in 1861 in The Early Italian Poets; it was reprinted in 1874 in Dante and his Circle.