 Theologians, monks and clergy criticized later humanists because the church believed that the study of classical poetry distracted men from religion.These later humanists, such as Petrarch and Boccacio defended the use of classical poetry the same way Mussato did several decades before by arguing that the allegorical truths classical works portrayed had contemporary relevance.Petrarch consciously echoed Mussato in both the defense, and ceremony of ancient poetry, and Mussato's tragedy "Ecerinis" has been cited as the work to popularize tragedy, and inspire Shakespeare's Richard the III to be modeled after the Senecan tragedy.