CORTÉS
            How now? What’s the debate?

AGUILAR                                              The­ Inquisition:
            It’s linked itself with tethers to our church,
            Like two, aloof, reluctant mountaineers.
            I fear, when that unholy office trips,
            And plummets in the popular regard,
            Its drop down estimation’s precipice
            Will pull down our religion in its tow.

OLMEDO
            We cavil, boys, as if there were two Spains.

CORTÉS
            One good, one evil?

OLMEDO                              Not so simple. Yet,
            One, global-bent, one isolationist,
            One liberal, one counter to reform,
            One, eyeing Greece, one stirring with the Moors,
            Who, like the fatal twins of Oedipus,
            Will not consent to reign in tandem more,
            But rather wound each other mortally.
            In Europe, there’s a word in currency:
            Renaissance- It is not a Spanish word,
            And there’s a reason.

CORTÉS                                And it is?

OLMEDO                                               Some flaw
            In Spain’s own character that’s culpable-
            Catholic fanaticism, feverish pride,
            Or warped deliriums of vanity.
            We thought we were the new elect of God,
            Mistook our patriotic egoism
            For fealty to the church. Hence, our divorce
            And isolation from the rest of Europe.

CORTÉS
            No, it’s not Spain, not Catholics, nor our race,
            But frailties of the human constitution,
            Which frequently reverse the gains achieved
            By previous generations, in the name
            Of progress, culture, and civility.                          Trumpet is heard.
            A parley sounds! See what those Mayas want.