“So you are leaving us?” asked Springer’s father.
“Yes. This place is dead,” replied Quentin.
“No, no—not that,” replied the younger Springer. “It isn’t dead; Cordova is merely asleep. All the kings have punished it. Its natural, its own civilization has been suppressed, and they have endeavoured to substitute another for it. And even to think that a town can go on living prosperously with ideas contrary to its own, and under laws contrary to its customs and instincts, is an outrage.”
“My dear lad,” rejoined Quentin rather cynically, “I don’t care about the cause for it all. What I know is that one cannot live here.”
“That is the truth,” asserted the older Springer. “One can attempt nothing new here, because it will turn out badly. No one does his part in throwing off this inertia. No one works.”
“Don’t say that, father.”
“What your father says, is right,” continued Quentin “and not only is that true, but the activity of the few who do work, annoys and often offends those who do nothing. For instance: I, who have done nothing so far but live like a rowdy, have friends and even admirers. If I had devoted myself to work, everybody would look upon me as a good-for-nothing, and from time to time, secretly, they would place a stone in my way for me to stumble over.”
“No, it would not be a stone,” said Springer, “it would be a grain of sand.”
“Still more outrageous,” rejoined Quentin.
“No,” added his friend, “because it would not be done with malice. These people, like nearly all Spaniards, are living an archaic life. Every one here is surrounded by an enormous cloud of difficulties. The people are all dead, and their brains are not working. Spain is a body suffering from anchylosis of the joints; the slightest movement causes great pain; consequently, in order to progress, she will have to proceed slowly,—not by leaps.”