[19] A. S. Oko, the Hebrew scholar, is certain that the original was in Italian. José Ortega y Gasset, Professor of metaphysics in the University of Madrid, assured me of his personal conviction that an original Castilian MS. was lost.
[20] A mighty lineage of masters who made of the Castilian an immortal language. Among them are the Dominican Luis de Granada; the Franciscans Juan de los Angeles, Diego de Estella, San Pedro de Alcántara; the Carmelites San Juan de la Cruz, Santa Teresa, Jerónimo Gracián, Miguel de la Fuente; the Augustinians Malon de Chaide, Alonzo de Orozco; and the Jesuits Nieremberg (Juan Eusebio) and Alonzo Rodríguez.... At the same time a literary æsthetic was developed (Ausias March, Fernando de Herrera de Sevilla) whose creative liberality rings refreshingly modern, beside the poetics of Boileau. Writes Herrera: “So long as a language lives and is spoken, it cannot be said to have run its course: for its constant tendency is to surpass itself and to leave behind what was formerly esteemed. We must constantly essay new forms....” This was the spirit which made possible El Greco and Góngora and Cervantes. It was one outcome of the monasteries and of the religious universities of the Age of Isabel. It proves how strong, in a way, the Renaissance was in Spain until the reactionary time of Philip II.
[21] The Jansenist belief in predestination and the Jesuit doctrine of free will appear to contradict this. The paradox is only of the surface. Acceptance of predestination and of pre-determined grace rests on acceptance of the inviolable autonomy of the individual soul and minimizes all objective—i. e., social—effect on it. The Jesuit free will actually puts the stress on possible change in the individual soul through social forces, thus minimizing the soul’s autonomy. That this interpretation is correct is borne out by the developments of Jesuit practice on the one hand and of French-Calvinist-Protestant cultures on the other.
[22] “When we lose our dominions, it will be said: You came here to evangelize and to commit outrage. It will not be said: You came here to mine coal.” Angel Ganivet.
[23] It must be added that this realistic art, and this realistic Europe, are doomed today. Cézanne, a disciple of El Greco, marks the turn of the tide, in the domain of painting.
[24] I hope it will be clear that in these parallels I am suggesting not identity but analogy. Elements of the Renaissance and of the modern world definitely distinguish these Spaniards from the true medievals. The beauty and the irony of the Spanish scene lies precisely in this.
[25] The elements which go to the making of a great corrida in Madrid, Seville, Barcelona, Zaragoza, San Sebastián, are intricate and varied. If any of them fails, the consummation fails. The rearing of perfect bulls is a science in Spain. Only a few preëminent ranches—ganaderías de toros bravos—are equipped to supply them. They are either in the province of Salamanca or in Andalusia. The toreros study the bulls in the field, coöperating in their upbring. Experts breed and train them, and prepare them for their supreme moment in the sun of the arena. And before the conflict, they are examined by veterinary surgeons. If they are one jot less than perfect, they may not enter the ring of a true corrida. They are then consigned to the corridas de novilleros: the innumerable encounters of the apprentice fighters—who must go through several seasons and win the applause of the most exacting critics ere they are admitted to the rank of espada.
Yet despite this care, imperfect bulls (bulls who refuse to fight, who fight erratically, who flinch at crucial moments) do enter the best corrida and blot out the artistry of the most expert matador. Indeed, the skill of the torero lies in great measure in his ability to control the bull. The genuine artist must possess hypnotic power. He must compel him in the instant of confrontation to forget the multitude, the flashing capas, the banderillas that bite his flesh: to concentrate upon his own frail grace all the bull’s hate and all the bull’s vigor. He must compel a brute to be the partner of an exquisite dancer.
He must control his own body as perfectly as any artist on a stage. Utter purity of form, of pace, of measure must be preserved within this threat of death. There is no virtuosity like this in all the world. Beyond is the crowd, not at all loth to seeing him undone: before him, his colleague, is a maddened bull whose horns are more terrible than swords. He must control the crowd; he must model the lunges of the brute into the design of an essential dance. And all this he must do in coolness.
The torero who can achieve this, not one time in a career but with reasonable frequency, and before the most savagely critical—and the most savage—audience in the world, comes not often in a decade’s passing. Most toreros are at the mercy of the bull. If he behaves they acquit themselves with credit. If he baulks, they must trust to luck—to the saving capas of the banderilleros—even to their heels. Hisses are more frequent in the plaza than cheers.