Note 20 — Chapter VIII · THE WILL OF SAINT AND SINNER

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.