“…a fresh green breast of the new world. Its vanished trees, the trees that had made way for Gatsby's house, had once pandered in whispers to the last and greatest of all human dreams; for a transitory enchanted moment man must have held his breath in the presence of this continent, compelled into an aesthetic contemplation he neither understood nor desired, face to face for the last time in history with something commensurate with his capacity for wonder.
F. Scott Fitzgerald, The Great Gatsby
“Then the hard, dry Spaniards came exploring through, greedy and realistic, and their greed was for gold or God. They collected souls as they collected jewels. They gathered mountains and valleys, rivers and whole horizons, the way a man might now gain title to building lots.
John Steinbeck, East of Eden
But our work was to exasperate, ravage, kill, mangle and destroy… and in a short time this land which was so great, so powerful and fertile… was depopulated…
Bartolomé de las Casas, History of the Indies
Who could conquer Tenochitlán? Who could shake the foundation of heaven?
