Our troubled age has sometimes mirrored medieval Spaniards at their very worst: killing the innocent in God’s name, expelling the “infidel,” rallying coreligionists by slandering other faiths, refusing to understand our neighbor’s sacred beliefs, and infringing his or her right to worship God freely. Wherever such acts trample human dignity and freedom, no just and lasting peace can be possible.

—Chris Lowney, A Vanished World

We are all the direct descendants of Columbus; it is with him that our genealogy begins, insofar as the word beginning has a meaning.

—Tzvetan Todorov, The Conquest of America