"I believe that there are great mines of gold here, and that the Indians have it from there."

"The people are all naked, men and women, as their mothers bore them."

"It was the Lord who put into my mind (I could feel His hand upon me) the fact that it would be possible to sail from here to the Indies."

"I arrived at the Indies with the fleet which the Sovereigns, our Lord and Lady, sent me. I had not been there twenty days when I discovered by my own experience that the whole of that land is an islan…"

"Nothing that results in human progress is achieved with unanimous consent. Those that are enlightened before the others are condemned to pursue that light in spite of the others."