ABSTRACT
This chapter examines writings by Lope de Vega, Francisco de Quevedo, Miguel de Cervantes, Baltasar Gracian, and others that work to dislodge inconstancy from the column of so-called negative feminine traits in order to recast it as a new masculine ideal: that of adaptability. Transatlantic navigation, global missionary outreach, dramaturgy, and the unofficial office of privado were five realms of cultural activity that found virtue in adaptability rather than constancy, thereby ratifying the sagacity of Donne's ironic wit. Transatlantic sea-pilots struggled to reconcile medieval assumptions concerning the movements of the sun and stars with their on-deck observations. Although sixteenth-century navigators may have wished to cling to Ptolemaic cosmography, empirical evidence forced them to admit that a discrepancy between true and magnetic North was interfering with their calculations. Slightly different situation confronted the Jesuit missionaries who fanned out from Castile to the East and West to spread Roman Catholicism.
