- [first lines]
- Cesare Borgia: [to the people] We've all experienced great tragedy these past ten days, as the deluge claimed homes and shops, loved ones and neighbors.
- Peasant: All except you, Borgia! Safe behind high walls on this hill while we, we sleep down at the river's edge in huts, up to our assholes in mud!
- Old Woman: And a monster prowls the shores!
- Cesare Borgia: [to his advisor] A monster?
- Agapito Geraldini: A mule's head on the body of a whore. One human arm, the other's an elephant's trunk. On its back, the bearded face of an old man. A tail like a neck, ending with a snake's head. Scaly limbs. It's left foot like a hoof, the right an eagle's talon.
- Lucrezia Borgia: Have you not heard the rumors? That I am no longer a virgin? That I have a child out of wedlock? That word means exactly what it says. After you are wed, you are locked.
- Girolamo Savonarola: You wonder: "How can you debase a man who serves as the mouthpiece of God?" Fair question, I answer you thus: My own eyes have gazed into the light of the Holy Spirit. The Light illuminates truth. If the Light deceives me and I deceive you, then God deceives. Do you believe God would deceive us? No.
- Girolamo Savonarola: But you, Lazzaro, you wonder what did the Light illuminate? I answer: Rome. Rome, a city of winding streets and dark recesses with shadows cast, not by buildings, but by people. Yes, Lazzaro in Rome there are more prostitutes than Monte Cassino has friars. This culture of sin extends all the way.
- Girolamo Savonarola: No, I do not point to Heaven, but at Alexander, who brings the entire Church to his level of debauchery. One priest sleeps with his concubine another with a boy and the next morning both perform Holy Mass.
- Girolamo Savonarola: I am overjoyed to have my faith tested. I accept your challenge. But if I am to stand trial, Borgia, then so should you.
- Cesare Borgia: I have no reason...
- Girolamo Savonarola: If my faith is proven false, that does not prove your faith true. So, I challenge you. Eminence, in the name of Pope Alexander, to verify your righteousness. Or has the Borgia bull been castrated?
- Cesare Borgia: You think me a boy of privilege, that I do not know pain. I have been tested by many, more powerful than you, yet here I stand. I have risen from the flames before, and I will rise in them again, a phoenix.
- Girolamo Savonarola: Phoenix is a myth.
- Cesare Borgia: And so may be the fires of hell.
- [last lines]
- Rodrigo Borgia: [on his knees] Dear God, oh that you would bless me indeed to expand my territory. And that your hand would be with me to guide me, and to keep me from evil. Amen.
- Rodrigo Borgia: [hands upward] Who serves you best, Lord? Do I or Savonarola? Send a sign. Save my son.