After writing the above...
I referred to the Wikipedia entry on Prescott and stumbled onto this prescient observation:
Historian Richard Kagan has identified "Prescott's Paradigm" as a 19th century interpretive model first fully articulated by Prescott. It argues that Spain's early modern 'decline' and subsequent 'torpor' was a product of its religious bigotry and political despotism.
Yes, history does repeat itself...