THE ROMAN CATHOLIC CHURCH IN ITALY. By Dr. Alexander Robertson. Price, 6s. London: Morgan & Scott.
In this new book Dr. Robertson, of Venice, gives a striking and convincing picture of present-day Catholicism. Dr. Robertson uses great plainness of speech in his rehearsal, and does not call a spade an agricultural instrument in dealing with the Papacy. The book is, in fact, one long indictment of the Roman Catholic Church. Claiming to be Christian in the highest degree, he finds her to be in reality the “very antithesis of Christianity, incapable of bringing holiness into the heart and life”; “A compromise with evil, teaching to deceive and deceiving”; “A moral leper, sensual, avaricious, and cruel beyond all measure.” These, he says, are her present-day characteristics, as notoriously as they were her features in pre-Reformation times. Having lost the temporal supremacy, and therewith the power to wield the dungeon and the stake, the Church of Rome since 1870 has, according to our author’s showing, betaken herself to the poison-cup and to unholy intrigue in order to remove from her pathway anyone who dares to oppose her, not excepting the more liberal minded of her own clergy. Dr. Robertson enters into details regarding the dealings of the Vatican with the State, with education, and also with the Bible and the Sabbath. The confessional and the teachings regarding it form a black record. He also criticises the attitude of the great English-speaking nations towards the Papacy, comparing it unfavourably with that of the Italian laity; and claiming that the unbending attitude of the latter is correct as far as it goes. The book is a well-written one. The author’s merited castigations of offending parties are couched in direct and well-chosen language. We hope the work will sell, and especially that it may fall into the hands of our rabid Ritualisers. It will do them good to read, mark, learn, and inwardly digest this account of the Papacy by one who speaks what he knows and testifies what he has seen.