THE GIANT MASQUERADE: AN HISTORICAL SURVEY OF THE ROMAN HIERARCHY, by the Rev. Frank C. Raynor. London: Morgan and Scott, Ltd., 12 Paternoster Buildings, E.C. 4. Price 6s.
This is one of the most fascinating books we have ever read on the Papacy. The author is a born literary artist. His keen eye has caught the light and shade in the marvellous panorama he has made to pass before the reader, and with unerring precision he describes the men and deeds of epoch-making events. With a masterly command of words he has given us a picture of the Papacy as it casts its giant, dominating form athwart human liberty and progress, and his indictment is one of the most terrible and crushing that was ever uttered against this tyranny before which kings and princes bowed until its spell was broken at the Reformation. If there is a lurking thought in the mind of any that Protestant controversialists have been too hard in characterising Romanism as the Mystery of Iniquity let him read this book. While we thus write of this remarkable book, we do not commit ourselves to Mr Raynor’s treatment of some of the subjects. Here and there are statements with which we do not agree, for instance where he says, speaking of one of Leonardo da Vinci’s masterpieces—”A race that can be swept into rapture by the Zaccaria Madonna is not far from the kingdom.” Art, whatever refining influence it may have, is but nature at best, and it will never take us higher than nature. Again, the statement about the woman on bended knees in Notre Dame with her eyes uplifted to a golden cross takes too much for granted when it is said she was “in Christ.” She may have been, and probably was, as gross an idolator as any of the careless crowd who thronged the great cathedral. Such statements as these and a few others are, to us, like blots in a very fine piece of work. We miss the mention of the glorious work done in Scotland under the instrumentality of John Knox. It is to be hoped that in the next edition, for there is sure to be a call for more editions, there will be some mention made of a country in which the work of Reformation was as thoroughly carried through as any under the sun.