This book sheds much new light on English Catholic intellectuals in the four decades that encompassed the two world wars. As James Lothian points out, the English Catholic intellectual community had never been as visible in public life as in this period. Its members developed a distinctive voice not just with respect to spiritual matters but on social, economic, and political questions as well. Indeed, Lothian argues that herein lay the roots of division, one branch of the community following the political line established by Hilaire Belloc in the years leading up to and following the First World War and the other adhering to the spiritual emphasis that found a figurehead in the writer and historian Christopher Dawson. The split mirrored the legacy in the previous century of Cardinal Manning's interest in social justice, on the one hand, and Cardinal Newman's interest in theology, on the other.

The book builds on but goes well beyond existing scholarship. Not least, it presents a group portrait rather than a study of individual thinkers, one that pays close attention to group dynamics. It represents a further advance on existing studies by focusing on the “cradle Catholics” as much as the famous literary converts that have interested historians hitherto. Among the cradle Catholics, Lothian brings into view not only Belloc but Frank Sheed, Maisie Ward, and Tom Burns, all key players in the Catholic publishing trade that Lothian rightly sees as pivotal to the success of the Catholic intellectual community. Other major figures that feature prominently in the study include G. K. Chesterton, Fr. Vincent McNabb, and Eric Gill—Belloc's “greater servants”—and Douglas Jerrold, Douglas Woodruff, Arnold Lunn, Evelyn Waugh, and Christopher Hollis among the “lesser servants.” But these names by no means exhaust Lothian's cast; it extends to all those who enhanced the profile of the English Catholic intellectual community through literary activity of one kind or another—for example, David Jones, a leading writer among the second generation of Catholic intellectuals after the First World War. Another such figure is Bernard Wall. He was the Dawsonite editor of the Colosseum, a journal devoted to debate of the most combative kind at the time of the Spanish Civil War and a focus of Nationalist sympathy among Catholics. Lothian argues that pro-Franco sentiment provided a common, albeit fragile rallying point for Catholic intellectuals, but England's hour of crisis ensured that the consensus shifted to higher, British national ground in 1940–41. He emphasizes that Cardinal Hinsley's Sword of the Spirit movement, with the Dublin Review at its helm, edited by Dawson and supported by Barbara Ward, was critical to this transition.

Much of the animus of this book is leveled at the influence of Belloc and, to a lesser extent, Chesterton, together with Jerrold, a younger man but nevertheless fully representative of the interests and outlook of the “old guard.” In Lothian's eyes they perpetuated the suspicion of the modern world among English Catholics in nineteenth-century Britain. The reaction of the Bellocians against capitalism and parliamentary democracy, in particular, led to a defense of Continental dictatorship. They regarded the maintenance of a Latin Catholic bloc against the threat of communism as of paramount concern. However, this stance lost much credibility with the establishment of the Vichy regime in France, which turned a blind eye to the Nazi persecution of the Church, and the entrance of Italy into the war on Germany's side. Britain's new alliance with Communist and atheist Russia in the face of the Nazi threat also posed problems for the followers of Belloc. The difficulties facing the idea of a Latin Catholic bloc made possible a new consensus needed to bring Catholics behind the patriotic war effort for which Hinsley was pressing. That consensus was short-lived, lasting only as long as the emergency itself, and allowing Jerrold to regain some of the initiative after Hinsley's death in 1943. But the consensus ensured the permanent undoing of Bellocianism as a major force in English Catholicism, and for Lothian this is a measure of its success. If the consensus had failed, English Catholicism would have maintained its subcultural status for much of the twentieth century, such was Belloc's hostility to modern society in general and parliamentary institutions in particular.

Away from the political propaganda and the rewriting of Whig and Protestant history that consumed the energies of the Bellocian branch of the English Catholic community, a cluster of thinkers around the Sheed & Ward publishing company sought spiritual inspiration in Catholic thinkers on the Continent, particularly the neo-Thomist philosopher Jacques Maritain and the German theologian Karl Adam. The broader, more liberal thrust of this wing is, for Lothian, reflected in the identification of secularism rather than Protestantism as Catholicism's chief target. His account of Maisie Ward's work for the Catholic Evidence Guild after the First World War is especially interesting, focused as it was on counteracting widespread agnosticism in Britain in outdoor speaking events.

Lothian perhaps draws Chesterton too closely within the Bellocian net. Much of Chesterton's writing before 1910 was independent of Belloc's influence; like Dawson's writing in the late 1930s, it linked Christianity firmly with liberalism. Moreover, Chesterton's political and spiritual thought developed through fierce engagement with secularists and agnostics, as well as through the extensive literary criticism he practiced in the columns of the Daily News before 1913. Some of this was carried over into his work in the interwar period. In focusing on his philo-fascism and his Catholic apologetics, Lothian misses the full range of Chesterton's literary concerns. In particular, Chesterton's biographies and his essays for the Illustrated London News underline his continuing English patriotism infused, as it was, with Christianity in the widest sense.

Nevertheless, this is a rich and pioneering study that sheds much light on a neglected area of English cultural and intellectual history. The wealth of primary sources on which Lothian has drawn, together with his compelling narrative, critical analysis, and attention to nuance, will ensure that this is a landmark book.