Dame Emmeline Tanner writes of the Renaissance that its "special characteristic was the revolt against authority and the rise to importance of the individual." Politically, "the Renaissance marks the death of the idea of the universal authority of the Empire." Ecclesiastically, "the period marks the breaking-up of the idea of the World Church and the rise of national churches.
The authority of the Church was overthrown, and in Teutonic lands the Renaissance became the Reformation." This is a book about broad concepts and remarkable individuals: the Borgia Pope, Alexander VI, the Emperor Charles V, Queen Elizabeth of England, Martin Luther, John Calvin, William the Silent, and Philip II of Spain and his terrible Inquisition.
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