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JOHN WYCLIFFE THE BOLD,
OR
^efofrqef.
By
J.
R.
ELLIS.
Xonfcon:
S.
W.
PARTRIDGE
&
Co.,
9, Paternoster Rcw.
TO BE HAD OF ALB BOOKSELLERS.
�PREFACE.
This little record of the life and times of Wycliffe, justly called “ The Morning
Star of the Reformation,” may seem to some readers to be dry and uninterest
ing ; but although there is nothing in it of the poetic or the ideal, yet it should
be to every thoughtful Christian a grand thing to contemplate the life, and
teaching and death of this man of men. Looking at him in the light of what he
has, through God, accomplished for our country, surely the voice of England
ought to ring out a thanksgiving from end to end of her dominions.
We who live in these enlightened and privileged times are too apt to forget
the struggle which that liberty has cost our forefathers, and it is only by reading
the lives of these great men that we are reminded of the glorious deeds of some
of our ancestors who fought so nobly for the truth, and who suffered even to
the death for that pure and simple Gospel which, by their very life’s blood, they
have handed down to us. Let us awake to a sense of our responsibility in the
matter. We have not got to fight/or the truth in the sense which they had, but
let it be ours, by our lives and by our teaching, to shed abroad the light ot that
truth through the length and breadth of .our land, that others of our countrymen
and countrywomen who are now sitting in darkness may be brought under the
light and influence, and power of the Gospel; then shall we be remembering our
great Reformer in the way that he would best have liked, viz., by carrying on
the great work which he began, in this our day and generation.
“Faithful found
Among the faithless ; faithful only he
Among innumerable false ; unmoved,
Unbroken, unseduced, unterrified,
His loyalty he kept, his love, his zeal; .
' Nor number, nor example, with him wrought
1
To swerve from truth, or change his constant mind,
j
Though single.”
‘
J. R. ELLIS.
�JOHN WYCLIFFE THE BOLD,
OR
(England’s Sirst Reformer.
Thebe is an old and very true saying, common amongst us, that “ When night
is darkest dawn is nearest.” This seems to have been specially the case with
regard to England at, or rather just before, the time of the Reformation.
Darkness, both spiritual and moral, and degradation seems to have spread all
over the land, till it appeared as if the vice and immorality of the people, aye,,
and of priests also, could go no farther. And so the advent of John Wycliffe at
such a time seemed to be, indeed, as light springing up like the dawn of day.
John Wycliffe was born in the little village of Spresswell, not far from
Barnard Castle, in the North Riding of Yorkshire, in the year 1324. Of his
boyhood there seems to be no authentic record, but it is supposed that as
monastic schools were springing up in various parts of England at that period, hewould have been sent to one or other of these schools. At any rate, he com
menced his college life at the age of 15, when he went to Queen’s College, Oxford,
or Oxenford, as it was then called, where he entered as a student, and was soon
removed to the celebrated Merton, and aftewards he was promoted to the
presidency of Baliol, and also presented with a college living ; but in 1365 Simon
Islip, the primate, constituted him Warden of Canterbury College, which he had
then newly founded at Oxford. An equal number of regular and secular priests
having been placed as fellows in this college by the founder, after his death
disputes arose, which led to the expulsion of Wycliffe and the other three secular
members of the college in 1367. On an appeal to Rome, the measure received
the sanction of the papal court, a circumstance which naturally exasperated the
mind of the ejected warden against the pope.
In the reign of Edward II., the payment of the thousand marks annually, as
agreed to by Johu, was quietly dropped, and no remonstrance against its discon
tinuance came from Rome ; but in the year 1365, a renewal of the papal claim,
was made, and the demand accompanied by an intimation to the effect that if
the king did not pay this tribute and also all the arrears of past years he would
have to appear before his feudal superior in Rome to answer for his conduct.
During the century which had elapsed since the great Charter was signed,
England’s growth in all the elements of greatness had been marvellously rapid.
She had fused Norman and Saxon into one people; she had extended her
commerce; she had reformed her laws ; she had founded seats of learning, wh-ich
had already become renowned ; she had fought great battles and won brilliant
victories; her valour was felt and her powers feared by continental nations, and
when the summons to do homage as a vassal of the pope was received, the nation
hardly knew whether to meet it with indignation or with derision.
�4
Edward liad oftentime been obliged, in order to meet the cost of wars, to ask
Parliament to consent to increased burdens of taxation; and all the more
acceptable to him was the opportunity of giving into the hands of the represent
atives of the country the repudiation of an impost which had been in abeyance
for more than a generation. Should Parliament adopt this resolution, the crown
■was covered by the country. But the burden of taxation was not the principal
point of view from which Parliament looked at the papal demand ; much more
than that, the honour and independence of the kingdom was the determining
consideration for its representatives. The Parliament assembled for the purpose
of considering this question in May, 1366, and required a day to consider as to
the answer. Wycliffe was present on the occasion, but whether as a spectator
merely, or as a Member of Parliament, does not seem quite clear. He wrote,
however, a treatise on the question of political right in the sense of the
declaration of Parliament. The decision given was unanimous. They said:
“ Forasmuch as neither King John, nor any other king, could bring his realm
and kingdom into such thraldom and subjection but by common consent of
Parliament, the which was not given ; therefore, that which he did was against
his oath at his coronation, besides many other causes. If, therefore, the pope
should attempt anything against the king by process, or other matters in deed,
the king, with all his subjects, should, with all their force* and power, resist the
same.” Thus was England freed from the insolent demands of the pope at this
time.
Failing in his attempt to assert a papal supremacy in England, the pope
allowed the matter to rest, although his priests tried every means in their power
to grasp some of her wealth, forgetting their true mission in their strivings after
worldly gains : they infested alike the castle and the cottage, threatening the poor
with everlasting sufferings if they did not give them their hardly earned money,
and, making their way to the bedside of the rich, would offer them pardon from
sins for filthy lucre.
What a contrast was the conduct of John Wycliffe at this time ! Knowing as
he did the people were trodden down by the cruel demands of the priests, he
insisted on himself receiving almost nothing at their hands, while he denounced
the hypocrisies of the Church of Rome and preached unto the people justification
by faith ; and such a man at this eventful period was sorely needed in England, for
wars were continually breaking out with France, and while the soldiers won
splendid victories, the people willingly bore the heavy burden of taxation imposed
upon them in consequence; but when Edward the Black Prince became
incapacitated by disease from leading the soldiers, then loud and bitter com
plaints arose, people became irritable, and threatened to rebel against the
Government unless some kind of relief was afforded them. In 1341 Edward
made a fresh demand for subsidy of 50,000 marks, and it was now that the power
of Wycliffe’s true teaching was displayed. He had become by this time very
popular, so that in the hour of danger every one looked to him for counsel and
advice. He had taught the people that the Bible said that the Church had
no right to any earthly king, and the people had so far received the doctrine
that they were determined, at all hazards, to force the priests into compliance
with it. Consequently, when the king made fresh demands, in the way of issuing
new taxes, the Parliament at once proposed that the Church should pay a part of
the cost of the war out of the revenue she had received from the people. Of
course, the priests frantically opposed this, but the people firmly insisted upon
the proposition being carried into effect, and gained the day. Also the Parlia
ment at this time proposed to the king to remove the prelates from all secular
positions which they might hold, and put laymen in their places. This proposi
tion was adopted by the king, and two or three of the bishops were succeeded by
laymen in their secular offices, according to the voice of the country. In a little
time however, the evil broke out again with greater violence. In 1373, the aged
king’listened again to the demands of the people, and sent a deputation to the
pope • but his holiness did not return a satisfactory reply. Parliament again
took ’up the scandal, and sternly demanded redress. A second embassy was
appointed consisting of seven men, the second of whom was John Wycliffe.
The papal court was at Avignon, but the City of Bruges was selected for the
�5
negotiations. Bruges was, at that time, a city of great importance, numbering
200,000 inhabitants, and with commercial and political relations extending far
and wide.
•
Wycliffe must, from his prominent position, have come into contact with
many eminent men, who were there also. Amongst these was the king’s fourth
son, John of Gaunt, Duke of Lancaster, who already knew and appreciated the
high qualities of Wycliffe. The terms of peace agreed upon between the king
and the pope did not reach any of the real evils complained of by the country,
and in April, 1376, when the Parliament met, it spoke with the voice of the
people when it put before the king the grievances under which they suffered,
through the arbritary conduct of the Roman See, and showed to him what great
need there was for reform in the land. The old king, however, was drawing
near his end, and possibly frightened too by his priestly advisers, rendered the
Parliament no help in the matter. The next year they renewed their complaint,
and now the power of Wycliffe’s influence over them once again came into full
play. He had, by his upright and generous conduct, inspired the people with
full confidence, and they seemed only too ready to follow where he led. No
wonder that the wrath of the priests now began to turn upon Wycliffe. He had
denounced them as hypocrites, and stirred up the indignation of the people
against them. In return they sought to bring false witnesses against him and
bring his deeds to nought, but the Hand of the Lord, whose he was and whom
he served, was with him ; and he was still preserved to do good in old England.
In 1377 Edward III. died, and was succeeded by his grandson, Richard II. The
country was still involved in war, the expense of which, together with a want of
economy in the administration, had entirely exhausted the royal treasury, and in
the same proportion ruffled the public temper, that the murmurs of the people
became deeper and more emphatic. All parties felt that something must be done
to relieve the country in its extremity, and, at the same time, to repress the
rising of popular discontent. The source of the evil was traced to the luxury,
extravagance and malpractices of the hierarchy. The pope was held guilty of
enriching himself by the reversion of benefices; of accepting bribes for the
promotion of unlearned and unworthy men to the cure of souls, who never saw or
cared to see the flocks; of levying a subsidy from the whole English clergy for
the ransom of Frenchmen as the avowed enemies of the king; of making a gain
by the translation of bishops and other dignitaries within the realm; and of
appropriating to himself the first-fruits of all benefices. Lay patrons, taking
advantage of the simony and covetousness of the pope, were accused of selling
their benefices. The pope’s collector and receiver of his pence not only kept a
house in London with clubs and offices thereunto belonging, as if it had been one
of the king’s solemn courts, but annually transported to the papal see twenty or
more thousand marks. Cardinals and others retained at the court of Rome were
raised to the highest offices and dignities within the realm. On these grounds,
it was represented to Parliament that it would be good to renew all statutes
against provisors from Rome, since the pope reserved all the benefices of the
world for his own proper gift, and had, within one single year, created twelve
new cardinals, thus raising the number to thirty; while all of them, with two or
three exceptions, were the known enemies of the king. It was further suggested
that the provisors of the pope should be most strenuously resisted, and that no
papal collector or proctor should remain in England upon peril of life and limb,
and that no Englishman on the like pains should become such coRector or
proctor, or remain at the court of Rome.
After Wycliffe’s return from Bruges, he was presented by the king to the
living of Lutterworth, in Leicestershire. From this pulpit he began to preach
the glorious Gospel, and to strike the keynote of the Reformation. That pulpit,
which is composed of richly carved oak, still remains in a high state of preserva
tion. Twice during the year 1377 was Wycliffe summoned as a heretic—the first
time before Convocation at St. Paul’s Cathedral. The history of the Reformation
thus describes it: “ On the 19th February, 1377, an immense crowd, heated with
fanaticism, thronged the approaches to the church and filled its aisles, while the
citizens favourable to the reform remained concealed in their houses. Wycliffe
moved forward, preceded by Lord Percy, Marshal of England, and supported b
�the Duke of Lancaster, who defended him from purely political motives. He
was followed by four bachelors of divinity, his counsel, and passed through the
hostile multitude, who looked upon Lancaster as the enemy of their liberties, and
upon himself as the enemy of the church. ‘ Let not the sight of these
bishops make you shrink a hair’s breadth in your profession of faith, ’ said the
prince to the doctor, ‘they are unlearned; and as for this concourse of people,
fear nothing. We are here to defend you.’ When the reformer had crossed the
threshold of the Cathedral the crowd within appeared like a solid wall; and
notwithstanding the efforts of the Earl Marshal, Wycliffe and Lancaster could
not advance. The people swayed to and fro, hands were raised in violence, and
loud hootings re-echoed from the building.
“At length Percy made an opening in the dense multitude, and Wycliffe
passed on.”
The haughty Courtney, who had been commissioned by the Archbishop to
preside over the assembly, watched these strange movements with anxiety, and
beheld with displeasure the learned doctor accompanied by the two most powerful
men in England.
He said nothing to the Duke of Lancaster, who at that time administered
the kingdom, but turning towards Percy, observed sharply, “ If I had known,
my lord, that you claimed to be master in this church I would have taken
measures to prevent your entrance.”
Lancaster coldly rejoined, “ He shall keep such mastery here though you
say Nay.” Percy now turned to Wycliffe, who had remained standing, and
said, “Sit down and rest yourself.” At this Courtney gave way to his anger,
and exclaimed in a loud tone, ‘ ‘ He must not sit down; criminals stand before
their judges.” Lancaster, indignant that a learned doctor of England should
be refused a favour to which his age alone entitled him (for he was between
fifty and sixty) made answer to the Bishop, “My lord, you are very arrogant;
take care, or I may bring down your pride, and not yours only, but that of
all the prelacy of England.” “Do me all the harm you can,” was Courtney’s
haughty reply. The Prince rejoined with some emotion: “You are insolent, my
lord; you think, no doubt, you can trust on your family; but your relations will
have trouble enough to protect themselves.’ ’ To this the Bishop nobly replied,
“ My confidence is not in my parents, or in any man, but only in God, in whom
I trust, and by whose assistance I will be bold to speak the truth.” Lancaster,
who saw only hypocrisy in these words, turned to one of his attendants, and
whispered in his ear, but so loud as to be heard by the bystanders, “ I would
pluck the Bishop by the hair of his head out of his chair than take this at his
hands.” Lancaster had hardly uttered these words before the Bishop’s partisans
fell upon him and Percy, and even upon Wycliffe, who alone had remained calm.
The two noblemen resisted ; their friends and servants defended them. The
uproar became extreme, and there was no hope of restoring tranquility. The
two lords escaped with difficulty, and the vast assembly broke up in great
confusion. On the following day, the Earl Marshal having called upon Parlia
ment to apprehend the disturbers of the public peace, the clerical party, uniting
with the enemies of Lancaster, filled the streets with their clamour ; and while
the Duke and the Earl escaped by the Thames, the mob collected before Percy’s
house, broke down the doors, searched every chamber, and thrust their swords
into every dark corner. When they found that he had escaped, the rioters,
imagining that he was concealed in Lancaster’s palace, rushed to the Savoy, at
that time the most magnificent building in the kingdom. They killed a priest
who endeavoured to stay them, tore dowm the ducal arms, and hung them on the
gallows like those of a traitor. They would have gone still further if the
Bishop had not very opportunely reminded them that they were in Lent. As
for Wycliffe he was dismissed with an injunction against preaching his doctrines.
But this decision of the priests was not ratified by the people of England.
Public opinion declared in favour of Wycliffe. If he is guilty, said they, why is
he not punished ? If he is innocent, why is he ordered to be silent ? If he is
the weakest in power he is the strongest in truth !
The hostility of the prelates continued, but his political friends were far
stronger than his enemies; they therefore resolved that they would appeal to the
�L utterworth
Church .
�8
pope and see what could be done by the highest spiritual authority. Some have
thought that the chief movers in this matter were the mendicant monks, but
•history seems to prove that it rested altogether with the English bishops, who
collected a number of propositions which the Reformers had propounded either
in published writings or in lectures or disputes. They were nineteen in number,
coming under three heads. 1st. Concerning the rights of property and inherit
ance ; 2nd. Concerning Church property and its lawful secularisation; and
3rd. Concerning the power of Church discipline and its necessary limits. These
were all condemned, and no less than five Bulls were issued against Wycliffe in
one day. These Bulls, however, were not made public until some months after
their issue, in consequence of the illness and death of Edward III. Afterwards
such a policy of antagonism to Rome was expressed by the members of Parlia
ment who assembled under the new king, Richard II., that the enemies of Wyclifie
thought it would be more favourable to their cause to postpone all their measures
against him until after the prorogation of Parliament. The subject which was
chiefly being discussed by this assembly cannot be better shown than by an
extract of Wycliffe’s own opinion, drawn up at this time for the benefit of the
young, “Christ, the head of the Church, whose example should be followed
by all Christian priests, lived upon the alms of devout women. He hun
gered, thirsted, was a stranger, and suffered in many ways, not only in His
members but in Himself. As the Apostle testifies, ‘ He was made poor for your
sakes, that ye through His poverty might be enriched.’ Accordingly, when theChurch was first endowed, whoever among the clergy were then holders of any
temporal possessions held the same in the form of perpetual alms. This is evident
from histories and other sources; hence, St. Bernard, in his second book to the
Pope Eugenius, declares that no secular dominion could be challenged by him
on the ground of his office as the Vicar of St. Peter, and writes thus: ‘ It may
indeed be claimed by you, in virtue of some other plea, but assuredly by no right
or title derived from the Apostles; for how could an Apostle give unto you
that which he did not himself possess ? That care over the Church which he
really had, he gave you ; but when did he give you any worldly rule or lordship ?
Observe what he saith: “Not bearing rule as lords over God’s heritage, but
yielding yourselves as examples to the flesh.” And that ye may not think these
words spoken in a show of humility, and not in truth, mark the words of our Lord.
Himself in the Gospel : ‘ The kings of the nations have lordship over them,
but it shall not be so with you.’ Here lordly dominion is plainly forbidden to
the Apostles ; and wilt thou venture to usurp the same ? If a lord, then apostle
ship is lost; if an Apostle, thy lordship is no more ; for certainly the one or the
other must be relinquished. If both are sought, both must be lost. Or should’st
thou succeed, then judge thyself to be of that number respecting whom God so
greatly complains, saying, “They have reigned, but not through Me ; they have
become princes, but I have not known them.” “He who is greatest among you
shall be made as the least, and he who is the highest shall be your minister.’’ And
to illustrate this saying He set a child in the midst of His disciples. This, then,
is the true form and institution of Apostolic calling—lordship and rule are for
bidden; ministration and service are commended.’
“ From the words of a blessed man, whom the whole Church hath agreed tohonour, it appears that the pope hath no right to possess himself of the goods of
the Church, as though lie were lord over them, but that he is to be with respect
to them as a minister or a servant and a proctor for the poor. And would to
God that the same proud and eager desire of authority and lordship which is
now discovered by this seat of poiver were aught else than a declension, pre
paring the pathway of Antichrist! ’’
The following year the Reformer appeared before the pope’s commissioners
at the Archbishop’s palace at Lambeth. This time he had to present himself
alone, for the Duke of Lancaster, who had before appeared as his defender, was
no longer in a position to do so, and was therefore absent. Wycliffe bravely
defended himself, and was supported by the people on the one hand, who
created much disturbance during the time of the trial, and by Royalty on the
other, so that, altogether, the commissioners were powerless to proceed, and
just to save appearances they issued a prohibition against any future teaching,
either by lectures or sermons.
�9
Soon after this trial at Lambeth Palace, the enemies of Wycliffe themselves
furnished him with a powerful weapon with which to effect their downfall. The
deep corruption which existed in every part of the Romish Church could not
but force itself upon Wycliffe’s notice, and to contrast itself with the pure life
and teaching of Jesus and His Apostles. He soon decided that the Christian
Church, as it was still called, possessed a name to live, while it was in reality
dead; and the light which had gone out from it must by some means be re
kindled, as it soon was by the Reformer and his followers. The death of pope
Gregory, on March 27th, 1378, proved to be the beginning of great dissensions
in the Church, as the newly-elected pope, who took the title of Urban VI.,
disappointed the cardinals; being a man of firmness and stability of character
he soon shewed them that he would never be the mere instrument of their
pleasure’. At the end of July the cardinals met and declared the election of
Urban to have been illegal, whereupon they called upon him to renounce his
papal dignitaries, and proceeded to elect another pope, the Bishop of Cambray,
who took the title of Clement VII. Thus the Church was completely divided;
the English Church continued to adhere to Urban VI., on whose side Wycliffe’s
sympathies were at first centred; but he soon found so much in both to cal)
forth his condemnation, that he publicly declared them both to be false popes,
for, said he, ‘ ‘ They have nothing to do with the Church, as is plainly seen by
their actions; they are apostates and limbs of the devil, instead of being
members of the body of Christ.” As Wycliffe saw the growing corruption and
dissension in the false Church he set himself more strenuously to study the
doctrines of Holy Scripture, so that he might be able to proclaim the old, old
story to thirsty souls all over the land. Not only did he preach and teach in all
places himself, but he organised a band of itinerant preachers, men, who like
Wesley, were noted for the zeal of their cause, and for the purity of their lives;
and these men carried the truth from village to village, preaching either in a
building or by the wayside. They urged the people to live in the peace that
becometh the Gospel; they condemned the vice and hypocrisy of the priesthood,
and warned the people to avoid all intercourse with them. Of course, they soon
encountered the fierce hostility of the Church, who spread all sorts of slanders
about them, but in spite of all, this great mission started by Wycliffe flourished and
spread throughout the laud. This is a specimen of one of the great Reformer’s
own sermons, preached at Lutterworth parish church on a Christmas Day:—
“ On this day we may affirm that a child is bom to us, since Jesus according to
our belief, was this day born. Both in figure and in letter God spake of old to
this intent, that to us a child should be born, in whom we should have joy.
From this speech of Isaiah three short lessons should be delivered, that men may
rejoice in the after services of this child:—First: We hold it as part of our faith
that as our first parents had sinned, there must be atonement made for it
according to the righteousness of God. For as God is merciful, so He is full of
righteousness. But except He keep His righteousness on this point, how may He
judge all the world ? There is no sin done but what is against God, but this sin
was done directly against the Lord Almighty and all rightful. The greater also
the Lord is against whom whom any sin is done, the greater always is the sin—
just as to do against the king’s bidding is deemed the greatest of offences. But
the sin which is done against God’s bidding is greater without measure. God
then, according to our belief, bid Adam that he should not eat of the apple, yet
he broke God’s command. Nor was he excused therein by his own weakness,
by Eve, nor by the serpent. Hence, according to the righteousness of God,
this sin must be alway punished. It is to speak lightly to say that God might
of His own power forgive the sin, without the atonement that was made for it,
since the j ustice of God would not suffer this, which requires that every trespass
be punished either in earth or in hell. God may not accept a person to forgive
him his sin without an atonement, else He must give free license to sin both in
angels and men, and then sin were no sin, and our God were no god ! Such is
the first lesson we take as part of our faith. The second is that the person who
may make atonement for the sin of our first father must needs be God and man.
For as man’s nature trespassed, so must man’s nature render atonement. An
angel, therefore, would attempt in vain to make atonement for man, for he has
not the power to do it, nor was his the nature that here sinned. Since all men
�10
form one person, if any member of this person maketh atonement, the whole
person maketh it. But we may see that if God made a mhn of nought or strictly
anew, after the manner of Adam, yet he were bound to God after the extent
of his power for himself, having nothing wherewith to make atonement for his
own or Adam’s sin. Since then atonement must be made for the sin of Adam, as
we have shewn, the person to make the atonement must be God and man, for
then the worthiness of this person’s deeds, were even with the unworthiness of
the sin! ’ ’
One of the chief doctrines which Wycliffe attacked was that of transubstantiation, a doctrine which makes every priest a miracle worker; he proclaimed it to be
unscriptural both in the pulpit and in the lecture room, and also he wrote twelve
short “ theses,” in which he set forth the ground of his disbelief. This created
a considerable sensation, not only amongst the prelates, but also amongst the
students at Oxford, to whom he was then lecturing. A conference was called,
whose voice was unanimous that the opinions of Wycliffe were erroneous, and a
decree was issued prohibiting them from being taught. When the mandate
reached the Reformer, with its sentence of condemnation, he said to the
messengers: “ But you ought first to have shown me that I am in error.” He
also told them, that no one on earth could alter his convictions, and that he
should appeal to the king and his parliament. Lancaster immediately became
alarmed, and, hastening to his old friend, begged him, ordered him even, to
trouble himself no more about this matter. Attacked on every side, Wycliffe,
for a time, remained silent. Shall he sacrfiice the truth to save his reputation—
his repose—perhaps his life? Shall expediency get the better of faith—
Lancaster prevail over Wycliffe? No; his courage was invincible. Although
he was compelled to keep from preaching, he yet made good use of his pen on
this subject. About this time he wrote a very popular tract, entitled “The
Wicket.” The following is an extract from it: “ Christ hath revealed to us that
there are two ways—one leading to life, the other leading to death; the former
narrow, the latter broad. Let us, therefore, pray to God to strengthen us, by His
grace, in the spiritual life, that we may enter in through the straight gate, and
that He would defend us, in the hour of temptation. Temptation to depart from
God and fall into idolatry is already present, when men declare it to be heresy
to speak the Word of God to the people in English, and when they would press
upon us, instead of this, a false law, and a false faith—viz., a faith in the
consecrated host. This is of all faiths the falsest.
“ Since the year of our Lord 1000, all the doctorshave been in error about the
sacrament of the altar except, perhaps, it may be Berengarius. How canst thou,
O priest, who art but a man, make thy Maker ? What—the thing that groweth
in the fields; that ear which thou pluckest to-day shall be gods to morrow! . . .
As you cannot make the works which He made, how shall ye make Him who
made the works ? Woe to the adulterous generation that believeththe testimony
of Innocent rather than that of the Gospel!”
In 1381 an insurrection broke out amongst the peasants of the country,
headed by Wat Tyler. Goaded by the excessive taxation, and tried by the
severity of the tax-collectors, mobs gathered in the beginning of June and
marched up to London, where they killed all the magistrates, lawyers, and
jurymen that they could lay hands upon; destroyed many valuable documents,
and burnt the splendid palace of the Duke of Lancaster in the Savoy to ashes,
and they seized the Primate and several other officers of state, and condemned
them to be executed as traitors. The poor king was so stricken, that he seemed
at first powerless to resist them, till at last the brave mayor of London, William
Walworth, of Smithfield, laid hold of Tyler just when he was approaching the
king, and sent him off to prison, whereupon some of the king’s knights took
him and killed him. From that time courage seemed to rise in the hearts
of the soldiers, and in a short time quiet was again restored throughout the land.
This insurrection was laid to poor Wycliffe’s charge ; but, of course, it is not
at all likely that he had anything to do with it, for the Duke of Lancaster, against
whom the mob was so bitter, was his chief friend; and, besides, they had
determined to destroy all the priests in the land, excepting the “ mendicant” or
‘ ‘ begging friars, ’ ’ against whom Wycliffe was most severe. Inl380Wy cliffe pub lished his tract, entitled “ Objections to Friars,” wherein he charges them with
�11
heresy and error. The course of his argument run thus: ‘ ‘ There cometh no pardon
but of God. The worst abuses of these friars consist in their pretended confessions,
by means of which they affect, with numberless artifices of blasphemy, to purify
those whom they confess, and make them clean from all pollution in the
eyes of God; setting aside the commandments and satisfaction of our Lord
There is no greater heresy than for a man to believe that he is absolved
from his sins, if he give money, or if a priest lay his hands on his head and
say that he absolveth thee ; for thou must be sorrowful in thy heart and make
amends to God, else God absolveth thee not. Many think if they give a penny
to a pardonner they shall be forgiven the breaking of all the commandments of
God, and therefore they take no heed how they keep them. But I say this for
certain: though thou have priests and friars to sing for thee, and though thou each
day hear many masses, and found churches and colleges, and go on pilgrimages all
thy life, and give all thy goods to pardonners, this will not bring thy soul to heaven.
May God of His endless mercy destroy the pride, covetuousness, hypocrisy and
heresy of this famed pardoning, and make men busy to keep TTis commandments
and set fully thy trust in Jesus Christ.
“The friars being cause, beginning, and maintaining of perturbation in
Christendom, and of all evil in this world, these errors shall never be amended,
till friars be brought to freedom of the Gospel and clean religion of Jesus
Christ.”
Wycliffe’s opposition to the friars increased with increasing years, and great
was their joy when in the year 1379 he fell dangerously ill. The four regents
who represented the four religious orders, accompanied by four Aidermen,
visited him. They said “ You have death on your lips, be touched by your faults
and retract in our presence all that you have said to our injury.”
Begging his servant to raise him on his couch, and turning towards the
friars, he opened his livid lips and fixed on them a piercing look, saying with
emphasis, ‘ ‘ I shall not die, but live, and again declare the evil deeds of the
friars.”
It seemed to be rather an unfortunate thing for Wycliffe that immediately
after the insurrection of Wat Tyler and his followers, Courtney was made
primate in the room of Sudbury, who had been beheaded in the tower by the
mob. Courtney was one of Wycliffe’s worst enemies, having before instituted
proceedings against him. Since that time, however, the influence of the
Reformer had spread and strengthened, and he had become bolder to resist
the persecution of his enemies. The primate believed that Wycliffe had
been in some way concerned in the insurrection, he therefore considered
it to be his duty to summon him to answer for his doctrine, with a view
of condemning the same. He therefore convened an assembly of men who
were known to be faithful to the pope, to examine these doctrines, and pronounce
judgment. The meeting was held in the Hall of the Dominican Monastery at
Blackfriars, in May, 1382. Just as it had commenced there was a dreadful earth
quake, which shook the foundations of the City of London, and at which the
people were so frightened that they wished at once to dismiss the charge, but
Courtney declared that it was but the favour of God upon their proceedings.
There is not much recorded of the transactions of this Conference, but it is stated
that one of the Archbishop’s officers read ten propositions, said to be Wycliffe’s,
but ascribing to him certain errors of which he was quite innocent. It was
now determined that if all Mho held heretical opinions did not recant they
should be crushed by the law. The Chancellor of the kingdom represented to the
House of Lords that it was a well-known fact that different ill-disposed persons
were going through the realm, from county to county and town to town, in a
well-known dress, and under the aspect of great holiness, even preaching from
day to day without authority from the proper ordinary, or credentials from any
other quarter, not only in churches and churchyards, but also in market places
and other public thoroughfares, where much people were wont to resort.
Their sermons were full of heresies and manifold errors, to the great injury
of the Church and the faith, and to the great spiritual peril of the people and of
the whole realm. “ These men preach also things of a calumnious kind in order
to sow strife and division between different classes, both spiritual and secular,
and they influence the minds of the people to the great danger of the whole
�12
t
kingdom. If these preachers are summoned by the bishops for examination,
they pay no regard to their commands, do not trouble themselves in the least
about their admonitions and the censures of the Holy Church, but rather testify
their undisguised contempt for them. They know besides how to draw the
people by their fine words to listen to their sermons, and they hold them fast in
their errors by a strong hand, and by means of imposing crowds.” It was, there
fore, he urged, indisputably necessary that the State should lend the assistanceof its own to bring to punishment these itinerant preachers as a common danger
to the country. The Lords consented to the motion. Not so, however, the
Commons. Indeed, it is supposed that it was never introduced to them. Yet,
although without the consent of the Commons it could not become law, it was
placed on the statute-book in May, 1382. Wycliffe had eyes sharp enough to
detect this irregularity, and so in the same month he addressed a memorial to
the Commons defending his teaching. The result was that the Commons pleaded
with the king to annul the statute, and he granted tlieir request. Courtney was
so enraged at this proceeding that he summoned Wycliffe once again to appear
at Oxford. Forty years ago the Reformer had come up to the University. Oxford
had become his home, and now it was turning against him! Weakened by labours,
by trials, by that ardent soul which preyed upon his feeble body, he might have
refused to appear. But Wycliffe, who never feared the face of man, came before
his enemies with a good conscience. We may conjecture that there were amongst
the crowd some disciples who felt their hearts burn at the sight of their master
and his persecution ; but no outward sign indicated their emotion. The solemn
silence of a court of justice had succeeded the shouts of enthusiastic youths.
Yet Wyclife did not despair. He raised his venerable head and turned to
Courtney with that confident look which had made the regents of Oxford to
shrink away. Growing wroth against the priests of Baal, he reproached them
with disseminating error in order to sell their masses. Then he stopped and
uttered these simple but energetic words: “ The truth shall prevail! ” Havingthus spoken he prepared to leave the court. His enemies dared not say a word,
and, like his Divine Master at Nazareth, he passed through the midst of them,
and no man ventured to stop him.
The prelate, even after this, continued to complain to the king; and
Richard, alarmed somewhat by the representations made to him, gave full power
to the primate to imprison all who preached the condemned doctrine, and not to
release them till they recanted and gave full proof of repentance. So earnest
and zealous were the bishops in their endeavours to extirpate the followers of
' Wycliffe that iu less than six months there was not one voice in his favour to be
heard in Oxford; but in spite of the desertion of his friends the Reformer
stood firm.
For two years previous to his death Wycliffe enjoyed something like repose,
while labouring as pastor in Lutterworth village. His health, however, failed so
much (having been seized by a paralytic stroke from which he only partially
recovered) that he was obliged to engage an assistant, named John Horn. He
also secured the services of a faithful attendant in the person of John Puvey, who
was to him a real bosom friend, and helped him considerably in the translation
of the Bible.
It may also be assured, with some degree of probability, that duringthese years, the preaching itinerancy, although menaced by the measures of the
bishops, was still carried on, though in diminished proportions and with some
degree of caution; and so long as Wycliffe lived, Lutterworth continued to be
the centre of this evangelical mission. But the narrower the limits became
within which the itinerancy could be worked, the more zealously did Wycliffe
apply himself to the task of instructing the people by means of short and simple
trac ts in the English tongue. The largest number of the tracts which have come
down to us belong to this period, and of these there are at least fifty.
Setting aside translations of portions of Scripture, these tracts may be
divided into two chief groups ; the one consists of explanation of single heads of
catechism ; the other, discussions of the doctrines of the Church. The latter, for
the most part, have a polemical character, while the former are of a more positive
form, didactic and edifying. Some treat of the ten commandments ; of works ofv
mercy; of the seven mortal sins; several discuss the duties belonging to the
�13
different stations and relations of life, while other treats of prayer, and explain the
Paternoster and Ave Maria. There are also tracts on the Lord’s Supper and
the confession and absolution. Some defend the itinerant preachers, others set
forth the function of preaching, the nature of pastoral work, and the life and
conversation which should characterise the priesthood.
There can be little doubt that although these last years were spent almost
without interruption, the wrath of his enemies still raged, and they still longed to
devise him some hurt. It has been said by some that about this time pope Urban
summoned him to Rome to answer for his heresies, and he openly refused so to
do; but there seems no foundation whatever for the statement, and one of
Wycliffe’s latest biographers says: “ This alleged citation to Rome must be rele
gated to the category of groundless tradition.” Two years subsequently to the
paralytic stroke before mentioned, on the 28th December, 1384, he received a
second one, from which he never rallied; in fact he never spoke again, but died
on the following Saturday.
The speech of one of his enemies after his death proves to us very forcibly
that their wrath against him was as warm as ever. It was this: “On the Feast
of St. Thomas of Canterbury, John Wycliffe—that organ of the devil; that
•enemy of the Church; that author of confusion to the common people ; that idol
of heretics ; that image of hypocrites; that restorer of schism; that storehouse of
Res; that sink of flattery—being smitten by the horrible judgment of God,was
struck with palsy, and continued to live in that condition until Saint Sylvester’s
day, on which he breathed out his malicious spirit into the abodes of darkness.”
Also in 1415, more than thirty years after his death, the Council of Constance
issued a decree. “ His body and bones, if they might be discovered, and known
■from the bodies of other faithful people, should be taken from the ground and
thrown away from the burial of any church, according to the canon laws and
decrees. Thirteen years after this order his body was ruthlessly disinterred, the
bones burnt, and then the ashes cast away into the river. 0 Christian England,
what a blot upon thy name and memory !
The preaching of Wycliffe deserves a word of thoughtful commendation.
Seeing as he did how the preaching friars deceived the people and misled them
on the most momentous of all subjects, he endeavoured yet the more earnestly
to expound to them the truth as it is revealed. Those of his sermons which have
been preserved are either in Latin or English. It is evident from th^style and
substance of the teaching contained in them, that the Latin discourses were
preached in the University. His English sermons are very remarkable ; free from
anything like set phraseology, they are clear and plain, yet withal fresh and
vitalising in their power. Many of them no doubt were preached at Lutterworth,
and many to the crowds of common people elsewhere, who assembled to hear
him whenever ■rportunity occurred. His preaching was eminently scriptural;
he endeavoured rnshow the harmony of different parts of scripture, while com
paring one part with another; and yet he did not fail toj^eat upon the wrongs
of the age, which were immediately connected with the religion in his day.
Some have complained that in his sermons he does not make the Gospel of the
atonement sufficiently plain, but we must remember that he had not the
advantages of the light that our modern preachers possess, but was, as it were,
just groping his way out of the darkness. His powers of illustration were great,
and he often showed a vein of humour, or even of sarcasm, in his pulpit teaching,
as when speaking of the begging friars he says: “They are like the tortoises,
which quickly find their way, one close after the other, through the whole
country. They penetrate every house into the most secret chambers like the
lapdogs of women of rank.” His preaching must have exerted a very powerful
influence everywhere; he preached occasionally in London, besides his regular
ministrations at Lutterworth, Oxford, and elsewhere. He shines not only as a
preacher, but as a pastor; he was a man of deep sympathy, and was ever found
when needed in the humblest cottage or the house of mourning, and proclaiming
alike to the prince and the peasant, the living and the dying, that which he had
taught from the pulpit. Speaking from “ The seed is the word of God,” he says
■“ 0 marvellous power of the Divine seed, which overpowers strong men, softens
hard hearts, and renews and changes into divine, men who had been brutalised
• by sins, and had departed from God! Such a change as this could never be
�14
•wrought by the word of the priest, if the Spirit of Life, and the Eternal Word
did not above all things else work with it.”
With the love and the power of preaching so deeply imbued within him, he
not only preached himself but he also sent forth other preachers—“poor
priests,’’ or, as we should call them in our day, “evangelists,” whose sole
business it was to go up and down over the country proclaiming the glad tidings
of salvation wherever and whenever they could gain an audience. Doctor Robert
Vaughan thus describes them : “ These ‘ poor priests,’ these sturdy, free-spoken
and popular Methodists of the fourteenth century, are here travelling before us,
from county to county, from town to town, and from village to village, bare
footed, staff in hand, the visible personation of the toilsome, the generous, the
noblehearted.” In churches or churchyards, in markets or fairs, before gentle or
simple, pious or profligate—wherever men or women are gathered together, or
may be gathered, there the itinerant instructor of this school finds his preaching
place, and discourses boldly on the difference between the religion of the Bible,
with its appeal to every man’s reason and conscience, and the superstitions of
the priests, which have nothing to sustain them, save that hollow mockery called
the supersition of the Church. Prelates and abbots, mendicants and monks,
rectors and curates, became wrathful; but the people are not wrathful. Almost
to a man they attest that the stranger is in the right, and that harm shall not
be done to him. Knighton mentions a number of persons of some figure who
openly favoured the new preachers; such as Sir Thomas Latimer, Sir John Perke,
Sir Richard Story, and Sir John Hilton. It was the manner of these distin
guished persons, as the historian informs us, when a preacher of the Wycliffe
order came into their neighbourhood, to give notice to all their neighbours of
time and place, and to draw a vast audience together. Even beyond this did
they proceed; for you might see them standing round the pulpit of the preacher
armed and prepared to defend him from assault with their good swords if it should
be needed. Knighton, who complains of their mode of proceeding as being rather
Mahomedan than Christian in its spirit, is nevertheless obliged to give these
Lollard or Puritan knights the credit of being governed by a “zeal for God, but
not according to knowledge. The advent of the preacher is the signal for the
interference of the magistrate, and an officer is sent to warn him of his danger
and order him to depart. The local official, not daring to go further, serves his
writ upon the disorderly stranger, requiring him to appear before his ordinary;
but the stranger is speedily elsewhere, and at his wonted labour.
“Proud churchmen thunder their anathemas against him; to him it is an
empty sound. The soul under that coarse garb, and which plays from beneath
that weather-worn countenance, is an emancipated soul; not so much the image
of the age in which we find it, as the prophecy of an age to come ; to come only
after a long, a dark, and a troubled interval shall have passed away.”
Wycliffe entertained the idea that nothing ought to come between the people
and the Word of God; he therefore undertook the grand work of translating the
whole of the Bible into the English tongue, first the New Testament and subse
quently the Old also. ‘ ‘ The interest taken in the man and in his work enlisted a
hundred expert hands, who, though they toiled to multiply copies, could scarcely
supply the many who were eager to buy. Some ordered complete copies to be
made for them, others were content with portions; the same copies served several
families in many instances, and in a very short time Wycliffe’s English Bible
had obtained a wide circulation, and brought a new life into many an English
home.” The following is a specimen of Wyclifie’s Bible in old English:—
“ Biholde ye the foulis of the eir, for thei sowen not nether ripen, nether
gaderen into bemes: and your Fadir of hevene fedith hem, wher ye ben not
more worthi thanne thei ? but who of you thenking mai putte to hys stature o
cubit ? and of clothinge whar ben ye bisie ? biholde ye the lilies of the feld how
thei wexen, thei travelen not, nether spynnen, and I seye to you that Salomon in
al his glorie was not kenerid as one of thes, and if God clothith thus the heye
of the feeld, that to dai is and to morewe is cast in to an ovene, how myche more
you of litel feith.”
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X
�The Worship of Humanity.
349
origin of their union. None can be more alive than ourselves to
the vast amount of misery which theological beliefs have inflicted
on mankind, but the wars which they have originated, and the
frightful tortures and cold-blooded murders which they have
prompted and sanctioned, were not due to the existence of these
beliefs simply as such, but to the egotism of their expounders, who,
not distinguishing between the spheres of knowledge and specula
tion, between truth and opinions, delivered their own dicta as
infallible.
M. Comte claims for the worship of Humanity the superiority
of reality, and affirms that the creed of the Theist is mere an
thropomorphism, and that he is but the worshipper of his own
ideas. We accept the statement, but not the conclusion in
tended to. be conveyed in it. The Positivist worships human
beings as he knows them either in life or in history ; or, he wor
ships them after subtracting their faults and weaknesses, and
idealizing their virtues. In the one case his worship, being of
frail creatures like himself, can neither prompt him to noble
deeds nor exert a hallowing influence on his life ; in the other,
his claim for the superiority of reality is annulled; while,
however, he may idealize his objects, they must ever remain
associated with the limitations of humanity, and consequently
he is not only a worshipper of his own ideas, but of his own ideas
after they are shorn of those majestic proportions which, if
unrestrained, they would instinctively and unconsciously assume,
while aspiring to realize even the feeblest conception of the
SouYce of all being.
Since the mysterious and incomprehensible perfection of the
Divine attributes transcends the possible perfection of humanity
as immeasurably as the infinite exceeds the finite, there is a
sphere for endless progress in our contemplations and concep
tions of those attributes, and for the consequent reaction of those
conceptions, which, in the sphere of morals, are at once the
power which moulds, the spirit which inspires, and we hope
and believe will become more and more the influence which
hallows both our personal and national existence. Here we see
the imperative reason for giving the largest scope and most
unrestrained activity to our intellectual faculties when aspiring
to conceive of the Divine Nature—appending only one condition,
viz., an abiding consciousness and recognition of the barrier
which divides the regions of imagination from those of knowledge.
This alone is the insuperable safeguard against spiritual usurpa
tion, the solvent of all thought which would otherwise petrifv
into dead immoveable institutions, and the lasting guarantee
of spiritual advancement.
The contemplations and conceptions of the Positivist who
�350
Recollections of Shelley and Byron.
worships his kind are bounded, as we have said, by the limita
tions which he knows are incident to humanity; idealize as he
may, he can never free himself of the belief that no perfect man
or woman has ever trod this planet. How, then, is it possible
that any one but the ignorant and unreflective can ever feel the
glow of genuine devotion when he bows himself to a being whose
nature he knows to have been but a fragmentary representative of
the ideal of man, or when he worships his best conception of this
ideal itself knowing it to be an idol of his own creation ? These
fatal weaknesses of Positivism have no application to the Theist:
the fervour of his adoration is deadened by no secret conscious
ness that the object of his worship is marred with imperfection;
for however great and glorious may be the attributes he ascribes
to it, he feels assured that they are infinitely surpassed by the
Reality itself.
Art. II.—Recollections of Shelley
and
Recollections of the Last Days of Shelley and Byron.
Trelawny. London: Edward Moxon. 1858.
Byron.
By E. J.
R. TRELAWNY has done well in giving this manly and
carelessly written little volume to the world: it will at least
revive the personal memory of two Englishmen who, though long
dead, can never be altogether of the past. Without telling much
of either with which we were not previously acquainted, the infor
mation communicated is the result of intimate personal know
ledge, and, gathered during the intervals of a familiar acquaint
ance, comes out with such freshness and vigour, that it possesses
nearly all the merit of novelty; and the striking features of cha
racter are brought forward in much stronger relief, than in the
tame and wearisome biography of whioh one at least was the
victim. It is the least enviable appanage of genius that it perpe
tuates by its own lustre those faults and weaknesses which repose
in the graves of meaner men; the biographer, even though a
friend, cannot ignore these; and while he avoids giving them
undue prominence, cannot forget that truth has its claims, as well
as genius.
We recognise Shelley in these sketches as he appeared in his
works—the gentle, guileless, noble soul who persisted in putting
himself wrong with the world, and who rashly and fearlessly
launched his indignant sarcasm at the cant and bigotry and sei-
M
�
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Description
An account of the resource
A collection of digitised nineteenth-century pamphlets from Conway Hall Library & Archives. This includes the Conway Tracts, Moncure Conway's personal pamphlet library; the Morris Tracts, donated to the library by Miss Morris in 1904; the National Secular Society's pamphlet library and others. The Conway Tracts were bound with additional ephemera, such as lecture programmes and handwritten notes.<br /><br />Please note that these digitised pamphlets have been edited to maximise the accuracy of the OCR, ensuring they are text searchable. If you would like to view un-edited, full-colour versions of any of our pamphlets, please email librarian@conwayhall.org.uk.<br /><br /><span><img src="http://www.heritagefund.org.uk/sites/default/files/media/attachments/TNLHLF_Colour_Logo_English_RGB_0_0.jpg" width="238" height="91" alt="TNLHLF_Colour_Logo_English_RGB_0_0.jpg" /></span>
Creator
An entity primarily responsible for making the resource
Conway Hall Library & Archives
Date
A point or period of time associated with an event in the lifecycle of the resource
2018
Publisher
An entity responsible for making the resource available
Conway Hall Ethical Society
Text
A resource consisting primarily of words for reading. Examples include books, letters, dissertations, poems, newspapers, articles, archives of mailing lists. Note that facsimiles or images of texts are still of the genre Text.
Original Format
The type of object, such as painting, sculpture, paper, photo, and additional data
Pamphlet
Dublin Core
The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/.
Title
A name given to the resource
John Wycliffe the bold, or, England's first reformer
Creator
An entity primarily responsible for making the resource
Ellis, J. R.
Description
An account of the resource
Place of publication: London
Collation: 14 p. : ill. (front. port.) ; 21 cm.
Notes: From the library of Dr Moncure Conway.
Publisher
An entity responsible for making the resource available
S.W. Partridge & Co.
Date
A point or period of time associated with an event in the lifecycle of the resource
[n.d.]
Identifier
An unambiguous reference to the resource within a given context
CT41
Subject
The topic of the resource
John Wycliffe
Lollards
Rights
Information about rights held in and over the resource
<a href="http://creativecommons.org/publicdomain/mark/1.0/"><img src="http://i.creativecommons.org/p/mark/1.0/88x31.png" alt="Public Domain Mark" /></a><span> </span><br /><span>This work (John Wycliffe the bold, or, England's first reformer), identified by </span><a href="https://conwayhallcollections.omeka.net/items/show/www.conwayhall.org.uk"><span>Humanist Library and Archives</span></a><span>, is free of known copyright restrictions.</span>
Format
The file format, physical medium, or dimensions of the resource
application/pdf
Type
The nature or genre of the resource
Text
Language
A language of the resource
English
Conway Tracts
John Wycliffe
Religion