opinions on this subject did not prevent him from holding preferment himself, and therefore we may conclude that he did not object to others enjoying the revenues of the Church, provided they administered them faithfully according to the intentions of the donors. Nevertheless, the manner in which he called for reform, in cases where there was evident abuse, lays him open to the charge of being a patron of revolutionary schemes of plunder, which he perhaps never seriously contemplated. Similar observations may be made with respect to his views of the episcopal office. The bishops of his time, many of them, deserved ample censure for their immorality and unworthy conduct; and yet it did not follow that his conclusion was correct, that no-bishop living in mortal sin was to be considered a bishop at all.1 The whole machinery of cardinals, patriarchs, archbishops, bishops, and other Church officers, he considered cumbrous, and intended to promote what he called "Cæsarean pomp," rather than the edification of the Church. Such a view, however, afforded no justification for the notions that episcopacy was not a primitive institution, that the necessity of obtaining the bishop's license for preaching within a diocese was a hinderance to the lawful exercise of the priest's functions, and that the reservation of the office of confirmation to bishops alone was a delusion, imposed for the purpose of unduly advancing the importance and dignity of the episcopal order.2

In these opinions, as in his stern denunciation of Church music, and other matters, he appears before us in the character of a prototype of the Puritan opponents of the Church of England in the days of Elizabeth; and it has been observed, with an appearance of truth, that had Wycliffe been permitted to remodel the Church according to his views, he would, in all probability, have anticipated the labours of

Le Bas. p. 269.

* Lewis, pp. 155. 157.167.

Calvin, and the English Reformation would have assumed the character of the Protestantism of Geneva.1

On the other hand, while he protested strongly against some of the erroneous doctrines and practices of the Church of Rome, as the intercession of saints, auricular confession, indulgences, the compulsory celibacy of the clergy, and the abuse of excommunications, there were others which he unquestionably maintained. Among these may be reckoned a qualified recognition of the supremacy of the Pope, as "Christ's highest vicar upon earth." Perhaps, however, we should not attach much importance to what was rather a respect for the abstract idea of a Pope, than any thing else, since it did not prevent him from denouncing the actual Pope, as "the worldly priest of Rome, the most accursed of cutpurses, the evil manslayer, and burner of the servants of Christ."3 He certainly retained the article of Purgatory in his creed; he allowed masses and prayers for the dead (with a protest against the abuse of them for purposes of covetousness), and also a qualified use of images. He also acknowledged seven sacraments, though he probably did not attribute the same sense to the term which is given in our formularies, while in the ordinance of penance he distinctly denied to the priest any but a purely ministerial function.4

There are two points of doctrine with respect to which Wycliffe has been censured by Melancthon and other Protestant writers as unsound, or at least defective, viz., the sacrament of the Lord's Supper, and justification by faith.5 With respect to the former of these subjects we have already observed, that his language is obscure and confused, and therefore, perhaps, open to suspicion. On the other hand, it

Le Bas, p. 274.

Lewis, pp. 163. 168-171. 173.; Vaughan, vol. ii. pp. 317-321. 331. 3 Le Bas, p. 248.

Vaughan, vol. ii. pp. 321-325.; Lewis, pp. 165. 168. 175.

5 Lewis, p. 140.; Milner's Church History, cent. xiv. chap. 3.

seems clear that he denied all change in the nature of the elements, and in particular refuted the sophistical distinctions of the friars upon the subject; although he did believe that some change took place by consecration, which warrants us in saying that Christ's body is really present in the Holy Eucharist, but in a spiritual and sacramental manner.1

The charge, with respect to unsoundness upon the doctrine of justification, seems to rest upon no other ground than this, that he did not, like the Reformers of the 16th century, make that doctrine the test of a standing or falling Church. It is not easy to see how such a charge can be fairly maintained against one who taught "that the merit of Christ was of itself sufficient to redeem every man from hell, and that faith in Him was sufficient for our salvation;" and who led men “to trust wholly to Christ, to rely altogether upon His sufferings, and not to seek to be justified in any other way than by His righteousness."

"2

Wycliffe's great glory, and what entitles him to the lasting respect and gratitude of every Englishman who loves his Bible, was this, that he asserted the supremacy of the Holy Scripture, as an authority paramount to every other, whether derived from the dogmatic decisions of Popes and councils, or the traditions of the Fathers; and that he claimed for all Christian people, as an inalienable right, that they should have free access to those oracles, which were able to make them wise unto salvation, and on the right use of which their salvation depended.3 These principles were, indeed, suppressed for a while, and their professors subjected to a cruel and exterminating persecution. Nevertheless, it was God's will that in His good time they should prevail in England, so as to afford a new accomplishment of the prophetic pro

Le Bas, p. 259.

2 Le Bas, p. 238.; Milner, ibid.

Vaughan, vol. ii. pp. 346-351.

mise, "As the rain cometh down, and the snow from heaven, and returneth not thither, but watereth the earth, and maketh it bring forth and bud, that it may give seed to the sower and bread to the eater; so shall my word be that goeth forth out of my mouth: it shall not return unto me void, but it shall accomplish that which I please, and it shall prosper in the thing whereto I sent it "1

1 Is. lv. 10, 11.

CHAP. XX.

THE ENGLISH CHURCH FROM THE DEATH OF WYCLIFFE TO THE END OF HENRY VII.'S REIGN.

ALTHOUGH Wycliffe had been permitted to die in peace in his own parish, a spirit of persecution was roused in England after his death, which raged with the utmost fury against his "poor priests" and their followers, and the ecclesiastical records of the succeeding century are chiefly occupied with the sufferings of the Lollards. Nor was the malignant spirit which unhappily actuated the supporters of the corruptions of the Church, contented with racking and imprisoning the bodies of Wycliffe's followers; it prompted them to violate the sanctuary of the tomb, and to disturb the remains of the great Reformer from what ought to have been their final resting-place.

It appears that his writings and opinions were extensively circulated in Bohemia, chiefly, as it is supposed, by means of the attendants of Richard II.'s Queen Anne, who was a Bohemian princess. The extent and magnitude of the influence ascribed to his works may be estimated by the fact that Subinco Lupus, bishop of Prague, is reported to have consigned 200 of them to the flames for the purpose of extirpating heresy. The admiration in which they were held by the Bohemian Reformers, Huss and Jerome of Prague, naturally provoked the vengeance of the Council of Constance, which persecuted those Reformers to the death. Accordingly, this Council, which met in 1414, thirty years after Wycliffe's death, selected forty-five articles from his writings which it declared heretical, and then, after solemnly