CHAPTER VI. NUMBER OF WYCLIFFE'S DISCIPLES.—THE LOLLARDS CONSISTED OF TWO 66 СНАР. Wycliffe's THE existence of such literature as we have VI. seen to be connected with the names of Longland Number of and Chaucer, suggests some important concludisciples. sions as to the state of society during their time. If we consider the supply as at all regulated by the demand, it follows, that, among our ancestors of the fourteenth century, the friends to ecclesiastical reform constituted a formidable body, both in numbers and intelligence. These, however, as in the case of the writers above named, were not always to be viewed as receiving the entire docThey con- trine of Wycliffe. If by the term Lollard, be meant, not only those who had embraced every important principle avowed by our reformer, but those also, who without proceeding to such lengths, were known to echo many of his complaints, we may, perhaps, safely conclude with Knighton, that in the year 1382 every second man in the kingdom was of that sect.' At such a moment, to sisted of two classes. 1 De Eventibus Angliæ, ad Ann. 1 VI. adopt any part of the language distinguishing CHAP. the disciples of Wycliffe, would be to incur the reproach of having adopted the most obnoxious of his tenets. Hence it sometimes happened, that the men who were loud in their censures of some branches of papal and prelatical encroachment, were equally loud in their censures of certain doctrines, as those maintained by the rector of Lutterworth. To persons who were concerned to obtain the praise of being wise and moderate men, there remained scarcely any other mode of placing their orthodoxy beyond suspicion, and in many cases even this was insufficient. John of ton. Among the more decided adherents, both to Notice of the political and the religious creed of our re- Northampformer, a place should be assigned to John of Northampton. This opulent citizen is described by Walsingham as a Lollard. While mayor of London, in 1382, he braved the displeasure of the clergy, by invading the province of their spiritual courts. Those improved notions of government, which in every state had been found to keep pace with the progress of its cities and its commerce, were eagerly embraced by the inhabitants of the English metropolis. A new power had arisen in the community, and one, the strength of which the elder authorities were obliged to feel once and again, before they could learn to credit its existence. The baronial castle was ceasing to be the only place of authority, and every gradation of modern society was beginning to appear. This is evident from the measures of John of Northampton, and from that state of popular feeling, in the absence of which, to have entertained his plans VI. CHAP. for a moment, would have been a weakness foreign to his character. He not only complained of neglect on the part of the clergy, considered as the appointed guardians of the public morals; but accused them of a covetousness, which had frequently led them to compound with the most notorious offenders; affirming, at the same time, that unless some wholesome severities were resorted to, the dissolute practices which became daily more prevalent through the city, must be expected to bring the displeasure of Heaven upon its inhabitants, and upon the nation. Accordingly, as chief magistrate of the capital, he seized on some of the more vicious persons of both sexes, and depriving them of their hair, ordered them to be led in procession through the streets, as in cases of theft. The bishop and his dependants stormed at this intrusion on the sphere of their acknowledged jurisdiction: but their wrath was fruitless. In the following year, Northampton was reelected, and through both periods of office, failed not to render himself the terror of the licentious, in a licentious age. He was aware of being supported by the more reputable of his fellow citizens; and their joint conduct is described by Walsingham, as the effect of that spirit of insolence, presumption, and heresy, which had long characterized the Londoners, and scattered its infection over other cities.2 Prospects of the reform It is mostly from expressions thus loose, and ers at this general, that we have to infer the state of the protestant doctrine in our cities before the ac crisis. 2 Walsingham, Hist. 1382. Knighton, ad Ann. Stowe's Survey of London. Godwin's Chaucer, c. xlix. VI. cession of the house of Lancaster. We know, CHAP. indeed, that the doctrines of the reformation were more or less known to all classes; and that while various opinions were very naturally entertained, as to the extent in which the proposed change was desirable, the majority of the nation would, probably, have acquiesced in a revolution quite as matured as that accomplished by Henry the eighth, rather than submit to a continuance of the evils which all parties had so often professed to deprecate. Nor is it, perhaps, too much to assert, that a prince capable of securing the attachment of the people might, at this crisis, have put the strength of the papal power at defiance, and have controlled the national priesthood at pleasure. They were but few, indeed, among the clergy, who had hitherto betrayed a disposition favourable to the opinions of Wycliffe. But unsup ported by the majority of the nation, and certainly by its intelligence, as in the supposed case they would speedily have been, we may presume that the firmness of most of them would soon have yielded to the current. Such, at least, has been the pliancy of the same order of men in later times. The ease with which the proudest members of the hierarchy were humbled by Edward the first, and that while scarcely a ray of the light of the reformation illumined the darkness, and before the papacy had suffered any material diminution of its power, is a fact, among many, conferring no little plausibility on this opinion. Oxford was the centre from which the sentiments of Wycliffe had emanated to the different quarters of the kingdom; and though the court, and the Previous CHAP. hierarchy, were after a while united in the effort VI. to exclude his doctrine from that seminary, it was only with a partial measure of success. to the reformer's exclusion from that university, the majority of the students appear to have been prepared for the adoption of a more scriptural creed; and favoured, in this respect, by the national authorities, or even left to themselves, they would ere long have given a strictly protestant character to that important establishment. The study of the ancient classics, was indeed revived considerably toward the opening of the sixteenth century; but it may be safely credited, that the capacity of judging on the questions of legislation, and religion, evinced by the educated classes, and by a large portion of the people in this country before the death of Richard the second, was far from being regained when the English sceptre passed into the hands of Henry the eighth. The interval which preceded that event, was one of some hopeful changes on the continent, but in this kingdom it was a time of fearful declension; and had not the seed time under Edward the third, and his successor, been so devoutly improved, the return of more auspicious influences from above, would not so suddenly have ripened the surface into fruitfulness and harvest. Testimony of Knighton the number ter of The language of Knighton, with respect to the respecting number of Wycliffe's disciples, is somewhat more and charac- definite than that of Walsingham. It is that also Wycliffe's of a contemporary, and though to be admitted with caution, is too important to be passed over. In the year 1382, he states that "their number disciples. |