withstanding this, as historic monuments these early versions are of the highest importance, illustrating as they do the English language in its Saxon origin. They further show that the evangelical idea prevailed, which sought to have the Holy Scriptures in the language of the people. Indeed, this was the only thought of the Christian Church until the beginning of the thirteenth century, when it became a distinctive Protestant idea, in opposition to the Roman Catholic decree of the Council of Thoulouse-a decree which required little or no authority to enforce, on account of the intellectual darkness of the people. But from the latter half of the fourteenth century, the translation of the whole Bible and the reading of the same, became living questions. For already there had begun an intellectual awakening: Edward the Third reigned, Mandeville traveled, and Chaucer wrote. In a word, the way was prepared for the Protestant labors of John Wycliffe, the sworn enemy of priestcraft, the translator of the Bible, and the forerunner of the Reformation of the sixteenth century. CHAPTER II. WYCLIFFE AND THE WYCLIFFITE VERSIONS. OHN WYCLIFFE was born in 1324,1 in a village "caullid Wiclif," from which he received his family name. But little is known of his early boyhood. Although doubts have been thrown upon the date of his entering Queen's College, and upon the statement of his removal to Merton College, yet we are safe in accepting the fact of his early connection with the University of Oxford. In many respects the age was favorable for education. Schools were established for youth, not only at Oxford and Cambridge, but in every borough. However, a significant sign of the times. was, that no person could act in the capacity of a school teacher unless licensed by a priest.? Wycliffe studied at Oxford as a student, he also taught there as a professor. In following the example of his predecessor Grosstete, who, in the previous century, resisted the arbitrary will of the pope in his disposal of Church benefices, Wycliffe possessed superior advantages, drew a keener sword, and maintained a more successful struggle against the inroads of the papacy. If, like Richard of Armagh, Wycliffe contended with the Mendicant orders, he sought not like that good bishop to reform them, but to exterminate them. Again, if like Geoffrey Chaucer, Wycliffe had confidence in his native tongue, and by his writings helped to give the English language a fixed place in literature, yet, unlike Chaucer, he gave to his age not works. of poetry but the Scriptures of the Old and New Testaments. The probable date of his birth. 2 Vaughan's Tracts and Treatises of Wycliffe. Introduction, London, 1845. p. iii. Wycliffe was a master of the accepted learning of his times. He especially gave himself to the study of the civil and canon. law. The former was a system of jurisprudence which had descended from the times of the Roman Empire, and even of the Republic. It was feudal in its characteristics, and most unfavorable to the liberties of the people. "However wise it may have been," says Vaughan, "in some of its provisions as relating to questions between man and man, it was in every way unfavorable to liberty as between sovereign and subject."1 The latter, the canon law, was made up of the decrees of councils and popes. It was supreme in all ecclesiastical matters, and not unfrequently it infringed upon the civil power.2 The temporal power of the papacy was both strenuously asserted and denied in the time of Wycliffe. The writings of Wycliffe show how zealously he embraced the cause of civil 1 Vaughan's Tracts and Treatises of Wycliffe. Introduction, p. vi. 2 The following are a few selected tenets of the canon law which show the assumptions and fearful power of the Romish Church : I. Princes' laws, if they be against the canons and decrees of the bishop of Rome, be of no force nor strength. II. The see of Rome hath neither spot nor wrinkle in it, nor can not err. III. The bishop of Rome may excommunicate emperors and princes, depose them from their states, and assoil (absolve) their subjects from their oath of obedience to them, and so constrain them to rebellion. IV. The bishop of Rome may open and shut heaven unto men. prison them in manacles and fetters. VI. The bishop of Rome may compel princes to receive his legates. VII. The clergy ought to give no oath of fidelity to their temporal governors, except they have temporalities of them. VIII. Kings and princes ought not to set bishops beneath them, but reverently to rise against them, and assign them an honorable seat by them. IX. He is [no] manslayer which slayeth a man which is excommunicate. (The no is "wanting in the C. C. C. MS.") See Cranmer's Writings and Letters, pp. 68-75. Parker Soc. edition, 1846. 1360.] WYCLIFFE'S OPPOSITION TO THE MENDICANTS. 55 freedom in its struggle with ecclesiastical tyranny. Next to the mastery of the civil and canon law, Wycliffe distinguished himself in the study of the philosophy of his times. This was the old system of Scholasticism, which had been recently revived by the renowned Ockham. Wycliffe, though naturally practical in his tendencies, was gifted with a speculative mind, and was thus fitted to wield the scholastic sword in the conflict with his opponents. By his book on the Reality of Universal Conceptions "he had created," says Neander, "an important epoch extending into the fifteenth century."1 His writings on subjects purely religious show how much he was influenced by this scholastic method. But Wycliffe, unlike other prominent school-men, made the Scriptures the supreme authority in all disputes, and insisted on their being interpreted in accordance with their plain meaning, in opposition to the "sentences of the Doctors, or the philosophy of Aristotle." 2 The life of Wycliffe was one of conflict. As early as the year 1360, he distinguished himself as an opponent of the Mendicant friars. It is an evidence both of his ability and courage, that, single-handed, he dared to attack a Monastic order of such power and authority in the Romish Church. Two of these orders, the Dominican and Franciscan, ruled the Roman Catholic Church throughout Europe for nearly three centuries, with an absolute sway. And that too against the united influence of prelates and princes. These two orders were to the Romish Church and to the world, before the Reformation, what the Jesuits have been since that time.3 Devoting themselves to the interests of the papacy, they enjoyed peculiar immunities. They trampled upon the rights of the regular clergy and ignored their authority. By the 1 Church History, V., 135. Boston, 1854. 2 Singularly enough Scholasticism made Aristotle the interpreter of St. Paul. 3 Warton's History of English Poetry, I., 294. London, 1774. sole condition of professed poverty, they assumed to themselves all riches. They begged for bread, yet lived in luxury. They professed to be the humblest of the humble, yet exalted themselves above kings. Though a servant of servants, yet they claimed that the dignity of the friar was above that of the bishop. "For they say," says Wycliffe, "that each bishop and priest may lawfully leave their first dignity, and after be a friar; but when he is once a friar, he may in no manner leave that, and live as a bishop, or a priest, by the form of the Gospel." By their zeal and show of piety, they grew in authority among the people; and so infatuated did many become that they regarded the very garments of the friars as possessing miraculous powers; and hence "made it an essential part of their last wills, that their carcasses after death should be wrapped in ragged Dominican or Franciscan habits, and interred among the Mendicants," 2 in the belief that they might the more readily obtain mercy in the day of judgment if they should appear thus associated with these friars. 1 The occasion of Wycliffe's first attack upon the friars was their successful attempt to entice the students from Oxford into their convent schools. To such an extent were they successful, that parents refused to trust their children at the University, lest they should be inveigled by the monks into their convents. In this contest Wycliffe appeared in behalf of the University, and dealt heavy blows against the friars. As a reward for his services, as well as in testimony of his ability, the mastership of Balliol College was bestowed upon him by the University in 1361. Wycliffe's opposition to the friars did not stop here. But from the pulpit and by his pen he attacked the very foundations of the Order, showing up the unlawfulness of their begging and the baseness of their religious pretensions. For all this the people were prepared, for the land was burdened by these abuses as by a curse. 1 Tracts and Treatises, p. 219. London, 1845. 2 Mosheim's Church History, I., p. 390. New York, 1851. 3 Baber's Preface. Wycliffe's New Testament, p. xi. London, 1810. |