sions. Unfortunately, these co-operating causes prevent the possibility of an authentic biographical work being written, which should embrace the lives of all original translators of the Sacred Volume; all that can be done, is to collect, from various quarters, such intimations as remain, respecting these valuable men, and their important labours.

"The lives of such persons, it may be said, could not have furnished many remarkable incidents; but we cannot tell: for although they did not all meet with similar treatment, to some of them, at least, the following lines are but too appropriate:

They lived unknown,

Till persecution dragg'd them into fame,

And chas'd them up to heaven. Their ashes flew
-No marble tells us whither: With their names

No bard embalms and sanctifies his song;

And history, so warm on meaner themes,
Is cold on this," "8

(78) See Anderson's Memorial on behalf of the Native Irish, pp. 12, 13,

CHAPTER XIII.

FIFTEENTH CENTURY.

Lollards. Bishop Arundel's Canon against Translations. Value of Books. Episcopus Puerorum.

Learned Englishmen. Libraries. Henry VI. John Huss. Jerom of Prague. Hussites. Invention of Printing.

WICLIF'S followers were called LOLLARDS, from

a German term, signifying to sing hymns to God; and increased so rapidly, that a contemporary writer affirms, "A man could not meet two people on the road, but one of them was a disciple of WICLIF.""

The vehemence with which they declaimed against the vices of the clergy, and the constant appeals which they made to the Holy Scriptures, in defence of their opinions, drew down upon them the anathemas of their mitred adversaries, and occasioned the most severe laws to be enacted against those who should embrace their sentiments, or dare to read the WORD OF GOD without ecclesiastical permission. In 1396, THOMAS ARUNDEL, archbishop of York, was translated to the see of Canterbury, and soon discovered by his conduct, that he designed to employ against the Lollards, all the additional power he had acquired by his promotion to the primacy. No sooner had Henry IV. gained possession of the throne of England, than Arundel, who had supported him in his pretensions to the crown, applied, with his clergy, to the parliament that met at Westminster, to obtain the sanction of the legislature to his cruel and iniquitous measures. In this he was unfortunately successful, and a severe law was passed against the dangerous innovations, (1) Knyghton.-See Lewis's Life of Wicliffe, ch. x. p. 175.

as they were called, of the Lollards. By this law, made A. D. 1400, the bishops were authorized to imprison all persons suspected of heresy, and to try them in the spiritual court; and, if they proved either obstinate or relapsed heretics, the spiritual judge was to call the sheriff of the county, or the chief magistrate of the town, to be present when the sentence of condemnation was pronounced, and immediately to deliver the condemned person to the secular magistrate, who was to cause him to be burnt to death, on some elevated place, in the sight of all the people. The first person who suffered under the writ De hæretico comburendo, was Sir William Sawtre, rector of St. Oswyth, London. One of the charges brought against him was, "That he had said he would not worship the cross on which Christ suffered, but only Christ that suffered upon the cross." Another of the charges was, "That he had declared, that a priest was more bound to preach the WORD OF GOD, than to recite particular services, at certain canonical hours." For such, alas! was the genius of the reigning superstition, that to worship the cross, and attend to customary formalities, was regarded as of more importance than to worship the Saviour, or to preach his gospel !*

In 1408, the archbishop held a convocation of the whole of the clergy of his province, at Oxford, the object of which was to frame certain constitutions against the Lollards. By the 5th constitution published in this convocation, it was ordained that "No book or treatise composed by John Wiclif, or by any other in his time, or since, or hereafter to be composed, be henceforth read in the schools, halls, inns, or other places whatsoever, within the province aforesaid; and that none be taught according to such [book,] unless it have been first examined, and upon examination unanimously approved by the uni(2) Fox's Actes and Monumentes, I. p. 615.

Henry's Hist. of Great Britain, X. B. v. ch. ii. p, 2,

versity of Oxford, or Cambridge, or at least by twelve men chosen by the said universities, or by one of them, under the discretion of us, or our successors; and then afterwards, [the book be approved] expressly by us, or our successors, and delivered in the name, and by the authority, of the universities, to be copied and sold to such as desire it, (after it has been faithfully collated,) at a just price, the original thenceforth remaining in some chest* of the university for ever. And if any one shall read any book, or treatise of this sort in the schools, or elsewhere, contrary to the form above written; or shall teach according to it, let him be punished according as the quality of the fact shall require, as a sower of schism, and a fautor of heresy."

Another Constitution of the convocation was formed expressly against the translation of the Scriptures into English, "VII. It is a dangerous thing, as the blessed Jerom testifieth, to translate the text of the Holy Scriptures out of one language into another, because it is not always easy to retain the sense of the original in a translation, as the same blessed Jerom confesseth, that although inspired, he frequently erred: We therefore enact and ordain, that no one hereafter do by his own authority translate any text of Holy Scripture into English, or any other tongue by way of book, libel, or treatise; and that no one read any such book, libel, or treatise, now

*The books in the public libraries were, at that period, all kept in chests.

+ Jerom's words, to which the constitution refers, are to be found in his Letter to Pope Damasus, who had desired him to determine which of the various readings, in the Latin copies, agreed most correctly with the Greek text; and to which he replies, that it was very hazardous to decide: "For who is there," says he, "whether he be learned or unlearned, when he takes the Bible into his hands, and sees, that what he reads differs from what he has been used to, who will not immediately clamour against me, as a falsifier and sacrilegious person, for daring to add, alter, or correct, any thing in books so ancient." See Lewis's History of English Translations, p. 44.

Jerom never pretended to inspiration.

lately set forth in the time of John Wiclif, or since, or hereafter to be composed, in public, or in private, in whole, or in part, under pain of the greater excommunication, until the said translation be approved by the diocesan of the place, or, if occasion require, by a provincial council. Let him that acteth contrary be punished as a fautor of error and heresy."s

In the 2nd year of the reign of Henry V. A. D. 1415, a law was passed, by which, in addition to the former laws against heresy, all Lollards, or those who possessed or read any of Wiclif's books, or entertained his opinions, were declared to be guilty of treason, and their goods ordered to be confiscated. This law was considered as particularly directed against those who read the NEW TESTAMENT IN ENGLISH of Wiclif's translation. Our old writers thus express themselves respecting it: "In the said parliament" (held at Leicester) "the kinge made this most blasphemous and cruell acte, to be a law for euer, That whosoeuer they were that should rede the Scriptures in the mother tong, (which was then called WICLEU's lerning,) they should forfet land, catel, body, lif, and godes, from theyr heyres for euer, and so be condempned for heretykes. to God, ennemies to the crowne, and most errant traytors to the lande. Besides this, it was inacted, that neuer a sanctuary,'nor priuiliged grounde within the realme shulde holde them, though they were still permitted to theues and murtherers. And if in case they wold not gyue ouer, or were after their pardon relapsed, they shulde suffer death in two manner of kindes; that is, they shulde first be hanged for treason against the kinge, and then be burned for heresy against God, and yet neither of both committed."

(3) Labbei S. S. Concilia, XI, pt. ii. p. 2095. Paris, 1671, fol. (4) Fox's Actes and Monumentes, 1. p. 678.

(5) Complete Collection of State Trials, I. p. 49, Lond, 1730, 2nd edition, fol.