RELIGIOUS ENCYCLOPEDIA
Wyclif
in ecclesiastical foundations—where in a very brief time the entire church estate was taken over and a most remarkable revolution brought about in the relations of temporal holdings. Since such views existed as the Curia charged upon him and its condemnation implies, they must have been strongly emphasized. It was altogether concordant with the plans of Lancaster to have a personality like that of Wyclif on his side. Especially in London the Reformer’s views won support; numerous partizans of the nobility attached themselves to him, and the lower orders gladly heard his sermons. He preached in various churches of the city, and all London rang with his praises. But he found adversaries. The first to oppose his theses were monks of those orders which held possessions, to whom his theories were dangerous. The University of Oxford and the episcopate later came under blame from the Curia, which charged them with so neglecting their duty that the breaking of the evil fiend into the English sheepfold could be noticed in Rome before it was in England. And yet the bishops were not inactive, as though they would prefer to deal with the case at home. Wyclif was summoned before William Courtenay, bishop of London, on Feb. 19, 1377, in order, as one source ironically says, “to explain the wonderful things which had streamed forth from his mouth.” What the exact charges were is not known, as the matter did not get so far as a definite examination. Lancaster, the earl marshal Henry Percy, and a number of other friends accompanied Wyzelif, and four begging friars were his advocates, who were whole-hearted in a matter which affected the question of the ideal of poverty. A great crowd gathered at the church, and at the entrance of the party animosities began to show, especially in a wrathy exchange of words between the imperious bishop and the Reformer’s protectors. Lancaster declared that he would humble the pride of the English clergy and their partizans, even if they had sprung from noble parents (Bishop Courtenay was of high birth [his father was earl of Devonshire])—doubtless hinting at the intent to secularize the possessions of the Church. The assembly broke up and the lords departed with their protégé.*
The greater part of the English clergy regarded this encounter with great irritation, and attacks upon Wyclif now began with vehemence, which found their echo in the second and third books of his work dealing with civil government. These
books carry a sharp polemic, which can
9. Papal hardly be a cause of wonder when it is
Condemna- recalled that his opponents charged tion. Wyclif with blasphemy and scandal, pride and heresy. It is concluded
from his performances that he had openly advised the secularization of English church property, and the dominant parties shared with him the conviction that the monks could better be held in check if they were relieved from the care of secular affairs. The bitterness occasioned by this advice will be the better understood when it is remembered that at that time the papacy was engaged in its war with the
* An excellent account of this wordy dispute between the bishop and the protectors of Wyclif is given in the Chronicon Anglie, the gist of which is quoted in DNB, |xiii. 206-207.
Wyclif
THE NEW SCHAFF-HERZOG
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Florentines and was in great straits. The demand of the Minorites that the Church should live in poverty as it did in the days of the apostles was not pleasing in such a crisis. It was under these conditions that Gregory XI., who in January, 1377, had gone from Avignon to Rome, sent on May 22 five copies of his bull against Wyelif, despatching one to the archbishop of Canterbury, and the others to the bishop of London, Edward III., the chancellor, and the university; among the enclosures were eighteen theses of his, which were denounced as erroneous and dangerous to Church and State. The position may well be taken that the reformatory activities of Wyclif began here, since all the great works, especially his Summa theologie, stand in a more or less close connection with the condemnation of his eighteen theses, while the entire literary energies of his later years rest upon this foundation. The aim of his opponents which next appears—to make him out a revolutionary in politics—failed in achievement. Indeed the situation in England resulted rather in damage to them; for on June 21, 1377, Edward III. died, and his inglorious end was a sad contrast to the brilliant days of Crécy and Maupertuis. His successor was Richard II., who was under the influence of Lancaster, the protector of the Reformer. So it resulted that the bull against Wyelif, although dated May 22, 1377, did not become public till Dec. 18. Moreover parliament, which met in October, came into sharp conflict with the Curia. Among the propositions which Wyclif, at the direction of the government, worked out for parliament was one which speaks out with distinctness against the exhaustion of England by the Curia. When the censure of his theses became known in England, Wyclif sought to gain the favor of the public. He first laid his theses before parliament, and then made them public in a tract,
to, Sharp- accompanying them, however, with ening of the explanations, limitations, and here and Conflict. there with interpretations. After the session of parliament was over, in ac-
cordance with papal directions he was called upon to make answer, and in March, 1378, he appeared at the episcopal palace at Lambeth to defend himself. The preliminaries were not yet finished when a noisy mob gathered with the purpose of delivering him; the queen mother also took up his cause. The bishops, who were of two minds, satisfied themselves with forbidding the Reformer to speak further on the subjects in controversy. At Oxford the vicechancellor, following papal directions, had confined the Reformer for some time in Black Hall, from which Wyclif was released at the threats of his friends; not long after the vice-chancellor was himself confined in the same place because of this indignity to Wyclif. The latter then took up the usage according to which one who remained for forty-four days under excommunication came under the penalties executed by the State, and wrote his De incarcerandis fidelibus, in which he demanded that it should be legal for the excommunicated to appeal to the king and his council against the excommunication; in this writing he laid open the entire case and in such a way that it came within the ken of the laity. He wrote his thirty-three conclusions, this
time not merely in Latin but also in English. ‘The masses of the people, a part of the nobility, and his former protector, the duke of Lancaster, rallied to his side. Before any further steps could be taken at Rome in the affair, Gregory XI. died (1378). But Wyclif was already engaged upon one of his most important works, that dealing with the truth of Holy Scripture. Indeed, the sharper the strife became, the more did Wyclif have recourse to Scripture as the basis of all Christian doctrinal opinion, and expressly proved this to be the only norm for Christian faith. To drag this basis from beneath him was the thankless task of his opponents; it was in order to refute them that he wrote the book in which he showed that Holy Scripture contains all truth and, being from God, is the only authority. He did not fail in this book to refer to the conditions under which the condemnation of his eighteen theses was brought about; and the same may be said of his books dealing with the Church, the office of king, and the power of the pope—all completed within the short space of two years (1378-79). Since all the world, he taught, understands by “the Church” the pope and the cardinals (whom one must obey in order to obtain salvation), it is necessary to make clear the distinction between what the Church is and what the common man supposes it to be. The Church is the totality of those who are predestined to blessedness. It includes the Church triumphant in heaven, those who are in purgatory, and the Church militant or men on earth. No one who is eternally lost has part init. There is but one universal Church, and outside of it there is no salvation. Its head is Christ. No pope may say that he is the head, for he can not say that he is elect or even a member of the Church.
It would be a great mistake to assume that Wyclif’s doctrine of the Church—which made so great an impression upon Huss, who adopted it literally and fully—was occasioned by the great
schism (1378-1429). In its principles
11. State- that doctrine was already embodied in ment Re- his De civili dominio. How closely the garding contents of the book dealing with the Royal Church are connected with the decision Power. respecting the eighteen theses ap-
pears in every chapter. The attacks upon Gregory XI. grow ever more unsparing and in places are extreme. His stand with respect to the ideal of poverty became continually firmer, as well as his position with regard to the temporal rule of the clergy. Closely related to this attitude was his book De officio regis, the content of which was foreshadowed in his thirty-three conclusions: One should be instructed with reference to the obligations which lie in regard to the kingdom in order that he may know how the two powers, the royal and the ecclesiastical, may support each other in harmony in the body corporate of the Church. The royal power, Wyclf taught, is consecrated through the testimony of Holy Scripture and the Fathers. Christ and the apostles rendered tribute to the emperor. The king is the servant of God. Sinful indeed is he who opposes the power of the king, since this is derived immediately from God. For this reason Paul appealed to Cesar, and subjects, above all the clergy