Merton College was then the best seminary for great and learned men in the whole university; and the following eminent persons belonged to it, about this time. 1. Walter Burley, called the Plain Doctor, who was preceptor to king Edward III. 2. William Occam, called the Singular Doctor. 3. Thomas Bradwardine, the Profound Doctor, who was called to court by archbishop Stratford, and succeeded him in the see of Canterbury. 4. Simon Mepham, archbishop of Canterbury, in 1330. 5. Simon Islip, who was also promoted to the same see, in 1349, was lord privy seal, and secretary to the king. 6. William Rede, an excellent mathematician, and bishop of Chichester in 1369. 7. Geoffry Chaucer, the Father of English Poetry. Wickliffe was afterwards called Doctor Evangelicus, or the Gospel Doctor; and he certainly deserved the title, as the study of the holy scriptures was his principal delight. He was indeed (to use the words of bishop Newton) deservedly famous, the honour of his own, and the admiration of all succeeding times.'

Wickliffe was soon distinguished, among these illustrious contemporaries, for the closeness of his application to study, and the vivacity of his genius. He became celebrated in philosophy and divinity; being so remarkable for an elegancy of wit, and strength in disputations, that he was esteemed more than human by the common sort of divines. He adorned the learning of the schools by acquiring a deep knowledge of the civil and canon law, as also of the municipal laws of his own country, which have been always too much neglected till our own times, when we find the Vinerian professorship of the laws of England established in the university of Oxford. Wickliffe not only studied and commented upon the sacred writings; but he translated them into his native language, and wrote homilies on several parts of them. He also diligently studied the writings of St Austin, St Jerom, St Ambrose, and St Gregory, the four fathers of the Latin church: But he was thirty-six years of age before he had a proper opportunity of exerting his excellent talents, so as to attract the observation of the university, and even of the whole kingdom; for it was in the year 1360 when he became the advocate for the university against the encroachments made by the mendicant friars, who had been very troublesome from their first establishment in Oxford, in 1230, and occasioned great inquietude to the chancellor and scho

lars,

lars, by infringing their statutes and privileges, and setting up an exempt jurisdiction.

Popery was established in England by Austin the monk, and continued to be the only religion till the Reformation. The church of Rome had infected all Christendom with its errors and corruptions; and the whole church was degenerated from its primitive purity by the artifices of the monks, who had polluted the clear stream of religion with the rank weeks of superstition.

The clergy had engrossed the greatest part both of the riches and power of Christendom: But the corruptions of their worship and doctrine were easily detected; nor had they any varnish to colour them by, except the authority and traditions of the church. When some studious men began to read the ancient fathers, and councils, they found a vast difference between the first five ages of the Christian church, in which piety and learning prevailed, and the last ten ages, in which ignorance had buried all their former learning Only a little misguided devotion was retainedfor six of those ages; and, in the last four, the restless ambition and usurpation of the popes were supported by the seeming holiness of the begging friars, and the false counterfeits of learning, consisting only of a vile metaphysical jargon, or vain school-divinity, which prevailed among the canonists, school-men, and casuists.

It may be noted, that soon after and about the year 1300, flourished several able and pious men, who boldly withstood the errors of the church of Rome, and the insolence of its popes. Of these, perhaps, none was more remarkable than Marsilius of Padua, who wrote his De fensor Pacis for the emperor Lewis, of Bavaria, against pope John XXII, and who is execrated by name in the bull of pope Gregory against Wickliffe. He vehemently opposed the enormities of the court of Rome, and maintained, that believers are freely justified by grace alone, and that works are not the efficient causes of our salvation, though justification and salvation are ever attended with them. He and others paved the way for our great countryman, who soon afterwards appeared and distinguished himself above them.

Wickliffe was indeed the morning-star of the Reformation; though he appeared like a meteor to the monks, when he opposed them in support of the university. The number of students there had been thirty thousand; but, in the 1357, they were so far decreased that the whole was not above six thousand. This was entirely owing to the

bad

bad practices of the preaching friars, who took all opportunities to entice the students, from the colleges, into their convents, which made people afraid of sending their children to the university. The friars disregarded the determination of the parliament in 1566, whereby it was enacted, that they should receive no scholar under the age of eighteen; and that the king should have power to redress all controversies between them and the university. Wickliffe soon distinguished himself by his bold and zealous opposition against the usurpations and errors of the friars, who justified their begging trade, by asserting, that the poverty of Christ, and his apostles, made them possess all things in common, and beg for a livelihood. This opinion was first opposed by Richard Kilmyngton, dean of St Paul's; who was seconded by Richard Fitz-Ralph, archbishop of Armagh; after which, Wickliffe, Thoresby, Bolton, Hereford, Bryts, and Norris, openly opposed this doctrine at Oxford, where they made the friars blush for their audacity.

Wickliffe wrote with an elegance uncommon in that age, especially in the English language, of which he may be considered as one of the first refiners, and his writings afford many curious specimens of the old English orthography. In one of his tracts, intitled "Of Clerks Posses"sioners," he exposes the friars for drawing the youth of the university into their convents, and says, "Freres "drawen children fro Christ's religion into their private "order by hypocrisie, lesings, and steling. For they "tellen that their order is more holy than any other ; "that they shullen have higher degree in the bliss of

heaven than other men that been not therein; and 66 seyn, that men of their order shullen never come to hell, but shullen dome other men with Christ at ❝domesday."

66

Wickliffe wrote and published several tracts against the beggary of the friars; particularly "Of the Poverty of "Christ, against able Beggary;" and "Of Idleness in Beggary." He asserts, that "Christ bad his apostles and disciples that they should not bere a sachell, ne scrip; but look what man is able to hear the gospel, "and eat and drink therein, and pass not hence, and "not pass fro house to house.-Sith there were poor "men enough to taken mens alms before that freres "camen in, and the earth is now more barren than it was, ❝ other freres, or poor men, moten wanten of this alms : but

"but freres, by subtle hypocrisie, gotten to themselves, "and letten the poor men to have these alms."

He disputed with a friar, on able beggary, before the duke of Gloucester, to whom he sent an account of both their arguments, and addressed his highness in these words; "To you lord, that herde the disputasion be geve the "fyle to rubbe away the rust in either partye."

These controversies gave Wickliffe such great reputation in the university, that, in 1361, he was advanced to be master of Baliol College; and four years after he was made warden of Canterbury-hall, founded by Simon de Islip, archbishop of Canterbury, in 1361, and now swallowed up in Christ-church. The royal license granted to the archbishop, for founding the college, is dated the twentieth of October 1361; and only mentions a certain number of scholars,' religious and secular. There were to be a warden and eleven scholars, who were to study logic, the civil and canon law; for whose maintenance the archbishop settled on them the rectory of Pageham in Sussex, and the manor of Wodeford in Northamptonshire. He purchased some old houses in the parish of St Mary's in Oxford, and fitted them up for the reception of his scholars, whom he placed there himself, and appointed Henry de Wodehall, or Woodhall, to be the warden. This man was a monk of Christ-church, Canterbury, and doctor of divinity: But he was at such variance with the secular scholars, that the archbishop, in 1365, turned him, and three monks, out of his new-founded Hall, in whose room he appointed Wickliffe to be warden, and three other seculars to be scholars. It was afterwards pretended, that the warden, and three of the scholars, were to be monks of Christ-church, Canterbury, and the other eight, secular priests; though this limitation could not be proved from the writings relating to the foundation.

The letters of institution, whereby the archbishop appointed Wickliffe to this wardenship, were dated the fourteenth of December, 1365; in which he is styled a person in whose fidelity, circumspection, and industry, his " grace very much confided; and one on whom he had fixed his eyes for that place, on account of the honesty of his life, his laudable conversation, and know'ledge of letters."

Wickliffe behaved with universal approbation, till the death of the archbishop, who had a great esteem for him. His grace died the twenty-fifth of April, 1366, and was succeeded in the archiepiscopal dignity by Simon

Langham,

1

Langham, bishop of Ely, who had been a monk, and was inclined to favour the religious against the seculars. The monks of Canterbury applied to Langham to eject Wickliffe from his wardenship, and the other seculars, from their fellowships. They alleged, that the warden was to be a monk, and nominated by the prior and chapter of Canterbury, and appointed by the archbishop: But that Wickliffe craftily obtained the wardenship. Archbishop Langham ejected Wickliffe from the wardenship, and the three other seculars, in 1367; in consequence of which, he also issued out his mandate, requiring Wickliffe and all the scholars to yield obedience to Wodehall as their warden. This was refused by them, as being contrary to the oath they had taken to the founder; but the archbishop sequestered the revenue, and took away the books and other things, which the founder, by his last will, had left to the Hall.

Wickliffe, and the three expelled fellows, appealed to the pope; to which appeal the archbishop made a reply, and the pope commissioned cardinal Andruynus to examine and determine the affair; who, in 1370, ordained, by a definitive sentence, which was confirmed by the pope, that only the monks of Christ-church, Canterbury, ought to remain in the college called Canterbury-hall, and that the seculars should be all expelled; that Wodehall and the other monks, who were deprived, should be restored; and that perpetual silence should be imposed on Wickliffe and his associates. Wickliffe and three poor clerks, could not oppose such a powerful combination, and the decree was strictly put in execution, pursuant to the papal bull, dated at Viterbium, the twenty-eighth of May, 1370, directed to Simon de Sudbury, bishop of London, and others, who were to restore Wodehall and the monks, and to compel all those who contradicted them by ecclesiastical censures, without permitting any appeal.

In this arbitrary manner Wickliffe was dispossessed of the wardenship of Canterbury-hall, which had been conferred on him by the founder, whose munificent intentions were frustrated by the papal sentence, which was directly contrary to the form of the licence of Mortmain that empowered the founder to endow his seminary for a certain number of scholars, religious and secular, who now, by this papal sentence, were to be all religious. It was, therefore, a question in law, whether the Hall and endowment were not forfeited to the crown? But the monks, in 1372, procured the royal pardon, and con

firmation