style of architecture. Arrived in London, possibly to make his "hostelrie" at the Tabard Inn, in Southwark, the traveller from Leicestershire would gaze with unconcealed eagerness upon a metropolis then rarely visited. The old, ugly, but venerable bridge, now supplanted, was then the only one which spanned the river, the stream at ebb tide flowing down its arches almost with the force of a cataract. Though on this bridge the church of St. Thomas was conspicuous, yet it was, as yet, unincumbered with the numerous buildings afterwards attaching themselves to it like limpets; and chivalry, then the prevailing fashion, held occasional joustings on its narrow area. The order of the Templars had been recently suppressed; but that of the Knights of St. John survived, and maintained its splendours in a building adjacent to the ancient gate, yet standing. "The pomp and circumstance of glorious war" was witnessed everywhere. Mingling with the crowd in the streets, less dense than that of 1851, the spectator might discern the mailed baron with his armed retinue of bowmen and lancers, or the gay lady wearing the embroidered jacket, not much unlike the "polka" of a more modern day, though sometimes accompanied by the long strips of linen which dangled from her elbows, or fluttered like pennons in the breeze, whilst her head was enveloped in an inflated but not ungraceful head-tire, and surmounted by a woollen cap. Ecclesiastics of high rank were then little distinguishable from the military barons; the man of peace was not to be found amidst those mounted and armed retainers. Sometimes, amidst the crowd, who were dressed in sober, and often wretched habits, might be discerned the men of some of the less strict orders, or the monk with his bald tonsure, and often jolly form; and, not unfrequently, the eye might rest upon the bare head, brown coat, and long rosary of the Franciscan friar, or the solemn, black-hooded stateliness of the Dominican. The civic honours of London were then in their infancy, and were guarded by the citizens with a

jealousy pertaining to semi-barbarous times; whilst the people were at all times ripe for conflict or even for revolt. A peculiar feature of the period was, that the city was then beginning to be remarkable for its opaque and dense atmosphere, derived from the use of coals, then recently introduced. The sides of the Thames were not then, as now, crowded with houses of merchandise; stately palaces, well fortified, stood on the Strand side of the river, among which the Savoy, the castellated residence of the Duke of Lancaster, was very conspicuous. A large Dominican friary stood in Blackfriars; another of equal pretensions, near to the Temple, belonged to the Carmelites, and was called Whitefriars; the Franciscans had an edifice in Newgatestreet, whilst a fourth, in the vicinity of what is now the Bank, was devoted to the Austins or Augustines. The plague, which had recently desolated Europe, had been extremely fatal in London, and had caused considerable improvements in the city. But it was close, ill-ventilated, and inconvenient; and the inhabitant of Chester can well understand, from certain parts of his own city, what was its general appearance.

To this city, and, when arrived there, to one of the courts in the vicinity of Old St. Paul's, Wiclif, now an accused man, made his way. He had sought protection from the Duke of Lancaster, who, nothing loth, accompanied him on his trial, together with Earl Percy, the Marshal of England. On their arrival at St. Paul's, they met an excited crowd. The Duke of Lancaster was suspected to be hostile to the liberties of the city of London, and was extremely unpopular amongst its inhabitants, and the representations made by the hierarchy had greatly inflamed the minds of the people. Wiclif made his way with much difficulty into the presence of his judges. He found Courtenay extremely annoyed at the powerful defenders who stood at his side. When the earl marshal employed his authority to gain Wicliff a place, the following excited conversation occurred :

Bishop Courtenay. Lord Percy, if I had known what maisteries you would have kept in the church, I would have kept you out from coming hither.

Duke of Lancaster. He shall keep such maisteries here, though you say nay!

Lord Percy. Wiclif! sit down, for you have many things to answer to, and you need to repose yourself on a soft seat!

Bishop. It is unseasonable that one cited before his ordinary should sit down during his answer.

shall stand!

He must and

Duke of Lancaster. The Lord Percy his motion for Wiclif is but reasonable. And as for you, my lord bishop, who are grown so proud and arrogant, I will bring down the pride, not of you alone, but of all the prelatey in England!

Bishop. Do your worst, Sir!

Duke of Lancaster. Thou bearest thyself so brag upon thy parents* which shall not be able to help thee; they shall have enough to do to help themselves.

Bishop. My confidence is not in my parents, nor in any man else, but only in God, in whom I trust; by whose assistance I will be bold to speak the truth.

Duke. Rather than I will take these words at his hands I would pluck the bishop by the hair out of the church!

How often have great interests been jeoparded by such rash and excited advocates! John of Gaunt had little sympathy with Wiclif's opinions as matters of truth. He regarded them only as implements of a party, and he soon after this period grew cold on Wiclif and his cause. His last words, however, though spoken in an undertone, were caught up by the by-standers, and a tumult ensued. The trial was suspended; the mob proceeded to violence. "They broke open," says Fox, "the Marshalsea and freed all the prisoners; and, not content with this, a vast number of them

* Courtenay's father was Duke of Devonshire: a powerful noble.

went to the duke's palace in the Savoy, where, missing his person, they plundered his house." At the same time, a clergyman, mistaken for the earl marshal, was put to death.

The protracted and vigorous reign of Edward III. was now ended, and the weak-minded Richard of Bordeaux had succeeded him on the throne. One of the earliest questions debated by parliament in this reign was, whether it was not lawful for the nation to forbid the exit of its treasure to foreign ecclesiastics. The judgment of Wiclif was appealed to; who, as a divine grounding his opinions solely on the lessons of God's Word, gave his conclusion strongly in the affirmative. In his published reply he says, "Temporal lords may lawfully and meritoriously take away the goods of fortune from a delinquent church." "In the paper subsequently published he repeats, that the use of church censures, and of the authority of the magistrate, to extort from the people a revenue for the priesthood, are customs unknown to the better ages of the church, and to be numbered among the corruptions consequent on her endowment under Constantine. He even proceeds so far as to say, that a state of things might arise, in which, to deprive the church of her wealth, would be a more Christian act than to have bestowed upon her."*

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Though the church had been baffled in its first endeavour to punish the boldness of Wiclif, it resolved to make a new attempt to exterminate these new and dangerous heresies. The pope wrote letters to the king and the higher ecclesiastics, demanding the seizure of the reformer's person and the suppression of his tenets. The rector of Lutterworth was once more summoned. The Duke of Lancaster had now lost much of his political influence, and on this occasion Wiclif was alone.

But it was better as it was. The people, who had now extensively learned Wiclif's doctrines, constituted a surer protection. The queen mother, widow of the Black Prince, * Vaughan's Tracts and Treatises of Wycliffe, xlvii.

sent a message to the court at Lambeth, before which Wiclif was cited, forbidding farther proceedings. Muzzled thus by a power greater than their own, the baffled authors of the citation could only vent their rage in angry growls.

But the great discovery was already made. Digging amidst these ruins of a hieroglyphical system, now beginning to be obsolete, Wiclif had found the explanatory stone, the key to the whole mystery; and, after him, Luther had nothing left to do but to show its important application. Errors and truths were alike expounded by one simple principle, THE SUFFICIENCY OF SCRIPTURE. Wiclif seized the truth, and it became in his hand a thunderbolt. His blood was up, and he wrote daringly, and, for himself, dangerously. It is not for ordinary minds to conceive of the impetuosity of an ardent soul which has caught fire from a "present truth"-especially if it happen to be one which has been long undiscovered. It is more than a conviction it is an inspiration. Colder men may censure; unbelieving ones may doubt. Prudence may summon a halt, and fear may draw back aghast. But such a man sees his goal, and opposition only stimulates the high purpose of his noble nature. Rushing onward to the conflict, Wiclif was not always careful on what or on whom he trod. But he uplifted his standard, and, fearful as have been the attacks upon it, it has never been removed. He set up the truth which the experience of centuries has but served to maintain, that, whether against popes or cardinals, against law churches or ecclesiastical organizations, the only test of truth is the Word of God.

But the mortal man failed where the spiritual one was impregnable. Bulls from Rome denounced him; a hostile and furious clamour pursued his steps, and in the midst of the irritation consequent on these combined hostilities, his overtasked frame gave way. He fell ill at Oxford, where he had still continued to deliver his lectures. His sickness emboldened his old enemies, them endicants, and they sent

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