than 1360, Wycliffe took a most prominent part in the controversy against the Mendicant friars. It was not till 1365 that he obtained the wardenship of Canterbury Hall, nor until 1370 that the Pope decided against his claims, the interval having been spent in further prosecuting his former opposition to the friars.

I have given in the text the common account which all writers from the end of the sixteenth century gave, and which never was doubted till 1841, when Mr. Courthope adduced important reasons for questioning whether Wycliffe ever was Master of Canterbury Hall. His opinion is founded on the undoubted fact that there was another J. Wycliffe, who died a year before the Reformer, having held the living of Hirsted Kynes in Sussex, and who also held the living of Mayfield, Archbishop Islip's residence, in the same county. It is further certain that Wycliffe himself never makes any allusion to his appeal in any of his numerous writings; and, what is more material to the argument, his bitter enemies, T. Walsingham and H. Knighton, are wholly silent upon the fact of his ever having had a dispute with Rome on his own individual account. I have caused search to be made in all the repositories of Oxford-those of Balliol, Merton, and Christ Church with which Canterbury Hall was united in 1545; but any mention of the great Reformer is rarely to be found in the records of those houses, Chichele, when he succeeded to the primacy, having indeed caused most of the documents in which his name appeared to be destroyed. Of Canterbury Hall there are no papers whatever preserved in Christ Church; and those of Lambeth only give the pieces of the proceedings in the appeal, from whence no inference can be drawn as to which of the two Wycliffes claimed the Mastership. But one circumstance seems to impeach Mr. Courthope's system, and to confirm the common account. The J. Wycliffe who was Master received his appointment in December, 1365; and it appears from the Balliol papers in the chest relating to St. Lawrence Jewry (a city rectory in the gift of that College), that John de Huegate was Master of Balliol in 1366. Now nothing can be less likely than that the Reformer, who is admitted on all hands to have been Master

of Balliol in 1365, should have given up his place unless he received some other promotion; and if he became Master of Canterbury Hall, the probability is very great that he would almost immediately resign Balliol. There is an appendix to the work of a Master of Balliol, entitled Balio-fergus,' which gives a list of the Masters, and after J. Wycliffe's name (1361) comes that of Tyrwitt (1371); but the author expressly states that he only gives the names of Masters who did something worthy of being recorded, and that his dates refer not to their admission, but to their acts. By the same list it appears that in 1340 another John Wycliffe had been Master of Balliol, for at that time the Reformer was only sixteen years old.

The Bursars' Rolls of Merton show that J. Wycliffe held a College office 30 Edw. III. (1357), and was therefore in all probability a Fellow at that time.

NOTE V. p. 4.

The following passage is taken from his MS. tract Of Clerks Possessioners,' apud Lewis, p. 7:-" Freres," says he, "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, and that they shullen have higher degree in the bliss of heaven than other men that ben not therein, and seyn that men of their order shullen never come to hell, but shullen dome other men with Christ at doomsday. And so they stelen children from fader and moder, sometime such as ben unable to the order, and sometime such as shullen susteyn their fader and moder by the commandment of God; and thus they ben blasphemers taken upon full councel in douty things that ben not expressly commanded ne forbidden in holy writ; sith such counsel is appropred to the Holy Gost, and thus they ben therefore cursed of God as the Pharisees were of Christ, to whom he saith thus: Woe to you scribes and Pharisees that

Matt. xxiii. 14.

ben writers of law, and men of singular religion, that compassen about the water and the lond to maken of your religion, and when he is made of your religion yee maken him double more a child of helle.' And sith he that steleth an ox or a cow is damnable by God's law and man's law also, muckil more he that steleth a man's child, that is better than all earthly goods, and draweth him to the less perfitt order. And though this singular order were more perfect than Christ's, yet he wot nevere where it be to damnation of the child, for he wot not to what state God hath ordained him; and so blindly they don agenst Christ's ordinance."

NOTE VI. p. 11.

Among the exaggerated notions of the day we find the strange assertion that the Pope levied five times as much from the country as the Crown. "Omnia Romæ venalia" was a maxim as generally cited in Edward III.'s time as in that of Catiline at Rome. That Prince was petitioned to expel all churchmen from civil offices; and the threat was sometimes plainly heard of terminating by force the papal authority. Piers Plowman's Vision' is chiefly directed against the clergy; and Chaucer is full of sarcasms at their expense; and though it may be observed that he flourished late in the same century, yet Langley preceded Wycliffe by many years.

NOTE VII. p. 12.

"In tantum in suis laboriosis dogmatibus prævaluerunt, quod mediam partem populi, aut majorem partem suæ sectæ adquisiverunt" (H. Knighton, 2664). "In tantum multiplicata fuit (Secta scil.) quod vix duos videres in via quin alter eorum discipulus Wycliffe fuit" (id. 2666).

NOTE VIII. p. 14.

Some accounts represent the Primate as having been present. But the Bishop of London alone as presiding makes answer to the Lords when they speak for Wycliffe, and yet, had the Primate been there, he must have presided. The mistake probably arises from the bull being addressed to the Primate as well as the Bishop. The inference that Courtenay or some of his followers had given an intimation to the populace of what had passed in court with the Duke seems difficult to avoid. For how else should they have been aware of it? His furious zeal was

too well known; nor was there anything in Lancaster's words to make the people suppose he had insulted Courtenay, unless the latter had showed himself greatly offended.

66

NOTE IX.-P. 16.

Quinimo si ibi esset corpus Christi asseveravit in fractione se posse frangere collum Dei sui. Quod panem esse dicebant, et rem inanimatam, et potius venerandum esse bufonem vel quodlibet animatum."-T. Wals. 356.

NOTE X.-p. 17.

T. Walsingham (p. 281) gives three several and distinct causes of the tumults, regarding them as judgments of Heaven-First, upon the prelates for not prosecuting with severity the partisans of the new heresy.-Secondly, upon the Lords for their bad lives and atheistical principles, and their tyranny over the community. Thirdly, upon the wicked lives of the community themselves. As regards the supineness of the prelates, he declares the breaking out of the insurrection on the day of Corpus Domini to constitute a proof of its being judicial. But not a

word does he or H. Knighton say of the Wycliffites as having by their preaching caused any discontent or stirred up any sedition among the common people.

NOTE XI. p. 17.

See Rot. Par. iii. 1 Ric. II. 88, 2 Ric. II. 60. Dr. Lingard, who makes the charge against Wycliffe's doctrines of having encouraged the turbulent spirits, places this accusation in such juxtaposition to the complaints of the Lords as would make a careless reader suppose that those complaints were partly levelled at the Reformed teachers.-iii. 175-6.

NOTE XII. p. 18.

It is somewhat singular that the expulsion of the parties themselves is not directly ordered, but only may be implied by the sentence against all who held the opinions.-Rymer, xii. 363. This royal mandate is directed to sheriffs and mayors as well as the university, and it enjoins obedience to the Primate's lawful orders. Hence it should seem to have been issued under the Stat. 5 Ric. II., afterwards repealed. For the subsequent royal proclamations, as that in 1395, do not refer to the prelate's authority, but to that of the Crown, and they contain no command to sheriffs and mayors.-Id. 805-6.

NOTE XIII. p. 19.

Stat. 5 Ric. II. c. 17, and 6 Ric. II. c. 53. The words of the Commons in desiring the repeal are worthy of remark-"It is no wise their interest that they or their posterity be justified and bound before the prelates any more than their ancestors have been in times past."-Rot. Par. iii. 141.