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LOLLARDS

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Originally appearing in Volume V16, Page 931 of the 1911 Encyclopedia Britannica.
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LOLLARDS , the name given to the See also:

English followers of See also:John Wycliffe; they were the adherents of a religious See also:movement which was widespread in the end of the 14th and beginning of the 15th centuries, and to some extent maintained itself on to the See also:Reformation. The name is of uncertain origin; some derive it from lolium, tares, quoting See also:Chaucer (C. T., Shipman's See also:Prologue) "This Loller heer wil prechen us somwhat .. . He wolde sowen som difficultee Or springen cokkel in our clene See also:corn "; but the most generally received explanation derives the words from lollen or lullen, to sing softly. The word is much older than its English use; there were Lollards in the See also:Netherlands at the beginning of the 14th See also:century, who were akin to the Fratricelli, Beghards and other sectaries of the See also:recusant Franciscan type. The earliest See also:official use of the name in See also:England occurs in 1387 in a See also:mandate of the See also:bishop of See also:Worcester against five " poor preachers," no-mine seu ritu Lollardorum confoederatos. It is probable that the name was given to the followers of Wycliffe because they resembled those offshoots from the See also:great Franciscan movement which had disowned the See also:pope's authority and set before themselves the ideal of Evangelical poverty. The 14th century, so full of varied religious See also:life, made it See also:manifest that the two different ideas of a life of separation from the See also:world which in earlier times had lived on See also:side by side within the See also:medieval See also:church were irreconcilable. The church See also:chose to abide by the See also:idea of See also:Hildebrand and to reject that of See also:Francis of See also:Assisi; and the revolt of Ockham and the See also:Franciscans, of the Beghards and other spiritual See also:fraternities, of Wycliffe and the Lollards, were all protests against that decision. Gradually there came to be facing each other a great See also:political Christendom, whose rulers were statesmen, with aims and policy of a worldly type, and a religious Christendom, full of the ideas of separation from the world by self-See also:sacrifice and of participation in the benefits of See also:Christ's See also:work by an ascetic See also:imitation. The See also:war between the two ideals was fought out in almost every See also:country in See also:Europe in the 14th century. In England Wycliffe's whole life was spent in the struggle, and he bequeathed his work to the Lollards.

The See also:

main See also:practical thought with Wycliffe was that the church, if true to her divine See also:mission, must aid men to live that life of evangelical poverty by which they could be See also:separate from the world and imitate Christ, and if the church ceased to be true to her mission she ceased to be a church. Wycliffe was a See also:meta-physician and a theologian, and had to invent a metaphysical theory—the theory of Dominium—to enable him to See also:transfer, in a way satisfactory to himself, the See also:powers and privileges of the church to his See also:company of poor Christians; but his followers were content to allege that a church which held large landed possessions, collected See also:tithes greedily and took See also:money from starving peasants for baptizing, burying and praying, could not be the church of Christ and his apostles. Lollardy was most flourishing and most dangerous to the ecclesiastical organization of England during the ten years after Wycliffe's See also:death. It had spread so rapidly and grown so popular that a hostile chronicler could say that almost every second See also:man was a Lollard. Wycliffe See also:left three intimate disciples: —See also:Nicolas See also:Hereford, a See also:doctor of See also:theology of See also:Oxford, who had helped his See also:master to translate the See also:Bible into English; John See also:Ashton, also a See also:fellow of an Oxford See also:college; and John Purvey, Wycliffe's colleague at See also:Lutterworth, and a co-translator of the Bible. With these were associated more or less intimately, in the first See also:age of Lollardy, John See also:Parker, the See also:strange ascetic See also:William See also:Smith, the restless fanatic Swynderly, See also:Richard Waytstract and Crompe. Wycliffe had organized in Lutterworth an association for sending the See also:gospel through all England, a company of poor preachers somewhat after the Wesleyan method of See also:modern times. " To be poor without See also:mendicancy, to unite xVI.30the flexible unity, the See also:swift obedience of an See also:order, with See also:free and See also:constant mingling among the poor, such was the ideal of Wycliffe's ` poor priests ' " (cf. See also:Shirley, Fasc. Ziz. p. xl.), and, although proscribed, these " poor preachers " with portions of their master's See also:translation of the Bible in their See also:hand to See also:guide them, preached all over England. In 1382, two years before the death of Wycliffe, the See also:archbishop of See also:Canterbury got the Lollard opinions condemned by See also:convocation, and, having been promised royal support, he began the See also:long conflict of the church with the followers of Wycliffe. He was able to coerce the authorities of the university of Oxford, and to drive out of it the leading Wycliffite teachers, but he was unable to stifle Oxford sympathies or to prevent the banished teachers See also:preaching throughout the country.

Many of the nobles, like Lords Montacute and See also:

Salisbury, supported the poor preachers, took them as private chaplains, and protected them against clerical interference. Country gentlemen like See also:Sir See also:Thomas See also:Latimer of Braybrooke and Sir Richard Stury protected them, while merchants and burgesses supported them with money. When Richard II. issued an See also:ordinance (See also:July 1382) ordering every bishop to See also:arrest all Lollards, the See also:Commons compelled him to withdraw it. Thus protected, the " poor preachers " won masses of the See also:people to their opinions, and See also:Leicester, See also:London and the See also:west of England became their headquarters. The organization must have been strong in See also:numbers, but only those who were seized for See also:heresy are known by name, and it is only from the indictments of their accusers that their opinions can be gathered. The preachers were picturesque figures in long russet See also:dress down to the heels, who, See also:staff in hand, preached in the See also:mother See also:tongue to the people in churches and graveyards, in squares, streets and houses, in gardens and See also:pleasure grounds, and then talked privately with those who had been impressed. The Lollard literature was very widely circulated—books by Wycliffe and Hereford and tracts and broadsides—in spite of many edicts proscribing it. In 1395 the Lollards See also:grew so strong that they petitioned See also:parliament through Sir Thomas Latimer and Sir R. Stury to reform the church on Lollardist methods. It is said that the Lollard Conclusions printed by See also:Canon Shirley (p. 36o) contain the substance of this See also:petition. If so, parliament was told that temporal possessions ruin the church and drive out the See also:Christian See also:graces of faith, See also:hope and charity; that the priesthood of the church in communion with See also:Rome was not the priesthood Christ gave to his apostles; that the See also:monk's See also:vow of See also:celibacy had for its consequence unnatural lust, and should not be imposed; that See also:transubstantiation was a feigned See also:miracle, and led people to See also:idolatry; that prayers made over See also:wine, See also:bread, See also:water, oil, See also:salt, See also:wax, See also:incense, altars of See also:stone, church walls, See also:vestments, mitres, crosses, staves, were magical and should not be allowed; that See also:kings should possess the See also:jus episcopale, and bring See also:good See also:government into the church; that no See also:special prayers should be made for the dead; that auricular See also:confession made to the See also:clergy, and declared to be necessary for salvation, was the See also:root of clerical arrogance and the cause of indulgences and other abuses in pardoning See also:sin; that all See also:wars were against the principles of the New Testament, and were but murdering and plundering the poor to win See also:glory for kings; that the vows of chastity laid upon nuns led to See also:child See also:murder; that many of the trades practised in the See also:commonwealth, such as those of goldsmiths and armourers, were unnecessary and led to luxury and See also:waste.

These Conclusions really contain the sum of Wycliffite teaching; and, if we add that the See also:

principal See also:duty of priests is to preach, and that the See also:worship of images, the going on pilgrimages and the use of See also:gold and See also:silver chalices in divine service are sinful (The Peasants' Rising and the Lollards, p. 47), they include almost all the heresies charged in the indictments against individual Lollards down to the See also:middle of the 15th century. The See also:king, who had hitherto seemed anxious to repress the See also:action of the clergy against the Lollards, spoke strongly against the petition and its promoters, and Lollardy never again had the See also:power in England which it wielded up to this See also:year. If the formal statements of Lollard creed are to be got from these Conclusions, the popular view of their controversy with the church may be gathered from the See also:ballads preserved in the The archbishop, having the power of the See also:throne behind him, attacked that stronghold of Lollardy the university of Oxford. In 1406 a document appeared purporting to be the testimony of the university in favour of Wycliffe; its genuineness was disputed at the See also:time, and when quoted by See also:Huss at the See also:council of See also:Constance it was repudiated by the English delegates. The archbishop treated Oxford as if it had issued the document, and procured the issue of severe regulations in order to purge the university of heresy. In 1408 See also:Arundel in convocation proposed and carried the famous Constitutiones Thomae Arundel intended to put down Wycliffite preachers and teaching. They provided amongst other things that no one was to be allowed to preach without a bishop's See also:licence, that preachers preaching to the laity were not to rebuke the sins of the clergy, and that Lollard books and the translation of the Bible were to be searched for and destroyed. When See also:Henry V. became king a more determined effort was made to crush Lollardy. Hitherto its strength had lain among the country gentlemen who were the representatives of the shires. The See also:court and clergy had been afraid to attack this powerful class. The new king determined to overawe them, and to this end selected one who had been a See also:personal friend and whose life had been blameless.

This was Sir John OldcastIe, in right of his wife, See also:

Lord See also:Cobham, " the good Lord Cobham " as the See also:common people called him. Henry first tried. personal persuasion, and when that failed directed trial for heresy. See also:Oldcastle was convicted, but was imprisoned for See also:forty days in the. See also:Tower in hope that he might recant. He escaped, and summoned his co-religionists to his aid. A Lollard See also:plot was formed to seize the king's See also:person. In the end Oldcastle was burnt for an obstinate heretic (Dec. 1417). These persecutions were not greatly protested against; the wars of Henry V. with See also:France had awakened the See also:martial spirit of the nation, and little sympathy was See also:felt for men who had declared that all war was but the murder and plundering of poor people for the See also:sake of kings. Mocking ballads were composed upon the See also:martyr Oldcastle, and this dislike to warfare was one of the See also:chief accusations made against him (comp. See also:Wright's Political Poems, ii. 244).

But Arundel could not prevent the See also:

writing and See also:distribution o: Lollard books and See also:pamphlets. Two appeared about the time of the martyrdom of Oldcastle—The Ploughman's See also:Prayer and the Lanthorne of See also:Light. The Ploughman's Prayer declared that true worship consists in three things—in loving See also:God, and dreading God and trusting in God above all other things; and it showed how Lollards, pressed by persecution, became further separated from the religious life of the church. " Men maketh ,now great stonen houses full of glasen windows, and clepeth thilke thine houses and churches. And they setten in these houses mawmets of See also:stocks and stones, to fore them they knelen privilich and apert and maken their prayers, and all this they say is they worship. . . . For Lorde our belief is that thine See also:house is man's soul." Notwithstanding the repression, Lollardy fastened in new parts of England, and Lollards abounded in See also:Somerset, See also:Norfolk, See also:Suffolk, See also:Essex, See also:Lincoln and See also:Buckinghamshire. The council of Constance (1414–1418) put an end to the papal See also:schism, and also showed its determination to put down heresy by burning John Huss. When See also:news of this reached England the clergy were incited to still more vigorous proceedings against Lollard preachers and books. From this time Lollardy appears banished from the See also:fields and streets, and takes See also:refuge in houses and places of concealment. There was no more wayside preaching, but instead there were conventicula occulta in houses, in peasants' huts, in sawpits and in See also:field ditches, where the Bible was read and exhortations were given, and so Lollardy continued. In 1428 Archbishop Chichele confessed that the Lollards seemed as numerous as ever, and that their See also:literary and preaching work went on as vigorously as before.

It was found also that many of the poorer rectors and See also:

parish priests, and a great many chaplains and curates, were in See also:secret association with the Lollards, so much so that in many places processions were never made and worship on See also:saints' days was abandoned. For the Lollards were hardened by persecution, and became fanatical Political Poems and Songs See also:relating to English See also:History, published in 1859 by Thomas Wright for the Master of the Rolls See also:series, and in the Piers Ploughman poems. Piers Ploughman's Creed (see See also:LANGLAND) was probably written about 1394, when Lollardy was at its greatest strength; the ploughman of the Creed is a man gifted with sense enough to see through the tricks of the friars, and with such religious knowledge as can be got from the creed, and from Wycliffe's version of the Gospels. The poet gives us a " portrait of the See also:fat See also:friar with his See also:double See also:chin shaking about as big as a See also:goose's See also:egg, and the ploughman with his See also:hood full of holes, his mittens made of patches, and his poor wife going barefoot on the See also:ice so that her See also:blood followed " (See also:Early English See also:Text Society, vol. See also:xxx., pref., p. 16); and one can easily see why farmers and peasants turned from the friars to the poor preachers. The Ploughman's Complaint tells the same See also:tale. It paints popes, cardinals, prelates, rectors, monks and friars, who See also:call them-selves followers of See also:Peter and keepers of the See also:gates of See also:heaven and See also:hell, and See also:pale poverty-stricken people, cotless and landless, who have to pay the fat clergy for spiritual assistance, and asks if these are Peter's priests. " I trowe Peter took no money, for no sinners that he sold. . .. Peter was never so great a fole, to leave his See also:key with such a losell." In 1399 the Lancastrian Henry IV. overthrew the See also:Plantagenet Richard II., and one of the most active partisans of the new monarch was Arundel, archbishop of Canterbury and the most determined opponent of Lollardy. Richard II. had aided the clergy to suppress Lollardy without much success. The new See also:dynasty supported the church in a similar way and not more successfully.

The strength of the See also:

anti-clerical party See also:lay in the House of Commons, in which the representatives of the shires took the leading See also:part. Twice the Commons petitioned the See also:crown to seize the temporalities of the church and apply them to such See also:national purposes as See also:relief of See also:taxation, See also:maintenance of the poor and the support of new lords and knights. Their anti-clerical policy was not continuous, however. The court party and the clergy proposed statutes for the suppression of heresy, and twice at least secured the concurrence of the Commons. One of these was the well-known See also:statute De heretico comburendo passed in 1401. In the earlier stages of Lollardy, when the court and the clergy managed to bring Lollards before ecclesiastical tribunals backed by the See also:civil power, the accused generally recanted and showed no disposition to endure martyrdom for their opinions. They became bolder in the beginning of the 15th century. William See also:Sawtrey (Chartris), caught and condemned, refused to recant and was burnt at St See also:Paul's See also:Cross (See also:March 1401), and other martyrdoms followed. The victims usually belonged to the See also:lower classes. In 1410 John See also:Badby, an See also:artisan, was sent to the stake. His See also:execution was memorable from the part taken in it by the See also:prince of See also:Wales, who himself tried to See also:reason the Lollard out of his convictions. But nothing said would make Badby confess that " Christ sitting at supper did give to His disciples His living See also:body to eat." The Lollards, far from daunted, See also:abated no effort to make good their ground, and See also:united a struggle for social and political See also:liberty to the hatred felt by the peasants towards the Romish clergy.

Jak Upland (John Countryman) took the See also:

place of Piers Ploughman, and upbraided the clergy, and especially the friars, for their See also:wealth and luxury. Wycliffe had published the See also:rule of St Francis, and had pointed out in a commentary upon the rule how far friars had departed from the See also:maxims of their founder, and had persecuted the Spiriluales (the Fratricelli, Beghards, Lollards of the Netherlands) for keeping them to the See also:letter (cf. See also:Matthews, English See also:Works of Wyclif hitherto unprinted, Early Eng. Text See also:Soc., vol. lxxiv., 188o). Jak Upland put all this into See also:rude See also:nervous English See also:verse: " Freer, what charitie is this To See also:fain that whoso liveth after your order Liveth most perfectlie, And next followeth the See also:state of the Apostles In povertie and pennance: And yet the wisest and greatest clerkes of you Wend or send or procure to the court of Rome, . . . and to be assoiled of the vow of povertie." in the statement of their doctrines. Thomas Bagley was accused of declaring that if in the See also:sacrament a See also:priest made bread into God, he made a God that can be eaten by rats and mice; that the See also:pharisees of the See also:day, the monks, and the nuns, and the friars and all other privileged persons recognized by the church were limbs of Satan; and that auricular confession to the priest was the will not of God but of the See also:devil. And others held that any priest who took See also:salary was excommunicate; and that boys could bless the bread as well as priests. From England Lollardy passed into See also:Scotland. Oxford infected St See also:Andrews, and we find traces of more than one vigorous See also:search made for Lollards among the teaching staff of the Scottish university, while the Lollards of Kyle in See also:Ayrshire were claimed by See also:Knox as the forerunners of the Scotch Reformation. The opinions of the later Lollards can best be gathered from the learned and unfortunate See also:Pecock, who wrote his elaborate Repressor against the " Bible-men," as he calls them. He summed up their doctrines under eleven heads: they condemn the having and using images in the churches, the going on pilgrimages to the memorial or " mynde places " of the saints, the holding of landed possessions by the clergy, the various ranks of the See also:hierarchy, the framing of ecclesiastical See also:laws and ordinances by papal and episcopal authority, the institution of religious orders, the costliness of ecclesiastical decorations, the ceremonies of the See also:mass and the sacraments, the taking of oaths and the maintaining that war and See also:capital See also:punishment are lawful.

When these points are compared with the Lollard Conclusions of 1395, it is See also:

plain that Lollardy had not greatly altered its opinions after fifty-five years of persecution. All the articles of Pecock's See also:list, See also:save that on capital punishment, are to be found in the Conclusions; and, although many writers have held that Wycliffe's own views differed greatly from what have been called the " exaggerations of the later and more violent Lollards," all these views may be traced to Wycliffe himself. Pecock's idea was that all the statements which he was prepared to impugn came from three false opinions or " trowings," viz. that no governance or ordinance is to be esteemed a See also:law of God which is not founded on Scripture, that every humble-minded Christian man or woman is able without " fail and defaut " to find out the true sense of Scripture, and that having done so he ought to listen to no arguments to the contrary; he elsewhere adds a See also:fourth (i. to2), that if a man be not only See also:meek but also keep God's law he shall have a true understanding of Scripture, even though " no man See also:ellis teche him saue God." These statements, especially the last, show us the connexion between the Lollards and those mystics of the 14th century, such as See also:Tauler and Ruysbroeck, who accepted the teachings of See also:Nicholas of See also:Basel, and formed themselves into the association of the See also:Friends of God. The persecutions were continued down to the reign of Henry VIII., and when the writings of See also:Luther began to appear in England the clergy were not so much afraid of Lutheranism as of the increased life they gave to men who for generations had been See also:reading Wycliffe's Wickette. " It is," wrote Bishop See also:Tunstall to See also:Erasmus in 1523, " no question of pernicious novelty, it is only that new arms are being added to the great See also:band of Wycliffite heretics." Lollardy, which continued down to the Reformation, did much to shape the movement in England. The subordination of clerical to laic See also:jurisdiction, the reduction in ecclesiastical possessions, the insisting on a translation of the Bible which could be read by the " common " man were all inheritances bequeathed by the Lollards.

End of Article: LOLLARDS

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