In this age of liberty it is difficult to imagine the arbitrary power exercised by the Popes of the Middle Ages. In England during the fourteenth century a battle was constantly being carried on between the King and his Parliament on the one side, and the Papal Court on the other.
We have seen how the Parliament in 1366 rejected the demand for the 1000 marks annually, made by Urban V. We have noticed how the country was being drained by the constant exactions of the Roman Pontiffs, and have stated that stringent laws were passed to protect the rights of the Crown and the property of the subject. We have now to witness a continuance of the strife, and to see the measures adopted by the estates of the realm to throw off the yoke which papal tyranny had imposed upon the nation.
Two Acts had been passed: the first, called the Statute of Provisors, in 1350, and the second, the Statute of Praemunire, three years after, especially with the view of checking the papal usurpations.
The first of these statutes declared it illegal to procure any presentation to any benefice from the Court of Rome, or to accept any living otherwise than as the law directed through the chapters and ordinary electors. The second forbade all appeals on questions of property from the English tribunals to the courts at Rome, under pain of confiscation of goods and imprisonment during the King’s pleasure.
In spite of these enactments the Pope continued to reserve to himself certain benefices in England, generally the more wealthy livings, and not only appointed to the same, but by his provisor issued his appointment beforehand. The rights of the Crown, or of the lawful patron, were set aside, and the real presentee had either to buy up the provisor or allow the Pope’s nominee, often a foreigner, to enjoy the benefice.
In this way the best livings in England were held by Italians, Frenchmen and other foreigners. Some of these were mere boys, ignorant not only of the English language but even of Latin, who never so much as saw their churches, but committed the care of them to such as they could get to serve them the cheapest, and received the revenues at Rome or elsewhere, remitted to them by their proctors to whom they let their tithes.
These grievances were felt to be intolerable. The Parliament addressed a new remonstrance to the King, setting forth the unbearable nature of the oppressions, and praying him to take action in the matter. Edward III, in 1373, appointed four commissioners to proceed to Avignon, where Pope Gregory XI resided, to lay the complaints of the English people before him, and to request that for the future he would forbear meddling with the reservation of benefices. The ambassadors were courteously received, but they obtained no redress.
The Parliament renewed their complaints, and requested that “remedy be provided against the provisions of the Pope, whereby he reaps the first fruits of ecclesiastical dignities, the treasure of the realm being thereby conveyed away, which they cannot bear.”
In 1374 a Royal Commission was issued to inquire into the number of ecclesiastical benefices and dignities, in England, held by aliens, and to estimate their value. It was found that the number of livings in the hands of Italians, Frenchmen, and other foreigners was so great that, says Foxe, “were it all set down, it would fill almost half-a-quire of paper.”
The king resolved to make another attempt to settle this matter with the Papal Court. He appointed a new commission, and it is an evidence of the growing influence of Wicliffe that his name stands second on the list of delegates. The commissioners were John Gilbert, Bishop of Bangor; John Wicliffe, Doctor of Theology; John Guter, Dean of Segovia; Simon Multon; William Burton; Robert Belknap; and John of Kensyngton.
The Pope declined to receive the King’s Commissioners at Avignon and made choice of the city of Bruges in the Netherlands. Thither he sent his nuncios to confer with the English delegates. The negotiations dragged on for two years, the result being a compromise: the Pope engaging on his part to desist from the reservation of benefices, and the King promising on his, no more to confer them by simple royal command.
This arrangement left the power of the Pope over English benefices at least equal to that of the sovereign. The result satisfied no one in England. The truce was seen to be a hollow one and did not last.
There is reason to suspect that the interests of England were betrayed in this negotiation. The Bishop of Bangor, on whom the embassy chiefly devolved, was immediately on his return home translated to the See of Hereford, and in 1389 to that of St. David’s. In both instances his promotion was the result of papal provisors, and looked like a reward for services rendered.
The visit to Bruges was an important one for the reformer. Wicliffe had never before left his native land. The city to which he went was a large and wealthy one, with a population of 200,000. It was the emporium of Europe. Its citizens combined a taste for splendor with a spirit of independence, and evinced a self-confidence and fearlessness which passed with the more patient victims of feudal tyranny for presumption and insolence. At the time of Wicliffe’s visit the conference for the settlement of peace between England and France was sitting in Bruges. The Dukes of Anjou and Burgundy, brothers of the sovereign, were delegates on the part of France, while the claims of England were entrusted to the Earl of Salisbury; Sudbury, then Bishop of London; and John of Gaunt, the Duke of Lancaster, son of the King. Wicliffe’s position at Bruges secured him access to these ambassadors and to other persons of note who were then in the city. His insight into the policy and intrigues of the States and the Church produced no doubt deep impressions upon his mind, not altogether favorable to the papacy and its friends.
He was more than disgusted with the result of the protracted negotiations, and the views which had been opened to him of papal sanctity were such that his rebukes of the corruptions of the Pope and the Papal Court were soon after his return applied with unsparing severity. Avarice, ambition, hypocrisy — these were the gods that were worshipped at the Roman Court; these were the virtues that adorned the Papal Throne.
Soon after his return from Bruges, Wicliffe was appointed to the rectorship of Lutterworth, in Leicestershire. As this preferment came from the King, it may be accepted as a sign of the royal approval of his conduct as a commissioner, and of his growing influence at Court.
Parliament in April, 1376, restated the grievances of the country in relation to the papal demands and encroachments. They drew up a Bill of Indictment against the papal usurpations, and set forth the manifold miseries under which the country was groaning through the tyranny of a foreign power which had crept into the kingdom under spiritual pretexts. In this document it was stated that the revenue drawn by the Pope from the realm was five times as much as that which the King received; that the Pope’s collector had opened an establishment in London, with a staff of officers, as if it were one of the great courts of the nation, transporting to the Pope twenty thousand marks annually, or more; and that the Pope often imposed a special tax upon the clergy, which he sometimes expended, in subsidizing the enemies of the country.
They further stated that it be good to renew all the statutes against provisions from Rome, and requested that no papal collector or proctor should remain in England, upon pain of life and limb; and that no Englishman, on the like pain, should become such collector or proctor, or remain at the Court of Rome.
The nation supported the Parliament, and the statutes against the papal appointments were rigidly enforced. The Pope maintained the strife for a few years, but ultimately had to give way before the firm attitude of the people.
Wicliffe’s was the spirit that moved the Commons of England. His graphic style may be recognized in the document of the Parliament, and he it was who once again led the way to victory and to the assertion of the people’s rights as the free subjects of an independent realm.
Prior to these events, the Parliament had in 1371 carried a motion imposing a war-tax upon the estates of the clergy, and, in connection with the imposition of this tax, they had made a proposition to the Crown that the King should remove all prelates from the high offices of State, and fill up the vacancies with laymen. Edward III accepted the proposal, and in February 1372 none but laymen constituted the Privy Council. Among those who resigned their offices in connection with this proposition were William of Wykeham, the famous architect, who was the Lord Chancellor, and the Bishop of Exeter, who was then the Treasurer of the Kingdom.
In the creation of the feeling which brought about this great and beneficial change, Wicliffe was one of the most important factors. His language is definite: “Neither prelates nor doctors, priests nor deacons, should hold secular offices, that is, those of Chancery, Treasury, Privy Seal and other such secular offices in the Exchequer. Neither be stewards of lands, nor stewards of the hall, nor clerks of the kitchen, nor clerks of accounts; neither be occupied in any secular office in lords’ courts, more especially while secular men are sufficient to do such offices.”
In another treatise he writes that “prelates and great religious possessioners are so occupied in heart about worldly lordships and with pleas of business, that no habit of devotion, of praying, of thoughtfulness on heavenly things, on the sins of their own hearts, or on those of other men, may be preserved, neither may they be found studying and preaching of the Gospel, nor visiting and comforting of poor men.”
He liveth long who liveth well!
All other life is short and vain;
He liveth longest who can tell
Of living most for heavenly gain.
He liveth long who liveth well!
All else is being flung away;
liveth longest who can tell
Of true things truly done each day.