CHAPTER VIII.

WICKLIFFE'S WRITINGS FOR THE PEOPLE.

FROM the period of Wickliffe's retirement to Lutterworth, a marked change appears in the direction of his labors. The plans of reform, on which he had spent so large a portion of his best years, seemed now farther from realization than ever. All hope of improvement proceeding from the "Head of the Church," from the clergy, or from the enlightened action of the secular power, was now seen to be vain. Even Oxford, the last refuge of intellectual and religious freedom, had barred her doors against him. It all served but to ripen in his mind the great idea, by which his labors were to be separated from the decaying Past, and to receive a living, organic connexion with the whole future of his country and his race. He turns from king and noble, from Pope, and priest and scholar, with the determination to place the light of divine truth, freed from all veil or covering, in the honest keeping of the common people.

Under the inspiration of this idea, Wickliffe entered

with redoubled vigor on the final stage of his activity. He was now in his fifty-seventh year; and though disease, and the excitements of his stormy life had shaken his bodily frame, the eagle spirit seemed gifted with more than youthful fire. Never before had he exhibited such productive energy. His English writings for the people budded under his pen like leaves in spring. It is evident, from various passages in his works, that he looked upon this golden opportunity as very brief; that persecution, to close perhaps in martyrdom, was among the anticipations of each to-morrow. He labored, therefore, as one who has a message of life and death to deliver, and fears he may not have time to utter it. "I should be worse than an infidel "— thus he writes in one of his works on the EucharistI not to defend unto the death, the law of Christ; and certain I am, that it is not in the power of the heretics, and disciples of Anti-Christ, to impugn this evangelical doctrine. On the contrary, I trust through our Lord's mercy, to be superabundantly rewarded, after this short and miserable life, for the lawful contention which I wage. I know from the Gospel, that Anti-Christ, with all his devices, can only kill the body; but Christ, in whose cause I contend, can cast both body and soul into hell-fire. Sure I am, that he will not suffer his servants to want what is needful for them, since he freely exposed himself to a dreadful death for their sakes, and has ordained that all his most beloved disciples should pass through severe suffering with a view to their good."

were

It is a matter of regret, that the limits of this sketch allow only of a few brief extracts from these writings, so characteristic of the genius and spirit of the man. whole range of subjects which had formed the groundwork

of his life-labors, was here presented in a form admirably adapted to the common mind. In his own noble, homely, expressive English, the true language of the people, he unmasks the character, the false pretensions and corrupt doctrines of the priesthood; and encourages the humble reader, in the exercise of the understanding which God has given him, enlightened by the Scriptures, to meet them like a free Christian man. They are not, however, mainly of a controversial nature, though most of them must, of necessity, contain pointed allusions to the specific sins and errors of the clergy. But his chief object, in the exposure of error, is to gain for the great saving truths of the Gospel, an immediate, life-imparting contact with the souls of his readers. He seeks to detach them from their false guides, only that he may lead them to the one Saviour from sin and misery.

Among the most interesting of his offerings to the poor and humble in society, are those little treatises, designed strictly as helps to a devout and holy life. His English writings, in general, are characterized by a brevity singular in that day of interminable folios. But these mark still more strikingly, the practical genius of the Reformer. Our modern religious tracts, that mighty agency for the diffusion of truth, are but the reproduction of the device struck from his prophetic brain five hundred years ago. "The Poor Caitiff" is a collection of such little detached pieces, none of them extending beyond a few pages, some only over a leaf or two, and others but a single page. From their extreme brevity, they could be multiplied and scattered almost without limit, even in an age when print

Published in the "British Reformers" of the London Religious Tract Society. Caitiff was the common appellation of a person in the lower ranks.

ing was unknown. It has been well said of Dr. Watts, that the true greatness of his character nowhere appears so clearly as in his "Divine Songs for Children." With yet deeper reverence do we sit at the feet of Wickliffe, the royal ambassador, the friend of princes, the most eminent scholar of his time, as with sublime simplicity, humility, and sweetness, he speaks to the neglected and degraded poor, these heavenly words of instruction and consolation. They are the best refutation of the malevolent charge that his influence tended to popular disorder. Two or three passages must suffice here.

"To any degree of true love to Jesus, no soul can attain unless he be truly meck. For a proud soul seeks to have his own will, and so he shall never come to any degree of God's love. Ever the lower that a soul sitteth in the valley of meekness, so many the more streams of grace and love come thereto. And if the soul be high in the hills of pride, the wind of the fiend bloweth away all manner of goodness therefrom." "Singular love is, when all solace and comfort is closed out of the heart but the love of Jesus alone. Other delight or other joy pleases not; for the sweetness of him is so comforting and lasting, his love is so burning and gladdening, that he who is in this degree may well feel the fire of love burning in his soul. That fire is so pleasant that no man can tell but he that feeleth it, and not fully he. Then the soul is Jesus loving, on Jesus thinking, and Jesus desiring, only burning in coveting of him; singing in him, resting on him. Then the thought turns to song and melody." "God playeth with his child when he suffereth him to be tempted; as a mother rises from her much beloved child, and hides herself and leaves him alone, and suffers him to cry, Mother, Mother,

so that he looks about, cries and weeps for a time; and at last when the child is ready to be overset with troubles and weeping, she comes again, clasps him in her arms, kisses him and wipes away the tears. So our Lord suffereth his loved child to be tempted and troubled for a time, and withdraweth some of his solace and full protection, to see what his child will do; and when he is about to be overcome by temptations, then he defendeth him and comforteth him by his grace."

These writings were the text-books of piety to the persecuted church of Christ, for more than a hundred years; and next to the English Bible, were the most efficient agency in moulding its opinions and character, and in making ready, against the happier times to come, a people for the Lord. They often had the honor of being cast with the inspired word into the flames, or of mingling their ashes with those of the martyr, convicted of having read and believed their words, on whose faithful bosom they had been hung as a mark of shame. So largely were they multiplied, and so sacredly treasured by the people, that after a century and a half of rigid proscription and destruction, it was found no very difficult matter to make entire collections of these writings.