Oxford and Its Story

o inconsiderable influence on its history. Bands of men began to arrive and to settle there, members of new orders vowed to poverty a

orbed in politics; spiritually the disuse of preaching, the decline of the monastic orders into rich landowners, the non-residence and ignorance of parish priests combined to rob her of her p

the alms of the poor and carry the Gospel to them. The older monasticism was reversed; the solitary of the cloister was exchanged for the preacher, the monk for the friar. Everywhere the itinerant preachers, whose fervid appeal,

grew their accommodation. They sold their land and buildings, and with the proceeds built themselves a house and schools and church "on a pleasant isle in the south suburbs," which was granted them by Henry III. (1259). The site of their new habitation at the end of Speedwe

ondon, whence two of them made their way to Oxford-Richard of Ingeworth and Richard of Devon. Their journey was eventful. Night drew on as they approached

said they were mistaken in them; for they were not such kind of people, but the servants of God, and the professors of an apostolic life. Whereupon the expectation of the monks being thus frustrated, they vilely spurned at them and caused them to be thrust out of the gate. But one of the young monks had compassion on them and said to the porter: 'I desire thee for the

e answered that he was of the order of S. Benedict. Then Christ, turning to S. Benedict said, 'Is it true that he speaks?' S. Benedict answered, 'Lord, he and his companions are overthrowers of my religion, for I have given charge in my rule that the Abbot's table should be free for guests, and now these have denied those things that were but necessary for them.' Then Christ, upon this complaint, commanded that the Prior before mentioned should immediately be hanged on the elm-tree before the cloister. Afterwards the sacrist and cellarer being examined did undergo the same death also. These things being done, Christ turned Himself to the young monk that had compassion on the said friars, asking him of what order he was. Who thereupon, making a pause and considering how his brethren were handled, said at length, 'I am of the order that this poor man is.' Then Christ said to the poor man, whose name was as yet concealed, 'Francis, is it true that he saith, that he is of your order?' Francis answered, 'He is mine, O Lord, he is mine; and

ition of the parochial priesthood to the spiritual energy of the mendicant preachers, who, clad in their coarse frock of grey serge, with a girdle of rope round thei

ops and abbots relinquishing their dignities and preferments became Minorites. They scorned not "the roughness of the penance and the robe," but "did with incomparable humility carry upon their shoulders the coul and the hod, for the speedier finishing this structure." The site chosen by the Grey Friars for their settlement is not without significance. The work of the friars was physical as well as moral. Rapid increase of the population huddled within the narrow circle of the walls had resulted here as elsewhere in overcrowding, which accentuated the insanitary conditions of life. A gutter running down the centre of unpaved streets was supposed to drain the mess of the town as well as the slops thrown from the windows of the houses. Garbage of all sorts collected and rotted there. Within the houses the rush-strewn floors collected a foul heritage of scraps and droppings. Personal uncleanliness, encouraged by the ascetic prohibitions and directions of a morbid monastic

e hear of Adam Marsh refusing bags of gold that were sent him; we hear of two of the brethren returning from a Chapter held at Oxford at Christmas-time, singing as they picked their way along the rugged path, over the

s rigorously suppressed, but under Haymo of Faversham (1238) a different spirit began to prevail. Haymo preferred that "the friars should have ample areas and should cultivate them, that they migh

and reaching southward to the bank of the Thames, and extending along the bank westward as far as the land of the Abbot of Bec in the parish of S. Bodhoc, and then turning again to the northward till it joins with the old wall of the borough, by the east side of the small postern." In 1245

ey. On the east side of it, where the main entrance lay, at the junction of the present Littlegate Street and Charles Street, was the road leading from Watergate

ir church large and decent; and their refectory, c

ch Place as it is called to-day. The cloisters probably

e true Doctors, he held, were those who with the meekness of wisdom show forth good works for the edification of their neighbours. But the very popularity of their preaching drove his disciples to the study of theology. Thei

earning." He was indeed much concerned at the results of Grossetete's lectures. For one day when he entered this school to see what progress his scholars were making in literature, he found them disputing eagerly and making enquiries whether there was a God. The scandalised Provincia

great industry from abroad Greek, Hebrew and mathematical writings, at that time unknown in England. The fate of this priceless collection of books was enough to make Wood "burst out with grief." For, when the monasteries had begun t

, not only from Scotland and Ireland, but from France and Acquitaine, Italy, Spain, Portugal, and Germany; while many of the Franciscan schools on the Continent drew their teachers from Oxford. Duns Scotus and William Ockham were trained by these teachers; Roger Bacon, the founder of modern sci

publish any work under pain of forfeiture, and the penance of bread and water. Even when he was commanded by the Pope to write, the friars were so much afraid of the purport of his researches that they kept him in solitude on bread and water, and would not allow him to have access even to the few books and writings available in those days. Science, they maintained, had already reached its perfection; the world enjoyed

s Minus, and the Opus Tertium were written. If this had been true of the Opus Majus alone, and if that work had not been remarkable for the boldness and originality of its views, yet as a

ork yet known is a fragment preserved i

led to the desks that they might do no harm. For Bacon's method of study exposed him to the charge of magic. It was said that he was in alliance with the Evil One, and the tradition arose

the Devil into his presence by his art, observed with astonishment that he did reverence when a priest carrying the sacrament passed without

ommon sort of bequest in those days-suspected by reason of his figuring and conjuring, so that his servitor found a ready audience when, wishi

ue his studies. And at a later time tradition said that Friar Bacon was wont to use as an observatory the story built over the semi-circular archway of the gate on the south bridge, and it was therefore known as Friar Bacon's Study. The little "gate-house" must h

Worceste

em, like the other Orders, soon to have forgotten their traditional austerity. Lands accrued to them; they erected suitable buildings with planted groves and walks upon a large and pleasant site. But not content with this, they presently obtained from Edward II. the roya

the death of his father, he entertained the same Baston for the same purpose. At length the said king encountering Robert Bruce, was forced with his bishops to fly. In which flight Baston telling the king that if he would call upon the Mother of God for mercy he should find favour, he did so accordi

ely as a convent for the habitation of twenty-four monks, but also as a place of education for members of this Order throughou

urch of the White Fria

cquired property and settled "without Smith Gate, having Holywell Street on the south sid

d also in violent philosophical controversies with the other Orders, so that at last they were even threatened with excommunication if they did not des

lege, from

from Henry III. a grant of land which formed the parish of S. Budoc and lay to the west of the property of

afterwards known as Trinity Hall, was situated outside the East Gate (opposite Magdal

within the East Gate, which was purchase

ne or two moves, settled themselves in

for the education of their monks. But they never aimed at producing great scholars or learned theologians. Historians o

es in the province of Canterbury with a view to establishing a house at Oxford where students of their Or

ter's Abbey at Gloucester." The buildings were afterwards enlarged to provide room for student-monks from other Benedictine abbeys. Of the lodgings thus erected by the various abbeys for their novices, indications may still be traced in the old monastic buildin

Worcest

o a hall for the use of his College of S. John. Gloucester Hall, now become S. John Baptist Hall, after a chequered career, was refounded and endowed in 1714 as Worcester College out

ut 50 feet (including Kettell Hall) on Broad Street, and 500 feet on the "Kingis hye waye of Bewmounte." It was here that Richard de Bury, Bishop of Du

at it was hardly possible to stand or move without treading upon them. In the Philobiblon the bishop describes his means and methods of collecting books. In the course of his visitations he dug into the disus

ith the necessary revenues, for the maintenance of a number of scholars; and, moreover, to enrich the hall with the treasures of our books, that all and every one of them

those of the Sorbonne, for the use and preservation of

s intention to convert into a body corporate, consisting of a prior and twelve brethren. And in gratitude for the signal defeat of the Scots at Halidon Hill, Edward III. took the proposed college under his special protection. Bury, however, died, and died in debt, so that he himself never succeeded in found

which asserts that some of them at least did come to Oxford. There, it is supposed, they remained till Durham Hall was dissolved by Henry VIII., when they were dispersed, s

nd it may be taken to form, happily enough, the connecting link between the old monastic house and the modern Trini

ndation of Rewley Abbey, of which the main entrance was once north-west of Hythe

Thame. He gave sixteen acres to the west of the Abbey for walks and for private use. To represent the twenty-one monks of the foundation, twenty-one elm-trees were planted within the gates, and at the upper end a tree by itself to represent the abbot. It was to this Abbey, then, that

l Co

ohn Baptist. But a large part of the buildings date from Chichele's foundation, and the statue of S. Berna

ant groves and environed with clear streams." Only a fragment of a wall and doorway now remain. A memorial stone, purchased from the site of Rewley by Hearne

gious foundations in Oxford. There was the House of Converts; there were several hospitals and hermitages and

, Rewle

After the expulsion of the Jews and when the number of converts began to fail, it was used as a Hall for scholars and known as Cary's Inn. Later it was the magnificent

iel College. In the fourteenth century forty days' indulgence or pardon of sins was granted by the Bishop of Lincoln to all who would pay their devotions at the chapel of S. Bartholomew, on the feast of that saint, and give of their charity to the leprous alms-folk.

od a certain vessel decked with Tuttyes, and therein offered a piece of silver; which was afterwards divided among the poor men. After leaving the chapel by paths strewn with flowers, they in the open space, like the ancient Druids, the Apollinian offspring, echoed and warbled out from the shady arbours harmonious melody, consisting of s

aw-bone of an ancient cenobite, the tooth or even the toe-nail of a saint or martyr. Charms, in those days, were considered more efficacious than drugs, and the bones of saints were the favourite remedies prescribed by the monkish physicians. Comb your hair with this comb of Saint Edmund, then, and you would surely be cured of frenzy or headache; apply the bones of S. Stephen to your rheumatic joints, and your pains would disappear. So it was most firmly

them to an officer appointed to receive them. Obedient crowds came to display their saintly treasures, and lo! a ton of the veritable teeth of

the benefit of them. S. Bartholomew's hospital was used as a common pest-house for the plague in 1643, and shortly after was completely demolished. The chapel fared

opposite the College cricket grounds, and just short of the Military College and barracks, a ruined building which is the old chapel of S. Bartholomew, and co

the west side of South Bridge. The hermits who lived there successively were called the hermits of Grand Pont. They passed their lives, we are told, in continual prayer and bodily labour-"in prayer against the vanities of the world, for poor

Grange, which was in great repute at one time for the entertainment of poor

d other miserable persons. Among the property granted or confirmed to it by Henry III. in a very liberal charter, was the mill kn

en College, and part of the site of the Physic Garden, which lies on the other side of the High Street, facing the modern entrance to that college. The latter site was that reserved for the Jews' cemetery; the hospital buildings were erected on the other port

confirmed the suppression of the hospital and its incorporat

place of the Hospital a College of a President, secular scholars and other ministers for the service of God and th

doorway to the west of the tower marks one of the entrances to the hospital. And Wood was probably correct in saying that the college kitchen was

llor," Adam Marsh, and the Franciscans in general, helped to reconcile their claims with the interests of the University. But the University was always inclined to be jealous of them; to regard them bitterly, and not without reason, as grasping bodies, who were never tired of seeking for peculiar favours and privileges and always ready to appeal to the Pope on the least provocation. Before lo

sed in 1253, and became the occasion of a statute, providing that for the future no one should incept in Theology unless he had previously ruled in Arts in some University and read one book of the Canon, or of the Sentences, and publicly preached in the University. This statute was challenged some fifty years later by the Dominicans, and gave rise to a bitter controversy which involved the Mendicant Orders in much odium. The Dominicans appealed first to the King and then to the Pope, but the award of the arbitrators appointed upheld the statute. The right of granting dispensations, however, or graces to incept in Theology, to those who had not ruled in Arts, was reserved to the Chancellor and Masters. A clause which prohibited the extortion of such "graces

ubt the University was right in insisti

y, "and had never learnt anything of real value. Ignorant of all parts and sciences of mundane philosophy, they venture on the stu

ystem is to specialise, not in theology but in science,

ar theologians from extinction, Robert de Sorbonne established his college (1257) for secular clerks, so now at Oxford, Walter de Merton took the most momentous step in the history of our national education by founding a college for twenty students of Theology or Canon Law, who not only

on of Merton College was the expression of a conception entirely new in England. It deserves special consideration, for it b

ide opposite to that of Simon de Montford, he was enabled perhaps by the very success of his opponent and the leisure that so came to him, to perfect the scheme which

Malden to a "house of Scholars of Merton," with the obj

as vested were not allowed to reside within its walls for more than one week in the year, at the annual

ton College Herb

e of Winchester. They were to study in some University where they were to hire a hall and live together as a community. It was in the very year of the secession to Northampton that the statutes were issued, and it would have been obviously inexpedient to bind the students to one Univers

e simply and frugally, without murmuring, satisfied with b

at Oxford and regulated their corporate life more in detail. A sub-warden was now ap

, he must use Latin. In every room one Socius, older and wiser than the others, was to act as Pr?positus, control the manners and studies of the rest and report on them. To every twenty scholars a m

n, so characteristic of English colleges, between the full members of the society, afterwards known as Fellows or Socii, and the scholars or temporary foundationers. Socii originally meant those who boarded together in the same hall. It was the foun

ved his idea of the institution of a separate class of Portionistae, the Merton Po

the return of Edward from the Crusades. As soon as he resigned the seals of office in 1274, he set him

rd, which was designated as the exclusive and permanent home of the scholars. The statute

e officers; the management of the college estates and the conduct of the college business are here regulated with remarkable sagacity. The policy which dictates and underlies them is easy to discern. Fully appreciating the intellectual movement of his age, and unwilling to see the paramount c

elves to studying the liberal arts and philosophy before entering on a course of theology; and he provided special chaplains to relieve them of ritual and ceremonial duties. He contemplated and even encouraged their going forth into the great world. No ascetic obligations were laid on them, but residence and continual study were strictly prescribed, and if

wed by every succeeding founder. The collegiate system revolutionised University life in England. Merton was never tired o

esides those of his own sole gain. Diversities of thought and training, of taste, ability, strength and character, brought into daily contact, bound fast together by ties of common interest, give birth to sympathy, broaden thou

aptist for the benefit of the college, and several houses in its immediate neighbourhood were made over to the

antique stone carving over the college gate, the great north door of the vestibule of the Hall, with its fantastic tracery of iron, perh

un at once to rebuild the parish church as a collegiate church. The high altar was

, with later Perpendicular windows and doors) were finished in 1424, but begun perhaps as early as the choir; a

naveless chapel at New College, the nave which had evidently been intended was omitted at Merton (after 1386). Two arches blo

etrical windows of the chancel is of great i

l Co

ll be noticed. Merton Chapel is v

er that the college quadrangles may trace their origin; as it is from Merton that they derive their constitution. The hall, the chapel, the libraries and the living rooms, as essentials for college life, were first adopted here, and these buildings were disposed in an unconnected manner about a qua

ents of succeeding centuries, beautiful plaster-work and panelling, noble glass and a sixteenth century ceiling, is not very different from that in which the medi?val student pored over the precious manuscripts chained to the rough sloping oaken desks which project from the bookcases. Thes

nce. "A cart-load," says Thomas Allen, an eye-witness, "of such books were sold or given away, if not burnt, for inconsiderable nothings." In this library Anthony Wood was employed in the congenial occupation of "setting the books to rights,"

s to Patey's Quad. The Fellows' Quadrangle was begun in 1608, and the large gateway with columns of the four orders (Roman-Doric, Ionic, Corinthian, and Composite) is typical of the architectural taste of the times. The quadrangle itself, very similar to that of Wadham, is one of the most beautiful and charming examples of late Gothic imaginable. It would have been a fortunate thing if this had been the last building added to Merton. But it was destined that the taste of the Victorian era should be

. In the following year he moved his scholars, eight of whom, he stipulated, must be drawn from Devonshire and four from Cornwall, to tenements which he had bought between the Turl and Smith Gate, just within the walls. The founder added a rector to their number and gave them statutes, based on those of Merton, which clearly indicated that his object was to give a good education to young laymen. The college was practically refound

advowson and rectory of the Church of S. Mary, and ordered to be governed by a Provost, chosen by the scholars from their own number. The first Provost was the founder, who was also Rector of S. Mary's, and the society now established itself in the Rectory House on the south side of the High Street (St Mary Hall), at the north end of Schidyard (Oriel) Street. The college gradually acquired property stretching up to St John's (now Merton) Street, and in so doing became possessed of the tenement at the angle of Merton and Oriel Street called /p, or, for some uncertain reason, but probably on account of its possessing one of the

ist Church keep alive by their names the recollection of the Canterbury college founded by Archbishop Islip (1363) for the Benedictines of Canterbury, the old hostels, which were once erected to receive the Benedictine students from other convents, survive in those old parts of Worcester which lie on your left as you approach the famous gardens of that college. Trinity College occupies the place of Durham, and Wadham has risen amid the ruins of a foundation of Augustines, whose disputative powers were

ldings, Worc

ollege, beautiful no longer, but greater now and more famous than ever by virtue of the services in politics and letters of its successful alumni, owes its origin. For it was under the guidance of

and the Church of Durham, was compelled by the militant bishop whose hard task it was to keep peace on the Border, to do penance. He knelt, in expiation of his crime, at

the peculiarly English college-system inaugurated by Walter de Mert

le supplied them only with food and lodging of a moderate quality. But these youthful students, according to the democratic principles on which the

ed was a Franciscan friar. Now, under the guidance and probably at the instigation of the friar Richard of Slikeburne, whom she appointed her attorney in the business, Lady Dervorguilla of Galloway, the widow of John of Balliol, set herself to secure the welfare of her husband's scholars. Since his death the very existence of the newly formed society had been in jeopardy. The Lady Dervorguilla, then, addressed a letter to the procurators or agents of Balliol's dole, instructing them to put in force a code of statutes which was no doubt in great p

an interesting link between the original scholars of Balliol and the modern Society which is connected with the name of Dr Jowett. The statutes, whic

as he thought best fitted to fulfil the intentions of the founders. He divided the Society into two halves:-ten juniors, Schol

he crumbs that should fall from the table of their superiors. They were to be nominated by the Fellow whom they were to serve, to be from eighteen to twenty-two years of age, and if they proved themselves industrious and well-behaved they

g required, however, to be Bachelors of Arts, of legitimate birth, good character, proficient in their studies, and in need o

senses of seeing clearly, hearing discreetly, smelling sagaciously, tasting moderately, and touching fitly; the senior Fellow was the neck; the Deans were the shoulders; the two priests the sides; the Bursars the arms and hands; the Fellows the stomach; the scholars the legs; and

s' library, and the Old Library, much defaced by Wyatt, survive. The east wall of the library was used to form the west end of the chapel, which was built in 1529 to replace the old oratory. The sixteenth century chapel was removed and the present building erected as a memorial t

ol Co

lege, the east side of the first quadrangle, the north side o

e Dominicans sided with the King. The Mad Parliament met in the Convent of the Black Friars. In philosophy the Franciscans attacked the doctrine of the Dominican, S. Thomas Aquinas, who had made an elaborate attempt to show that natural and revealed truth were complementary the one of the other. In order to establish th

octors have fared very differently at the hands of posterity. Thomas was made a Saint, judged to be a "candlestick," and awarded by Dante a place high in the realms of Paradise. Duns Scotus, on the other hand, whose learning and industry were as great and his merit probably not much inferior, survives chiefly in the English language as a "dunce." The name of the great Oxford scholar stands to the world chiefly as a synonym for a fool and a blockhead. For wh

he Orders in extreme bitterness. The Dominicans retorted that these Franciscans, who claimed and received such credit througho

selytes, their continual strife with the University and their endeavours to obtain peculiar privileges therein had long undermin

ic, theology and philosophy were text-books in the University. But pr

ed the doctrine of Nominalism. At once the glory and reproach o

e bound to follow the example of their Master, and to impose upon themselves absolute poverty. It was a view which found no favour with popes or councils. But undet

taken its place as the centre of intellectual activity in Europe. The most important schoolmen of the age were all Oxonians, an

re. "It was at this time that Philosophy literally descended from the schools into the street, and that the odium metaphysicum

The disputants were led on to deal with the burning questions of the day, the questions, that is, as to the

cal speculations of the Oxford schoolmen, was to issue in a crisis. The crisis was a conflict between the claims

nd left Oxford for a while, but was back again in 1363, and resided in Queen's College. He combined his residence there and his studies for a degree in theology with the holding of a living at Ludgershall in B

o study at Oxford, developing his views. That he was in high favour at Court is shown by the fact that he was nominated (1374) by the Crown to the Rectory of Lutte

before Bishop Courtenay of London to answer charges of erroneous teaching concerning the wealth of the Church (1377). The Duke of Lancaster accepted the challenge as given to himself. He stood by Wycliffe in the Consistory Court at S. Paul's, and a rude brawl between his supporters and those of Courtenay, in which the Duke himself is said to have threatened to drag the Bishop out of the church by the hair of his head, put an end to the trial. Papal bulls were now promulgated against Wycliffe. The University was directed to condemn and arrest him, if he were found guilty of maintaining certain "conclusions" extracted from his writings. The Oxford masters, however, were annoyed at the at

e arrival of a Knight from the Court, who brought a peremptory message from the Princes

ped scot-free. Then followed the scandal of the Great Schism, when two, or

unded on grace." He organised a band of preachers who should instruct the laity in the mother tongue and supply them with a Bible translated into English. Thus under his auspices Oxford became the centre of a widespread religious movement. There the poor or simple priests, as they were called, had a common abode, whence, barefooted and clad in russet or grey gowns which reached to their ank

power, their wealth, their mendicancy, he maintained, were all contrary to the example and precepts of Christ and therefore of their founder. He charged them also with encroaching upon the rights of parents by making use of the confessional to induc

iscan" he had said, "is very near to God"-for then he had been attacking the endowments of the Church, and it was the monks or "possessioners" and th

therefore, when Wycliffe passed from political to doctrinal reform, his att

ip and all the vigour of the vernacular. Iscariot's children, they called them, an

n outbreak of disease in Oxford to the idlene

gathered together in towns they caus

f working a daily miracle by "making the body of Christ." Wycliffe, in the summer of 1381, first publicly denied that the elements of the sacrament underwent any material

tinued to maintain his thesis, and made a direct appeal, not to the Pope, but to the King. The University rallied to his side and tacitly supported his cause by replacing Berton with Robert Rygge in the office of Vice-Chancellor. Rygge was more than a little inclined to be a Wycliffite. And Wycliffe meanwhile appealed also to the people by means of those innumerable tracts in the English tongue, which make the last of the schoolmen the first of the English pamphleteers. Whilst he was thus entering on his most serious encoun

to examine them. The first session was interrupted by an earthquake, which was differently interpreted as a sign of the divine approval or anger. The Earthquake Council had no cho

rendered him too formidable a person to attack. He was left at peace and the storm fell upon his disciples. The attack was made on "certain children of perdition," who had publicly ta

entre of the movement a separ

pinion as the rulers of the University. Still, when the Chancellor was summoned before the Archbishop in London, he did not venture to disobey, and promptly cleared himself of any suspicion of heresy. The council met again at the Blackfriars, and Rygge submissively took his seat in it. On his bended knees he apologised for his disobedience to the Archbishop's orders, and only obtained pardon through the influence of William of Wykeham. Short work was made of the Oxford Wycliffites; they were generally, and four of them by name, suspended from all academical functions. Rygge returned to Oxford, with a letter from Courtenay which repeated the condemnation of the four preachers, adding to their names the name of Wycliffe himself. The latter was likened by the Archbishop to a serpent which emits noxious poison. But the Chancellor protested he dared not execute this mandate, and a royal warrant had to be issued to compel him. Meanwhile he showed his real feeling in the matter by suspend

it a forgery, and at the best it probably only represented, as Maxwell Lyte suggests, the verdict of a minority of the Masters snatched in the Long Vacation. But it is in any case of considerable significance. It extols the character of John Wycliffe, and his exemplary performances as a son of the University; it

any original opinion or truth. Two years later Arundel risked a serious quarrel with the University in order to secure the appointment of a committee to make a list of heresies and errors to be found in Wycliffe's writings. He announced his intention of holding a visitation of the University with that object. He met with violent opposition. The opponents of the Archbishop were not all enthusiastic supporters of Wycliffe's views. Not all masters and scholars were moved by pure zeal either for freedom of speculation or for evangelical truth. The local patriotism of the n

btaining a bull from Boniface IX. in which he specifically confirmed the sole jurisdiction of the Chancellor over all members of the University whatever, Priests and Monks and Friars included. The University, however, was compelled to renounce the bull, and t

iversity was divided against itself. These men, so runs the

, and bring in armed strangers to spend the night. Thomas Wilton came in over the wall at ten and knocked at the Provost's chamber, and woke up and abused him as a liar, and challenged him to get up and come out to fight him. Against the Provost's e

re. S. Mary's, it will be remembered, belonged to Oriel. Hence, perhaps, the active resistance of these Oriel Fellows and of the Dean of Oriel, John Rote, who asked "why should we be punished by an interdict on our church for other people's faults?" And he elegantly added, "The Devil go with the Archbishop and break his neck." The controversy was at last referred to the king. The Chancellors and Pro

obnoxious books solemnly burnt at Carfax. Not long after, a copy of the list of condemned articles was ordered to be preserve

ry notices the few martyrs who from time to time have laid down their lives for their principles, but it oft

subtle and profitless speculation, reproducing and exaggerating in their logical hair-splitting all the faults without any of the intellectual virtues of the great thinkers of the thirteenth and fourteenth centuries. It was against these degenerate dullards that the human mind at last rebelled, when intellect was born again in the New Birth of letters. What wonder

liament and with it the suppression of Lollardy, of free

of Lollardism as a recognised force in English politics

the scruples or passions of their adherents. At length the Council of Pisa deposed, with equal justice, the Popes of Rome and Avignon. In their stead, as they intended, but in addition to them as events were to prove, the conclave, at which the representatives of Oxford and Cambridge were present, unanimously elected Peter Philargi. This Franciscan friar from Crete, who had taken his degree of

gners to benefices in England; they accused the Archbishops of encroaching on the rights of their suffragans, and charged the whole Order of prelates with nepotism and avarice. Abbots, they contended, should not be allowed to wear mitres and sandals as if they were bishops, and monks should hot be exempt from ordinary episcopal jurisdiction. Friars should be restrained from granting absolution on easy terms, from s

t the whole of this manifesto is a cry from Oxford, in 1414, for reformation; it is a direct echo of the teaching and declamation of Wycliffe, and an appeal for reformation as deliberate and less veiled than "the vision of William Langland concerning Piers Plowma

future Warden of Merton, very greatly distinguished themselves. Yet it was by a decree of this very Council of Constance (1415) that the remains of Wycliffe were ordered to be taken up an

dispersed unto all lands: which things are an allegory. For though in England the repression of his teaching deferred the reformation, which theologically as well as politically

e to be cast out of the College "as diseased sheep." It was in 1427 that Fleming obtained a charter permitting him to unite the three parish churches of All Saints', S. Michael's, and S. Mildred's into a collegiate church, and there to establish a "collegiolum," consisting of a rector and seven students of Theology, endowed with the revenue of those churches. No sooner had he appointed the first rector, purchased a site and begun to erect the buildings just south of the tower, than he died. The energy of the second rector, however, Dr John Beke, secured the firmer foundation of the College. He completed the pur

urged its claims in the course of a sermon. He took for his text the words from the psalm, "Behold and visit this vine, and the vineyard which thy right hand hath planted," and he earnestly exhorted the bishop to complete the work begun by his predecessor. For the College was poor, and what property it had was at this time threatened. So powerful and convincing was his appeal that, at the end of the sermon, the bishop stood up and announced that he would grant th

dow, Linc