WILLIAM OF OCCAM.

Works. A critical catalogue of his works is given by Littles, Grey Friars, pp. 225-234. For his political works see S. Riezler, Die literarischen Widersacher der Päpste zur Zeit Ludwig des Baiers, Leipz., 1874, who gives a fine treatment. For his philosophy see C. von Prantl, Geschichte der Logic im Abendlande, Leipz., 1867, iii, 327-420, and Ueberweg, History of Philosophy, i, 460–464. No collected ed. of his works has been issued, nor has there appeared a satisfactory monograph of his life. T. M. Lindsay has an excellent article in the British Quar. Rev., July, 1872, and A. Dorner investigates his doctrine of Church and State in Studien und Kritiken, 1885, iv.

THOMAS BRADWARDINE.

Works. His De Causa Dei contra Pelagium et de Virtute Causarum was edited by Sir Henry Saville, Lond., 1618. Several of his mathematical works were pub. in Paris, 1495-1530.

For Lives see Saville, pref. to above; G. V. Lechler, Leipz., 1862, and his Wiclif, i, 234 ff.; W. F. Hook, in Lives of Archbishops of Canterbury, Lond., 1865, iv, 85-110.

WILLIAM LANGLAND.

Editions of Piers Plowman by R. Crowley, Lond., 1550, 2d enl. ed., 1550; Owen Rogers, Lond., 1561; H. P. Whitaker, Lond., 1813, with introd., notes, and glossary; Thos. Wright, 2 vols., Lond., 1842, new ed. with additions, 1856; and W. W. Skeat, whose exhaustive studies have superseded all former works : (1) pt. i (A text), Lond., 1867, pt. ii (B text), 1869, pt. iii (C text, with Richard the Redeles), 1873, pt. iv, notes, 1877, pt. v, glossary, etc., 1884; (2) a most convenient ed. with the three texts in parallel columns, 2 vols., Oxf., 1886, vol. i, texts, vol. ii, commentary; (3) handy ed. for students, Oxf., 7th ed. rev., 1893. This last has copious selections, introduction, notes, and glossary. An excellent edition of Piers Plowman in modern English prose, with introd. and notes, was prepared by Kate W. Warren, N. Y. and Lond., 1895. See Nat. Rev., 1861, 414 ff., and on Skeat's 3d part, T. R. Lounsbury in New Englander, 1875, 274–285. A grammatical investigation is Emil Bernard, William Langland, Bonn, 1874. The best monograph, a fascinating book of great learning, is J. J. Jusserand, Piers Plowman: a Contribution to the History of English Mysticism, Lond. and N. Y., 1894.

2

HISTORY OF THE CHRISTIAN CHURCH.

The Modern Church.

PART I.

HERALDS OF THE BETTER CHURCH.

CHAPTER I.

GROSSETESTE, WILLIAM OF OCCAM, BRADWARDINE, AND LANGLAND.

THE morning never comes unheralded. Every great historical movement has antecedents-those prophetic gleams which tell us that a new day is coming to the world. The Reformation was no exception to this. It had its intellectual preparation-Humanism and the Renaissance; its moral preparation-Savonarola; and its dogmatic preparation-Wyclif and Hus. Each of these was a mighty historical current.

Robert Grosseteste' (Greathead) was one of the noblest prelates of England. Born of peasant parentage about 1175, educated at Lincoln, Oxford, and Paris, teacher in the Franciscan school at Oxford, archdeacon and rector of various churches, bishop of Lincoln in 1235, and dying in 1253-this is the simple record of his life. His reforming zeal was based on a passionate devotion to the priestly ideal. He labored hard to do away with the employment of ecclesiastics in secular pursuits, and to abolish "appropriations,' that is, the transference of church tenures, tithe-rights and glebelands to monasteries, knightly orders, and the like-a practice which so impoverished the parishes that they were left entirely without pastoral care. He tried also to stop the papal custom of putting "Italian rascals" into English benefices, who drew the fees but never set foot in the country. For these and other reforms he 'This name is spelled in thirteen different ways.

journeyed twice to Pope Innocent IV at Lyons, 1244-46 and 124950. In 1250 he presented his famous Memorial to the pope, which on the moral side is an anticipation of the Ninety-five Theses of Luther. After scathing the "bad pastors" and describing the miserable conditions of the Church, he says:

GROSSE

MORIAL."

66

"What is the cause of this evil? I tremble to speak of it, and yet I dare not keep silence. The cause and source of it is the holy see itself; not only because it fails to put a stop to these evils as it can and should, but still more because of its dispensations, provisions, and collations. It appoints evil shepherds, thinking therein only of the living which it is able to provide for a man, TESTE'S ME- and for the sake of that handing over many thousands to eternal death. He who commits the care of a flock to a man in order that the latter may get the milk and the wool, while he is unable or unwilling to guide, to feed, and protect the flock, gives over the flock to death as a prey. That be far from him as the representative of Christ! He who so sacrifices the pastoral office is a persecutor of Christ in his members. And since the doings of the papacy are a lesson to the world, such a manner of appointment to the cure of souls on its part teaches and encourages all who have patron's rights to make pastoral appointments of a like kind as a return for services rendered to themselves, or to please men in power, and in this way to destroy the hope of Christ. And let no man say that such pastors can still save the flock by the ministry of middlemen. For among these middlemen many are themselves hirelings who flee when the wolf cometh.

"Besides, the cure of souls consists not only in the dispensation of the sacraments, in singing of hours,' and in reading of masses, but in the true teaching of the word of life, in rebuking and correcting vices; and, besides all this, in feeding the hungry, giving drink to the thirsty, clothing the naked, lodging the strangers, visiting the sick and the prisoners-especially among the parish priest's own parishioners-in order by such deeds of charity to instruct the people in the holy exercises of active life. To do such deeds is not at all in the power of these middlemen, for they get so small a portion of the Church's goods that they scarcely have enough to live upon. In the midst of such evils men might still have the consolation of hoping that possibly successors might follow who would better fulfill the pastor's calling. But when parish churches are made over to monasteries these evils are made perpetual. All such things end, not in the upbuilding, but in the destruction, of the Church. God forbid that even the holy see should act

against Christ and thereby incur the guilt of apostasy and division. Further, the pastoral office, especially of the bishops, is at the present time circumscribed and restrained, particularly in England, and this in three ways: 1. The exemptions and privileges of monasteries. For when the inmates of these addict themselves outside their walls to the worst vices the bishop can take no action against them their hands are tied by the privileges of the convents. 2. The secular power puts obstacles in the way in cases where investigations are made into the sins of the laymen, in order to prevent other laymen from being sworn as witnesses. 3. Appeals to the pope or archbishop. For if the bishop take steps according to his duty to punish vice and depose unworthy pastors, protest is taken, the liberty of the Church is appealed to, and so the matter is delayed and the action of the bishop lamed."

In conclusion, Grosseteste appealed to the holy see to stop these disorders, to leave off the unevangelical practice of using the interposition of the sword, and to root out the notorious corruption of the papal court. Unless this is done the holy see would draw upon itself the heaviest judgment-yea, destruction itself.

Certainly such writing is in the true Protestant spirit. Bolder still is Grosseteste's letter on the appointment of the pope's nephew or grandson to the prebendary of Lincoln. This appointment

made by the pope himself-Grosseteste disowned and GROSSE

almost anathematized. As the appointment was made TESTE'S PROTsimply to give the young ecclesiastic the revenue of

ESTANTISM.

the prebend without its work, Grosseteste's ire was raised, and he indulged in a plainness of speech unwonted in those who, like him, were thoroughly devoted to the Roman Church. The commands of the apostolic see, he said, are valid only when given for the edification of the Church, and when such orders as this are sent forth it is the duty of all loyal subjects of the pope to resist them with all their might. No command is apostolic which contradicts the teaching of Christ and the apostles.

This is very near the Protestant ground, for evidently Grosseteste reserved to himself the right to judge whether any papal command was according to Christ or not. At all events, the writings of Grosseteste were very good food for the ripening mind of Wyclif, who studied them ardently and quoted them freely and accurately. In fact, this memorable letter of 1253 Wyclif quotes entire in his De Civili Dominio,' and adds notes and comments of his own. Hus was also perfectly familiar with it.'

'Bk. i, ch. 43.

See his De Ecclesia, ch. xviii.

Grosseteste was a teacher of Wyclif, who refers to him admiringly and often, and the English reformers looked back upon him with gladness as a kindred spirit with their own. Lechler sums up

very well the position of Robert Grosseteste as a precursor of the Reformation: "When we take into view how high a place he assigned the Holy Scriptures, to the study of which in the University of Oxford he assigned the first place as the most fundamental of all studies,' and which he recognizes as the only infallible guiding star of the Church; when we remember with what power and persistency and without any respect of persons he stood forward against so many abuses in the Church, and against every defection from the true ideal of church life; when we reflect that he finds the highest wisdom to stand in this- To know Jesus Christ and him crucified," it is certainly not saying too much when we signalize him as a venerable witness to truth, as a Churchman who fulfilled the duty which he owed to his own age, and in so doing lived for all ages; and who, through his whole career, gave proof of his zeal for a sound reformation of the Church's life.”

WILLIAM OF
OCCAM.

One of the boldest thinkers and most original minds of the fourteenth century was William of Occam, who died in 1349. An Englishman by birth, he spent most of his time at Munich, under the protection of Lewis of Bavaria, where he was the center of a coterie of brave writers who were vindicating the rights of the State and the Church against the extravagant pretensions of the pope. He was general of the Franciscan order, 1342-49. His principles undermine the modern theory of the papacy, which was made an article of faith by the Vatican Council of 1870. It is false, he says, to maintain that the pope possesses unlimited power, both spiritual and temporal. That would mean intolerable slavery, whereas the gospel of Christ is a law of liberty. The whole hierarchy is not immediately of divine

1 Epistolæ, 123.

2 Hac sola ad portum salutis dirigitur Petri navicula, Ep. 115. "The hac sola," says Lechler, answers completely to the Reformation principle-verbo solo-which constitutes the formal principle of Protestantism."

3 Ep. 85.

John Wycliffe and his English Precursors, p. 40. The most of Grosseteste's works remain in MS. Edward Brown published some of his sermons, treatises, and selections from his epistles in his Appendix to the Fasciculus Rerum Expetendarum et Fugiendarum, Lond., 1690. A critical edition of his invaluable epistles was prepared by H. R. Luard for the Rolls Series, Lond., 1862. His life has been written by Pegge, Lond., 1793; Perry, Lond., 1871; and Felten, Leipz., 1887.