9<S SOCIAL DISTINCTIONS, AND THE 



easier. But the doctrines of the later Lollards, in so far as 

 they had a social significance, and the struggle in which Pecock 

 was the champion for those persons of whom he was ultimately 

 the victim, lie beyond the limits of the present volume. 



Ball, one of the leaders of the insurrection, is said to have 

 been a follower of Wiklif. Mr. Lingard holds that he was 

 actually a precursor of the distinguished reformer. Both Wai- 

 singham and Knyghton assert that Ball made confession at 

 the time of his execution, to the effect that he had learnt 

 Wiklif s doctrine. But we may hesitate before we accept 

 the authority of these writers on such a subject, even if there 

 were no need to look with suspicion on any confession gathered 

 from the judicial examination of culprits in the fourteenth 

 century, and for many a century afterwards. 



It is not easy to determine whether Wiklif 's teaching and 

 tenets are to be in any way connected with these outbreaks. 

 Religious and social innovations always go together, though 

 it is not always the case that the reformer of ecclesiastical 

 discipline or doctrine is prepared to fully sympathize with 

 the social changes which are sure to accompany the promul- 

 gation of any considerable novelty in religious faith or practice. 

 One hundred and fifty years afterwards, the conservative party 

 in the Church asserted that Luther's doctrines were the exciting 

 cause of the excesses committed by the Anabaptists at Munster, 

 but we know that Luther vehemently condemned the proceed- 

 ings of those sectaries. 



This is not the place in which to attempt a review of 

 WikliPs theological views. He has been, I think, unfairly 

 treated by Lingard, who wishes to insinuate that he was 

 alternately a fool and a coward; and who, while censuring 

 the doctrine ascribed to the reformer, "that dominion is 

 founded in grace," forgets that this very doctrine in other 

 words was the origin and stronghold of all the claims which 

 the Popes have advanced for a right to intermeddle with the 

 domestic or municipal regulations of the states of Western 

 Christendom; as the acceptance of the doctrine measures the 



