100 SOCIAL DISTINCTIONS, AND THE 



According to Walsingham, the Earl of Salisbury, one of 

 the few persons who attended on the king during the days 

 of June, was a favourer and supporter of the Lollards ; and 

 he was probably not the only nobleman who protected these 

 innovators. And though it may have been the case that 

 Wiklif's opinions and great personal influence had not been 

 ranged on the side of the rebels, there can be no doubt that 

 an alliance subsequently sprung up between those who kept 

 alive the popular feeling and the parties who accepted and 

 maintained the social and religious tenets of Lollardism. 

 Walsingham inveighs bitterly against the mendicant friars as 

 the instigators of these agrarian disturbances. They were 

 ,not, however, the only malcontents. Among those contained 

 in the proscription list of 1382, and described as leaders of 

 the Suffolk rioters, are the vicar of All Saints', Sudbury, the 

 rector of Ringsfield, and the rector of Bucklesham. 



The history of Lollardism is very obscure, and made more 

 difficult by the partisanship with which it has been discussed 

 since the Reformation. Without pretending to decide on its 

 theological significance, I may state, that it certainly had, 

 from the days of its founder in England, what we should 

 call a strong communistic tendency. It is clear, too, from 

 existing records that the profession or suspicion of Lollardism 

 was invariably associated with habits of insubordination. 

 The Lollards were as much persecuted for their political 

 opinions, and for breaches of the peace, as for their hostility 

 to the tenets and policy of the Roman hierarchy. Oldcastle is 

 a prominent type of the genuine Lollard, and Oldcastle's later 

 years were quite as much occupied by political conspiracies 

 as by any activity for the reformation of the Church. In 

 course of time religious bigotry assumed a darker and more 

 tyrannical aspect, and the justifiable condemnation of Old- 

 castle was cast into the shade by the atrocious and suicidal 

 persecution of Pecock. 



I need not apologize, in illustration of these facts, for 

 quoting the terms of a record which shews how the tenets 



