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 LOMAN 335 LOMAN

towards the supremacy of the State in the externals of hand and be in a position to persecute the Catholics,

religion. This unquiet condition lasted during the earlier part of

Outline of the Hislory of the LoUarde. — ^The troubled the reign of Henry VI. There were many rccanta- days of Richard II at the close of the fourteenth cen- tions though few executions, and in 1429 Convocation tury had encouraged the spread of Lollardy, and the lamented Uiat heresy was on the increase throughout accession of the House of Lancaster in 1399 was fol- the southern province. In 141.3 there was even a lowed by an attempt to reform and restore constitu- small rising of heretics at Abingdon. Yet from this tional authority in Church and State. It was a task date Lollaray Ijegan to decline and when, about 1445, which proved m the long run beyond the strength of Richard Pecock wrote his unfortunate " Repressor of the dynasty, yet something was done to remedy the overmuch blaming the Clergy", they were far less of a worst disorders of the previous reign. In order to put menace to Church or State than they had been in Wal- down religious opposition the State came, in 1401, to den's day. They diminished in numbers and import- the support of the Church by the Act " Do Haeretico ance, but the records of the bishops' courts show that Comburendo"^ L e. on the burning of heretics. This they still survived in their old centres, London, Coven- Act recited in its preamble that it was directed against tr>', Leicester, and the eastern counties. They were a certain new sect ''who thought damnably of the sacra- mostly small artisans. William Wych, a priest, was ments and usuiped the office of proacliing". It em- indeed executed, in 1440, but he was an old man and powered the bisnops to arrest, imprison, and examine belonged to the first generation of Lollards, offenders and to hand over to the secular authorities The increase in the number of citations for heresy such as had relapsed or refused to abjure. The con- under Henry VII was probably due more to the re- denmed were to be burnt "in an high place" before the newed acti\'ity of the bishops in a time of peace pMBople. This Act was prol)ably due to the authorita- than to a revival of Lollardy. There was such a re- live Archbishop Arundel, but it was merely the appli- vival, however, under Henry VIII, for two heretics cation to England of the common law of Christenaom. were burnt on one day, in 1511, and ten years later Its passing was immediately followed by the burning there were many prosecutions in the home counties of the first victim, William Sawtrey, a ]x>ndon priest, and some executions. But though Lollardjr thus re- He had previously abjured but had rcla{)Kcd, and he mained alive, ''conquered but not extinguished", as now refused to declare his lielief in transubstantiation Erasmus expressed it in 1523, until the New Leuning or to recognize the authority of the Church. was brought into the country from Germany, it was a

No fresh execution occurred till 1410, and the Act movement which for at least half a century had exer-

was mercifully carried out by the bishops. Great cised little or no influence on English thought. The

pains were taken to sift the evidence when a man de- days of its popularity were long passed and even its

nied his heres}^^ the relapsed were nearly always al- martyrdoms attracted but little attention, llie little

lowed the benefit of a fresh abj urat ion, and as a matter stream of English heresy cannot be said to have added

of fact the burnings were few and the recantations much to the Protestant flood which rolled in from the

many. Eleven heretics were recorded to have been Continent. It did, however, bear witness to the

burnt from 1401 to the accession of Henry VII in existence of a spirit of discontent, and mav have pre-

1485. Others, it is true, were executed as traitors for pared the ground for religious revolt near London and

being implicated in overt aSts of rel)ellion. Yet the m the eastern counties, though there is no evidence

activity of the Lollards during the first thirty years of that any of the more prominent early reformers were

the fifteenth centuiy was great and their influence Lollards before they were Protestants. spread into parts of the coimtry which had at first The authoritiea for the life and teaching: of Wyclif Dv-ill be

been unaffected. Thus the eastern counties l>ecame, found at the close of his biography; many of the Enslish tracts

»d ^ loM to remain «n important Lollard centre.!^f.n contains a num-

Scriptures, and the theological e

J J. ,]^Trt "^1 xi-^rt/j-» v/ »^vv.*iK.vy s» ^v/i* Thomas of Walsinoham. Chronxcon Angha m Rolls Senes,

demnedm 1410 no less than 26/ propositions collected and inthecontinuatorof KNioHTON»'CA«)nirtmin/2o//«.SmM

out of Wyclif's writings, and hnaDv the Council of Foxe, Book of Martyrs includes the records of a number of

Constance, in 1415, solemnlv declared him to have ^",?"i *"A^' ^"^ »^ must^naturally be u8«l with the Krcatert

r^ i! x» rm- j'« "j. J. 1- caution. Of modern works Lechijer, J oAann twi ^ tcUf (2

been a heretic. These different measures seem to nave vob., Leipzlflr, 1873), contjiins what is probably the most

been successful at least as far as the clergy" were con- complete account of the movement, while Gairdner, Lollardy

cemed, and Lollardy came to be more ancl more a lay "l^ i^^. Reformation in England (2 vols., Lon(k)n. 1908) is an

' . £. ^ .J -Al I-4,- 1 J- J. I ailmirable study of its character and aims. Bncfcr sketches

movement, often connects with political discontent, ^iu be found in Poole, WycUJ[e and Movements for Reform in

Its leader during the reign of Henrv V was Sir John Epochs of Church History Sencs (Ix>ndon, 18S9), and in Cam'

Oldcastle, commonly known as Ix)rd Cobham, from ^' r^^^F?^ ^Vi^ rh'^Vf'^'^A' '''?ko-J- T«S^'=^\^^•

,. .' -._ r< Vu u • Tj* T 11 J u J England %n the Age of Wych ffe {ljon<\oii,\^^ I ) ^R-WQWyKTiXijea

his marriage to a Cobham heu^s. UlS Lollardy had and useful, but it is murkctf by a frank hostility towards and

long been notorious, but his po.sition and wealth pro- by a ^:ood deal of i^onmcc of medieval and Catholic ideas and

tected him and he was not proceeded against till 1413. P'^*^« ^^ &^ Zimmermann in Kirrhenlexicon, s. y LtA-

.-- „ J 1 u - * I ^ • 1 J larden: Bonet-Maury, Les pncurseurs de la R^forme (ParuL

After many delays he was arrcsted from the Tower and F. F. Urquhart.

organised a rising outside I^ndon early in 1414. The

young king suppressed the movement in person, but Loman, Saint, Bishop of Trim in Ireland, nephew Oldcastle again escaped. He remained in liiding but of St. Patrick, wa« remarkable as l)eing the first placed seems to have inspired a number of sporadic disturb- over an Irish see by the Apostle of Ireland. This was ances, especially during Henry's alj.sence in France, in the year 433. St. Loman ha<l convertoii lx)th Fort- He was finally captiu-ed on the west border, con- chem, the Prince of Trim (grandson of Laeghaire, demned by Parliament, and executed in 1417. His King of Meath), and his father Foidilmid, and was personality and activity made a great impression on given Trim for an episcopal see. Some say that he

hiB contemporaries and his poorer followers put a was a bishop before he came to Ireland, but this

this time, expected that they would get the upper that he was only a simple priest, but consecrated by