Page:John Wycliff, last of the schoolmen and first of the English reformers.djvu/432

 same time that the Archbishop prevailed on Congregation to nominate a committee of twelve doctors in order to draw up a list of Wyclif's errors. The will was everything in a search of this kind, and out of fourteen works examined—and subsequently burnt at Carfax—the committee were fortunate enough to light upon two hundred and sixty-seven instances of false teaching.

By the time that the Council of Constance met in 1414 to put an end to the scandal of the Schism, to burn John Huss, and to lay a solemn curse on the memory of Wyclif, somebody had increased this catalogue of errors to more than three hundred. The formal record of the Council in regard to the condemnation of Wyclif is as follows:

"By the authority of the sentence and decree of the Roman Council, and of the mandate of the apostolic see, the Council proceeded with the condemnation of John Wyclif and his memory: and, having published injunctions to cite all who would defend the said Wyclif or his memory, and nobody appearing for that purpose, and having moreover examined witnesses of the impenitence and final obstinacy of the said Wyclif, and the things being proved by evident signs attested by lawful witnesses, the holy Synod did declare and define the said John Wyclif to have been a notorious heretic, and to have died obstinate in heresy, excommunicating him and condemning his memory; and did decree that his body and bones, if they could be distinguished from those of the faithful, should be disinterred, or dug out of the ground, and cast at a distance from the sepulchre of the church."