Wicliffe and His Times - James Aitken Wylie

to this cause the Parliament attributed the frequent
famines and plagues that had of late visited the
country, and which had resulted in a partial
depopulation of England.
Two statutes in particular were passed during
this period to set bounds to the Papal usurpations;
these were the well-known and famous statutes of
Provisors and Praemunire. The first declared it
illegal to procure any presentations to any benefice
from the Court of Rome, or to accept any living
otherwise than as the law directed through the
chapters and ordinary electors. All such
appointments were to be void, the parties
concerned in them were to be punished with fine
and imprisonment, and no appeal was allowed
beyond the king's court. The second statute, which
came three years afterwards, forbade all appeals on
questions of property from the English tribunals to
the courts at Rome, under pain of confiscation of
goods and imprisonment during the king's pleasure.
Such appeals had become very common, but a stop
was now put to them by the vigorous application of
the statute; but the law against foreign nominations
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