In England from Wicliffe to Henry VIII - James Aitken Wylie

lurk and hide themselves in the Lord's vineyard."
The personal search of the bishop and archdeacon,
or their commissaries, was not, the archbishop
judged, enough; they were to supplement their own
diligence by calling to their aid certain of the
"honestest men, to take their oath upon the holy
evangelists, that if they shall know or understand
any such" they should report them "to our
suffragans, or archdeacons, or to their
commissaries."
These edicts raise the curtain, and show us how
numerous were the followers of Wicliffe in
England in the fifteenth century, and how deep his
teaching had gone into the hearts of the English
people. It is only the choice spirits of the party who
come into view at the stake. The greater part hid
their Lollardism under the veil of an outward
conformity, or of an almost entire seclsion from the
world; or, if apprehended on a charge of heresy,
they quailed before the terrible alternative offered
them, and preferred submission to the Church to
burning. We may be permitted to draw a covering
over their weakness, and to pass on to those whose
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