In England from Wicliffe to Henry VIII - James Aitken Wylie

and guided the steps of the prince into the same
paths in which his father had walked. Lollard blood
still continued to flow, and new victims from time
to time mounted the martyr's pile.
The most illustrious of the Protestants of that
reign was Sir John Oldcastle, a knight of
Herefordshire. Having married the heiress of
Cowling Castle, near Rochester, he sat in
Parliament under the title of Lord Cobham, in right
of his wife's barony. The youth of Lord Cobham
had been stained with gay pleasures; but the
reading of the Bible, and the study of Wicliffe's
writings, had changed his heart; and now, to the
knightly virtues of bravery and honor, he added the
Christian graces of humility and purity. He had
borne arms in France, under Henry IV., who set a
high value on his military accomplishments. Hewas
not less esteemed by the son, Henry V., for his
private worth, his shrewd sense, and his gallant
bearing as a soldier. But the "dead fly" in the noble
qualities and upright character of the stout old
baron:, in the opinion of the king, was his
Lollardism.
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