Liber tertius

XIIINTRODUGTION.if every estate in the land had a just owner living there with his family;then there would not be so much arable land lying fallow, there wouldbe no lack of corn and cattle, and there would be plenty of servants,farm labourers and artizans. But now there are only tenants bearing therule of the clergy hardly; they care not for the tillage of the ground,as it is not theirs ; they Hve by theft, as there is nobody to look afterthem, and in their wantonness they disturb the kingdom. i The clergy,overburdened with worldly goods, seek to equal the splendour of thelaity, or to surpass it. How different would all that be were thosetemporaHties in the possession of poor owners: more homes would befounded, the population, and with it the state, would grow, but the priestscould devote themselves to an edifying life, as becomes them.. They wouldnot need to fear that after the death of one master the next would beill afifected towards them. They could Hve weU on alms."These are Wyclifs theorifes concerning the utiUzation of EngHshchurch-property. Against such ^iews there arose adversaries on aH sides.Even people who otherwise favoured him could not but mock at him,others again scolded him \iolently, calling him a book from hell.2-But they did not reply with any sound arguments, as the accumulatingof land in mortmain and its attendant evils were too apparent.Wychfs next attacks were directed against the principle of thematter. By means of quotations from the Bible, Roman, English and canonlaw, from the history of former kings of England, especially WiUiam I.and II., he proves that the kingdom would be justified in that course.There are certain definite cases in which even the church plate may beseized; for example in order to ransom prisoners from captivity. InHigden, whom Wyclif quotes as a source in his historical comments,can be read what the monasteries gave up to obtain King Richard'sdeliverance: wool, prelate's rings, church plate, crosses, cups; even thegold was scraped off the shrines and melted down.^1 Of the plunderlng of the monastery at Evesham by the Earl of Warwick'smen in July 1376, Walsingham, Hist. Angl. I 322.2 Hec sentencia licet a quibusdam doctoribus sit derisa et ab aliis verberata,dicendo quod siim liber inferni, a nullo tamen efficaciter est impngnaia.3 Pro rcdempcionc Richardi capta est tota lana monachorum alborum ctcanonicorum, quin cciam prclatorum anuli, vasa, cruces, caliccs cum auro dc fcrelrissanctorum abraso sunt conflata. De Civ. Dom. II, 9 and Ranulph Higden's Polychr,ed. Lumby VIII, 128.