HE year 1382 is the earliest date at which it can with certainty be said that the entire Scriptures were known in the English language. This was chiefly the work of John Wycliffe, the "Morning Star of the Reformation," at whose life and work we must now rapidly glance.

      Wycliffe lived in dark and trying times. The Church of God had sunk to a sad and desperate condition of spiritual decay. The lives of the clergy were a reproach to the name of religion. Men were promoted to a high position in the Church who were not only intellectually unfit, but who were scandalously impure in their conduct. The upper classes, too, were flagrantly wicked and unchaste.

      John Wycliffe was perhaps the first reformer in England who dared to stand alone and rebuke the leaders of the Church, and fearlessly assert the freedom of religious thought and teaching against the dogmas of the Pope. [90]

      It is with Wycliffe as a translator of the Bible that we have to deal. He labored bard to put the Word of God into the common language of the people, and succeeded to an extent which none before him had done.

      The whole of the New Testament, which was issued first, was the work of the Reformer himself, but in the translation of the first half of the Old Testament he was assisted by Nicholas de Hereford, one of his friends at Oxford, About 1382 he was able to send forth the whole Bible in the English tongue as generally spoken, and it was then that the people became possessed of that unspeakable treasure, the Word of God. The Bible was no longer merely the property of the priests and the few scholarly men of the time. It was now to be had in the mother-tongue of the people; and the dream of many--to enable every plowboy to read the Bible--was in a fair way of being realized. Wycliffe's Bible had a large circulation. But we must remember that it was in manuscript, for printing was not yet invented.

      It is, impossible fully to measure the influence which Wycliffe's Bible had upon the English people and upon the world. It was eagerly sought after by the people. Though it was sold at a high price, its treasure came down to the very poorest. Wycliffe's [91] preachers went about the country reading the pages of the book, and telling of its contents in their sermons; and often parties were gathered together to hear some one read a page or two, or recite their contents.

      This great work of Wycliffe laid all succeeding ages under deep obligation to him. As a translation it was not so perfect as the Bible which we now happily possess. We must recollect that it was but a translation of Jerome's Vulgate, that is, a translation of a translation. Men in those days had not access to the original manuscripts of which we have spoken.

      Wycliffe's work was so well done that its influence remains upon our version to this day. Unfortunately, however, the men in office and power in the Church in Wycliffe's time did not appreciate the work of such a Reformer. Not only did he publish the Bible in the language of the people in 1382, but before doing this he had attacked the false and wicked position of the leaders in the Church; and for this attack he was called to account. He was summoned to appear before a great council at a monastery at Blackfriars, in May, 1382, with Courtenay, the Archbishop of Canterbury, presiding. There he stood alone--tall, pale, and thin. That brave man presented a great contrast to the dignitaries, clothed in [92] their purple and satin and damask gowns, as he stood before his judge, surrounded by scowling abbots and monks, bishops and priests.

      You may ask, For what offence is this poor, pale, friendless clergyman brought here? Has be been guilty of some grave crime? Does some nameless immorality sit upon his head? Has be been impure, unchaste, and wicked? Had such been his offence, he might easily have escaped. He had been guilty of a serious offence. He had attacked the Church, and denounced the sinful practices of some of her priests and monks. As did Luther at a later date, he spoke boldly against the sale of indulgences, and against masses for the souls of the dead, as systems of fraud and dishonesty.

      Some consternation was caused during his trial by an earthquake which made London tremble. Many of the men in that assembly grew pale; but the archbishop declared that the trial must go on, and said that as the earthquake purged away the evil odors in the earth, so the trial would purge away the evil in the hearts of men which Wycliffe and his followers had introduced into the land.

      The result of the trial was that after some days' consideration, a solemn condemnation was issued against the teaching of Wycliffe, and all who taught or received his doctrines. He returned to his home and his church at Lutterworth: and there during the [93] last two years of his life, amid his books and poor parishioners, he translated and published the Bible as described above.

      Doubtless much material had been gathered for this work during the earlier and busier portion of his life; but at Lutterworth he had the needful leisure for the completion of his life-work. He was assisted by his curate, John Purvey, in the work of revising and editing the whole; and transcribers then took in hand the task of multiplying copies, of which nearly one hundred and fifty were finished within forty years of Wycliffe's death.

      The home-call of the Reformer was tragic in its swiftness. On the last Sunday of 1384 he was administering the Lord's Supper in his church. In that awful moment he fell to the floor, was seized with a fit of palsy and never recovered, lingering only to the last day of the year, when his soul passed on to that land where all is peace and love. But what a priceless legacy he left behind him! [94]

[HWGI 90-94]