nd was less a doctrinal heterodoxy than
a revolt against the Papacy and the priestly hierarchy. Mere
theoretical speculations were seldom interfered with, but anything
which touched their material interests at once aroused the vigilance
of the clergy. It is noticeable that the diffusion of Lollardism, that
is of the ideas of Wyclif, if not the cause of, was at least followed
by the peasant rising under the leadership of John Ball, a connection
which is also visible in the Tziska revolt following the Hussite
movement, and the Peasants' War in Germany which came on the heels of
the Lutheran Reformation. How much Huss was directly influenced by the
teachings of Wyclif is clear. The works of the latter were widely
circulated throughout Europe; for one of the advantages of the custom
of writing in Latin, which was universal during the Middle Ages, was
that books of an important character were immediately current amongst
all scholars without having, as now, to wait upon the caprice and
ability of translators. Huss read Wyclif's works as the preparation
for his theological degree, and subsequently made them his text-books
when teaching at the University of Prague. After his treacherous
execution at Constance, and the events which followed thereupon in
Bohemia, a number of Hussite fugitives settled in Southern Germany,
carrying with them the seeds of the new doctrines. An anonymous
contemporary writer states that "to John Huss and his followers are to
be traced almost all those false principles concerning the power of
the spiritual and temporal authorities and the possession of earthly
goods and rights which before in Bohemia, and now with us, have called
forth revolt and rebellion, plunder, arson, and murder, and have
shaken to its foundations the whole commonwealth. The poison of these
false doctrines has been long flowing from Bohemia into Germany, and
will produce the same desolating consequences wherever it spreads."

The condition of the Catholic Church, against which the Reformation
movement generally was a protest, needs here to be made clear to the
reader. The beginning of clerical disintegration is distinctly visible
in the first half of the fourteenth century. The interdicts, as an
institution, had ceased to be respected, and the priesthood itself
began openly to sink itself in debauchery and to play fast and loose
with the rites of the Church. Indulgences for a hundred years were
readily granted for a consideration.