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The Lollard movement in the Parliament of 1395 was led by Chaucer’s old fellow-ambassador, Sir Richard Stury, the “valiant ancient knight” of Froissart’s chronicles; and Chaucer himself has often been hailed, however falsely, as a Wycliffite.

In spite of all political appearances it is true that it was really the Bible which stirred up these two movements, the Wycliffite and the Hussite.

Biographers of Wycliffe have referred to this tract and quoted passages in evidence of the Wycliffite heresies; but they appear to have failed altogether of perceiving its larger scope, or understanding its political bearing and significance.

About this time he became an ardent Wycliffite, winning over many persons, some of high rank, to the side of the reformer, and incurring the censure of Archbishop Arundel.

It was the intermediate dialect, intelligible, as Trevisa has told us, to both extremes, even when these failed to be intelligible to each other; in its south-eastern form, it was the language of London, where the supreme law courts were, the centre of political and commercial life; it was the language in which the Wycliffite versions had given the Holy Scriptures to the people; the language in which Chaucer had raised English poetry to a height of excellence admired and imitated by contemporaries and followers.