While one member of the monastic order was thus contributing by his satirical pen towards producing a reform among his countrymen, another monk was beginning to preach in a still bolder manner against the popish system. This was John Wycliffe, under whom the despised lollards became an important sect. This attempt at religious reformation only formed part of the great movement of the fourteenth century, which soon afterwards broke out in the popular commotions of the reign of Richard II. The writer of Piers Ploughman was neither a sower of sedition, nor one who would be characterised by his contemporaries as a heretic. The doctrines inculcated throughout the book are so far from democratic, that he constantly preaches the Christian doctrine of obedience to rulers. Yet its tendency to debase the great, and to raise the commons in public consideration, must have rendered it popular among the latter: and, although no single important doctrine of the popish religion is attacked, yet the unsparing manner in which the vices and corruptions of the church are laid open, must have helped in no small degree the cause of the Reformation. Of the ancient popularity of Piers Ploughman we have a proof in the great number of copies which still exist, most of them written in the latter part of the fourteenth century; and the circumstance that the manuscripts are seldom executed in a superior style of writing, and scarcely ever ornamented with painted initial letters, may perhaps be taken as a proof that they were not written for the higher classes of society. From the time when it was published, the name of Piers Ploughman became a favourite among the popular reformers.[8] The earliest instance of the adoption of that name for another satirical work is found in the Creed of Piers Ploughman, printed also in the present volume, and in which even the form of verse of the Vision is imitated.
In this latter poem, which was undoubtedly written by a Wycliffite, Piers Ploughman is no longer an allegorical personage--he is the simple representative of the peasant rising up to judge and act for himself--the English _sans-culotte_ of the fourteenth century, if we may be allowed the comparison. When it was written, a period of great excitement had passed since the age of Langlande, the reputed author of the Vision--a period characterised by the turbulence of the peasantry--which had witnessed in France the fearful insurrection of the _Jacquerie_, and in England the rebellion of Wat Tyler and Jack Straw.[9]