But Wycliffe himself meanwhile had received a clear intimation of his own declining position.  His opposition to the church authorities, and his efforts at re-invigorating the faith of the country, had led him into doubtful statements on the nature of the eucharist; he had entangled himself in dubious metaphysics on a subject on which no middle course is really possible; and being summoned to answer for his language before a synod in London, he had thrown himself again for protection on the Duke of Lancaster.  The duke (not unnaturally under the circumstances) declined to encourage what he could neither approve nor understand;[471] and Wycliffe, by his great patron’s advice, submitted.  He read a confession of faith before the bishops, which was held satisfactory; he was forbidden, however, to preach again in Oxford, and retired to his living of Lutterworth, in Leicestershire, where two years later he died.

With him departed all which was best and purest in the movement which he had commenced.  The zeal of his followers was not extinguished, but the wisdom was extinguished which had directed it; and perhaps the being treated as the enemies of order had itself a tendency to make them what they were believed to be.  They were left unmolested for the next twenty years, the feebleness of the government, the angry complexion which had been assumed by the dispute with Rome, and the political anarchy in the closing decade of the century, combining to give them temporary shelter; but they availed themselves of their opportunity to travel further on the dangerous road on which they had entered; and on the settlement of the country under Henry IV. they fell under the general ban which struck down all parties who had shared in the late disturbances.

They had been spared in 1382, only for more sharp denunciation, and a more cruel fate; and Boniface having healed, on his side, the wounds which had been opened, by well-timed concessions, there was no reason left for leniency.  The character of the Lollard teaching was thus described (perhaps in somewhat exaggerated language) in the preamble of the act of 1401.[472]

“Divers false and perverse people,” so runs the act De Heretico comburendo, “of a certain new sect, damnably thinking of the faith of the sacraments of the church, and of the authority of the same, against the law of God and of the church, usurping the office of preaching, do perversely and maliciously, in divers places within the realm, preach and teach divers new doctrines, and wicked erroneous opinions, contrary to the faith and determination of Holy Church.  And of such sect and wicked doctrines they make unlawful conventicles, they hold and exercise schools, they make and write books, they do wickedly instruct and inform people, and excite and stir them to sedition and insurrection, and make great strife and division among the people, and other enormities horrible to be heard, daily do perpetrate and commit.