justice of Heaven as they could that of earth. The Christian clergy were admitted to the best half of the plunder, and became and have continued for ages fanatical supporters of power and property. The laity, however, alarmed at the rapidity with which the land was falling into the hands of the Church, and at the papal assumption of Universal Dominion, gave their support to a principle of which they did not see the meaning. Wiclif's doctrine of "Dominion" proved the axe laid to the root of the tree, not only of clerical but also of lay assumption. "Dominion," said Wiclif, "can in its highest and purest sense belong to God alone. He deals it out to men in their several stations and offices on condition of obedience to His commandments; mortal sin, therefore, breaks the link and deprives man of his authority. … Thus no one in a state of mortal sin has, in strict right, either priesthood or lordship, a principle which applies of course to every human being." There was nothing on which Wiclif wrote more fully than this same doctrine of Dominion, and it is clear that no part of his system had greater influence on the subsequent history of Europe.
To assert that Dominion was founded on Grace and depended on its preservation, was to cut at the root of hereditary right in political sovereignty, and of all those acquired and permanent rights upon which the hierarchies in Church and State are founded.
That this is no exaggeration may be seen by an inquiry into the causes of the great Hussite war in Bohemia. Nothing is more certain than that John Huss was the champion of Wiclif's doctrine in Bohemia, and especially of that on Dominion. "If," he said before the Council of Constance, "a bishop or a prelate is in mortal sin, he is no longer pope, bishop, or prelate; still more, if a king is in mortal sin, he is not truly a king before God." The phrase was hardly out of his mouth than the prelates rose, crying: "Call the king, this concerns him." Huss was made to repeat his words. Sigismund listened, and stolidly remarked that no one was without sin; the Cardinal of Cambrai, whose wits were sharper, cried: "What, is it not enough for you to overthrow the Church? do you wish to attack kings?" All saw that the doctrine was revolutionary. "Away with such a fellow;
