THE PORTRAITS OF JOHN KNOX. 215 'branded himself with the stamp of cruelty, and 'has acquired for thee a glory so much the more ' splendid. ' John Wicldiffe flourished in the year 1372. He ' died after diverse combats, in the year 1387. His ' bones were burnt at Oxford in the year 1410.' No not at Oxford, but at Lutterworth in Leicester- shire, as old Fuller memorably tells us: 'Such the ' spleen of the Council of Constance,' says he, ' they ' not only cursed his memory, as dying an obstinate ' heretic, but ordered that his bones (with this charit- ' able caution, "if it," the body, " may be discerned ' from the bodies of other faithful people,") be taken ' out of the ground and thrown far off from any ' Christian burial. In obedience hereunto, Eichard ' Fleming, Bishop of Lincoln, Diocesan of Lutter- ' worth, sent his officers (vultures with a quick-sight ' scent at a dead carcase) to ungrave him accordingly. ' To Lutterworth they come, Sumner, Commissary ' Official, Chancellor, Proctors, Doctors, and the ' servants (so that the remnant of the body would not hold out a bone against so many hands), take what ' was left out of the grave and burnt them to ashes,
