Bradley comments that -
This is a translation, with introduction, of the Letter of Richard Wyche – one of only two heresy interrogation narratives from medieval England written from the perspective of the accused heretic.Wyche writes that -
The Letter is an autobiographical account of Richard Wyche’s interrogation, in 1402-1403, at the hands of church officials. Wyche originally composed the Letter in (Middle) English but it survives only in a Latin translation, alongside other forbidden texts in a manuscript now in Prague. Wyche wrote and covertly sent away this Letter to an audience of intimates sympathetic to the cause (the so-called Wycliffite or Lollard heresy) before his interrogations ended. Ultimately, Wyche was freed and lived several decades before he was finally burned at the stake for his heretical beliefs, in 1440.
Few similar narratives survive from the pre-modern era, and none combines public drama with novelistic inwardness, or layered artifice with personal urgency, as does the Letter. Not just a literary or religious artifact, the letter is a legal narrative comfortable alongside classics such as those presented by Natalie Zemon Davis (Fiction in the Archives) and R. Po-Chia Hsia (Trent 1475).
The Letter is a counter-authoritarian and transnational work, produced under enormous pressure and preserved in an alien land and alien language. The fact that such effort was taken to snuff it out, and to save it, lends all the more weight to this engrossing narrative. Still, the author refuses to serve as a stereotyped “heretic” or fit his story into a generalized master narrative. Instead, humanizing details and complicated emotions serve as the engines of an extended consideration of the limits of institutional demands on individual conscience. Wyche’s Letter offers an ambiguous, dramatic meditation on the boundaries of political, spiritual, and social faith, truth, and compromise.
... I arrived at the town Chester le Street. I left my saddle and breviary in a lodging near the middle of town, but at Lent I was told that the good master Dees Oknolle had taken them in. May the Father of Jesus give him the sweetness of heavenly life and the purity and blessing of the fullness of grace.
I could not get around well owing to pain from a fall, so I had hired a horse to get there.
December 7th
On December 7th, I appeared before the bishop. In his presence, I denied the alleged doctrines and also denied that I had preached them.
We discussed the mendicancy of the friars. They wished me to publicly approve the friars’ voluntary mendicancy as a perfect practice. But I said it was not, because it was contrary to God’s law.
They said, “But the catholic church has approved it with one voice. Friars are permitted to beg.”
“Paul says, ‘All things are permissible for me, but not all are beneficial.’”
Then they set this oath before me, to swear that I would “obey, firmly and precisely, the laws and regulations to which a catholic person is bound — those contained in the Decretum, Decretals, Sext, and Clementines.”
I requested counsel, and a hearing date.
They said, “No. But you may have time until after our meal. You will figure it out — should you want to.”
So, after the ninth hour [3 p.m.], I appeared before the bishop. He admonished me once, twice, and a third time to swear the oath, then and there. I gave no word in reply. He denounced me as an excommunicate and sent me to a cell. Thus they persecuted the one whom the Father, in His grace, was striking along the way. They heaped more onto the pain of my wounds.
I asked the bishop to have my horse taken to his stable, and I gave what I had in my purse to the man leading it there. ...
The next day, the Augustinian master came to me in my cell and offered me tempting advice.
He promised that his lord the chancellor or the bishop would advocate for me if I would reach an agreement with them. Even if the things I said were true, he said, nevertheless because everyone was unanimously against me, I should yield to them. He said that he himself would heartily advocate for me and pray for me in particular during mass for a year.
“You should make sure,” I said, “that you will find your actions sufficient for yourself on the day of judgment.”
He said, “Unless you follow their instruction, you are looking to be burnt.”
“As God wishes, let it be done.”
... When I had read that oath, I thought about the agreement that I had undertaken not to press questions about the oath they gave me. I went to the knight, who was standing by the fire in front of the bench, and said to him, “This is not the oath that was agreed on. I will never swear this oath.”
“Will you not swear it with the limitation in your heart?”
“Very well. I will.”
The bishop was sitting on the bench, and I knelt before him. I said to the bishop, “My lord, if you wish, I am willing to swear the oath I agreed to swear, as limited in my heart by my lord this knight.”
“Then swear. Place your hand on the book.”
I put my hand on the book. They read the oath, and when they finished, I kissed the book, hoping that the bishop would not try to extract anything from me beyond the agreed-upon oath — if, indeed, the truth was that he wanted an agreement.
But they gave me another oath to read and to swear concerning the doctrine of the Eucharist, and yet another on confession ...
