If the Statutes of Labourers were powerless for their immediate ends, either in reducing the actual rate of wages or in restricting the mass of floating labour to definite areas of employment, they proved effective in sowing hatred between employer and employed, between rich and poor.

But this social rift was not the only rift which was opening amidst the distress and misery of the time.

The close of William Langland's poem is the prophecy of a religious revolution; and the way for such a revolution was being paved by the growing bitterness of strife between England and the Papacy.

In spite of the sharp protests from king and parliament the need for money at Avignon was too great to allow any relaxation in the Papal claims.

Almost on the eve of Crecy Edward took the decisive step of forbidding the entry into England of any Papal bulls or documents interfering with the rights of presentation belonging to private patrons.