But with the rising his whole work seemed suddenly undone.

The quarrel between the baronage and the Church on which his political action had as yet been grounded was hushed in the presence of a common danger.

His "poor preachers" were looked upon as missionaries of socialism.

The friars charged Wyclif with being a "sower of strife, who by his serpentlike instigation had set the serf against his lord," and though he tossed back the charge with disdain he had to bear a suspicion which was justified by the conduct of some of his followers.

John Ball, who had figured in the front rank of the revolt, was falsely-named as one of his adherents, and was alleged to have denounced in his last hour the conspiracy of the "Wyclifites." Wyclif's most prominent scholar, Nicholas Herford, was said to have openly approved the brutal murder of Archbishop Sudbury.