At the top of this picture our
Saviour was represented as sitting on a rainbow with two angels on each
side, two of whom were blowing trumpets, and on the earth, which
appeared far down below, the graves were opening, and all sorts of
strange people, from the king down to the humblest peasant, were coming
out of their tombs, while the fire and smoke from others proclaimed the
doom of their occupants, and skulls and bones lay scattered about in all
directions.
[Illustration: JOHN WICLIF. _From the portrait in Lutterworth Church_]
It was not a very pleasant picture to look upon, so we adjourned to the
vestry, where we were shown a vestment worn by Wiclif in which some
holes had been cut either with knives or scissors. On inquiry we were
informed that the pieces cut out had been "taken away by visitors,"
which made us wonder why the vestment had not been taken better care of.
We were shown an old pulpit, and the chair in which Wiclif fell when he
was attacked by paralysis, and in which he was carried out of church to
die three days afterwards. We could not describe his life and work
better than by the inscription on the mural monument subscribed for in
1837:
Sacred to the Memory of John Wiclif the earliest Champion of
Ecclesiastical Reformation in England.
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