Note 941 — XXIII. THE HERESIES.
Reading edition
“God ordeyned prestis in the olde lawe to have wyves, and nevere forbede it in the newe lawe, neither bi Crist ne bi his apostlis, but rathere aprovede it. But now, bi ypocrisie of fendis and fals men, manye binden hem to presthod and chastite, and forsaken wifis bi Goddis lawe, and schenden maydenes and wifis and fallen foulest of alle.”—Of Weddid Men and Wifis, cap. i. (Arnold’s Wyclif, III. 190; also in Vaughan’s Tracts of John de Wyckliffe p. 58).—See also The Seven Deadly Sins, cap. xxx. (Arnold, Vol. III. p. 163).
In the tract “De Officio Pastorale,” alluded to above, there is a similar passage—“conjugium secundum legem Christi eis licitum odiunt ut venenum, et seculare dominium eis a Christo prohibitum nimis avide amplexantur” (P. II. cap. xi. pp. 50-51).
It is to be borne in mind that at this period no one assumed that clerical celibacy had been ordained of Christ or the Apostles.