(John), the first divine in Europe who had resolution to attempt a reformation of religion, was born about the year 1324, in the parish of Wycliff, near Richmond, in Yorkshire. He was educated at Oxford, first in Queen's, and afterwards in Merton college, of which he was a probationer-fellow. Having acquired the reputation of a man of great learning and abilities, in 1361 he was chosen master of Balliol-hall, and in 1365 constituted warden of Canterbury college, by the founder archbishop Simon de Islip; but was, in 1367, ejected by the regulars, together with three secular fellows. He thought their proceedings arbitrary, and therefore appealed to the pope; but instead of obtaining redrefs, in 1370 the ejectment was confirmed. This disappointment probably contributed somewhat towards his enmity to the see of Rome, or rather to confirm that enmity; for he had long before written against the pope's exactions and corruptions of religion. However, his credit in the university continued; for having taken the degree of doctor in divinity, he read public lectures with Wickliff, with great applause; in which he frequently exposed the impositions of the Mendicant friars. About this time he published a defence of his sovereign Edward III. against the pope, who had insisted on the homage to which his predecessor king John had agreed. This defence was the cause of Wickliff's introduction at court, and of his being sent one of the ambassadors in 1374 to Bruges, where they met the pope's nuncios, in order to settle several ecclesiastical matters relative to the pope's authority. In the meantime Wickliff was presented by the king to the rectory of Lutterworth in Leicestershire, and in 1375 he obtained a prebend in the church of Welfbury in Gloucestershire. Wickliff continued hitherto, without molestation, to oppose the papal authority; but in 1377 a bull was sent over to the archbishop of Canterbury, and to Courtenay bishop of London, ordering them to secure this arch-heretic, and lay him in irons; at the same time the pope wrote to the king, requesting him to favour the bishops in the prosecution: he also sent a bull to Oxford, commanding the university to give him up. Before these bulls reached England Edward III. was dead, and Wickliff, protected by John duke of Lancaster, uncle to Richard II., favoured by the queen mother, and supported by the citizens of London, eluded the persecution of pope Gregory IX. who died in 1378. In the following year this intrepid reformer presented to parliament a severe paper against the tyranny of Rome, wrote against the papal supremacy and infallibility, and published a book On the Truth of the Scriptures, intended to prepare the way for an English translation of them, in which he had made considerable progress. In 1381 he published Sixteen Conclusions; in the first of which he ventured to expose the grand article of transubstantiation. These conclusions being condemned by the chancellor of Oxford, Wickliff appealed to the king and parliament; but being deserted by his already patron the duke of Lancaster, he was obliged to make a confession at Oxford; and by an order from the king was expelled the university. He now retired to his living of Lutterworth, where he finished his translation of the Bible. This version, of which there are several manuscript copies in the libraries of the universities, British Museum, &c. is a very literal translation from the Latin Vulgate. In 1383 he was suddenly struck with the palsy; a repetition of which put an end to his life in December 1384. He was buried in his own church, where his bones were suffered to rest in peace till the year 1428, when, by an order from the pope, they were taken up and burnt.

Besides a number of works that have been printed, he left a prodigious number of manuscripts; an accurate list of which may be seen in bishop Tanner's Bib. Brit. Hib. Some of them are in the Bodleian Library, others in the British Museum, &c.

Wickliff was doubtless a very extraordinary man, considering the times in which he lived. His natural sagacity discovered the absurdities and impositions of the church of Rome, and he had the honesty and resolution to promulgate his opinions, which a little more support would probably have enabled him to establish: they were evidently the foundation of the subsequent reformation.