no mere gathering of local
representatives, but a national assembly, and that a seat in it could no
longer be confined to dwellers within the bounds of this county or that.
But it showed also a pressure for seats, a passing away of the old dread of
being returned as a representative and a new ambition to gain a place among
the members of the Commons. Whether they would or no indeed the Commons
were driven forward to a more direct interference with public affairs. From
the memorable statute of 1322 their right to take equal part in all matters
brought before Parliament had been incontestable, and their waiver of much
of this right faded away before the stress of time. Their assent was needed
to the great ecclesiastical statutes which regulated the relation of the
See of Rome to the realm. They naturally took a chief part in the enactment
and re-enactment of the Statute of Labourers. The Statute of the Staple,
with a host of smaller commercial and economical measures, was of their
origination. But it was not till an open breach took place between the
baronage and the prelates that their full weight was felt. In the
Parliament of 1371, on the resumption of the war, a noble taunted the
Church as an owl protected by the feathers which other birds had
contributed, and which they had a right to resume when a hawk's approach
threatened them. The worldly goods of the Church, the metaphor hinted, had
been bestowed on it for the common weal, and could be taken from it on the
coming of a common danger. The threat was followed by a prayer that the
chief offices of state, which had till now been held by the leading
bishops, might be placed in lay hands. The prayer was at once granted:
William of Wykeham, Bishop of Winchester, resigned the Chancellorship,
another prelate the Treasury, to lay dependants of the great nobles; and
the panic of the clergy was seen in large grants which were voted by both
Convocations.

[Sidenote: John of Gaunt]

At the moment of their triumph the assailants of the Church found a leader
in John of Gaunt. The Duke of Lancaster now wielded the actual power of the
Crown. Edward himself was sinking into dotage. Of his sons the Black
Prince, who had never rallied from the hardships of his Spanish campaign,
was fast drawing to the grave; he had lost a second son by death in
childhood; the third, Lionel of Clarence, had died in 1368. It was his
fourth son therefore, John of Gaunt, to whom the royal power mainly