REGINALD PECOCK. - Theologian, born in Wales c. 1395, died at Thorney c. 1460. He was bishop of St. Asaph (1444) and of Chichester (1450), and one of the most notable prose writers of 15th-century England.
Famed as a controversialist, his reputation rests on *The Repressor of overmuch Blaming of the Clergy* (1455), a polemical work against the Lollards (v.). His tendency to justify orthodoxy and authority with arguments at times paradoxical earned him the accusation of treating authority with little respect and of elevating reason to the criterion of religious faith. Forced to disavow his writings, he spent the remainder of his life in Thorney Abbey.
His importance as a stylist and prose writer WYCLIF, JOHN (v.). While the latter had chiefly employed Latin in his theological works, P. used the vernacular and sought to adapt it to the needs of precise prose. His vocabulary is more technical and at times more archaic than Chaucer’s, with a strong predominance of Saxon and vernacular forms over Latin ones. His achievement remained unique in the English language owing to the classicist reaction of the Renaissance. Among his other works should be noted *The Book of Faith* (1456).