Oxford University was granted a charter which put the greater part of the town under control of the Chancellor and scholars. The mayor of Oxford was required to take an oath at his election to maintain the privileges and customs of the university. Roman law Regius professorships were founded by the King at Oxford and Cambridge.
The physicians of London were incorporated to oversee and govern the practice of medicine. A faculty of physicians was established at Oxford and Cambridge. Only graduates of the new College of Physicians or of Oxford or Cambridge may practice medicine or surgery. Food that was digested was thought to turn into a vapor which passed along the veins and was concreted as blood, flesh, and fat.
Geoffrey Chaucer's "Canterbury Tales" was a popular book. Through Chaucer, London English became a national standard and the notion of "correct pronunciation" came into being.
The discoveries and adventures of Amerigo Vespucci, a Portuguese explorer, were widely read. The North and South American continents were named for him.
London merchant guilds started to cease to be trading organizations and began to be identified mainly with hospitality and benevolence. Twelve Great Companies dominated city politics: Mercers, Grocers, Drapers, Fishmongers, Haberdashers, Ironmongers, Vintners, Goldsmiths, Skinners, Salters, Company of Merchant Tailors, and the Clothworkers (composed from leading fullers and shearmen). The leading men of these guilds were generally aldermen and the guilds acted like municipal committees of trade and manufactures. Then they acted like a state department for the superintendence of the trade and manufactures of London. They were called Livery Companies and categorized their memberships in three grades: mere membership, livery membership, and placement on the governing body. Livery membership was distinguished by having the clothing of the brotherhood and were usually those who bought membership and paid higher fees because they were richer. Most of these companies had almshouses attached to their halls for the impoverished, disabled, and elderly members and their widows and children. For instance, many members of the goldsmiths had been blinded by the fire and smoke of quick silver and some members had been rendered crazed and infirm by working in that trade. The pensions of the liverymen were larger than those of mere members and they generally had a right to a place at those banquets which are chartered franchises, and they are invited by the governing body, as a matter of favor, to other entertainments. The freedom and rights of citizenship of the city could only be obtained through membership in a livery company.
A lesser guild, the Leathersellers, absorbed the Glovers, Pursers, and Pouchmakers. These craftsmen then became wage earners of the Leathersellers, but others of these craftsmen remained independent. Before, the Whittawyers, who treated horse, deer, and sheep hides with alum and oil, had become wage-earners for the Skinners.
There are 26 wards of London as of 1550. This is the number for the next four centuries. Each has an alderman, a clerk, and a constable.
Though there was much agreement on the faults of the church and the need to reform it, there were many disagreements on what philosophy of life should take the place of church teachings. The humanist Thomas More was a university trained intellectual. His book "Utopia", idealized an imaginary society of pagans living according to the principles of natural virtue. In it, everything is owned in common and there is no need for money. There is agreement that there is a God who created the world and all good things and who guides men. But otherwise people choose their religious beliefs and their priests. From this perspective, the practices of current Christians, scholastic theologicians, priests and monks, superstition, and ritual look absurd. He encouraged a religious revival. Aristotle's position that virtuous men would rule best is successfully debated against Plato's position that intellectuals and philosophers would be the ideal rulers.
More plead for proportion between punishment and crime. He urged that theft no longer be punished by death because this only encouraged the thief to murder his victim to eliminate evidence of the theft. He opined that the purpose of punishment was to reform offenders. He advocated justice for the poor to the standard of justice received by the rich.
Erasmus, a former monk, visited the nation for a couple of years and argued that reason should prevail over religious belief. He wrote the book "In Praise of Folly", which noted man's elaborate pains in misdirected efforts to gain the wrong thing. For instance, it questioned what man would stick his head into the halter of marriage if he first weighed the inconveniences of that life? Or what woman would ever embrace her husband if she foresaw or considered the dangers of childbirth and the drudgery of motherhood? Childhood and senility are the most pleasant stages of life because ignorance is bliss. Old age forgetfulness washes away the cares of the mind. A foolish and doting old man is freed from the miseries that torment the wise and has the chief joy of life: garrulousness. The seekers of wisdom are the farthest from happiness; they forget the human station to which they were born and use their arts as engines with which to attack nature. The least unhappy are those who approximate the naiveness of the beasts and who never attempt what is beyond men. As an example, is anyone happier than a moron or fool? Their cheerful confusion of the mind frees the spirit from care and gives it many-sided delights. Fools are free from the fear of death and from the pangs of conscience. They are not filled with vain worries and hopes. They are not troubled by the thousand cares to which this life is subject. They experience no shame, fear, ambition, envy, or love. In a world where man are mostly at odds, all agree in their attitude towards these innocents. They are sought after and sheltered; everyone permits them to do and say what they wish with impunity. However, the usual opinion is that nothing is more lamentable than madness. The Christian religion has some kinship with folly, while it has none at all with wisdom. For proof of this, notice that children, old people, women, and fools take more delight than anyone else in holy and religious things, led no doubt solely by instinct. Next, notice that the founders of religion have prized simplicity and have been the bitterest foes of learning. Finally, no people act more foolishly than those who have been truly possessed with Christian piety. They give away whatever is theirs; they overlook injuries, allow themselves to be cheated, make no distinction between friends and enemies, shun pleasure, and feast on hunger, vigils, tears, labors, and scorn. They disdain life, and utterly prefer death. In short, they have become altogether indifferent to ordinary interests, as if their souls lived elsewhere and not in their bodies. What is this, if not to be mad? The life of Christians is run over with nonsense. They make elaborate funeral arrangements, with candles, mourners, singers, and pallbearers. They must think that their sight will be returned to them after they are dead, or that their corpses will fall ashamed at not being buried grandly. Christian theologians, in order to prove a point, will pluck out four or five words from different places, even falsifying the sense of them if necessary, and disregard the fact that the context is irrelevant or even contradicts the point, They do this with such brazen skill that our lawyers are often jealous of them.