494 LIVES OF TILL PURITANS. and an " anabaptist," his sentiments were deemed seditious and factious, and the virulence of the mob was instigated against him by the high-constable. At one time he was stoned out of the pulpit ; and at another time the doors of the church were shut against him and his hearers ; upon which he preached in the church-yard.. But this was a crime of too great magnitude to be connived at or excused. He was, therefore, taken into custody, and prosecuted at the petty-sessions of the county ; then sent a prisoner to London, with articles of complaint against him to the parliament. On his examination he proved, by witnesses of good reputa- tion, that he had neither sowed sedition nor raised tumult ; and that all the disorders which had happened were owing to the malignity and violence of his opposers, who had acted contrary to law and common civility. He also produced co.pies of the sermons he had preached, and afterwards printed them. Indeed, his answers on this occasion were so perfectly satisfactory, that, on the report of the committee of the house of commons, he was not only discharged, .but a vote passed that he should have liberty to preach in any part of Suffolk, when the minister of the place did not himself officiate. And, upon the petition of the inhabitants of Ipswich, the house ordered, January 17, 1648, that Mr. Knollys and Mr. Kiffin should go there to preach.* In addition to all the trouble which the above business gave Mr. Knollys, it cost himno less than sixty pounds. This persecuted servant of Christ, finding how much offence was taken at his preaching in the church, and to what painful and expensive troubles it exposed him, set up a separate meeting in Great St. Helen's, London ; where the people flocked to hear him, and he had commonly a thousand hearers. This, however, gave greater offence to his presby- terian brethren than his former method ; and the landlord was prevailed upon to give him notice to remove from the place. After this he had a large meeting-house in Finsbury-fields ; and still continuing to preach, he was summoned before a committee of divines, in Queen's-court, Westminster. Being brought to examination, Mr. Leigh, the chairman, asked him, why he presumed to preach without holy orders. Towhom he replied, that, though he had renounced his episcopal ordi- nation, he was ordained in a church of God, according to the order of the gospel; and then explained the manner of ordination among the baptists. At last, when he was corn- Whitlocke's memorials, p. 363.
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