Then occurred a charge which Crofton always denied, but which was brought up against him continually. A certain maid-servant accused him of chastising her with a rod in an improper manner. Afterwards she swore that she had been bribed to bring the accusation. In 1657 Crofton sent a letter to John Simpson; he was going to take possession of his own pulpit, and Simpson might commence an action as soon as he pleased. Simpson, however, complained to the Council of State, and an order was granted him to preach in the afternoon. Accordingly on Sunday, Crofton being in the pulpit and surrounded by his friends, John Simpson and his party entered the church and presented the order. It was addressed to Grafton, not Crofton. “This order is not for me,” said the Vicar; whereupon the Simpson party retired, beaten for once. The Council of State again interfered and Crofton had to submit. He took revenge by charging Simpson’s three principal friends with brawling in church. They were acquitted; he made a public protest in the church. John Simpson then began to preach against infant baptism; Crofton charged him with heresy and demanded of him a defence of his position. Simpson preserved silence. But he took other steps. He charged Crofton with being a declared enemy to the Government and with preaching sedition and insurrection. Crofton refused to acknowledge the jurisdiction of the Court. He published a pamphlet, however, in which he defended himself and told a pretty story of parish dissensions and persecutions. After this came the whirlwind. Cromwell died. Crofton went into the country just before the Cheshire rising, and was charged with preaching to the rebels; from this he cleared himself. He then threw himself into the politics of the time, strongly advocating a free Parliament; he preached at St. Peter’s, Cornhill, for the restoration of Charles the Second; meantime John Simpson had vanished and the magnanimous Crofton preached a sermon on peace. He lost his church at the Restoration; he was consigned to the Tower for a twelvemonth; he went down into Cheshire and turned cheese-factor; he was again arrested for sowing sedition; he went back to London and started a grocer’s shop; under the pressure of the Five Mile Act he left London and took a farm at Little Barford in Bedfordshire; after the Plague he returned to London and set up a school in Aldgate; it was here that he preached a course of sermons in St. James’s, Duke’s Place, which he afterwards published under the title of “The Saints’ Care for Church Communion.” He died just before Christmas 1672, and his body lies buried in the churchyard of his old parish.