their head, and not look to rule
over the same."' Well, Queen Mary was as good as her word. As Fox adds,
'What she performed on her part the thing itself and the whole story of
the persecution doth testifie.' But the stubborn Suffolk gospellers were
not to be put down, and a remnant had been left in Framlingham, as well
as in other parts of the country. At Framlingham we find a Richard
Goltie, son-in-law of Samuel Ward, of Ipswich, was instituted to the
rectory in 1630. In 1650 he refused the engagement to submit to the then
existing Government, and was removed, when Henry Sampson, M.A., a fellow
of Pembroke Hall, Cambridge, was appointed by his college to the vacancy.
He continued there till the Restoration, when Mr. Goltie returned and
took possession of the living, which he continued to hold till his death.
Not being satisfied to conform, Mr. Sampson continued awhile preaching at
Framlingham to those who were attached to his ministry, in private houses
and other buildings, and by his labours laid the foundation of the
Congregational or Independent Church in that town, as appears from a note
in the Church Book belonging to the Dissenters meeting at Woodbridge, in
the Quay Lane. Mr. Sampson collected materials for a history of
Nonconformity, a great part of which is incorporated in Calamy and
Palmer's works. It was to him that John Fairfax, of Needham Market,
wrote, when he and some other ministers were shut up in Bury Gaol for the
crime of preaching the Gospel. It appears that they had met in the
parish church, at Walsham-le-Willows, where, after the liturgy was read
by the clergyman of the parish, a sermon was preached by a non-licensed
minister. The party were then taken and committed to prison, where they
remained till the next Quarter Sessions, when they were released upon
their recognisances to appear at the next Assizes. Then, it seems,
though not convicted upon any other offence, upon the suggestion of the
justices, to whom they were strangers, they were committed again to
prison, on the plea that _they were persons dangerous to the public
peace_. Thus were Dissenters treated in the good old times. Mr. Sampson
seems to have fared somewhat better. After his removal, he travelled on
the Continent, returned to London, entered himself at the College of
Physicians, and lived and died in good repute. The old congregation
having become Unitarian, a new one was formed, and of this Church a
pillar was Mr. He