he spoils of hereticks and
malignants.

Having, in time, almost extirpated those opinions which he found so
prevalent at his arrival, or, at least, obliged those, who would not
recant, to an appearance of conformity, he was at leisure for
employments which deserve to be recorded with greater commendation.
About this time, many socinian writers began to publish their notions
with great boldness, which the presbyterians, considering as heretical
and impious, thought it necessary to confute; and, therefore, Cheynel,
who had now obtained his doctor's degree, was desired, in 1649, to
write a vindication of the doctrine of the Trinity, which he
performed, and published the next year.

He drew up, likewise, a confutation of some socinian tenets advanced
by John Fry, a man who spent great part of his life in ranging from
one religion to another, and who sat as one of the judges on the king,
but was expelled afterwards from the house of commons, and disabled
from sitting in parliament. Dr. Cheynel is said to have shown himself
evidently superiour to him in the controversy, and was answered by him
only with an opprobrious book against the presbyterian clergy.

Of the remaining part of his life, there is found only an obscure and
confused account. He quitted the presidentship of St. John's, and the
professorship, in 1650, as Calamy relates, because he would not take
the engagement; and gave a proof that he could suffer, as well as act,
in a cause which he believed just. We have, indeed, no reason to
question his resolution, whatever occasion might be given to exert it;
nor is it probable that he feared affliction more than danger, or that
he would not have borne persecution himself for those opinions which
inclined him to persecute others.

He did not suffer much upon this occasion; for he retained the living
of Petworth, to which he, thenceforward, confined his labours, and
where he was very assiduous, and, as Calamy affirms, very successful
in the exercise of his ministry, it being his peculiar character to be
warm and zealous in all his undertakings.

This heat of his disposition, increased by the uncommon turbulence of
the times in which he lived, and by the opposition to which the
unpopular nature of some of his employments exposed him, was, at last,
heightened to distraction, so that he was, for some years, disordered
in his understanding, as both Wood and Calamy relate, but with such
difference as might be expected fr