[2] He probably took orders early, for on the presentation of his college he succeeded John Warren, the ejected vicar of Hatfield Broad Oak, Essex.
He refers to these disputes in his memoranda of 1678 and 1680; on 31 July 1683 he enters a thanksgiving for the successful issue of a suit, and in the same year registers a vow that if he gains a cause then pending he will devote half the tithe so recovered to the relief of the poor.
After his wife's death Brokesby appears to have resided constantly at Shottesbrooke, and early in 1706 succeeded Mr Gilbert of St John's College, Oxford, as chaplain to the little society of nonjurors established there.
[6] He travelled about a good deal, and generally paid a yearly round of visits in the north of England, probably to the men of his own party, occasionally also going up to Oxford and London.
At Shottesbrooke he enjoyed the society of Robert Nelson, to whom he rendered valuable assistance in the compilation of his book on the Festivals and Fasts of the Church.
In common with some other moderate nonjurors, Brokesby refused to take the oath simply because his conscience forbade him to do so, and not as a matter of politics.
[7] The death of James, however, was followed by the oath of abjuration, and neither Brokesby nor his friends were prepared to declare that the kingship of William of Orange was founded on right.
[8] A letter from S. Parker of Oxford, dated 12 November,[9] appears to have called forth a reply dated 18 November, in which Brokesby shows that 'the new bishops' were merely suffragans, that no synodical denunciation had invested them with independent authority after the deaths of the deprived diocesans, that the 'deprived fathers' had no power to invest them with such authority, and that therefore they were not diocesan bishops.