Cromwell met his Parliament on the 22nd of January, 1655, and told them that dissettlement and division, discontent and dissatisfaction had been more multiplied during the five months of their deliberations than for years before. Seeds were being sown by them for the renewal of old troubles. Briers and thorns were nourished under their shadow. In connection with the fostered confusions--on which he emphatically dwelt--his Highness touched upon the spirit which the House had manifested in endeavouring to abridge the amount of religious liberty; although he did not seem at all to disapprove of the treatment which John Biddle had received. He ended his speech by formally dissolving the Assembly. [Illustration] CHAPTER VI. Upon the dissolution of the first Protectorate Parliament, the supreme management of affairs once more relapsed into the hands of Cromwell and his Council. They constituted an ultimate tribunal, before which all ecclesiastical, as well as all secular matters had to be brought, if any doubt arose respecting the decisions of inferior authorities. Notices of questions referred to them, or of matters in which they saw it proper to interfere, are found in such of the Minute Books as are still extant. But, excepting these occasional and revisionary interpositions, the Commissioners for approving godly preachers, and the Commissioners for ejecting scandalous ones, undertook the entire superintendence and discipline of the Clergy. [Sidenote: _Commissioners at Whitehall._] The former sat at Whitehall. There country ministers, summoned from various parts, were obliged to attend; and, in numerous cases, where the benefice was distant and the living poor, the hardship of travelling all the way up to the metropolis became very great. As might be expected, men forced to pass through the ordeal complained of arbitrariness and oppression. There were frequent grumblings about "super-metropolitan" and "hyper-archiepiscopal" tyranny, and of despotism worse than the Bishops'--even "overtopping Laud." Clergymen, out of all sympathy with their judges, entered the Court full of prejudices; and by their known character were likely to excite a corresponding prejudice on the part of those who decided their destiny. They walked into the room full of suspicion; they met at the Board with abundant annoyance; and then came out irritated at the judgment pronounced upon their case. Often-times they complained of delay, and said they had "to wait the leisure of the underlings, clerks, or registrars"--a complaint which probably was not without foundation, for much business was thrown into a few hands, to be transacted far away from the residence of the parties most interested.