And although the murmurings and discontents of God's people, together with all our unsuitable walkings under those precious enjoyments we have from the Lord, may provoke Him to leave us to be overcome by our enemies, and cause us to hang our harps upon the willows, and cause the enemy to call for one of the songs of Sion in a strange land; yet, if the Lord shall take pleasure in us, He will cause His face to shine upon us, and carry us well through the seas of blood that are threatened against us, and the waste howling wilderness of our straits and difficulties, and at length bring us to that blessed haven of reformation, endeavoured by us, and cause all our troubles and disquiet to end in a happy rest and peace--when all His people shall be one, and His name one in all your dominions, which is and shall be the daily prayers of, my Lord, your Highness's most humble and obedient servant to his power, "THOS. KELSEY. "Chatham, 26th August, 1656." [Sidenote: 1656, September.] This advice was adopted, and between one and two hundred of the persons returned were refused their seats because of their disaffection to the Protectorate Government. [Sidenote: _Cromwell's Speech._] The second Protectorate Parliament met on the 17th of September, 1656. Sir Harry Vane, now a prisoner, had been proposed in three places, but had been elected in none. Haselrig had succeeded in securing his return, but for a time he did not take his seat. After Dr. Owen had preached at Westminster Abbey from the words in Isaiah xiv. 32--"What shall one then answer the messengers of the nation? That the Lord hath founded Zion, and the poor of his people shall trust in it,"--adjourning to the Painted Chamber, Cromwell stood up, took off his hat, and discoursed characteristically upon the Spaniards and Papists, and the Cavaliers--upon the late rising--the levellers and the Fifth Monarchy men--and also upon the Major-Generals. Then he turned to the subject of religion. His practice since the last Parliament, he said, had been to grant liberty to all who continued quiet and peaceable. He was against such liberty of conscience as might be repugnant to this. Let Baptists, Independents, and Presbyterians be countenanced as long as they were thankful to God, and made use of their liberty--not to interfere with others, but "to enjoy their own consciences." Men who believed in free justification by the blood of Jesus, and lived upon the grace of God, claimed freedom as a debt due to God and to Christ; and God would require it, if such Christians did not enjoy what they claimed. But his Highness declared he would not suffer one Christian to trample on the heels of another, or to revile, reproach, or provoke him. He prayed that God would give hearts and spirits to keep things equal, for striving after which he had "some boxes on the ear." Even Presbyterians, at last, were beginning