Petitions from the Army followed these proceedings, the soldiers saying, "Because our consciences bear us witness that we dipped our hands in blood in that cause; and the blood of many thousands hath been shed by our immediate hands under your command in that quarrel, we are amazed to think of the account that we must render at the great and terrible day of the Lord, if by your silence the freedom of these nations should be lost, and returned into the hands of that family, which God hath so eminently appeared against in His many signal providences little less than miracles."[19] [Sidenote: 1659.] The Commons, although weak, assumed the semblance of strength, and upon the 18th of April resolved that no Council of Officers should be held without permission of the Protector and the Parliament; and that no one should have command in the Army or Navy who did not engage to leave the two Houses uninterrupted in their deliberations. The Protector, still more feeble than Parliament, proceeded to dissolve the Council; the officers asserted their authority by continuing to meet for conference. As it was in the father's days so it was in the son's: when argument failed violence took its place. Violence, like that which had been employed by Oliver against the Parliament, was now threatened against Richard by the Army. The officers, clutching at their old weapons, seeing how things were likely to proceed, fearing the Presbyterian ascendancy, and the destruction of their liberties, determined to put an end to the sitting of the two Houses; and told His Highness that if he did not dismiss them he might expect to be dismissed himself. Richard was no soldier, and had not, like Oliver, secured the attachment of the military, so that resistance by him to martial chiefs could avail nothing. He, therefore, allowed the Parliament to be dissolved by Commission, upon the 22nd of April. After this act had been accomplished, not without opposition from some members, the party in power summoned to the resumption of their trust, such of the Long Parliament as had continued to sit until the year 1653. They amounted in number to ninety-one; out of these forty-two obeyed the new order, and took their places on the 7th of May. Fourteen of the old Presbyterians, including Prynne,[20] who had sat in St. Stephen's before Pride's purge, were refused admittance. [Sidenote: INTERREGNUM.] Upon the 13th of May the heads of the Army presented a petition, in which they proposed to men whom they addressed as rulers, but who were in fact servants, that religious liberty should, as in the days of Oliver, continue to be conceded to all orthodox believers (Papists and Prelatists being distinctly excepted); that a godly ministry should be everywhere maintained; and that the universities and schools of learning should be countenanced and reformed.[21] Gleams of Presbyterian influence disappeared; the broad ecclesiastical policy of Oliver again resumed the ascendant.