For several years, nothing remarkable occurred in Colonel Barclay’s life that deserves our particular consideration; but in 1663, he was unexpectedly arrested and thrown into Edinburgh Castle, by an order from Government. As no crime was alleged against him, he was soon liberated; but it does not appear that he received any compensation for the injury. His arrest was the more surprising, as he had suffered so much in the royal cause, and his principles were well known to be favourable to the Restoration. It is probable, indeed, that this event arose from the resentment of some personal enemy; for malevolence often pursues the best of men, and those eminent for their virtues are by no means exempted from its baneful effects. Colonel Barclay’s military and political career had now drawn to a close; and his future life was devoted to study, religious abstraction, the practice of charity, and all the benevolent and amiable pursuits of the human mind. In the year 1666, he joined the sect called _Quakers_, and became as eminent for piety and zeal, in private life, as he had before been distinguished for courage and intrepidity in the field. Religious disputes, however, running high in the country, his life was checquered by many indignities and insults. Those who had caressed him, while at the head of an army, by every flattering mark of respect, now forgot their benefactor, and cruelly sought to embitter his days by persecution. But he steadily adhered to his principles; for it could scarcely be supposed, that a man who had been bred in the camp of the great Adolphus--who had fought for liberty of conscience, and had braved all the dangers of war--could be either intimidated, or diverted from his purpose by the assaults of power, or the threatening clamour of a senseless rabble. The colonel now generally resided at Ury, enjoying the society of his friends, and disseminating among his neighbours the doctrines of the Quakers. Many of “good account” embraced their tenets; and weekly and monthly meetings of these peaceable and religious people were held at Ury, for devotional exercises. But the clergy looked on them with an eye of jealousy, and stirred up against them the malicious passions of weak and intolerant men. And in the month of March 1676, Colonel Barclay and others, were indicted at Aberdeen, before a committee of the privy-council, for holding meetings contrary to a statute enacted against armed field conventicles, which, under every latitude of interpretation, could not be applied to Quakers. They were, however, found guilty, and amerced in a fine to the amount of a fourth part of their respective valued rents, and committed to prison until payment should be made.