Without question Roger Williams numbered among his friends the most powerful men of England at this time--Oliver Cromwell, Sir Henry Vane, the former governor of the Massachusetts Bay Colony, and perhaps Milton. They greeted the pioneer from over-seas with hearty welcome. Their warm friendship must have meant much to the outcast from Massachusetts. But his patient heart must have been filled with a still greater joy when a commission appointed by Parliament granted his colony the much-desired charter. Massachusetts’ cold disapproval might continue, but the Narragansett settlements were on their feet at last! They had a future. Their star, slow in rising, was now above the horizon. During his stay in London, Roger Williams attended to other matters besides the procuring of the charter. Often his own personal concerns were pushed aside for the sake of others. The poor of the city were enduring great suffering due to a lack of coal, for the war had interfered with mining. Wood was very expensive. Roger Williams made it his business to do what he could to obtain fuel and so lessen the distress around him. In addition, he made use of every spare moment to write a great work on toleration bearing the rather startling title of “The Bloody Tenent of Persecution,” which was put together “in variety of strange houses, sometimes in the fields, in the midst of travel.” It was in answer to a letter of his old antagonist, John Cotton. Going back a step further, this letter had been called forth by a pamphlet on persecution composed by a prisoner of Newgate. Being denied writing materials, he had substituted milk for ink, and for paper, had used the wrappings of the milk bottles brought him. Such writings, he knew, would, upon the application of heat, become legible. To “the arguments against persecution _in milk_,” Roger Williams now wrote “the answer in blood.” He was on familiar ground, and with clear logic, good sense and strong English, he shaped his ideas on religious liberty. Such a book had never before been published. Truth and Peace are represented as discussing this all-important subject. “In what dark corner of the world, sweet Peace,” begins Truth, “are we two met? How hath the present evil world banished me from all the coasts and quarters of it? And how hath the righteous God in judgment taken thee from the earth?” “’Tis lamentably true, blessed Truth,” answers Peace, “the foundations of the world have long been out of course.... With what a wearied, tired wing have I flown over nations, kingdoms, cities, towns, to find out precious Truth.” “The like inquiries,” says Truth, “in my flights and travels have I made for Peace, and still am told she hath left the earth and fled to Heaven.” “Dear Truth,” then exclaims Peace, “what is the earth but a dungeon of darkness where Truth is not?”