For two centuries after their expulsion from England by Edward I--that is, until the seventeenth century--Jews either avoided England entirely or lived there in deliberate obscurity. Some Spanish and Portuguese Jewish refugees from the Inquisition did arrive in England; but particularly after the execution for treason of Elizabeth's physician Roderigo Lopez in 1594, they could remain only as "Crypto-Jews." It was during the Puritan regime that the Jewish position in England really improved, and the removal of the legal bar dates from the conference summoned by Cromwell in response to the demands of Menasseh.[3] The interest in Rabbinical literature displayed by learned men like Joseph Scaliger, Johann Buxtorf, Hugo Grotius, and John Selden, together with a general Old Testament emphasis in Protestant scriptural study, made Judaism a more fashionable interest than it had been in previous years. Cromwell's own encouragement of Menasseh is usually viewed as an expression of his tolerationist principles and the hope that the return of Jews to England would aid in extending trade with Spain and Portugal, and even with the Levant. An additional facet of his general reception of Menasseh is relevant to Evelyn's _Pretended Messiah_. A chief argument in _The Humble Address of Menasseh ben Israel_ (November 5, 1655) was the Amsterdam rabbi's belief that since England was the only country rejecting the Jews, their readmittance would be the signal for the coming of the Messiah. Fifth-Monarchy enthusiasts recalled the prophecies of _Daniel_ and _Revelations_ and linked them with the relatively immediate experience of the Thirty Years' War; motives of mercantile jealousy were to some extent offset by millenarian anxiety. Indeed, the possibility of an imminent millennial reign of the saints could be the strongest kind of argument for showing favor to the Jews. Cromwell all but proselytized at the meetings of the conference; ultimately, because of the opposition of commercial interests, he was forced to dissolve it.