That which E. Burrough mentions in the forepart of this letter, of the grievous burdens and oppressions laid upon the just, seems chiefly to regard the tithes which the priests extorted from the Quakers, so that many thereby were reduced to poverty; and the heinousness of this was not unknown to Cromwell; for when he was about to give battle to his enemies, near Dunbar in Scotland, he said in his prayer to God, that if the Lord would be pleased to deliver him at that time, he would take off that great oppression of tithes. But this promise he never performed, but suffered himself to be swayed by the flatteries of his teachers; and therefore it was not without great cause that E. Burrough laid this grievous oppression before him. A copy of the said letter, of which but a part is inserted here, to shun prolixity, was given into the hands of Oliver Cromwell, then protector, in the Third month of this year. In the next month E. Burrough spoke with him about it, and Cromwell told him in effect that all persecution and cruelty was against his mind, and said that he was not guilty of those persecutions acted unjustly upon Burrough’s friends. This made E. Burrough write again to him, and bid him, ‘Consider what the cause is, that what thou desirest not to be done, is yet done: is it not that thou mayest please men; making it appear thou art more willing to do the false teachers of this nation, and wicked men, a pleasure, than to own the people of God, in relieving them, and easing them of their cruel burdens and oppressions, laid upon them by unjust men? For a word of thy mouth, or a show of thy countenance, in dislike of these cruel and unjust persecutions, would bind the hands of many blood-thirsty men. Therefore consider: thou canst not be cleared in the sight of the Lord God from them, being acted under thee, and in thy name: for there seems rather to be a favouring of them in thee, by forbearance of the actors of cruelty, by which their hands are strengthened, than any dislike showed by thee, in bearing thy witness, as thou oughtest to do, against them. For thou knowest of some in this city, and elsewhere, whom we know to be just men, who suffer imprisonment, and the loss of their liberties, because for conscience-sake they cannot swear; and many others in this nation, suffering cruel things upon the like, or same ground: even for well-doing, and not for evil; which oppression might be removed, and their unjust sufferings taken off by thee, by a word from thy mouth or pen; and this makes that thou canst not be clear in the sight of God in these things, because not helped by thee, who hast the power to help it.