After Captain Drury had lodged me at the Mermaid, he left me there, and went to give the Protector an account of me. When he came to me again, he told me, the Protector required that I should promise not to take up a carnal sword or weapon against him or the government, as it then was, and I should write it in what words I saw good, and set my hand to it. I said little in reply to Captain Drury. But the next morning I was moved of the Lord to write a paper to the Protector, Oliver Cromwell; “Wherein I did in the presence of the Lord God declare, that I denied the wearing or drawing of a carnal sword, or any other outward weapon, against him or any man: and that I was sent of God to stand a witness against all violence, and against the works of darkness; and to turn people from darkness to light; and to bring them from the causes of war and fighting, to the peaceable gospel, and from being evil-doers, which the magistrates’ swords should be a terror to.” When I had written what the Lord had given me to write, I set my name to it, and gave it to Captain Drury to hand to Oliver Cromwell, which he did. After some time Captain Drury brought me before the Protector himself at WHITEHALL. It was in a morning, before he was dressed, and one Harvey, who had come a little among Friends, but was disobedient, waited upon him. When I came in, I was moved to say, “Peace be in this house; and I exhorted him to keep in the fear of God, that he might receive wisdom from Him, that by it he might be directed, and order all things under his hand to God’s glory.” I spoke much to him of truth, and much discourse I had with him about religion; wherein he carried himself very moderately. But, he said, we quarrelled with priests, whom he called ministers. I told him, “I did not quarrel with them, but they quarrelled with me and my friends.” “But,” said I, “if we own the prophets, Christ, and the apostles, we cannot hold up such teachers, prophets, and shepherds, as the prophets, Christ, and the apostles declared against; but we must declare against them by the same power and Spirit.” Then I showed him, “that the prophets, Christ, and the apostles declared freely, and against them that did not declare freely; such as preached for filthy lucre, and divined for money, and preached for hire, and were covetous and greedy, that can never have enough; and that they that have the same Spirit, that Christ, and the prophets, and the apostles had, could not but declare against all such now, as they did then.” As I spoke, he several times said, it was very good, and it was truth. I told him, “that all Christendom (so called) possessed the Scriptures, but wanted the power and Spirit that they had, who gave forth the Scriptures, and that was the reason they were not in fellowship with the Son, nor with the Father, nor with the Scriptures, nor one with another.”