Even the validity of the humble petition and advice was questioned, as being voted by a parliament which lay under force, and which was deprived by military violence of a considerable number of its members.

The protector, dreading combinations between the parliament and the malecontents in the army, resolved to allow no leisure for forming any conspiracy against him; and, with expressions of great displeasure, he dissolved the parliament.

When urged by Fleetwood and others of his friends not to precipitate himself into this rash measure, he swore by the living God that they should not sit a moment longer.
These distractions at home were not able to take off the protector's attention from foreign affairs; and in all his measures, he proceeded with the same vigor and enterprise, as if secure of the duty and attachment of the three kingdoms.

His alliance with Sweden he still supported; and he endeavored to assist that crown in its successful enterprises for reducing all its neighbors to subjection, and rendering itself absolute master of the Baltic.

As soon as Spain declared war against him, he concluded a peace and an alliance with France, and united himself in all his counsels with that potent and ambitious kingdom.