In terminating this chapter it may safely be asserted that, during the reign of Charles II., after the time when the Act of Uniformity came into force, except for the short space presently to be described, there occurred not any period, when persecution, in some form or other, did not disturb the Nonconformists of this country; yet perhaps it would not be going too far also to assert, that when persecution reached its greatest height, there were some of the proscribed who successfully asserted their liberty, and, either from the ignorance or from the connivance of the predominant party, escaped the rigours of the law. Sixteen months after the new statute for the suppression of Conventicles had been passed, and when in many directions it was being severely enforced, the Dissenters at Taunton, not only met together for worship, but boldly celebrated a festival in honour of the deliverance of the place, in the midst of the Civil Wars, under their illustrious townsman Robert Blake.[561] CHAPTER XXI. The fall of Clarendon had been succeeded by a Ministry well known in history under the name of the CABAL.[562] With the merely political conduct of the statesmen indicated by that word, we have nothing to do; their policy in relation to ecclesiastical affairs alone demands our notice. A change of feeling in the upper classes towards Nonconformists ensued, now that Clarendon's influence had been withdrawn, the virtues of distinguished sufferers became better known, and rumours about plots were far less frequent. This change prepared for a measure, which, unconstitutional as to its basis, was liberal in its operation. To found indulgence upon Royal authority alone, and not upon an Act of Parliament, was in harmony with a scheme for the exaltation of the Crown; but there is reason to believe that the measure proceeded, in part at least, from the better side of the nature of the Ministers, as well as from the better side of the nature of the Monarch. The previous history of those Ministers had been such as to dispose them to befriend oppressed Nonconformists. [Sidenote: THE CABAL.]