In vain did he exhaust his heart in sound, pious, and affectionate remonstrances, meditated and penned in the spirit of prayer, that he might recall his dear and wandering child to the bosom of the church, or, at all events, so far recover him from gross delusions as to see him join that upright and devout portion of the community, which, though differing from the discipline of the church, maintained a pure and practical doctrine. In vain did he press the return of Cuthbert to Cheddar, by every argument which parental love could suggest. The letters of Noble and his wife were replied to in the words of love; but the fruit of his new persuasion was an obstinate self-will; and while he implored them, at great length, to consider his views, and urged the danger of despising them, he evinced to others, what was not perhaps suspected by himself, a degree of spiritual pride only to be exceeded by the strength of his delusion. He had adopted the notions of those fanatics who were styled Fifth-monarchy Men, and who ranged themselves where, indeed, any sect, however extravagant, might have found a place, under the banner of the Independents. It was some consolation to these troubled parents to hear from the Philips’s, their relations, and also from other friends, that the life and the conduct of Cuthbert were, as regarded all moral and social duties, a credit to any theory, and such as became the pure precepts of the Gospel. His intellect was clear upon every other subject, except on that which, if it be rashly touched, seems to be guarded by invisible angels, who put forth their hands and smite the daring intruder with madness. “Oppression,” saith the preacher, “will make a wise man mad;”--a truth abundantly proved by the events, which, leading first to a secret and salutary reform, ended at last in a bloody revolution and an iron rule. It may be added, that he who seeketh to meddle with the hidden mysteries of unfulfilled prophecy is often smitten with blindness and confusion for his presumption. Thus it was with Cuthbert:--sensible, amiable, and affectionate in all the relations of life, he was now the subject of a monomania, and turned a deaf ear to the voice of truth and wisdom, though it spoke with all the authority and all the earnestness of a father. These were not times in which a minister could leave his parish for a distant journey, nor, indeed, was it at all likely that the presence of his parents would have effected that change in the sentiments or the course of Cuthbert, which their admirable and Christian letters had failed to produce. Time wore on gloomily enough, even in the peaceful parsonage at Cheddar. Many a time as old Noble paced his garden amid sunbeams and flowers, praising that “mercy which endureth for ever,” his thanksgivings ended in tears and lamentations, not for his domestic troubles, but for the great evils which he feared and expected would befall the church and the nation.