As may with sweetness through mine ear
Dissolve me into ecstasies,
And bring all heaven before mine eyes.
Milton.
The affliction of the good parson of Cheddar at the strange and painful conduct of his son Cuthbert was heavy to bear. However, from a sense of duty to his weaker partner, he made great efforts to preserve his wonted serenity and composure in her presence; but when alone he was bowed down in the dust.
Nothing could possibly present a greater contrast to the tone of religious profession which was, at this period, obtaining a wide reception among men than that in which old Noble lay prostrate in his closet before his God.
He had ever been a meek and cheerful Christian; but there were depths of humiliation which he had not as yet fathomed; and he would have fainted at the waves of trouble, which his prescient eye saw rolling onward, if he had not felt the hand, which led him down into the deep, was that of a heavenly Father, if he had not heard a voice that whispered in his ear, “It is I, be not afraid.”
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.