oing
only so much as may preserve them from the reproach of gross and visible
neglect; but seriously to consider how much they can possibly do without
going out of their proper sphere, to serve the public, by the due
inspection of those committed to their care. The duties of the closet and
of the sanctuary were so adjusted as not to interfere with those of the
parade, or any other place where the welfare of the regiment called
him. On the other hand, he was solicitous not to suffer these things to
interfere with religion, a due attendance on which he apprehended to
be the surest method of attaining all desirable success in every other
interest and concern in life. He therefore abhorred every thing that
looked like a contrivance to keep his soldiers employed with their horses
and their arms at the seasons of public worship--an indecency which I
wish there were no room to mention. Far from that, he used to have them
drawn up just before it began, and from the parade they went off to the
house of God. He understood the rights of conscience too well to impose
his own particular profession in religion on others, or to treat those
who differed from him in the choice of its modes, the less kindly or
respectfully on that account. But as most of his own company, and many of
the rest, chose (when in England) to attend him to the dissenting chapel,
he used to march them up thither in due time, so as to be there before
the worship began. And I must do them the justice to say, that so far as
I could ever discern, when I have seen them in large numbers before me,
they behaved with as much reverence, gravity, and decorum, during the
time of divine service, as any of the worshippers.

That his remarkable care to maintain good discipline among them (of which
we shall afterwards speak) might be the more effectual, he made himself
on all proper occasions accessible to them, and expressed a great
concern for their interests, which, being genuine and sincere, naturally
discovered itself in a variety of instances. I remember I had once
occasion to visit one of his dragoons in his last illness at Harborough,
and I found the man upon the borders of eternity--a circumstance which,
as he apprehended himself, must add some peculiar weight and credibility
to his discourse. He then told me, in his colonel's absence, that he
questioned not that he should have everlasting reason to bless God on
Colonel Gardiner's account, for he had been a father to h