he whole military force put
into such hands as the Independents could rely on. Besides members of
parliament who were excluded, many officers, unwilling to serve under
the new generals, threw up their commissions, and unwarily facilitated
the project of putting the army entirely into the hands of that faction.

Though the discipline of the former parliamentary army was not
contemptible, a more exact plan was introduced, and rigorously executed,
by these new commanders. Valor indeed was very generally diffused over
the one party as well as the other, during this period: discipline also
was attained by the forces of the parliament: but the perfection of
the military art, in concerting the general plans of action and the
operations of the field, seems still on both sides to have been in
a great measure wanting. Historians at least, perhaps from their own
ignorance and inexperience, have not remarked any thing but a headlong,
impetuous conduct; each party hurrying to a battle, where valor and
fortune chiefly determined the success. The great ornament of history,
during these reigns, are the civil, not the military transactions.

Never surely was a more singular army assembled, than that which was now
set on foot by the parliament. To the greater number of the regiments
chaplains were not appointed, the officers assumed the spiritual duty,
and united it with their military functions. During the intervals of
action, they occupied themselves in sermons, prayers, exhortations;
and the same emulation there attended them, which in the field is so
necessary to support the honor of that profession. Rapturous ecstasies
supplied the place of study and reflection; and while the zealous
devotees poured out their thoughts in unpremeditated harangues, they
mistook that eloquence which to their own surprise, as well as that of
others, flowed in upon them, for divine illuminations, and for illapses
of the Holy Spirit. Wherever they were quartered, they excluded the
minister from his pulpit; and, usurping his place, conveyed their
sentiments to the audience, with all the authority which followed
their power, their valor, and their military exploits, united to their
appearing zeal and fervor. The private soldiers, seized with the same
spirit, employed their vacant hours in prayer, in perusing the Holy
Scriptures, in ghostly conferences where they compared the progress of
their in grace, and mutually stimulated each other to further advances