ere universally infected with
that enthusiastic spirit. To their assistance did the Independent party
among the commons chiefly trust in their projects for acquiring the
ascendant over their antagonists.

Soon after the retreat of the Scots, the Presbyterians, seeing every
thing reduced to obedience, began to talk of diminishing the army; and,
on pretence of easing the public burdens, they levelled a deadly blow at
the opposite faction. They purposed to embark a strong detachment, under
Skippon and Massey, for the service of Ireland; they openly declared
their intention of making a great reduction of the remainder.[*] It was
even imagined that another new model of the army was projected, in
order to regain to the Presbyterians that superiority which they had so
imprudently lost by the former.[**]

* Fourteen thousand men were only intended to be kept up;
six thousand horse, six thousand foot, and two thousand
dragoons. Bates.

** Rush. vol. vii. p. 564.

The army had small inclination to the service of Ireland; a country
barbarous, uncultivated, and laid waste by massacres and civil
commotions: they had less inclination to disband, and to renounce that
pay which, having earned it through fatigues and dangers, they now
purposed to enjoy in ease and tranquillity. And most of the officers,
having risen from the dregs of the people, had no other prospect, if
deprived of their commission, than that of returning to languish in
their native poverty and obscurity.

These motives of interest acquired additional influence, and became more
dangerous to the parliament, from the religious spirit by which the
army was universally actuated. Among the generality of men educated in
regular, civilized societies, the sentiments of shame, duty, honor,
have considerable authority, and serve to counterbalance and direct
the motives derived from private advantage: but, by the predominancy of
enthusiasm among the parliamentary forces, these salutary principles lost
their credit, and were regarded as mere human inventions, yea, moral
institutions, fitter for heathens than for Christians.[*] The saint,
resigned over to superior guidance, was at full liberty to gratify all
his appetites, disguised under the appearance of pious zeal. And
besides the strange corruptions engendered by this spirit, it eluded
and loosened all the ties of morality, and gave entire scope, and even
sanction, to the selfishness and ambition which