THE AUTHOR RETIRES FROM THE ARMY—SHOULD A SOLDIER BE RELIGIOUS?—SCRIPTURE HEROES: ABRAM, JOSHUA, DEBORAH, JEPHTHAH, GIDEON, SAMSON, SAUL, AND DAVID—OTHER GODFEARING SOLDIERS: THE THUNDERING LEGION, ALFRED THE GREAT, GENERAL DYKERN, COLONEL GARDINER, FREDERIC OF PRUSSIA, COLONEL BERDELEBEN.  
n November, 1823, on another reduction in the army, I finally retired from the service. The leisure thus afforded induced me to look within, not with the superficial survey of former years, but with a desire and determination to discover my real condition as a moral and accountable creature; in other words, the facts and verities of the Christian religion were revealed to my mind with new and affecting power. To many this will appear strange, to some ridiculous; and there are a few who will ask, why a soldier of spirit, above all others, should trouble himself about the concerns of religion. I answer that question by asking another,—Why should he not? He has as deep an interest in gospel truth as any other person; and if piety of life be deemed essential for any person in any station of society, it is not less so for him. I apprehend, that if there be any difference between civil and military life, in this respect, the soldier ought to be the most religious; for his life is usually in greater jeopardy than that of the man of peace. Death, it is true, comes to all men sooner or later; but the soldier often anticipates its approach by the perils of active warfare. Others have objected, that for military men, who 194are proverbial for licentiousness, to set up for extraordinary sanctity, is not only uncalled for, but absurd and hypocritical. I again ask, Why so? If soldiers are actually so very bad, both in pretension and reality, they stand so much the more in need of religion to make them better. Salvation is a girdle which encompasses the world; and why a man is to be excluded from its benefits because he had defended his country’s right at the sword’s point, and hazard of his life and fame, I have yet to learn.
But, say some, there is something so pitiful and gloomy in a soldier who professes to be religious. There we are again at issue; and I consent to try the question by this single test. I affirm the converse; and aver, that pity must fall only on the irreligious, who are often gloomy and sad from certain assaults of conscience, known only to themselves; while some of the most intrepid and courageous men who ever lived were noted for obedience to Divine law; and, what is more to the present purpose, many of the ablest warlike achievements ever effected were planned and executed by pious soldiers. What is more extraordinary still, we shall presently discover that the success of many an expedition depended upon that piety; and that the Almighty Ruler of the universe granted or withheld the victory, to or from those whose hearts were right with Him.
It is not a little singular that one of the first battles recorded in Scripture consisted of a well-conducted expedition formed and led on by one of the greatest saints that ever lived; and the circumstances, so far from being stated to his disparagement, evidently redound to his honour. Soon after the combat in the Vale of Siddim, which was full of slime pits, Lot, the nephew of Abram, was taken prisoner, and his property carried away by the four kings commanding the victorious forces. When the disaster was made known to Abram, he armed and led forth his trained 195servants, three hundred and eighteen in number, and pursued the army unto Dan. He there made the needful dispositions for the approaching conflict; and, as his detachment was of far inferior numerical strength, when compared with the opposing force, he properly resolved upon a night attack. To use the emphatic language of holy writ, there ‘he smote them, and pursued them unto Hobah, which is on the left hand of Damascus;’ and to show that the discomfiture was complete, it is added, ‘he brought back all the goods, and his brother Lot, the women also, and the people.’ This action is enhanced when the principle is examined which induced it. Abram fought not for his own profit, but for the welfare and credit of his country. When rewards were tendered, he refused them. ‘I have,’ said he unto the king of Sodom, ‘lift up mine hand unto the Lord, the most high God, the possessor of heaven and earth, that I will not take from a thread even to a shoe-latchet, lest thou shouldest say, I have made Abram rich.’
The valour and success of a religious captain are also shown during the hostile advances of the Israelites through the wilderness, nearly five hundred years after the event just recited. Among other opponents, Sihon, the Amoritish king, endeavoured to dispute their passage. We do not discover that recourse was had to tedious and doubtful negotiations. It was probably shown to the Israelitish leader, by divine impulse, that with enemies so treacherous treaties were vain. At all events, an immediate battle took place; Israel smote the foe with the edge of the sword, after which the forces ‘turned and went up by the way of Bashan; and Og, the king of Bashan went out against them, he and his people, to the battle at Edrei.’ That monarch fell, and all his people; and it is remarkable that the Israelitish chieftain was no other than the meek and pious Moses, who had received the special command of the Almighty to extirpate their enemies, who, we have therefore reason to believe, had filled up the measure of their iniquity, and were no longer fit to live.
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ABRAM RETURNING FROM THE SLAUGHTER OF THE KINGS.
197An instructive and highly curious circumstance is recorded in the Book of Joshua, which discovers that religion not only sits well upon the warrior, but that impiety is the bane of military life. In consequence of a certain trespass committed by Achan the son of Carmi, the Israelitish army became absolutely useless. They fled before the men of Ai, who ‘chased them from before the gate even unto Thebarim, and smote them in the going down so that the hearts of the people melted, and became as water.’ Now, mark the difference when Joshua took the command. Five kings with their combined armies advanced against the Gibeonites, who, naturally alarmed, despatched a messenger to their allies, requesting help. Joshua, like all other good men, lost no time in doing a good action. He did not let the grass grow under his feet. He came on the enemy ‘suddenly, and went up from Gilgal all night, and slew them with a great slaughter at Gibeon, and chased them along the way that goeth to Bethhoron, and smote them to Azekah, and unto Makkedah.’
What is, in some respects, more singular, the Israelites were subsequently delivered from a foreign yoke by the heroism of a religious woman. This was Deborah, a prophetess, the wife of Lapidoth. For twenty years her country had groaned beneath the iron hand of Jabin, the Canaanite, of whose numerous armies Sisera was captain. Under the direction of Deborah, the Israelites, amounting only to ten thousand, joined battle with their oppressors. The adversary was completely beaten, so that not a man survived to tell the tale of their defeat; and, lest the shadow of doubt should rest upon these active operations, conducted as they were by the wise and good, they were celebrated, and thus rendered immortal, by one of the 198noblest odes on record, written, without doubt, under plenary inspiration: while pointed maledictions are levelled against those lukewarm friends whose supineness kept them from the righteous fray. Let us listen a minute. ‘The inhabitants of the villages ceased, they ceased in Israel, until that I Deborah arose, that I arose a mother in Israel. They fought from heaven; the stars in their courses fought against Sisera. The river of Kishon swept them away, that ancient river, the river Kishon. O my soul, thou hast trodden down strength. Curse ye Meroz, said the angel of the Lord, curse ye bitterly the inhabitants thereof; because they came not to the help of the Lord, to the help of the Lord against the mighty. So let all thine enemies perish, O Lord; but let them that love Him be as the sun when he goeth forth in his might.’ The result of these spirited demonstrations was of the most substantial order; for it is particularly noted that the land had rest forty years.
We find, also, that Gideon and Jephthah were of the same noble line of godly soldiery. The former rescued his country from Midianitish despotism; and the latter put down the children of Ammon. ‘He smote them from Aroer, even till thou come to Minnith, even twenty cities, and unto the plain of the vineyards, with a very great slaughter.’ I scarcely need add, that the sympathy of succeeding generations has been excited by his rash and thoughtless vow connected with the virtuous and noble-minded conduct of his daughter. But his fame, as the brave and pious defender of his people, can never be tarnished.
About eleven centuries before the Christian era, another prodigy arose. This was a man of superhuman physical power; and, what is most remarkable, the feats resulting from his prodigious strength were performed chiefly, if not exclusively, when, as the Scriptures term it, ‘the Spirit of the Lord came mightily upon him;’ and when that influence departed, he became weak as other men. In other 199words, while his heart was right with God he prevailed; and when he forsook the Rock of his salvation, defeat and ruin were nigh. In the height of his glorious career, he slew a thousand men with the jaw-bone of an ass; and when in danger of perishing from thirst, a miracle was wrought in his favour. ‘God clave an hollow place that was in the jaw, and there came water thereout; and when he had drunk, his spirit came again, and he revived: wherefore he called the name of that place En-hakkore,’ or, the well of him that cried. It is true he lost his life at last, and, in the interim, had been sadly abused; but his end was triumphant; and he fell, buried beneath the bodies of the slain. This remarkable man judged Israel twenty years; and if we survey the dreadful excesses in which the people indulged, as recorded in the latter part of the Book of Judges, the restraints of some such influential ruler as Samson appear to have been necessary. When there was no king in Israel, every man did that which was right in his own eyes; and that was, in most instances, uniformly wrong.
Another of the heroes of antiquity, whose biography illustrates our meaning, is Saul. The immediate cause of his first achievement arose from the conduct of Nahash, an Ammonite, who insulted the men of Jabesh-Gilead by epistolary insolence, and the threat of future outrage. Unable to defend themselves, they contrived to obtain seven days’ respite for consultation. This they employed in sending messengers to Gibeah, specially empowered to obtain immediate help. When the tidings reached the ear of Saul, he was greatly moved: the Spirit of God came upon him; measures were directly adopted to repress the raging of the heathen, and the deputation were sent back to assure their friends that, ‘to-morrow, by that time the sun be hot, ye shall have help.’ Faithful to the promise, Saul and his men were in sight by the morning watch; and the 200Ammonites, though three hundred thousand of them shone in arms, were utterly routed. Saul was a courageous man and an approved soldier. Though at last slain in battle, and his countrymen were defeated, it should be remembered that he had offended and forsaken his God by an improper invasion of the office of the priesthood; had been weak enough to consult a witch at Endor; and under a malignant influence had several times attempted the life of his best earthly friend. The varied vicissitudes of his life, and his untimely end, are therefore to be viewed as proofs of the position now sought to be maintained. Pious soldiers fight best. When Saul served God, he beat the Philistines; when he ceased to serve God, the Philistines slew him. The occasion of his death was touching, and called forth from a hand of no common skill a lament not easily surpassed: ‘The beauty of Israel is slain upon the high places; how are the mighty fallen! Ye mountains of Gilboa, let there be no dew, neither let there be rain, upon you, nor fields of offerings: for there the shield of the mighty is vilely cast away, the shield of Saul, as though he had not been anointed with oil. How are the mighty fallen, and the weapons of war perished!’ But of all the warriors whose history is recorded in Scripture, none is to be compared with David. Almost every step of his eventful life, from the period when he was taken from the sheep-cote to his complete establishment on the throne of Israel, was marked by a spirit of singular enterprise and valour, regulated and impelled by fervent piety. He is described even in youth as ‘a mighty valiant man, and a man of war, and prudent in matters, and a comely person, and the Lord was with him.’ His combat with Goliath exhibits an astonishing instance of cool and determined resolution, especially when the simplicity of his attire and weapons are contrasted with the panoply of the tall Philistine. The Israelitish slingers, it is said, could hurl stones with amazing 201force, and precision so wonderful as to strike within an hair’s-breadth of the intended mark. David was, no doubt, a proficient in this art, of which the issue of the duel is sufficient proof. The Philistine came on, wrapt probably in steel, and in formidable array, preceded by his armourbearer. He then commenced a speech, somewhat Homeric, but replete with invective, in which, like an overgrown coward, he impudently invoked the curses of his gods upon his antagonist, and ended by intimating that his shattered remains should soon be the vultures’ meal. David’s answer was finely conceived, and as well expressed. Without further delay, he addressed himself to the fight; ‘he put his hand in his bag, and took thence a stone, and slang it, and smote the Philistine in his forehead, that the stone sank into his forehead, and he fell upon his face to the earth.’ The military prowess and superior talents of David were afterwards shown, during a lengthened course of brilliant operations, in which he was generally successful.
As collateral evidence of the possible existence and moral worth of a pious soldiery, it is worth notice, that in the New Testament, which divulges the religion of peace and love, the writer of the Epistle to the Hebrews in exhibiting ‘a great cloud of witnesses,’ whom he sets forth to defend and exemplify the truth, takes care to include therein, with special commendation, several of the heroes to whom allusion has been made. Were it not that the time failed, as we are expressly told, he had a desire to expatiate largely on their respective merits and services. He is, therefore, obliged to content himself with an extract, as it were, from the army-list, adding only a brief summary of a few of the more splendid excellencies of each. There are delightful notices of Gideon, and Barak, and Samson, and Jephthah, and David, and Samuel; ‘who through faith subdued kingdoms, wrought righteousness, obtained promises, stopped the mouths of lions, quenched 202the violence of fire, escaped the edge of the sword, out of weakness were made strong, waxed valiant in fight, turned to flight the armies of the aliens; and of whom, waiving all other encomium,’ we are told in one comprehensive sentence, that ‘the world was not worthy.’
Independently of the instances cited from sacred record, the page of profane history furnishes numerous instances of sound and practical piety among the professors in the rough and repulsive art of war; and had we leisure for copious extract, there would be no difficulty in arranging a formidable staff, composed of such persons,—of men, too, who had been eminently successful in the strategy and science of hostility. One of the earliest and most extraordinary manifestations of Christian zeal is recorded to have happened to the Theban legion, in the reign of Diocletian, the Roman Emperor; who, it is said, rather than conform to the rites of Paganism, suffered martyrdom by the order of Maximian, to the number of six thousand. Another instance of ancient military piety is recorded in the case of the Thundering Legion, a name given to those Christians who served in the Roman army of Marcus Antoninus, in the second century. It seems that when that emperor was at war with the Marcomanni, his army was enclosed by the ene............