Page:Memorials of Capt. Hedley Vicars, Ninety-seventh Regiment by Marsh, Catherine, 1818-1912.djvu/14

x recalled in the moment of temptation and in a distant scene, were mused upon during lonely midnight watches, and cherished in a close companionship with danger and death.

There are those who, in the face of examples to the contrary, still maintain that entire devotion of the heart to God must withdraw a man from many of the active duties of life, and who would be prepared to concede that in making a good Christian you may spoil a good soldier. To them the subject of this memoir affords a fresh and ample refutation. While so many, whom God's grace has awakened in our Army and Navy, conceive it to be their duty, as they feel it will be their delight, to receive a fresh commission as ministers of the Gospel of Peace, that they may preach at once to others the Name so dear to themselves; and while the weak in faith seek a sphere more sheltered from temptation, he determined upon the wiser and nobler course of standing firm to the colours under which he was already enrolled. When called to God's service, he found his mission-field in the camp and in the hospital. He lived, during months of sickness and pestilence, to commend the religion he professed to all around him—while he pursued the duties of his profession with distinguished ardour and constancy—maintaining as a Christian a high reputation for bravery among the bravest of his companions in arms, and winning on his first battle-field the blood-stained laurels so soon to be exchanged for the crown of glory that fadeth not away.