IRVING. 



551 



is to attract the attention of professor Leslie, who, 

 on being applied to for a teacher, recommended him 

 as the fittest person in his class to undertake the 

 mathematical department in an academy at Had- 

 dington. At that time Mr Irving had not com- 

 pleted his seventeenth year. He occupied this 

 situation only one year, when he was invited to 

 one more lucrative in a larger establishment at 

 Kirkaldy. At Kirkaldy he, besides, kept 

 boarders, and gave private tuition. This situation 

 he filled for nearly seven years, during which time 

 he completed his probationary terms, and became 

 a licentiate of the church of Scotland. It was here 

 that he contracted the acquaintance of Miss Isabella 

 Martin, daughter of the Rev. John Martin, one of 

 the ministers of Kirkaldy. He engaged himself 

 to this young lady, on the understanding that as 

 soon as he had obtained a living they should be 

 married ; an engagement which he fulfilled shortly 

 after he had obtained the living at Cross street, 

 Hatton Garden. In 1819 Mr Irving removed to 

 Edinburgh, uncertain what to do ; he determined 

 only to abide henceforth by preaching the gospel, 

 as his true and sole vocation. Preaching one Sun- 

 day from the pulpit of Dr Andrew Thomson, of 

 Edinburgh, unknown to him, Dr Chalmers was one 

 of his auditors. It was the first time the Doctor had 

 heard Mr Irving; and he then formed the favour- 

 able opinion of him that subsequently led to his 

 appointing him his assistant and colleague in St 

 John's church, Glasgow, During his ministry at 

 that church, he had the offer of a call to a church 

 in Kingston, Jamaica; which he would probably 

 have accepted, but for the interference of his rela- 

 tions. He was also, during that period, offered a 

 living in one of the collegiate churches in Scot- 

 land ; but that he rejected, on the ground that it 

 was the gift of the patron 



It was in the year 1822 that Mr Irving became 

 a resident in the British metropolis. At that 

 period the Caledonian church, in London, had 

 dwindled into insignificance ; and the few families 

 which considered themselves as belonging to it 

 found some difficulty in keeping up the public wor- 

 ship statedly. Some person Belonging to the 

 denomination, happening to hear a favourable re- 

 port of Mr Irving's pulpit talents, was induced 

 to suggest to the proper authorities the propriety 

 of endeavouring to prevail upon him to become 

 a candidate for the then vacant pulpit in, what 

 was termed, the Caledonian Asylum, a place of 

 worship situated in Cross street, Hatton Gar- 

 den. He accepted the invitation, and was intro- 

 duced to public notice as the assistant of Dr Chal- 

 mers. Mr Irving's style and mariner of preaching 

 differed widely from every thing that was then to 

 be found even in that immense metropolis. He 

 soon attracted very large congregations by the force 

 and eloquence of his discourses, and the singularity 

 of his appearance and gesticulation. The greatest 

 orators and statesmen of the day hurried to hear 

 him; the seats of the chapel were crowded with 

 the wealthy and the fashionable, and its doors were 

 thronged with carriages. It became necessary to 

 exclude the public in general, and .to admit only 

 those who were previously provided with tickets. 

 The stranger who had effected an entrance found 

 himself in a chapel of moderate dimensions, sur- 

 rounded by the gay, the noble, and the intelligent 

 of both sexes. When every part of the building 

 had become densely and oppressively crowded, the 

 preacher appeared tall, athletic, and sallow; 



arrayed in the scanty robe of the Scotch divines, 

 displaying a profusion of jet-black, glossy hair, 

 reaching even to his shoulders, with a singular 

 obliquity in one of his eyes, and a stern calm so- 

 lemnity of aspect, somewhat debased by an expres- 

 sion indicative of austere and conscious sanctity. 

 His strong northern accent added to his singular- 

 ity ; which was still further increased by his violent 

 and ungraceful, but impressive, gesticulation. His 

 phraseology was not the least remarkable trait ; and 

 was among the peculiarities which gave him fclat 

 with the public. He expressed his ideas in the 

 language of Milton, Hooker, and Jeremy Taylor. 

 The circumstance of his meeting with Hooker's 

 Ecclesiastical Polity, which it is said he did, when 

 a boy, at a farm-house near his father's, was a me- 

 morable incident in his life ; as it no doubt gave 

 the peculiar bent and tone to his character, and 

 contributed much to draw forth the powers of his 

 mind. But his exertions were riot restricted to 

 his labours from the pulpit he had scarcely been 

 a year in the metropolis, when he came forth from 

 the press, in an octavo volume of 600 pages, under 

 the singular title of " For the oracles of God, Four 

 Orations for Judgment to come, an Argument, in 

 nine parts." Such was the demand for this publi- 

 cation, that a third edition was called for in less 

 than six months. It underwent, however, the or- 

 deal of the most severe and extensive criticism. 



In May, 1824, the London Missionary Society 

 applied to Mr Irving to preach one of their anni- 

 versary sermons ; to which request he consented. 

 At an early period of the following year this ser- 

 mon, filling one hundred and thirty large and 

 closely printed pages, (independent of a dedication 

 and preface, which occupy nearly thirty more,) was 

 published, under the title of " For Missionaries 

 after the Apostolic School, a Series of Orations, in 

 four parts. I. The Doctrine. II. The Experi- 

 ment. III. The Argument. IV. The Duty. 

 By the Rev. Edward Irving, A.M." The volume 

 was dedicated to Mr Coleridge the poet, with whom 

 Mr Irving had recently formed an intimate ac- 

 quaintance. 



In 1825, Mr Irving preached the anniversary ser- 

 mon for the continental society, the substance of 

 which he afterwards published in a treatise on the 

 prophecies of Daniel and the Apocalypse, entitled 

 " Babylon and Infidelity foredoomed of God." 

 This work he dedicated to Mr Hatley Frere, bro- 

 ther to the British envoy at the court of Madrid, 

 and one of the noted students of prophecy of what 

 is called the Albury school. In this dedication he 

 acknowledges that until he fell in with Mr Frere, 

 and had access to that gentleman's conversation 

 and writings, the subject was quite new to him. 

 It was about this time that he drew up his Intro- 

 ductory Essay to bishop Home's Commentary on 

 the Book of Psalms, published in Glasgow, and 

 which appears to be generally considered as one of 

 the choicest products of Mr Irving's pen. In the 

 controversy which occurred among the numerous 

 friends and supporters of the British and Foreign 

 Bible Society, and which at one period threatened 

 the very existence of the society, Mr Irving took 

 an active part; and made himself somewhat con- 

 spicuous by a speech which he delivered at the an- 

 niversary meeting of the society in 1827. In the 

 same year, he published " The Coming of the 

 Messiah in Glory and Majesty, by Juan Josafat 

 Ben Ezra, a converted Jew," translated from the 

 Spanish. In 1828 Mr Irving preached a Fastday 



