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IRVING, EDWARD (1792-1834)

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Originally appearing in Volume V14, Page 855 of the 1911 Encyclopedia Britannica.
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IRVING, See also:EDWARD (1792-1834) , Scottish See also:church divine, generally regarded as the founder of the " See also:Catholic Apostolic Church " (q.v.), was See also:born at See also:Annan, See also:Dumfriesshire, on the 4th of See also:August 1792. By his See also:father's See also:side, who followed the occupation of a See also:tanner, he was descended from a See also:family See also:long known in the See also:district, and the purity of whose Scottish lineage had been tinged by See also:alliance with See also:French See also:Protestant refugees; but it was from his See also:mother's See also:race, the Lowthers, farmers or small proprietors in Annandale, that he seems to have derived the most distinctive features of his See also:personality. The first See also:stage of his See also:education was passed at a school kept by " Peggy See also:Paine," a relation of the well-known author of the See also:Age of See also:Reason, after which he entered the Annan See also:academy, taught by Mr See also:Adam See also:Hope, of whom there is a graphic See also:sketch in the Reminiscences of See also:Thomas See also:Carlyle. At the age of thirteen he entered the university of See also:Edinburgh. In 1809 he graduated M.A.; and in 1810, on the recommendation of See also:Sir See also:John See also:Leslie, he was chosen See also:master of an academy newly established at See also:Haddington, where he became the See also:tutor of Jane Welsh, afterwards famous as Mrs Carlyle. He became engaged in 1812 to See also:Isabella See also:Martin, whom in 1823 he married; but it may be at once stated here that meanwhile he gradually See also:fell in love with Jane Welsh, and she with him. He tried to get out of his engagement with See also:Miss Martin, but was prevented by her family. If he had married See also:bliss Welsh, his See also:life, as well as hers, would have been very different. It was Irving who in 182r introduced Carlyle to her. His See also:appointment at Haddington he exchanged for a similar one at See also:Kirkcaldy in 1812. Completing his divinity studies by a See also:series of partial sessions, he was " licensed " to preach in See also:June 1815, but continued to See also:discharge his scholastic duties for three years. He devoted his leisure, not only to mathematical and See also:physical See also:science, but to a course of See also:reading in See also:English literature, his See also:bias towards the See also:antique in sentiment and See also:style being strengthened by a perusal of the older See also:classics, among whom See also:Richard See also:Hooker was his favourite author.

At the same See also:

time his love of the marvellous found gratification in the wondersof the Arabian Nights, and it is further characteristically related of him that he used to carry continually in his waistcoat See also:pocket a See also:miniature copy of Ossiair, passages from which he frequently recited with " sonorous elocution and vehement gesticulation." In the summer of 1818 he resigned his mastership, and, in See also:order to increase the See also:probability of obtaining a permanent appointment in the church, took up his See also:residence in Edinburgh. Although his exceptional method of address seems to have gained him the qualified approval of certain dignitaries of the church, the prospect of his obtaining a settled See also:charge seemed as remote as ever, and he was meditating a missionary tour in See also:Persia when his departure was arrested by steps taken by Dr See also:Chalmers, which, after considerable delay, resulted, in See also:October 1819, in Irving being appointed his assistant and missionary in St John's See also:parish, See also:Glasgow. Except in the See also:case of a select few, Irving's See also:preaching awakened little See also:interest among the See also:congregation of Chalmers, Chalmers himself, with no partiality for its bravuras and flourishes, comparing it to " See also:Italian See also:music, appreciated only by connoisseurs "; but as a missionary among the poorer classes he wielded an See also:influence that was altogether unique. The See also:benediction " See also:Peace be to this See also:house," with which, in accordance with apostolic usage, he greeted every dwelling he entered, was not inappropriate to his figure and aspect, and it is said " took the See also:people's See also:attention wonderfully," the more especially after the magic of his personality found opportunity to reveal itself in See also:close and homely intercourse. This See also:half-success in a sub-See also:ordinate See also:sphere was, however, so far from coinciding with his aspirations that he had again, in the See also:winter of 1821, begun to turn his attention towards missionary labour in the See also:East, when the possibility of fulfilling the See also:dream of his life was suddenly revealed to him by an invitation from the Caledonian church, See also:Hatton See also:Garden, See also:London, to " make trial and See also:proof " of his gifts before the " remnant of the congregation which held together." Over that charge he was ordained in See also:July 1822. Some years previously he had expressed his conviction that " one of the See also:chief needs of the age was to make inroad after the See also:alien, to bring in the votaries of See also:fashion, of literature, of sentiment, of policy and of See also:rank, who are content in their several idolatries to do without piety to See also:God and love to Him whom He hath sent "; and, with an abruptness which must have produced on him at first an effect almost astounding, he now had the See also:satisfaction of beholding these various votaries thronging to hear from his lips the words of See also:wisdom which would deliver them from their several idolatries and remodel their lives according to the fashion of apostolic times. This sudden leap into popularity seems to have been occasioned in connexion with a veiled allusion to Irving's striking eloquence made in the House of See also:Commons by See also:Canning, who had been induced to attend his church from admiration of an expression in one of his prayers, quoted to him by Sir See also:James See also:Mackintosh. His commanding stature, the symmetry of his See also:form, the dark and See also:melancholy beauty of his countenance, rather rendered piquant than impaired by an obliquity of See also:vision, produced an imposing impression even before his deep and powerful See also:voice had given utterance to its melodious thunders; and harsh and superficial half-truths enunciated with surpassing ease and See also:grace of gesture, and not only with an See also:air of See also:absolute conviction but with the authority of a prophetic messenger, in tones whose magical See also:fascination was inspired by an earnestness beyond all See also:imitation of See also:art, acquired a plausibility and importance which, at least while the orator spoke, made his See also:audience entirely forgetful of their preconceived objections against them. The subject-See also:matter of his orations, and his See also:peculiar treatment of his themes, no doubt also, at least at first, constituted a considerable See also:part of his attractive influence. He had specially prepared himself, as he thought, for " teaching imaginative men, and See also:political men, and legal men, and scientific men who See also:bear the See also:world in See also:hand "; and he did not See also:attempt to win their attention to abstract and worn-out theological arguments, but discussed the opinions, the See also:poetry, the politics, the See also:manners and customs of the time, and this not with philosophical comprehensiveness, not in terms of warm eulogy or measured blame, but of severe See also:satire varied by fierce denunciation, and with a specific minuteness which was concerned primarily with individuals. A See also:fire of See also:criticism from See also:pamphlets, See also:newspapers and reviews opened on his See also:volume of Orations, published in 1823; but the excitement produced was merely superficial and essentially evanescent. Though cherishing a strong antipathy to the received ecclesiastical formulas, Irving's See also:great aim was to revive the antique style of thought and sentiment which had hardened into these formulas, and by this means to supplant the new influences, the accidental and temporary moral shortcomings of which he detected with instinctive certainty, but whose See also:pro-found and real tendencies were utterly beyond the reach of his conjecture.

Being thus radically at variance with the See also:

main current of the thought of his time, the failure of the See also:commission he had undertaken was sooner or later inevitable; and shortly after the opening of his new church in See also:Regent Square in 1827, he found that " fashion had taken its departure," and the church, " though always well filled," was " no longer crowded." By this See also:desertion his self-esteem, one of his strongest passions, though curiously See also:united with singular sincerity and humility, was doubtless hurt to the See also:quick; but the See also:wound inflicted was of a deeper and deadlier See also:kind, for it confirmed him finally in his despair of the world's See also:gradual amelioration, and established his tendency towards supernaturalism. For years the subject of prophecy had occupied much of his thoughts, and his belief in the near approach of the second See also:advent had received such wonderful corroboration by the perusal of the See also:work of a Jesuit See also:priest, See also:writing under the assumed Jewish name of Juan Josafat See also:Ben-See also:Ezra, that in 1827 he published a See also:translation of it, accompanied with an eloquent See also:preface. Probably the religious opinions of Irving, originally in some respects more catholic and truer to human nature than generally prevailed in ecclesiastical circles, had gained breadth and comprehensiveness from his intercourse with See also:Coleridge, but gradually his chief interest in Coleridge's See also:philosophy centred See also:round that which was mystical and obscure, and to it in all likelihood may be traced his See also:initiation into the See also:doctrine of millenarianism. The first stage of his later development, which resulted in the See also:establishment of the "Irvingite " or " See also:Holy Catholic Apostolic Church," in 1832, was associated with conferences at his friend See also:Henry See also:Drummond's seat at See also:Albury concerning unfulfilled prophecy, followed by an almost exclusive study of the prophetical boots and especially of the See also:Apocalypse, and by several series of sermons on prophecy both in London and the provinces, his apocalyptic lectures in 1828 more than crowding the largest churches of Edinburgh in the See also:early summer mornings. In 183o, however, there was opened up to his ardent See also:imagination a new vista into spiritual things, a new hope for the age in which he lived, by the seeming actual revival in a remote corner of See also:Scotland of those apostolic gifts of prophecy and healing which he had already in 1828 persuaded himself had only been kept in See also:abeyance by the See also:absence of faith. At once he welcomed the new " See also:power " with an unquestioning See also:evidence which could be shaken by neither the remonstrances or desertion of his dearest See also:friends, the recantation of some of the See also:principal agents of the " gifts," his own declension into a comparatively subordinate position, the meagre and barren results of the manifestations, nor their See also:general rejection both by the church and the world. His See also:excommunication by the See also:presbytery of London, in 183o, for See also:publishing his doctrines regarding the humanity of Jesus See also:Christ, and the condemnation of these opinions by the General See also:Assembly of the Church of Scotland in the following See also:year, were secondary episodes which only affected the main issue of his career in so far as they tended still further to isolate him from the sympathy of the church; .but the " irregularities " connected with the manifestation of the " gifts " gradually estranged the See also:majority of his own congregation, and on the complaint of the trustees .to the presbytery of London, whose authority they had formerly rejected, he was declared unfit to remain the See also:minister of the See also:National Scotch Church of Regent Square. After he and those who adhered to him (describing themselves as of the Holy Catholic Apostolic Church) had in 1832 removed to a new See also:building in See also:Newman See also:Street, he was in See also:March 1833 deposed from the See also:ministry of the Church of Scotland by the presbytery of Annan on the See also:original charge of See also:heresy. With the See also:sanction of the " power" he was now after some delay reordained " chief pastor of the church assembled in Newman Street," but unremitting labours. and ceaseless spiritual excitement soon completely exhausted the springs of his vital See also:energy. He died, worn out and wasted with labour and absorbing care, while still in the See also:prime of life, on the 7th of See also:December 1834. The writings of Edward Irving published during his lifetime were For the Oracles of God, Four Orations (1823); For See also:Judgment to come (1823); See also:Babylon and Infidelity foredoomed (1826); Sermons, &c. (3 vols., 1828); Exposition of the See also:Book of See also:Revelation (1831); an introuctioit to a translation of Ben-Ezra; and an introduction to See also:Horne's Commentary on the See also:Psalms.

His collected See also:

works were published in 5 volumes, edited by Gavin Carlyle.

End of Article: IRVING, EDWARD (1792-1834)

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