TRIAL 
 
 OF THE 
 
 REV. EDWARD IRVING, M.A. 
 
 CENTO OF CRITICISM. 
 
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 Presented by Mr. Samuel Agnew of Philadelphia, Pa. 
 
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 Number 
 
 

TRIAL 
 
 REV. EDWARD IRVING, M.A. 
 
 CENTO OF CRITICISM. 
 
 " I ui'ythee take lh« cork out of thy mouth, that I may drink 
 ?hy tidings." 
 
 As You Like It. 
 
 LONDON : 
 
 Printed bv Shackel/ and Arrowtmith, Johnson's-Court, FlettStreet. 
 
 PUBLISHED BY E. BRAIN, 
 
 4, BUTCHER-HALL-LANE, NEWGATE-STREET. 
 
 MDCCCXXlll. 
 
HIGH COURT OF COMMON SENSE. 
 
 SPECIAL JURY CASE. 
 
 TRINITY SESSIONS, 1823. 
 
 The King, at the Instance of Jacob Oldstyle, 
 Clerk, v. the Rev. Edward Irving, M. A. 
 
 From the extraordinary interest which this case 
 excited, the doors of the Court were no sooner 
 opened than it was filled in every part to excess, 
 by an assemblage of persons of the first rank and 
 distinction in the country. On the bench beside 
 the Chief Justice sat the Lord Chancellor and his 
 brother Lord Stowell, Earl Liverpool, Earl Grey, 
 Marquis of Lansdowne, Lord Erskine, Right Hon. 
 Sir William Grant, Mr. Justice Bayley, Sir James 
 Mackintosh, Mr. Canning, Mr. Peel, Mr. Hus- 
 kisson, Mr. Tierney, Mr. Brougham ; and at the 
 extremities of the bench, but railed off from the 
 others, (for in the Court of Common Sense it is 
 not as in other Courts) the Duke of Somerset, 
 Lord Kenyon, Sir Gerard Noel, Sir Harcourt 
 
Lees, Mr. Peter Moore, Mr. Parkins, Romeo 
 Coates, and Dr. Dinwiddie. Earl Grosvenor was 
 put into a box by himself, and the prayer-book 
 placed out of his reach. The galleries were almost 
 entirely filled with elegantly dressed ladies, admit- 
 ted by tickets from the Lady Patronesses at Al- 
 mack's. All its best blood was there. Among a 
 crowd of persons attending below the bench to 
 give evidence, were most of the active literary 
 characters about town connected with the periodi- 
 cal press ; and for reasons developed in the course 
 of the proceedings, it is necessary that we here 
 enumerate their names, as far as they were known 
 to us. We observed Dr. Stodart and Mr. Barnes 
 side by side ; Mr. Jerdan, Mr. Mudford, Mr. Haz- 
 litt, Mr. Cobbett, Lieut. Col. Torrens, Mr. Soane, 
 Sir Richard Phillips, Pierce Egan, Rev. Ingram 
 Cobbin, Rev. George Redford, Mr. Black, 
 Dr. Dreghorn, Mr. Thomas Campbell, Mr. Byer- 
 Jey, Mr. GifFord, Mr. Haynes, Mr. Wooler, Mr. 
 Coulston, Mr. David Booth, Mr. D. W. Harvey, 
 Rev. Mr. Burder, Rev. Mr. Knox, Mr. Theod. 
 Hook, Paul Potter, Dr. Walsh, Mr. Robinson, Mr. 
 Josiah Conder, Mr. William Jones, Mr. Bell, Mr. 
 Wallace, Mr. Lamb, Mr. Gale Jones, Mr. R. Hunt, 
 and Mr. Moody (not the Judy.) 
 
 Mr. Serjeant Bishop appeared for the prosecu- 
 tion, along with whom were Mr. Parsons and Mr. 
 Macvicar. 
 
 The defendant conducted his own case, assisted 
 by Mr. Counsellor Phillips. Mr. Irving maintained 
 throughout a very firm and collected demeanour. 
 
3 
 
 He seems to be about thirty-five years of age, and 
 nearly six feet high. The general contour of his 
 countenance is intellectual, though somewhat 
 coarse, his complexion very dark, his hair black 
 and bushy, whiskers tremendous. As one of his 
 many critics has observed, " he would undoubted- -f 
 ly be a very handsome man," only he squints 
 abominably. 
 
 The list of the special jurors being called over, 
 the following gentlemen answered to their names, 
 Alderman Sir James Shaw, Bart., Alderman 
 Birch, Alderman Key, James Mill, Esq. Dr. 
 Alexander Crombie, A. Strahan, Esq. A. J. 
 Valpy, Esq. Horace Twiss, Esq. M. P. 
 
 The defendant having prayed a tales, the jury 
 was completed by the following names from the 
 common jury list. Mr. Thomas Underwood, 
 Mr. Richard Taylor, Mr. Hurcombe, Mr. T. 
 C. Hansard. 
 
 CASE FOR THE PROSECUTION. 
 
 Mr. Macvicar opened the case to the jury. The 
 present, he said, was a prosecution instituted at 
 the instance of Mr. Jacob Oldstyle, Clerk, against 
 the Rev. Edward Irving, Minister of the Cale- 
 donian Church or Chapel, in Cross Street, Hatton 
 Garden. The indictment was laid on seven dif- 
 ferent counts. 
 
 First, For being ugly. 
 
 Second, For being a merry-andrew. 
 
 Third, For being a common quack. 
 
Fourth, For being a common brawler. 
 
 Fifth, For being a common swearer. 
 
 Sixth, For being of very common understanding. 
 
 And, Seventh, For following divisive courses, 
 subversive of the discipline of the order to which 
 he belongs, and contrary to the principles of 
 Christian fellowship and charity. 
 
 Mr. Serjeant Bishop, said, that he would not 
 detain the court with any long harangue. He saw 
 so many gentlemen of far higher talents than he 
 could pretend to, so many lights of the age, in 
 waiting, who would be called upon to state to the 
 jury what they knew of the case, that it would 
 be presumption in him to pre-occupy their minds 
 with anything he could offer on the subject. He 
 would state merely in vindication of his client, 
 Mr. Jacob Oldstyle, that he had not instituted 
 this prosecution from any feeling of personal re- 
 sentment towards Mr. Irving, nor from any vain 
 hope of gaining a name to himself, by measuring 
 his strength with the great boar of the forest. — 
 He appeared here, not on his own account alone, 
 but in the name and the behalf of the whole gene- 
 ration of the Oldstyles. He did not claim to be 
 the best of the family, and therefore of right their 
 Champion, but being the oldest among them, he 
 had been called upon to stand forward and defend 
 their common interests, from the rude assaults 
 which Mr. Irving, in his ugliness and quackery, 
 and divisive-mindedness, had made upon them. 
 He loved his family, and could not refuse, though 
 
bending under a load of years, to make this hum- 
 ble effort, ere he died, to wipe off the stain at- 
 tempted to be. fixed on their name and reputation. 
 The Learned Serjeant, said, that he would now 
 proceed to call the witnesses who would prove 
 the different charges, which his learned friend, 
 Mr. Macvicar, had so clearly and explicitly laid 
 before them. [Here some twenty voices from the 
 body of the court cried out Stop ! Stop ! and a 
 portly gentleman with spectacles, pushing forward 
 to the Learned Serjeant, whispered something in 
 his ear.] 
 
 Mr. Serjeant Bishop, " My Lord, it has been 
 just intimated to me, that it will be an unpleasant 
 circumstance to many gentlemen who are here to 
 give evidence, and may withal be attended with 
 dangerous consequences, if they are called by their 
 individual names into the witness box. I need 
 scarcely remind the court of the melancholy fate 
 of Mr. Scott. The gentlemen are all in one way or 
 another connected with different periodical works, 
 and it is their wish, I understand, that each should 
 be called by the name of the work to which he 
 belongs. They have brought Masks with them, 
 which, with the leave of the court, they will put 
 on during examination," 
 
 Mr. Cobbett. " Not I, my Lord, thank God, I 
 want no mask." 
 
 Mr. Wookr. " Nor I." 
 
 Dr. Dreghorn (aside). " Brazen faces need no 
 masks.'* 
 
Chief Justice. " It is a novel application, cer- 
 tainly. At common sense, however, we want no 
 precedents to justify us in doing what seems right 
 and proper. Let it be as the gentlemen please ; 
 each may mask or not, as he likes. It would be 
 a shocking thing were any person to catch harm 
 from his appearance here to day, in aid of the 
 ends of justice." 
 
 The Editor of The Times was then called, and 
 examined by Mr. Parsons. 
 
 You are editor of The Times journal ?— L Yes. 
 
 It is the leading journal of Europe, is it not ? — 
 Undoubtedly. 
 
 How do you take the lead, Sir ? 
 
 By guarding the candid and enlightened public 
 against extravagant pretensions, wherever and 
 whenever we meet with them. 
 
 All sorts of pretensions ? 
 
 No, Sir. I would beg leave to say, there 
 is a fashion in every thing — in wigs and bon- 
 nets, in poetry and novel writing, and lastly, 
 in actors and preachers. All this is matter of 
 course ; and while things go on in the ordinary 
 way — while wigs do not accumulate their curls 
 into perriwigs — nor bonnets swell into coal-scuttles 
 — while our popular poets scribble only one poem, 
 and our popular romancers only two novels a 
 year — while our actors are content with one new 
 reading in a play of Shakespeare ; and our preach- 
 ers aim at no praises beyond that of the regular 
 frequenters of fashionable chapels j we, I say we, 
 
Sir, are disposed to let things pass, and allow the 
 " candid and enlightened public" to be pleased in 
 their own way. 
 
 Do you know any thing of the defendant, Mr. 
 Irving ? Have you allowed him to pass ? 
 
 Oh dear, no ! The case is quite different with 
 Mr. Irving. His popularity, Sir, absolutely fright- 
 ened us, Sir, " from our propriety." When we 
 learnt that statesmen and quack doctors, old 
 ladies and judges, young ladies and students at 
 law, all flocked with equal eagerness to hear this§ 
 Caledonian orator : we became curious to know 
 what could be the attractions to collect together 
 such an heterogeneous mass. 
 
 And so you went to hear him preach ? 
 
 Not only went to hear him preach, Sir, but read 
 all that he had written. 
 
 Did you find out, then, what his attractions are ? 
 
 After a serious consideration, I must profess, 
 that we were utterly unable to discover. We 
 were, in our own minds — (for we hate, Sir, to think 
 with the minds of other people) — fully convinced 
 that Mr. Irving is a man of very ordinary talents ; 
 that his understanding is weak in its grasp, and 
 limited in its observation ; and that his taste is of 
 the very lowest order of badly-instructed school- 
 boys. 
 
 You are aware that Mr. Irving was assistant to 
 the celebrated Dr. Chalmers, of Glasgow : did it 
 strike you, that he is of the same school ? 
 
 Of the same school, Sir ! He is an imitator of 
 the doctor's, indeed j but no more like the proto- 
 
tvpe, than the inflated frog in the fable was like 
 the bull he strove to resemble. For the energy 
 of thought of the original, he gives us nothing 
 but rumbling and distorted common-places ; for 
 the impassioned and expressive diction of his 
 master, we have nothing but antitheses, without 
 point, and epithets without distinctness; while the 
 poor and insignificant idea, wrapt up in a heap of 
 tinsel and clumsy phraseology, looks like " the 
 lady in the lobster," or a mouse under a canopy 
 *>f state. 
 
 Give us, pray, a specimen of his quality. 
 
 " Obey the Scriptures, or you perish. You 
 may despise the honour done you by the Majesty 
 above ; you may spurn the sovereignty of Al- 
 mighty God ; you may revolt from Creation's 
 universal rule, to bow before its creator, and 
 stand in momentary rebellion against its ordi- 
 nances $" and so forth. " But come at length 
 it will, when revenge shall array herself to go 
 forth, and anguish shall attend her, and from the 
 wheels of their chariot ruin and dismay shall 
 shoot far and wide among the enemies of the 
 king, whose desolation shall not tarry, and whose 
 destruction, as the wings of the whirlwind, shall 
 be swift, hopeless as the conclusion of eternity, 
 and the reversion of doom. Then around the 
 fiery concave of the wasteful pit the clang of grief 
 shall ring, and the flinty heart, which repelled 
 tender mercy, shall strike its fangs into its proper 
 bosom;" and so on. " All, all shall pass away! 
 And instead shall come the level lake that burneth, 
 
9 
 
 and the solitary dungeon, and the desolate bosom, 
 and the throes and tossings of horror and hope- 
 lessness, and the worm that dieth not, and the 
 fire that is not quenched. 'Tis written, 'tis writ- 
 ten, tis sealed of heaven, and a few years shall 
 reveal it all. Be assured, it is even so to happen 
 to the despisers of holy writ : with this in arrear, 
 what boots liberty, pleasure, enjoyment — all 
 within the hour-glass of time, on the round earth's 
 continent, all the sensibilities of life, all the pow- 
 ers of man, all the attractions of woman ! " 
 
 And this, you think, is the lady in a lobster ? 
 
 Yes. I would fearlessly ask, Sir, whether a boy 
 at any public school would not have his exercise 
 flung in his face — (a smile from Lord Grosvenor) 
 —if he presented such trash to his master. We 
 absolutely felt ashamed, and began to distrust our 
 own judgment, when we found that we had one 
 idea in common with such a turgid and shallow 
 declaimer. Surely, surely (said we to ourselves), 
 it cannot be long before this bubble bursts. 
 
 And all this you stated to the public ? — Yes. 
 
 Did you find that your exposure of the de- 
 fendant's pretensions had the effect of putting an 
 end to the public delusion ? 
 
 Quite the reverse. The crowds which thronged 
 to the Caledonian chapel, instantly doubled. The 
 scene which Cross-street, Hatton-garden, pre- 
 sented on the following Sunday, beggared all de- 
 scription. It was quite a Vanity Fair. Not one 
 half of the assembled multitude could force their 
 way into the sanctum sanctorum. Even we, our- 
 
10 
 
 selves, were shut out among the vulgar herd. For 
 the entertainment of the excluded, however, there 
 was Mr. Basil Montague, preaching peace and re- 
 signation from a window ; and the once celebrated 
 Romeo Coates acting the part of trumpeter from 
 the steps of the church, extolling Mr. Irving as 
 the prodigy of prodigies, and abusing the Times 
 for declaring that Mr. Irving was not " the god 
 of their idolatry." We laughed heartily at the 
 fool. 
 
 From what text did Mr. Romeo discourse ? 
 
 Proverbs vii. 7. " And behold, among the 
 simple ones, I discovered a young man void of 
 understanding" — (much laughter). 
 
 Did you, on this, make any other attempt to 
 bring back the public to reason ? 
 
 Yes, we did once more enter our protest in the 
 name of good sense and common sense, against his 
 fustian phraseology, his pigmy ideas, mounted on 
 stilts, and all the other little tricks by which a 
 mean understanding endeavours to acquire the 
 character of depth and dignity of thought. 
 
 Cross-examined by Mr. Phillips. 
 
 Are you not, Sir, in the practice of inserting 
 articles in your journal as from yourself, when 
 they are, in fact, written by others ? — Yes, when 
 cleverly written. 
 
 Is not Mr. Cobbett in the habit of supplying 
 you with clever articles occasionally ? 
 
 Mr. Cobbett ! never, Sir : we should take shame 
 
11 
 
 to ourselves if we polluted our pages with any 
 thing from the pen of that arch mountebank 
 and impostor. 
 
 But on your oath, Sir, did not Mr. Cobbett 
 write those articles on the late Queen which 
 gained your paper so much of the bubble repu- 
 tation ? 
 
 A lie— an odious lie, upon my soul a d d 
 
 lie. (Accompanied with great violence of gesti- 
 culation.) 
 
 Keep your temper, Sir. Was it not so reported 
 at least ? 
 
 Yes. The old ruffian gave it out himself, that 
 he had written them ; but it was all a base and 
 wicked invention of his own. 
 
 I must nevertheless ask you whether it was not 
 this very same Mr. Cobbett who wrote the criti- 
 cisms which you have repeated here to-day on 
 Mr. Irving ? 
 
 No, Sir ; no earthly consideration could ever 
 induce us to insert a syllable from the pen of that 
 rascally grave-stealer, on any subject whatever. 
 
 Mr. Phillips. But Mr. Cobbett, you are per- 
 haps aware, has done you the honour of agreeing 
 with you in opinion as to the present case ? 
 
 Honour, Sir ! I know nothing about it ; I am 
 no reader of his trash. 
 
 And yet you quote him at times ? 
 
 Yes, the blustering blockhead will start across 
 our path now and then, when we like to stir him 
 up with our long pole a little, for the diversion of 
 the public. But he is so nauseous a dog, that 
 
12 
 
 when we have any thing to quote from him, we 
 never defile our pens with the task, but toss him 
 to the compositors, that they may print from his 
 own detestable pages. 
 
 Admirable delicacy indeed ! Now, Sir, let me 
 ask you, who have so freely condemned Mr. Irving 
 as a man of mean understanding, whether you have 
 not at the same time condemned Sir Walter Scott 
 as a write?" of no imagination ? — Yes, I have. 
 
 And Lord Byron, as destitute of all poetical 
 talent 2 —Yes. 
 
 Enough, Sir, you may go down. 
 
 I am going down, Sir. 
 
 The Editor of the Courier examined by 
 Mr. Macvicar. 
 
 Mr. Macvicar (handing to the witness a copy of 
 the Courier of Thursday, July 17, 1823). Is that 
 a genuine copy of the Courier newspaper for 
 Thursday, the 17th of July ?-It is. 
 
 It contains, I see, an article on the subject of 
 the controversy about Mr. Irving — is that your 
 writing ? — It is. 
 
 Had you heard Mr. Irving when you wrote it ? 
 
 No ; as there observed, we had not heard the 
 gentleman, and until we could do so without fight- 
 ing our way into his church, we were resolved to 
 remain contented with what we could hear of him. 
 
 You were enabled, however, to express an opi- 
 nion of his merits ? 
 
 Yes ; from specimens which appeared in the 
 Morning Chronicle (the only paper we read ex- 
 
IS 
 
 cept our own) of what he had delivered in the 
 pulpit, we were enabled to say, that he was the 
 last preacher to whom we should choose to listen. 
 What he uttered seemed to be a mere mass of 
 gaudy, glittering words, without matter or method. 
 What effect the mode of his delivery could have 
 upon the tinsel of his language, we could not 
 know, but we felt satisfied that if he could not 
 reach the minds of his congregation, his influence 
 on their ears and eyes would soon find its proper 
 level. 
 
 Were these all your objections ? 
 
 No. We were given to understand that he 
 made the pulpit a theatre for coarse attacks upon 
 individuals. Now we hold it to be the business of 
 a clergyman simply to expound the word of God, 
 to enforce the precepts of religion, and to animate 
 his fellow Christians in the pursuit of moral duty. 
 He is not to level his rebukes at persons, for what 
 he may consider as an aberration from strict pro- 
 priety of conduct ; such a practice would convert 
 a sacred place of worship into a hot-bed of angry 
 passions and mutual animosities. Still less ought 
 a preacher to fulminate ex cathedra petulant cen- 
 sures upon literary effusions. 
 
 What do you particularly allude to ? 
 
 We had seen in the papers of the day some 
 foolish, illiberal, and greatly misplaced remarks 
 of his upon the Vision of Judgment, by our friend 
 Southey, and its ribald parody, by Lord Byron. 
 Do people, we asked, and again ask, go to . 
 church to hear trash like this-? 
 
 You concluded, I observe, with a prophecy ? 
 
14 
 
 Yes. I said then, and I now repeat, that by 
 acts like these, and by a fustian Ossianic phraseo- 
 logy, Mr. Irving may for a time draw crowds, but 
 I venture to predict, that unless he betakes him- 
 self to a sounder and purer method of pulpit ora- 
 tory, the new church which there is a talk of 
 building for him will not be wanted half so much 
 as he will want a congregation. 
 
 Cross-examined by Mr. Phillips. 
 
 Look at that paper, Sir, and tell the Jury what 
 it is. 
 
 It is a copy of the Courier of Monday, July 7. 
 
 Older by ten days than the Courier you have 
 just been quoting? — Yes. 
 
 You there give an account of Mr. Irving's 
 preaching at Hatton Garden on the day preced- 
 ing, as if you had been present ? — Yes. 
 
 You say the chapel was crowded to suffocation 
 — that the heat was so intolerable that some stout- 
 hearted men were absolutely fainting, and were 
 obliged to be carried out of the crowd j all which 
 things you of course saw ? — Yes. 
 
 You describe Mr. Irving's person — his bushy 
 hair — his large whiskers — his unfortunate squint? 
 Yes. 
 
 You say his prayers and his reading are very 
 impressive, and that his sermon was a masterpiece 
 of oratory^ and full of sound doctrine ? — Yes. 
 
 And yet ten days after, you say you had not 
 heard the gentleman-, and that his sermons are 
 
15 
 
 a mere mass of glittering, gaudy words, without 
 matter or method? — Yes. 
 
 I have nothing more to say to you, Sir. Good 
 God ! that by such witnesses as this my noble- 
 minded client should be borne down and reviled ! 
 
 Re-examined by Mr. Macvicar. 
 
 You can perhaps explain how this extraordinary 
 discrepancy arises ? 
 
 Quite easily, Sir. I have occasion to make fre- 
 quent visits to Paris, and it was during one of 
 these that the prior article, which Mr. Phillips rests 
 so much upon, was written by an assistant, who, 
 as my friend ofl'Etoile says, has got un tete foible 
 extremement. (Much laughter.) Why, Sir, it was 
 the same gentleman with the weak head, who 
 sounded the famous retreat of the French behind 
 the Ebro, while at the very moment I was at Paris, 
 receiving instructions from the French minis- 
 ters to do all I could to make the public believe 
 that the game was all up with the Spaniards. He 
 is constantly committing blunders of this sort. 
 
 Re-examined by Mr. Phillips. 
 
 On your oath, Sir, did not you find, on your 
 return from Paris, a letter lying from your friend 
 Southey, chiding you for praising to the skies in 
 your journal, a man who had called his Vision of 
 Judgment " a most nauseous and unformed abor- 
 
10 
 
 tion ; vile, unprincipled, and unmeaning ; a bra- 
 zen-faced piece of political cant ?" 
 
 Mr. Macvicar submitted, that Mr. Phillips was 
 not at liberty to prove a written document by pa- 
 role evidence. Notice should have been given to 
 produce the letter. 
 
 Mr. Phillips declined pressing the cpiestion. 
 
 Mr. William Cobbett examined by Mr. Parsons. 
 
 Have you heard the defendant, Mr. Irving, 
 preach ? 
 
 I never go after fools, Sir. 
 
 Perhaps, Mr. Cobbett, you " keep a fool of 
 your own," and then think yourself " wise ?" (A 
 laugh.) 
 
 Perhaps not, Mr. Jackanapes. 
 
 Come now, Cobbett, don't be angry j you are 
 all on our side, you know ; tell us, then, how you 
 came to know all about this Caledonian prodigy ? 
 
 Why, I will tell you. — My friend William Hone, 
 since he took to writing about Apocryphas and 
 Mysteries, has become as pious and dreaming a 
 noodle as any lank-haired fanatic in all England. 
 It was only the other day he told me, that in mak- 
 ing his famous defence on the three trials, which 
 every body knows was a stammer and a halt all 
 through, he verily thought he had the gift of 
 tongues given unto him ! The man is sadly gone. 
 He can speak to you about nothing but the Mac- 
 cabees, and Habbakuk, and Mahaleel, and Jero- 
 
17 
 
 boam, and Rehoboam, and goes moreover to 
 church as regularly as my Lord Bexley, or that 
 saintly gentleman, Mr. Butterworth. The God of 
 his idolatry at present is Mr. Irving, on whose mi- 
 nistry y as the poor man calls it, he attends every 
 Sabbath, with all his pretty little chubby children ; 
 and it is from him I have heard more than enough 
 about this " Scotch dealer out of brimstone and 
 fire"— 
 
 Chief Justice. Mr. Cobbett, this is harsh lan- 
 guage to use of a minister of the gospel. 
 
 Mr. Cobbett. I like, my Lord, to call things 
 by their right names ; a cat, as the old adage goes, 
 is but a cat all the world over. 
 
 Mr. Parsons. What, then, is the opinion, Mr. 
 Cobbett, that you have formed of Mr. Irving 
 and his preaching ? 
 
 Every body, Sir, must know that ; for every 
 body reads Cobbett ; the very children must have 
 got it by heart. 
 
 Well, but a good thing, you know, can't be 
 repeated too often — once more, if you please ? 
 
 Well, then — " The exhibition now going on at 
 Hatton-garden every Sunday, is far more con- 
 temptible than any thing ever seen in the Catholic 
 church. I have heard, indeed, of the women 
 following the preaching and laughing Capuchins 
 of Rome ; but I never heard of any thing else 
 resembling this Hatton-garden show ; at which it 
 is said, Mr. Canning and other ministers attend. 
 This preacher has been described to me as having 
 
 D 
 
v. 
 
 18 
 
 a fine voice, being very eloquent, full of the spirit 
 of grace, six feet two inches high, shoulders of 
 breadth in proportion, long black hair, and a 
 beard like a German scrubbing brush. The church 
 is advertised in the newspapers, almost in direct 
 terms. Tickets are said to be sold for half-a- 
 guinea. To hear this man bawling about " the 
 level lake of fire" u the worm that dieth not," 
 and " the flame that is not quenched ;" to hear 
 this stuff bawled out in a harsh Scotch accent, 
 people run, and push, and squeeze, and strive, as 
 if they were endeavouring to get from a house on 
 fire. They run to his Jire with as much eagerness 
 as they would run from another fire. The Morn- 
 ing Chronicle frequently entertains us with stories 
 about the credulity and gullibility of Roman 
 catholics. That which I have just described is 
 now actually going on in London. The audience 
 consists partly of ministers of state, and of mem- 
 bers and peers of parliament. This great brim- 
 stone merchant has the most fashionable part of the 
 metropolis for his auditory. Here we have a spe- 
 cimen of the fruit of that light which the Chroni- 
 cle tells us is in the Protestant mind. Can the 
 Chronicle cite any instance in which Roman 
 catholic folly has surpassed this ?" 
 
 But you are aware, Mr. Cobbett, how much the 
 protestant mind has fallen from its former " high 
 estate" Have you not read how " our soul is smitten 
 with grief and shame" to remark how in this latter 
 day, in this fag end of the thread of human ex- 
 
19 
 
 istence, Revealed Wisdom hath fallen, fallen, fal- 
 len, and along with her fallen the great and noble 
 character of men ? 
 
 All Stuff — stuff— stuff, Sir: the common-place of 
 quacks and impostors. — Mr. Irving tells you that 
 nine-tenths of the people of England know nothing 
 at all of the truths of Revelation. There is nothing 
 new, however, false in this. There are two hun- 
 dred and eighty preachers already roaming about 
 the country preaching the same sort of nonsense. 
 They speak of the English people as Heathen ; as 
 " destitute persons," destitute of all knowledge of 
 the Lord! They call the places neglected vil- 
 lages, and they assert that these people : that is 
 to say, a very large part of the people of England, 
 are without the knowledge of God in this world. 
 This Society has its head-quarters at the " Home 
 Missionary Rooms, 18, Aldermanbury, London j" 
 and it has four Secretaries, whose names are Cob- 
 bin, Dunn, Moore, and Millar. The very exist- 
 ence of such a society, in a country paying tithes 
 to the amount of six or seven millions a year, is a 
 scandal without parallel. Here is a Church, col- 
 lecting its tithes by the aid of soldiers ; and here 
 is a society, putting into print and publishing that 
 they have under their care, two hundred and 
 seventy-four villages t containing a population of 
 ninety-five thousand, three hundred and forty-four 
 souls, who enjoy no means of evangelical instruction. 
 M What then," say they, (and Mr. Irving but 
 imitates their cant,) " must be the general state of 
 
20 
 
 the villages in England." The Christian heart 
 shudders at the thought! — Sir, either this is 
 true, or these are most impudent vagabonds. 
 If it be true, what a pretty Church we have, 
 after our two hundred years of reformation! 
 If it be false, what a pretty state we are in 
 with two hundred and eighty, (for that is the 
 number that they say they have) of bawling 
 ######*# f this one description, going about 
 England to introduce the people to a knowledge of 
 God ! Augustine, when he landed in Kent with 
 his forty monks, had, I am sure, too much modes- 
 ty to speak of the English of that day, as these 
 impudent vagabonds speak of them now ; and 
 that in print too, and as bold as brass. They have 
 no scruple to declare that the agricultural popu- 
 lation of England, is in a perfectly heathenish 
 state. 
 
 But if they did not do this, Mr. Cobbett, what 
 success would they have ? 
 
 Oh ! to be sure, money is collected by these 
 heathen converters. Money is always included ; 
 for their object is to live without work; and to 
 do this, they must have money. Accordingly, 
 they plead most pressingly for money. They, in 
 various publications, in pamphlets, in sheets, in 
 half sheets, in quarter sheets, and in single leaves, 
 set forth in grand array, the works of grace and sal- 
 vation, that they are performing. But, then, they 
 are in want of money. If they had but money, 
 they would soon extirpate all the heathenishness 
 
21 
 
 of the poor souls who are now perishing, But 
 without money what can they do ! 
 
 Cross-examined by Mr. Phillips. 
 
 You know the Times newspaper, Mr. Cobbett ? 
 
 The b y old Times ? — Oh yes — none better. 
 
 Do you ever write for it ? 
 
 I have written all its best articles for a long 
 time past ; I wrote those famous articles about 
 the queen, which raised its circulation from 3,000 
 to 20,000 in one week. To do it justice, however, 
 I must say, that I don't think the stupid num- 
 sculls who manage it knew they were written by 
 me : if they had, they would rather have been 
 smothered to death (to make use of one of their 
 own favourite similies), under the thousand and 
 one quires they printed daily at that time, than 
 have adopted them. But I have a way of my 
 own, Sir, of managing these things. I can do 
 other people's work for them, and make them say 
 and do what I please, without their knowing or 
 suspecting any thing of the matter. 
 
 Another Brownie o'Brodsbeck, I suppose ? 
 
 Something of that, i* faith. 
 
 Well, Brownie, will you tell us one thing more ? 
 Was it not you who wrote that clever article in 
 The Times, about Mr. Irving, beginning " there 
 is a fashion in every thing—in wigs and bonnets," 
 and so forth ? 
 
 Yes — every word of it. 
 
 You swear that ? 
 
 Broil me on a gridiron if it was not. 
 
Editor of the Literary Chronicle examined by 
 Mr. Parsons. 
 
 Do you know any thing, Sir, of the rev. de- 
 fendant, what he is, and whence he came ? 
 
 Mr. Irving, Sir, is a young man, a native of 
 Annan in Scotland, who was for some time an 
 assistant preacher to Dr. Chalmers of Glasgow, 
 until both the doctor and his colleague having 
 calls, left their flocks to seek other shepherds. 
 Dr. Chalmers was called to a professorship in a 
 northern university. Mr. Irving was called, (and 
 what Scotsman ever refused such a call?) from the 
 bleak mountains of Scotland to the more fertile 
 vineyards of the south, to that land flowing with 
 milk and honey— the British metropolis. 
 
 Well, Sir, how has he fared since his arrival in 
 this land of milk and honey ?j 
 
 " Some nine moons wasted," he was seated in 
 the Caledonian chapel in Cross Street, Hatton 
 Garden — a place of worship, formerly known by 
 the name of the Gaelic Chapel. 
 
 Gaelic ! Does Mr. Irving preach in Gaelic? 
 
 Oh, no, Sir. It was found out by some honest 
 folks, that the Gaelic language, however sono- 
 rous and mellifluous it may be in the long deep 
 glens of the Highlands, is, in the polished streets 
 of the metropolis, one of the most barbarous and 
 intolerable jargons ever known to the tongue 
 of man.* It was therefore resolved that there 
 
 *JAbsolutely what was stated at one of the meetings about 
 Mr. living's call to the Caledonian chapel.— Reporter. 
 
 
23 
 
 should be no more preaching in Gaelic, but that a 
 call should be given to Mr. Irving to come and 
 proclaim the glad tidings of the gospel in Gallo- 
 vidian English. 
 
 Or rather, I fancy, Sir, the resolution to call 
 Mr. Irving was made first, and the reason for it 
 came afterwards ? 
 
 Not unlikely. 
 
 And what has become of the poor Gaelic folks 
 in London who don't understand English ? Have 
 they been turned adrift without a pastor, and left 
 to perish for lack of instruction ? 
 
 Oh, Sir, nobody but porters and the like speak 
 Gaelic only ; and who cares for their perishing ? 
 Give me, says Mr. Irving, your " imaginative 
 men and political men, and legal men and medi- 
 cal men." What indeed would the society of 
 saints be worth, if it were made up only of Scotch 
 caddies, Highland porters, Kentish gipseys, West 
 Country bargemen, Welsh miners, and the like ? 
 
 Mr. Irving preaches then only to people of high 
 degree, such as your poets and statesmen, and 
 lawyers and physicians ? Yes. 
 
 But how has he contrived to make these people 
 run after him so ? 
 
 Why the art is simple enough. Mr. Irving saw 
 that in London preachers are followed not so 
 much for their talents and attainments, as for their 
 apparent zeal and the violence of their denun- 
 ciations, that the more lustily a minister preaches 
 damnation to his followers, the more eagerly he is 
 followed, and every word he drops caught, as if 
 
24 
 
 it were manna from heaven. He saw the higher 
 classes heedless of religion because their preachers 
 preached nothing but peace, peace : he saw the 
 lower cramming conventicles to the very ceiling, 
 because they heard of nothing there but fire, fire. 
 He reasoned, and reasoned correctly, that as the 
 poor crowded to chapels in proportion as their 
 sins were denounced, the rich would do the same, 
 and that he had only to attack the vices and follies 
 of the fashionable world to become popular : he 
 did so, and has succeeded. 
 
 Is this then the whole secret of his success? 
 No ; another secret of his popularity is, that he 
 does not confine himself to attacking the higher 
 classes in the abstract : he singles out individual 
 characters — he thus takes advantage of that weak- 
 ness of human nature, the love of scandal, and is 
 the very " John Bull " of the clergy. 
 
 Has not curiosity also some share in the matter ? 
 Undoubtedly. His chapel is every Sunday a 
 gallery of beauty and fashion ; and while some of 
 the nobility and gentry,are prompted by curiosity 
 to see and hear a preacher become popular by the 
 boldness of his denunciations, no inconsiderable 
 portion of his auditors are collected in the hopes 
 of seeing some Royal Duke or Princess, some Mi- 
 nister of State, the famed Lady A. or the beau- 
 teous Miss B. 
 
 But do you mean to say that Mr. Irving is a 
 man of no talents ? 
 
 Certainly not, he is a man of considerable ta- 
 lents, but they have been sadly overrated. He is 
 
3$ 
 
 read well in books, but has not studied men ; his 
 reasoning is superficial ; his judgment indiscreet ; 
 his taste bad ; his conceit overwhelming ; his as- 
 surance most unblushing ; he is, in short, nothing 
 but a sounding brass, a tinkling cymbol ; or, to 
 call things by their right names, a mere scold. 
 
 You say he is well read in books. Do you mean 
 that it should be inferred, that he shines in bor- 
 rowed plumes ? 
 
 Not so exactly j I have met with little in his 
 volume of what we call plagiarism. Indeed, the 
 only instance worth remarking is, after all, very 
 excusable. " I wish," says Mr. Irving, " that I 
 had a dwelling place in every bosom." Sweet ec- 
 static idea ! but borrowed, as you will see, Sir, 
 from the following passage of the Don Juan of 
 that " woe-begone and self-tormented, wretched 
 man " Lord Byron, as Mr. Irving calls him : — 
 
 I love the sex, and sometimes would reverse 
 
 The tyrant's wish " that mankind only had 
 
 One neck, which he with one fell stroke might pierce." 
 
 My wish is quite as wide, and not so bad, 
 
 And much more tender, on the whole, than fierce ; 
 
 It being — (not now, but only while a lad) 
 
 That womankind had but one rosy mouth, 
 
 To kiss them all from north to south. 
 
 (much laughter : fans in requisition in the gallery.) 
 
 Cross-examined by Mr. Phillips. 
 
 You keep a common establishment, Sir, for 
 giving characters ? 
 
 E 
 
26 
 
 I edite a weekly Review, Sir. 
 Which every body knows is the same tiling, Sir. 
 Go down. 
 
 Tfie Editor of the Album examined by 
 Mr. Macvicar. 
 
 Were yon at the Scottish church in Hatton 
 Garden, on Sunday, the 6th of July ? — I was. 
 
 What sort of audience did you find collected ? 
 
 I was surrounded on every side by faces well 
 known upon town in every way. 
 
 For what purpose did they seem assembled ? 
 
 They were evidently brought there by some 
 strong and peculiar motive ; but the general buzz 
 and hum of different conversations, plainly proved 
 that the motive was not to pray to God. There 
 was none of that staid and decorous aspect and 
 manner which, in those who cannot be called de- 
 vout, supply an appearance fitted to the place. 
 The company were evidently come to see a show, 
 and they conversed with one another till the show 
 began. 
 
 When was that ? 
 
 Just at eleven, a sort of motion and movement 
 through the assemblage, told that Mr. Irving was 
 entering. He had some difficulty in making his 
 way to the pnlpit, the stairs of which were covered 
 with gaily dressed ladies. The service com- 
 menced by Mr. Irving reading a hymn, which 
 was immediately afterwards sung by the clerk and 
 the children of the Caledonian school. 
 
How were you impressed at first with Mr. 
 Irving's style of officiating ? 
 
 I was disappointed. His voice seemed to have 
 little modulation or tunefulness. I was still more 
 displeased with the manner in which he read, it 
 being with extreme pompousness of tone and con- 
 tortion of countenance. 
 
 Did he improve as he went on ? 
 
 Far from it. When he delivered the prayer, 
 his eyes were forcibly closed ; his mouth was 
 drawn into an expression so pompous as almost to 
 be farcical ; the enunciation was studied and 
 stilted to the last degree ; the gesture was ungrace- 
 ful throughout, and often vehement, and the 
 matter was a succession of scriptural phrases 
 linked together by language, aiming not very 
 happily at the same style. Mr. Irving, I said to 
 myself, means to make his prayer impressive by 
 this manner : it is a pity he does not know that it 
 is impossible to be impressive and unnatural at 
 the same time. The prayer was concluded by 
 the Lord's prayer, and the way in which he gave 
 this was perfectly sufficient, I thought, to decide 
 his taste and manner. 
 
 How was that ? 
 
 It was mouthed, I might almost say, ranted, in 
 the manner in which we are accustomed to hear 
 the mock invocation in the Critic, spouted upon 
 the stage — the face was more than usually contorted 
 — the voice was more than usually violent and un- 
 equal — and the gesture ! Oh ! heavens ! such ges- 
 ture! During the preceding prayer, Mr. I. had 
 
 i 
 
stood chiefly with tlie arms slightly protruded 
 from the body, and crossed by the right hand 
 clasping the left arm about half way between the 
 wrist and the elbow ; but this curious, and some- 
 what awkward posture, was changed when he 
 commenced the Lord's Prayer, into one still more 
 curious, and far more awkward. The arms were 
 placed close by the sides, but raised perpendicu- 
 larly from the elbow, with the hands erect. 
 
 Now, Sir, if you please, for the sermon — What 
 did you think of that ? 
 
 I am no divine, Sir, and can say nothing of the 
 matter of doctrine that it involved. 
 
 You can tell us, however, what you think of 
 him as an orator, if not as a theologian ? 
 
 I had heard, Sir, a good deal of the peculiarity of 
 diction, which Mr. Irving has adopted after the 
 model of Jeremy Taylor, and the other old writers 
 of our Church. It was, as it had been represented 
 to me, and its effect was also what I had antici- 
 pated it would be. The diction which he employs 
 is not now in use ; and it consequently appears 
 affected, unnatural, and therefore unimpressive. 
 He uses the third person singular of the verb, ac- 
 cording to the old form, — for instance, he says, " it 
 hath ,, — " it doth**— «« it dometh*^" it goeth"— 
 &c, and he employs a consonant obsoleteness 
 of diction. 
 
 But of what sort was the substance of his ser- 
 mon ? 
 
 The discourse, Sir, was one flood of inappropriate 
 and bombastic language j — extravagant without be- 
 
iug in the least degree poetical; — furious, without 
 even for a moment being forcible. I could recog- 
 nize no deep thought — no fine images — nothing 
 pathetic— nothing impressive ; His style was over- 
 charged with metaphor to the utmost degree ; but 
 his metaphors are nearly always false and broken. 
 During the whole sermon, which lasted an hour 
 and «£ve-and-twenty minutes, there was scarcely 
 any image which was perfect, and positively, not 
 one, which remained impressed upon the mind by 
 its beauty, terseness, and truth. 
 How did he deliver the sermon ? 
 The manner of delivery, Sir, displeased me as 
 much as the composition. The Lord's Prayer, 
 had prepared me for a good deal, but I had no 
 conception that it was possible, any thing like 
 the violence of enunciation and gesture which' Mr. 
 • Irving displayed, could have been used in the pul- 
 pit; or, indeed, anywhere else. Mr. Irving' s solem- 
 nity, is vehemence ; Mr. Irving' s passion, is fury; 
 and he is not guided in these bursts of convulsive 
 frenzy by the matter which he is delivering. He 
 throws himself into all the variations of attitude, 
 which are consistent with every one of them being 
 ungraceful — his hands are clenched — the sweat 
 starts from his brow — his whole frame shakes — 
 and his voice comes forth with a quivering^sound 
 from the extremity of his agitation ; and all this, 
 at a passage where manly earnestness was all that 
 was needed, or indeed, admissible. 
 Can you give us an example ? 
 When speaking of the Omnipotence of God, 
 
30 
 
 that the whole universe was in His person, as 
 he pronounced the word universe, he absolutely 
 waved his arm round and round above his head, 
 in a manner, which is usual only when the hand 
 contains a hat, and the mouth is uttering huzza ! 
 huzza! My friend Cruickshanks, who was with 
 me, was constantly whispering into my ear, " What 
 a subject! capital! admirable!" His mischievous 
 pencil was at work the whole time, catching the 
 oddities and contortions of the preacher. 
 
 Perhaps you could shew the court some of these 
 sketches. 
 
 Here are some. — [Witness produced several of 
 these sketches done on the back of small address 
 cards. They were handed about the Court, and 
 kept it for several minutes in a general roar of 
 laughter. The editor of the Alburn has been kind 
 enough to permit us to have them engraved for 
 this report. The preacher is exhibited in four 
 different attitudes : — 1 st. The Glance Penetrat- 
 ing. 2d. The Knock it into Them. 3. The So- 
 lemn Invocation. 4. Solemn Invocation after 
 another manner. 5. The Crown All.] 
 
 Have you any thing farther, Sir, to add to your 
 evidence ? 
 
 I ought to observe that Mr. Irving' s obliquity 
 of vision, of which so much is said, is worse than 
 that which is called a squint, and varies according 
 to the direction in which he looks. I came away, 
 upon the whole, lost in wonder, not at the noto- 
 riety which Mr. Irving has gained, for his stile is 
 very much ad captandum, but at the report which 
 
31 
 
 I had heard, (but which I must say I now doubt), 
 that some of our most really eloquent men have 
 spoken of him in high praise. 
 
 The Printer of the Liberal examined by Mr. Par sons. 
 
 Have you, among the contributors to your 
 " Verse and Prose from the South," any " well- 
 wishers to religion and good order ? " 
 
 We have one queer fellow who calls himself so ; 
 but I do not know what to make of him. He is, 
 
 for all that, constantly in the company of 
 
 and and . 
 
 Is he not in the practice of haunting churches 
 and chapels a good deal ? 
 
 He has been hearing Mr. Irving several times 
 of late ; and yet is constantly abusing him. The 
 Caledonian Chapel, he says, resembles a booth at 
 a fair ; and the pulpit, a stage, for a tall, raw- 
 boned, hard-featured, impudent Scotch quack, to 
 twang through the nose indecency, blasphemy, 
 and sedition. 
 
 The things, probably, which take him there so 
 often. Did he give you any instance of Mr. 
 Irving's indecency ? — None. 
 
 Of his sedition ? — None. 
 
 Of his blasphemy ? 
 
 Yes, of something like it, at least. He men- 
 tioned that he had heard Mr. Irving, at one time, 
 describe the God of natural religion as like 
 the great desert — dry, disagreeable, comfortless, 
 deadly — where no one wished to dwell ! No one, 
 
4 
 
 32 
 
 he insisted, could venture upon this gross insult 
 to the God of nature (whom he apprehended to 
 be also the God of Christians), without that strong 
 obliquity of mental vision, that can keep natural 
 religion in one eye and revealed religion in the 
 other : look grave on the parent, and fulsome on 
 the daughter. Mr. Irving had at another time, 
 he said, asserted, by an impudent figure of speech, 
 that the God of Mercy was like Alsatia, where 
 the scum of mankind took refuge I ! 
 
 But all this does not prove Mr. Irving to be 
 what he called him, " an impudent Scotch 
 quack ? " 
 
 No ; but he mentioned another thing which does. 
 He heard Mr. Irving issue a proclamation in the 
 name of the King of Heaven, appointing himself 
 crier of the court, beginning with a To wit, to 
 wit ; and ending with damnation to all those who 
 do not go to hear him. 
 
 The Editor of the British Press examined. 
 
 Are you "A member of the established church ? 
 
 Yes. 
 
 Have you inquired into the merits of Mr. Irving ? 
 
 Yes, most particularly. 
 
 What is your opinion of him ? 
 
 I think him quite over-rated. Every page of 
 his orations bears the stamp of a mind perfectly 
 bewildered : we have a jargon of words with an 
 utter barrenness of ideas ; there is no coming at 
 his meaning, for he addresses himself neither to 
 
3.S 
 
 the head nor to the heart, and contributes nothing 
 either to enlighten the one, or improve the other. 
 He delivers himself in a dialect so studiously 
 quaint and affected, as to be for the most part 
 wholly unintelligible. He roils his sentences one 
 over another, with an utter disregard to any thing 
 like logical orcler or consecutive arrangement. If 
 the reader passes them over rapidly, it is so far 
 well ;"but if he pauses over any one of them, to 
 discover its tendency, or examine its truth, he 
 will find that it is either so indefinite as to lead to 
 nothing, or that when understood it leads to con- 
 clusions which no sound mind can admit. He 
 delights not merely in rhetorical exaggeration of 
 matters of fact ; his discourses are full of idiotic 
 trash, that any man of decent understanding would 
 be ashamed of. He appears as if he sat down to 
 write (to use a proverbial phrase of his country) 
 with a bee in his bonnet. What man, for example, 
 unless the faculties of his mind were disturbed, 
 could run on in such a strain as the following : — 
 " Masterful men, or the masterful current of opi- 
 nion, hath ploughed with the word of God, and 
 the fruit has been to inveigle the mind into the ex- 
 clusive admiration of some few truths, which being 
 planted in the belief, and sacrificed to in all reli- 
 gious expositions and discourses, have become po- 
 pular idols, which frown heresy and excommunica- 
 tion upon all who dare stand for the unadulterated, 
 uncurtailed testimony. Such Shiboleths every age 
 hath been trained to mouth ; and it is as much as 
 one's religious character is worth, to think that 
 
 F 
 
34 
 
 the doctrinal Shiboleths of the present day may 
 not include the whole contents and capacity of 
 the written word. But, truly, there are higher 
 fears than the fear even of the religious world ; 
 and greater loss than the loss of religious fame. 
 Therefore, craving indulgence of you to hear us 
 to an end, and asking the credit of good intention 
 upon what you have already heard, we summon 
 your whole unconstrained man to the engagement 
 of reading the word ; — not to authenticate a 
 meagre outline of opinions elsewhere derived, but 
 to prove and purify all the sentiments which bind 
 the confederations of life ; to prove and purify all 
 the feelings which instigate the actions of life ; 
 many to annihilate ; many to implant ; all to re- 
 gulate and reform : — to bridle the tongue till its 
 words come forth in unison with the word of God, 
 and to people the whole soul with the population of 
 new thoughts, which that word reveals of God 
 and man — of the present and the future." 
 
 Voila un chef-d'oeuvre digne de notre siecle ! 
 
 And this is the orator of Hatton Garden, who 
 can only be heard with admission tickets ? 
 
 Yes ; Mr. Irving professes to address himself 
 to a blind and senseless generation, but he seems 
 to have caught the distemper he came to cure. 
 
 Fools that we are, like [srael's sons of yore, 
 The calf ourselves have fashion'd, we adore ; 
 But let true Reason once resume her reign, 
 This idol will become a calf again. 
 
3: 
 
 Editor of the Pulpit examined by Mr. Macvicar. 
 
 I understand, Sir, you have lately established a 
 censorship over the pulpits of the metropolis ? 
 
 Yes. 
 
 Your attention must, of course, have been par- 
 ticularly drawn to the exhibitions of Mr. Irving, 
 in Hafton Garden ? — It has. 
 
 Tell us, pray, how Mr. Irving ranks as a 
 preacher ? 
 
 Mr. Irving himself, Sir, claims to be like no 
 other living preacher on this side of the Tweed at 
 least ; he has come to set " an example " to the 
 whole body of the English clergy, of all denomin- 
 ations ; for so exceedingly deficient have they all 
 been in the performance of their sacred functions, 
 that according to him, there are nine-tenths of 
 every class who know nothing at all about the 
 truths of revelation. Our popular leaders, he tells 
 us, " finding no necessity for strenuous endea- 
 vours and high science in the ways of God, but 
 having a gathering host to follow them, deviate 
 from the ways of deep and penetrating thought — 
 refuse the contest with the literary and accom- 
 plished enemies of the faith — bring a contempt 
 upon the cause in which mighty men did formerly 
 gird themselves to the combat — and so cast the 
 stumbling-block of a mistaken paltryness between 
 enlightened men and the cross of Christ ! " 
 
 Do you deem the pulpit a place for such re- 
 flections as these ? 
 
36 
 
 By no means, Sir ; I take it to be a gross pros- 
 titution of the privilege which the pnlpit gives 
 to preachers of saying what they please, and having 
 all the saying to themselves, to reflect in this manner 
 on one's fellow labourers in the ministry. Mr. 
 Irving is besides but a young labourer, and as yet, 
 almost a stranger in this country ; and it ill be- 
 comes one of such few years and limited experi- 
 ence, thus to stalk forth, dispensing his censures 
 on all around him, and holding himself up as the 
 only model for universal imitation. 
 
 But may not the clergy, Sir, stand really in need 
 of some such example being held up to them ? 
 
 No, Sir ; it is sheer ignorance which makes Mr. 
 Irving vaunt so. Were he at all acquainted with 
 the state of religion in the community where his 
 lot is now cast, with w r hat has been done, and is 
 doing in it, to promote the cause of Christ ; had 
 he heard one out of ten of all the clergymen whom 
 he calumniates in the mass "without hearing them, 
 he would never have spoken so falsely as he has 
 done. 
 
 It would seem then, that Mr. Irving has erred 
 merely from want of information ? 
 
 Not so entirely. Mr. Irving is ignorant, not so 
 much for want of opportunities of knowing better, 
 but from a vanity and self-sufficiency which have 
 prevented him from availing himself of those op- 
 portunities he has had. He thinks he has nothing 
 to learn, and that nobody knows more ; he goes 
 on expatiating, when his first step should be to 
 inquire. The attitude which he assumes is that 
 
37 
 
 of the Pharisee, " Stand by thyself — touch me not 
 — I am more holy than thou." 
 
 You can tell us, perhaps, what the scriptures 
 say of this sort of professors ? 
 
 When our Redeemer commanded one of his 
 disciples to follow him, the latter asked what his 
 fellow disciple should do? Most just and striking 
 was the reproof contained in our Lord's answer — 
 " If I will that he tarry till I come, what is that to 
 thee? Follow thou me." So I would say to 
 Mr. Irving : — Even admitting all you say to be 
 true of your fellow disciples, " what is that to 
 thee ? " What is it to the great truths you have 
 undertaken to enforce, that others do not enforce 
 them after your fashion, or to your taste ? Do you 
 expound them as you think they ought to be ex- 
 pounded ; do you take care to do justice to the 
 " gathering host" that follows you ; be contented 
 to lay up for yourself a crown of glory that fadeth 
 not ; and snatch not with a rude and invidious 
 hand the wreath from the brow of your fellow dis- 
 ciple. " If I will that he tarry till I come, what 
 is that to thee? Follow thou me." 
 
 But has not Mr. Irving actually "set the example 
 of two new methods of handling religious truth ?" 
 I allude to his Orations and Argument. 
 
 The titles are new, Sir, and that is all. The ora- 
 tions and arguments themselves are like any other 
 discourses from the pulpit, except only that they 
 are not so formally divided and subdivided as ser- 
 mons commonly, though by .no means invariably 
 are. All that Mr. Irving says about the one me- 
 
58 
 
 thod being " after the manner of the ancient 
 oration," and the other " after the manner of the 
 ancient apologies," I look upon to be exceed- 
 ingly after the manner of the Fudge Family. Mr. 
 Irving has a modest aversion to be thought in the 
 least like any body else of his order ; he won't 
 be called a writer of sermons, because all other 
 clergymen are writers of sermons ; and this, Sir, 
 is the real secret of the matter. 
 
 You have said, that were Mr. Irving acquainted 
 with the state of society in this country, he would 
 not talk so falsely as he has done. Do you mean 
 then to deny that the oracles of divine wisdom 
 " have fallen into a household commonness, and 
 her visits into a cheap familiarity," that there is 
 an " abeyance of intellect, a dwarfish reduction 
 of the natural powers of men ;" that, in short, 
 nearly all the Christian world have " drifted 
 away from that noble, manly and independent 
 course which, under steerage of the word of God, 
 they might have safely pursued ?" 
 
 All a rhapsody of abuse, Sir. I would merely 
 oppose to it the truth — the known and undeniable 
 truth. I assert with perfect confidence (and I 
 am no offended gownsman, but an unpretend- 
 ing layman, who would wish the very worst to 
 have their due) that in no period in the history 
 of this country, was revealed wisdom studied and 
 expounded in a purer spirit, and with a happier 
 effect on the lives of men, than it is at the pre- 
 sent moment. With Mr. Irving there is nothing 
 
39 
 
 like the " olden time ;" but I know of no olden 
 time when the great body of the people ranked 
 higher in the scale of morals and intelligence than 
 they do now. I have read of times when they ate 
 more bacon and pudding, and drank more ale, and 
 were better clothed than they have lately been ; 
 but at no time that I ever read or heard of, was 
 the bulk of our community more orderly and 
 well-behaved, more morally and religiously in- 
 clined, more given to rational pursuits, more be- 
 ings of mind, than they are now. 
 
 But Mr. Irving gives you facts. He tells you 
 " their holidays are days of dissipation, their cups 
 crowned with licentious and blasphemous talk, 
 their raptures intoxication and brutal excess, 
 our fairs scenes of iniquity scandalous to be 
 looked upon, our intemperance proverbial over 
 the world, our prize fights a cruel game else- 
 where never played at, our forgeries, our thefts, 
 our murders, not surpassed if equalled in the 
 most barbarous lands." " The innocent sports of 
 our villages for which weary labour was wont to 
 relax himself, the cheer and contentment which 
 blessed the interior of our cottages, and the 
 plenty and beauty which beamed around their 
 walls, the homebred comfort and cleanliness, 
 with all the Arcadian features of old English 
 life, live," he assures us, " no longer, save in the 
 tales of ancestry y" and much he bewaileth, that 
 " hard and well earnt labour, broken with fierce 
 gleams of jollity and debauch, poor-house de- 
 pendance and poor-house discontent, nocturnal 
 
40 
 
 adventures of the poacher and the smuggler, 
 aiul the depredator; Sabbath breakings, Sabbath 
 sports, and Sabbath dissipations, are now become 
 the characteristics of our city and our rustic 
 people." 
 
 But specks at best, Sir, on the face of so- 
 ciety. It is absurd and fallacious to convert them 
 into a general picture. Mr. Irving talks of facts, 
 Sir ! I. too would appeal to facts, and to some of 
 the most recent which have come under public 
 observation, with respect to the character and con- 
 duct of the lower orders. Will Mr. Irving shew 
 us in all his " olden time," any example of such 
 temperate behaviour on the part of thousands of 
 men in the humblest walks of life, assembled to 
 oppose a measure which they conceived was about 
 to deprive them and their wives and children of 
 bread, as has just been exhibited by the weavers 
 of Spitalfields ? Or will he show us, in all his 
 *f olden time," the whole workmen of a town, 
 turning out for a rise of wages, as is now the case 
 at Knaresborough, assembling daily in immense 
 multitudes, yet committing no violence nor out- 
 rage, and closing their meetings at night-fall, with 
 the singing of psalms to that God who delivereth 
 the poor and needy, and riddeth them out of the 
 hand of the wicked ? 
 
 Does not Mr. Irving elsewhere in his " argu- 
 ment," admit the constantly encreasing improve- 
 ment which the Christian spirit is producing in 
 society ? 
 
 Yes, explicitly enough. For example : — " In 
 
41 
 
 this land, saith he, Christians " have disarmed 
 the thigh of its weapon, and procured revenge to 
 be taken out of the hands of the injured into the 
 hands of the upright judge ; — they have made 
 reformation to be acknowledged as the only ob- 
 ject of punishment ; they have abolished the 
 divine right of kings to have their will out of sub- 
 jects ;— =they have almost got adultery to be ac- 
 knowledged as the only righteous cause of di- 
 vorce ;— they have made the accommodation of 
 others to be sanctioned as the basis of polite- 
 ness ; — the spirit of government they have forced, 
 by sundry desperate efforts, to become equitable, 
 open, and disclosed, instead of being, as in the 
 Italian and other continental states, crooked and 
 intriguing. From all which it is manifest, that, in 
 the force of heaven-directed will, there is a 
 staunchness, an intrepidity, and a long-suffering, 
 which brings out equity triumphant against in- 
 justice, and liberty against wilfulness, forming a 
 wall of shields around whatever is good in human 
 laws, — smiting, as with a constant battering ram y 
 against every thing which is evil." 
 
 How is it that Mr. Irving is betrayed into such 
 gross contradictions and inconsistencies ? 
 
 It all arises, Sir, from his egregious vanity. The 
 truth seems to have escaped from him in spite of 
 himself; for recollecting very shortly after, that 
 were it to pass as an admitted fact, that the doc- 
 trines of Christianity, as they have been hitherto 
 preached in this country, have been " smiting 
 us with a constant battering ram, against every 
 
 G 
 
42 
 
 thing that is evil" there must of course be less 
 call than he imagines for the aid of the minister 
 of the Caledonian church, and his new methods ; — 
 anxious to guard against any such dangerous ad- 
 mission in the way of business, he falls again into 
 the lamenting strain. " Oh," says he, " that the 
 spirit of the ancients would rise again and shame 
 these modern men who go dreaming, &c." All 
 this affected lamentation, Sir, is made for no 
 other purpose than to furnish one opportunity 
 more of telling the world what a different sort of 
 example Mr. Irving means to exhibit. " Moved 
 by their lethargy and indifference, I do challenge 
 them, &c." I shall " try another method," I " shall 
 strike a note to thrill the drowsy chambers of the 
 soul, and awaken it from its fatal slumbers." 
 Alas, proud boaster ! he thinks he has got the 
 world on his shoulders ! The men he talks of 
 shaming, the men he charges with lethargy and 
 indifference, are the men of the battering ram, 
 who as he hath himself before confessed, have 
 in their might brought out " equity triumphant 
 against injustice, and liberty against wilfulness, 
 forming a wall of shields around whatever is good 
 in human laws." 
 
 Mr. Irving's censures are not, I believe, con- 
 fined to the clergy. Does he not blame alike our 
 poets, our men of science, our politicians ? 
 
 Yes, his shafts lie thick. In poetry he tells us 
 there is none who " inditeth a song unto his 
 God." In philosophy, the palace of the soul, men 
 see in the rough and flinty faces of the cloud- 
 
43 
 
 capt rocks, more delectable images to adore, 
 than in the revealed countenance of God '" and 
 in politics, there are men to whom the Liberal, 
 or John Bull, (afar from me be such indeco- 
 rous associations) " are more moving than the 
 secrets of the Eternal." All these assertions, Sir, 
 are the offspring either of downright ignorance, 
 or of wilful misrepresentation. Mr. Irving talks 
 as if he knew nothing of the people he was ar- 
 raigning. We have, thank God, many pious 
 poets, many pious philosophers, many pious politi- 
 cians. There is nobody who sees and feels as 
 Mr. Irving describes. His mode here as elsewhere, 
 is to blow the bubble first, and then, at the slightest 
 puncture of his lance, it falls to nothing. 
 
 After all, Sir, is there any thing strange or 
 new in this chapter of lamentations ? 
 
 Nothing, I confess. It savours all of the rank- 
 est common place — such common place as a man 
 of Mr. Irving's pretensions to originality should 
 have disdained. The goodness of the good old 
 times is the common cant of your self-righteous 
 people, your ranters, and your jumpers. There 
 is a lady of the name of Priscilla Hunt, who 
 journeys about talking the same sort of extrava- 
 gance. The chief difference between her and 
 Mr. Irving, in this respect, is, that she does not 
 ascribe the "fallen" state of men to precisely the 
 same cause. In a report of one of this pious dam- 
 sel's recent exhibitions which I have lately seen, 
 her first complaint is, " of the lamentable state 
 into which things had fallen, in consequence of 
 
44 
 
 the hissing of the serpent, the whispering of the 
 back-biter, and the lashing of the lying tongue. 9 '' 
 I would say with this same Priscilla : — " But it 
 is of verity, my friends, that if people were 
 truli) concerned for the well-being of the human 
 family and the good of their own souls ; all these 
 customs (namely of hissing and whispering, and 
 backbiting and lashing with the lying tongue,) 
 would necessarily vanish, and instead thereof 
 boundless love would prevail, universal harmony 
 would predominate." 
 
 Your chief objection, Sir, to Mr. Irving, seems 
 to be to his vain boasting. Have you told us the 
 worst you know of it ? I fear not, Sir. 
 
 The egotism of Mr. Irving is unhappily not li- 
 mited to a supreme disdain of other men's powers 
 and attainments ; it dares even to ascend beyond 
 this mortal sphere. He thinks so much of himself 
 as to be to all appearance habitually divested of 
 every thing like true Christian humility. When 
 he speaks of the Almighty, the familiarity and 
 levity of the language he employs is at times 
 shudderingly revolting. In one place we are 
 told that God might be & pattern to all lawgivers ;" 
 in another, that the laws of God, of Him who 
 is the source of all things, differ from all others 
 in the originality of their principles ; further on, 
 that God is all perfect " like the Apollo Belvi- 
 dere!!!" (a thrill of horror through the court). In 
 short, such is Mr. Irving's high opinion of his 
 Maker, that he does " not doubt of the Al- 
 mighty's force of character to carry any thing 
 
45 
 
 into effect." Then we have every now and then 
 such expressions as " Oh, heavens ! " " Oh, my 
 God ! " " In the holy name of Christ, and the 
 three times holy name of God ! " " God send 
 repentance, or else blast the powers they have 
 abused so terribly." 
 
 You do not mean, surely, to impute to Mr. 
 Irving intentional impiety in the use of these ex- 
 pressions ? 
 
 Certainly not. Few men have described more 
 forcibly than Mr. Irving has done elsewhere, the 
 majesty of heaven, and the immeasurable distance 
 between man and his Creator ; but it is to be ga- 
 thered from the fact of his frequent forgetfulness 
 of the reverence which is due to the Most High, 
 that his descriptions have not been the result of a 
 sufficiently heartfelt or abiding sense of man's in- 
 significance, but have been produced very much 
 like any other task or exercise which might be 
 proposed to the imagination. Were Mr. Irving 
 called upon to describe the Paradise of Mahomet, 
 he would do it, I dare say, in language nearly as 
 vivid as any in this book concerning the mansions 
 of God. To exemplify to you that play of the 
 imagination to which I allude, I may refer you to 
 Mr. Irving's offer to create a new hell for men. 
 You shudder, I perceive, at the impiety of the 
 proposition, nor do I wonder at it. No man, who 
 felt a becoming awe for the Omnipotent Creator, 
 could even in imagination, thus dare to place him- 
 self on a level with God, in the creation of des- 
 
T — 
 
 46 
 
 tinies for mankind. The words of the proposal, 
 Sir, are these : — ■ 
 
 " Bring me all the classes of men upon the earth, and let 
 ME have the sorting and the placing of them upon this earth, and 
 I shall make hells for each one of them without further ado. 
 I would send the poets to bear burthens, and the porters to indite 
 tuneful songs. The musicians I would appoint over the kennels, 
 and the roving libertines I woidd station over the watch and 
 ward of streets. I would banish the sentimentalists to the fens, 
 and send the labourers of the fens to seek their food among 
 the mountains ; each wily politician I would transplant into a 
 colony of honest men, and your stupid clown I would set at 
 the helm of state. But lest it may be thought I sport with a 
 subject which I strive to make plain, I shall stop short, and 
 give no farther proof of this wicked ingenuity ; for sure I am, 
 I could set society into such a hot warfare and confusion, as 
 should, in one day, make half the world slay the??iselves, or slay 
 each other, and the other half run up and down in wild dis- 
 traction." 
 
 And this is what Mr. Irving calls preaching the 
 Gospel ? — Yes. 
 
 The opinion you entertain of him on the whole, 
 is not, I presume, very favourable ? 
 
 It is not. No man who hears him, or who reads 
 his works, can remain without a conviction that 
 he is a man of more than ordinary talents ; but 
 for my own part, I am not disposed to rate those 
 talents half so highly as the author does himself. 
 The self-sufficiency which Mr. Irving displays, is, 
 of itself, an evidence of a mind not wonderfully 
 elevated above the common level. He overrates 
 himself as much from narrowness of intellect as 
 
47 
 
 from ignorance. He is not at all deeply read 
 either in men or books ; yet, for a person of his 
 years, and with the opportunities he has had, he 
 ought to know more than he does. His novelties 
 are, for the most part, common places ; his pro- 
 jects, revivals of things which have never ceased. 
 He has imagination, but little judgment — Jacob's 
 dream, without the ladder. He is all sail, without 
 ballast. His views want depth, steadiness, uni- 
 formity, consistency. He is an imaginer of pre- 
 mises, and jumper to conclusions. He is one of 
 those who flatter themselves that they have such 
 an intuitive knowledge of things, that they may 
 spare themselves all the vulgar fatigue of inquiry : 
 a single glance serves their purpose, and it is on 
 single facts accordingly that all their reasoning 
 turns. He would be a meteor in literature ; for 
 there is nothing, he tells you, like books, but 
 places his chief dependence for attracting the gaze 
 of the multitude, not on writing better in the style 
 of the age in which he lives, but on strutting 
 in the antiquated robes of his great grandfather. 
 We have read of a Bishop in the olden time, who 
 played at shuttlecock in the pulpit in order to fix 
 all eyes upon him : Mr. Irving would do the same 
 if there were no other way of bringing a " gather- 
 ing host " around him. 
 
 Do you think that it is for Christ's sake alone 
 that he affects so much ? 
 
 I am afraid not. His censoriousness, his osten- 
 tation, his boastings, his denunciations, breathe 
 all of something very different from the pure 
 
48 
 
 Christian spirit. It is not strong writing occasi- 
 onally in favour of the tenets of the Gospel, that 
 will mark the sincere believer ; the greatest infidel 
 that lives may do the same. The faith of a man 
 must be evidenced by all his habitual modes of ex- 
 pression, and habitual modes of acting ; and more 
 especially by meekness, by charity, by loving- 
 kindness, before I, for one, can believe for one 
 moment, that its home is seated in the heart. 
 
 Cross-examined by Mr. Phillips. 
 
 You have imputed to Mr. Irving narrowness of 
 intellect? You have said that he is not at all 
 deeply read either in men and books ; and that his 
 views want depth, steadiness, uniformity, consist- 
 ency. Now, Sir, will you have the goodness to 
 look at this — [handing to the witness No. I. of the 
 publication called the Pulpit] —and read to the 
 Jury the passage which I have marked there on 
 page 5. 
 
 Witness (reading) — " Mr. Irving is an ex- 
 pounder qfthejirst order — (expressions of surprise 
 throughout the Court) — whose knowledge of 
 human nature, and imaginative insight into the 
 ways of Providence, are such as enable him, with 
 singular success, to vindicate the reasonableness 
 and justice of these opposite destinies which the 
 book of God unfolds to his erring creatures." 
 
 Mr. P. Well, Sir, out of thine own mouth I 
 have refuted thee. 
 
 Witness. Allow me, Sir, to explain. When we 
 
49 
 
 ventured on the opinion I have last read, we had 
 only occasionally heard Mr. Irving preach ; we 
 had not read his sermons, for they were not then 
 published : we had heard him too in one of his 
 wiser and happier moods. He was expounding 
 the principles on which the distinction is to be 
 drawn between the righteous and the wicked, as 
 laid "down in Matt. ch. xxv. v. 31. It was a vigour- 
 ous, straight-forward, and uncompromising expo- 
 sition of the divine law on the subject, and dis- 
 tinguished by comparatively but few ebullitions 
 of conceit or spleen. It won him that esteem 
 and admiration which we expressed so warmly at 
 the time, and which it has given us pain to be 
 obliged to retract. We little anticipated that it 
 would make its appearance in print, in such ex- 
 ceptionable company as it does. We did not ex- 
 pect to see the sincere Christian pastor affiliating 
 with the braggarts and mountebanks of this selfish 
 world ; affecting exclusive gifts and inspirations ; 
 seeking to build a name to himself, by casting 
 down every high and venerated name around 
 him. We fondly hoped that he would have ad- 
 hered to the straight line of pastoral duty, and 
 made it his great and single ambition to gather 
 the flock entrusted to his care, unto the bosom of 
 their Redeemer. He has not done so ; and there- 
 fore alone have we condemned him. 
 
 Editor of the New Evangelical Magazine examined 
 by Mr. Parsons. 
 
 Have you heard Mr. Irving preach ? Yes. 
 
 H 
 
V 
 
 50 
 
 Will you favour the Court with your opinion of 
 it is style of oratory ? 
 
 It is one of the most finished specimens of bur- 
 lesque on the art of oratory that ever fell under 
 my notice. When Demosthenes was asked what 
 w T as the first point in oratory 
 
 Oh ! we know all about that. Have you re- 
 viewed his book ? — No. 
 
 Do you mean to review it ? — No. 
 
 Why not ? 
 
 Because I could say nothing good of it. 
 
 Editor of the John Bull examined hy Mr. Serjeant 
 Bishop. 
 
 [The call for this witness produced a general buzz and move- 
 ment throughout the assembly. Every one was on tiptoe to get 
 
 a sight of him. " How provoking!" whispered Lady , so 
 
 loud as to be heard by all the Court. " Here we have him now 
 — but that confounded mask — there is still no telling who he is. 
 I declare if I were down there I could tear it from his face.*' 1 
 " He does not look old, Sir." " Nor so very young, Ma'am." 
 " Nor so very frightful, my dear." " He is not tall," " not little," 
 " not fat, 1 ' "not lean," "no giant," "no pigmy," " no Hercules," 
 " no Jack-a-dandy." What he was not every body could tell ; 
 
 what he is Miss Letitia B alone ventured to surmise. "As 
 
 1 shall declare," simpered the amiable creature, " he is 
 
 just the height of dear Mr. D ."] 
 
 I understand, Sir, that your Jorte as a journalist 
 consists in the successful exposure of what is vul- 
 garly called humbug. Have you met with anything 
 of that description lately in the neighbourhood 
 of Hatton Garden ? 
 
Yes, Sir, with one of the most flagrant and dis- 
 gusting pieces of humbug ever foisted upon the 
 people of this metropolis. 
 
 To what do you allude, Sir ? 
 
 To the absurd fashion which has obtained of 
 following a Scotch Presbyterian parson of the 
 name of Irving. I was inclined to laugh at the 
 folly at first as one which could not last, and 
 whicli during a temporary prevalence would not 
 be seriously mischievous, but soon felt called 
 upon to look at the affair in a very different point 
 of view. 
 
 You took it up then seriously ? 
 
 Yes. Bull pointed out how degrading, how 
 theatrical, how laughable, how contemptible a 
 thing it was to see such bustling and crowding, 
 such scrambling, pushing and squeezing for ad- 
 mission — all to hear a great brawny Scotchman, 
 with an accent as vulgar and abominable as 
 Hume's, talk the most detestable nonsense that 
 ever came from human lips. Bull shewed up the 
 quack — described his Jewish appearance and 
 black matted hair, and ludicrous obliquity of 
 vision. Bull dissected the sort of stuff which 
 men, orators, wits, senators, and statesmen, were 
 said to countenance by their presence ; which 
 crowds, following the example of those to whom 
 the nation looks up, leaving their pews unte- 
 nanted, and their own churches all but locked, 
 were huddling helter-skelter, pell-mell to Hatton 
 Garden, to hear, and to come away delighted 
 withy as they were said to be. 
 
52 
 
 What effect had your exposure ? 
 
 It opened the eyes of the public to the Presby- 
 terian quackery with which, at first, they were 
 so surprisingly taken. The most zealous of Mr. 
 Irving's adherents and followers began to re- 
 pent of the rashness with which they had com- 
 mitted themselves by an avowal of their admira- 
 tion. My Lord Erskine, indeed, went after this 
 to hear him ; but you may imagine what he took 
 by his motion, when I tell you the words of the 
 text — " He speaketh to the Jews words of com- 
 fort, but to the Greeks, foolishness." (A laugh, in 
 which his Lordship joined.) 
 
 Was any attempt made to bolster up the de- 
 fendant when thus assailed by your satire ? 
 
 Yes. When he began to fall off from that tipsy 
 popularity which for a week or two he had ac- 
 quired, it became necessary for his brother quacks 
 to lend their aid to keep up the humbug, by 
 which, defection from the established church was 
 to be promoted, and rant and cant exalted above 
 reason and religion. The Rev. John Clayton, 
 junior, of the Poultry Chapel, it appeared, had said 
 that which follows, from the pulpit : — 
 
 " There has recently appeared in our metropolis, an extraor- 
 dinary man, of whom I have endeavoured to suspend my opinion 
 till I had seen and compared his promised production. And 
 now, to what shall I compare him ? I will liken him to a fine 
 young eagle from the bleak regions of the north, which has lately 
 escaped from the nest. His eye is piercing, and he can look at 
 the solar orb : his pinions are strong, and capable of a lofty flight. 
 At present he chiefly dwells among rocks and caverns, amidst 
 wild and romantic scenes. Though he floats with some irregu- 
 
53 
 
 larity of movement over the ocean and plain above which he 
 soars — though he pounces with indiscriminate eagerness upon his 
 prey ; and though, when he alights, he may sometimes strike his 
 broad wings against the projecting points of the craggy cliffs — 
 yet give him the fair opportunity to plume his feathers and renew 
 his flight, and (if God still sustain him,) the evident tendency of 
 his course is to direct the eyes and minds of the spectators to the 
 ' sun of Righteousness/ and to those glorious skies in which that 
 everlasting luminary shines. 
 
 " For my own part, I have been grieved to see a number of 
 lesser birds, of meaner nest, of feebler wing, and harsher note, 
 flocking around him, and attempting to impede his ascent by 
 their flutterings, screams, and cries. I hope that you, my be- 
 loved people, will prove yourselves to be of a better brood. Re- 
 fuse not to honour the man God has been pleased to honour. 
 Pray that the church and the world may receive the benefit of his 
 ministrations, and God have all the glory. At least, shake off 
 from the.^pings of your spirits, the earthly dust of envy, malice, 
 and all uncharitableness. 
 
 " Pale envy, withering at another's joy, 
 
 Which hates the excellence it cannot reach!" 
 
 Did you make any reply to this fine effusion ? 
 
 Yes ; Bull proved that it was all noise and non- 
 sense. — Ex. gr. " At present," says Mr. John 
 Clayton, junior, " he dwells chiefly among rocks 
 and caverns, amidst wild and romantic scenes.'* 
 How could Mr. John Clayton tell such an abo- 
 minable bouncer ? The orator, as we all know, 
 dwells chiefly in Cross-street, Hatton-garden, 
 among houses and chimneys, between Saffron-hill 
 and High Holborn. The nonsense these mounte- 
 bank ranters prate is below any serious criticism. 
 
 Did your tilt at the Caledonian orator end 
 there ? 
 
54f 
 
 No ; Bull indited a ballad, to the tune of Nancy 
 Dawson, which finished him. 
 
 You can perhaps favour the Court by singing 
 the ballad ? 
 
 Mr. Phillips objected to such an exhibition, as 
 contrary to the decorum of the Court. 
 
 Mr. Serjeant Bishop knew of no difference, in 
 common sense, between saying and singing. Cer- 
 tain he was, that he had heard many a speech 
 which was all singsong, and no objection made to 
 it ; some too which, though full of sound and 
 pretension, were not worth the tenth part of an 
 old song. 
 
 Mr. Parsons remembered a case in the Court 
 of King's Bench, Ireland, where a defendant, ac- 
 cused of singing a seditious song, was permitted 
 to sing it over again in Court, in order to con- 
 vince the Jury that the meaning of it had been 
 misapprehended. 
 
 The Chief Justice overruled the objection. 
 
 Bull then sung, with a very clear and melodious 
 voice, the following ballad :— 
 
 DOCTOR SQUINTUM. 
 
 f 
 
 Come, Beaux and Belles, attend my song, 
 Come, join with me the motley throng, 
 The time is apt, the tide runs strong, 
 
 Your hearts no longer harden. 
 The world at once is pious grown, 
 And vice a thing no longer known ; 
 For Doctor Squinttim's come to town 
 
 To preach in Hatton Gaiden. 
 
55 
 
 The Doctor is a charming man, 
 
 A good deal on the Whitfield plan, 
 
 Men's vices he doth plainly scan, 
 
 Not delicately" hint 'em. 
 A fire upon his flock he'll keep, 
 And treats them more like wolves than sheep, 
 Till some go mad — but more to sleep : 
 
 Oh, charming Doctor Squintum ! 
 
 Such crowds of fashion throng the door 
 With tickets numbered, to secure 
 " Exclusion'* to the Pious Poor 
 
 Who never pass the entry. 
 Humility the Scot doth teach 
 In tones the hardest heart to reach ; 
 But when he condescends to preach, 
 
 'Tis only to the Gentry, 
 
 The Chapel's like a playhouse quite, 
 When thronged on Mr. Liston's night; 
 The boxes, gall'ries, bursting tight, 
 
 Besides a very full pit. 
 And there they crowd to hear their doom 
 From one who talks like Doctor Hume, 
 And works and jerks like Lawyer Brougham, 
 
 Exalted in a pulpit. 
 
 When wandering quacks expose their stuff — 
 Themselves not quite absurd enough — 
 They hire Jack Puddi/ig fools to puff 
 
 Their trash to ev'ry noodle. 
 So Squintum, zanies gets in pairs, 
 As other Humbugs do at fairs. 
 And Montague upon the stairs, 
 
 Harangues with Cock-a- Doodle! 
 
 t 
 
56 
 
 -Small Taylor leaves bis teeming board, 
 Suxe Cobourg quits his sbining board, 
 And Poodle By tig gives up a Lord, 
 
 To join the pious jostle. 
 Witb lightening speed Lord Sefton flies, 
 And Coke contrives betimes to rise, 
 While little Bennet sits and cries, 
 
 At HolbonCs bigb Apostle, 
 
 My Lord, the Duchess, and his Grace, 
 All join the scrambling melting race, 
 And Ministers in pow'r and place, 
 
 Whose names — we scorn to print 'em. 
 These leave their pastors in the lurch, 
 And much it grieves us in the search, 
 To find the State desert the Church 
 
 For such a thing as Squintum. 
 
 But vanity doth never know, 
 
 At what to stop, nor where to go, 
 
 His sermons are attractive, so 
 
 He undertakes to print 'em. 
 This last manoeuvre spoils the whole, 
 For partisans, like Mistress Cole, 
 Peruse and cry — " God bless my soul ! 
 
 " Are these by Doctor Squintum?" 
 
 Like that Hibernian blazing star, 
 Great Mr. Phillips at the bar, 
 His metaphors his matter mar, 
 
 Nor does he care to stint 'em ; 
 In holding forth he tops his school, 
 But readers find — (then being cool) 
 The sermon trash, the man a fool, 
 
 A very Doctor Squintum. 
 
57 
 
 Air. Sergeant Bishop said, that he ifrould here 
 close his case. He had many other witnesses in 
 attendance of equal talent and respectability with 
 those he had examined, who could bear similar 
 testimony ; but he conceived that he had already 
 proved more than enough to entitle him to a verdict 
 from the Jury on all the Counts of the Indictment. 
 
 THE DEFENCE. 
 
 Mr. Irving. " My Lords and Gentlemen of 
 the Jury. While, in a humble dependance on 
 Divine aid, I undertake my defence against the 
 various charges now brought against me, much it 
 dispiriteth me to think how this world's scorn 
 constantly triumphs over every manly endeavour to 
 speak to men of their eternal interests, in terms 
 befitting the awful importance of the theme. No 
 sooner doth a preacher or writer with any nerve 
 appear, who might make invasion on Satan's 
 reign, than that prince of darkness covers him 
 with the disparagement of some hated name — 
 calling him enthusiast, fanatic, or gospel quack, 
 and so prevents his words from reaching to those 
 places where the lust of the flesh, the lust of the 
 eye, and the pride of life have their strongest 
 holds. Or Satan raiseth up some strong-minded, 
 light-witted scoffer to argue or laugh him down. 
 Nay, of such he hath establishments — scholars, 
 wits, and critics, who hate the very visage of a 
 
 i 
 
58 
 
 genuine disciple of Christ, and are aye ready to 
 asperse any book which is marked with the sign of 
 the Cross, and send it into the arcana of oblivion. 
 And oh ! the natural man loveth any thing better 
 than to hear of his new birth and regeneration, 
 and will take up with a pleasant song or idle tale 
 sooner than he will with the institutes of his own 
 salvation. And, alas ! there are multitudes who 
 cannot read what is written, and come not to 
 hear what may be spoken ; so that, Gentlemen, it 
 dispiriteth me while I address you, to think of 
 the difficulties which stand before my way, and 
 how abler men have endeavoured in vain, to beat 
 these difficulties down. 
 
 " Gentlemen of the Jury, it hath been my 
 wish to deal wisely between the reason of man 
 and the Revelation of God, steering wide of the 
 coarseness and cruelty with which dogmatical 
 theologians ride over the head of every natural 
 feeling and reasonable thought of doubting men. 
 To occupy this ground of mediating the matter 
 in dispute between the reasoning power of man 
 and the Revelation of Almighty God, I may have 
 given offence to both — to the one for not having 
 done its difficulties justice, to the other for having 
 too daringly intermeddled with the secrecy and 
 sacredness of its counsels. 
 
 " Gentlemen, I am but weak and feeble-minded 
 like other men ; begirt also with manifold engage- 
 ments, and invaded with the noise of this unrest- 
 ing place, and therefore I hope, from the sympa- 
 thv of mv fellow-mortals, forgiveness for anv 
 
60 
 
 injustice I may have shewn them. From the 
 secret ear of God I shall seek for that forgive- 
 ness for which He is to be feared, and that 
 redemption for which He is to be sought after. 
 
 " In casting my thoughts back on what I have 
 said and written, I confess that I see many pas- 
 sages in which I have spoken with liberty of men 
 who. still live under their Maker's good providence 
 and within the reach of his tender mercy. These 
 I might easily have expunged, or now soften 
 down or make atonement for ; but I would not, 
 I cannot. For our zeal towards God and the 
 common good, hath been stung almost unto mad- 
 ness by the writings of reproach able men, who 
 give the tone to the sentimental and the political 
 world. Their poems, their criticisms, their blas- 
 phemous pamphlets h.Tve been like gall and worm- 
 wood to my spirit, and I have longed to summon 
 into the field some arm of strength which might 
 evaporate their vile and filthy speculation into the 
 limbo of vanity from whence it came. 
 
 " For which office, being satisfied that nothing 
 less than omnipotent truth under leading of 
 Almighty God will suffice, I am weary of the 
 vain infliction of pains and penalties by the ruling 
 powers, which doth but aggravate the evil by 
 awakening sympathy in the bosom of all who 
 dread that power should ever intermeddle with 
 the free circulation of thought. Seeing that Truth 
 which I revere, thus wounded both by friends and 
 foes, I could not rest, but have spoken out my 
 feelings wherever occasions offered, at the risk of 
 
60 
 
 offending the workers of evil, and those who by 
 brute power endeavour to counterwork them. 
 
 " I have done so I say ; not, Gentlemen, that I 
 am equal to the task, or have executed the task, 
 but in the hope of summoning from the host of 
 the Lord of Hosts some one (surely I cannot be 
 mistaken that there are some such !) able and wil- 
 ling to take the field in the fair conflict of truth, 
 and cast back into these blaspheming throats their 
 vain bravadoes against the armies of the living 
 God. One such spirit would do us more good 
 than all the prosecutions and suppressions which 
 all the law authorities of the realm can carry into 
 effect. 
 
 " But, Gentlemen, I fear the worst; that the in- 
 trigues of policy and the weight of power will in 
 this age totally expel from the two established 
 churches all the virtue and vigour of mind from 
 which such deeds can alone proceed. 
 
 " Sometimes again I hope the best ; that 
 through the spirit of God working better under- 
 standing upon those powerful men who at present 
 outwit religion with their policies, and strangle 
 her with their power, the noble spirit which now 
 lieth depressed in both, and especially in this esta- 
 blishment of England, will be extricated, and the 
 Newtons and Scotts who still watch in her corners 
 will yet have wide seas to administer, and pro- 
 vinces to watch over. 
 
 " But, alas ! this renovation long lingereth, and 
 the enemy taketh advantage of its tardiness. If 
 it linger however much longer, if our churchmen 
 
61 
 
 will not bestir themselves, I do hope that ere this 
 realm, which is faint at both extremes, sick at the 
 heart, and threatening to lay down its heavenly 
 spirit of religion, some of those men who in our 
 senates do both know and seek the Lord, will lift 
 up their voice and make the calamity of England's 
 and Scotland's wasted parishes and faded pro- 
 vinces to be heard in the ears of those whom God 
 nath appointed to rule them in righteousness and 
 holiness. Surely they mean not to await till we 
 fall into the condition of prostrate Ireland. No ! 
 that can never be ; for long ere then, the generous 
 spirit of the south and the indignant spirit of the 
 north will have eased them of those who trouble 
 their prosperity. 
 
 " Oh ! it afflicts me to see this generation merg- 
 ing apace into a state of sensuality, the lowest to 
 which human nature can be addicted. It hath its 
 head-quarters in your splendid feasts and your 
 park parades, in your Vauxhall, your operas, and 
 your theatres. It is very hateful as it is exhibited 
 in cities where it is stewed up in hot quarters, 
 and revels away the hours of quiet night, and 
 wastes upon feverish couches the hours of cheer- 
 ful day. In the country it shews itself under 
 fairer forms, wandering from stream to stream, 
 climbing the brow of lofty mountains, seeking 
 love in cottages, and doting over the face and 
 charms of external nature. Ah ! in this shape it 
 is a dangerous enchantment, for it taketh the 
 forms of taste and poetry, and even affects the 
 feeling of devotion ; but unless conjoined with 
 
62 
 
 that spiritual life whereof I have discovered the 
 sources, it is vanity and vexation of spirit, and 
 hurries one through an exhausting variety to the 
 lethargy and tedium of overwrought excitement. 
 This, Gentlemen, is the form of sensual life, which 
 is prevailing at this day among our lettered and 
 reading people. It hath been promoted and 
 brought into maturity by the writings of Byron 
 and of Moore, who are high priests of the senses 
 and ministers of the Cyprian goddess, whose tem- 
 ples they have decorated with emblems of genius, 
 and disguised with forms of virtue, and surround- 
 ed with scenes of balmy freshness ; but with all 
 its forms and decorations, it is the temple of im- 
 moral pleasure, and the source of its inward 
 shame is disgusting sensuality. It is very pitiful 
 to behold the hopes of a nation, the young men 
 and young women who are to bear up the ancient 
 honours of this godly and virtuous island, hear- 
 kening to the deceptions of such enchanters who, 
 being themselves beguiled, would fain bewitch 
 the intellectual, and moral, and spiritual being 
 of others. 
 
 " Am I to blame that I have endeavoured to 
 reach those sensualists with the tidings of spiritual 
 and everlasting life ? Am I to blame that I have 
 directed their thoughts beyond the grave ? Am 
 I to blame for carrying them beyond the yawning 
 gulf of dark immateriality, where they have vainly 
 sought to bury*' all fear and apprehensions of 
 the future ; for exhibiting to them matter again 
 invested with spirit, eyeing the spiry flames and 
 
63 
 
 the dim smoke of hell ; bathing on the liquid ele- 
 ment of fire, snuffing up the fumes of her sulphu- 
 reous bed, and at her heart a worm gnawing that 
 dieth not ? 
 
 " Much too doth it afflict me to behold some 
 men, who, in contrast to the true animal I have 
 just represented, claim for themselves the cha- 
 racter of intellectual and rational men. I speak 
 not, Gentlemen, against intellect — I cannot find 
 in my heart to speak against it ; and, thanks be 
 to God, I am not called by my Christian calling 
 to do so. It is a hand-maiden of religion, and 
 religion loveth to be adorned at its hands. The 
 intellectual or rational life is an exalted kind of 
 existence, to which true men in all ages have be- 
 taken themselves. They stand like towers of 
 strength athwart the desolation of ages that hath 
 swept over the reputation of the rest ; their names 
 are like the ruins of ancient temples and palaces 
 in a desert city, where a level bed of sand hath 
 hidden in darkness all meaner places. A Homer, 
 a Socrates, a Plato, an Archimedes, a Newton — 
 these are the giants of the soul, the plenipoten- 
 tiaries of intellect, who redeem the reputation of 
 the human race. These men cared not for their 
 body ; but, like St. Paul, they groaned under it, 
 and made their moan in the ear of God, who 
 listening to their prayer, gave them victory. 
 The intellect which is weighed down with a fleshly 
 load achieved its redemption ; it wandered abroad 
 into the regions of the handy works of God ; it 
 dived into the mysteries of the soul, and dis- 
 
64 
 
 Coursed over the fields of wisdom, inditing match- 
 less sayings, and dressing feasts of fancy and of 
 reason for all ages of mankind. They are the 
 royal priesthood of mind, sphered above the sphere 
 of Kings, great and glorious beyond all heroes, 
 and conquerors of the earth. After their example, 
 the true men amongst mankind have strove, setting 
 them up for the Apostles of their high calling ; 
 and in this island we have had, in all ages, a suc- 
 cession of such men, who have collected libraries 
 which are the armouries of intellect, and founded 
 colleges which are its nurseries, and created ho- 
 nours which are its laurels. 
 
 " But must I speak the truth? Intellect is now 
 often a handmaiden of other mistresses, with whom 
 religion hath no fellowship ; — of vanity of carnal 
 pleasure, and of filthy lucre. — Go to the seats of 
 learning, which intellect decked for herself with 
 chaste and simple ornaments, where she dwells in 
 retirement from noise and folly, wooing medita- 
 tion under the cool shade, or forcing her to yield 
 her hidden secrets to midnight research and mor- 
 tification, — what find you generally but pomp 
 parading it under vain apparel ; sense rejoicing it 
 over feast and frolic ; youth doting upon outward 
 distinctions ; and age doting on idle and luxurious 
 ease. Such are a sort of sacrilegious ministers in 
 the temple of intellect. They profane its shew- 
 bread to pamper the palate ; its everlasting lamp, 
 they use to light unholy fires within their breast, 
 and to shew them the way to the sensual cham- 
 bers of sense and worldliness. 
 
G.5 
 
 " Am I to blame, Gentlemen, that against this 
 sort of intellectual life I have proclaimed war? 
 That I have shewn unto them that such abuse of 
 God's gift, cannot abide his judgment? Nay, 
 that for men so gifted, to set God at nought, and 
 so to lust after worldly vanities, is to deserve to 
 be twice condemned? 
 
 " Let religious people blame me, or not, I will 
 declare, for I speak my thoughts freely and fear- 
 lessly, that if intellect, foregoing such worldly 
 prizes, will for itself cultivate itself, and guard 
 against self-idolatry, it will come by a natural 
 course to speculate upon the invisible God, like 
 Plato and Socrates, in the days of old, and the 
 Bible will come to its hungering and thirsting 
 after divine knowledge like a stream of water to 
 the thirsty hart in a parched land ; and it will 
 rear its house by the clear m argent of the waters 
 of life, and therein dwell till God do separate it 
 into his nearer neighbourhood and closer fellow- 
 ship. Such intellectual examinations, brought 
 Locke and Newton, after they had exhausted the 
 faculties of the mind in research, to lay them down 
 at length and drink refreshment from the river 
 of the Lord's revelations, and there to devote the 
 whole enjoyment of their souls. 
 
 " But such intellectual creatures as find their be- 
 loved field a mere physical research, contented 
 with any new thing in nature or in art, that is, 
 your mere naturalists, often the weakest and idlest 
 of men; such others as are satisfied with the 
 speculations of politics, and have their feast in the 
 
 K 
 
66 
 
 triumphs of a party, or in being themselves the 
 leaders of a party ; or such others, who gape with 
 open mouth for whatever the daily press may serve 
 them withal, devouring with equal relish, novels, 
 poems, news, and criticism, and so they can hold 
 discourse about such wrecks, which ever float 
 upon the edge of oblivion's gulf, think they have 
 purchased to themselves a good degree in intellect. 
 Oh ! what shall I say to such men ? Why should it 
 have fallen to my lot to rebuke such a genera- 
 tion ? What right has such a reading and talking 
 generation of beings to claim any place or degree 
 in the world of intellect ? Not that I undervalue 
 such an employment as perusing what the mind of 
 man is continually producing, but that I would 
 estimate the value and duration of that sentimen- 
 tal life, in which so many pride themselves, and 
 estimate it as a mere game or pastime of the 
 faculties, a dissipation of the eye of the mind ; a 
 sort of life, which must pass away at death, for its 
 food will then be at an end, and its excitement at 
 an end; and in the spiritual and eternal world, 
 with which it held no communion, it can expect 
 to find no enjoyment, unless God, as hath been 
 said,* for the sake of those that never could have 
 mercy, or obeyed any word, should make himself 
 ' an egregious liar.' 
 
 " Then, Gentlemen, there are your moral men, 
 whose excellence consists in living after the rules 
 
 Argument for Judgment to come, p. 448. 
 
07 
 
 and measures of truth, sacrificing the heart in 
 obedience to the understanding, conforming the 
 will to the deliberations of reason — am I to blame, 
 that I have declared of these, that they are not 
 excusable for refusing to enter into communion 
 with God, and enrolling themselves under the 
 banner of Christ, who is the great teacher of pure 
 morals, the great martyr in their behalf, and their 
 great rewarder? For though to them 1 have 
 spoken in soft and gracious language, yet to them, 
 no less than the others, the truth must be spoken, 
 that this life of theirs, hath its limitation in the 
 grave. 
 
 " Alas ! alas ! The common heart of man hath 
 forsaken the revealed supremacy of God, and re- 
 fused to be charmed withal. I testify, that there 
 ascendeth not from earth a hosannah of her chil- 
 dren, to bear witness in the ear of the upper re- 
 gions to the wonderful manifestations of her God! 
 From a few scattered hamlets in a small portion of 
 her wide territory, a small voice ascendeth like the 
 voice of one crying in the wilderness. But to the 
 service of our General Preserver there is no con- 
 course from Dan to Beersheba of our people ; the 
 greater part of whom, after two thousand years of 
 apostolic commission, know not the testimonies of 
 our God, and the multitude of those who do re- 
 ject or despise them. 
 
 " Return we now to inquire whence this lament- 
 able state of things arises. There is an establish- 
 ment of physicians to make known the remedy 
 unto the people, and there are houses open where 
 
68 
 
 the remedy is made known. But alas ! the peo- 
 ple know not of the soul-consuming malady, and 
 having none to tell them, they come not to be 
 cured, while in their darkness Satan revelleth, — 
 wasting them with lust, and pride, and quarrels. 
 The men of God hardly speak above their breath, 
 who were wont to ring doom and woe into every 
 impeding minister of evil. They creep about un- 
 der the colossal limbs of power, and cry mercy, 
 instead of denouncing vengeance. It is an age in 
 which the ancient spirit is well nigh extinct. It 
 is not that the powers of man are weakened, for 
 I thus far agree with one of the witnesses you 
 have heard this day, that there never was an age 
 more patient of research, or more restless after 
 improvement. Neither is it that the Spirit of God 
 hath become backward to his help, or the Word 
 divested of its truth. The great reason of the de- 
 cadence I lament, is our treating the Word not as 
 the all-accomplished wisdom of God. Faith 
 should brood with expanded wings over the whole 
 heavenly legend, imbibing its entire spirit. What 
 hath it become ? A name to conjure up theories 
 and hypotheses upon. Duty likewise hath fallen 
 into a few formalities of abstaining from amuse- 
 ments and keeping up severities, instead of denot- 
 ing a soul girt with all its powers for its Maker's 
 will. Religion, also a set of opinions and party 
 distinctions separated from high endowments, and 
 herding with cheap popular accomplishments, a 
 mere serving maid of every-day life, instead of being 
 
the mistress of all earthly, and the preceptress of 
 all heavenly sentiments, and the very queen of all 
 high gifts, and graces, and perfections, and every 
 walk of life ! 
 
 " Gentlemen of the Jury, I felt that the miser^ 
 able people had no chance of being delivered, un- 
 less the Lord would awaken his congregation and 
 send them forth on errands of salvation. I prayed 
 for the spirit of a Paul to lead the congregation 
 forth upon this errand of good. I prayed for the 
 spirit of a Loyola, to bind them in a harmony of 
 exertion. I prayed for the spirit of a Luther to 
 make them fearless of infringing established things, 
 that a reformation might come about, which 
 would need not to be reformed. I resolved to make 
 a humble endeavour to revive again in this land 
 the junction of manhood with religion, to add to 
 the piety and humility of the church her ancient 
 fearlessness and heroism. 
 
 " I donot hesitate, Gentlemen, to confess, that 
 in this essay in the cause of Christ, I felt like 
 the knight that breaks his first lance in the cause of 
 honour. For the sake of Him whom I heartily 
 serve, I have encountered all risks, albeit in an 
 unwonted costume, and very ungainly style. 
 
 "And now, Gentlemen, let me claim your willing 
 ear while I detail to you a little more particularly 
 my humble services in this great cause. It ap- 
 peared to me that questions touching the truths of 
 revelation had been too long treated in a logical 
 or scholastic method, which doth address itself to 
 
 I know not what fraction of the mind ; and not 
 
70 
 
 finding this used in Scripture, or successful in 
 practice, I was resolved to try another method, 
 and appeal our cause to every sympathy of the 
 soul which it doth naturally bear upon. We re- 
 solved to speak according as it suited the topics in 
 hand, to the parts of human nature which the 
 poet addresseth, to the parts of human nature 
 which the economist addresseth, no less than to 
 those to which the logician addresseth. Never- 
 theless, after a logical method, I have done so: 
 that is, I have presented the question before these 
 affections of the mind, in a fair and undisguised 
 form, without fear and without partiality. In or- 
 der to have a chance of a hearing, I have re- 
 frained from systematic forms of speech, and en- 
 deavoured to speak of each subject in terms 
 proper to it, and to address each feeling in lan- 
 guage that seemed most likely to move. I wished 
 to argue like a man not a theologian, like a 
 Christian not a churchman. It is these peculiari- 
 ties, Gentlemen, which constituted my two new 
 methods of handling religious truth — the oration 
 and the argument. 
 
 " You have been told indeed by one of the wit- 
 nesses to-day, whose emptiness and self-sufficiency 
 you must have daily appreciated, that my ora- 
 tions and arguments differ only from sermons in 
 the name. My orations, Gentlemen, are as purely 
 orations or addresses to move and persuade men 
 upon a particular point, as any of the ancient or 
 modern models. It would have been absurd, to- 
 tally absurd, to have given them any other name. 
 
71 
 
 In the like manner, if the argument be not a re- 
 gularly constructed argument, let its irregularities 
 and defective parts be pointed out ; but merely 
 to object that it shall not be so named, is nothing 
 but another evidence of the poverty-struck in- 
 vention of this age in things religious, and its re- 
 solution to remain for ever in its miserable state. 
 The world, the thirsty spirit of the world, will 
 never be refreshed, until more various vessels for 
 ^fcntaining and serving out the waters of life be 
 discovered and made use of. 
 
 " The subject which I have had to agitate is the 
 whole matter of human responsibility and future 
 judgment, as they are set forth in the Scriptures 
 of the Old and New Testament. My instruction, 
 or brief, to speak technically, was taken from the 
 revelation of God. We held no question upon 
 the authenticity of the revelation, which we took 
 altogether for granted. We had to do with its 
 matter only, so that our business was not with the 
 believer or unbeliever, but with the man. 
 
 " I seem to myself, allowing for occasional di- 
 gression, to have kept with sufficient constancy to 
 my subject, and generally within the sight and 
 experience of common minds. All abstract dis- 
 course upon the responsibility in general, and the 
 freedom and necessity of the human will, I have 
 avoided ; not out of terror of that marlstroom in 
 the ocean of thought, but because it was too nice 
 a question to be handled by the way. Instead of 
 such metaphysical discourse, I inquired how the 
 nature of man accorded practically with a state of 
 
72 
 
 responsibility ; and discovered, that in no one of 
 its relationships was it devoid thereof, but acceded 
 to it with a constant choice, as the very buckler 
 of its social existence. I next passed on to peruse 
 and consider the constitution of law and govern- 
 ment which God hath in his mercy granted to us 
 to live under. Here there opened upon us a wide 
 field of ethical and political discourse. The large- 
 ness of divine law, compassing every province of 
 purity, came under our review ; the immeasurable 
 requirements of Christ's discipline, the unanswer- 
 able demands of his judgment, the inquisition of 
 conscience with the purer inquisition of God — 
 these, considering well, our mind was staggered 
 not a little, and we applied ourselves to discover 
 the profitableness and the fitness of an institution 
 so incommensurate with the limited powers of 
 man — which application it pleased the Lord to 
 reward to the satisfaction of ourselves, and we 
 hope the profiting of others. 
 
 " Being satisfied upon the great purchase (as 
 with a lever) which such a spiritual institution 
 takes upon the spirit of man, to raise it to dignity 
 and honour, we then gave ourselves to canvass the 
 provision which it makes for our deficiencies, and 
 to sound this question to the very bottom. 
 Thereto we made trial of various suggestions 
 which nature presenteth from her own stores, and 
 which men are wont to uphold as a sufficient ac- 
 count of the matter. These having tried upon 
 principles of law, and exhibited their total inade- 
 quacy to any end, except to the end of making 
 
73 
 
 law and responsibility altogether void, we came to 
 the great disclosure of Christ sacrificed for the 
 sins of men. And here we wandered, well pleased, 
 in a glorious field. We shewed how this revela- 
 tion of the gospel of peace took a pleasant power- 
 ful hold upon all our affections and all our in- 
 terests, sustaining and promoting all the enthu- 
 siasm" which the pure law had awakened, how it 
 fed the lamp of knowledge with oil from heaven, 
 and enlightened the whole house, and set all use- 
 ful works on foot ; how it awakened ! how it 
 cheered ! how it pressed us forward ! 
 
 " Ah ! Gentlemen, it is sweet to speculate upon 
 themes glorious like these. Gladly would I re- 
 new all that hath been done for the mere pleasure 
 sake, but that the occupations of life are so 
 many. 
 
 " Feeling within our souls an enthusiasm arise 
 for God, we did invoke, as Elijah did of old, all the 
 priests of Baal to the contest, and call upon them 
 to kindle such a flame in the cold bosom of man, 
 such an enthusiasm after holiness as this which 
 glowed beneath the feeding hand of God, which 
 invocation of the Anti-Christian people I again 
 repeat, praying them right early to lay down 
 within compass their scheme for raising fallen 
 man, and making him great and good, and I 
 pledge myself to give it the same impartial trial of 
 reason and understanding which I have given unto 
 the gospel scheme. 
 
 " We deemed it expedient to indulge our 
 humour another turn, and for the purpose of be. 
 
74 
 
 stirring the God-forgetting spirit of this age's po 
 licy, we adventured into the thorny path of man's 
 political well-being, and endeavoured to study 
 how this constitution of the gospel tended to the 
 remedy of its ills ; and here as before we reaped 
 the fruit of our labours, finding it to be the long 
 sought remedy of personal and political disorders, 
 regenerating the sluggish and taming the fiery ? 
 and setting every subject of the realm into the 
 position which is most easy to a good governor, 
 and most terrible to a bad one ; all which we 
 proved by the induction of many cases, and by 
 the ineffectual struggles which have been made 
 and are making at social improvement, without 
 this necessary implement of religion. 
 
 " Oh ! in this crisis of the world, when thrones 
 are shaken, and nations are arising to the work 
 of terrible revenge, and all things are unsettled. 
 Oh ! thou Almighty Ruler of the destinies of 
 men, make the voice of truth to be heard by the 
 raging people, and guide them into those mea- 
 sures which will ensure their success, and make 
 thy name glorious over the slavery and idolatry 
 in which the nations are held. 
 
 " Having thus, Gentlemen, justified the con- 
 stitution to which God hath made man responsible 
 both as to its necessity, its wisdom, and its good 
 effects, we then felt ourselves at liberty to launch 
 upon the great question of the Future Judgment, 
 yet cautiously and thoughtfully as one who had 
 the conviction of wakeful reason to win ; there- 
 fore we held a parley upon preliminaries, and 
 
75 
 
 gave her a fair field of objections, and fair liberty 
 to complain. — We took her doubts, her rights, her 
 very prejudices into account, to allay which, we 
 had to entertain large discussion upon many pro- 
 found questions, over which, some may think 
 a shadow of indistinctness was notwithstanding 
 left. 
 
 " I will own to you, Gentlemen, that here I 
 did begin to feel the limitation of my powers. I 
 had to forsake the realms of light, and carry the 
 vision of my mind into the obscure of the middle 
 state ; I felt a light and a shadow upon my 
 thoughts ; they stood not constantly, but they 
 came by glimpses, and often when I sought to 
 write them down, they were gone.— Some apology 
 for the cloudy indistinctness of these preliminary 
 thoughts of judgment may be found in the active 
 bustling spirit of this age, and especially of this, 
 my profession, of which every individual is in some 
 measure the slave, and of which slavery, I feel too 
 much the influence. — This life of ours, Gentlemen, 
 I feel to be neither an apostolic, nor a philoso- 
 phic life. — It hath in it no quietness, no retire- 
 ment, no contemplation. It is driven on by duty. 
 — The spear of engagement ever galleth it. — There 
 is no free bounding of the mind along the high 
 courses of thought, and a narrow style of opinions 
 hath set in upon free thought, like a stream con- 
 fined within bounds, which teareth up and de- 
 lugeth all the open plain. And a hot zeal for 
 orthodoxy, consumeth speculation up, or fretteth 
 it into madness j and the canker hath eaten so 
 
76 
 
 deep into the judgments of men, that I question, 
 whether any one will regard these lamentations in 
 any better light than the murmurs of a discon- 
 tented, or the reveries of an unintelligible mind. 
 
 " Whether, if thinking men should ever again 
 be conditioned as the ancient sages were, medi- 
 tating and musing like Pythagoras in the deep 
 groves of Crotona, or like Plato, sending from the 
 sacred promontory of Sunium his speculations 
 abroad into boundless regions, they might not by 
 the new aids of revelation, bring forth out of these 
 unseen dwellings of the disembodied spirit, some 
 light of certain understanding I do not know. 
 But of this, I am certain, that while they live, and 
 act, under ten thousand invasions, or their atten- 
 tion buried in sensual gratifications, or floating 
 amongst ambitious vanities, and courting earthly 
 distinctions, seeking chariots and horses, and cost- 
 ly abodes, and delicious entertainments, it is vain 
 to think that either poet, or philosopher, or divine, 
 will make any invasion upon these unredeemed 
 provinces of thought, or even follow the flights 
 which the more pure and self-denied spirits of 
 former ages have taken. 
 
 " One man there is in these realms, who hath 
 addressed himself to such a godlike life, and dwells 
 alone amidst the grand and lovely scenes of nature, 
 and the deep unfathomable secrecies of human 
 thought. Would to Heaven it were allowed 
 to others to do likewise ! And he hath been 
 rewarded with many new cogitations of nature 
 and of nature's God, and he hath heard in 
 
77 
 
 the stillness of his retreat, many new voices of his 
 conscious spirit, all which he hath sung in har- 
 monious numbers. But mark, Gentlemen, the 
 Epicurean soul of this degraded age ! They have 
 frowned on him ; they have spit on him ; they 
 have grossly abused him. The masters of this 
 critical generation, (like generation ! like masters !) 
 have> raised the hue and cry against him, as they 
 have now done against me : the literary and senti- 
 mental world, which is their sounding board, hath 
 reverberated it ; and every reptile, who can re- 
 tail an opinion in print, hath spread it, and given 
 his reputation a shock, from which it is slowly 
 recovering. All for what? For making nature 
 and his own bosom his home, and daring to sing 
 of the simple but sublime truths, which were re- 
 vealed to him ; for daring to be free in his man- 
 ner of uttering genuine feeling and depicting na- 
 tural beauty, and grafting thereon, devout and 
 solemn contemplations of God. Had he sent his 
 Cottage Wanderer forth upon an excursion 
 amongst courts and palaces, battle fields and 
 scenes of faithless gallantry, his musings would 
 have been more welcome, being far deeper and ten- 
 derer, than those of the * Heartless Child,' but 
 because the man hath valued virtue, and retiring 
 modesty, and common household truth, (as I do) 
 over these the ephemeral decorations or excessive 
 depravities of our condition, therefore is he 
 hated and abused. 
 
 " But, to return, Gentlemen, from this digression 
 — I proceeded to treat of the final adjudication to 
 
78 
 
 men; of their proper allotments of praise and blame, 
 reward and punishment. The principle of judgment 
 being developed, we then passed on to apply it to 
 various conditions of men, that we might shew 
 how simple and efficient it is for the intended pur- 
 pose. Here our subject properly concluded ; but 
 I thought it good to advert to two prejudices, one 
 existing within, the other existing without the 
 church. The former presumes that orthodox 
 faith, the latter that our worldly accomplishments, 
 will carry a certain weight. We demonstrated 
 that the one view was narrow, the other erro- 
 neous. 
 
 " Having thus, Gentlemen, opened up, applied, 
 and justified the tests of acquittal and condemna- 
 tion, we were in a state to pass on to the decrees 
 of judgment. In treating which, I endeavoured 
 to keep from a coarse, vulgar sensuality on the one 
 hand, and a weak, refined sentiment on the other ; 
 giving to heaven and hell some intelligible form, 
 and some identity with the present good and bad 
 of human conditions. For almost all Christians, 
 in their eagerness to keep the spirit of our faith 
 free from heathen and Mahomedan superstitions, 
 have set forth nothing tangible upon the subject 
 of future conditions. Their heaven is the heaven 
 of a metaphysician or a devotee, — not of a man ; 
 their hell a bugbear only to children. In my 
 endeavour to give breadth of exposition to this 
 subject, I kept as close as possible to the revela- 
 tion, and sought merely to become its interpreter. 
 Having drawn our sketches to the best of our abi- 
 
79 
 
 lity, we then went at length into the question of* 
 their duration, resting it upon positive revelation, 
 — upon the advantages of the Christian system, — 
 upon the nature of God, and the nature of sin, 
 as known from experience ; and with this ended 
 our argument of judgment to come, of which we 
 came then to exhibit the conclusion. 
 
 ""But whereas it might fare to some of my 
 hearers and readers to be excited by these terrible 
 pictures which I was fain to draw, and to cry out, 
 * What shall I do to be saved ?' I thought it 
 would not be amiss to interpose an inquiry upon 
 the way of escape from the wrath to come. Here 
 I felt it needful to shake nature again out of her 
 insecure refuges, before opening up the only city 
 of refuge that holds good against the terrible day 
 of the Lord, — which is a life devoted to holiness, 
 a new birth, and a spiritual life. Here I felt tram- 
 meled and confined by crude and insufficient no- 
 tions popular in the churches ; but I flinched not 
 from the utterance of the truth, as I believe it for 
 the salvation of souls. Not, Gentlemen, that I 
 desired to provoke controversy, but that I love 
 truth, and wish to see the confused mind of the 
 people set to rights, upon the true source and ori- 
 gin of the spiritual life. 
 
 " Gentlemen of the Jury, having thus joined 
 in harmony the word and the Spirit of God, I felt 
 at liberty to wind up and conclude the whole. I 
 cast myself as it were, sword in hand, on the 
 strengths in which nature shuts herself up against 
 all access of the thoughts of death, judgment, and 
 
80 
 
 eternity. The first strong hold I encountered, 
 was called Procrastination— but I thought it best 
 to hold a parley with the garrison before I offered 
 to storm the place ; I laid before them the folly 
 of a protracted resistance ; shewed them how 
 their commander, Postponement, was but a kid- 
 napper of souls, and recruiting officer of Hell. I 
 explained to them how they were living upon 
 time as the sloth does upon the tree, till every par- 
 ticle of the food is consumed, then droppeth she 
 knoweth not whither. Overcome by my argu- 
 ments the garrison abandoned the place, but cast 
 themselves into another strong hold called Bravery. 
 I followed close upon their heels, and when I 
 reached the fort, I meditated no parley, no tedious 
 operation of argument, but a main attack, a storm, 
 where the battle should be fought hand to hand, 
 without any reserve or any mercy upon either side. 
 They must be desperadoes, I concluded, with 
 whom I have to deal, since our former mild and 
 reasoning method of discourse has failed to move 
 them. And so I set myself in the strength of God, 
 to fight his battle with the ungodly generation. 
 Oh ! these topers, these gamesters, these idle re- 
 vellers, these hardened death despisers, these 
 swaggering braggadocios — how they quaked for 
 very fear in the hour of assault ; how their chi- 
 valry was made to skip, how they turned their 
 backs, and bowed their necks, and supplicated for 
 mercy ! After capturing Fort Bravery, there but 
 remained the Hospital of Incurables in the hands 
 of the enemy. You are aware, Gentlemen, that 
 
81 
 
 in many cases a man withereth like a tree, and in 
 his old age is desolate of thought ; he is not preg- 
 nant with feeling, words kindle no fire in him, 
 thoughts awake no kindred thoughts. He is of 
 the order of incurables, whose case is perhaps the 
 most pitiable of all. You cannot raise a spark of 
 conviction, or kindle towards the Deity one flash 
 of love. The whole faculties are occupied, and 
 the old possessors will not give place ; old habits 
 will not be disturbed ; the conscience is seared 
 'as with a red-hot iron. You would speak to him, 
 but you know not how to begin. You do speak, 
 and you find him intrenched in his decencies, his 
 moralities, his charities. You cannot blast his hopes, 
 though you know them to be hopeless, for there 
 remaineth no chance of conviction. It would 
 only be vexing him in vain — adding inward tribu- 
 lation to outward trouble. Every thing was 
 against interference, and the Hospital of Incura- 
 bles I have therefore left in the possession of its 
 miserable inmates, till the dread sentence is passed, 
 when the bottomless pit shall open its mouth to 
 receive them. 
 
 " Gentlemen of the Jury, I am now about draw- 
 ing to a close what I proposed to myself to ad- 
 dress to you. After the melancholy yet faithful 
 picture which I have presented to your minds of the 
 condition into which mankind are sunk ; after the 
 simple recapitulation you have heard of the steps 
 I have taken to rouse them from their slumbers, 
 and of the indisputable success which has attended 
 my endeavours, feeble though they have been, I 
 
 M 
 
82 
 
 look with confidence to obtaining at your hands 
 a full and honourable acquittal from the various 
 charges, some serious enough, and some con- 
 temptible enough, which have been now brought 
 against me. For such as refer to matters with 
 which the freedom of the will has nothing to do, 
 I nothing care, nor as it seemeth to me, are they 
 matters for human judgment; yet I do confess 
 that it hath grieved me much that I should be 
 so pertinaciously charged with speaking calumni- 
 ously and uncharitably of my fellow men, and 
 of being thereto urged by the most paltry of mo- 
 tives, vanity, ambition, conceit, self-interest. God 
 doth know I would not misrepresent my fellow- 
 creatures whom his hand hath formed in a com- 
 mon mould, or rudely discover the nakedness of 
 their condition ; but it does irk the heart to con- 
 template the deep beds of degradation into which 
 the masses and multitudes of mankind are forced 
 for want of the discipline which might be wrought 
 on the heart by the Divine constitution, which 
 alone availeth to produce virtue, magnanimity, 
 peace, and all the finer fruits and conditions of 
 the soul. I know not what fearful misgivings 
 upon the vanity of human nature come over my 
 mind, when I behold the condition of imregene- 
 rate men, while I feel assured that there is in 
 the religion of Christ a power and facility to raise 
 them to the highest attainments of reflective and 
 hopeful creatures. I feel as if the better part of 
 man were writhing like the camp of Israel, when 
 bitten with fiery spirits under a deforming deadly 
 
83 
 
 disease, for which the specific a thousand times 
 approved was brought before them to their very 
 hand, but through obstinacy, through a very love 
 of misery and death, the infatuated people pe- 
 rished from present happiness and future hope. 
 In this my sincere, honest, and zealous ef- 
 fort to prevent my beloved countrymen from 
 sharing the same fate, I have besought the 
 guidance of the Almighty and his blessing 
 very often. ' And do thou, great source of 
 all intelligence, forgive the errors and imper- 
 fections which thine omniscient eye behold- 
 eth in my humble endeavours, to promote thy 
 glory and the eternal welfare of men, remember- 
 ing the limited faculties of every creature, and 
 the clouds which sin hath induced upon the mind 
 of man. If aught hath been uttered injurious to thy 
 Majesty, of which thou art very jealous, do thou 
 forgive that greatest of transgressions. If aught 
 hath been said opposed to thy revealed word, 
 hinder it from its evil influence upon the mind 
 of men. As for men themselves — for my ac- 
 cusers — for the witnesses against me — for you 
 Gentlemen of the Jury, who are my judges — for 
 you noble, honourable, and venerable men, who 
 preside over this tribunal — for all who hear me, of 
 you I have nothing to beseech, but that you will 
 look to yourselves, and have mercy on your own 
 souls." 
 
 The effect which the reverend Defendant's ad- 
 dress left on the audience, was marked by a deep 
 silence for several minutes; some of the fair listen- 
 ers in the gallery seemed much affected. 
 
S4 
 
 Mr. Phiixips then rose. — He observed, that after the eloquent, 
 convincing, triumphant, defence which the Court had just heard 
 from his Rev. Friend, it might be deemed a matter of supererogation 
 to bring any thing forward in the way of evidence to rebut the case 
 for the prosecution. Just to show, however, how partially the wit- 
 nesses in support of it had been selected ; and how diametrically 
 opposite their opinions were to those of men, in every respect as 
 capable of forming a correct judgment of the merits of the Defen- 
 dant, he would very briefly examine a few of the cloud of witnesses 
 who were in waiting to give evidence in his behalf. 
 
 Editor of the London Christian Instructor and Congregational 
 Magazine, called and examined. 
 
 Differs from Mr. Irving in matters of taste, and cannot always 
 assent to his modes of statement, but admires his abilities, and is 
 convinced of his ardent anxiety to do good. Conceives that Mr. 
 Irving leaves no room for hesitation respecting either his intentions 
 or his powers ; and that he assails the conscience and the under- 
 standing in a strain of eloquent and urgent expostulation, that 
 cannot but have with the divine blessing, a beneficial influence. 
 His compositions are possessed neither of the depth nor elaboration of 
 Burke, but more intense, and more effective in producing convic- 
 tion. Some of his passages remind one of the march and rhythm 
 of Milton's English prose. No imitator, he stands on his own 
 merits — might, if he chose, take his stand, if not among the high- 
 est, at least not far below the highest of contemporary orators. 
 
 Cross-examined bij Mu. Parsons. 
 
 Do you think that any advantage is gained in pulpit oratory by 
 the adoption of antiquated forms of expression, or by the intro- 
 duction of words and phrases commonly used in a low or ludicrous 
 sense ? 
 
 None. But I have no relish for the work of carping at minor 
 defects amid substantial excellence. 
 
 Do you think that Mr. Irving's Orations for the Oracles of God 
 deserve, that name ? 
 
 No. I will not say that they do. I perceive in them no dissi- 
 milarity from the sermon, except in a less decided use of subdivi- 
 
8b 
 
 sion, division, or arrangement, which is in reality the same thing 
 and must exist in every intelligible address ; but if it be meant merely 
 to exclude the formality of " heads," principal and subordinate, 
 there is no novelty in the practice : it has been done by Bossuet, 
 Chalmers, Robert Hall ; it has been expressly recommended by 
 Cheminais, and is frequently acted upon by preachers both in and 
 out of the establishment. 
 
 Editor of the Christian' 1 s Pocket Magazine and Anti-Sceptic 
 examined. 
 
 Considers Mr. Irving as no inferior man. Has heard him 
 charged as deficient in Evangelical sentiment, but denies it. Thinks 
 that he has many admirable qualities. His language often obsolete 
 and uncouth, with a strange mixture of that which is inflated : but 
 it has a strength and an originality which call forth admiration. 
 His thoughts too are novel, and his arguments have power. Believes 
 that Providence has raised up Mr. I. for much good — Has read hif 
 book, and blushes for the boldness of those who have levelled such 
 ungrounded charges against an estimable minister. Admires him a i 
 a man endowed with the spirit of Elijah — Has read passages of his 
 more pointed than ever were delivered by the undaunted Knox, and 
 not less bold— No mimic of Dr. Chalmers — Resembles him about 
 as much as a lily resembles a rose ; the resemblance consisting in 
 both shedding an agreeable fragrance around, and both being 
 flowers. 
 
 Editor of the New Times, examined. 
 
 Can you tell us any thing of the Editor of the Old Times ? 
 
 A great deal. The stupid editor of that stupid paper is, as all the 
 world well knows, a disappointed and neglected author, and equally 
 disappointed and neglected aspirant after several other professions. 
 His volumes are ticketted on every stall " Cd. each." He is now 
 driven to write in the Old Times for the pot-houses. 
 
 Then you would not, perhaps, be surprised at his casting an eye 
 of malicious envy at any successful literary character whose works 
 might penetrate into the drawing-rooms from which his own are 
 excluded ? 
 
 Just what I should expect, as a matter of course. 
 
86 
 
 Have you read what this distempered Censor has said of the Rev. 
 Defendant in this case ? 
 
 I have ; and could not help smiling at the excessive conceit 
 which could embolden such a scribbler to assume so exalted a tone 
 of contempt towards a man honoured by the attention of My Lords 
 Liverpool and Stowell, Mr. Canning, Sir James Mackintosh, Mr. 
 Peel, Mr. Brougham, and a long list of other gentlemen, the most 
 distinguished in every department of the State. 
 
 Has himself read Mr. Irving's Orations and Arguments. Found 
 him to be a writer of very extraordinary endowments, who has 
 drawn largely from the stores of the Church of England, and is 
 glad to own his obligations, as a Christian Teacher, to such men a s 
 Hooker and Taylor. His reason for not teaching to the poor exclu- 
 sively, explained satisfactorily. Witness read in support of this a long 
 extract from Burke. Thinks the Orations highly wrought. Mr. 
 Irving employs the same weapons of animated diction and vivid 
 imagination, as his antagonists, not declining the edge of sarcasm, 
 but turning it aside with weapons equally sharp, and opposing to 
 the popular sophisms and errors of the day, the testimonies of con- 
 science. — Knows that he has been called a declamatory, turgid, 
 bombastic, writer, but has not been able to observe any of these 
 characteristics. Considers his thoughts as clear and cogent ; his 
 expressions plain, happy, and appropriate. Eloquence, often truly 
 striking and majestic — Conception, super-human ; thoughts, 
 overpowering ; sentiments, such as " make the sealed heart knock 
 at the ribs." Likes him the better for the roughness of antiquity 
 which there is about him. Regards him altogether with unfeigned 
 admiration. 
 
 Editor of the Sunday Monitor, examined. 
 
 (By the powers !) Considers Mr. Irving's popularity, richly 
 deserved. His discourses are soul-awakening. Heard him often ; 
 and not, he trusts, without benefit. Witnessed also, with pleasure 
 the effect they appeared to have on the congregations assembled. 
 Popular through the mere force of his genius, and unaided by 
 patronage. Has created a sensation in the political, literary, and 
 fashionable world unequalled in this country. Princes and nobles, 
 orators and statesmen, poets and wits, beauty and fashion, have 
 
been attracted by his eloquence, as by a magnet ; and what Curran 
 said of the celebrated Dean Kirwan, that " he came to interrupt 
 the repose of one world, with the thunder of another," may be 
 applied to Mr. Irving. 
 
 Cross-examined by Mr. Parsons. 
 
 You have of course observed what Mr. Irving says in his Pre- 
 face, «f the want of books fit for the instruction, amusement, and 
 guide of Christians. What think you of that? 
 
 I confess that it is a proof either of ignorance or vanity. 
 
 Do you approve of his forming his style on that of the age of the 
 Reformers ? 
 
 Not entirely. The expressions he uses are sometimes quaint 
 and obsolete, and the sense of many passages is obscured by the 
 " rich wardrobe of words." It is, however, the style of holy writ ; 
 it is the phraseology of the book of Common Prayer ; it is the lan- 
 guage of Taylor, of Bacon, of Hooker, and the venerable fathers of 
 the church ; and as such, endeared by a thousand recollections. 
 
 Editor of the Examiner examined. 
 
 In point of doctrine, considers Mr. Irving a Calvinist ; but his 
 claims to distinction are those of an orator and an expositionist 
 rather than of a theologian. The theory under which Mr. Irving 
 is seeking to appal the guilty and amaze the free, is that of bold 
 and fearless preaching, in the style and manner of the most purely 
 intellectual age of England. What tamed this spirit ? A political 
 re-action, which tamed every thing English ; and this in its turn 
 produced another, which, occurring under very different times and 
 circumstances, has gradually made bishops just what we see them, 
 and the church that which it is, not to mention the Kirk of Scot- 
 land, which appears, to witness, to have undergone the same happy 
 process ; that is to say, to have been rendered very accurate in cal- 
 culation, and very moderate in zeal. Holds Mr. Irving to be a sin- 
 cere friend to political liberty, and that he abounds more in Chris- 
 tian meekness than Dr. Johnson, and less in crabstick criticism 
 
88 
 
 than the Times. Speaks spiritedly and manly, in comparison 
 with the slaver of certain lick-spittles of the Establishment, who 
 are eternally prating of passive obedience, and of the piety of ex- 
 claiming, in the event of the existence of such a legitimate ruler, 
 Nero quand meme ! Heard Mr. Irving quote with approbation the 
 noble truth of the old covenanters, that " when persecution begins, 
 allegiance ends ;" — forcibly and honestly opposed to the non-re- 
 sisting cant of the clergy of the day. Until Mr. Irving is warmed 
 by his subject, the hearer is only struck with a full and scriptural 
 phraseology, in which much modern elision is rejected, some ad- 
 ditional conjunctions introduced, and the auxiliary verbs kept in 
 most active service. As he goes on, his countenance, which is 
 surrounded by a dark, apostolical head of hair, waving towards his 
 shoulders, becomes strongly expressive and lighted up, and his 
 gesture marked and vehement. With respect to action, has no 
 doubt that St. Paul at Athens has been Mr. Irving's study, a prac- 
 tice which is frequently diversified by an almost perpendicular ex- 
 tension {see the plate, Jig. 5.) of the arm. The fabric of his ora- 
 tions argumentatively assertive, and his hearers not violently as- 
 sailed with the peculiar dogma of Calvinism, with the exception 
 that Mr. Irving would by no means soften matters with respect to 
 hell. The grand argumentative forte of Mr. Irving consists in his 
 able manner of working out his great theological position, — that 
 revelation is necessary to men, — displays a degree of acumen and 
 penetration which is certainly very rare. Is a tolerable disputant, 
 and grants more to his sceptical disputants than most theologians. 
 There is a fine solemnity in his manner, but it borders on the the- 
 atrical ; the government of his vehemence, and consequently of his 
 voice, is sometimes out of his own management. 
 
 Cross-examined by Mr. Macvicar. 
 
 You have told us that Mr. Irving's style is formed on that of the 
 most purely intellectual age of England. Do you mean to say that 
 you approve of his assuming this antiquated garb ? 
 
 Oh, certainly not. The style is affected, the beauty indisputably 
 artificial. Whatever be his taste or intention in it, it is a mas- 
 
so 
 
 querade habit. You have heard Mr. Irving's lamentation over poor 
 Wordsworth ? Do you think there is any foundation for it ? 
 
 No. It is quite new to us that Mr. Wordsworth has been thus 
 outrageously treated ;- — that some people made him a stamp distri- 
 butor, we know, (similar soil of persons made Burns an excise- 
 man) — if this be the insult alluded to, be it so ; but in every other 
 respect he has only met the common fate of all authorship. In fact, 
 I know of no writer, in proportion to circumstances, who has re- 
 ceived^more ample homage than Wordsworth. 
 
 Do you not think that Mr. Irving at times takes a rather high 
 ground ? 
 
 Yes, frequently, — ground as visionary as Fairy land. 
 
 And is rather liberal of his attacks ? 
 
 Yes, too liberal, especially against every sort of excursive and 
 imaginative genius but his own. I could pass over what he says 
 about his clerical brethren, but I know not on what reasonable 
 ground the whole province of imagination is to be accommodated 
 to the square and rule of Mr. Irving's taste and opinions. For 
 theology has little to do in this matter. Providence, by pointing 
 intellect to such different issues, laughs this petty assumption to 
 scorn. Lord Byron, I suppose, is fair game, although the cant is 
 miserable from a man of talent ; but Moore receives similar con- 
 demnation, and every one who has not Mr. Irving's taste for soli- 
 tude and lofty musings, which leaves nobody living to be praised, 
 except himself and Mr. Wordsworth. This is puerile. 
 
 Resident Director of the Liberal examined. 
 
 [Holding, like most of the other witnesses, a mask to his face, 
 but in so careless and shifting a manner, that any one could 
 tell the " New Pygmalion" was behind it.] 
 
 Thinks, that the Scotch bear at present the belle, and have " got 
 the start of the majestic world." They boast of the greatest no- 
 velists, the greatest preachers, the greatest philanthropists, and the 
 greatest blackguards in the world. Sir Walter Scott stands at 
 the head of them for Scotch humour, Dr. Chalmers for Scotch 
 logic, Mr. Owen for Scotch utopianism, and Mr. Blackwood for 
 Scotch impudence : Unrivalled four ! And here is Mr. Irving, 
 who threatens to make a fifth, and stultify all our London orators 
 
 N 
 
90 
 
 from t( kingly Kensington to Blackwall ! " Mr. Irving is the 
 most accomplished barbarian, and the least offensive and most dash- 
 ing clerical holder forth, the witness remembers to have seen. Puts him 
 in mind of the first man, Adam, if Adam had but been a Scotch- 
 man, and had had coal-black hair. He seems to stand upon the 
 integrity of his composition, to begin a new race of practising be- 
 lievers, to give a new impulse to the Christian religion, to regene- 
 rate the fallen and degenerate race of men. One would say, at the 
 first glance at him, without knowing his calling or his ghostly parts, 
 " That is the man for a fair saint." You'd swear it by 
 
 " His foot mercurial, his martial thigh, 
 The brawns of Hercules, but hie jovial face ! " 
 
 Aye, there you'd stop, like Imogene — there is a want of expression 
 in it — " The iron has not entered his soul." He has not dared to 
 feel, but in trammels and in dread ; pleasure, fancy, and humanity, 
 are syrens that he repels and keeps at arm's length ; and hence his 
 features are hardened and have a barbaric crust upon them. They 
 are not steeped in the expression of Titian or Raphael, but they 
 would do for Spagnoletti to paint ; and his dark profile and matted 
 locks have something of the grave commanding appearance of 
 Leonardo da Vinci's massive portraits. Thinks Mr. Irving's voice 
 flowery and silvery ; that he is a more amiable moralist, and more 
 practical reasoner, than Dr. Chalmers. He throws a glancing, 
 pleasing light, over the gloomy ground of Calvinism. There is some- 
 thing humane in his appeals, striking in his apostrophes, graceful 
 in his action, soothing in the tones of his voice ; not at all affected 
 or theatrical ; above common-place both in fancy and argument, yet 
 hardly to be ranked as a poet or a philosopher. He is a modernized 
 covenanter, a sceptical fanatic. His pulpit style has a resemblance 
 to the florid gothic. It is, on the whole, polished and ambitious. 
 Can conceive of a deeper strain of argument, of a more powerful 
 and overwhelming flood of eloquence ; but altogether, deems him 
 an able and attractive expounder of holy writ, and farther believes 
 him to be an honest man. 
 
91 
 
 Cross-exumiiied by Mu. MacvicAK. 
 
 Is the account you have given to-day of Mr. Irving the same 
 which you gave to the readers of the Liberal, some weeks ago ? 
 
 I have said nothing to-day, Sir, but what I have said before iu 
 that publication. 
 
 Perhaps less, Sir. You have told us to-day, that there is some 
 thing very " humane" and soothing in Mr. Irving's appeals. — Did 
 you not say, at the same time, in the Liberal, that there was 
 something very exclusive and intolerant in his plan of exalting Religion 
 as the thaumat.urgos, or wonder-worker in the reform of man- 
 kind, reconcileable neither to sound reason, nor to history. 
 
 Yes ; I do remember saying something of that sort. 
 
 You have told us also to-day, that you believe Mr. I. "to be 
 an honest man ?" Did you not add in the Liberal, that " you did 
 not feel exactly on sure grounds with him, — that you scarcely knew 
 whether he preaches Christ crucified, or himself?" 
 
 Yes. 
 
 And in illustration of that, you took notice of certain liberties 
 with the divine character, in which Mr. I. is apt to indulge ? 
 
 I did : for example, his talking of Jesus Christ destroying me- 
 lody;" and the " Mouth of God being muzzled by man." Nor 
 did I hesitate to censure these expressions as contrary to every 
 allowed licence of speech. 
 
 Could these expressions have been slips of the tongue ? 
 
 Not likely ; for Mr. Irving preaches from written notes, and his 
 printed volume contains, I am told, expressions which are a great 
 deal worse. 
 
 The Chief Justice, observing that Mr. Phillips 
 was about to call another witness, recommended to 
 him to consider whether he was exercising a sound 
 discretion, in the line of examination he was pur- 
 suing. 
 
 Mr. Phillips. — Some of my witnesses, it is 
 true, have broken down rather unexpectedly. I 
 will venture, however, one more. 
 
 M 
 
92 
 
 Editor of tht Museum examined. 
 
 Considers Mr. Irvine's volume of Pulpit Eloquence, a work of a 
 most unusual and interesting character; the production of no 
 ordinary mind; the fruit of no common soil or every day culture. 
 Occasionally \vc have all the tenderness of Massilon, now and th- n 
 the fire and impetuosity of Bourdalouc ; at other times the pictu- 
 resque vigour and raciness ot^prabbc. Could point to passages, 
 which in felicity of imagery and harmony of style, are not exceeded 
 hy any thing in the whole compa^ of the English language. Con- 
 ceives the most prominent feature of Mr. lrving's style to be a 
 pertain tone of soothing tenderness, a love of mankind in the 
 humbler departments of life. Exhorting, enco uragi ng, entreating 
 them to know their stake in the great interests of this world, and 
 in the contemplation of their heavenly Redeemer. Vet u firee to 
 c on fess, thai Mr. lrving's metaphors are so frequent, so bold, 
 and Bomi 1 1 m< s so lengthen* <1 and spun out, thai we become wi 
 of comprehending them. — II " milk for bal 
 
 lmt strong meat for strong men. — Hardly knows any volume, which 
 is, upon the whole, likely to reflect more substantia] credit upon 
 its author, or to produce more salutary -the bod] politic. 
 
 W Ins it to be attentively perused by all cl ry, imdei 
 
 tin oonviction thai it will do mw h to promote the best into rest of 
 social order and vital religion. 
 
 < - nined /"/ Mk. Parsons. 
 
 Of what need of Eaitlrdoyou hold Mr. Irving to 
 
 I am delighted, Sir, to p< ret ive that he is m> Calvitiisl. 
 
 ( >i' what i n ed is the Si ottiah Church ? 
 
 ( alvinistie. 
 
 Does Mr. Irving belong to that Chun h ; 
 
 II- 
 
 \ud must have signed its articles? 
 
 Of course. 
 
 Admirable witness ! to be delighted thai tin object "l" bis praise 
 does no) believe the faith which h- has subscribed ajid sworn to 
 maintain. 
 
93 
 
 Mr. Phillips declined calling any more wit- 
 nesses. 
 
 Mr. Serjeant Bishop waived his right of reply ; 
 and in doing so, could not omit tendering his 
 grateful thanks to his learned friend Mr. P. for 
 the great pains he had taken, daring the preceding 
 hour, to render all reply unnecessary. 
 
 The Chief Justice charged the Jury in his usual 
 plain, and perspicuous manner. He described the 
 case to the jury as one of unprecedented import- 
 ance. Well might the Reverend Defendant tell 
 them all to look to their own souls ; for the ques- 
 tion at issue was, neither more nor less, than whe- 
 ther they were not one and all in the broad road 
 to perdition, notwithstanding the many thousand 
 guides whom they employed and paid well, to prevent 
 them from straying from the right path. The jury 
 were in fact sitting in judgment on the whole clergy 
 of the united empire ; for if the Rev. Defendant 
 were really no mere pretender, as he is charged 
 to be — if one half of all he says be true, then are 
 all the rest of his clerical brethren (with such ex- 
 ceptions only as Mr. I. may be pleased to point 
 out) a set of the most unfaithful stewards that 
 ever lived. In proportion to the magnitude of 
 these pretensions was, however, the difficulty of 
 coming to the consideration of them, with minds 
 as free and unbiassed as they ought to be. We 
 were apt to start back from the claim of any man 
 to be so much better and more enlightened than 
 his fellow*, and without admitting for a moment 
 
 & 
 
94 
 
 the possibility of the thing, were very likely to 
 set him down at once, as that quack and brawler 
 which Mr. I. was here alleged to be. When he 
 looked, however, to the high respectability, in- 
 telligence and discrimination of the gentlemen he 
 addressed, he felt confident, that from their minds 
 every prejudice of this kind must have been dis- 
 missed, and that they had come to this enquiry, 
 as open to a conviction that the clergy deserve 
 all the opprobrium heaped upon them, as that Mr. 
 Irving is entitled to the extraordinary precedence 
 which he demands. The indictment, he was sorry 
 to observe, was very carelessly and loosely drawn. 
 The first count, touching the defendant's personal 
 appearance, could not go to the jury at all. It 
 was not laid on any rule of common sense; no 
 punishment could possibly follow a conviction 
 upon it. If a charge lay anywhere on this score, 
 it was against nature, for casting so intellectually- 
 gifted a gentleman as Mr. I. in so coarse a cor- 
 poreal mould. Neither could the sixth count, 
 which imputed to Mr. I. a commonness of under- 
 standing, as a fault, be at all entertained ; he liked 
 men of common understanding, and only wished 
 we had more of them ; it was by pretending to a 
 more than a common share that there were so many 
 knaves and dupes in the world. The remaining 
 five counts certainly contained fair enough mat- 
 ters for human judgment, and these he would 
 send to the jury. At the same time it was 
 easy to perceive from the loose manner in which 
 
96 
 
 they were worded, from the width of the meshes 
 of which the net was constructed, that they 
 might, after all, catch nothing. The Rev. Ed- 
 ward Irving might be a Mr. Merryman, but 
 he would at all events be no mewy- Andrew ; he 
 might be a quack, but no " common" one ; a 
 brawler, but no " common" one ; a swearer, but 
 no " common" one. Now, if the jury thought that 
 in any one of these respects the defendant was 
 something more than common, they could not, 
 though thus superlatively guilty, convict him on 
 this indictment, but must give him the benefit of 
 their verdict. The seventh and last count seemed 
 to be the only one drawn up with any distinctness 
 and comprehensiveness ; and perhaps the jury 
 would direct their chief attention to the bearing 
 of the evidence upon it. Much he wished to 
 have been able to assist them by a digest of 
 that evidence ; but the task was one from which 
 he shrunk in dismay. It w r as obviously a matter 
 of no ordinary nicety and difficulty to balance 
 such a mass of conflicting authorities, to say how 
 much one was entitled to respect, and how little 
 another. It might be a perilous thing too, to say 
 all one thought of such and such — their corrupt 
 leanings, their base subserviency, their low abuse, 
 their habitual lying, their matter-of-business, 
 praise, and censure. He preferred, on all these 
 accounts, leaving the Jury to judge for them- 
 selves on which side the evidence preponderated, 
 not doubting that they would bring in such a ver- 
 dict as would fully meet the justice of the case. 
 
96 
 
 The Jury then ret "ed, and after the lapse of 
 about an hour, the Jiuy returned into Court. 
 
 Foreman. " We find the defendant guilty on 
 the seventh count of the indictment — not guilty 
 on all the others. I am desired, however, by my 
 brother Jurymen, to state, that but for the manner 
 in which several of the counts are laid, as re- 
 marked on by your Lordship, our verdict would 
 have been very different." 
 
 The defendant was ordered to be brought up 
 for judgment next term j but it is understood 
 that he intends to move for a new trial. 
 
 THE END. 
 
 SHACKELL AXD ARROWSMITH, JOHNSON^ COURT, FLBET-STRKET. 
 
iaylord Bros. 
 
 Makers 
 ttSCnse, N. Y 
 
 W. JAN. 21, 1908 
 
 Date Due 
 
 r sep 1 ? -3(1 
 
 
 
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 1 1012 00035 9168