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CHAPTER 1.A - INTRODUCTION.

When it pleased God of late to awaken the slumbering virgins by the midnight cry, not only were the wise roused, but the foolish. Nor did Satan delay to set up counterfeits, so as to bring the discredit of heterodoxy and evils of various other kinds on the recovered hope. Evangelical men were at a manifestly low ebb, even the most devoted of them betraying their ignorance of church or even christian privilege by periodical gatherings for prayer that the Holy Spirit might be once more shed on souls, and meanwhile eagerly forming societies to do thus anomalously the work which was the common responsibility of God's church. There was no real faith in the presence of the Spirit, no looking for His free action in the assembly, no expression of the one body of Christ, nor even sense of the church's ruin-state, any more than really waiting for God's Son from heaven. There was not even the consciousness of the true deliverance and heavenly associations of the christian. The evangelical revival, whether of Wesley or of Whitfield, or outside the borders of either, was a pious reaction, which insisted on the new birth and earnestness on behalf of perishing souls, from the cold ethics and formality, if not deism, of the century before. But the calling and the inheritance of saints, the purposes of God for the glory of God in Christ, never fully dawned on evangelical hearts, any more than on Puritans, or even the Reformers that preceded. It is needless to say that it would be vain to look for aught better, or as good, in the middle ages, or among the Fathers. Even redemption in any adequate conception of it had quickly faded away, before men had to contend for the truth of Christ's person or the Holy Ghost. Nobody doubts that grace saved all through; but for more than a dozen centuries where is there a single sentence which proclaims salvation as the apostles once taught and all saints enjoyed?

In such circumstances as these who can wonder that the privileges, either of the individual christian or of Christ's body the church, were unknown? Hard and narrow Calvinism since the sixteenth century maintained a measure of solid footing for the saint sorely tried under law. Active, warm-hearted Arminianism, when it did not lapse into Arianism, went out in zeal personally, and in service of others, but with a minimum of truth, without which one could hardly be saved. Man and the world were unjudged. The assembly of God united to Christ, and the scene of the Spirit's free activity according to the word as a present thing, and even christian standing, were ignored, the future glories of Christ, as well as the actual bearing of His exaltation, being not at all understood.

The horrors of infidelity, both in its multitudinous excesses and in its rising to a head of despotic self-will, made the Bible, then going forth in active circulation beyond example, dearer to the children of God, whose consciences began to be searched as to their state and ways by the coming of the Lord, which now became more distinctly, practically, and urgently pressed. The family likeness on a small scale, first to the apostasy, next to the man of sin and son of perdition, could not but arouse thoughtful souls to the still more awful evils disclosed in 2 Thess. 2 which are to call down the Lord's personal judgment at His appearing. Hence was felt increasingly the imperious call to be ready for the Lord when He comes for His own, that they may go in with Him to the marriage feast. Resting on Him and His redemption, they had the oil in their vessels. But had they not departed from the original call to quit "the camp," to love not the world nor the things that are in the world? Had they not, in ceasing to go out to meet the Bridegroom, turned in here or there to slumber or sleep? Had they not, on the one hand, failed to resist evil in the church, and, on the other, adopted ways of their own to escape what was gross, with little heed to Christ's will and glory? If He was coming as they hoped, they knew not how soon, it behoved them to be found honouring the word and Spirit of God. They could not but feel that the church was fallen and broken irremediably as a whole: the great eastern and western bodies swamped by idolatry and plain evils, both doctrinal and practical; the lesser Protestant systems, either enslaved to the state, or settled on their differences without a thought of unity, save invisibly or in heaven.

The ruin was complete; but had faith no resource? Was there no provision for the faithful in a state so sinful and hopelessly awry? Had the blessed Lord not foreseen and revealed His will in view of it? They must cease to do evil if they would learn to do well. Obedience is the saving principle that never fails in Old Testament or New, for Jew or christian. The word made it clear that, whatever the wreck of outward manifestation, there is one body and one Spirit, even as there is one hope of our calling. These abide unchangeably for such as believe. Were the saints content to fall back on the imperishable blessings of the church, clearing themselves from all compromise of the truth, and owning the fidelity of the Lord to His own word? The Spirit, beyond doubt, was sent down to abide in and with the saints for ever. He will be poured out afresh on all flesh for the kingdom by and by; but He has not forsaken, and never can, the church, any more than the cloud of divine presence left Israel, yea disobedient and guilty Israel, all the wilderness through. But the time is come when God wakes up His own, and works readiness to receive their returning Lord; and they recall His voice vouchsafing the promise of His presence in the midst, were they but two or three, no longer scattered by the names of leaders or by exalting this doctrine and policy or that, but gathered to (eij") His name.

Hence they judged themselves and their ways, personal, worldly, ecclesiastical, in the light of that word, which also testified the way of obedience that never fails for the single-eyed in the worst of times. For as sure as God lives, His child never has to choose man's wretched alternative — the less of two evils. There is a way, and it is the way of obedience, of obeying God rather than man, in which the weakest may walk, and the strongest ought to walk. If others turn, as all alas! have turned, to the right and to the left, whatever be the snare, our idol of silver, or our image of gold, Away with it! The written word solves every possible dilemma; but we are wholly dependent on God, Who works in us by His Spirit to exalt the Lord thereby. We have been verily guilty; and repentance, not self-confidence, becomes us. Re-construction is not, nor ever was, God's way for His people in a fallen state. He that doeth the will of God abideth for ever. Ceasing from evil in brokenness of spirit, our place is to search the scriptures and find what the Lord reveals there open to saints, whatever be their measure; for we are put members in the body as it pleased Him. God set some in the church: first apostles; secondarily prophets; thirdly teachers; after that miracles; then, gifts of healing, etc. This raises the question of power and authority; and assumption is as dangerous as mistake about them is easy. But obeying God's word is the clear duty of every soul born of God. We are elect through sanctification of the Spirit to obedience and the sprinkling of the blood of Jesus.

Here it was that the divergence ensued among those awakened from slumber. Many are the paths of error. There is but one way of truth: it was that of Christ on earth, the obedient One. Power from on high had been already given; and the Spirit sent down from heaven, though our sins be great and many as they are, has never retired again. He has been grieved in a thousand ways, and has shown His sense of the church's unfaithfulness. But never for a moment has He deserted the post which He deigned to take here below to glorify the Lord Jesus. In obedience we prove His gracious power, and this not in gift individual only, but in communion where we in faith come together to Christ's name in the unity of the Spirit which we are all bound to keep. Those who act obediently have ever found His blessing in it, whatever others may or may not do.

Nor is there a tittle of presumption in obeying God. Therein only is true humility. Imitating the apostles is as proud as it is childish; it would be ridiculous, if it were not profane. Men have turned the gifts of Christ, endorsed with the power of God's Spirit, into titles of honour in the world, or of ostentation in a church already judaized. God has taken care to preserve every privilege good for the saints in lowliness to Christ's glory. Whatever is no longer vouchsafed would be incompatible with the church fallen and scattered as it is. He is as wise in what He withholds, as He is good in what He continues, the state of the church being what it is. Those whose principle it is to obey in the immutable relationships of His grace He has not spared all needed sifting and humiliation, but has largely blessed in an increasing enjoyment of Himself and His word. Such as have set themselves up, coveting power and authority, He has covered with shame in all eyes but their own, perhaps in their own also, if the truth were known.

Mr. Irving and his friends stood on the wholly different ground of ignoring known evil in which they were consciously involved, till God should interfere in power and blessing. This, however seemingly humble after a human sort, was neither faith nor holiness; failure as to which was not repented of as sinful, but virtually set to God's account. Moral responsibility was thus ignored and shirked. They did not judge but accept the unbelief of Christendom in the ever-abiding presence of the Holy Spirit, and prayed (like the evangelicals) for a fresh outpouring; as if God's word were void, and His church had no longer that divine indwelling, without which it is not God's house, and in truth cannot be His church at all. This was to judaize the assembly. For it is confessed by all who look for the Lord's premillennial advent that the Jews etc. in that day are to be the object of the Spirit's latter rain on the earth.

But the Holy Spirit never left the church since Pentecost. Had it been true, Christ had no longer a body on earth united to Him the Head in heaven. And the error was far more serious in character and consequence for those who professed to be awaiting the Lord from above, as their habitual hope. Others who shared like unbelief meant little more by His outpouring than greatly increased blessing in their own souls, or in conversion at home and abroad. Not so those who (judging Christendom by the light of the word, with the Lord's coming immediately before them) were as loud as men could be in denouncing the various denominations as only so many streets of Babylon. Yet from their incurably vicious starting-point, those who were crying loudly for the Spirit to come down afresh were as urgent as the idolaters of succession and tradition, that men who saw the abominations they shared should remain where they were till God appeared in power, as their selfish unbelief expected. Even after they had had certain strange manifestations in Port Glasgow, London, etc., they still held to the same evil principle, and insisted on all over whom they had influence, that none should abandon the evil under which they groaned, till they had received manifestations of power like their own. Obedience, the uniform principle of the christian's life, as it was in all perfection seen only in our Lord, was not at all in their counsels and conduct, but really though unwittingly denied by them.

It was just about the same time that God began to impress on some of His children, solemnly and practically, that we are called to holiness, not individually alone, but congregationally; that any other ecclesiastical principle surrenders in truth all genuine claim to consistency with His will about His assembly on earth; that waiting for divine manifestations is a vain excuse for tampering with the evil we allow from day to day; and that in fact we have the personal presence of the Spirit, irrevocable while the church is here below, to know and act on His word. So that the unbelief of that plea is as plain as its unholiness. The abuse of 1 Corinthians, and of the seven Apocalyptic Epistles to justify continuance in flagrant evil is a perversion which all corrupt systems have shared. No upright christian ought to be ensnared by it; he might be unable to unravel the sophistry of the special pleader for going on with iniquity; but surely the Spirit who dwells in him testifies that to employ God's word for associating His children with evil that He hates is, and must be, from beneath.

Herein it is evident that the Irvingite statements are as inconsistent with themselves as they are with scripture, and thus betray their hollow character, to say the least, human, and wholly unreliable, their egregious pretensions notwithstanding. They do not absolutely deny that the Holy Spirit dwelt in some measure or way in the saints since primitive apostolic days; but they arrogate to themselves as their peculiar blessing, and exclusively to be enjoyed under the authority of their apostolate, "the restored Comforter." Now it is striking to read how scripture puts scorn on this self-exalting claim of theirs. For it is precisely in speaking of the Comforter that the apostle John gives our Lord's assurance that the Father would give that other Paraclete "that He may he with you for ever" (John 14: 16). Their notion of His restoration impeaches Christ's authority and the truth of scripture. If the Lord, if the scripture, is true, as every christian believes, the so-called Catholic Apostolics are false. But they in fact as little with themselves as with God's word. For they do allow that the gifts or manifestations of the Spirit, the ministrations of the Lord, and the workings or energisings or the Father are is identified their Persons; that if one fails, so proportionately do the others; and that it is the Father's energising which raised up Christ that quickens the soul. But if this be true, was there no soul thus born of God between the apostolic age, and the apostles of Newman Street? If souls were so born, what is the value of teachings and pretensions?

The truth is, that, with all their boldness of assumption and haughty titles, these men have not the courage of their convictions. For if a word of prophecy forbade any other name than that of the Catholic Apostolic Church, as Dr. Norton states (The Restoration, etc., p. 159), it is idle to say, "we arrogate to ourselves nothing, for we do not appropriate it in any exclusive sense." Common honesty concludes that they thereby arrogate to themselves everything of value. If there were an atom of truth in their doctrine of a restored Comforter, and of a restored apostolate, they most logically appropriate the one body of Christ to their party. The ever-abiding Comforter is as essential on earth, as Christ the exalted Head in heaven, to the perpetuity of the church here below till Christ comes; and the special boast of Irvingism, that they, and they only, have the Comforter restored, is mere folly and falsehood, which are so glaring that one wonders not at their toning down their language in public, whatever they may utter among the initiated. Let their "sealed" ones answer whether they do not in private, and in the most, exclusive sense, appropriate more than title or name common to all.

CHAPTER 1.C - EARLY HISTORY.

In tracing the first manifestations of that which issued in the establishment of this society, two publications furnish considerable help. One is Dr. R. Norton's "Restoration of Apostles and Prophets; in the Catholic Apostolic Church (London: Bosworth and Harrison, 215, Regent Street, 1861)," the other, and far earlier pamphlet, "Narrative of Facts, characterizing the Spiritual Manifestations in members of Mr. Irving's congregation, and other individuals in England and Scotland, and formerly in the writer himself. By Robert Baxter. Second Edition, etc. London: James Nisbet, Berners Street, 1833." The "Morning Watch" (7 vols. 8vo.), which changed its publisher from J. Nisbet with whom it appeared in March 1829, to James Fraser for vol. iv., closing somewhat abruptly in 1833, will afford illustrative matter; for it was therein that the chief men made their first public stand and defence, as it was there that their heterodoxy was keenly defended, though broached, taught, and circulated very fully and in every form elsewhere. Among the various authorities I have writings of their accepted apostles, prophets, angels, etc. Nor must one omit to name the Rev. R. Miller's History and Doctrines of Irvingism, etc. (2 Vols. cr. 8vo., London. C. Kegan Paul & Co., 1, Paternoster Square, 1878), which presents a very full and painstaking account of the system, with such a judgment of it as might be expected from a clergyman of decided Anglican views.

Mr. M. devotes four preliminary chapters to (1) predisposing causes, (2) Edward Irving, (3) early meetings at Mr. Drummond's (Albury), and (4) the early prophesyings and tongues in Scotland. Though interesting we may pass these over and come to the utterances in London, which followed two things gravely to be weighed: continual prayers for the outpouring of the Spirit; and Mr. Irving's heterodoxy on the humanity of Christ, as fallen like every other's, save that He never sinned. Dr. N. devotes his first two chapters (pp. 1-71) to what he calls "the outpouring of the Spirit of God in Scotland," and "in England"; as in the second (p. 40) he does not disguise the connection of the movement with Mr. Irving's doctrine that the Saviour assumed fallen human nature in the virgin's womb.

Mrs. Cardale, wife of a London solicitor (of whom more anon), was, it seems, the first in London to speak in a tongue and prophesy; as did afterwards his sister (E.C.), and a Miss Hall who afterwards recanted and left them with an humbling confession. The late Mr. B. Noel refused his sanction and exposed the delusion, which drove the family away, till, finding little more countenance from another clergyman, they betook themselves to Mr. I. Mr. Taplin, a clergyman's son, who attended Mr. I's early and late prayer-meetings for the outpouring of the Spirit, was the first, after some six months' perseverance, to burst on them one morning as with a cras-cran-cra-crash of thunder when beginning to read Isa. 43, following the tongue with the English words, "Jehovah, hear us." Mr. I. at once gave thanks to God for thus answering their cry! The next morning, when Ezek. 28 was read, Dr. N. tells us that the same superhuman voice was heard: — "It is thou, O Britain; thou art the anointed cherub." The third morning the same voice burst forth (while one of the young men was praying to God to come down and help them) in these words, "The Lord hath come down. He is in the midst of you. His eye hath seen, His heart hath pitied the affliction of His people, and He will deliver them. He will not leave any behind."

Females spoke as yet only in private houses. But on Oct. 16, 1831, Miss Hall left her seat during morning service, went into the vestry, and was heard speaking there. An interview ensued when the service was over, when she so spoke that Mr. I. groaned under her exhortation, and on that evening confessed publicly to the congregation his guilty holding out, and thus prepared them for whatever might be spoken in power, that God's gifts might be thankfully received and His voice be not driven away! The moment he ceased speaking, says Dr, N., "a voice that seemed to rend the roof burst from Mr. T—, first in a tongue, and then in the following words:– 'Why will ye flee from the voice of God? The Lord is in the midst of you. Why will ye flee from His voice? Ye cannot flee from it in the day of judgment.' When order was restored, Mr. Irving told the people that they had been alarmed by what had often pierced his own heart; it was the voice of the living God. He solemnly exhorted all, and concluded with thanksgiving that the Lord had at length prevailed" (pp. 48, 49).

The following Sunday infidels among others attended. Mr. I's subject was antichrist, and the utterance drew out a tumult of hissings and hootings. Under the horror of such a scene Mr. I. intimated his wish for "the gifted" to remain away from the evening service, but regretted it when said, and only carried this out one Lord's day, giving license more than ever afterwards. The trustees therefore intervened and ejected him in the spring that followed; as indeed such proceedings were intolerable in the eyes of sober Presbyterians, to whose discipline and policy he was yet responsible. Mr. I. however, independent as he was in his bearing toward other christians, seemed spell-bound before the gifted men and women. There were moments when he deeply felt their iron heel, only to fall under their commands more and more deeply. It is a painful and humiliating story. But for their unhallowed influence Mr. I. would probably have seen it his duty to have given up, not the Regent Square Chapel only, but Presbyterianism. But the spirit at work perverted and paralysed an otherwise honest mind and noble heart. By the Presbytery of Annan, which had ordained him in 1802, he was tried and deprived in 1832 for his false doctrine, and died a worn-out old man at forty-two in Glasgow, Dec. 8th, 1834.

For years before Mr. I's death, and in high estimation, not only for correct piety, but among the "gifted," stood Mr. Baxter, to whose "Narrative" we may now profitably turn. One can understand how godly souls were moved by the sight, on the one hand, of infidelity coming in like a flood, on the other, of Christendom's self-complacency, whether in its irregular activities, or in its Pagan-Jewish forms and ceremonies. Then all alike started with the unbelieving thought that the Holy Spirit needed to be poured out afresh; which directly exposed to a snare of the enemy. An answer from God could only come to the prayer of faith. Had they before Him sought to cease from all that grieved the Spirit, and hindered their subjection to the Lord in devoted obedience of His word, how blessed had it been for them, how full of honour to Christ!

Mr. B. (a few months after writing the "Layman's Appeal" on behalf of The English Establishment, then beginning to totter under the strokes which will never cease till the end of its enemies is accomplished) was one of those who longed greatly and prayed much for such an outpouring, as he tells us himself. "When I saw, as it seemed to me, proof that those who claimed the gifts were walking honestly, and that the power manifested in them was evidently supernatural, and moreover bore testimony to Christ come in the flesh, I welcomed it as the work of God, though it was long before I publicly spoke of it ......

"At this period I was by professional arrangements called up to London, and had a strong desire to attend at the prayer-meetings which were then privately held by those who spoke in the power and those who sought for the gift. Having obtained an introduction I attended; my mind fully convinced that the power was of God, and prepared, as such, to listen to the utterances. After one or two brethren had read and prayed, Mr. T—* was made to speak two or three words very distinctly, and with an energy and depth of tone which seemed to me extraordinary; and it fell upon me as a supernatural utterance, which I ascribed to the power of God, the words were in a tongue I did not understand. In a few minutes Miss E. C. broke out in an utterance in English, which, as to matter and manner and the influence it had upon me, I at once bowed to as the utterance of the Spirit of God. Those who have heard the powerful and commanding utterance need no description; but they who have not may conceive what an unnatural and unaccustomed tone of voice, an intense and rivetting power of expression — with the declaration of a cutting rebuke to all who were present, and applicable to my own state of mind in particular — would effect upon me, and upon the others who were come together, expecting to hear the voice of the Spirit of God. In the midst of the feeling of awe and reverence which this produced, I was seized upon by the power; and in much struggling against it was made to cry out, and myself to give forth a confession of my own sin in the matter, for which we were rebuked; and afterwards to utter a prophecy that the messengers of the Lord should go forth, publishing, to the ends of the earth in the mighty power of God, the testimony of the near coming of the Lord Jesus. The rebuke had been for not declaring the near coming of Jesus; and I was smitten in conscience, having many times refrained from speaking of it to the people, under the fear that they might stumble over it and be offended.

*Here is the late Dr. McNeile's judgment. "I heard Mr. Taplin, and what I heard was this. I write it in all seriousness before God, without scoff, or sneer, or ridicule; but simply and bona fide descriptive of what I heard. It was neither more nor less than what is commonly and vulgarly called jargon, uttered ore rotunda and mingled with Latin words, among which I distinctly heard, more than once, amamini, amaminor.

"The same gentleman afterwards read the first chapter of the First Epistle of Peter, in a sort of unnatural recitative, which, as I was informed, was reading in the Spirit. That is, as they define it, it was not he who read, but the Holy Ghost in him, merely using the voice and lips of the man, as an organ of utterance unto men, On this supposition, the reading might have been expected to be perfect indeed. My ear was struck by deviations from our Authorised Version. I had a Greek Testament in my hand, and perceived at a glance that the deviations were palpably incorrect. That Mr. Taplin should make a mistake in his reading, might be very natural; but that the Holy Spirit, speaking by the physical organs of Mr. Taplin, should misrepresent the holy Scriptures, was more than I could receive. I can truly say, that my predominant feeling on the occasion alluded to was astonishment at the possibility of men of mind and education, or even of common sense, being for a moment deluded by such paltry and profane absurdities. Before I left the house I plainly declared my judgment in the matter to Mr. Irving. His reply was strange, and highly characteristic of the system: but it was private, and I do not feel at liberty to quote it" (Mr. N.'s Letters on the Church, pp. 111-113, 1834).

"I was overwhelmed by this occurrence. The attainment of the gift of prophecy, which this supernatural utterance was deemed to be, was with myself and many others — a great object of desire. I could not therefore but rejoice at having been made the subject of it; but there were so many difficulties attaching to the circumstances under which the power came upon me, and I was so anxious and distressed lest I should mistake the mind of God in the matter, that I continued many weeks weighed down in spirit and overwhelmed. There was in me at the time of the utterance very great excitement. and yet I was distinctly conscious of a power acting upon me beyond the mere power of excitement. So distinct was this power from the excitement that, in all my trouble and doubt about it, I never could attribute the whole to, excitement. Conceiving, as I had previously done, that the power speaking in the speakers was of God, I was convinced the power in me was the same power; and I regarded the confession which was wrung from me to be the same thing as is spoken of in 1 Cor. 14, where it is said, 'If all prophesy,' etc. It seemed to be so with me: I was unlearned; the secret of my heart was manifest; and I was made, by a power unlike anything I had ever known before, to fall down and acknowledge that God was among them of a truth" (pp. 3-6).

After detailing some further experience tending to confirm his impressions, Mr. B. proceeds (p. 8), "I am thus particular in explaining these circumstances that I may accurately show how unequal we are, in our own strength to stand before God; and how rapidly we may fall from all our convictions and views of truth, if our God should see fit, in judgment for our sins, to leave us for a season to the influence of a seducing spirit. From this period for the space of five months I had no utterance in public; though, when engaged alone in private prayer, the power would come down upon me, and cause me to pray with strong crying and tears for the state of the church.

"On one occasion, about a month after I had received the power, whilst in my study endeavouring to lift up my soul to God in prayer, my mind was so filled with worldly concerns that my thoughts were wandering to them continually. Again and again I began to pray, and before a minute had passed, I found that my thoughts had wandered from my prayer-book again into the world. I was much distressed at this temptation, and sat down, lifting up a short ejaculation to God for deliverance; when suddenly the power came down upon me, and I found myself lifted up in soul to God, my wandering thoughts at once rivetted, and calmness of mind given me. By a constraint I cannot describe, I was made to speak — at the same time shrinking from utterance and yet rejoicing in it. The utterance was a prayer that the Lord would have mercy upon me and deliver me from fleshly weakness, and would graciously bestow upon me the gifts of His Spirit, the gift of wisdom, the gift of knowledge, the gift of faith, the working of miracles, the gift of healing, the gift of prophecy, the gift of tongues, and the interpretation of tongues; and that He would open my mouth and give me strength to declare His glory.

"This prayer, short almost as I have now penned it, was forced from me by the constraint of the power which acted upon me; and the utterance was so loud that I put my handkerchief to my mouth to stop the sound that I might not alarm the house. When I had reached the last word I have written, the power died off me, and I was left just as before, save in amazement at what had passed, and filled, as it seemed to me, with thankfulness to God for His great love so manifested to me. With the power there came upon me a strong conviction, This is the Spirit of God: what you are now praying is of the Spirit of God, and must therefore be of the mind of God and; what you are now asking will surely be given to you. This conviction, strong as it was at the moment, was never shaken until the whole work fell to pieces. But from that day I acted in the full assurance that in God's own good time all these gifts would be bestowed upon me."

An important fact appears in Mr. B.'s "Narrative," p. 12. The early prayer-meeting had been instituted to pray for the General Assembly to be guided aright in judging Mr. I.'s doctrine, especially on the Human Nature of our Lord. In Jan. 1832 Mr. B. took part there "in the power." During this visit to London, at a private house, after Mrs. J. Cardale testified, Mr. B. gave out for two hours or upwards, with very little interval, "what we all regarded as prophecies concerning the church and the nation." "The power which then rested on me was far more mighty than before, laying down my mind and body in perfect obedience, and carrying me on without confusion or excitement. Excitement there might appear to a bystander, but to myself it was calmness and peace. Every former visitation of the power had been very brief; but now it continued and seemed to rest upon me all the evening. The things I was made to utter flashed in upon my mind without forethought, without expectation, and without any plan or arrangement: all was the work of a moment, and I was as the passive instrument of the power which used me. In the beginning of my utterances that evening some observations were addressed by me to the pastor [Mr. Irving] in a commanding tone; and the manner and course of utterance manifested in me was so far differing from those which had been manifested in the members of his own flock, that he was much startled," etc. (pp. 13, 14).

On the following morning, as we are a little after told, Mr. B. was made by the power to read and expound Rev. 11, declaring that the two witnesses were two offices (prophet and minister), the one already known in "the gifted," the other now for the first time manifested (in himself), and that this should be multiplied, as the days of their witnessing, were now begun. In the evening the declaration of the two witnesses was repeated; "and very distinctly we were commanded to 'count the days, one thousand three score and two hundred' — 1260 — the days appointed for testimony, at the end of which the saints of the Lord should go up to meet the Lord in the air, and evermore be with the Lord" (p. 17). It seems that Mr. B. used to think of some earthly sanctuary in and through the days of vengeance, but had experienced a sudden change of opinion more in accord with Mr. I., founded on Matt. 24 and Luke 21, his wife also having undergone a like charge, each unknown to the other (pp. 17, 18).

These scriptures were no right basis for a truth clearly provable by others; for they speak of the Lord's future dealings with Israel on earth, not with the saints for heaven. This was not divine guidance, But Mr. B. draws special attention (for "the words of the prophecy were most distinct) to count from that day (viz. 14th Jan. 1832) 1260 days, and (? or) three days and a half (Rev. 11: 11); and on innumerable other occasions by exposition and prophecy was the same thing again and again declared, and most largely opened" (pp. 18, 19). It was one of the many falsehoods to which the spirit there at work stood committed, which ought to have satisfied all, as it later convinced Mr. B. himself, that the work was not of God's Spirit. Other failures startled the prophet, but two ladies prophesied (pp. 20, 21) so as to show that the work in him was of God, and that he was not to be troubled by anything! "I found on a sudden, in the midst of my accustomed course a power coming upon me which was altogether new and unnatural and in many cases a most appalling utterance given to me — matters uttered by me in this power of which I had never thought, and many of which I did not understand until long after they were uttered — an enlarged comprehension and clearness of view given to me on points which were really the truth of God (though mingled with many things which I have since seen not to be the truth, but which then had the form of truth), etc. ....... It was manifest to me the power was supernatural; it was therefore a spirit. It seemed to me to bear testimony to Christ, and to work the fruits of the Spirit of God. The conclusion was inevitable that it was the Spirit of God; and, if so, the deduction was immediate that it ought in all things to be obeyed" (p. 22). Fresh and marked failures occurred; but Jer. 20: 7 was perverted to cover lies; or they were spiritualised to quiet conscience and to lull all into deeper deceit (pp. 23-28). "In the course of the same day and the day following, a prophecy was given to me that God had cut short the present appointment for ordinary ministers. It was added that this was the consequence of the setting up of the abomination of desolation. The Spirit of God having withdrawn from the church, the church was thenceforth desolate; and now God would endow men with the power of utterance in the Spirit, as the gift of distinguishing those set apart for the ministry"...... The plan was adopted of assigning the present day as the time of fulfilment on the Gentile church of those scriptures which speak of the setting up of the abomination of desolation" (Matt. 24, Luke 21) p. 29. Again, the reader will observe the judaising at work by misapplied scripture, the abomination being said to be the quenching of the Spirit, and the desolation, God's withdrawal of the Spirit. Thus 2 Thess. 2 was read mystically (which the popular commentators endorse), for the man of sin was the spirit, of the world in the church opposing the Spirit God would shortly pour down; as by and by he would be a more fearful manifestation in mimicry of Jesus as King of kings in the person of young Napoleon (pp. 30, 31).

Mr. B. gives the development of this working of Satan as an angel of light in pp. 32-55, some domestic, some as to his brother, a clergyman, drawn into the delusion (whose service Mr. B. undertook one Lord's day publicly in the power). Then came in the power an interpretation of Rev. 12 (pp. 56, 57), which made "the woman" mean the spiritual church, i.e., those partakers of the Spirit, and contradistinguished from the visible church seen in "the beast rising out of the earth!" The man child was the testimony by preaching Christ's Second Coming; and the fleeing into the wilderness meant the spiritual now to be cast out and separate since Jan. 14, 1832 for the 1260 days, as the war in heaven was now against the Spirit in the midst of the Lord's people! These of course would have the victory, but woe to the inhabiters of the earth and of the sea, i.e., the nations, and the churches, respectively, thenceforward given up to Satan's delusions and anger.

This, full of self-complacency, in every part false, was followed closely by the power on Mr. B. opening Rev. 8, as if "the third part" meant Protestant Christendom, the papal and the infidel being the other two parts, the last brought about by the late French Revolution. The hail meant the tories! once fertilising water, now frozen so as to beat down and hurt the grass, i.e., good order! and trees or settled institutions, which it once sustained., the fire was the liberal party! now as ardent and hot as the tories were congealed, but destructive and burning to make all things now.

On the following Sunday, as we are informed, the power moved him to declare the second trumpet to be God's judgment on the sea, or military state! as the earth was the civil. The mountain burning with fire was made the aggregation of liberalism in different forms of a side in collision with the military, so as to reduce even the army to a lifeless state, the ships being the commanders! the creatures the rank and file! and the third part still Protestant, and Great Britain as principal and head. The third trumpet was applied ecclesiastically, and the fourth governmentally, so that king and queen would reign, and the House of Lords be extinguished! Yet the Reform Bill would not pass; but when the people flew against the army, the iron Duke would be again Prime Minister, and fulfil the third and fourth trumpets. Think of this trumpery attributed to scripture, as well as to the power of the Spirit! The fifth trumpet would be the spoliation of the church, the sixth its complete overthrow and civil war, England being still the scene! and all these trumpets to be fulfilled, the first four within two years, and the others in the remaining year and a half (pp. 58-62). It is interesting to have the rare opportunity of a man confessing his false prophecies, and the sad spectacle of a religious body cleaving to them with a death-grip notwithstanding.

But even worse was at hand, following a blinding use of Eph. 6: 12 (p. 62). "The display of this truth was used to rivet me, and those with me, in the power of the enemy." It was Satan warning against Satan to keep them fast in his snare.

CHAPTER 1.C - EARLY HISTORY.

"About this time was consummated the masterpiece of doctrinal delusion in the development of 'the baptism of fire,' as it was thenceforth expounded by me," etc. (pp. 63, 64). I should rather say that a deeper foundation of evil was laid in the blasphemous assumption of fallen humanity in Christ's person. But however this be, "it was declared in utterance that the Lord would again send apostles, by the laying on of whose hands should follow the baptism of fire; and should give to the disciples of Christ the full freedom of the Holy Ghost, and full and final victory over the world" (p. 65). Fresh utterances followed, calling for enlarged confidence in the Lord's unbounded love, as before they had warned against Satan's snares as an angel of light, alike from the enemy to blind and turn them into his meshes. "At the interval of a day or two there followed an appalling utterance — that the Lord had set me apart for Himself — that from that day I was called to the spiritual ministry I must count forty days — that this was now well nigh expired — that for those forty days was it appointed I should be tried — that the Lord had tried me and found me faithful, and, having now proved in me the first sign of an apostle, patience (referring to 2 Cor. 12: 12), he would give to me the fulness of them in the gifts of signs, and wonders, and mighty deeds — that the Lord had called me to be an apostle; and, by the laying on of my hands and the hands of the other apostles whom the Lord should call, should the baptism of fire be bestowed. Then was added a repetition of the fearful oath given on the declaration of my call to the ministry, 'By Myself have I sworn, saith the Lord; by Myself have I sworn; by Myself have I sworn that I will not fail you, I will never leave nor forsake you.' I was commanded to go back to the church where my mouth wits opened, and on the fortieth day power should be given, the sick should be healed, the deaf should hear, the dead should be restored, and all the mighty signs and wonders should appear; apostles and ministers should be ordained, endowed, and., sent forth to the ends of the earth, to warn the world of the rapture of the saints, and make ready a people prepared for the Lord. It was declared that, when I again stood in the church in London, I should be made to rebuke them sharply; that they had sorely pained the Lord and hindered His work; ....... This full development took place on the Friday preceding the fortieth day, which would fall on a Wednesday. On the Sat. or Sunday came an utterance concerning Scotland — that that was a land of prophets; that the church there had greatly erred in rejecting the remembrance of the apostolic government, but God had used them as prophets to His church; that, because of this, the servant of that church in London (alluding to Mr. Irving) would not be given the apostolic office, but would be sent as a prophet to Scotland, to bear the Lord's warning before the carriage which would ensue from the cholera there. This utterance was accompanied with great power in the form of revelation, laying open to me that Mr. A. [Nicholas Armstrong, an Irish clergyman] would be ordained an apostle [which was done afterwards], and that the clergyman, to whom I have before alluded as a believer in the work, would be set apart for the apostolic office in London [which was certainly never done]; that I should be carried to foreign lands, after passing through a few parts of this land, and should only return at the end of the three years and a half, to join my family immediately previous to the tribulation" (pp. 66, 67).

It is needless to enlarge. It was all a tissue of pretentious falsehood with just enough appearance of truth to ensnare its votaries. The solemn fact is to be noted that the mouth-piece was a saint, more upright than most of his companions, yet a prey to delusion for a season, but soon mercifully delivered.

"On the morrow [i.e., the fortieth day of promise], at the morning prayer-meeting, nothing peculiar occurred. At breakfast several strangers to me were present, and having been made to give forth what seemed a most glorious prophecy concerning the endowments which would attend upon the spiritual (!) apostles whom the Lord would send forth; in how much they would exceed (!!) the endowments given to the twelve apostles (!!!), it was, etc. The day however passed without any manifestation of the signs and wonders which had been foretold. I was made in power to speak to Mr. A., declaring the Lord had called him to the office of apostle; that he would receive the endowment of an apostle, and speedily go to Ireland, to build the Lord a spiritual church there. On the disappointment of our hopes for the day we all seemed to pause, expecting that the succeeding day might realise what the present did not furnish" (pp. 69, 70).

Even so Satan kept up the delusion, not only by Mr. Baxter's public utterance on Thursday which wrought powerfully on Mr. Irving, but by a strange incident on the Saturday at breakfast in Mr. I's house. A stranger asked the Lord's will about something, when the power came on Mr. Baxter and referred in the answer to Mr. B.'s proceedings [for Mr. H. Bulteel of Oxford was for a while carried away by the delusion] with a warning against his rash course. There was nothing in the question, gentleman, or previous conversation, leading to Mr. B.; yet it turned out that it was the very thing that led to the difficulties as to which counsel was asked. No wonder, in detailing yet more (pp. 74, 75), that Mr. B. says, "Ah! how true is the word of God. 'If the light that is in you be darkness, how great is that darkness.' On the Sunday, when Mr. I. was noticing the unseemly behaviour of a young man who insisted on going out, the power came on Mr. B. with 'a most appalling cry, or rather shout' to the effect of a curse on the land, when Mr. I. pronounced this an example of Rev. 11: 5 (fire proceedeth out of their mouth), and that Mr. B. was called of God a spiritual minister, one of the witnesses, while he himself was but a fleshly minister, and unable to command discipline as Mr. B. did; and so it would be, when the full power of this ministry was come in, that discipline would be enforced" (p. 77).

But the snare of an evil spirit once yielded to is not so easily detected or broken, specially, we may suppose, in one accepted as a prophet, and more than a prophet, as an apostle elect. How God wrought to deliver we shall soon learn.

Several circumstances about this time happened and were used somewhat later of God to deliver Mr. Baxter from the evil spirit which was at work in him, accepted by Mr. Irving and his friends as the Spirit of God. The visit to London of a North American Indian chief may be mentioned as a plain fact, and not without instructive interest for its proof of the infatuation that reigned among thorn.

"One evening at Mr. P.'s [? Percival's] I met Mr. R. [? Ryerson] who had come from North America, and had been a missionary among the Indians there. I had in the country received an utterance and a revelation concerning America, which I was mentioning, when he declared his opinion that the American Indians were the lost ten tribes of Israel. He asked me if I had any teaching upon it. I told him I had not, and after hearing from him that one of their native chiefs was converted and now in London, I thought no more of it. A few mornings afterwards, at breakfast at Mr. Irving's, a conversation arose upon America, and I mentioned what had been revealed to me concerning it; and Mr. Irving asked, with reference to some utterance, whether I should conclude it referred to the ten tribes. I paused, for the power rested upon me, and after a little time it was distinctly revealed in the power, and I was made to utter that the American Indians were the lost ten tribes, and that they should, within the three years and a half appointed for the spiritual ministry, be gathered back into their own land, and be settled there before the days of vengeance set in. That the chief, who was now in London, was a chosen vessel of the Lord to lead them back — that he should be endowed with power from on high in all signs and mighty wonders, and should lead them back though in unbelief — that he should receive his power here, and be speedily sent forth to them. After this I went with Mr. Irving, Miss E. C. (who had been present at the foregoing prophecy), and several others, to a Jewish institution, where I was again made to reiterate to the Jews there present the promise of speedy restoration, and vengeance upon all their enemies.

"Being on another occasion assembled with some young men of Mr. Irving's congregation, the Indian chief, who had been alluded to, came in; and I was made in a most triumphant chant to address him as the vessel chosen of God, and to be endowed of God for the bringing back of his brethren. Afterwards I supped with him at Mr. R.'s. The chief did not believe in the message, or in the gifts, though he was apparently astounded; and, as I conversed with him, his countenance and tout ensemble was so utterly foreign to my idea of a Jew, and so strongly of the Tartar cast, that my confidence in my prophecy was shaken, and I was quite miserable under the fear that I had been mistaken and deluded in the matter. However, my conscience was clear of all wilful mistake, and I resisted the fear as a temptation, though exceedingly tried by it. I hinted it to no one, and sought counsel of no one; but I was relieved from my doubt in a most extraordinary way — a way which might be called accidental, did not the very frequent occurrence of such things in the midst of the working of the power, under which I and others were walking, show that it was much more. On the following or next succeeding morning, as I was walking from church with Miss E. C., she, without any reference on my part to the subject, alluded to the prophecy, and said to me, 'It is very remarkable that when you spoke about the ten tribes the other morning, whilst you were pausing the power was so strong and so distinct upon me, I was ready to give the very utterance you gave, and the whole was before my mind as distinct as if I had spoken it.'

"This quite dispelled my doubts. I thought I could not have mistaken the mind of the Spirit, since the same communication was made to her at the same time. Thus were my doubts in this instance removed; and were I to multiply instances, even beyond what may occur in the narrative, I should only more largely confirm the fact of the subtle lying in wait of the enemy, ready by signs and workings (so far as power was committed unto him) to remove doubts, and cancel difficulties, and bring us anew into a state of unsuspecting confidence in the spirit which swayed us. I will also point to this simultaneous action of the power upon Miss E. C. and myself, as an instance of what continually occurred, and as a proof of the identity of the origin of the manifestations in both. The subject of this prophecy was so far new to me, that I had never had the question of the Indians being the ten tribes brought before me, old as it is in the literary world; and even when Mr. R. mentioned it, it made no perceptible impression upon my mind; nor did I to my knowledge ever think any more of it until it arose again at Mr. Irving's. What Miss E. C.'s previous impressions were I know not; but certainly the prophecy developed no previous impressions formed in my own mind, but was to me both a novelty and a difficulty.

"The complete failure of this prophecy is very manifest. The chief went away to his countrymen an unbeliever in the work; and none of the powers have been at all manifested" (Narrative, pp. 80-82).

But there was like failure about that which affected all nearer home. "Not to dwell too long upon minor incidents I was weighed down under the delay of the fulfilment of the prophecy concerning the apostolic endowments on the fortieth day. Prayer was made daily for me in Mr. Irving's church, in obedience to the injunction given by Miss E. C. on the evening before alluded to; and Mr. Irving did not hesitate to pray publicly before his people that I might receive the full endowment of an apostle. To add to my distress, I had heard from my friend in the country,* who had spoken in power and received directions to go and perform a miracle of healing, stating, that in fasting and prayer he had gone upon the errand, but had failed to perform any miracle; that he concluded he had spoken by a lying spirit, and could no longer believe we were speaking by the Spirit of God. My prophecy concerning the fortieth day had been bruited about in my own neighbourhood, and its failure, together with that of my friend, had had such an effect, that my wife, and greater part of the believers in the country, abandoned it as a delusion. My faith in it was, however, not the least shaken. I saw the fiery trial I had to go through in endeavouring to uphold what I considered to be the truth in the face of such seeming failures; and yet I confidently trusted God would make manifest His mercy and power in the midst of it.

[* This was the clergyman who spoke in the power in his own house on the evening when the christian armour was expounded. "In the few seconds I could speak to him, he told me he had had a revelation, accompanied with a very powerful utterance, in singing, directing him to go on the following Wednesday to perform a miracle of healing upon a poor cripple who had for many years been bedridden. When he had told me this, the power came greatly on me," etc. Narrative p. 68.]

"I continued yet a day or two with them; and one morning calling upon Mrs. J. C., she asked me whether I had any teachings upon the propriety or impropriety of prayer-meetings formed of ladies alone; one of which had been some months established, and she and the other gifted persons had been in the habit of attending. I was made in power to declare they were not profitable — to rebuke her for not having sooner discerned it, and to bid her go, as they met that morning, and declare to them what had now been spoken. She carried the message to the meeting, and they all at once agreed to abandon it, but desired to go to prayer, to return God thanks that they had so long been kept in peace; when the power came on Miss E. C., as she afterwards told me, and she was made to rebuke them for not more implicitly obeying the word of the Lord given by me, and so bid them separate without prayer.

"At the same time that Mrs. J. C. consulted me as to the ladies' meetings, Mr. J. C. remarked, concerning the select prayer-meetings at Mr. Irving's church, that he had often found great heaviness upon him at them. I was then made to declare Mr. Irving had erred in making them select — that they ought to be open to all. This was conveyed to Mr. Irving, and he at once acknowledged the error, and opened the meetings generally to all. I may here mention that on a former occasion Mr. Irving had consulted me upon the same subject, and had received a like rebuke. The reason he made them select was, that he found the power more manifested when those who believed in it as of the Spirit of God were alone present; and on the other hand found in a miscellaneous assembly the power was quenched. It was told him in power from my lips that he was offending in this, by giving occasion to the enemy to say the manifestations would not bear the light; and, furthermore, by shutting up the manifestation of God's love he was practically acting as though God did not intend the message of His love and pardon to be made known to all men. He seemed at the first rebuke to yield to the reasoning, but he did not act upon it; and it was not till the second rebuke was conveyed by Mr. J. C. to him, that he publicly declared to the congregation that he had received such a rebuke and changed his plan. I understand that now he has again under another name restored select meetings, and I am deeply grieved to find it so. For here in the midst of minds duly prepared Satan can gradually develop the subject of his delusion, and going on step by step can unwarily lead his victims into extravagance, first of doctrine, and next of conduct, which they themselves would without such gradual preparation shudder to contemplate. So long as their proceedings are open to the public eye, there will always be some warning and remonstrance set before them upon the development of any mew device. When shut up to themselves, the mind is gradually darkened, and the delusion becomes daily stronger, until they are ripe for each successive stage of the mystery of iniquity. As a proof of this, I may allude to the fact that they are now avowedly exercising apostolic functions, without pretending to have the signs of an apostle, in signs and wonders and mighty deeds; and the individual who has been thus set apart for apostolic office prays in their meetings in the following strain: — 'Lord, am I not thine apostle? Yet where are the signs of my apostleship? Where are the wonders and mighty deeds? O Lord, send them down on me,' etc. He has as an apostle, and in the name of an apostle, laid hands on several, and ordained them to the ministerial office, as evangelists and elders; yet it is not pretended that the manifestation of the baptism of the Holy Ghost follows with the laying on of his hands.

"When I was amongst them, we were all of one mind, that the apostolic office could not be exercised until the signs of an apostle in signs, wonders and mighty deeds, were manifest in the individual claiming the apostolic office; and ware also of one mind that the baptism with the Holy Ghost would attend the laying on of the hands of the apostle. It appears in their private meetings this further depth of 'folly' has been added to the 'folly' to which I wickedly introduced them. And they are so hardened under it, that they do not now hesitate publicly to declare it. Coupled with this also is the further 'folly' of Mr. Irving's claiming, as angel of the church, authority over the apostle; and the apostle is put under subjection to the pastor, or angel, as he designates himself. Surely in these things is a darkness that may be felt. We may however trust that the word of the Lord has reached them, which declares, concerning the deceivers of the last days (2 Tim. 3: 9), They shall proceed no further; for their folly shall be manifest unto all men. May God graciously make it manifest to themselves.

"But to resume the narrative: my professional engagements in town being ended, I purposed going out; but before I did so, I mentioned to Miss E. C., as well as to Mr. T., the full circumstances under which I was sent up to them. Mr. T. was made almost immediately to declare in the power, with reference to the powers, and signs, and miracles which were promised, 'Ye shall do it — ye shall do it'! Miss E. C. spoke once or twice in the power, and I gathered I ought to wait till the morrow at least. One utterance which she gave was, 'Wait and pray, that the glory of the Lord may burst forth in the midst of the congregation,' with some other words referring to the congregation then assembled, and leading me to the full expectation that on that very evening, in the congregation there met, the power with signs and wonders would be given. As, however, I went out of the, vestry, an extraordinary visitation of darkness, which I had experienced on more than one occasion when expectations were not realised, came over me, laying my mind under the severest darkness. Nothing whatever occurred on that evening in the congregation, and I returned to my hotel. On the morrow I was made at the morning meeting to give a long and severe rebuke to the congregation, declaring they hindered the work of the Lord, and calling upon them to humble themselves because of it. Alas! little did I think what it was which was hindered.

"At breakfast at Mr. Irving's the closing scene of my unhappy ministrations among them was no less remarkable than mysterious. Very great utterance had for several mornings been given me at family prayers there, and particularly beautiful and comforting expositions of scripture were given from the power. This morning a clergyman (who, I have since understood, was from Ireland, and had come especially to enquire, favourably disposed towards the work, but startled at the doctrines) was present. He was talking to Mr. Irving, but I did not hear his observations. Presently the sister of Miss E. C., who sat by me, said, 'That gentleman is grieving the Spirit.' I looked, and saw a power resting on Miss E. C., and presently she spoke in rebuke; but I did not gather more from it than that the gentleman had been advancing something erroneous. Mr. Irving, then began to read a chapter, to which I had been made in power to direct him; but instead of my expounding as before, the power resting upon me revealed there were those in the room who must depart. Utterance came from me that we were assembled at an holy ordinance to partake of the body and blood of Christ, and it behoved all to examine themselves, that they might not partake unworthily. None going out, I was made again and again, more and more peremptorily, to warn until the clergyman in question, and an aged man, a stranger, had gone out, when Mr. Irving proceeded in reading the chapter, 'I am the man that hath seen affliction by the rod of His wrath,' etc., and I was made to expound as usual, with great setting forth of God's love in the midst of the trials of His people, and with great promises of blessing. It was greatly to my own comfort, and I believe also to that of others. I often prayed in the power, and when all was concluded I was made in power to declare to Mr. Irving that he had seen in this an example of the ministration of the supper of the Lord, as he had before seen the example of baptism; that he must preach and declare them to his flock, for speedily would the Lord bring them forth; that the opening of the word was the bread, and the indwelling and renewing presence of the Spirit, the wine the body and blood of the Lord; and the discerner of spirits would not permit the unbelievers to mingle with the faithful, but they would be driven out as he had seen. Then in power I was made to warn all of the snares of the enemy, and concluded with the remarkable words, Be not ye like unto Peter, 'I will smite the Shepherd, and the sheep shall be scattered.' It is not a little remarkable, that upon the call being made for all to depart who did not examine themselves and receive the word spoken in power as the word of God, the clergyman I before alluded to professed his faith in the work, and I was made to tell him he was doubting and was not confirmed in it. And I have since heard that he was in so much doubt that, when he came to consider, he abandoned the work as delusion. Whilst under the awe of the presence of the supernatural power, he was so confounded or overcome as to profess full faith in it, and believe himself to be really receiving it. I had not any previous idea that on this morning the ministration of the Lord's Supper would be given, nor had I until this was set before me any conception what its spiritual ministration would be.

"In the previous part of the morning Miss E. C. had been made to speak in power to me, to the effect that I was shrinking from the cross, in being pained at going back into the country with the endowment promised. This had weighed with me, and my mind was made up to return. After the noon-day service, before all the congregation were departed, she asked me if I intended to go home. On my telling her I did, she was made in power to address me, which though in a subdued tone, was perceived by the congregation remaining, who immediately stopped. Her message was, that I was right in returning home; that the Lord was well pleased with me that I had been content to walk in darkness; that I had been faithful to the Lord, and the Lord would be faithful to me; that I should return and pass into deep waters, but yet for a little time, and I should behold the glory and rejoice. Mr. Irving then informed the remaining congregation, that it appeared to be the will of the Lord that I should depart for a little season, and prayed that I might speedily return with full powers of an apostle to impart unto them the gift for which they were longing" (pp. 86-89).

These minute particulars are here given, as more will follow of a witness not only reliable, but with the best possible means of information, before the seal of secrecy was imposed, as it soon was sought to be, on all, of prime importance to be known in order to a sound judgment. Grace secures that God's children have ample warning of the enemy's work.

CHAPTER 1.D - EARLY HISTORY.

"I accordingly returned into the country deeply depressed, though quite unshaken in my faith of the work. The difficulties which had been thrown in my way were great; but I trusted the Lord would overrule them all, and I resumed my public teaching as before. My wife having relapsed into unbelief of the manifestations, my mouth was not at all opened in private, until by another remarkable dealing her confidence in it was restored. On the fourth day after my return, I had arranged to begin a public morning prayer-meeting; and as it gave her such pain, I did not mention the subject to her. She however seemed to have an impression that something particular was about to be done, and questioned me so closely that I was obliged to tell her. She was both irritated and distressed, and, in the fullest conviction that the work was a delusion, did all she could to dissuade me from having the prayer-meeting.

"I had however only left her a few minutes, to proceed to the prayer-meeting, before a power came upon her in the form of revelation, calming all her irritation and distress, and in a moment filling her mind with peace, giving to her a reason why the powers and signs and wonders were not bestowed upon the fortieth day, and assuring her of great blessings from the Lord and a speedy fulfilment of what had been prophesied. It was also told her as a sign to prove this revelation to be of God, that as soon as I came home, when she came to me, I should say, 'Speak, speak;' and then after she had told me the revelation, I should speak to her in the power, and beginning, 'It is of the Lord,' should fully explain what had been revealed to her. When I came home, I thought she seemed much troubled, and, unconscious of what had occurred, I said to her, 'Speak, speak.' Upon this she told me the revelation, not saying anything of my speaking afterwards; and when she had told me, the power immediately came upon me to utterance, and I was made to say in great power, 'It is of the Lord,' and then to open and explain it. This so fully concurring with what had been revealed cleared away the doubt which the non-fulfilment of the former promise had created; and she again fully yielded to the persuasion that the work was of God.

"In the revelation allusion had been made to the case of Miriam (Num. 12: 10); and in the utterance which followed it was declared, that the power was not given on the fortieth day, because the church in London had failed in love toward the visible church which God had cast off. It had some time before been declared that the separation between myself and my wife, which the Lord had ordained, was as a type and figure of the Lord's casting off the visible church and the visible ordinances. Now it was further declared that God was zealous for those whom He had so cast off; and as the camp of the Israelites could not proceed in its journeyings until Miriam was brought in again, so now was the work of the Lord stayed, and the power in signs and wonders delayed until the heart of the church was turned toward those whom the Lord had made desolate. And then followed in the power a most emphatic declaration that on the day after the morrow we should both be baptised with fire: so should we be joined together in the bond of the Lord's baptism, the Lord also joining Himself to His desolate church again, by bringing forth visibly a spiritual church with spiritual ordinances in fulness of power and gifts; that had the church in London manifested greater love, this baptism and power would have been given there; but now it should be given here, and on the day named we should receive it, and thenceforward would the work proceed in swiftness and not again tarry. Most glorious prophecies, as they seemed to be, followed these declarations, and great fulness of development as to the constitution of the spiritual church: and its progress through the earth to make ready a people prepared for the Lord.

"We were overjoyed with these communications, and, in fulness of hope and confidence, awaited the day of fulfilment. The interval was filled up by very powerful and frequent utterances in interpretation of scripture, and in confirmation of the work. The day named arrived, and in the evening an utterance from the power, 'Kneel down, and receive the baptism of fire.' We knelt down, lifting up prayer continually. Nothing however ensued. Again and again we knelt, and again and again we prayed, but day by day for a long time we continued in prayer and supplication, continually expecting the baptism. My wife gradually concluded the whole must be delusion, and ceased to follow it. For six weeks, however, I continued unshaken to seek after it, but found it not.

"The baptism of fire was fully explained in utterance to be the burning out of the carnal mind, and subduing every sinful lust of the flesh; so that those who received it should be freed from the law of sin, and thenceforth freed from Satan's temptations through the flesh; that the fulness of the presence of the Holy Ghost should accompany it, and thenceforth those receiving it should walk in the fulness of spiritual light and life, and repel every assault of the enemy — should walk in perfect holiness and be utterly free from sin; that the gifts of the Spirit would follow according to the office to which each individual was ordained of God, to the apostle in all fulness of gifts, and power, and signs, and mighty wonders, and to all other office-bearers in due measure; that it was a baptism specially reserved for the three years and a half of the last ministry upon earth, and during this period the ministers of the Lord would be borne about from place to place by the Spirit as Philip was. Bodily changes, it was also declared, would be wrought by the baptism; and it was especially declared, that, as a consequence of such changes, the marriage state would no longer be blessed with increase; and husbands and wives, sons and daughters, would thenceforward be called to the ministry, and devote themselves to the office of warning the world, until the expiration of the days of testimony should summon them to the glory of the Lord.

"From the time of my return from town the difficulties seemed on all sides to increase. A few days after I left him, Mr. Irving, forwarding a letter, added a few lines of his own, telling me how greatly they were encouraged and strengthened in London by my last visit, and stating how they looked forward to my return with the full powers of an apostle; but at the same time adding that Mr. F., who had spoken in power amongst us, had been found to speak by an evil spirit, Mrs. C. and Miss E. O. having been made so to declare. This troubled me greatly, for I have (? had) been made to declare to him his call to the spiritual ministry. He had also been present and spoke in power on the last morning of my presence at Mr. Irvings, when two persons were sent out; and where it was declared in the power that the Lord would not suffer an unbeliever or unclean person to be present at that holy ordinance, as it was called. Here were contradictions I could not explain away; and all I could do was to wait the Lord's teaching on it.

"Next, after an interval came a letter from Mr. Irving, which yet more perplexed me. He said, 'This moment the Lord hath sent me a very wonderful and wonderfully gracious message by our dear sister, Miss E. C., concerning the time which you have been made so often to put forth: rebuking me for having repeated it, and counselling me not to do it any more; declaring the word to be a true word, containing a mystery — declaring that the day is not known, and commanding me to write to you to say you must not repeat them in the flesh, but suffer the Spirit to say it how and when it pleaseth.' Mr. Irving, then added, 'Here I leave it without any comment whatever. I am not equal to the work of commenting upon these words of the Lord. I am content to walk in the darkness. The same message which said that the word you spake was true, said also that the day is not known, and that it is a mystery, and that you as well as myself had erred in repeating in the flesh this matter of the time. The Lord lead us aright.' I was amazed at this message, for constantly I had been made in power to declare the time, and to explain it, and to enforce it; and more than once I had been made to enjoin ministers publicly to preach it in the flesh, though they had no gift. I had then nearly fallen into the persuasion that my gift could not be a true gift, or that I had so mistaken the leadings of it as to be no more worthy to exercise it. But the recognitions and encouragements given me by Mrs. C. and Miss E. C. in London held me up against the conclusion. I went on speaking and preaching in power, and found the matter of the three years and a half as constantly in my mouth as ever. I could not refrain from speaking it; and yet, when any one asked me about it, I dared not to say anything in explanation, except in power, my mouth being shut by this extraordinary message from Miss E. C.

"A fact which came to my knowledge, after I abandoned the work, has served to give me some insight into the message. A sister of mine when in London, attending the private prayer-meetings before I ever spoke in power, heard several utterances from Miss E. C., in which she most emphatically pronounced that Christ would come at an hour when even His own people would not be looking for Him — that the time of His coming would not be known to His own people. I remember also, that when preaching in the power at Hampstead, I was made to declare the time in Miss E. C.'s presence. She, as we were returning, asked me whether the time had been clearly revealed to me. I saw she did not receive it; but she said no more about it. When I heard of the previous utterances, my inference was that she, having a remembrance of these utterances and feeling the contradiction which my utterances gave to them, was troubled in mind upon it, and that the message that was sent to me was a device of the enemy to lull the disquietude and reconcile the contradiction. The subtlety is indeed deep — recognising my prophecy as a truth, and yet setting it practically aside, by alleging it to contain a mystery, and therefore not fitted to be named except in the power. I mentioned this inference subsequently to Miss E. C., but she would not speak upon the subject.

"A little later came another blow. Intelligence was sent me, that Miss H., who had for months been received as a prophetess among them — (who had been the first to speak in the Sunday congregation, and whose speaking Miss E. C., on that occasion was made in power to declare ought to be heard; to whom also I in the power had spoken as a prophetess, and on a second occasion Miss E. C. had alluded as speaking of the Lord) — that she had by Miss E. C. and Mrs. C. been charged with feigning utterances, and they in power had pronounced that the whole work in her was of the flesh, and not of the Lord. I had heard her speak, and her utterance seemed to me at times as full and as clearly supernatural as Miss E. C.'s. She had also begun a prophecy, which Miss E. C. would take up and complete; and she would take up in power what Miss E. C. had begun; so as to cause Mr. Irving to remark how manifestly one Spirit spoke in both.

The particular occasion on which this charge and declaration was made against her did not at all lessen the difficulty. it will be remembered, I was made after the prophecy concerning the national fast to write it down, and send it to a member of the House, enjoining him to deliver it in the House of Commons, This message, after some deliberation, it was intended to deliver by reading the letter containing it. By some accident however the letter was mislaid, and it could not be done. Whilst I was in town, the letter was found; and I was consulted, whether reading the letter would be the proper method of delivering it, and it seemed to me it would not. The letter was shown to Miss E. C., and she in power declared to the effect that the member in delivering it might be made to speak in the power. We could not read positively whether it would without doubt be so; and I was in power made to say he might deliver in the power or without the power. Circumstances, of which I do not know the particulars, prevented its being delivered in the House until the night before the fast-day. For some short time previous to this night Miss E. had urged the member to deliver it, and on the previous night when he had been prevented, she said in the power, 'Satan has triumphed in its not being delivered.' When, however, the message had been delivered, Miss E. C., knowing Miss H. had spoken on giving it, rebuked her in power for it, and declared that the member had rushed before the Lord, in delivering it without waiting for the power. Upon this unfortunate message the two speakers came into collision, and Miss H. was pronounced a false prophetess. The rebuke however proved true in the matter of feigned utterances; for Miss H. acknowledged that, in two or three instances, she had meditated utterances before repeating them. She was smitten in conscience and bowed before the accusation; and I believe to this day she acknowledges the justice of the sentence against her, though in the particular utterance concerning the message, and in most others, she declares she did not at all premeditate. Explained in any way however, it was a most startling occurrence, as involving all of us in lack of discernment, and two of us in false testimony to her gift.

"Added to all this, the fast-day passed over; and notwithstanding all the prophecies marking it out as a day much to be remembered, and the day of the Lord's answer by fire, nothing had occurred upon it. Moreover, the servant girl, on whom it was declared the miracle of casting out a devil should be performed was recovered of derangement, and had gone out to service, these prophecies also failing. Upon my return to town I saw again the friend whose attempt to perform a miracle had failed, and was made instrumental, soon after we again met, in showing him a, gross error of judgment as another subject into which he had nearly fallen. This I believe added to the impression which the power had yet left upon him; and the arguments I used to convince him had such an effect that, though he never returned to a full unsuspecting credence, he again joined the work, and forbore all testimony against it. I was made on several occasions to speak in power to him, and declare that the message to perform the miracle was of the Lord, and only hindered by want of faith in the person on whom it was to be wrought, and that it should yet be fulfilled. These messages he seemed to receive as the word of God, and for some time his confidence seemed restored. But as the time was restored, and failures increased, he was again brought to discard it, though not satisfied that no work of God at all attended it. Since we both fully abandoned it, the person on whom the miracle was to be performed is dead, never having been in the least degree restored.

"Distressing as all these occurrences were, yet I dared not on account of them suffer myself to deny the work. The supernatural nature of it was so clear — the testimony to Jesus was so full — the outpouring of prayer, and, as it seemed to me, the leading towards communion with God, so constant in it, that I still could not condemn it, but treated every doubt as a temptation. I rested implicitly upon the text, 'Every spirit that confesseth Jesus Christ is come in the flesh is of God,' and felt assured that no spirit making that confession could be of Satan. I had heard the confession made several times by the spirit which spoke in myself and others; and, resting in the confession, I persuaded myself I was resting in the faithfulness of God, and that His faithfulness was a sure defence. Most true it is, the faithfulness of God will never fail; but God requires of us the exercise of watchfulness, and it is but provoking Him when we shut our eyes to the teaching He gives us, and continue to assert and pledge His faithfulness to a thing which we ought to have seen to be untrue or unsafe. In the case of Mr. F. the spirit in him confessed Jesus come in the flesh; and Miss H. also, when the other gifted persons had been called to confess, had herself given in power the confession equally with them. Thus then had it been shown us that the mere confession in words was not itself a proof of the spirit being of God; and this I ought to have seen, and to have searched more fully whether the spirit did really set out the truth as it is in Jesus, and not to have rested in the verbal confession.

"Whilst upon this point, it is necessary I should refer to a remarkable occurrence in Gloucestershire, which served to sustain my faith in the verbal confession as an unfailing trial of the spirit. In the latter end of the past year two children of a pious and exemplary clergyman there [a Mr. Probyn] had been made to speak by a supernatural power, They were twins, a boy and a girl, and only eight or nine years of age: children in whom nothing of a religious turn had been remarked. Their parents were unfortunately led to seek after the manifestations, believing them to be of the Spirit of God. From the time the mouths of the children were opened, their conduct seemed so much changed that they appeared most religious and devoted children. Their utterance was most astounding; beginning in the setting forth of Jesus, and calling to self-abasement before His cross; and preaching with such recital of scripture and such power of argument and exhortation as might be said to surpass many able ministers, and certainly quite out of the compass of children of their age and understanding. Having by this demonstration of power, of truth, and holiness, gained the confidence of their parents and friends, they were carried on to deliver prophecies of things which were coming to pass — then uttering commands to their parents and friends, and sending them here and there — denouncing the judgments of God upon the church and world, and setting a day for a particular manifestation of judgment.

"Shortly things were spoken by them which seemed to their parents contrary to scripture; and they were startled by an utterance forbidding to marry. This was so plainly the work of a false spirit, that their parents and friends were greatly distressed; and, though much awed by the influence which the power had obtained over them, they remembered they had forgotten the command, 'Try the spirits'; and they wished to try the spirit in the children by the scripture test. They accordingly called the boy and told him their doubts, and that they must try the spirits. The boy seemed to be much wrought upon by the power, and in the supernatural utterance said, 'Ye may try the spirits in men, but ye may not, try the spirits in children. Ye will surely be punished.' They however persisted. Though the father was so much agitated as not to be able to do it, yet the curate addressed the spirit in the child, and demanded in the words of scripture a confession that Christ was come in the flesh. Paleness and agitation increased over the child till an utterance broke from him, 'I will never confess it.' They were thus satisfied it was an evil power which spoke in him; and the curate went on to say, 'I command thee, thou false spirit, in the name of Jesus come out of the child. As the child afterwards described his feelings, he felt as though a coldness were removed from his heart and passed away from him. They told the child if he felt the power coming on him again to resist it; and several times he did so. Once, some time afterwards, from his mistaking something his parents had said to him, he did yield to it, and spoke supernaturally as before; but being corrected, and thenceforth resisting the power whenever it came, upon him, he was entirely freed from it. This narrative which I first saw in print has been confirmed to me by one who was eye-and-ear-witness of the whole. If any one should be inclined to doubt whether any supernatural agency has been manifested in the adults, and should be led to think excitement coupled with a fervid imagination is sufficient to account for all that has occurred in them, he will yet be compelled to acknowledge that, in these children at least, neither excitement nor imagination can account for it."

Dr. Norton in his "Restoration of Apostles and Prophets," chap. iii., pp. 74, 75, essays to explain away the damaging effect of this story, the truth of which he confirms in the main, though he lowers their age to "seven years," and adds that "they also described and manifested bodily influences, proving that some invisible power had possession of them. Living in a distant village, they had never witnessed anything supernatural, and could not have been excited by the conversation of their parents, who were from home at its beginning, but hastened to them on receiving intelligence of it." That the twins may have heard enough to excite them seems probable from the fact that their father was one of those who attended the Albury meetings, and could not be ignorant of, or uninterested in, the manifestations, good or ill, that had broken out in Scotland, and later on in England. The rest of the tale stands alike in both accounts; and the late Lord Rayleigh, who was there at the time, used to testify to the facts. Dr. N. makes the most of Mr. Irving's formal trial of his prophets on the receipt of this intelligence; but what could be the value of a test from one who was himself involved in positive and extreme heterodoxy?

CHAPTER 1.E - EARLY HISTORY.

It is easy to turn aside, and hard to recover; but God is faithful, as Mr. Baxter was to prove. "Continuing however in the exercise of their power, and in daily teaching and preaching the things which had been declared in power, I was providentially led to an examination of doctrines, for neglecting which at an earlier period I justly suffered what came upon me. At the recurrence of the monthly meeting for exposition of scripture, to which I have before alluded, the friend to whose turn it had fallen to choose the subject, chose this, The Word was made flesh, with the special view, as I believe, of eliciting the views which were held by those of us who believed in the power, he himself deeming it a delusion. I stated what, as far as I am conscious of my own mind, had always been my view, viz.: That Jesus took the fallen flesh, but took it free from the law of sin which we are all born under — by fallen flesh, intending the consequences of the fall, as it respects our outward relations, and the constitution of our frame — we having become unsuited to the world, and the world unsuited to us; and we having become subject to pain, sickness, and other infirmities of frame; whereas Adam was made suitable to all around him, and all the world was suitable to him; and the diseases and infirmities to which we are subjected, had no place in him. Many persons identify the idea of fallen nature with sin. The fall was certainly the consequence of sin, and we, in our fallen estate, are under the law of sin, which rules in all our members. But it is clear the consequences of past sins are distinct from sin itself; and it is very easy to understand that Jesus took our nature in that condition into which sin had brought it, and yet took it free from all sin — as free as Adam before his fall possessed it. Jesus came into a fallen world, and took part of flesh and blood with those whom He was not ashamed to call brethren, and subjected as that flesh and blood was to all weakness and infirmity; and yet He so took it that He took no stain of sin nor taint of corruption with it. Being conceived of the Holy Ghost, He took manhood of the substance of the Virgin, but took it pure, and free from all sin. The law of the flesh, or law of sin, which was in the substance of the virgin, was not in His substance; so that in Him there were no motions of the fleshly or carnal mind, as there are in all of us.

"This my friend fully assented to; but he charged Mr. Irving with holding the opposite view, and asserting that the law of the flesh, or law of sin, was in Jesus, and only kept down by the Spirit. I could not see this, but contended as my persuasion was, that Mr. Irving, by "sinful nature" meant no more than I meant by "fallen nature," and that my views were the same as Mr. Irving's After much discussion we parted, and I thought little more about it, until I received a letter from a member of Mr. Irving's church, making inquiries relative to the Indian chief and the prophecy of the Jews before detailed; and in this letter, by way of postscript, he added that he had just heard Mr. Irving expound the eighth chapter of Romans, and he gathered My. Irving's view to be that our Lord had the carnal mind, or law of sin, to contend with. My correspondent was troubled at this, and asked my opinion upon it. He had heard two utterances in power, which, put together, seemed to him conclusive that Jesus had not the carnal mind to keep down or contend with. One was from me on Mr. Irving's having asked whether Jesus was baptized with fire, the power answered, "No, He had nothing in Him to be burnt out." The other was from Mrs. C., who, explaining in power what the baptism by fire was, declared it should burn out the carnal mind.

"After this letter, I thought much on the matter; but my persuasion continued that Mr. Irving, did not hold the law of sin to be in Jesus. I was, however, in power, made to write to him on the subject, setting forth that the carnal mind was not in Jesus, and some other points alluded to. After this my mind was at rest upon it, under the assurance that, if there had been any error in his view, it would be corrected from the message I had been made to write to him.

"God, however, graciously ordained that the matter should not rest here. A few days later a clergyman from Staffordshire came to me, who, though by no means disposed to receive the work, thought it his duty to inquire, perhaps more in the hope of my conviction than of his own. He examined very closely my views on the human nature of our Lord, and declared, when he heard them, that they were opposite to Mr. Irving's He produced Mr. Irving's book on the subject to prove his assertion, and pointed out many passages. These, however, did not seem to prove his point, but on the following day, resuming his position, two passages were found which showed clearly that Mr. Irving conceived the workings of the law of sin were felt by our Lord (Hum. Nat. p. 23):– 'And in the face of all these certainties, if a man will say that His flesh was not sinful flesh as our's is, with the same dispositions, and propensities, and wants, and afflictions, then, I say, God had sent that man strong delusion that he should believe a lie'; and page 24, 'Now if there had not been in Christ's nature appetites, ambitions, and spiritual darkenings, how, I ask, could the devil have addressed these several temptations to His will?' On reading over this, an utterance in power broke from me, 'He has erred, he has erred' — an utterance accompanied with great anguish under the feeling then that my friend's presence was grieving and quenching the Spirit; but which I now see to have been because the utterance was wrung from the spirit, as a desire of testifying, against Mr. Irving to lull my inquiries. My friend's argument, which followed upon this, was very sound; he argued that, if Mr. Irving had been holding false doctrine, it could not be the Spirit of God which was speaking in his church, or he would before this time have been rebuked. I, however, thought that the spirit in me had fully testified against this error, and, as I had never myself held it, the character of the work could not be involved in it.

"These discoveries, and the reference to Mr. Irving's book, led me to search more fully into the views he held; and I not only found, on the further reading of his work, that his views were unsound on the human nature of our Lord, but that he was also still more unsound on the doctrines concerning holiness in the flesh. Besides his works, I also consulted the published sermons of Mr. Campbell, who had preached in Scotland, and was spoken of as the great champion of the truth in Scotland; and he appeared to be involved in the same mistakes as Mr. Irving. I was much disturbed by this, because I thought how greatly the church was prejudiced by these false doctrines against what I yet deemed the manifestations of the Spirit; and in much heaviness I sat down to write to Mr. Irving, stating fully his error in conceiving the law of sin to be in the flesh of Jesus; and in stating also what I conceived to be the truth concerning our holiness: that as by faith accepted in Christ, and clothed in His righteousness, so we are in the sight of the Father holy and without blame; but whilst in the flesh, the law of sin remains even in them who are regenerate, and the flesh lusteth against the Spirit. And though our mark and aim should be to be perfect even as our Father is perfect; yet that we all come short of perfect holiness in the flesh, and are unprofitable servants. As Mr. Irving regarded me destined to the apostolic office, and set for the instruction of his church, I had great confidence that he would receive this, and would be led to retract and abandon his errors, and thus remove a great stumbling-block from his door.

"A short time before this, I had received a communication from the Rev. Mr. Dow, who in Scotland was exercising the gift of utterance, after the same manner as those speaking in London. His sister had written to Mrs. Irving, and, she had sent me an extract from the letter; declaring, that much additional light and power had been vouchsafed to Mr. Dow, and he had in the Spirit given a clear testimony confirming my prophecies, opening the six trumpets in the Book of Revelations, and giving a very full opening of each trumpet. This was an encouragement to me, giving me, as it did, the recognition, in my prophetic office, of the Scotch followers at Irongray.

"In a few days after I had sent to Mr. Irving, I received his answer, and as this letter was mainly instrumental in opening my eyes to the delusion by which we were bound, I give it at length.

"'London, 21st April, 1832.

"'My dear Brother, Read this letter with your eye on God. We have great need, especially the spiritual amongst us, to walk humbly with the Lord. Your first letter,* containing the utterance of the Spirit, without any expression of his intention in sending it to me, led me very deeply to ponder the subject of our Lord's flesh, and to cry upon the Lord to examine me; and to the same exercise of soul had I been drawn by the utterance of the Spirit, and the experience of the spiritual of my flock in these days past. These things put me into a fit condition for receiving the full impression of your last letter, which arrived last night after I had preached a sermon on the Holy Generation of the Flesh of Christ. This I had done, in order to express anew, before my people, with all caution and consideration, what I firmly believe to be the truth; and to guard them against the effect of any rash or unguarded *expressions which I might at any time have used. All night long, my soul, sleeping and waking, was exercised upon the subject of your last letter. And it being wonderfully ordered in God's providence that Mrs. C. should be in town a day or two; and that Miss E. C., though desirous to go home before breakfast, was so burdened as not to be able to go — these two prophetesses of the Lord, who have been His mouth of wisdom and warning to me and my church in all perplexities; I called along with my wife, who had read your letter, and read it to me, and having spread the whole matter before the Lord, and twice besought His presence, we proceeded to read your letters in order. Upon your first letter there was no utterance of the Spirit, nor expression of any kind amongst us, but that of assent. When we had read the two first pages of the second, wherein you reason upon the words of the Spirit, 'He has erred, he has erred,' given to you upon two sentences of my book; and bring forward your views of our Lord's flesh, and of the believer's holiness, in contradistinction from mine, we paused, and seeing there was so manifest a discrepancy between us, I solemnly besought the Lord that He would speak His own mind in the matter. Instantly the Spirit came upon Miss E. C., and, after speaking in a very grieved tone and spirit in a tongue, she was made to declare many words which I will not take upon me to attempt to repeat, seeing the Spirit has discountenanced such attempts. But the substance was most precisely this, that you had been snared by departing from the word and the testimony — that I had maintained the truth, and the Lord was well pleased with me for it — that I must not flinch now, but be more bold for it than heretofore — that He had honoured me for it, and I must not draw back — that in some words I had erred, and that the word of the Spirit by you was therefore true; and that if I waited upon the Lord He would show me them by His Spirit, but that He had forgiven it because He knew my heart was right towards Him — that I had maintained the truth, and must not drawback from maintaining it. Thereupon we knelt down, and having confessed my sin and thanked Him for His mercy, I proceeded to entreat Him for you, that you might be delivered from the snare in which you were taken concerning the flesh of Christ and the holiness of the believer. This done, I sought to recover and recount the substance of the utterance as above given, that by their help I might report it to you exactly. My wife was mentioning a doubt as to whether it should not simply be left to the Lord, and not dealt with in the understanding at all; seeing that in your letter you had gone astray by commenting in your own understanding on the words of the Spirit, 'He hath erred,' as applicable to two sentences of my book, and applied them to my whole doctrine, which the Spirit had just declared to be 'the truth,' that 'must be maintained'; when Mrs. C. was made to speak in a tongue with great authority and strength, and immediately after in English, to the effect that you had stumbled greatly by bringing your own carnal understanding to spiritual things; that truth in the inward parts, the law of God in the heart, wrought in us the fulfilment of the righteousness of the law in all our members; and that union with Jesus brought into us the holiness of Jesus in body, soul, and spirit; that the Lord would have a church upon the earth holy as He is holy, the light of the world as He is the light of the world; that some had sought to bring this about in the flesh; that you had been snared in the opposite extreme of denying it altogether, and making a distinction between Christ's holiness and that of His church; that you must be informed of it, because this it was which was preventing the work of the Lord. There was a third utterance through Miss E. C. to teach me Satan sought to overthrow my confidence in the truth, and to bring me into a snare; but that I was called upon to maintain it now more firmly than ever.

[*The letter I had written in power, setting forth that the carnal mind was not in Christ.]

"'There were no more utterances, but when we came to that part of your letter where you say, 'Concerning the vessels by whom He speaks, you have fearfully provoked Him, and they are ready to burst asunder under your hands,'* there was great indignation felt by both the vessels of the Lord present, and great sense of injustice felt by myself. For, oh! dear brother, I have done all things to know and follow the Lord in respect of them. It was indeed said, I think in the Spirit, that this in you was the same spirit of 'The accuser of the brethren,' which hath manifested itself lately amongst us in one of the gifted persons who spoke evil of me in the midst of the congregation. But the Lord hath showed him that though it was with power, the power was not from God but from Satan, to whom, by hard and unjust thoughts of me, he had opened the door. Ah, dear brother, you have surely been much overseen in some way or other — search it out. The thing you spoke of F. and of Miss H. was not of God. I fear, and am persuaded in my own mind, that you have not discriminated duly what is of God, and what is not of Him; and that sin in this matter, undiscerned and unconfessed, hath brought on greater falls, as we have seen amongst ourselves; and that now you are brought to oppose that very doctrine which alone can bring the church to be meet for her Bridegroom: — That as He was holy in the flesh, so, are we, through the grace of regeneration, brought to be holy — planted in a holy standing — the flesh dead to sin, as His flesh was dead to sin; and that by the baptism of the Holy Ghost we are brought into the fellowship of His power and fulness, to do the works which He also did, and greater works than these.

[*This passage was written under the dictation of the power, and the impression on my mind was, that he had too much honoured me and the other persons speaking in the power, and so had dishonoured God. He, and these with him, evidently read it as though I accused him of behaving ill towards one or more of the speakers — the very opposite of what I intended.]

"'When we came to that passage of your letter where you censure as 'fearfully erroneous' a passage in the Day of Pentecost,* we were all made to feel that you were forgetting what you yourself had been made to utter so abundantly concerning the baptism with fire and the spiritual ministry.

"'I have read this to my wife, and Mrs. C., and. Miss E. C.; and they say it is a full and exact account.

"'And now, upon the whole, my well-beloved brother and prophet of the Lord, I give you counsel to search and prove what it is that sits so heavy upon your conscience, for the Lord will surely reveal it. Concerning the flesh of Christ, we will discourse when we meet. I believe it to have been no better than other flesh as to its passive qualities or properties, as a creature thing. But that the power of the Son of God, as Son of man in it, believing in the Father, did for His obedience to become Son of man, receive such a measure of the Holy Ghost as sufficed to resist its own proclivity to the world and to Satan, and to make it obedient unto God in all things, which measure of the Spirit He received in His generation, and so had holy flesh; and by exercise of the same faith, He kept His vineyard holy, and presented it holy to the great Husbandman. Regeneration, through faith, sealed in baptism, doth give to us the same measure of the Spirit to do the same work of making our flesh the holy thing, the temple of the Holy Ghost, body, soul, and spirit holy, wherefore we have the name 'saints,' or 'holy ones,' 'sons of God,' as He received those names in virtue of His generation of the Holy Ghost. If we were to meet, I think we would not find much difference of mind as to the flesh of Christ. But as to your view of holiness, it is the very deepest and darkest and subtlest snare of the enemy. If you understood thoroughly the one subject, you would understand thoroughly the other. I say not that Christ had the motions of the flesh, but that the law of the flesh was there all present; but that where as in us it is set on fire by an evil life, in Him it was by a holy life put down, and His flesh brought to be a holy altar, whereon the sacrifices and offerings for the sin of the world, and the whole burnt offerings of sorrow, and confession, and penitence for others, might be ever offered up. And thus ought we to be, and shall be, when the flesh becomes the sack-cloth covering.†

[*This passage is the one (p. 39) in which he asserts "Baptism of the Holy Ghost doth bring to every believer the presence of the Father, and the power of the Holy Ghost, according to that measure at the least, in which Christ, during the days of His flesh, possessed the same." I had myself, received what they all held to be the baptism of the Holy Ghost, and could, therefore, testify practically as well as doctrinally.]

[†The allusion here is to Rev. 11 where the sackcloth clothing of the witnesses is spoken of. Mrs. C— had been made to prophesy that the baptism by fire would burn out the carnal mind, and our flesh would become a sackcloth covering, the clothing of the witnesses; and this is what Mr. Irving, was looking forward to.]

"'Oh! brother, I have had many trials, but the Lord hath sustained me, and I dwell before Him in — peace of soul, though in much sorrow because of the condition of His church. I shall be glad when we meet. But, oh! I beseech you, lay to heart the words which have been spoken by the Spirit, and doubt any words which may be spoken in you contrary thereto. For though an angel from heaven should come to me, testifying to your views of holiness, I would not receive him.

"'Do you hold correspondence with any of my flock, that you speak so positively, yet so unjustly, concerning my treatment of the spiritual persons? or is there some meaning couched under it which I do not understand? Did the Spirit say so in you? If so, doubt that spirit; for certainly it is not true, they themselves being witnesses.

"'Fare you well. May the Lord have you in His holy keeping. Amen. Your faithful brother,

EDWARD IRVING.'

"This letter was at once a great blow to me. Here I saw doctrines, which I could never have believed Mr. Irving, held, not only avowed by him, but sustained and enforced by the utterances, in power, of those who were deemed gifted persons. I had no copy of my own letters, and had the utterances been confined to a denial of the accuracy of my views, I should not have dared to question it, as I should rather have attributed it to some inaccuracy of statement. But here was an unqualified approval of Mr. Irving's views; and in the same letter, those views broadly stated without disguise, and clearly involving heresies most fearful and appalling."

[NOTE. The Editor thinks it well to state here, that, while giving Mr. B.'s testimony as much the most important he knows on the real character of the Irvingite movement, and especially on the fact of powers beyond man, yet not of God though professing to be, he does not mean to endorse all Mr. B.'s thoughts or expressions. He does not, for instance, approve of applying "fallen flesh" to the human nature of Christ, which was a body prepared of God by the power of the Spirit of God, beyond Adam's even when unfallen. But Mr. B.'s doctrine is sound in the main.]

CHAPTER 1.F - EARLY HISTORY.

"That there was in Christ's flesh a 'proclivity to the world and to Satan' and that Christ received 'such a measure of the Holy Ghost as sufficed to resist' this proclivity, is a doctrine so fearfully erroneous, that I cannot conceive anyone who has at all learned Christ, unless he be blinded by delusion, can allow himself for a moment to entertain. Christ, the Holy Thing as born of the virgin, to whom the prince of this world cometh, 'and findeth nothing in Me;' also holy, harmless, and undefiled — that in His flesh there could be a proclivity to Satan, which needed to be resisted; or that He, of whom it is declared, that God giveth not the Spirit by measure unto Him, should be held to have received only a measure of the Spirit, and this for the purpose of resisting a sinful tendency in His flesh: this is a departure from the truth, which is broad as the day. But if any one's eyes should be holden that he cannot see its errors, singly considered; when it is conjointly affirmed, that 'regeneration through faith, sealed in baptism, doth give to us the same measure of the Spirit, to do the same work of making our flesh the holy thing' — dark indeed, must be our state, if we do not instantly see how Christ is first abased towards our sinful condition, and we next exalted to be put on an equality with Him: as though Christ had a work to do in making His own flesh holy, and we are enabled to do the same work and make our flesh holy. What said the apostle Paul, after he was called to his apostleship, and had been caught up into the third heaven, and had received gifts of the Holy Ghost abounding above all others? 'I know that in me, that is, in my flesh dwelleth no good thing.' And again, 'So that with the mind I myself serve the law of God, but with flesh the law of sin.' And what does he say of every believer who is born again of the Spirit of God? 'If Christ be in you, the body is dead because of sin.' Here is no holiness of flesh, but a plain declaration, that even in those in whom Christ dwells the body is dead because of sin, and the flesh has no good things, but serves the law of sin. The apostle's glorying was not that he had made his flesh holy, but the law of the Spirit of life, in Christ Jesus, which made us free from the law of sin and death; adding, if we live after the flesh ye shall die: but if ye, through the Spirit, mortify the deeds of the body, ye shall live. The living after the Spirit, and mortifying the deeds of the body, was the apostle's state, and is our state, as many of us as are born of God; whereas, if our flesh were made holy, what need would there be to mortify it?

"I have heard the sophistry which denies that the tendency or proclivity to sin is itself sin, and which dares, therefore, to ascribe the first to our beloved Lord in His human nature, while it is properly indignant at the second. As it regards, ourselves, I am ready to admit, that God does not bring us into judgment for such a tendency to sin, when we mortify and resist it, the apostle showing the ground of such mercy, where it is written, 'Now, then, it is no more I that do it, but sin that dwelleth in me.' But yet we must say, is expressed in the article of our church, 'The apostle doth confess that concupiscence and last hath of itself the nature of sin.' But who shall say that in our Lord 'the law of the flesh was all present, but by a holy life kept down,' without feeling that such a statement compromises the character of 'holy, and undefiled?' The law of the flesh is the law of sin and death, or, in other words, that corruption of nature which is called the lust of the flesh, and which is the mark and consequence of original sin. Now, surely all will agree, that not a breath or suggestion of sin — no lust — no desire — ever arose in or from the flesh of our blessed Lord. The law of the flesh, which in us daily sends up streams of corrupt desires, though our flesh never was in Him nor ever could be in Him, so as to need to be resisted or kept down. To suppose this corruption to be in Jesus, is to deny His holiness. However much, and however completely you may affirm it to be kept down, if it ever was there, holy and undefiled are set aside at once.

"I would not lay hold of words to convict a man of heresy, if his real intention was not comprised in those words. Every man may err in words; and hard indeed is it, if we should lie in wait for one another, to make a man an offender for a word. The letter copied, however, does so clearly show Mr. Irving's mind, that, far from doubting whether it is not a matter of words, it is very obvious that his general design and view is unsound. As gathered from the letter itself, and as confirmed by subsequent conversations with him, I gather his general design or broad doctrine to be this: — That Christ Jesus, though God as well as man, yet was a man in all respects such as we are, and was by the power of the Holy Ghost, from His generation to His death, upheld in holiness and perfect purity; and that we receiving through His blood the pardon of past sins, are now called to receive the Holy Ghost; and by the same power of the Holy Ghost, shall, if we faint not, be ourselves, in the flesh, brought into and upheld in holiness and perfect purity, as fully as Jesus was.

"To sustain these propositions, Mr. Irving sees it necessary to suppose the law of sin to have been in the flesh of Jesus: otherwise the work of the Holy Ghost, in sustaining Jesus in perfect holiness, would be no precedent nor assurance to us, that by the Holy Ghost we can be sustained in equal holiness. Here then, lies the first error, in ascribing to Jesus that corruption of nature, as it regards His flesh, which belongs to all of us. The next error lies in putting out of sight the imputation of the righteousness of Christ to us, which is our wedding garment, and in which we are holy and without blame in the sight of the Father — seen as standing in Christ; and, in the stead of this, requiring us to work out a personal holiness, and, by the power of the Spirit, to make ourselves holy as Christ was holy."

It is not needful to give all the workings of Mr. B.'s conscience more fully. "These considerations of doctrine weighed with me, and I could not for a moment doubt the erroneousness of Mr. Irving's views. I was then of necessity compelled to conclude the utterances which supported these views were not of the Spirit of God. Upon this a doubt arose in my own mind, which however I trembled to entertain; and yet with such facts before me I could not reject: whether the whole work was not of Satan. I could not conceive of a person speaking at one moment by the Spirit of God, and the next by the spirit of Satan. Moreover it had been declared in the power by the mouth of Mrs. C., Miss E. C., and my own mouth, that God would guard the utterances of His prophets, and that they should never be permitted to speak by the power of Satan. According therefore to my view and understanding of scripture, a false utterance convicted a person of being a false prophet; and this was also according to the interpretation of the power I had been acting under. Mrs. C., Miss E. C., and Mr. T. were therefore on both grounds manifestly to be deemed false prophets; and this, as to the two former, upon a test of scripture doctrine. Then was not I convicted as a false prophet by the non-fulfilment of the words I had spoken according to the test in the book of Deuteronomy? And might not the whole be accounted for as a chastisement of God sent for the correction of heresy? All who were caught in it having drank of, or sustained, that heresy. These questions and considerations weighed upon my mind and almost worked conviction.

"On the other hand so strongly was the whole interwoven with interpretations of scripture, and so much of the fruits of the Spirit had I seemed to find under it, so entirely had I become pledged to the work, and my character and consistency become involved in it, I paused and weighed again and again the several facts and proof, trembling at entertaining doubts at all.

"It had been very providentially ordered that I was expecting a professional call from home on the very day succeeding the arrival of Mr. Irving's letter; and I had arranged for a week's absence. The same post which brought me this letter brought me also a respite of my engagement, and left me at liberty. Otherwise, having engagements to preach almost every morning and evening, I should have been still more perplexed as to my course. If I stayed from preaching, it might overthrow the faith of many, and give occasion to the enemy to traduce the work; if I went on preaching it whilst I had doubts upon it, how could I answer it to conscience? There would have been no time for consideration, but for this providential opening; and I at once availed myself of it to visit the brother to whom I have before alluded. During the journey, which occupied two days, I was, as may be supposed, engaged in consideration of the subject; and the whole train of circumstances from the beginning, with the successive failures of prophecy and contradiction of utterance, when calmly reviewed and compared with the present fact of the support of false doctrine, were so strongly affirmative of the evil origin of the work, that, however supernatural I had found it and still knew it to be, I was convinced it must be a work of Satan who, as an angel of light, was permitted for a time to deceive us.

"My brother, who had continued speaking in the power, examined the doctrines and fully agreed in their fearful errors. He weighed also the facts which I had to state to him, and joining them with other facts which had occurred within his own observation, he arrived of the same conclusion as myself.

"Being anxious to communicate with Mr. Irving I travelled on to London, and reached him on the morning of his appearance before the presbytery of London. Calling him and Mr. J. C. apart, I told them my conviction that we had all been speaking by a lying spirit, and not by the Spirit of the Lord. He said it was impossible God could have sent us strong delusions, for that was His final judgment upon the wicked; and we at least thought ourselves seeking after the Lord, and desiring His glory. I answered, I believed God had sent it as a chastisement for pride and lofty imaginations; that we had been lifted up in our hearts, and God would humble us. He was astounded, but asked me to stay with them a little. I replied, I could not without rebuking the utterance, if it were made by any of the speakers in my presence; and as he would not suffer this, we parted. I saw him again in the evening; and on the succeeding morning I endeavoured to convince him of his error of doctrine, and our delusions concerning the work of the Spirit; but he was so shut up, he could not see either. I particularly pressed, upon Miss E. C. and Mrs. C., and before him also, the non-fulfilment of the word, and particularly the falseness of that prophecy which they, as well as myself, had given — that God would guard the utterance of His prophets, and not suffer Satan to speak by them; whereas in the case of Mr. T [aplin] alluded to in Mr. Irving's letter, he who was and (I believe) is still received as a prophet, had, in the midst of the congregation, with tongues, and with English, spoken evil of Mr. Irving, and Miss E. C. had since in utterance declared he spoke it, of Satan. They however could not see the non-fulfilment in the other cases; and in this case they said we must have mistaken the meaning of the utterance — that it could not mean God would keep the utterance always, but when they were speaking, He would not suffer Satan to mingle words with His word: a most miserable subterfuge.

"The argument on which Mr. Irving mainly relied for parrying the difficulties was this; — that the same person might at one moment speak by the Spirit of God, and the next moment by an evil spirit, He urged therefore, that those things which had failed were from the false spirit, and those which were fulfilled were of God. I had the most distinct remembrance, when I first heard Mr, Irving, preach upon the utterances, that he preached the utterances, being the voice of God, were pure water without admixture — that he might in his exposition as a man fail, or fall into error, but in the word of the Lord, ministered by the prophets in their utterances, the most entire and implicit confidence might be placed, as in every respect and purely the truth. Out of this position he was, however, evidently driven by the appalling fact of the prophets, before all the congregation, denouncing him as the cause of the Lord's anger against the congregation — this denunciation coming with every usual demonstration of power and tongues. The only solution now to be found was, that the utterance at one time might be of God, and at another time of Satan, even in the same person. For if this were not admitted, Mr. T., being himself recognised as having spoken by God in his former utterances and by Satan in this, would either overturn the whole fabric of the spiritual gifts and falsify the claims of the prophets, or must be himself still received as a prophet, notwithstanding his false utterance.

"The mere enunciation of the proportion of a varying origin, whilst the outward demonstration remained the same, was enough to shake even the nerves of Mr. Irving. To be under the necessity of telling such a fact to his congregation, and thereby assuring them that they could no longer give credence to the utterances without deciding upon the origin of each message; to tell them moreover, that no one could decide this without the gift of the discernment of spirits; and lastly that no member of his church yet possessed that gift — this would seem beyond the courage of any minister, and beyond the power of belief of any people. To this however was Mr. Irving reduced, and to this were his people subjected.

"It was attempted to decide the origin of the utterance in the mind of the speakers from whom it came by prescribing a certain frame (e.g. a calm sense of the love of God in Christ and of our abiding therein), as the proof of the utterance from the Spirit of God; and an opposite state of mind, as a proof of the utterance being deceitful. This, however, I could experimentally contradict. For several utterances which were still held true, and particularly that which Mr. Dow had confirmed, were made when I was in the disturbed frame; and others which had proved false were given under the prescribed heavenly frame; and I was fully persuaded that no such line of distinction could honestly be drawn" (pp. 116-120).

We may leave Mr. I's argument on Jer. 15: 7 (a strange and misleading juxtaposition, and yet more Ezek. 14: 9), as well as Mr. B.'s reply in disproof. Deut. 13 and 18 are, as he shows, quite at issue with the desired excuse for error in a true prophet from God's word. From p. 123 we may cite: — "I am overwhelmed (says Mr. B.) with the remembrance of my own blindness and unfaithfulness by hesitating at all after one instance of the failure of the word. and I may well shut my mouth against the like offence in others. But I desire to confess my sin, and in love to those who like myself are erring, to pray them take warning and no longer to continue such a provocation.

"It is not necessary I should enter into any subsequent communications which have passed with those holding the manifestations. After my first visit, I found the utterance amongst them warned them against having intercourse with me; and they now shut themselves up, refusing to hear arguments, or discuss the subject at all. It may however be only just towards Mr. Irving that I should give another letter of his, written some months after my renunciation of their views; as he there again fully sets forth his doctrinal views, and if he intended this in any particular to correct the expressions in his former letter, he ought to have the benefit of it.

"'London, July 6,1832.

"'My dear brother, — I can no longer refrain from writing you in a few words what I believe to be a most heinous sin under the oppression of which you are lying bound. It is the sin of blaspheming the ministers, and prophets, and church of God, and calling us ministers of Satan under the form of an angel of light. Not to bear testimony of myself, still less to judge thee, O brother, do I say this, but to assure thee that herein thou hast sinned, and dost sin exceedingly, nor wilt be restored till thou restore thyself to charity with thy brethren who have never but loved thee.

"'My testimony to Jesus is that in our flesh He was most holy. That His flesh was in itself no otherwise conditioned, nor is otherwise to be defined than ours, with all its laws, properties, and propensities. But through His anointing of it, and upholding of it from first to last, it hath no other properties nor propensities than those which may be predicated of God — holy as He is, pure as He is, yet temptable, mortal, and corruptible as ours — until the resurrection changed its form and fashion altogether.

"'Concerning the holiness of the believer, my testimony is that he ought never to be less holy both in flesh and spirit than Jesus was; and that the same power of God incarnate, which presented Christ's flesh and Spirit holy, is bestowed upon the believer at baptism, to present his flesh and spirit always holy through faith. And every short-coming from holiness is not of necessity, nor of accident, nor of circumstance, but of positive will not to believe, and not to receive the power of regeneration, which is the continuance unto us of the power of generation in Jesus.* Wherefore we are called 'holy ones,' and 'sons of God,' as he was called 'The holy Thing,' and 'Son of God.' He kept the name of the Father, and glorified it: we have not kept it, and therefore need continual atonement and intercession.†

[*The position that the power of regeneration in us is the continuance of the power of generation in Jesus is a most fatal one, implying that act of the Holy Ghost which formed Jesus in the womb of the Virgin was nothing more than that act of the Spirit (as the apostle says to the Galatians 4: 19), or, in other words, by which we were born of the Spirit and made the children of God by adoption and grace. This virtually annuls the doctrine of the incarnation, and supplants it by supposing the Son of God to be made flesh only by inhabitation of the human nature. Indeed many of Mr. Irving's positions suggest the idea of inhabitation instead of incarnation. Mr. Irving's inference from the position which follows above is very lamentable, as tending to put us on a par with Jesus."]

[†"To 'need continual atonement,' I should conceive, must be a mere error of expression; but there is much watchfulness requisite with respect to his view of continual intercession, which, coupled with his views of fleshly holiness, tends very far towards the idea entertained by the Romanists of the efficacy of their mass." [The Editor cannot concur in so mild an inference either here or as to the former note. The doctrine destroys the truth of Christ's person, and so fritters away the atonement. He that knew no sin (not merely did no sin) could alone avail for us or be made sin by God. It is a lowering of Christ in the vain hope of raising the christian to the same level by the same Spirit. Now we are by grace one with Him, Who died for us, yea for our sins, with Whom we too died to sin. But there was no sin in Him, there is in us. Christ as born of woman was ever and absolutely holy. For us God condemned sin in the flesh, which we have, in Him a sacrifice for it,]]

"'Furthermore, concerning the baptism of the Holy Ghost, my testimony is, and ever has been, that it is the indwelling of the Father in the members, after what manner He dwelt in the Head while on earth, for the same ends and for what other ends the Father may have to accomplish by His church until He comes.

"'Now, brother, you may not apprehend these things, thy natural mind being very formal and wedded to its forms; whereas the fashion of my natural mind is rather ideal, or spiritual (!). But because thou apprehendest not the truth in that form in which I do, shouldest thou say that thy brother hath a devil, when thou knowest from my fruits that I serve God with a pure conscience? And my dear flock thou hast misrepresented, whom yet thou knowest not.* My love to thy soul, my desire to see thee standing where God set thee — a spiritual minister — beareth no longer that this sin should be upon thee. Repent of it, and ask forgiveness of the Lord. I fully forgive thee, and love thee with a pure heart fervently, as I have ever done and never ceased to do, though thy words and letters, of which I have seen some and heard of others, have sore wounded me. Repent of thy rash judgments against the children of God, that thou mayest be healed of thy sin. I write to thee as a man of God, and minister of His gospel, even thy brother in great love. For I know thou art an honest man, though thou hast greatly erred through thy rashness. Your faithful brother, EDWARD IRVING.'"

* "To the charge here made my reply is: — What I say of his doctrine and of the spirit which speaks and rules in the midst of them, I desire to speak out of love to them: not to charge them or judge them, but to show forth the cunning of the enemy, that if possible they may be delivered. His position, that I am not to judge his doctrine because I may not apprehend him, is very unsafe, and what he cannot and does not act upon."

Some general characteristics in the work casting suspicion on it, which follow in pp. 126-129, we may leave, as also Mr. B.'s testimony to the sincere piety and devotedness of Mr. I. and others with him whom he knew, with his judgment of the inadequacy of the tests applied (pp. 129-133), In this last page he adds his personal experience of the tongue. "A few days before the prophecy of my call to the apostolic office, whilst sitting at home, a mighty power came upon me, but for a considerable time no impulse to utterance; presently a sentence in French was vividly set before my mind, and under an impulse to utterance was spoken. Then in a little time sentences in Latin were in like manner uttered, and with short intervals sentences in many other languages, judging from the sound and the different exercise of the enunciating organs. My wife who was with me declared some of them to be Italian and Spanish; the first she can read and translate, the second she knows but little of. In this case she was not able to interpret nor retain the words as they were uttered. All the time of these utterances I was greatly tried in mind. After the first sentence an impulse to utterance continued on me, and most painfully I retained it, my conviction being that until something was set before me to utter, I ought not to yield my tongue to utterance. Yet I was troubled by the doubt what could the impulse mean, if I were not to yield to it. Under the trial I did yield my tongue for a few moments, but the utterance that broke from me seemed so discordant that I concluded the impulse without words given was a temptation; and I retained it, except as words were given me, and then I yielded. Sometimes single words were given me, and sometimes sentences, though I could recognise neither the words nor sentences as any language I knew, except those which were French or Latin. What strengthened me, upon after consideration, in the opinion that I ought not to yield my tongue was the remembrance that I had heard Mr. Irving say, when explaining how the utterance in tongue first came upon Mr. T., that he had words and sentences set before him. Immediately after this exercise there came an utterance in English, declaring that the gift of tongues, which was manifest in London, was nothing more than that of the tongue needing interpretation, manifested formerly in the Corinthian church; but that shortly the Lord would bestow the Pentecostal gift, enabling those who received it to preach in all languages to the nations of the earth. I was on several other occasions exercised in this same way, speaking detached words and sentences, but never a connected discourse.

"When I went to London after this, I questioned those who spoke in the tongues, whether they had the words and sentences given, or yielded their tongues to the impulse of utterance without having them. They answered almost entirely the latter, though sometimes also the former. I was also in London made to confirm in utterance before Mr. Irving, what I had spoken here concerning the Pentecostal gift of tongues for preaching; and such was the readiness with which he yielded to the utterances, that, though he had both written and published that the Pentecostal gift was not for preaching, he at once yielded and confessed his error, giving thanks for the correction. Oh! that he may manifest the same ingenuousness in abandoning his opinion concerning the power, when, weighing its fruits, he sees it is not of God.

"My persuasion concerning the unknown tongue as it is called (in which I myself was very little experienced) is, that it is no language whatever, but a mere collection of words and sentences; and in the lengthened discourses is, much of it, a jargon of sounds" (p. 134). To this we may all agree, save in the unfounded distinction as to Corinth, which was clearly similar to Pentecost. How could a sober christian think the Holy Spirit conferred there or anywhere "a jargon of sound"? Neander, in his History of the Planting of Christianity, reasons on the "tongues" in 1 Cor. 12, 14 as ecstatic to set aside the force of Acts 2: 6-8; but such efforts to explain away scripture are as lamentable as vain. The Lord had promised this sign in Mark 16: 17.

CHAPTER 1.G - EARLY HISTORY.

There is a fearless and distressing paper in the last vol. of the Morning Watch ("What caused Mr. Baxter's fall?" vii, 129-140), so characteristic of this early phase, that it may fitly follow Mr. Baxter's Narrative.

"It is written in the scriptures, 'Blessed are the pure in heart, for they shall see God.' Give me, O God, the heart purged by Christ's blood, the single eye of sincerity and truth, that I may now Clearly set and show forth the mystery of Thy dealings with my friend, and more than brother, Robert Baxter, who having been called of Thee as a prophet, and as such been attested of Thy Spirit, an approven of Thy church, hath now openly set himself against Thee to pull down that which Thou didst set him to build up. To me it appertaineth not to sit in judgment upon him, nor to account for the inconsistencies wherewith he chargeth the Spirit that spoke in him; nor to distinguish whether these be really inconsistencies, or only inconsistencies between the spiritual word and his own interpretation thereof; and, if real spiritual inconsistencies there be, to determine whether, like Saul, he may have been visited by an evil spirit from the Lord, for his haste and unbelief, or whether he may, being still a true prophet, have spoken presumptuously and beyond the analogy of faith, or whether being, like Balaam, at heart a Moabite, he may have been drawn out from the river of his people, and constrained against his proper nature to bless the people of God: — to determine whether of these be the manner of his fall, I undertake not, because he standeth not at my bar, nor is he one of my flock; but in love to his soul, and the souls of those whom he hath stumbled, and chiefly for the glory of God, I will show forth the righteousness of God in permitting him to be brought thus low.

"Robert Baxter is a vessel marred upon the wheel of the Potter, whom the Potter would yet make into a good vessel for the hand of the King, to be filled with treasures of glory for the good of the church. But he fighteth sore against the gracious purpose of his Maker, and standeth in peril of being dashed and broken in pieces. The Lord called him to be a prophet and more than a prophet; a strong stone, but not the Corner stone, of His house; nor yet the Builder thereof, though a master builder under the Builder, Whose name is The Branch. The Lord, which is the word of God, opened his mouth in mighty utterances, of things unutterable by the lip, inconceivable to the mind, of man; and gave them forth with a richness and variety and exuberance of knowledge, with a majesty and strength, with a melody and power of harmony, and yet with a calmness and distinctness and exactness, Yea, and minuteness of truth and beauty, which if Satan hath power to give, then Satan may have written all the oracles of God. [Is not this presumptuous for a saint to write?] For verily there be no parallels to the words which he spake, nor to the manner and method of his discourse, but those which the universal church hath stamped by the name of the word of God (!) If Satan, as an angel of light and a minister of righteousness, can give forth the honour, the nobility, the grandeur, the glorious truths, which not thy poor formal intellect, Robert Baxter, but He that, spake them in defiance of thy formal intellect did utter, in my hearing, and in the hearing of the church; — then say I again, Satan may have indited the word of God [shame on thee, Edward Irving], which is of all blasphemy the most horrible and guilty.

"Yet for all this, Robert Baxter, a man of godly spirit but yet an enthralled understanding; a man of truth in the inward parts, but of tradition in the outward; a man in his reason taught of God, but in his understanding taught of the traditions of men, a man who, in unfolding the forms of godliness in the law and the traditions of the church, surpasseth the men of this day, as is manifest from his two papers in this work, but whose spirit hath not informed his understanding with the heavenly life — he, even such an one, hath endeavoured to show that the mighty Spirit which spake in him these utterances of honour and glory is no other than the spirit of error; for he is too honest a man to believe, or to say, that it was excitement of the flesh. He knoweth too well what an ungodly thing — what a rash, riotous, turbulent, wayward, and contradictory thing — the flesh is, to mistake for its excitement that heavenly rapture, that sober certainty of truth and collected wisdom of God which first enwrapped him into divine assurance of faith, and love, and rest, and then poured forth through him streams of the waters of life, beams of the sun of glory. Oh! my brother, my brother! Where is thy discernment gone between God and Satan, good and evil, Spirit and flesh, that thou shouldest thus turn aside like a deceitful bow in the hand of thy Maker! Here therefore is an enigma and a dark riddle; that a man, with more formal theology in him than most men I know of, should have committed the most fearful sin of naming the Spirit of truth and holiness by the name of the father of lies. And how cometh this to pass? Where is the interpreter to interpret this parable?

"It cometh to pass from this, that the natural understanding apprehendeth not the things of the Spirit of God. No, nor no single mind of even the spiritual comprehendeth all the words and ways of God; which are spoken not for one man, but for the church of many members composed; nor for the church of one generation, but for the church of all generations; for no prophecy of the scripture is of any private interpretation, but holy men of old spake as they were moved by the Holy Ghost. And least of all is the prophet himself capable of resolving his own words. Sufficient is it for the tongue to have the glory of utterance. The ear must have the glory of hearing; the heart the glory of understanding; and the mind the glory of bringing forth the flowers and fruits of the word rooted in the heart of love. But thou, Robert Baxter, prophet of the Lord, in thy rashness, in thy strength of head, in thy solitary self-sufficiency, in thy great personal stedfastness — for there was no soldier like thee in all the camp for personal single combat; thou wast a rock beside other men; a lion wast thou amongst the beasts of the field; yet see, O brother, how thou art fallen before the rock of Israel, the Lion of the tribe of Judah; thou thoughtest by thine own capacity to measure the capacity of the word that thou wast made instrumental to utter. This was the reason wherefore God took thee to use thee, that thou hadst strong personal parts, in a day of confederacies. Thou wast not afraid to trust thy God; and thy God did not belie thy trust. He did open thy mouth in majesty, but not until He had found an ear to hear, a heart to understand, and a mind to realise, in the church whereof I am the pastor. And if thou hadst heeded the counsel of Him That sent thee, and staid there where thy mouth was opened until the power was given, it would have been well with thee at this day, instead of being very evil. For, O man, thou art not the pillar and ground of the truth, strong though thy manhood be; the church is the pillar and ground of the truth. Therefore it is thou hast fallen, because thou wouldst be both giver and receiver, both utterer and container, both prophet and angel, and pastor and teacher; and so, by usurping all offices, which dignity pertaineth to Jesus, thou hast lost all, and become nothing but a stumbling-block in the way of the children of the Lord.

"Ever and anon, as thou didst utter a thing, thou wouldst understand it; thou wouldst settle down in to space and time the word of the Lord, which is unto all generations. The Spirit in the prophets warned thee of this; and I, according to the light given unto me, did also warn, and in some cases was able to deliver thee. But still thou wouldst be grasping with thy fist the word of the Lord; and with thine understanding, which is formal and fashioned according to the traditions of men, thou wouldst be containing the word of the Lord. Did ever Isaiah think of comprehending what the lips of Isaiah spake? And when Jeremiah gave formal expectation to his words, instead of patience and hope, his feet had well-nigh slipped; and he was only brought back from this state of saying, 'I will speak no more in this name,' by his obedience greater than thine, which, when the fire burned within him, constrained him to speak. But thou, O man, hast not grace to do this; for thou hast called the Spirit of God the spirit of evil; and the word of thy God the word of the father of lies. Take heed, take heed, O my brother, lest the Lord harden thy heart, as He hardened the heart of Pharaoh; and lest thou as Balaam did, in the slaughter of Midian and Moab.

"God is righteous in his dealings with Robert Baxter, whom, for the years that I have known him, He hath led by a gentle and steady hand into the knowledge of all the forms of truth written in His word, especially of the purpose which He hath laid in the Christ. I say, the Lord led him onward with a steady hand into the forms of the truth; and at the same time gave him a child's heart for simplicity and gentleness. A tender husband, and a tender father, and a tender friend, did He make thee, O my brother. But thy heart lay in its guileless simplicity of childhood, and did not grow up to fill the majestic forms of thine understanding with the life of God. Thou buildest, and buildest in thine understanding; thou didst fashion and mould until thou hadst made it a noble temple; but the voice within it was but the voice of a child. Thine understanding was not a living temple. Thou hadst quickened none of thine articles of faith, none of thy forms of truth. They were but an outward shape, whose proportions thou couldst measure; not the food of an inward joy, not the growth of an inward principle of organic life. Thy child-like spirit from within the temple called upon thy Maker for strength and power; thou didst lie sore upon thy Father, thou didst entreat Him much, and thy Father could not refuse thee thy desire. But well knowing what rendings His Spirit must make in the temple which thou hadst built around thee, He sent thee first into the bosom of a living temple — a church whose understanding of truth had grown out of a vital informing principle; and He would have had thee submit thy building of man to the building of God. And He did put thee there to prophesy to the builders of the house, to ask change of raiment for Joshua, and to strengthen the hands of Zerubbabel; but thou wouldst not, thou wouldst be both prophet and church unto thyself. The Lord saw that He must either part with thee for His prophet, or part with us for His church. So, when thou hadst sown among us the seed of hope, the hope of the Man-child, He shut thy mouth, like Zacharias, for disbelieving the word and asking for a sign; and thou shalt be dumb like him for a season; aye, and until thou shalt yield thyself to be fashioned and builded by the Spirit of God, according to His mind, and not according to thine own.

"All thy doctrines concerning our Lord's flesh, and concerning regeneration, and concerning holiness of the believer, and concerning the baptism of the Holy Ghost and of fire, are dead letters of tradition, as thou holdest them, blind conceptions, having in them a form of godliness without the power. O brother! I would teach thee, for I am set as a teacher in the house of God; but thou wilt not be taught. Those letters, which, contrary to all honour and friendship — letters, so private, so holy — those two letters of mine, which thou hast dared (or rather, I should say, been constrained by God overruling thine evil) to publish, would have taught thee the truth, the living truth of God, concerning these great heads of doctrine. But thou wilt not be taught by any man, by any ordinance; nay, thou wilt not be taught by the Comforter dwelling within thee: how shouldst thou be taught by man? Yet once more, and for the multitude that follow after thee, I will get forth distinctly what my faith is, what the only living faith is, concerning these matters" (pp. 129-133).

Next follows a bold exposition of Mr. Irving's peculiar doctrine, too sad and evil to be transferred to these pages, which will fall elsewhere for judgment by God's word. Suffice it to cite the peroration in pp. 139, 140. "But what serveth this dispensation to the church? Much, every way. Chiefly to mar the work in the sight of the multitude, who were gaping after it, as to a market-place of mighty power and signs and wonders; — to separate those who bowed the knee to the waters of the Spirit and drank, from those who did but stoop their girded loins and stretch down the hand of faith to the brook that runneth in the way; to send back the thousands to their homes, while the handful pass onward with Gideon to the fiery fight. For this battle is not with confused noise and garments rolled in blood, but with burning and fuel of fire: whereunto who would send the hay, the wood, the stubble, and the chaff? Nay, but only the gold and silver and precious stones may abide that fiery conflict. Therefore is it that God hath permitted thee to put forth thine own shame, which will serve as a touchstone, to distinguish the men that have been feeding upon the word of God, from the men who have been eyeing it with suspicion, lying in wait for the faltering of their God, and taking good heed to risk nothing for the Saviour of their souls. But, O ye little ones, who are stumbled by this stumbling-block which a giant has put in your way — for he is a very mighty man — know the word of the Lord to Zerubbabel: 'Not by might, nor by power, but by My Spirit, saith the Lord.' Taste and see that God is good: prove ye the meat by the eating of it; know ye Satan from Jesus by the house which he buildeth; come amongst us, and see whether we be a church of the living God, or a synagogue of Satan. Ah! this pang woundeth the deepest, that Satan should have the credit of such a work! O thou enemy, thou hast triumphed, but thy triumph is short! And thou, Robert Baxter, hast lifted up Satan in the sight of many men, and crowned him as the author of a work which has been, and is, the joy and edification of thousands of saints. Be ashamed! Fear and tremble! Repent of thy wickedness, and pray, if haply the thought of thy heart, the word of thy mouth, and the work of thy hand, may be forgiven.

EDWARD IRVING."

The fact is, that Mr. B. held to the faith of God's elect for his soul, but was only too long deaf to the strange and fatal heterodoxy of Mr. I., through the great personal influence and surpassing ability of the latter, partly through the evil power to which he had too long surrendered himself. But Mr. I. was more honest than most false teachers. There was nothing privy about him. He was open, not to say arrogant, enough in the foregoing. It was (to adopt their phraseology) before the ordinances were fully set up, when an angel laid down that, if he taught positive error, none must question it, as the authority responsible to God! But even Mr, I. does pave the way for denying the Christian's title to judge, where a prophecy failed manifestly, on the perversion of 2 Peter 1: 20, that no prophecy is of private interpretation. They are not the only party in Christendom that would supersede (by the church, or the clergy) the believer's direct subjection to the Lord by scripture. Faith is undermined whenever the alleged voice of God — not in man, or the people, but in the church — is made superior to the written word. Even the natural honesty of Mr. I's soul was impaired, as we may see; but as a whole, he was plain-spoken, where he sets out his error, though he well knew how offensive it was to the mass of those he had once respected and loved. He was taken away prematurely, in spite of many a prophecy which promised him grand results in the near future. God cut short, in mercy, as well as judgment, a career of delusion. For even he, uncompromising as he was, submitted absolutely to the spirit in the gifted, which sanctioned his evil doctrine against Christ (though not all his expressions), and he was powerless before the ordinances which he idolized. Who indeed could or ought to resist if he believed it was God speaking?