INGITES, OR APOSTOLICAL CHURCH.

If the absence of brotherly love for religious people, if a scorn of all
who worship God different from themselves, constitute heresy--and surely
the Apostle John shows that it does very clearly--then there are no such
heretics in London as the Irvingites, who worship in a very magnificent
cathedral in Gordon Square. Irving, I imagine, with all his genius, had
a very uncatholic spirit. Take, for instance, his celebrated missionary
sermon. Requested by the directors of the London Missionary Society to
preach the annual sermon at Surrey Chapel--how did he begin?

When he ascended the pulpit he entered on a kind of audible soliloquy.
Said he, "How shall I encourage myself to address the thronging multitude
by whom I am surrounded? I will even cast about for a few examples.
There are three of a notable character which now strike me: that of the
Apostle Paul preaching before the Jewish Sanhedrim, that of Bernard
Gilpin preaching before the Court of King Edward VI., and, that of a
Scottish Divine preaching before the Commissioner of the General
Assembly. On these three examples, as on a sacred tripod, I feel my
spirit propped; but especially the last, the Scottish Divine preaching
before the Commissioner of the General Assembly. If he could venture to
encounter the hoary-headed eldership and substantial theology of the
North, surely I may, without fear, address myself to the flimsy
evangelism of the South." In this kind and flattering way did Irving
speak of the great body of English Dissenters.

Of the Irvingite Church, the late Drummond, the banker, M.P. for Surrey,
was also an elder, and the same spirit lent bitterness to his sarcastic
and biting tongue. It was a treat to see and hear him, especially when
the topic was at all theological. Irving describes Drummond as one "who
hath taken us poor despised interpreters of prophecy under your wing, and
made the walls of your house like unto the ancient schools of the
prophets." But out of his own house Drummond seemed to have taken little
else or nothing under his wing. His mission apparently was to preach
that in nothing was there anything--that we were all whited sepulchres.
The Egyptians placed a skeleton at their feasts to remind them of their
mortality. The Sultan Saladin, it is said, had a similar message dinned
daily into his ears by a herald especially appointed to that purpose.
Mr. Drummond voluntarily took that duty on