The Statements and Words of William Irvine

The documented statements made by Wm. Irvine verbally or in writing are from the following sources:

(1)  Statement for a Court Case dated July, 1913

(2)   Interview with Reporter Lloyd's Review Feb 3, 1907

(3)  John Coles Interview with Morning Leader

(4) Letters written by Wm. Irvine after he went to Israel in 1919 where he lived for the rest of his life

(5)  Quotes from sermons Wm. Irvine made as a leading worker at the Crocknacrieve N. Ireland Conventions printed in the Impartial Reporter Newspaper

(6) Extract of sermon in Nenagh Guardian - April 15, 1911, page 5

(7)  Notes taken of statements made by Wm. Irvine at the following conventions:

Convention Addresses circa 1910

July, 1911 Sermon

Statements in Letters by Wm. Irvine that he was the Founder

Statements that Wm. Irvine was the Leader

NOTE: Wm. Irvine uses the term "The Testimony" to refer to the 2x2 ministry and church he founded.

Today is my birthday. I am forty-four. To-morrow I celebrate another birthday. Fourteen years ago I was ‘born’ spiritually…After years of hard work I rose to be manager for Messrs. W. Bearn (sic-should be Baird) & Co. at their Kilsyth and Bothwell pits, where I was employed when the Rev. John McNeil, the Evangelist, converted me, and eight months after his visit I gave up my position in order to devote my life to the Gospel, and I went to the Bible Training Institute in Glasgow. Had I chosen the ordinary path that leads to the ministry with its churches, chapels, congregations, and stipends, all would have been well.

But already I had realized that such things were not part of Christ’s ministry, and I decided to discard them. My studies finished I joined the Faith Mission, which was controlled by J. G. Govan, and I preached in various parts of the kingdom for something like five years. It was whilst I was working in the South of Ireland that I came to the conclusion that my positions was still inconsistent with the example set by Christ, and I left the mission to preach alone.

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September 29, 1904:  The next speaker was Mr. William Irvine.  He referred to John the Baptist baptising our Lord.  He said all the churches taught the doctrine of immersion, though they don’t practise it.  Every church believed in immersion in a river of running water, but they went from that to their synagogues and temples, and evaded the plain command.

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October 13, 1904 p8:  Mr. Irvine also delivered an address.  He wanted all people to be saved, as he had been, and not to be ashamed of openly confessing their sins, so that they might not only obtain remission for them but become followers of Christ, and so enter the Kingdom of Heaven, and there enjoy that everlasting glory promised to them by the Giver of All.

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July 23, 1908:  WHAT WAS FILLING HELL.  Mr. Wm. Irvine next spoke.  This gentleman had originally belonged to the Presbyterian Church, and in the early passages of his address he stated that Presbyterianism was not Roman Catholicism—it was white-washed Popery.  Where they saw the clergyman, there they saw Rome.  Where they saw collections they saw Rome.  Where they found men worshipping in a building put up for that purpose, that was devilry.  That was what was filling hell.  How was it he did not believe in men paid for preaching?  Because Christ, Moses, Elijah were not men like that.  Why did he not believe in making collections?  Because Jesus never did so.  Whenever that was done it was the Devil who did so.  The Devil’s work was the building of churches with stone and lime throughout the world’s history.  And every church was a monument to the power of the Devil over the hearts and lives of men.
 
CLERGY AND THE WORLD.  Most people today, continued Mr. Irvine, prided themselves, saying that they were Presbyterians.  Poor blind fools!  People said they were Methodists.  Poor blind fools!  Poor blind fool, with the mark of the Devil to go down to Hell.  It was the CLERGY WHO WERE FILLING HELL.  The publicans were blamed for making the drunkard, but many a drunkard was saved.  No one could believe in a clergyman and get to heaven, and if any of them had friends who had gone down to Hell through belief in the clergy, let them stop and think.  The clergy were filled with pride and worldliness and the desire to get on in the world as ever they were.  But God changed their hearts, and they were now as much opposed to Presbyterianism and other clericalisms as they were opposed to Popery.  He saw a priest and his brother shaking hands the other day at a railway station, and the priest was almost offended because his brother was so rough a man.  The brother was the gentleman, and the priest a mean scamp to be ashamed of his own flesh and blood.  And yet they found Protestant clergymen dressed well to liken the poor blind Roman priest.  God pity any man who did so!  Some of them dared question their right to speak against the clergy, lest it should affect their pocket or their good name.  The clergy were men sitting in a manse fattening and destroying their fathers and mothers, their brothers and sisters.  And yet some said unkind things about them because they dared speak against the clergy.

NORTH AND SOUTH COMPARED.  From Rome to the Salvation Army they had a great choice.  Put an Orange sash on a man and he would go to hell with one on, when he would not go in company with a Ribbonman! Poor honest North of Ireland man!  In the south they had the Pope and priest stirring up strife against the British Government.  In the north they had them stirring up strife for the British Government, and all the time the clergy were pocketing the proceeds.  Where did they put the money?  They were building more churches and multiplying their organizations, so that it would be impossible for a man to live in Ireland without suffering from them.
 
A CHALLENGE.  Mr. Irvine delivered a strong address against the clergy and mentioned some in particular.  One, whom he mentioned by name, and whom he alleged had sat beside his (the speaker’s) mother and had broken her heart, he described as a dirty, greasy man, a devilish fellow, and a fat, lazy, good for nothing man.  That man was going to hell, and his (the speaker’s) relations were following him gladly on.  ‘I will give you my head,’ said Mr. Irvine.  ‘If I can’t prove that there is not the slightest chance of a clergyman being in heaven by the way set forth in the Bible.  You say that these are strong words.  They are not half as strong as the occasion demands.’

METHODIST CLERGYMAN’S VISIT.  The speaker stated that on the previous Sunday a Methodist clergyman had visited them and also on some days during the week, and when spoken to had not a word to say for himself.  It showed the mean contemptible spirit of the man when he was afraid to go to the platform to defend his position.  When he looked to Jesus he had no foundation for saying that he was right in the position he was in.  False prophets had always been fond of money, and always went down most assuredly to the pit.  There was more tyranny in the world from the clergymen than anything else.  They were worse than wolves, lions or tigers.  They were the most deadly creatures on God’s earth.

ALLEGED IRVINESTOWN BOYCOTT.   Reference was then made by the speaker to an alleged boycott of a lady in Irvinestown, who had left the Methodists, as he said, to follow Jesus in the true way, by the Methodists there.  ‘If you will not be a Methodist’ quoted Mr. Irvine, ‘I will boycott you,’ and he described them as ‘DIRTY DEVILISH METHODISTS.’

The speaker also made frequent use of the adjectives, ‘dirty,’ ‘mean,’ ‘lazy loafers’ regarding clergymen in his address.  He also referred to a case of a Christian school teacher who was expelled by a Church of Ireland clergyman from the school because he refused to teach the ‘prayer book and devilish lies.’
 
GOD’S MESSAGE TO CLERICALISM.  ‘How do I know Methodist preachers are wrong?’ said Mr. Irvine.  ‘Because they fight against me.  They fight against all who preach the Jesus Way.  They speak behind backs.  Let them come and stand on this platform and speak out, and then we will know what to answer.  Christ said to the clerics:  "Ye generation of vipers, how can you escape the damnation of Hell."  That is the eternal message of God to clericalism.  Mr. Irvineadded that any man capable of courting the patronage of the clergy was inviting a part of the Devil on his shoulder on his way to Hell.’

CONSECRATED BURIAL GROUND. With regard to the burial of a true Christian woman in the Co. Wicklow, the speaker said that her body was refused burial in the churchyard.  Better to bury her in a dung heap.  He would rather be buried there than in consecrated ground.  In the consecrated ground there was marked off a spot for drunkards, harlots, and unbaptised babies—babies not sprinkling with dirty, devilish hands.  When he said ‘dirty and devilish’ he meant it, for the clergy were the servants of the Devil.  Every time they looked at a spire they beheld the work of the Devil, or at the church clock.  He believed in the Town Hall clock not in the church clock, because the latter never told the right time nor never could.  (Laughter.)  In the whole world no country suffered so much from clericalism as Ireland.  ‘You don’t believe in Rome.’  He added, ‘Why do you then believe in clericalism?  It is not in the Book.  You will not find priests or clergymen in the New Testament.’

…After tea, another service was held, at which both Mr. Cooney and Mr. Irvineagain spoke.  The latter chiefly referred to clergymen preparing their sermons and reading them.  He said that if God were in the pulpit there was no need for a written sermon; that a man who was filled with the Glory and Spirit of God had no need to trust to notes or manuscripts to preach the Word of God.  (Also July 23, 1908, p8)

Collections, we are told by Mr. Irvine, are the work of the Devil. (Also July 23, 1908, p8)

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July 30, 1908 p8:  At the afternoon service the first speaker was Mr. William Irvine, who, as he did on a previous Sunday, again attacked the clergy and the churches in general.  He challenged anyone to give him a text to prove that a man should be a clergyman or to get a college education to become one.  Paul, he said, went to college and he came out a persecutor of Jesus and his way.  The clergymen of the present also went to college, and came out a persecutor of Jesus and His Way.  Why did they believe, said Mr. Irvine, that John Wesley, Spurgeon, the Archbishop of Canterbury and John Calvin were in hell?  Was it out of their own imagination?  No.  He would give an honest reason.  Because it was the same kind of men like John Wesley and those others that led men and women to believe they were going to heaven, when they were going to hell, because they let them love steeples and church buildings.  It was to such men that Jesus said:—‘How can ye escape the damnation of hell?’  That Book taught them what kind of man went to hell.  No man need make the slightest mistake as to what kind of man a preacher sent by God was.

Mr. Irvine complained that the IMPARTIAL REPORTER of last issue had published some statements he made and left out others.  It did not report his statement for the people of Fermanagh to know that Calvin who was a Presbyterian, had been instrumental in putting people on the scaffold.  Calvin, he said, belonged to Presbyterian Popery.  He (the speaker), did not see any difference between a Presbyterian pastor and a Roman Catholic priest.  God made no difference between a clergyman of one kind and one of another.
 
The speaker in his addresses also referred to Mr. W. D. Wilson, of Framlingham, whom he described as a poor old clerical fool and a supporter of the clergy.  Mr. Wilson’s two daughters were sitting in the tent that day, and he (Mr. Wilson) was wasting his time and his money in scattering literature against them and hindering in every way he could the word of God.  And clergymen were even willing to put their names to those papers he published, which contained the dirtiest and filthiest lies.  Some people said that the clergy had nothing to do with it.  They would publish them on the church steeple if they could prove one of the statements that that poor deluded fool (Mr. Wilson) published.

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July 30, 1908 pg 5:   A Scotch gentleman followed who started by reading extracts from a local paper—(the IMPARTIAL REPORTER)—and commenting on them, making some personal remarks about the editor of the paper.  He next gave out a text and began a la Cooney.  Holding up his Bible in front of his face he said, ‘There is no clergyman who has ever stood behind this book but is in hell, or is going there.’ This was the subject matter of his discourse, but he went further, and said that all those who listened to clergymen and supported them were also on their way to the place of perdition.

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August 12, 1909:  MR. IRVINE - SOME STRONG VIEWS.  The discourses at Sunday’s meetings would on the whole lead one to conclude that there was no real Christian love or sympathy manifested in their line of thought, which is apparently devoid of all true Christian charity, brotherly kindness, and Christ likeness.
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An address was delivered by Mr. Wm. Irvine, the recognised leader of the sect, who in his remarks criticised very strongly the work carried on by the workers, during the holding of mission services over all parts of the country and United Kingdom.  He blamed them for allowing the flesh to have too much influence in the work, with the result that numbers of converts were allowed to join The Testimony who were nothing more than

SHAM HYPOCRITES.
Mr. Irvine’s remarks seemed specially directed towards two prominent members of the sect, whether he intended it or not, and seemed to include Messrs. Cooney, Ben Bowles, Bill Carroll, John Kelly, and others, and were made applicable to all the other workers, with the exception of one or two.
 
It is understood that Mr. Irvine’s strong views in this respect have accounted for his conspicuous absence at all the public meetings held during the present convention up to the present.

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August 19, 1909, p8:  The closing stages of the annual convention of Tramp preachers at Crocknacrieve, near Ballinamallard, were reached on Sunday. As was stated in last week’s IMPARTIAL REPORTER, Mr. Edward Cooney, who has figured prominently as leader this year, left during the week for America, where he is expected to remain. He was badly missed at Sunday’s proceedings, for they lacked the interest which his personality imparted.  At a previous meeting of the ‘brethren,’ addresses were delivered by Wm. Irvine and Miss Gill, both of whose remarks were confined to expounding the gospel, and instructing those present how to ‘walk’ when they left that convention..

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July 3, 1913:  Three meetings were held during the day.  Wm. Irvine was present at the mid-day meeting, accompanied on the platform by Messrs. E. Cooney and W. Gill, and some remarks which he made in his address would show that the Pilgrims have NOT CHANGED in their attitude towards the clergymen of the present day and all associated with them.  He was not sure yet, he said, whether God would ask him to forgive Scottish Presbyterian clergymen for the teaching they had given him until he was 30.  If there was anything pure in the human family it was A LITTLE BABY,  and nothing made him so mad as to hear the people talk of its being born in original sin.  The baby, because of its human nature, very seldom got better—very often worse.  People said they should not say anything against clergymen, but the serpent in the Garden of Eden got great denunciation, and religious people at the present day would be very angry if they were called the brood of the Serpent, as Jesus called the Scribes and Pharisees.   

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July 31, 1913:  The morning meeting was a ‘testimony’ meeting.  Mr. Wm. Irvine spoke at intervals.  He said that God could have no interest in a man that was indulging his selfishness, either in a saloon or in a ‘synagogue.’  The world was filled with hatred and pride.  ‘People were saying they would fight for their religion.  Whether they were Protestants or Roman Catholics that only proved they were human.  The devil’s work was to teach men how to be religious and how to get to Heaven—but not the way Jesus did.  But there would come a time when there would be no spires seen on this world, when Jesus came back to reign.  And the work of making men like Jesus would continue in every part of the universe… The closing scene at the meeting in the gloaming was impressive.  All the arrangements had been made for the departure of the ‘preachers’ to different parts of the world, and it only remained for the Go-Preachers’ founder to give to all the last words of counsel and farewell.  Mr. Irvine dealt mainly with the duty of those in fellowship towards one another and towards the outside world.  There was more heart for one another there, he said, than they would get in any community in all the world.  And what people had heard there during the Convention would either torment them in hell or make them glad in heaven, for the word would not return void.  They could do much to soften the hearts of the people with a little kindness.  Many of them got an IMPARTIAL REPORTER, and they never thought of passing it on to the fellow who had none.  They could do many little things among their friends and relatives.  The best use they could make of anything was to express a little love.

Extract from Nenagh Guardian extract from Belfast paper
Cloughjordan Fair "Preaching" Incident
April 15, 1911, page 5

Dear Sir,--In reference to your remarks in last Saturday's "Guardian," to the preachers at Cloughjordan fair, I do not think you will find many of any denomination of Christians to disagree with you. I enclose an extract from a Belfast paper giving an account of an address, at one of their conventions, by a man called Irvine or Irwin, who visited this neighbourhood some years ago. I hope you will, give it in full. All Christians should unite in putting down this devilish movement—Yours, &c CHURCHMAN

Extract from Belfast paper:

A Mr Irvine, who seems chief lieutenant to Mr Cooney, next gave an address. He said, "Presbyterianism was not Roman Catholicism, it was whitewashed Popery; where they saw the clergyman there they saw Rome; where they saw collections they saw Rome; where they found men worshipping in a building put up for that purpose that Was devilry. That was what was filling hell. How was it he did not believe in men paid for preaching? Because Christ, Moses, Elijah were not men like that. Why did he not believe in making collections? Because Jesus never did so. Whenever that was done it was the devil who did so. The devil's work was the building of churches with stone and lime throughout the world's history and every church was a monument to the power of the devil over the hearts and lives of men.

"The Filling of Hell.  Most people prided themselves, saying they were Presbyterians; poor blind fools. People said they were Methodists; poor blind fools. Poor blind fools with the mark of the devil to go down to hell. It was the clergy who were filling hell. The publicans were blamed for making the drunkard, but many a drunkard was saved. None could believe in a clergyman and get to heaven, and if any of them had friends who had gone down to hell through belief in the clergy let them stop and think. The clergy were men sitting in a manse, fettering and destroying their fathers and mothers, their brothers and sisters."

The speaker referred in his denunciations to several clergymen by name. One whose name he gave was “a dirty greasy man, a devilish fellow, and a fat, lazy, good-for-nothing man—that man was going to hell; and the speaker's relations were following him gladly on.

"I will give you my head," said Mr Irvine "if I can't prove that there is not the slightest chance of a clergyman being in heaven by the way set forth in the bible. You say that these are strong words; they are not half as strong as the occasion demands. There was more tyranny in the world from the clergyman than anything else. They were worse than wolves, lions or tigers. They were the most deadly creatures on God's earth,"

The speaker went on to speak of "dirty devilish Methodists," and to complain about a Church of Ireland clergyman dismissing a teacher because he refused to teach the "prayer book and devilish lies." "How do I know the Methodist preachers are wrong? Because they preach against me; they fight against all who preach the Jesus way," "Christ said to the clerics, ye generation of vipers how can you escape the damnation of hell." "That is the eternal message of God to clericalism. Any man capable of courting the patronage of the clergy was inviting a pat of the devil on his shoulder on his way to hell."

With regard to the burial of a woman in Co. Wicklow, the speaker said her body was refused burial in the churchyard. "Better to bury her in a dung heap. He would rather be buried there than in consecrated ground. In the consecrated ground there was marked off a spot for drunkards, harlots, and unbaptised babies, babies not sprinkled with ditty, devilish hands." "When he said ‘dirty and devilish’ he meant it for the clergymen, the servants of the devil; every time they look at one they beheld the work of the devil. You will not find priest nor clergymen in the New Testament," continued the preacher.