leration--such was the
solution of the Platform controversy offered and advocated by his son,
Charles Porterfield. To this Krauth, Sr., agreed. April 2, 1857, he
wrote to his son: "I am decidedly of opinion that the General Synod
ought to do something effectual for the pacification of the Church. I
concur in the views you express, and believe, unless such views prevail,
the Church must ere long be rent into fragments. Whilst I am anxious for
such an agreement in regard to a doctrinal basis as will embrace all the
wings of Lutheranism in our country, I very much wish we could agree on
forms of worship in accordance with the liturgical character of our
Church, and erect a barrier against the fanaticism and Methodism which
so powerfully control some of our ministers and people." (380.) W. M.
Reynolds, in the _Evangelical Review_ which he had established 1849
(1870 succeeded by the _Lutheran Quarterly_), denounced the Platform as
a declaration of "separation from the whole Lutheran Church of the
past." "We trust," said he, "that no Lutheran synod will be beguiled
into the awful movement here so abruptly, yet so confidently proposed to
them--to revolutionize their whole previous history, and declare
separation from the whole Lutheran Church of the past, and all their
brethren in the present who hold to the faith of their fathers, 'the
faith once delivered to the saints.'" (360.) Reynolds, who publicly
renounced his former un-Lutheran views and withdrew his endorsement of
Kurtz, was hailed by many as the leader of the conservatives in the
General Synod. But, his confessional endeavors being vitiated and
neutralized by his fundamental unionistic attitude, he, too,
disappointed and failed the friends of true Lutheranism. He opened the
pages of the _Evangelical Review_ to both, liberals as well as
conservatives, to the advocates as well as the opponents of the Platform
and its theology. Reynolds stood for mutual toleration, and in
1864--turned Episcopalian. (_L. u. W._ 1857, 314; 1870, 156.) J. N.
Hoffmann entered the controversy with his "Broken Platform," and W. J.
Mann with his pamphlet "A Plea for the Augsburg Confession," according
to Spaeth "the strongest refutation of the Definite Platform." (_L. u.
W._ 1856, 75; 1857, 283.) Dr. Mann wrote, May 7, 1856: "If Schmucker had
not the _Observer_ as an ally, he would accomplish absolutely nothing.
As it is, however, the two gentlemen fabricate a public opinion,
supported by a mul