55, 337.) The Synod of West Pennsylvania, urged by the Synod of East
Pennsylvania to endorse its resolutions, refused to enter the
controversy or pass on the Platform, declaring that they were satisfied
with their present constitution and unwilling to add new test-questions.
(1855, 320.) It came as a relief to Kurtz and the Platform men when the
Synod of Central Pennsylvania, in May, 1856, unanimously and solemnly,
by a rising vote, adopted the Platform. (1856, 223.) In October, 1856,
the Synod of Maryland declared that every member was at liberty to
accept or reject the alleged errors of the Augsburg Confession,
enumerated by the Platform, provided that thereby the divine institution
of the Sabbath was not rejected, nor the doctrinal basis of the General
Synod subverted. (1856, 382.) In October, 1856, the Allegheny Synod
declared its adherence to the doctrinal basis of the General Synod, but,
at the same time, rejected the doctrines enumerated by the Platform as
errors contained in the Augsburg Confession. (1856, 27; 1857, 156.) A
similar compromise was adopted by the Pittsburgh Synod. The knock-out
blow to the Platform came from the older, larger, and conservative
synods. In May, 1856, the Ministerium of Pennsylvania, then numbering
98 pastors, condemned the Platform and reaffirmed its own basis of
faith. (1856, 224; 1857, 252.) The New York Ministerium instructed its
delegates for the convention of the General Synod in 1857 to vote
against the Platform. Whence the wind was blowing was apparent also from
the fact that representative men of both the New York and Pennsylvania
synods participated in the Free Evangelical Lutheran Conferences
(1856-1859), advocated and led by Walther (1856, 348).

64. Pittsburgh and Hartwick Synods.--In the _Observer_, February 15,
1856, Kurtz suggested with respect to the Platform controversy that a
District Synod adopt a resolution to the effect that the Augustana did
not contain the errors charged with by the Platform, and that respecting
these doctrines every member of Synod was at liberty to follow his own
judgment. In accordance with this advice the Pittsburgh Synod, in the
same year, compromised the differences of the Old and New School men in
a number of resolutions framed by Charles Porterfield Krauth, who then
was still spending his efforts in trying to mediate between the
adherents and opponents of the Definite Platform. Among these
resolutions are the following: "II. Resolved, T