ad
increased materially, it was not in every respect the old genuine, but a
modified Lutheranism which also their most pronounced representatives
advocated--not whole-hearted, undivided loyalty to Lutheran doctrines
and practises, but a Lutheranism tainted, more or less, with
indifferentism and unionism, nor absolutely free even from elements of
Pietism and Reformedism. For the cry of the conservative leaders who
later organized the General Council was not, "Back to Luther!" but,
"Back to Muhlenberg!" And the prominent conservatives that remained in
the General Synod after the Fort Wayne rupture, they all, without
exception, were outspoken unionists, ready to tolerate un-Lutheran
doctrines in their own midst and pulpit-fellowship with the sects, some
of them being disloyal even to doctrines distinctive of Lutheranism.
During the Platform controversy some of the most influential
conservatives differed from Schmucker not so much in theology as in
their policy of mutual toleration and the refusal to mutilate and
abandon the venerable Augsburg Confession. The lack of bold
aggressiveness on the part of the most Lutheran of these conservatives
is illustrated by the letter of H.J. Schmidt, already referred to: "If
all open conflict is avoided, our cause, I mean the cause of truth and
of the Church, will continue silently and surely to gain ground."
(Spaeth, 1, 349; _Lutheraner_, April 12, 1852.) Their lack of Lutheran
seriousness is exemplified by the cordial relation existing at
Gettysburg between C.F. Schaeffer, who in his lectures in Catechetics
endeavored to create an interest in, and respect for, the Lutheran
symbols, and his brother-in-law S.S. Schmucker, who did everything in
his power to discredit and misrepresent them. (_L. u. W._ 1884, 357.)

85. Conservatives Unionistic.--In their reports in the _Lutheraner_ and
in _Kirchliche Mitteilungen_ on the confessional awakening within the
General Synod, Walther and Sihler joyfully mention Drs. Morris and
Reynolds as the promising leaders of the movement. (_Lutheraner_ 6, 37.)
"An opposition has arisen against Kurtz and Schmucker such as no one
would have dared to hope for ten years ago," Loehe wrote in 1850.
"Reynolds," he continued, "placed the Confession into the light again.
Ministers ask for the wisdom of old. Students at Gettysburg purchase the
Book of Concord." The _Evangelical Review_ would contribute "to deliver
the children of the Church and her teachers out of the