ARTICLE VI.

THE CAUSES AND THE REMEDIES OF THE LOSSES ()F HER POPULATION BY THE LUTHERAN CHURCH IN AMERICA.

BY REv. B. SADTLER, D. D., PRESIDENT OF MUHLENBERG COLLEGE, ALLENTOWN, PA. Introductory to the consideration of the causes of the losses of her population by the Lutheran Church in this country, it will be necessary to take a brief historical view of the sources and national and personal characteristics of that population. It was originally an emigrant population; to a limited extent from Holland and Sweden, and predominantly from Germany. The history of these early settlers has been written by able pens, and in full detail, and at the recently held Diet, was so lucidly, though summarily, given by one of its worthy secretaries, Dr. Jacobs, that I need not re hearse the well told story. My task will be to find, in the external circumstances and spiritual surroundings of that population, such facts as will help to solve the question, why we have lost a part of it. The period in which our brethren in the faith first settled in this country, covering the latter half of the 17th and the whole of the 18th century, was an era of colonization. All the old countries were sending out their full quotas, partly to dispose of surplus pop ulation, and partly to secure a share in the rich lands and commerce of the new continent. When the Dutch came over and settled New Amsterdam, now New York, and the lands along the Hudson and Mohawk, those of our Confession came along with their Reformed neighbors. They were a small minority of the whole number, but I can find no historical statement that will show they were not the equals of the Reformed in intelligence and means. The Swedish emigrants were a noble band, and came to our shores not only in fluenced by the spirit of enterprise, but by the higher purpose of (Io 4) Dr. SADTLER's ESSAY. IO5 planting the standard of Christian truth among the aboriginal tribes that roamed in the forests. The traveler from this city to Balti more will observe on his right as he enters Wilmington, Delaware, a very ancient structure, partly of native stone, and partly of im ported brick, standing high above the street grade, in the midst of the graves of its founders, long departed. There dwelt and labored Campanius, the second pastor of the congregation. He has the high honor of having been the first Protestant missionary to the Indians. His thorough devotion to the truth and methods, as con fessed and used by our Church, is proved by the fact that he trans lated and published Luther's Catechism in the language of the Del awares. The German emigration to this country set in rather later than that of the Dutch and the Swedish, but it assumed larger propor tions, and has flowed on, in an uninterrupted stream, for about two centuries, until we have the remarkable spectacle of American cities, containing more Germans than any in the mother country, except ing a few of the capitals. The early German settlers were differ ent from the Dutch and the Swedish, in that they were not only emigrants, but refugees from religious persecution. As a conse quence, they were generally poor in this world's goods, and for a long time were unable to provide for more than the sternest require ments of the present life. Many were sent over as early as 1706 to 1710, at public expense, under the auspices of Queen Anne of England, to supply the labor market in the colonies, especially in New York. Others came over as so called redemptioners ; that is, they were brought over by contract, by the shipowners and masters, and sold into temporary servitude, until they paid the price of their passage and outfit by their personal services. The abuses of this system became so great that the German Society of this city inter fered, and secured the necessary legislation to abrogate it. But without dwelling on the evidences of the general poverty of the early German settlers any longer, we assert the fact of that poverty, and in it will find one of the two great factors that from the very beginning operated to the detriment of our Church. Let us see how it injuriously affected the early prosperity of our Zion. It prevented her securing an adequate su/pſy of ministers to serve at her altars. Nay, for a long time she had no ministry at all. The Swedish branch had. In that cold land of the North, Protest IO6 - SECOND LUTHERAN DIET.

ant zeal was at fever heat. It had come forth gloriously from the Thirty Years' war, and, though he was never canonized, Gustavus Adolphus was thenceforth a sort of Protestant saint, revered on no special saint's day, but on all days. When the descendants of per haps some of the very men that had followed their great king to victory on the plains of Germany, went forth as emigrants to the New World, they went protected and provided for by the State and blessed by the Church. They were provided with a learned, pious and adequate ministry, to preach to them the everlasting truth as it is in Jesus, and to comfort and edify their souls under the hard ships of their pioneer life. But not thus with the Germans. They were exiled from their vineyards and fields, their forges and looms in the Palatinate; but it was not a wholesale exodus of pastors and flocks, of school-masters and scholars. Many remained behind, and their pastors remained to minister to them. Those that went forth went well nigh empty-handed, as to this world's goods, and their whole visible spiritual outfit, in addition to the Bible and Cate chism, was the few devotional books that were in vogue in their day. These old heirlooms can still be occasionally bought at the sales of household chattels in the German counties. For a genera tion they were well nigh without regular pastors and services. There were but few exceptions to this state of things. The exodus of the Protestant Salzburgers was wholesale, and they took with them pastors supplied from Halle, to their settlement in Georgia. Here in the North, our poor forefathers were a prey to every de structive influence that could befall a shepherdless people. Near the Swedish settlements, their pastors took pity on their forsaken German brethren in the faith, and did what they could to provide them with the ordinances and the sacraments. In the interior, chil dren often grew to manhood and womanhood without baptism, or received it at the hands of vagabond pretenders to holy orders, or of deposed ministers, that had left their country for their country's good, and here palmed themselves off as the Lord's true servants, until, renewing their vices, the wolf was discerned beneath the sheep's clothing. In the Hallische Nachrichten, p. 142, as late as 1751, the sad recital of what these settlers had just lived through, is thus given: “For many years these poor people had gone with out proper instruction out of the Word of God, the children had grown up without the knowledge of God and of divine things, in DR. SADTLER's ESSAY. Ioy part even without baptism ; nor was there any lack of wolves and hirelings in this spiritual wilderness. From one side the scattered sheep were torn, or at least driven about by the many sects; on the other side the deposed preachers and school-masters from Ger many, or even other persons, who were worthless at home, when they came to Pennsylvania, set up for preachers and wrought much mischief among them. One can easily imagine, that such fellows were but little concerned about the instruction and edification of the people, and their own disorderly walk could only give rise to offences among them.” Yet even under these discouraging circumstances the great ma jority of our brethren held fast to the faith of their Fatherland. Exiles for conscience sake, they knew the value of the pure Word and Sacraments, and sent pitiable pleas out to Germany for pastors and teachers. In 1733 the Church, already existing, at New Han over, and Providence (now the Trappe), and here, united in an earnest appeal to Halle to have regularly ordained ministers sent to them, and in their pitiful plea say they are in a land “full of sects and heresy, without ministers and teachers, schools, churches and books.” It was not until 1742 that their prayer was answered, and on the 25th of November of that year Muhlenberg stepped ashore in the New World. With his arrival a great star arose in the dark ness that had overhung an infant church. He was a man of the Barnabas order: “a good man and full of the Holy Ghost and of faith; and much people was added unto the Lord.” His spiritu ality was the deepest, his consecration to his work the most devoted, his industry simply wonderful, both in acquiring and dispensing. He seemed almost to pick up a language over night, that he might preach in it the next day. A lay historian of the Lutheran Church in New York city (Review, April, 1877, p. 274), gives the following as a specimen of a day's work of this eminent servant of Christ in that city: “Early in the morning he held confession in his house, with some church members from abroad, after that he preached in the Dutch language and administered the communion to fifty per sons. In the afternoon he preached in German and concluded with a catechisation. In the evening he preached in the English lan guage; and all this on a warm July day.” In less than five years after his arrival in this country, Muhlenberg preached English as often as in his travels he found an audience desiring it. Had his IO8 SECOND LUTHERAN ID1ET.

spirit and zeal and discernment animated all his successors, we would have few losses to deplore. But this is a digression, and let us return to our subject proper. The same poverty that had prevented the German colonists from providing for their spiritual wants, from the beginning, continued to operate in retarding the development of the Church throughout the last century. Others followed Muhlenberg, sent out by Dr. Franke, from that blessed seat of piety and learning at Halle. They were provided with means to pay their passage by friends in the home churches. The very sanctuaries in which the congrega tions, here, and at Germantown, and at Reading, and elsewhere, worshiped, were built in part from the same source. To this day there are productive legacies left by these pious donors in Germany, and that are managed by the Ministerium of Pennsylvania to aid in the support of needy pastors. A consequence of this poverty was that a number of congregations were compelled to unite in the maintenance of a preacher. For a series of years the churches in Philadelphia, the Trappe and New Hanover, were compelled to be content with the services of one pastor between them. This state of affairs was the rule, not the exception. It is to be feared that this arrangement, that originally grew out of the poverty of the worshipers, has been continued, in many cases, through the greed of pastors and the parsimony and spiritual indifference of the congre gations. But this poverty operated in another way to the detriment of the Church and to the loss of its population. It prevented the organi. zation of educational institutions to provide the churches with a native ministry. The Revolutionary war produced a great change in the relations of the churches here to the home church. Already since 1769, the supply of pastors from Halle had ceased. Though the pastors that came thence continued to report to their superiors in Germany, for a few years after the Revolution, yet that event was a declaration of independence in the State, and very soon be came such in the Church. But now came the difficulty how to provide a ministry for the churches. In 1703, the Swedish pastors in this city and vicinity ordained a German minister named Justus Falkner, who after laboring for a short time in Montgomery county, went to New York city and there took charge of the Dutch Lutheran Church. There is no record of any subsequent ordination of a DR. SADTLER's ESSAY. IO9

German pastor, by any competent authority, for the next half cen tury. Few and far between were the accessions for years thereafter. In 1771, the Ministerium had two licentiates, and from that time on there is frequent mention, in their legislation, of the examina tion and licensure of candidates; but the references are often to poorly qualified and even suspicious characters, whom they either reject or take on long trial and put under close surveillance. Leading theologians were compelled to take students into their own families and train them for the holy office. The Synod turned with hope of relief and promises of assistance to the College then under the auspices of Presbyterians, at Carlisle, and to Franklin College, at Lancaster. The venerable Dr. Helmuth was Professor of Philology in the University of Pennsylvania, and Dr. Kunze, Professor of Oriental Language in Columbia College, New York, and these institutions, especially the former, were put under requisi tion to educate young men with the ministry in view. But save the feeble institution endowed by Hartwick, remote from the great centres of Lutheranism and German influence, the Church had neither College nor Seminary until full twenty-five years of the present century had elapsed. As late as 1818, a committee of the Reformed Synod appeared, in the Convention of the Ministerium of Pennsylvania at Harrisburg, to suggest common action for the establishment of a Theological Seminary. Yet all this while our population was increasing, both by continued immigration and natural increase. Congregations were multiplying, new Synods were forming, the West was opening to settlement, and our brethren were hastening thither to occupy its lands, under the inducements held out by the government. Under the operation of the law of supply and demand, there were persons found to respond to the cry for pastors, but in many cases it was the wolf that held the shepherd's staff. It was a period in which some wretched stuff was introduced into our ranks. If I dared, I could draw you some sorry sketches of men and manners, as imparted to me by eye witnesses, who are now at rest, and in part which had come under my own observation. But there were not even enough to meet the wants of the Church, taking the poor with the good. Single men were constrained to take charge of enormous pastorates. Congre gations were thrust upon them. Unfortunately what was then a necessity, has become, in many instances, a fixed evil. The German I IO SECOND LUTHERAN DIET. character is conservative, does not readily take to innovation, and what the fathers did, forsooth, the children must do. If the former could only have service once in four weeks, the latter do not desire it any oftener. It might be deemed filial impiety, to wish to have better privileges than the fathers had. I need not detain you to prove that if our ancestors had had the means to have early established colleges and seminaries to train up a ministry, well equipped spiritually and intellectually, and adequate in number, our communicant membership this day would be vastly larger, better instructed in doctrines, better trained in the duties of practical piety and benevolent work. Our loss was others' gain; but may it not be feared too that, in many cases, our lack of spirit ual food and culture was the eternal loss of souls that looked unto us for bread, and we gave them husks or let them starvel Let us proceed to notice another potent factor in the external cir cumstances of our population that helped mightily to thin our ranks. It was the hindrance of an alien speech. Language has been the chief cause at work in sweeping our poſulation into other folds. The original colonies that were established, in the present Atlantic States of the Union, were all English excepting the Dutch colony of New Amsterdam, which, however, passed into the hands of the English at an early day. They were established under crown grants and placed under the government of English officials and English laws. It was the language of authority, of legislation and of the courts, of business and of amusement. It was the lan guage of honor and of preferment, and political ambition and social emulation alike encouraged its attainment and use. Above all it was the language of the schools, excepting where the foreign element was strong enough to retain the use of the mother tongue in the parochial schools. But even there the English was early in troduced, side by side with the German, and the scholars recited in German and played in English. We cannot but see that under these circumstances the Dutch, and Swedish, and German lan guages, had to contend with tremendous odds in the cities and towns. In the interior, where the emigrant population was massed and isolated, the case was different, and for more than a century and a half the German language has held its own. Indeed, in some districts, where the Germans were numerically strong, and there was a limited Scotch-Irish settlement, the former have swal DR. SADTLER's ESSAY. I I I lowed up the latter in language and faith, and we have Lutherans whose names begin with the Irish Mc or O’. The Dutch Lutheran element was never very strong, and was not reinforced by continued immigration. It melted away at an early period, and was absorbed into the English churches, especially the Episcopal. Already in 1751 Muhlenberg found the demand for English to be so great in New York city, that during a four months' ministry there in that year, and again in the next year, his labors were largely in that language. Upon his departure, on both occasions, he preached his farewell sermons in Eng lish, and testifies in the Ha//ische AWachrichten : “Trinity Epis copal church has grown up by thousands; their very large church is already too small, and they are building a new church (St. George's, on Beekman street). The cause of this growth is that the children of Dutch parents soon forget the language of their parents and learn English.” The Swedish language did not succumb as readily, but it was a forgotten tongue in Lutheran worship in this country, for perhaps seventy-five years, until restored by the more recent immigration of the Scandinavians. It may have been the incident that a modified episcopacy prevails in Sweden that led the English Episcopalians to claim first-cousinship with the Swedish Lutherans; it is certain they plead it most effectually, and finally carried off congregations, churches, glebes, schools and all. This is the history of several of the old Swedish churches in this city and vicinity. It may be a matter of interest to notice, passingly, the strong bonds of sympathy that sprung up between the Episcopal church and our own, near the close of the last century, and in the early years of this. In the minutes of the Ministerium of Pennsylvania, in 1781, occurs the item : “Notice given in regard to a union with the High Church” (meaning the Episºopal). The action taken was to invite Rev. Mr. White (afterwards bishop of the diocese), to a friendly conference at Dr. Helmuth's house. In Virginia, shortly after the second war with England, * Meade, of that State, made the overture to absorb the Lutheran Church into the Episcopal, offering to recognize the validity of the ordination of the pastors of the Synod. A similar offer was made to the Zion's German Lutheran Church in Baltimore, of which my father was the president. But most marked are the cases, cited by Dr. Jacobs, i I 2 SECOND LUTHERAN DIET.

in his essay at the last Diet, p. 127. The New York Ministerium in 1797, actually passed the following resolution : “That on ac count of an intimate relation subsisting between the English Epis copalian and Lutheran Churches, the identity of their doctrine, and the near approach of their church discipline, this consistory will never acknowledge a newly-erected Lutheran Church, in places where the members may partake of the services of the said English Episcopal Church.” Now refer to the minutes of the Ministerium of Pennsylvania, for this identical year, and you will find that Dr. Kunze, of New York city, complains of Strebeck, his former student, who has founded an English congregation. We need not be surprised that between recommendation in New York, and complaint in Penn sylvania, Strebeck and part of his congregation, a few years there after, went over to the Episcopal Church and founded St. Stephen's Church, of which Dr. Tyng has so long been the distinguished rector. In 1794, the Lutheran ministers in North Carolina ordained Rev. R. J. Miller, as an Episcopal minister, and charged him in his ordi nation certificate “to obey the rules, ordinances and customs of the Christian Society, called the Protestant Episcopal Church in America,” and sent him forth to labor in Lutheran congregations, for twenty-seven years. In 1821, the Synod of that State entered into an agreement with the Episcopal Church, whereby each body sent deputations to the conventions of the other, with the privilege of voice and vote. Evidently that was not the era of theses on “Kanzel-Gemeinschaft.” Seriously, it is a wonder that there is any Lutheran Church left, in some parts of our country. The conflict of language has been most marked between the Ger man and the English in our cities and larger towns, and there our losses have been wholesale. The youth were lost to us in detail. For six days in the week their education, their amusements, their social intercourse, their business connections, were largely English. It requires no very profound philosophy to tell how long the mind can bear such a constancy of influence and impression, before it will yield to them and the fixed habit of thought and desire will be set in their direction. With the seventh day will invariably come the craving for the language and companionship of the previous six. I can easily comprehend how German parents could deceive themselves as to the changes transpiring in their children's minds DR. SA DTLER's ESSAY. II 3 and tastes. They would return from school or business and sit down to their meals. The conversation of the table would be in German, and the children would frequently bear their part. There would be the unmistakable ability, on their part, to understand and speak the language. But when the Lord's day would come, and parents would call upon their sons and daughters to go with them to the house of God, there would be first the hesitancy and after ward the refusal. Linguistic preference would overpower their he reditary faith. Take the spiritual census of this or any other city, where there is a strong German element, and, I doubt not, you will find the number of the families that have been able to retain all their children in their own household of faith, to be vastly in the minority. Our German youth have not been lost to us in bodies, but, I repeat it, in detail. They have broken away from their par ents' churches and faith, singly or in pairs, here one, there one, . until in the aggregate the thousands have gone. I will concede to many of the older German pastors sincerity in . their conviction that the German could be maintained in equal authority and lasting prominence, side by side with the English. They have a glorious language to love, and they love it with cor responding warmth. They are disposed to regard an indisposition to use it, as a symptom of foolish pride, weak-minded shame, or even a lapsing into dangerous heresy. They see a hundred and one sects using the English language, and therefore the English language and an erratic faith, are synonymous. The argument is sophistical, but the impression is real. Most unhappy, for the peace and prosperity of our Church, has been this conflict of language. It began as early as 1750, and it has not ended yet. It is manifest destiny that these United States shall call the Anglo-Saxon their national language, and it is the part of wisdom to recognize the fact and practically to regulate our church work by it, without, however, doing the least injustice to . the tongues in which our Church had her birth and history. In the very parochial schools of the Synod of Pennsylvania, before there was an English Church in the body, in 1795, there came the general complaint to Synod, that the preference for English was very strong. And that preference is as strong to-day, and will be until the nation is a unit in language. Should immigration from Germany and Scandinavia cease, that event would occur before an 8 I 14 SECOND LUTHERAN DIET. other half century would roll around. As long as there are wor shipers in the languages of the mother churches, every dictate of justice and piety requires that they should be provided for. Another cause of loss of Aopulation to our Church that has ofter ated in the Aast, and is stil/ operative, is the un-Lutheran develop ment of many of our churches. It is beyond dispute, that the Eng lish speaking denominations have largely influenced our churches that have become English. In localities where Episcopalianism was the predominant phase, that gave tone to the cultus in worship and methods in church work. Where Presbyterianism or Method ism led in numbers and social influence, their peculiarities were liable to be imported into our own policy and practical activity. The hard task was often assigned our English pastors to be called upon to work with their ecclesiastical neighbors, and yet not work like them ; especially when our churches were as yet feeble in mem bership and influence. It is hard to be in the minority and not to be overshadowed and either led or forced. But let the causes be what they may—whether emanating from the association of our people and pastors with the larger bodies, or from the fact that our ministers were constrained, by the want of theological seminaries in our own bounds, to pick up their theological training where they could find it—the results were patent. One could enter the doors of our sanctuaries, where the English language was used, and if all the stripes of Lutheranism he would encounter, from New York to Georgia, and Philadelphia to Omaha, had been woven into one coat, Joseph's coat of many colors would have been Quaker-like simplicity beside it. Well nigh every pastor was a law unto him self, in modes of worship and often even in doctrine. When whole Synods cast contempt upon the great symbol of our Church faith, and charged it with damnable heresy, and from the practical side ignored everything distinctively Lutheran, we wonder not that the anglicized German would hesitate to enter the nominal fold of his father, when it was so nominal. A western professor of foreign birth, puts the reasonable requirement of his countrymen thus (Quarterly Review, Oct., 1877, p. 533): “Our people want the gown and the liturgy, baptism and confirmation, Good Friday, with the other familiar festivals, and all the well-known traits of our Church, and cannot see that a Church lacking all this should be re lated to or identical with the Church of their fatherland. * * * DR. SADTLER's ESSAY. II 5

If, instead of vain complaints and unavailing accusations, one would look with open eyes at the facts, the reason for the disin. clination of our children to the English Lutheran congregations would soon be understood to be the distance to which the com plained-of distance has been allowed to grow.” Another cause of our losses that we may briefly notice is a lack of a Lutheran /iterature, especially in the Eng/ish language. The first settlers brought with them their Bibles and catechisms, “Arndt's Wahres Christenthum,” and “Stark's Gebetbuch.” That was a most valuable library, but for a century was scarcely supplemented by a single book. But if we did not publish, others did, and if you traverse the German counties, you will find the books in the houses of our German members to be largely those of the Ameri can Tract Society and other publishing houses; translations mostly from the English, and if not positively aggressive and hostile to our doctrinal system, yet positively advocating their own systems. It is only comparatively recently that this difficulty has been measura bly removed, and our own publications have been introduced into the Sunday-school and family. Even yet, it is the most difficult thing imaginable to select a parochial or Sunday-school library harmless on one side and instructive on the other. In the English language, the difficulty is tenfold greater. Of the making of books there is no end, but it is sickening to think of the food they offer to the spiritual palates of our poor children. If ever a censor were needed anywhere, surely it is at the library cases of our schools and homes, lest the books dealt out, so attractive in gorgeous bind. ing and beautiful illuminations, may be gilded poison; or if not that, may be voiceless proselytors, luring our children out of their parents' fold It is easily to be comprehended that if our people sing and read Methodism, Presbyterianism or Episcopalianism, with the regularity of returning Lord's days, they will not be very long in adopting the system in the pew and at the altar. But time forbids me to dwell longer on these points and to de velop other causes of the loss of our population. I must hasten to indicate some remedies that may be applied in arrest of this exodus. I shall do but little more than name them, leaving this branch of my theme for ampler verbal discussion by those that are to follow ine. We must begin with the effort to harmonize our Church in its I 16 SECOND LUTHERAN DIET.

organization. It may be no easy task. Apart from the fact that we are a transplanted church, where, on American soil, we cannot en tirely escape the influence of other spiritual growths, from the stately trees of Episcopacy, Presbyterianism, etc., down to the noxious weeds of ignorant sects, we are not a unit from the very fatherland of our Church. We are a polyglot church. German, Swedish, Danish, Wendich, Russian, Dutch and French. Taking the German again as genus, we have as species, Suabian and Saxon, Bavarian and Alsatian, Silesian and Lithuanian, Hanover ian and Holsteiner, and others. Admitted that it may be no easy task to unify such a heterogene ous mass of materials, made such by the diversities of national and provincial life and education, yet there is one hopeful feature. We have one common symbol of our doctrina/ faith in the Augsburg Confession, and the artic/es and books that c/uster around it to en force and explain and define. The first step to ecclesiastical unity is doctrical unity, and the firmer and sincerer our unity among our selves, the firmer will be our hold on our people. Hence to unify our Church we must indoctrinate our members in the family and Sunday school, in the catechetical class and from the pulpit. Our Church has its peculiarities, not only in outward methods of work and modes of worship, but they are doctrinal too, and these points are no trifles, unless in our estimation vital doctrines and truths of the Word of God are trifles. Let the church member reach the conclusion that all doctrinal truth is alike indifferent, and hence one denomination has no claim to being biblical beyond another, and another conclusion is easily reached, and that is, that he may be long to any one of the half-hundred denominations and sects in turn, one a year, if he lives long enough to reach the last, without detriment to Christian character; nay, that he is the model Chris. tian so liberal, so brotherly, so charitable ! We need the churchly training that will make us know why we have a right to existence and why we have the best right: because our symbols of faith are in harmony with revelation. But whilst this doctrinal instruction, and consequent unity, are the point of prime importance in helping us to maintain our ranks unbroken, unty in ſiturgical services and forms of worship are like wise important. Well were it for our churches, if we had but one hymn-book and one book of worship respectively for our English, DR. SADTLER's ESSAY. I 17

German and Scandinavian Churches. And better than well would it be for them, if our pastors would all consent to sink their vain conceit and idealism, and use the books and formulas thus supplied. The “every man for himself” policy in the pulpit has driven more members out of our fold, than ever the most specious sophistry of sectarians persuaded out of it. Let our people go from city to city and village to village, and entering Lutheran churches hear the same hymns and find the same order of service, and know what to do, what comes next, without an intense watchfulness, lest they may make some awkward mistake in posture or language, and they feel they are at home and they will love that home. Another remedy to Arevent the sheep from straying from our fo//s is to provide them with sufficient shepherd's, or in many cases not to allow one shepherd' to have too mnny sheep and ſolds to watch. For our frontier and new States work, we need an increase of pastors, and hence greater Home Mission activity. For our older States, and nowhere more than here in this State, the very cradle of Lutheranism on this Continent, we need to divide our large parishes. The German Reformed Synod, in recent session in Easton, has decreed as its deliverance on this subject, that no pastor should have over four congregations, nor have over six hundred communicants, under his charge. We apprehend no fixed rule can be laid down, to cover all cases and allow no exceptions; but we do affirm that it is simply preposterous for any one man to undertake to serve eight and ten congregations, and have the spir itual charge of fifteen to eighteeen hundred souls. It makes one shudder to think of loading such a responsibility upon one man's conscience. Until you can clothe a pastor with well nigh ubiquity, you cannot expect him to be preacher and pastor, watchman and guardian, over such a sphere of labor. With all the borders un guarded, ecclesiastical sheep-stealing is easy work. As coſ/atera/ to this point, we need to ca// out the spiritua/ and fractica/ activity of our Aeo//e, if we would save them. Is it not an undoubted fact that where one pastor serves one congregation, and he can reside among them, be one of them, can direct their energies in the line of missionary labor, Sunday-school work, socie ties for the relief of the poor, young men's associations for mutual improvement and sociality, etc., just there and then you have the most efficient churches, and those that hold together in fidelity to I I 8 SECOND LUTHERAN DIET. their creed, and towards their pastor and each other ? Men love what they work for, but a congregation that has nothing to do but to hear a sermon once in four weeks, has no cohesive power. I am afraid there are some congregations, where the burial right, which is forfeited if they leave, is the strongest bond of union. It is a better bond when pastor and people are co-workers with God in the great work that recognizes the fact that when by faith we have saved our own souls, then there is a world to save. To retain a most influential portion of our membership, the cuſ. tured and educated, we must strive more generally and more /iber. a/ly to educate the whoſe body of our people, that the relatively few may not be isolated amid an uncongenia/ majority. We need to fos ter higher education, not only for this end, but for the nobler one, that we may have intelligent leaders in larger numbers among our laity, to take part in our synodical and congregational work, and by the power that comes of piety combined with knowledge, to labor for the prosperity of the Church. Pastoral urgency is sometimes rated as mere professional zeal; when backed up by intelligent lay activity it moves the inert mass to corresponding progressiveness. Zealous churches, whose zeal is according to knowledge, are con tented churches. Their piety has a wholesome outlet, and pro ductive results; it need not go abroad to find work in other com munions. But here I must end, with the profound conviction that the sub ject assigned me is either too extensive for treatment within the limits of a paper of reasonable length, or my powers of condensa tion are inadequate to the task.

DISCUSSION.

REMARKS OF REV. S. LAIRL), PITTSBURGH, PA. Another source of loss of membership is the neglect by the Church of the great work of Home Missions. While it is true that we have been increasing in numbers in a remarkable manner, it is also true that we have failed to hold our own people in many in stances, because we have not provided ministers to preach to them, and spiritual homes into which they might be gathered. There are many large cities in different parts of our country, especially in regions lying west of the Alleghanies, where we are not represented