the General Synod, of absolute assent to
the "Word of God, as the only infallible rule of faith and practise, and
fundamental agreement with the Augsburg Confession." This document was
signed by such men as H.L. Baugher, M. Jacobs, M.L. Stoever, S.S.
Schmucker, Krauth, Sr., E.W. Hutter, T. Stork, C.A. Hay, W.H. Lochman,
M. Valentine, B. Sadtler, and J.A. Brown. The pledge of the "Overture"
involved the obligation of abstinence from newspaper controversy. Kurtz
did not sign the document, and Schmucker reserved for himself the right
of replying to Mann's "Plea," which he did in _American Lutheranism
Vindicated_. This book, according to the _Observer_, proves that the
Augustana does teach baptismal regeneration, the bodily presence of
Christ in the Eucharist, private confession and absolution, and denial
of the divine institution of the Lord's Day, and that all of these
doctrines are errors conflicting with the Scriptures. (_L. u. W._ 1856,
320.) Thus Kurtz and Schmucker, who had kindled the conflagration,
persisted in pouring oil into the flames, while the rest were shouting,
"Extinguish the fire!" H.I. Schmidt wrote from New York: "I can see no
use in signing that 'Overture'; the compromise which it proposes cannot
preserve the peace of the Church or prevent a disruption. Schmucker has
got up that 'Overture' simply because he was utterly disappointed in the
effect produced by his proposed Platform; because he saw that he had
raised a conflagration that was very likely to burn him up. And now,
after doing all he could to disrupt the Church, after getting up a
platform, the adoption of which would have expelled all of us
confessional Lutherans from the Lutheran Church; after laboring with all
his might to fasten the charge of serious errors upon our venerable
Confession, he very coolly comes forward and asks us to sign a
compromise, in which, forsooth, we are to declare the points of
difference between us to be non-essential.... No, indeed. Those points
are not non-essential: the Lutheran doctrine of the Sacraments is so
completely interwoven with our whole view of the scheme of redemption
and salvation, that concerning the Eucharist grows so directly and
necessarily out of the great doctrine of Christ's Person, that for me to
give up those doctrinal points alleged to be non-essential is to give up
all, to give up the whole Gospel. And what good would come of patching
up such a hollow peace? At the first favorable opportuni