# Der Lutheraner_St. Louis Missouri_1852 01 06_S78
# AI translation — CHI Digital Archive (demonstration)

78

they thereby give counsel and answer to thee also? Or if they show to the whole people of the Greeks, or even to all men, by prodigies which they cause to appear, what is to befall them: dost thou think that this concerns not thee alone, that they exclude thee alone from their care? Or dost thou think the gods would have implanted in men the belief that they are able to do them good, or also to punish them, if they were not really able to do this? Or, if this belief came from a delusion, dost thou think men would not in so long a time have noticed or discovered this delusion? Seest thou not that the oldest and wisest institutions and establishments of men, their constitutions of people and state, are for the most part founded upon religion, and are most intimately bound up with religion;4) that the oldest and wisest nations are the most religious, and that man in his riper age also inquires more and more earnestly after God? Consider, my dear friend, how thine own spirit, which dwells in thy body, uses it and rules it as he will: should not the all-wise Spirit, who fills the universe, be able to dispose of it according to his good pleasure? Thine eye can see over great distances; should not the eye of God behold all things at once together? Thy soul can care for things in Athens, Egypt and Sicily; but should God's care not be able to extend over the whole world at once? To this conviction the perceptions and experiences which thou makest in intercourse with men may already lead thee: if thou showest attention and reverence toward men, if thou showest thyself obliging and kind toward them, thou seest that they in turn also gladly show themselves in like manner toward thee; if thou askest them for counsel, thou canst gain experience of their disposition and understanding: even so thou canst also learn whether the gods have will and inclination to impart counsel and information to men in dark and difficult matters; namely, when thou renderest them veneration and service; if thou wilt do this, thou wilt learn and recognize that there is a divine Being, and that of infinite greatness, power and glory, who beholds all things at once, hears all things, is present everywhere, cares for all creatures without exception, and has ever a watchful eye upon them.

4., Also with this truth, confirmed by history, the heathen Socrates bears witness against the present-day deniers of God, who as such are also men of overthrow, friends and promoters of the red republic, and it is not for want of good will on their part that they do not, if possible, murder all princes and priests in one day, abolish marriage and property, and throw into confusion all wholesome restraints, including those of civil laws and ordinances, which oppose their wild communism and their unbridled lusts. On the other hand it is true that the first founders of lawful orders and civil constitutions, who brought into life the true principle of right implanted in human reason, set it forth by definite laws, and by these ordered and regulated the mutual doing and dealing of this and that people or tribe—that these founders, according to the degree also of their natural knowledge of God, were God-fearing men. —

Conversations like these (says Xenophon here) must have had a very salutary influence upon the friends and disciples of Socrates; so that they not only, when they were seen by men, allowed no ungodly, or unjust, or shameful act to come into their mind, but also when they were alone, because they believed that from all that they did nothing was hidden from the gods.

Correction of an Article in the "kirchlichen Informatorum" of Pastor Grabau, Concerning the Affairs of the Lutheran Congregation at Detroit, Mich.

(Continuation.)

When now Winkler further reports that immediately upon Crämer's appearance the talk went forth from the factionists themselves that the pastors were there to found a congregation, and that the whole proceeding of Pastor Crämer agreed with this talk, for he had, against Winkler's knowledge and will, held meetings and addresses in his congregation, had undertaken official arbitrations in the congregation, and had so strengthened the excited minds in their doings that after his departure, which took place on the 9th of May, they conducted themselves noticeably more insolently than before: then he must indeed have a brow of iron, to write such insolent lies so knowingly into the world. For he knows best how and for what purpose the undersigned came to Detroit. Even if, which is not probable, some false rumor concerning it had spread abroad through misunderstanding, he could best have given information and demonstrated its nullity. He knows, indeed, that our whole activity in Detroit was confined solely to carrying out our commission. Moreover, he has indeed passed over in silence, but knew full well, that we spent the most of the time between the 2nd and the 9th of May in Monroe, whence we returned on Tuesday morning, to wait for him until Wednesday noon, whereupon we then indeed had to remain until Thursday morning, because there was no earlier opportunity to depart. But when he repeatedly asserts that we held meetings in his congregation against his knowledge and will, that is a base slander. Everyone will readily see that the people must have been concerned to see and speak with their appointed committee member, to make him acquainted with their wishes, and to hear from him what progress the matter was making. Since now the people were mostly artisans, who had to attend to their business the whole day, what wonder that they came in the evening to a place where they could find and speak with us. Yet never did this assume the character of a meeting, nor will it ever be declared such by an honest man. If Winkler wishes to persist in his insolent lie, it will harm only him, not us, with all honest Christian people. He may then, for that matter, also say that we held addresses, seeing that we had to address the people and tell them what they were to expect of us, namely that we would judge and settle according to God's Word, and what we, on the other hand, expected of them, namely, that they would submit to the Word of God, even if it should condemn themselves, with which they all also declared themselves agreed. Let Pastor Winkler, further, tell us for once what official, arbitrating acts we performed in his congregation, unless he has heard how we, in Christian brotherly manner, made peace between two neighbors, our old acquaintances from Germany, of whom the one could not for conscience' sake join Winkler's congregation, at their express wish and request, and that he is malicious and slanderous enough to call this an official, arbitrating act. Finally, when he says we had wantonly strengthened the excited minds in their doings, it is indeed, sad to say, true that we found the minds highly excited over the dreadful anathemas which they told us of, and over the domineering manner of Winkler, of which they bitterly complained to us, but it is just as true that, the few times we saw them, we pacified them in every possible way and with success exhorted them to wait patiently for the investigation. Let him also furnish the actual proof that plans had been on foot for a considerable time to gain a footing in Detroit for the Missouri Synod. On the other hand, let him be ashamed of the sins of further saying in his report that the fire of faction, mightily fanned by Crämer, threatened to lay waste his whole congregation, and that no stop could be put to it otherwise than by a sharp, thorough and upright investigation of the complaints brought against the pastor, wherefore he, having come in Buffalo to the conviction that acting together with the Missouri Synod in a matter concerning "the Office of the Keys" was not possible, indeed sinful, and that therefore no committee could come into being, had to take the other way, which the constitution prescribes, and lay the matter before an orthodox Lutheran synod, which in any case is also the churchly way, and to be preferred to the secular committee arrangement. — There Mr. Winkler has indeed forgotten that he himself reported above how, under the existing circumstances, since the congregation was not joined to any synod, constitutionally no other way could be taken, yea, no other was marked out or trodden by himself than