# Der Lutheraner_St. Louis Missouri_1853 10 11_S27
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executed President in a coffin covered with black cloth into his house. On the following day he was buried in the St. George's churchyard amid the singing of several hymns. Not until the 7th of January 1725 did the solemn interment take place.

The remaining points of the Warsaw sentence were now carried out as well. The burgrave Thomas and the councilman Zimmermann were deprived of their offices and had to go to prison. The councilman Meißner and the secretary were acquitted, in that they swore the oath. Captain Graurock and the spice-dealer Silber met their punishment. Heyder, who was condemned to death, went over to the Catholic Church and was pardoned. His son, who had been carried off but brought back again, was taken in by the Jesuits. Those to whom imprisonment or strokes of the whip had been adjudged were partly punished, partly set free, or taken into custody again pending further decision. Because the wedding address of the preacher Geret could no longer be found, some leaves were burned publicly in its stead to the beat of the drum. The damage done to the Jesuits was assessed at 11,000 Polish gulden; the Father Rector received the money himself. On the 7th of December itself possession was taken of the Marienkirche and the Gymnasium. On the 8th of December, the feast day of the Conception of Mary, the suffragan bishop of Culm solemnly consecrated the church, another priest said the Mass, and the Jesuit who had conducted the accusation against the people of Thorn at Warsaw delivered the dedication address. Remarkable is the opening: "Jesus, Mary, Joseph!" That is these people's Trinity. He took his text from the Apocrypha: 1 Macc. 4, 36. 48, 57. The nonsense, the false piety, the wolf peering out from under the sheepskin, the twisting of Scripture which are found in this sermon seek their equal.

On the 11th of December it was announced to the Vice-President Zernecke, who was wholly prepared for his death, that his life was granted him. Yet he was deposed and had to pay 60,000 gulden. The Jesuits had long wished to have his house. Now they could take it. King Augustus issued a special decree in which the death penalty was remitted to Zernecke. He excuses himself therein that the circumstances had not permitted him to have any less severe sentence passed at all, or to moderate it in the execution. But the blood lies upon him too, since as king he had the right of pardon.

The other penalties too were collected. The commissioners took from the property of the President Rösner household goods, silver and the like to the value of 3,000 gulden. After the example of their masters the servants also helped themselves. But here judgment already overtook some. They came upon a cupboard in which gingerbread lay, in which was rat poison. They ate of it, but it agreed with them so ill that one fell sick and another lost his life. On the 18th of December the commissioners gave the keys of the city back to the magistrate and departed. The most furious among them was Prince Lubomirski, whom a song of that time, on the memory of Rösner, called the hangman-prince. Punishment followed the murderer close upon his heels. Not long after the bloodbath he went entirely blind. And what has befallen the other murderers and instigators of murder, the Day of the Lord will bring to light. The executioner of Plock also went away, and it is scarcely credible, were it not proved, the Jesuit pupils gave him escort with horn music as far as the gate.

The Lutherans of Thorn were given the strictest command neither to speak nor to write about the occurrence. They wished to bury the bloody outrage in silence. But the blood of the murdered cried to heaven, it cried through all Europe. Some 40 writings appeared. All evangelical princes, England, Denmark, Sweden, the German Emperor, the Czar Peter the Great expressed their disapproval of the King of Poland. Even the Pope assumed the air of rejecting this deed and publicly censured the Jesuits. King Augustus, whose wings had indeed been sorely clipped, sought through his ministers to justify himself before the Diet at Regensburg, but the bloodbath had been wrought, the brood of the Jesuits had incited to it. It had become clear anew how the Roman Church, where it has power, knows no mercy, no compassion. The bloodbath of Thorn is a further proof of the deceptive edifice of Rome and of the murderous spirit which fills the most faithful servants of the Vatican; a lesson for the present day, which seems to have forgotten all this. Otherwise it could not seek its salvation, its deliverance, among those who indeed say that they do not thirst for blood, but whose blood-stained hands prove the contrary.

(Submitted.)
Our Mission.

We give here an extract from the report of Missionary G. Mießler on the mission station Bethany, which he has sent to the Mission Commission of the Evangelical Lutheran Synod of Missouri, Ohio and other States.

To the praise and glory of God, he writes, I may report to you that the work of our weak hands has not been in vain in the Lord also in the time just past. The Lord lets us see daily and abundantly the traces of His blessing presence, and learn that He still has thoughts of peace and not of evil over our poor Bethany.

Truly we were anxious at the departure of our dear brother Baierlein, and with trembling hearts we asked, what will the consequence be? What will the future bring? Had I not known that the Lord is mighty in the weak, if only they feel themselves weak and wish to become strong in Him, and that He can also help much through little, truly I should have had to say, in view of the heavy office which has now been entrusted to me, I am not fit to preach; send whom Thou wilt send. But the faithful God has helped thus far, has been strong in our weakness and has shown Himself mighty in the struggle against heathenism and Methodism and other works of the devil, with which we are abundantly surrounded. Yes, the Lord has done above that we ask or understand, has put our unbelief to shame and graciously kindled our hope in His further help.

If I am now to communicate to you some features from our most recent mission experiences, the principal ones are the following: On the seventh Sunday after Trinity a man named Misguanagust (that is, red cloud) was received through holy Baptism into the fellowship of grace with Christ. He is a father of five children, who have all been baptized for a long time. He himself with his wife was so devoted to heathenism and its vices that not long ago we still thought he would let his time of grace pass by unused. When he had opportunity for drinking, he let none escape without drinking himself full and debasing himself by drink beneath the irrational cattle. He was one of the few of our place who still most often celebrated or even arranged heathen feasts after the manner of his fathers. And if the power of God's Word at times came too near to his heart, he thought he had done enough for it by having let his children become Christians. Both he and his wife declared openly that they never wished to become Christians. In this levity they went their way and let the Lord knock in vain at the door of their heathen hearts. But it was to come true in this man also that the Lord shall have the strong for a prey, and that nothing is impossible to Him. About a year ago the two people began to give themselves somewhat more willingly to the drawing of the Spirit of God; they came now and then to church and heard the preaching of the Gospel, and when it happened that the salvation in Christ and the damnation without Him were laid especially upon their hearts, they let go more of their former levity, with which they had often avoided a conversation about the one thing needful; instead they declared now that they too would gladly become Christians, if this one and that one became Christian; but those for whom they waited were no less careless as to the salvation of their souls than they themselves. Yet the Spirit of God worked quietly upon their hearts and made them willing to heed His voice.