# Der Lutheraner_St. Louis Missouri_1848 08 02_S210
# AI translation — CHI Digital Archive (demonstration)

a lasting peace; but the latest reports make this hope doubtful. In Germany, out of the chaotic condition there emerged the German Parliament, which was supposed to give the country a new, free constitution, unity within and power abroad. For a time it was uncertain whether Germany would continue to have emperor, kings, dukes, etc., or whether there would instead be a general republic; at last the monarchical party has prevailed and expects all salvation from the German emperor of its choosing, for the present still called the Imperial Administrator (Reichsverweser). The republicans cry out over treason to the fatherland and would like to strike in with the sword. From the Slavonic lands united with Prussia and Austria nothing good is reported. In Posen much blood has been shed, likewise in Prague. Everywhere among the Slavs the greatest bitterness prevails against the Germans, and the papist priests are said, under promise of full indulgence, to be inciting the people to torment and murder the Protestants; and indeed this is actually happening. In various parts of our fatherland, in Swabia, Lower Franconia, Saxony, a devastating peasants' war has broken out anew, set in motion not so much by Münzer-like fanaticism as by communistic greed. The Jews too have been plundered and driven out. A necessary consequence of this upheaval is the collapse of credit, of trade and industry; the workers dismissed from the factories are ready for the commission of further outrages. The people are beginning to feel that through the revolution they have brought upon themselves the greatest scourge. The northern bear, Russia, stands in silent wrath with a great army on the German border and shows signs, before it deals a decisive blow here, of stretching its claws toward the Turkish Danube provinces, thus hastening the downfall of the decayed Turkish empire. Over and above all this, cholera continues to advance ever further westward; it rages in Constantinople and St. Petersburg and is said to be beginning to spread in wave-like leaps, as it has already shown itself in Finland.

These are the outermost outlines of the picture which the newspapers, up to July 22, draw of the old world. What effects these revolutions have had and will have upon the state of the church, little is as yet reported. Presumably there has not yet been time to give it much thought. Private letters say that the apostasy has now become wholly manifest, that unbelief, under the name of the Friends-of-Light movement, is now celebrating its complete triumph; that within the existing church bodies no place will remain any longer for orthodox preachers. "What is to become of churches and schools," it says in a letter of May 8, "cannot yet be foreseen at all. We may be facing a long period of destruction. For years everything may lie prostrate; a time may be near for us like that when wild hordes broke in upon the rotted Roman empire. So it is natural that one thinks even of a Pella." That state and church are being separated we cannot lament; but on the other hand it is to be feared that unbelief will absorb everything among the great mass. The artificial web of the Prussian Union will shortly tear apart — of that much is certain. But what will take its place? The new minister of religious affairs in Berlin, Count Schwerin, a son-in-law and faithful disciple of Schleiermacher, has ordered that all who call themselves evangelical shall come together in a synod to deliberate about the church. That no good can or will come of this, a child can see. "Prof. Guericke in Halle has been the first to raise his voice publicly on the matter of Lutheranism and has issued a call to make use of the generally demanded and granted liberation of the church from the state for the founding of a Lutheran fellowship."*) So writes a friend at the end of March, and adds: "May the Lord, when it comes to acting, grant as much unity and strength as is needed in a time so torn by subjectivism, if there is to come about a new shaping of church life on the old foundation of the Word and the Lutheran confession. May God preserve a man like Harless from the dangers of the time, that he may be what he has the gifts and the knowledge to be." In any case, a wholly new epoch is beginning for the Lutheran church over there, one which calls us, on this side, to the most earnest, most fervent prayer that it might please God to let it become for her a time of gracious visitation and rebirth. But we must break off here for today. In the next issue may we be permitted to set forth our opinion as to how a Lutheran Christian should regard those events, especially in the old fatherland.

God's Wondrous Ways and Judgments.
An Old Didactic Poem.

There once was a devout Christian who could not reconcile himself to God's wondrous ways and judgments, and therefore often asked God that He would deem him worthy to let him know their hidden causes. Thereupon an angel appeared to him one day and said to him: "Come! journey with me; I will show you God's judgments." Joyfully the Christian followed the angel. Now when the two had journeyed a short distance, they first came through a dark forest. Here they found the corpse of a devout and godly hermit, whom a lion had torn apart and killed. Astonished at the sight of this corpse, the angel's companion exclaimed: "Ah, this man was indeed a devout soul; how then does it happen that God could allow this misfortune to befall him?" Without giving any answer to this, the angel drew his companion further on

*) This appeal is to be printed in the next issue. — The Editors.

and led him to a man who lived on a high rocky cliff, beneath which flowed a deep stream. This man had once, in earlier times, been very God-fearing, but had at last let himself be dazzled by the world again; he had come to think that from piety one got nothing but trouble; that whoever kept in with the world had everything go well for him; so he now wanted to hang up his conscience on the peg, join in with the world, and enjoy this temporal life. The angel movingly reminded him that one must look not only to the temporal but above all to the eternal; that it would be a grievous delusion, for the sake of the brief, base pleasure that the world could give, to want to forfeit eternal joy; that a Christian ought to consider how dearly the Son of God had purchased him, and ought therefore not so recklessly rob himself of the treasure which had cost his Redeemer so dear to acquire. Momentaneum, he said, quod delectat, aeternum, quod cruciat — that is, short is the world's joy, and eternal heartache follows after. When the man heard this admonition, he was struck to the heart and said: "God be praised, that He has sent me such a devout guest and has sought out again me, a poor stray sheep. God be merciful to me, a sinner!" But behold! scarcely had the man let these sighs of repentance be heard, when the angel seized him and cast him down from the cliff into the stream, in which he drowned. Silently the travelers then went on further and came now to an innkeeper, who received them kindly, entertained them splendidly, and among other things set before them a silver goblet; but at parting the angel secretly pockets the goblet and carries it away with him. Dismayed, the Christian follows the angel further and now comes with him to a nobleman. This man was a godless person; he snarled at the travelers and, without offering them a morsel of bread or a drink of water, drove them angrily out of his house; wherefore the travelers, in order not to have to spend the night under the open sky, crept into a stable. But what does the angel do? Politely he takes leave the next morning of the wretch, and even gives him besides the goblet which he had taken the previous day from the house of that devout innkeeper. So at last our wanderers come to a well-to-do man, who receives them well and, after having richly refreshed them with food and drink, sends along with them his only little son, so that this boy might show them the right way through the region unknown to them. What happens? As soon as the child has shown the travelers the right way, the angel suddenly seizes him, strangles him, and throws him into a nearby pit. Now the angel's devout companion can no longer restrain himself, and breaks out indignantly in these words: "What? Do you claim to be an angel? You must surely be a devil, for you are not only a thief but also a shameful robber and murderer; not one step further will I accompany you." Thereupon the angel began, with a grave countenance, thus: