As it is, however, the two gentlemen fabricate a public opinion, supported by a multitude of uninformed members of the Lutheran Church. The mass of all influential, well-meaning members, preachers as well as laymen, whatever their views may otherwise be, are indignant at Schmucker, Kurtz, _Observer_, and the whole Platform affair. I would not be astonished if the matter should lead to a breach between us and the General Synod. The consequence will be that involuntarily we shall be brought closer to the strict Lutheranism, all the more so as the Missourians of late seem to become milder." But Dr. Mann was rudely awakened from his optimism when, in the following year, his "Lutheranism in America: an essay on the present condition of the Lutheran Church in the United States," was severely criticized even by Charles Philip Krauth, in the _Evangelical Review_. And the result? "I have no desire at all to make any further concessions to Old Lutheranism," Mann meekly declared in a letter of April 15, 1857, in which he referred to the cold reception and stern rebuke which his book had received by the press within the General Synod. (Spaeth, 179 f.) Thus even the most conservative men within the General Synod rendered the cause of true Lutheranism but little service in the Platform emergency. Being in the minority and without a clear insight into the nature of Lutheranism, also without an organ, except, in part, the _Evangelical Review_, they lacked the courage and seriousness to take a determined and open stand against the corrupters and assailants of Lutheranism. They favored a policy of silent, watchful waiting. H. I. Schmidt, who, in the _Evangelical Review_, had defended the Lutheran doctrine of the Lord's Supper, wrote in a letter dated February 4, 1853: "We Lutherans had better keep perfectly quiet at the next General Synod, and say nothing at all about 'Doctrinal Basis.' ... If all open conflict is avoided, our cause will continue silently and surely to gain ground, and thus the character of the General Synod will gradually be changed and righted." (Spaeth, 1, 349.)