Our churches received but little support from this large and influential class. Many of them had long since renounced allegiance to Jesus, and in the free air of America looked upon churches as anachronisms and hearthstones of superstition. Their influence upon the common people and upon the social life of the German community was hostile to that of Christianity. The churches had to get along without them, or rather, in spite of them. There were notable exceptions. But as a rule the "Achtundvierziger" did not go to church. Still, in spite of their unchurchly views, most of them were unable to shake off wholly the forms of their ancestral religion. There were too many remnants (_superstites_) of the old faith binding them to ancient customs. Independent ministers with no synodical relations, with or without certificate of ordination, or the endorsement of organized congregations, unmindful of the _nisi vocatus_ clause in the Augsburg Confession, helped to maintain the forms of an inherited Christianity by performing such ministerial acts as were required by the people. At one time these free lances were quite numerous. At present no representatives survive in New York. But there was another class of immigrants that came to us from the Fatherland. They, too, sought to escape from political and economical conditions that had rested like an incubus upon a divided country for centuries. But they brought with them a spirit of Christian aspiration and the ripe fruit of a traditional Christian culture which became a priceless contribution to our own church life. They were men and women from all corners of Germany, who had come under the inspiration of the religious awakening to which reference has already been made. They became leading workers in our congregations and Christian enterprises. We, whose privilege it was to minister to them, knew well that we were only reaping where others far away and long ago had sown. The inability of the Lutheran Church to supply an adequate ministry for this vast immigrant population left the way open also for other Protestant churches to do mission work among the lapsed members of our communion. A number of churches were established where services in the beginning were held in the German or Scandinavian languages. Through Sunday Schools and other agencies many Lutheran children were gathered into their congregations where they and their children are now useful and honored members of the church. A goodly number of eminent ministers in various non-Lutheran Protestant churches of this city are the children or grandchildren of Lutheran parents. [illustration: "Carl F. E. Stohlmann, D.D."] With this general outlook over the period, let us take up the thread of our story.