and convents, whose vast possessions comprised 130,000 peasant houses and many hundreds of thousands of serfs; the richest was the great Troïtsa monastery, near Moscow, which owned 20,400 houses and upwards of 100,000 serfs, representing, at the present time, a value of nearly four millions sterling;[1] then came the official property of the patriarchate, which was reckoned at 8900 houses, and that of the see of Rostov, comprising 4400 houses, with proportionate numbers of serfs.
The Department of the Monasteries was empowered to take charge of, and manage, this enormous property for the general good of the Church, paying an annual sum to each establishment for the support of its inmates.
The thriftless and lazy thronged in and about religious communities in order to enjoy an easy and comfortable existence, and to secure exemption from military service. To remedy this evil, really serious from the sparseness of the population, the number of residents in each institution was prescribed by law, and stringent regulations were enacted for entrance to religious life. It was prohibited to minors—to such as could not read nor write — to those of noble birth, and to all in the employment of the State. The limit of age for admission was fixed at thirty years for monks and at forty for nuns, and the previous consent of the tsar was necessary. The inmates of each establishment were compelled to remain within its walls, and were subjected to rigid observance of strict monastic discipline. Allowances and salaries were assigned to the higher spiritual authorities in lieu of their estates, and of the dues hitherto exacted from the parishes. The surplus income of the fund was to be devoted to charitable objects and military hospitals, and finally to the current necessities of the State.
- ↑ Haxthausen, vol. i, p. 72.
