Silvester. At the age of seventeen he issued a revised edition of his grandfather's Sudebuik, and the next year the Stoglat or "Book of the Hundred Chapters" appeared. Its object was to reform the discipline of the Church, and among other improvements it ordered was the establishment of schools throughout the country, where reading, writing, and choral singing were to be taught.
The second half of Ivan's reign was totally different in character. He had greatly increased the importance of Russia by his military achievements; but later on he grew suspicious of the disaffection of the boyars, and his conduct bordered on insanity. Ivan now went about the country with a body of six hundred young men, whom he called his "Peculiars," burning and ravaging his towns and villages. He claimed the lives of his slaves, the Russians, as his property. In a fit of passion he killed his own son. Yet Ivan was religious in his way. He prided himself on his orthodoxy, and was credited with being able to repeat whole chapters of the Bible. He would ring the bell for matins himself and call up his court at all hours of the night to attend the prayers. When at Alexandrooskoe he spent most of his time in church. He practised severe asceticism and attempted to force it on his servants.
One metropolitan after another fell under the displeasure of the pious tyrant. When the tsar's insane degeneration set in, Athanasius, the metropolitan in office at the time, being of a mild, timid nature, retired from his responsible post, unable to meet its new requirements. Ivan then appointed Germanus, the archbishop of Kazan, a good old man, who begged to be excused from undertaking the difficult task that was laid upon him. But the tsar would have no refusal. Germanus, forced to accept the post, now resolved to do his duty in it. He at once sought an interview with Ivan, and in a faithful, earnest, fatherly way, urged him to turn from his ruinous course. Such impertinence was intolerable. The tsar flung himself into a rage, and forthwith sent the old bishop back to his former diocese.
