This is seen especially in ecclesiastical matters. Peter aimed at giving some culture to the grossly ignorant parish clergy. But his autocratic dealings with the Church paralysed its energy. From this time onwards there is little to chronicle in Russian ecclesiastical affairs. The sects will become active and interesting, but the orthodox Church ever more and more somnolent. "The Church," writes M. Leroy Beaulieu, "has come to be considered a sort of adjunct to the police, and the religious practices as police regulations."[1] Therefore in thinking of the Church in Russia as it has settled down subsequently to the establishment of the Holy Synod by Peter the Great, with the virtual absorption of its official life into that of the bureaucracy, we must entirely dismiss from our minds the ideas of the relations of pastor and people seen in England and America, or that of the French curé or the Irish priest and his flock. The village pope is miserably poor, and he has to maintain a bare livelihood by taking his dues from the peasants, who resent his visits as the calls of a tax-gatherer. They do not look up to him as a religious leader. He is a functionary who has to perform certain rites. He rarely preaches, and he must never do so until he has submitted his sermon to the judgment of an ecclesiastical superior. Nobody expects him to be a model of higher living than is customary among his neighbours. We have seen that while the bishops are celibates and are found in the monasteries, the parish priests or popes must be married men. A priest must marry before he can be ordained. If his wife dies he may not marry again. But neither should he continue in office as a widower. He should resign at once, and retire to a monastery. Recently, however, this requirement has been relaxed, and there are now some widowed priests in Russia. As a rule, it appears, his bishop finds a wife for the young postulant of priesthood. This curious custom has sprung out of the bishop's responsibility for his priests and their families. The
- ↑ The Empire of the Tsars, part iii. p. 139.
