CHAPTER IV
On Sunday, March 2, the service in the Church of the Assumption was conducted by the newly appointed Bishop of Pskoff, Feofan Prokopovitch.
Only the nobility and officials were admitted.
Near one of the four huge pillars, covered with frescoes of dark faces on dim gold, which support the dome, under the canopy where the ancient Tsars of Muscovy had prayed, stood Peter. Near him was Alexis.
The Tsarevitch looked at Feofan, and to his mind came all he had heard about him.
Feofan had taken the place of Theodosius, who had grown old and latterly more inclined to melancholy. It was Feofan who had devised the decree which ordered that crimes revealed in confession should be reported. He also had compiled the Ecclesiastical Statute which was to guide the institution of the Holy Synod.
The Tsarevitch eyed the new Bishop with curiosity; he was a Tcherkass by birth, a Little Russian, about thirty years old, ruddy, with a shining face, glossy black beard, and large glossy moustaches; he looked very much like a huge beetle. When he laughed his whiskers moved like the horns of a beetle. From this smile alone it could be guessed that he enjoyed the coarse Latin jokes, the jests of Poggio, no less than the greasy galoushas (small dumplings) of his native place; and sharp dialectic as much as good brandy.
Notwithstanding his clerical dignity, a kind of intense merriment, bordering on intoxication, trembled and flitted almost imperceptibly across his face. He was drunk with his own intelligence, this red-cheeked Silenus in a bishop’s robe. “O head, my head, that hast been drunk with knowledge, where wilt thou rest now?” he used to say in his moments of candour.
And the Tsarevitch wondered with what is called in the Book of Revelation “a great wonder,” at the idea that this mendicant, this runaway “Uniate,” or advocate of the Union of the Greek and Roman Churches, who had taken Roman vows, this pupil first of Jesuits, then of Protestants, and then of Atheistic philosophers, maybe an atheist himself, was compiling the Spiritual ordinance on which depended the fate of the Russian Church.
When the archdeacon of the Cathedral had pronounced the usual anathema against all heretics and apostates, from Arius down to Gregory Otriópieff and Mazeppa, the bishop mounted on the ambo and gave a discourse on the power and honour of the Tsar.
The oration set forth what was to be the corner-stone of the Holy Synod: the Sovereign as the head of the Church.
“The teacher of nations, the Apostle Paul, proclaims that ‘there is no power but of God: the powers that be are ordained of God. Whosoever therefore resisteth the power, resisteth the ordinance of God.’ Truly these are wonderful words! I am almost tempted to say that Paul was sent by the Emperors themselves, so assiduously does he exhort, repeating again and again, ‘Power comes from God, from God alone.’ I beseech every one to consider, what more could a faithful minister of the Tsar say? Let us add, as a crown to this exhortation, the names and titles befitting those who have the highest power, which are a fairer endowment to Tsar than purple and diadems. What titles? what names are these? Autocrats are termed gods and Christs. Because of the power given by God, they are called gods, that is representatives of God on earth. Their other name is Christ, which means ‘anointed,’ because of that ancient ceremony when the Tsars are anointed with oil. Paul further says, ‘Servants, obey your Masters as ye obey Christ!’ Hence the Apostle made the masters equal to Christ. But what is most astonishing and clothes this truth with adamantine armour—it cannot be overlooked: the Scriptures demand obedience, not only to good lords but also to those who are wicked, faithless and godless. Everybody knows the words. ‘Fear God, honour the king. Servants, be subject to your masters with all fear, not only to the good and gentle but also to the froward.’ And David the prophet, himself a king, calls Saul, though impious and rejected by God, ‘the anointed of the Lord.’ He says, ‘Seeing he is the anointed of the Lord.’ But you will say, Whatever Saul may have been, nevertheless he was anointed king by God’s special order, and therefore found worthy of that honour. Good; but tell me who was Cyrus of Persia, who Nebuchadnezzar of Babylon? Yet God Himself, by the prophets, calls them ‘His anointed,’ or, according to David, ‘Christs of the Lord.’ Who was Nero, the Roman Emperor? Yet the Apostle Peter exhorts obedience even to this cruel persecutor of the Christians, as to the anointed, ‘The Lord’s Christ.’ One doubtful point remains: are all men bound by this obedience to sovereigns? are not some exempt from it, especially the clergy and monks? This is a thorn, or rather a fang—the fang of the serpent. This is the Papal idea! The clergy has a separate rank among the people, but not a separate kingdom. Every one to his own business; the military, civil officers, doctors, merchants, the different artisans, all have their duties; so also pastors and all clergy have their own appointed duty, to serve God; but at the same time they are subject to the rulers and powers. In the old Jewish Church the Levites were in all things subject to the king of Israel. If this were so in the Old Testament why should it not be the same in the New? The law about authority is unchangeable and eternal, and has existed since the world began.”
Then came the conclusion:—
“All ye people of Russia, not only laity, but clergy, must honour your Autocrat, the most pious Peter Alexeyevitch, as your head, father of your country, and Christ of the Lord!”
The last words he uttered in a sonorous voice, looking straight at the Tsar, and raising his hand towards the vaulted roof, where a dark painting of the face of Christ stood out on a dim golden background.
The Tsarevitch, listening to his convenient doctrine, wondered with a great wonder.
Since all Tsars, even the impious, are “Christs of God,” so also presumably would be the last and the greatest of them, he who will come, the Tsar of the world—the Antichrist?
A blasphemy had been uttered! by a prelate of the Orthodox Church in the oldest cathedral of Moscow, in the presence of Tsar and people; yet the earth had not opened to engulph the blasphemer; no fire from heaven had fallen upon him!
Everything remained calm; above the slanting sheaves of sunbeams, above the azure clouds of incense, the face of Christ in the centre of the dome seemed to ascend to the skies, inaccessible, remote.
The Tsarevitch glanced at his father. He was quite calm and listened with pious attention.
Encouraged by this attention, Feofan concluded solemnly:
“Rejoice, O Russia, be proud and thankful! Let all thy cities and frontiers be glad, for on thy horizon, like a radiant sun, rises the flame of the Tsar’s son, the three-year-old infant, Peter Petrovitch, the heir designed by God. May he live happily, may he reign prosperously, Peter the Second, Peter the Blessed! Amen.”
When Feofan had ended, a voice, weak but clear, came out of the crowd:—
“Lord, save, keep and bestow thy grace upon the only true heir to the Russian throne, the most pious Tsarevitch, Alexis Petrovitch.”
The crowd shuddered as one man, and remained motionless, terror-struck. Then it began to grow noisy and restless.
“Who is it? who is it?”
“A madman, no doubt!”
“One possessed!”
“What are the guards about! How has he got in!”
“He ought to be arrested at once, else he will escape; it will be impossible to find him in the crowd.”
At the far end of the Church, where nothing had been either seen or heard, the wildest rumours were spreading.
“A revolt, a revolt!”
“Fire! the altar has caught fire!”
“A man with a knife has been arrested; he wanted to murder the Tsar!”
The alarm increased.
Without paying any attention to what was going on, Peter approached the prelate, kissed the crucifix, and, returning to his place, ordered the speaker of these “frantic words” to be brought before him.
Captain Skorniakoff-Pissareff and two sergeants led before the Tsar a small, frail old man.
The old man handed a paper to the Tsar; it was a printed copy of the oath of allegiance to the new heir.
At the bottom, on the space left for the signature, something was written in a compact, florid clerk’s handwriting.
Peter glanced at the paper, then at the old man and asked:
“Who are you?”
“Larion Dokoukin, late clerk in the arsenal.”
The Tsarevitch, who stood close by, at once recognised him; it was the same Dokoukin whom he had met at Petersburg in the spring of 1715 at St. Simon’s Church, and who had been to his house the day of the Venus Festival in the Summer Garden.
He had remained the same common clerk, one of those who are termed “inky souls,” pettifoggers, hard, fossilized, dull and colourless, like the papers over which he had pored in his office for thirty years, at the end of which he had been dismissed for accepting bribes. And in his eyes there gleamed, just as three years ago, his fixed idea.
Dokoukin in his turn glanced stealthily at Alexis. The expression which flitted across the man’s hard features, reminded the Tsarevitch of their interview; how Dokoukin had begged him “zealously to work for the Christian Faith,” how he had wept, embraced his knees and called him, “Russia’s hope.”
“Do you refuse to swear allegiance?” said Peter calmly, as if surprised.
Dokoukin, looking straight at the Tsar, in the same low clear voice, which could be heard all over the Church, repeated by heart what he had written on the printed paper.
“I neither recognise the Tsarevitch Peter to be the legitimate heir, nor will I swear allegiance to him on the holy Gospels or by kissing the crucifix, on account of the unmerited dispossession and expulsion from the Russian throne of the only legitimate heir, Lord Alexis Petrovitch! May God keep him! Though the Tsar’s wrath should smite me for this, I cannot otherwise, may the will of my God and Lord Jesus Christ be done. Amen, Amen, Amen!”
Peter looked at him with yet greater amazement. And the whole building, crowded with the dignitaries of this world, listened in dead silence.
“Do you know that such disobedience to our will means death!”
“I know it, Sovereign; I came with the view of suffering for Christ’s sake,” replied Dokoukin simply.
“You are brave, old man! Let us see, however, what you will say when you are at the gallows!”
Dokoukin crossed himself silently and deliberately.
“Did you hear,” continued the Tsar, “what the bishop has said just now about subjection to the higher powers? There is no power but from God!”
“I heard it, Lord; ‘The powers that be are ordained by God, and what is not of God, is no power.’ But it is not befitting to call impious Tsars and Antichrists, ‘the anointed of the Lord,’ and he who says it ought to have his tongue torn out!”
“Do you consider me Antichrist?” asked Peter, with a tinge of sadness and a smile which was almost kind. “Speak the truth!”
The old man looked down at first, but the next moment he raised his head and looked straight at the Tsar.
“I believe thee to be the most pious, orthodox Tsar, Autocrat of all the Russias, the Lord’s anointed,” he declared in a firm voice.
“If so, you should do as we wish and hold your tongue.”
“Lord Tsar, your Majesty, hold my tongue, even if I would, it were impossible; I burn inwardly like a flame; my conscience urges me on, I cannot bear it. If we remained silent the stones would cry out.”
He fell at the Tsar’s feet.
“Lord Peter Alexeyevitch, little Father, listen to us miserable folk! We dare not change or alter anything, but in the same way as thy parents, forefathers and the holy patriarchs worked out their salvation, we too want to be saved, and to reach the heavenly Jerusalem. In the name of God, seek the truth; in the name of Jesus seek the truth! For the sake of thy own salvation seek the truth! Pacify the Holy Church, thy mother. Judge us without wrath and anger! Show mercy unto thy people, show mercy to the Tsarevitch!”
At first Peter listened attentively and even with curiosity, as though trying to understand.
But after a while he turned away, in weariness shrugging his shoulders:—
“Enough! Enough! It is impossible to hear all you have to say, old man. No doubt I have hanged too few of you fools. What are you aiming at? What do you want? Do you imagine I revere God’s Church and believe in Christ my Saviour less than you do? And who set you slaves to judge between Tsar and God? How dare you!”
Dokoukin rose and lifted his eyes up to the dark face in the vaulted roof of the Church. A ray of sunshine surrounded as with an aureola his blanched head.
“How do we dare, Tsar?” he exclaimed in a loud voice. “Listen, your Majesty. It is said in the Holy Scriptures, ‘What is man, that Thou art mindful of him? and the son of man, that Thou visitest him? For Thou hast made him a little lower than the angels, and hast crowned him with glory and honour. Thou madest him to have dominion over the works of Thy hands; thou hast put all things under his feet.’
“Thus it is that God has ordained man to be lord of himself, self-ruling; ordainer and arbiter of his own actions. He is to be self-controlled! What hast thou made of him?”
Slowly, as though with an effort, Peter averted his eyes from Dokoukin. On leaving he turned to Tolstoi, who stood close at hand, saying:—
“Take him to the prison and keep him under strict watch until the inquiry.”
The old man was seized; he struggled, crying that he had still more to say. He was bound and carried off.
“O secret martyrs! fear not! neither despair!” he continued to shout, looking at Alexis. “Bear patiently yet a little while, for the Lord’s sake. He is coming, He will not be slow. Even so! Come, Lord Jesus! Amen.”
The Tsarevitch, pale and trembling, stood listening and gazing at the scene.
“That man is, as I should be!” said he to himself, now only understanding the whole of his past life. Something was changed, transformed within his soul; what till now had been a weight became wings. Well knew he that he should fall back into weakness, melancholy, despair, but he also knew that he should forget no more what he had just for the first time fully understood.
He, too, like Dokoukin, raised his eyes to the dark image in the dome. And it seemed to him, in the slanting rays of the sun, and the blue clouds of the incense, the gigantic Face was moving, no longer receding from the earth as before, but descending, coming down nearer from heaven; the Lord Himself was approaching at last.
With joy akin to fearfulness he repeated, “Even so! Come, Lord Jesus! Amen.”