“What is your opinion about this extraordinary ringing, Father?” Peter turned to Theodosius, continuing their conversation about the Novgorod church bells which, according to recent information, were tolling miraculously at night: the rumour spread that this was a foreboding of great calamities.
Theodosius stroked his thin beard, played with the double-faced panagia, adorned with the crucifix and the Tsar’s portrait, cast a side glance at the Tsarevitch Alexis, who was sitting next to them, blinked with one eye as if taking aim, and suddenly his diminutive face, like the snout of a bat, lit up with rarest subtlety:—
“Anybody can understand the meaning of this speechless droning. It obviously comes from the fiend; Satan is sobbing because his reign over the Russian people is coming to an end; he is cast out from the possessed, the Raskolniks, the monks, the old hypocrites, whom your Majesty has taken great pains to cure.”
And Theodosius led the conversation to his favourite topic, the uselessness of the monks.
“Monks are parasites. They escape taxation in order to eat the bread of idleness. What gain are they to society? They count their civil position for nothing, describing it as part of the vanities of the world. They have a saying to this effect:—‘He who becomes a monk no longer works for the Tsar of earth, but for the Tsar of heaven. They lead an animal life in the deserts. They seem incapable of realizing that the Russian climate makes a real hermit life impossible.”
Alexis understood that this talk about hypocrites was aimed at him.
He rose. Peter looked at him and said, “Stay where you are!”
The Tsarevitch submissively returned to his seat, casting down his eyes, as he felt, with the air of a hypocrite.
Theodosius was in his best vein. Stimulated by the attention of the Tsar, who had brought out his notebook and was taking notes for future decrees, he suggested measure after measure; ostensibly for the reform, but to Alexis it seemed for the destruction, of monasticism in Russia.
“Establish in the monasteries regulation hospitals for discharged dragoons, also schools for arithmetic, geometry; in the convents foundling institutions for illegitimate children; the nuns should be employed in weaving.”