After that night Tichon did not miss a single meeting, Mitka taught him how to dance. At first he was shy, but he got used to it, and soon the dance became a necessity to him.
Each time new mysteries were revealed to him.
Yet it seemed that the essential and most terrible mystery was as yet concealed. From what he saw and heard he gathered that the brethren and sisters lived in carnal intercourse.
“We Cherubin and angels, live in purity of the fire,” said they. “There is no sin, when a brother and sister of the faith live together in true, christian love; but vile and sinful is the wedlock sanctified by the Church. Before God it is vile; before men insolent. A husband and wife are the abode of the devil; children are unclean brats.”
Children born of husbands not belonging to this sect were exposed by their mothers in public baths, or else strangled.
One day Mitka naïvely told Tichon that he lived with his own two sisters, both nuns; while Yemelian, a teacher and prophet, had thirteen wives.
Whoever confessed to him had become his mistress. Tichon was naturally troubled by these unspeakable revelations. For some days he avoided Yemelian, and dared not look into his face. Yemelian noticed this confusion, and said to him when alone:—
“Listen, young man, I will reveal to you a great mystery. If you wish to live, mortify for God’s sake, not only your body, but your soul, your reason, even your conscience. Free yourself of all rule and law, of all virtue, of fasting, abstinence, virginity. Discard all sanctity. Descend into yourself, as into a tomb. Then, mysteriously dead, you will rise and the Holy Spirit will dwell within you and will not leave you whatever you do.”
Yemelian’s ugly face, the faun-mask, lit up with such sly audacity that great fear possessed Tichon; he asked himself whether he was in the presence of a prophet or a madman.
“You are scandalised to see us commit what ordinary people call immorality. We know that we do not conform to your code of morality. Yet how can we help it? We have no will of our own. The spirit works in us and our most frantic actions are the mysterious results of God’s providence. To quote my own case, my conscience does not accuse me for living with women; on the contrary it fills my heart with inexpressible joy and sweetness. Should an angel come down from heaven and tell me, ‘Your life is evil, Yemelian,’ I would not listen to him. My God has justified me, and who are you to judge. You know my sin, but you ignore God’s grace towards me. You tell me ‘Repent,’ and I answer, ‘I have nothing to repent of!’ He who has reached the goal, does not trouble about the way he has come. If you banish us to Hell, we shall be saved even there; send us to Paradise, we shall not find there greater joy than here. We are immersed in the Spirit as a stone in water. Yet we have to conceal ourselves; we assume guilelessness to prevent discovery. That’s our position, my child.”