A few years passed over; and Peter assuming the title of Emperor of all the Russias, was formally acknowledged as such by the various powers of Europe. He established order throughout his dominions, provided education for youth, and adopted many useful reforms. But his temper was still so despotic, and his nature so fierce, that when Alexis, his son and heir, offended him by a dissolute life, and by opposing his schemes of civilization, the Czar ordered that he should suffer death. Peter himself expired in 1725, and was succeeded on the throne by his second spouse, the Czarina.
Catharine, originally a Livonian captive, exercised the functions of government with credit for the next three years, and was succeeded by Peter II, a son of the murdered Alexis. This Czar only reigned for a brief period; and the male line of the Romanoffs thus becoming extinct, the Russians elevated to the vacant throne Anne, duchess of Courtland, the second daughter of the Czar Peter’s brother. The reign of Anne was happy and prosperous; but on her decease there took place a struggle for the succession, which terminated in the proclamation of Elizabeth, a daughter of Peter the Great, and in the imprisonment of her rivals. Her reign was particularly fortunate. A war with Sweden was brought to a satisfactory conclusion, and the Czarina’s fleets and armies were every where victorious. Russia, under the auspices of Elizabeth, took an important part in the Seven Years’ War, and the position of Frederick the Great had gradually become one of the extreme peril, when the Empress died in 1762, and the throne was inherited by her nephew Peter III.
Peter who was animated by an enthusiastic admiration of the Prussian King’s talent and courage, immediately consented to a peace, and the new reign commenced auspiciously. The nobles and gentry were freed from vassalage, and placed on an equality with those in other countries; and the laborers were, to some extent, relieved from the burden of taxation. But being a Lutheran, Peter shocked the clergy by his contempt for the Greek Church, while he offended the army by his partiality for the Holstein Guards, and thus raised up a host of foes. The unfortunate Emperor had made another enemy, still more uncompromising. Before coming to the throne he had espoused Catharine, a princess of Anhalt Zerbst, a woman of great ability and boundless ambition. Their tastes, habits, and dispositions, were, however, utterly dissimilar; and fierce quarrels arising between them, Peter became so deeply enamored of the Countess of Woronzoff, that ere long a rumor crept about of his intention to shut up the Empress in prison and raise the Countess to share his throne. The rumor cost him dear; for while he was seeking consolation in the society of the lady of his heart, Catharine marched against the devoted Czar at the head of a strong party, proclaimed that he had ceased to reign, and threw him into prison, where he soon after breathed his last, under suspicious circumstances.
The masculine Empress then ascended the Russian throne with the title of Catharine II, and commenced her reign by flattering the prejudices which her illfated husband had so fatally wounded. But a large share of her attention was speedily bestowed upon the affairs of Poland. When Augustus, king of that illfated country, expired at Dresden in 1763, the Empress, by the influence of Russian bayonets, procured the election of Stanislaus Augustus, one of her former favorites. Almost from the opening of the reign, Poland was the scene of disorder and desolation; for Catherine, having transported to Siberia a number of senators hostile to her designs, roused the indignant spirit of the nation. A band of patriotic Poles, seizing on Cracow and Bar, formed a league for their deliverance from a foreign yoke, and implored assistance from Louis XV. Fifteen hundred Frenchmen, under Dumouriez, marched to the assistance of the confederates, and Turkey took part in the quarrel. But the Russians were completely victorious; Bender was captured; the Turkish fleet was destroyed; and the Crimea was annexed to Catherine’s dominions. Flushed with success, and unscrupulous by nature, the Empress projected the dismemberment of Poland, forced her scheme upon Maria Theresa, and in 1772 entered into a treaty of partition with the rulers of Austria and Prussia. The Polish Diet was intimidated by menaces; and the several provinces, about one-third of the Polish territory, which had been allotted to the spoilers, were surrendered.
Scarcely had the Russian Empress perpetrated this piece of ruthless injustice, when she was alarmed by the serious rebellion of a Cossack, who, assuming the name and character of her dead husband, pretended that he had escaped from the hands of those employed to assassinate him. The Cossack bore a striking resemblance to the deceased Czar, and was successful in arraying a considerable band of followers under his banner. He boldly took the field, and, possessing both skill and valor, was for a time victorious over the generals of Catherine. But at length he was totally defeated, taken prisoner, carried to Moscow in an iron cage, and beheaded as a traitor.
Danger soon arose from another quarter. After undertaking one of the most pompous processions on record to be crowned at Cherson, Catharine, on her return to St. Petersburg, was disturbed by a declaration of war on the part of Turkey: but the Ottoman power lost considerably by the operations, and the Dneister was henceforth recognized as the frontier of the hostile empires.
Soon after this Catharine was startled with the outbreak of the French revolution, and against it she issued a strong declaration. But she refrained from taking any active part in opposition to its promoters; for while other countries were binding themselves up for the fierce struggle that ensued, the Czarina seized the occasion to make a second onslaught on devoted Poland. In 1788 the Poles, in their aspirations after liberty, increased their army, and framed a new constitution, which rendered the crown hereditary in the family of the Elector of Saxony. The Empress thereupon sent an army into Poland, under pretense of maintaining the settlement of 1772, but in reality to complete the subjugation of the unhappy country, which, in 1793, she effected, with the aid of the King of Prussia. The Polish nobles, however, took up arms to rescue their native land, and, under the brave Kosciusko, were at first victorious, but the defeat and captivity of their general rendered further resistance unavailing.
Warsaw still holding out, and refusing to surrender, the Russians, under Suwarrow, assailed the town; and there ensued a fierce conflict, in which the Poles perished by thousands. After a resistance of eight hours they laid down their arms; but even then a multitude of unarmed and defenseless human beings were mercilessly sacrificed by fire and sword. Suwarrow entered with the pride of a victor; and the Te Deum was sung to celebrate his triumph. Next year Stanislaus made a formal resignation of his thorny crown. ‘I can cheerfully,’ he said, ‘surrender what has brought me so much calamity.’
With insatiable ambition the Czarina next cast her eyes longingly on Courland, and allured its Duke to her court. During his absence the nobles of that fertile and populous district assembled the states, to annex their country to Russia. To this scheme there was at first serious opposition; but a Russian general suddenly appearing in the assembly silenced all objections, and the deposed Duke retired to extensive estates which he had purchased in Prussia.
In 1796, after a successful war with Persia, Catherine was summoned to another state of existence; and the empire which she had rendered so extensive, was inherited by her son Paul. The deceased Czarina had confined herself to verbal denunciations in her hostility to revolutionary France; but her successor, eager to signalize his ascension by some brilliant exploit, entered—with singular zeal for the cause of sovereigns—into a confederation against the Republic. After setting the brave Kosciusko at liberty, and making peace with Persia, he took an active part in the war against France, and sent a powerful force into Italy to the aid of Austria. Under Suwarrow the Russian army afterward entered Switzerland, and menaced that Republic; but the veteran conqueror of Poland was there utterly unsuccessful, and, depressed with the loss of renown, he returned with his shattered army to die of despair, under the frowns of his despotic sovereign.