The election day came: it was in Lent, in the year 1613. The debates were long and stormy. The princes Mstislavski and Pojarski, it appears, refused the crown; the election of Prince Dmitri Trubetskoi failed, and the other candidates were set aside for various reasons. After much hesitation the name of Michael Romanov was put forward; a young man sixteen years of age, personally unknown, but recommended by the virtues of his father, Philaretes, and in whose behalf the boyars had been canvassed by the patriarch Hermogenes, the holy martyr to the national cause. The Romanovs were connected through the female branch with this ancient dynasty. The ancestors of Michael had filled the highest offices in the state. He fulfilled, moreover, the required conditions. “There were but three surviving members in his family,” says Strahlenberg; “he had not been implicated in the preceding troubles; his father was an ecclesiastic, and in consequence naturally more disposed to secure peace and union than to mix himself up in turbulent projects.”
The name of the new candidate, supported by the metropolitan of Moscow,[37] was hailed with acclamation, and after some discussion he was elected. The unanimous voice of the assembly raised Michael Feodorovitch to the throne. Before he ascended he was required to swear to the following conditions: that he would protect religion; that he would pardon and forget all that had been done to his father; that he would make no new laws, nor alter the old, unless circumstances imperatively required it; and that, in important causes, he would decide nothing by himself, but that the existing laws and the usual forms of trial should remain in force; that he would not at his own pleasure make either war or peace with his neighbours; and that, to avoid all suits with individuals, he would resign his estates to his family, or incorporate them with the crown domains. Strahlenberg adds that Alexis, on his accession, swore to observe the same conditions.
These forms, however futile they may have been, are remarkable: not because they render sacred a right which stands in no need of them, but because they recall it to mind; and also because they prove that, even on the soil most favourable to despotism, a charter which should give absolute power to a monarch would appear such a gross absurdity that we know not that an instance of the kind ever existed.
Nothing could be more critical than the state of the empire at the moment when its destinies were confided to a youth of seventeen. Disorder and anarchy everywhere prevailed. Ustrialov gives us the following picture: “The strongholds on the frontier which should have served to defend his dominions were in the hands of external or internal enemies. The Swedes possessed Kexholm, Oresheck, Koporie, and even Novgorod. The Poles ruled in Smolensk, Dorogobuje, Putivle, and Tchernigov; the country around Pskov was in the power of Lisovski; Raisin, Kashira, and Tula struggled feebly against the Tatars of the Crimea and the Nogai; Sarutzki (Zarucki) was established in Astrakhan; Kazan was in revolt. At home bands of Cossacks from the Don, and the Zaparogians, and whole divisions of Poles and Tatars ravaged the villages and the convents that were still entire, when there were hopes of finding booty. The country was wasted, soldiers were dying of hunger, the land-tax was no longer collected, and not a kopeck was in the treasury. The state jewels, crowns of great price, sceptres, precious stones, vases—all had been plundered and carried into Poland.
“The young prince was surrounded by courtiers belonging to twenty different factions. There were to be found the friends of Godunov, the defenders of Shuiski, the companions of Wladislaw, and even partisans of the brigand of Tushino—in a word, men professing the most various opinions and aims, but all equally ambitious, and incapable of yielding the smallest point as regarded precedence. The lower class, irritated by ten years of misery, had become habituated to anarchy, and it was not without difficulty and resistance on their part that they were reduced to obedience.” Such, then, was the situation of the country; but Michael found means to redeem it.
[1617-1627 A.D.]
Notwithstanding the desperate state of his finances, the insubordination of his troops, the ill-will of the diets, and the confederations continually springing up against him, Sigismund did not abandon his attempts upon Russia; but the negotiations which ensued in consequence, upon various occasions, produced no result. Wladislaw, at the head of an army, once more crossed the frontiers, and appeared for the second time, in 1617, under the walls of Moscow, which he assaulted and whence he was repulsed. Deceived in the expectation which the intelligence he kept up with various chiefs had induced him to form, harassed by his troops, who were clamorous for pay, he consented to renounce the title of czar, which he had up to that period assumed, and concluded, on the 1st of December, 1618, an armistice for fourteen years. The Peace of Stolbovna, January 26th, 1617, had terminated the preceding year the war with Sweden, and was purchased by the surrender of Ingria, Karelia, and the whole country between Ingria and Novgorod; besides the formal renunciation of Livonia and Esthonia, and the payment of a sum of money.
The captivity of Philarete had now lasted nine years; from Warsaw he had been removed to the castle of Marienburg, and it was from that place, as it is asserted, that he found means to communicate with the council of the boyars, and use his influence in the election of the czar, never dreaming that it would fall upon his son. The cessation of hostilities restored him to freedom. He returned to Moscow on the 14th of June, 1619, and was immediately elevated to the patriarchal chair, which had remained vacant from the death of Hermogenes, in 1613. His son made him co-regent, and the ukases of that date are all headed “Michael Feodorovitch, sovereign, czar, and grand prince of all the Russias, and his father Philarete, mighty lord and most holy patriarch of all the Russias, order,” etc. There exist, moreover, ukases issued in the sole name of the patriarch, thus called out of his usual sphere of action, and placed in one in which absolute power was granted him. He took part in all political affairs; all foreign ambassadors were presented to him, as well as to the czar: and at those solemn audiences, as well as at table, he occupied the right of the sovereign. He held his own court, composed of stolnicks and other officers; in a word, he shared with his son all the prerogatives of supreme power. From this period dates the splendour of the patriarchate, which at a later epoch excited the jealousy of the czar Peter the Great, who was induced to suppress it in 1721.
Philarete always gave wise advice to his son, and the influence he exercised over him was always happily directed. A general census, of which he originated the idea, produced great improvement in the revenue; but, perhaps without intending it, he contributed by this measure to give fixity to the system of bondage to the soil. In the performance of his duty as head pastor, he directed all his efforts to re-establish a press at Moscow,[38] which had been abandoned during the troubles of the interregnum; and he had the satisfaction of seeing, after 1624, many copies of the Liturgy issue from it.[h]