The History of Peter the Great, Emperor of Russia

by Voltaire

'If his majesty is inclinable to punish the offender according to his deeds and the measure of his crimes, he has before him the examples in the Old Testament, if on the other hand, he is inclined to shew mercy, he has a pattern in our Lord Jesus Christ, who receives the prodigal son, when returning with a contrite heart, who set free the woman taken in adultery, whom the law sentenced to be stoned to death, and who prefers mercy to burnt-offerings. He has likewise the example of David, who spared his son Absalom, who had rebelled against and persecuted him, saying to his captains, when going forth to the fight, "Spare my son Absalom." The father was here inclinable to mercy, but divine Justice suffered not the offender to go unpunished.

'The heart of the czar is in the hands of God; let him take that side to which it shall please the Almighty to direct him.'

This opinion was signed by eight archbishops and bishops, four archpriests, and two professors of divinity; and, as we have already observed, the metropolitan archbishop of Rezan, the same with whom the prince had held a correspondence, was the first who signed.

As soon as the clergy had signed this opinion, they presented it to the czar. It is easy to perceive that this body was desirous of inclining his mind to clemency; and nothing can be more beautiful than the contrast between the mercy of Jesus Christ, and the rigour of the Jewish law, placed before the eyes of a father, who was the prosecutor of his own son.

The same day the czarowitz was again examined for the last time, and signed his final confession in writing, wherein he acknowledges himself 'to have been a bigot in his youthful days, to have frequented the company of priests and monks, to have drank with them, and to have imbibed from their conversations the first impressions of dislike to the duties of his station, and even to the person of his father.'

If he made this confession of his own accord, it shews that he must have been ignorant of the mild advice the body of clergy, whom he thus accuses, had lately given his father; and it is a still stronger proof, how great a change the czar had wrought in the manners of the clergy of his time, who, from a state of the most deplorable ignorance, were in so short a time become capable of drawing up a writing, which for its wisdom and eloquence might have been owned, without a blush, by the most illustrious fathers of the church.

It is in this last confession that the czarowitz made that declaration on which we have already commented, viz. that he endeavoured to secure to himself the succession by any means whatever, except such as were just.

One would imagine, by this last confession, that the prince was apprehensive he had not rendered himself sufficiently criminal in the eyes of his judges, by his former self-accusations, and that, by giving himself the character of a dissembler and a bad man, and supposing how he might have acted had he been the master, he was carefully studying how to justify the fatal sentence which was about to be pronounced against him, and which was done on the 5th of July. This [sentence] will be found, at length, at the end of this volume; therefore, we shall only observe in this place that it begins, like the opinion of the clergy, by declaring, that 'it belongs not to subjects to take cognizance of such an affair, which depends solely on the absolute will of the sovereign, whose authority is derived from God alone;' and then, after having set forth the several articles of the charge brought against the prince, the judges express themselves thus: 'What shall we think of a rebellious design, almost unparalleled in history, joined to that of a horrid parricide against him, who was his father in a double capacity?'

Probably these words have been wrong translated from the trial printed by order of the czar; for certainly there have been instances in history of much greater rebellions; and no part of the proceedings against the czarowitz discover any design in him of killing his father. Perhaps, by the word parricide, is understood the deposition made by the prince, that one day he declared at confession, that he had wished for the death of his father. But, how can a private declaration of a secret thought, under the seal of confession, be a double parricide?