and kopeks as possible. They command the deacon to yell half the time, “Many years for the Orthodox, godly” harlot Catherine II. or “for the most godly Peter,” the robber, the murderer, who blasphemed over the Gospel, and I am compelled to pray for them. They command me to curse, burn, and hang my brothers, and I must cry after them “anathema.” These people command me to regard my brothers as cursed, and have to cry “anathema.” They command me to drink wine out of a spoon and swear that it is not wine, but the body and blood, and I must do so.
But this is terrible!
It would be terrible, if it were possible; but in reality it is not so, not because they have weakened in their demands,—they still shout “anathema,” or “many years,” if they are commanded to do so,—but because in reality no one listens to them.
We, the experienced and cultured people (I recall my thirty years outside the church), do not even despise them: we simply pay no attention to them and do not even have the curiosity to know what they are doing, writing, and saying. A pope has come,—very well, give him half a rouble. A church has been built for vanity's sake,—very well, dedicate it, send for a shaggy-maned bishop, and give a hundred roubles.
The masses pay still less attention to them. During Butter week we must eat pancakes, and during Passion week we must prepare ourselves for communion; and if there arises a spiritual question for one of our kind, we go to clever, learned thinkers, to their books, or to the writings of the saints, but not to the popes; and the people from the masses turn dissenters, Stundists, Milkers, the moment the religious sentiment is awakened in them. Thus the popes have for a long time been serving only themselves, and the weak-minded and rascals and women. It is to be assumed that very soon they will be instructing themselves only.
