{"collection":"scripture-revelation","full_text_available":true,"graph_url":"https://unchartedknowledge.5gfusion.net/v2/api/page/gutenberg_65157/graph","html_url":"https://unchartedknowledge.5gfusion.net/v2/page/gutenberg_65157","id":"gutenberg_65157","license":"Public Domain (US)","rights_basis":"gutenberg_metadata_copyright_false","source":"gutenberg","source_url":"https://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/65157","summary":null,"tags":["Category: Philosophy & Ethics","Category: Religion/Spirituality","Category: Russian Literature","Category: Travel Writing","National characteristics, Russian","Russia -- Religion"],"text":"THE WAY OF MARTHA AND THE WAY OF MARY\n\n\n\n\n    MACMILLAN AND CO., LIMITED\n    LONDON \u00b7 BOMBAY \u00b7 CALCUTTA\n    MELBOURNE\n\n    THE MACMILLAN COMPANY\n    NEW YORK \u00b7 BOSTON \u00b7 CHICAGO\n    DALLAS \u00b7 SAN FRANCISCO\n\n    THE MACMILLAN CO. OF CANADA, LTD.\n    TORONTO\n\n\n\n\n                 THE WAY OF MARTHA AND THE WAY OF MARY\n\n                                   BY\n\n                             STEPHEN GRAHAM\n\n                               AUTHOR OF\n             \u2018WITH THE RUSSIAN PILGRIMS TO JERUSALEM,\u2019 ETC.\n\n\n                       MACMILLAN AND CO., LIMITED\n                      ST. MARTIN\u2019S STREET, LONDON\n                                  1915\n\n\n\n\n                                PREFACE\n\n\nThe quotation \u201cMartha, Martha, thou art cumbered about with many things:\nbut one thing is needful: and Mary hath chosen that good part which\nshall not be taken away from her\u201d is as common in Russia as \u201cfaith\nwithout works is dead\u201d is common here. Speaking roughly, Eastern\nChristianity is associated with Mary\u2019s good part and Western\nChristianity with the way of Martha and service. The two aspects seem to\nbe irreconcilable, but they are not; and I have called my book _The Way\nof Martha and the Way of Mary_ because the ways of the sisters are as\ntouchstones for Christianity, and in their reconciliation is a great\nbeauty.\n\nIf you would know what a nation is, you must ask what is the religion of\nthe people. Without a national religion a nation is not a nation but a\ncollection of people. It is a truism to say that what is best in a\nnation springs from its religion, from some central idealism to which\nevery one in the nation has access\u2014the idea of the nation. There is a\n\u201cBritish idea,\u201d an \u201cAmerican idea,\u201d a \u201cGerman idea,\u201d a \u201cRussian idea.\u201d\nThis is profoundly true of Russia; for all that is beautiful in her\nlife, art, and culture springs from the particular and characteristic\nChristian idea in the depths of her. She is essentially a great and\nwonderful unity. It is of that essential unity that I write, and in\nwriting hope to show on the one plane Russia, and on another the\nsplendour of the true Christian idea.\n\nThis book was written in Russia and in Egypt during 1914 and 1915. In\n1913 I was in America and wrote my study of American ideals in contrast\nto Russian ideals. I returned to Russia in January 1914 eager to look at\nthe East afresh and compare it with the West. In setting out for Russia\nthe fundamental idea in my mind was that of Russia as a religious\ncountry where one found refuge from materialism and worldly cares, and I\nhoped to find stories and pictures of life with which to clothe the\nbeautiful idea of the sanctuary. The book I was going to write I always\ncalled in my mind \u201cthe sanctuary book,\u201d and my notion was to make a book\nthat should also be a sanctuary itself\u2014a book in which the reader could\nfind sacred refuge.\n\nMuch has intervened. My quest resolved itself first of all into a\nseeking for what I call the Russian idea, then into a study of Russian\nChristianity. My new volume is necessarily one of seeking and finding, a\nmaking of discoveries. One chapter led me on to another, and the scope\nof my study increased till it took in the whole question of what Eastern\nChristianity is and how it is in contrast to Western Christianity.\n\nAthwart this peaceful work came the typhoon of the Great War, and my\nhand was claimed by the new friendship between England and Russia, the\nfriendship of brothers in arms. It was fitting to seize the opportunity\nto make that friendship wider and deeper by describing and interpreting\nthe Russian people to larger audiences. But I carried the purpose of\nthis book with me, and much of what is written here was first put into\nwords on public platforms in the winter of 1914-15. Finally, as a\nculmination to this personal work, on the 16th April 1915 I gave a\nlecture at the Royal Institution on \u201cThe Russian Idea,\u201d and therein\ncollected together and summarised all that I had said during the winter.\nThat evening I read almost all that is vital in Part I. of this book.\n\nIn May, in order to carry on this study I went to Egypt to visit the\nshrines and monasteries of the Desert, some of the sources of\ninspiration of Eastern Christianity, and to make a journey to Russia the\nway Christianity came to her. In these journeyings and doings lie the\nchronological and geographical scheme of this new volume.\n\nI feel that this book, the hardest of all my books to write, is not in\nany sense a collection or a medley of impressions and stories, but has\none and the same object and quest running through the whole of it; and\nthat in order to understand it even in a small way it is necessary to\nread the whole of it, and perhaps re-read it. It is an organic unity,\nand reflects in its form something of the Russian idea and of Sancta\nSophia itself.\n\n_The Way of Martha and The Way of Mary_ is an interpretation and a\nsurvey of Eastern Christianity, and a consideration of the ideas at\npresent to the fore in Christianity generally.\n\nChristianity is not yet a system: it is chaotic in its tenets and the\nmanner of its profession. This _young_ religion of Christianity! Perhaps\n6000 years hence it will have crystallised out, but as yet it is in the\nconfused grandeur of youth. It has all possibilities. A young man or\nyoung woman of to-day can live by Christianity because it is young with\nthem. Probably any true book on Christianity must reflect this fact. As\nyet Christianity is running germs: it is in being\u2019s flood, in action\u2019s\nstorm. It is not all logical, symmetrical, like a thesis demonstrated\nand proved to a class in moral philosophy.\n\nChristianity is a great live religion still absorbing all that is true\nin other religions. It is _the word_. It is part of our language, and by\nmeans of it we express what is deepest in ourselves. There has not been\nin history such a powerful medium of self-expression. Words are our\nmeans of inter-communication, of understanding one another and telling\none another what is in the heart, that is\u2014of communion with one another.\nThat communion is deep and tender, and the knowledge of it, like the\nknowledge of God, passeth understanding; all that we know is that love\nkindles from it. I make this affirmation as one whose special medium is\nthe written and the spoken word.\n\nSTEPHEN GRAHAM.\n\nMOSCOW, _September 1915_.\n\n\n\n\n                                CONTENTS\n\n\n    I. THE RUSSIAN IDEA\u2014\n\n    1. TO RUSSIA 1\n\n    2. MODERN RUSSIA AND HOLY RUSSIA 12\n\n    3. PEREPLOTCHIKOF AGAIN 29\n\n    4. AT THE THEATRE 37\n\n    5. THE MOVEMENTS OF THE PEOPLES 48\n\n    6. LET US GO INTO THE TAVERN 58\n\n    7. IN THE CHURCH 73\n\n    8. IN THE MARKET-PLACE 86\n\n    9. THE RUSSIAN IDEA 90\n\n    10. THE LABYRINTH 105\n\n\n    II. MARTHA AND MARY\u2014\n\n    1. THE _PODVIG_ 111\n\n    2. THE HERMITAGE OF FATHER SERAPHIM 121\n\n    3. TOLSTOY\u2019S FLIGHT FROM HOME 130\n\n    4. BACK TO MOSCOW 136\n\n    5. THE RELIGION OF SUFFERING 143\n\n    6. THE TWO HERMITS 155\n\n    7. AT THE CONVENT OF MARTHA AND MARY 161\n\n    8. THE WAY OF MARTHA 168\n\n    9. MARTHA\u2019S TRUE WAY 178\n\n    10. MAKING WEST EAST 182\n\n    11. THE ECCLESIASTICAL CHURCH AND THE LIVING CHURCH 190\n\n    12. WITNESS UNTO THE TRUTH 200\n\n    13. THE FESTIVAL OF THE DEAD 206\n\n\n    III. THE DESERT AND THE WORLD\u2014\n\n    1. A CHAIN OF HAPPENINGS 217\n\n    2. THE HERMITS 221\n\n    3. IN THE DESERT 235\n\n    4. THE WORLD 246\n\n    5. ST. SOPHIA 256\n\n    6. FROM EGYPT TO RUSSIA 263\n\n\n    APPENDICES\u2014\n\n    1. WAR AND CHRISTIANITY 273\n\n    2. THE CHOICE OF EAST AND WEST 280\n\n    _Frontispiece_\u2014MARTHA AND MARY.\n\n\n\n\n                                   I\n                            THE RUSSIAN IDEA\n\n\n\n\n                                   I\n                               TO RUSSIA\n\n\n    KIEF, _January 1914_.\n\n\nAll night long from Paris to Cologne the train speeds like a bird,\njoyously screaming. I am in the carriage next the engine, and as I lie\nfull length in the darkened empty carriage I look out on snow-patched\nfields and hills, now partly obscured by wild volumes of vapour, now\nfierily illumined by the glow of the furnace, the black sky raining\nshowers of red sparks on to the vague night landscape, the engine racing\nforward past signal-boxes and stations, clattering along the changing\npoints of the rails of junctions, knowing apparently that all signals\nare _for_, never anticipating any hindrance, skirling and leaping in the\nexuberance of accomplishment.\n\nWe pass the Belgian frontier at three in the morning near Namur, and the\nGerman at Herbesthal in the dim glimmering before dawn. The world that\nbecomes visible as the sun rises is the ordered world of the Germans.\nEverything is prim, everything is as it should be; the fields are\nsymmetrical, the palings are vertical and in good repair, the manure\nheaps are compact; where houses are being pulled down or set up there is\nno disorder whatever; nothing is scattered about, everything is\ncollected and numbered. At the little stations we pass through, the\nstation-master in brilliant red and blue is standing erect at that point\non the platform that it is his duty to occupy. On the train a woman in\nuniform has appeared. She has put thirty or forty little tablets of soap\nand two dozen hand-towels into the lavatory; she has picked up the bits\nof paper that lay scattered in the corridor all night; she has washed\neverything in the lavatory; put water in the cistern and boiled water in\nthe carafe. The conductor, a well-groomed military man, has come and\nallotted us definitely numbered seats in the carriages and has seen that\nour respective hand-luggage occupies just that space in the rack which\nis above our numbered seats.\n\nAt Cologne there are just four minutes to cross the subway and get into\nthe Berlin express. My porter\u2014luggage-dragger, as the precise Germans\ncall him\u2014takes me across at a run and puts me in the train, and my\nregistered box of books and papers and what-not is not allowed to miss\nthe connexion. I hardly sit down in the speckless third-class carriage\nof the real German train before the whistle goes and we slip past the\ngreat black piles of Cologne Cathedral in the background. All day long\nwe tear over Germany at sixty miles an hour to Berlin.\n\nAt Paris I had registered my box to the Charlottenburg Station of\nBerlin, but to my dismay the train did not stop there. I had only ten\nminutes in which to change francs to marks, get my ticket to the Russian\nfrontier, have my luggage weighed and registered, and get into the\ntrain. And I do not speak German, but the Germans understood. I was put\ndown at Zoological Gardens Station. My porter understood the situation\nat once, ran me along to some stairs, and pointed down them. I went\ndown; he went \u201cto expedite my baggage,\u201d so I understood. I took my\nticket, and in doing so offered the girl in the booking-office about six\nmore marks than was necessary. She pushed back the superfluous silver\nwithout a smile. Turning round, I saw my trunk reposing on the weighing\nmachine. My porter pointed to the registration window. I paid two marks\nand obtained my receipt and went up the stairs to the platform for the\nRussian train, and had two minutes to spare.\n\nHow efficient the Germans are! They have a great excellence in their\nway. They permit no one to lose himself, they permit no disorder,\neverything is done by the chronometer rather than by the watch. They\nhave a genius for orderliness, neatness, and precision. They have our\nEnglish ideal of thoroughness and smartness, but they seem to have\nconsummated it whilst we have paused in the ways of Destiny and changed\nour mind in favour of something different. If we could see Germans in a\nfriendly spirit there are many English who would bow down in admiration\nto their civilisation. For the Saxon part of English nature has a\nsimilar instinct for order, for living one\u2019s life like a neatly-worked\nmathematics paper. It is the aboriginal Celtic base in us which with\nmuch that came over with the Normans has frustrated the Saxon element in\nour race. The British earth itself has formed us, inspired us: hence our\nkindliness, verve, and imaginativeness, human tenderness. Thanks to the\nancient Briton in us, we are more like the Russians than the Germans.\n_There_ is a people who are the antipodes of the Germans\u2014wild in their\nemotions, anarchic in their spirits, amused by laws and regulations,\nlacking in the instincts that make \u201cprogress\u201d possible. Naturally the\nRussians can\u2019t stand the Germans. As a Russian said to me when I\nrecounted how once I left a Kodak behind in the waiting-room at Cologne\nstation, wired from Dusseldorf my Russian address, and eventually\nreceived the apparatus in good condition at Rostof-on-the-Don, \u201cThe\nGermans are an accurate people. O Lord, how accurate they are!\u201d\n\nWe reached the Russian frontier at one in the morning, and, passing in\nsingle file, gave up our passports to the sentry. At the Custom-house\nthe baggage was submitted to a vigorous examination. An armed Customs\nofficer in a heavy overcoat with black astrakhan collar directed the\noperations; three or four porters and inspectors fumbled in the trunks,\nturning things almost upside down, and a slim girl of twenty-five, a\nfemale expert, scrutinised all the clothes for the things that men were\nnot likely to see of themselves\u2014embroidery, lace, silk underwear, neatly\npacked away Paris blouses, feathers, new costumes with artificial\ncreases and tacked-in dirty linings. But I am not smuggling anything\nthrough, and no one takes the trouble even to look at the contents of my\nbooks.\n\nI take my ticket to Kief and a supplement to Warsaw. At half-past three\nwe are allowed to board the Russian train and spread out our bedding and\nmake ourselves comfortable. The station is dark and gloomy, the\ndreariest station in western Russia. As we stand at the windows of the\ntrain and look out a strange procession comes up out of the\ndarkness\u2014threescore of men in irons, following a soldier who carries on\na pole high above his head a flaming naphtha torch. The faces of the men\nare pale, furtive, hairy, their shoulders awkward; some are in old\nblouses, some in collars, some in sheepskins; they are Jews, Poles,\nRussians, chained together in fours, marching along the railway track to\na barred convict-train waiting at a siding. Foot soldiers accompany them\nwith drawn swords in their uplifted hands. They come out of the darkness\nlike living shadows and disappear into the darkness again.\n\n\u201c_Soloveiki_,\u201d says the conductor disparagingly.\n\n\u201cWell,\u201d says a Russian, \u201cI don\u2019t suppose they\u2019re heroes. Poland swarms\nwith thieves and smugglers, and people smuggling themselves across the\nfrontier in order to get to America.\u201d\n\n\u201cThey are human beings,\u201d says another. \u201cThey are in chains and we free.\nIt is a heavy sight.\u201d\n\nBut the second bell and the third bell sound, and the train moves\ngradually out of the station and nearly every one lies down to sleep.\nEven when we arrive at Warsaw many of the passengers are snoring and\nhave to be awakened up by acquaintances or porters.\n\nAcross the two miles of the slush-covered cobbles of Warsaw, through\ndriving rain and sleet, in an open _droshky_ at dawn, from the Vienna to\nthe Brest station.\n\n\u201c_A vam ne skoro!_\u201d says the Russian porter who greets me. \u201cYour train\nis not soon. The next for Kief is at four o\u2019clock in the afternoon.\u201d\n\nI have breakfast. I stroll into the rainy city and back, have a plate of\nhot soup, read the papers, write letters.\n\nOpposite me in the Kief train was a little girl in simple but antique\nnational attire, in soiled clothes, but having a fresh and delicate\nclassical face and black hair in two plaits, one about each little ear\u2014a\nrare beauty: it was a piquant pleasure just to look at her.\n\n\u201cWhen do we get to Kharkof?\u201d she asked.\n\n\u201cSeven, to-morrow night.\u201d\n\n\u201cOh, what a long time! It\u2019s a long way: it\u2019s the first time I\u2019ve been\naway from home.\u201d\n\nAs the guard blew his whistle she stood up, looked towards the city, and\ncrossed herself.\n\n\u201cAre you a little Russian?\u201d I asked.\n\n\u201cNo; a Pole. I was once a Jewess, but have just been baptized. See....\u201d\n\nShe showed me a little crucifix, and the figure of the Virgin on a\nlittle medallion hanging from her neck.\n\n\u201cYou\u2019re a Catholic now?\u201d\n\n\u201cYes; and I don\u2019t like the Jews.\u201d\n\nI wondered whether in view of the ill odour in which the Jews were at\nthat time, she had been told by her mother to announce her conversion\nvery distinctly.\n\n\u201cSuch a mama I have!\u201d said she, turning out a basket of provisions\u2014two\nbags of nuts, several pots of jam, biscuits, a Polish Christmas pudding.\n\nThere were in the carriage besides myself and the girl opposite me a\nRussian student, a young Polish _flaneur_, and a middle-aged, grizzly,\nsmelly, Polish peasant. The young convert offered us all nuts. She was\nvery engaging. She took out a long bottle, put it to her lips and drank\nfrom it. She told me it was cold tea with sugar at the bottom of the\nbottle, but to the Pole announced that it was vodka.\n\nHe was fool enough to believe her, and at once cast about in his mind\nsome means of doing her an ill turn. He came over and made love to her\nin excited whispers, and was so rude and urgent that at last the girl\nrefused to have anything more to do with him, and turned sullen and\nangry. He for his part sneaked off to another compartment, and we saw no\nmore of him. After a while the girl relaxed and smiled, took out a large\nbut cracked hand-mirror, looked at her pretty face, and patted the curls\nto her temples. I got a kettleful of boiling water and made tea for the\ngrizzly peasant and her and myself. Then the peasant climbed on to the\nshelf above and spread out his big overcoat and slept on it, and the\nlittle girl, after explaining that she was going to live with Poles in\nKharkof, and that her father played the violin and she the mandoline,\nand that she was going to take a part in a \u201ctroop\u201d and earn her living,\nundid her black locks, put down a quilt and a pillow, and curled herself\nup and slept. The conductor came round and searched under the seats for\n\u201chares,\u201d the flickering candle burned low, and I was about to turn in\nand sleep when the Russian student, who had been trying to read a\nnewspaper by the aid of a dip of his own, finally gave up the task and\nset himself to talk to me.\n\n\u201cHow far are you going? Where from? What for? How long have you been\naway from Russia? What interest can Russia have for you? I should have\nthought the West more interesting....\u201d and so on, the usual flood of\nquestions.\n\nThen my questions. \u201cHas much happened in Russia during the year? What\nare people talking about? What are they doing? What is in the air?\u201d\n\n\u201cOh,\u201d said he, \u201cthe Futurists are walking about with gilded noses and\ndyed faces. The Jew-haters of the Black Hundred want to raise a temple\nin memory of the Christian boy Yushinsky. Everyone has been discussing a\nplay of Artsibashef called _Jealousy_. Literary Russia has been giving a\nwelcome to the Belgian poet Verhaeren, such as you in England have been\ngiving Anatole France. Every one is either hearing or giving lectures\nabout Verhaeren. But I suppose most clamour of all has been raised about\nGorky and Dostoieffsky and the Theatre of Art at Moscow. They propose to\nperform Dostoieffsky\u2019s _Demons_ at the Theatre of Art, and Gorky has\nraised a great protest. He holds that Dostoieffsky is so reactionary in\ntendency that he ought not to be played at the great democratic theatre.\nNot only that, but he holds that Tolstoy, and indeed all Russian\nliterature, is on the wrong side in the struggle for the liberation of\nthe people. He is almost ready to say, \u2018Burn the works of Tolstoy and\nDostoieffsky; burn them, and let us be free!\u2019\u201d\n\n\u201cHow does Russia take it?\u201d I asked. \u201cIt is indeed true that\nDostoieffsky\u2019s work is not on the side of progress and freedom. He\nbelieved in suffering; he believed in the Russian Church, and was a\nChristian.\u201d\n\n\u201cRussia is mostly against Gorky,\u201d said the student. \u201cMerezhkovsky, for\ninstance, has written a brilliant article against him in the _Russian\nWord_, and he says, \u2018Yes, Gorky is keenly sensitive, but in Italy or\nGreece, where he lives,[1] he is too far away to feel what Russia is\nnow. Russia has changed much in the last eight years. Her wounds have\nhealed up, many of them; she has the great hope of the convalescent. If\nGorky breathed Russian air he would understand that there was now in\nRussia a strong religious movement.\u2019\u201d\n\n\u201cAnd what do you think?\u201d I asked. \u201cDo you possibly agree with Gorky?\u201d\n\n\u201cNo. I don\u2019t think it is right to steal an instrument from the other\nside\u2019s box of tricks. The Censorship is one of their weapons, not one of\nours. The people have loved Dostoieffsky more than they have loved any\nother Russian author; he is still beloved. We Russians are a religious\nand loving people. We will never sacrifice humanity for ideas....\u201d\n\nWe talked a long time. When I lay down on my shelf to sleep I felt only\ngladness that I was coming back to Russia, coming to live with her and\nfor her once more, after a year in England and America. It seemed to me\na pity that Gorky had not come back the year before when so many exiles\ntook advantage of the Tsar\u2019s manifesto, and returned to the open arms of\na loving, astonishingly patriotic people!\n\nNext morning at dawn I arrived at Kief, said \u201cGood-bye\u201d to the little\ngirl who was sleepily stretching herself, and to the student who was\nchatting with a new acquaintance in the gangway and smoking a cigarette.\nThe grizzly peasant I let snore on....\n\nA fine crowd this of the Kief streets: stalwart, diverse, interested in\none another, attractive-faced, they are a refreshment, such a\nrefreshment, after Paris and New York.\n\nBut I do not reckon that I have achieved the first stage of my journey\nback till I enter the Cathedral of St. Vladimir and light candles before\nQueen Olga, King Vladimir, and the Mother and Child, baring my head in\nthe presence of Russia and accepting her sanctuary from the West.\n\nFootnote 1:\n\n  He had not then returned to Russia.\n\n\n\n\n                                   II\n                     MODERN RUSSIA AND HOLY RUSSIA\n\n\n    KIEF, _January 1914_.\n\n\nOne of the first friends I visited in Kief was Little-Russian Katia, a\ntypical Russian of to-day, with the problems and prospects of the\nnew-formed middle class.\n\nAt the time of the Boer War Katia ran away from school and set off on\nfoot for South Africa as a Russian pilgrim would set out for Jerusalem,\nwith a bundle on her back and a stick in her hand. She would beg her way\nto the Transvaal and collect money to help the Boers! At the same\nschool, in the time of the riots in Kief, the first class presented an\nultimatum to the masters and directors, demanding among other things the\nright to hold meetings, the right to get books from the public\nlibraries, and equal justice for all pupils irrespective of race, be\nthey Russians, Poles, or Jews! A go-ahead school as far as the scholars\nwere concerned. If a mistress in a fit of anger strikes one of her\nclass, straight away a boycott of her lessons is arranged, and no one\nanswers her questions, no one does any homework for her.\n\nKatia learnt at school to adore above all things the works of Oscar\nWilde. She professes to know his works almost by heart; she sleeps with\n_The Happy Prince_ under her pillow. On a wall in her bedroom hangs a\nlarge portrait of Oscar Wilde; in a corner is the sacred ikon, before\nwhich on festival nights and for holy days she lights a little lamp. She\nwas the last Russian I had seen when I left Kief some fifteen months\nbefore. She was then engaged to Sasha, a thinly-clad, stern,\npoverty-stricken student, who in order to travel thirty versts on the\nrailway free would take a conductor\u2019s job and examine the tickets in the\nsecond class. If she married Sasha he would get drunk and beat her; they\nwould live dogs\u2019 lives\u2014so every one said. The father, a rich\nmanufacturer, was opposed to Sasha, but then the father was a tyrant;\nthe mother, not on speaking terms with the father, gave countenance to\nthe engagement. Sasha was able to come to all meals and stay as long as\nhe liked with Katia. When Katia was indisposed and thought fit to lie in\nbed, he might spend whole evenings sitting by her. That was all _comme\nil faut_, for in Russia a betrothed couple are already called bride and\nbridegroom and have such freedom.\n\nThe father, however, cut short Katia\u2019s pocket-money and cut short his\nwife\u2019s housekeeping money, and made coarse jokes at the expense of the\nhouse-hold. Though Katia was twenty-two years of age she had no passport\nof her own. Her father simply kept her name written on his own passport,\nand in that way cut off the chance of his daughter\u2019s running away from\nhome. You cannot get far in Russia without a passport of your own. You\ncertainly cannot get married without a passport and without many\ndocuments.\n\nKatia\u2019s sweetheart was not at all abashed by his own poverty or by the\nrudeness of the father. He came to all parties and functions in his\nshabby clothes. He lectured the father and mother on their behaviour. He\nwas even hard and brusque to Katia herself upon occasion. But he stood\nup for her dignity, and would have fought any one who insulted her.\n\n                  *       *       *       *       *\n\nReturning to Kief this month I rather wondered how far Katia\u2019s romance\nhad got. Perhaps she and Sasha were now man and wife. But I could not\nimagine it. One of the felicities of travelling is to pay surprise\nvisits. I had heard nothing from Katia in the interim. So I rang at the\ndoor and gave my name to a strange servant and went in and....\n\nExclamations! \u201cOh, how fine! on the twenty-fifth of January is my\nwedding,\u201d says the same beautiful Katia.\n\n\u201cI congratulate you. I did not know whom to visit first,\u201d said I, \u201cyou\nor Sasha.\u201d\n\n\u201cSasha is in Moscow,\u201d says Katia with a troubled expression.\n\n\u201cWill you live in Kief?\u201d I ask.\n\n\u201c_I_ in Kief,\u201d says she with meaning emphasis.\n\nSo it is not Sasha that she is marrying.\n\nPresently in comes a bright-looking soldier of rather charming manners,\nand he is introduced as the bridegroom. He is a guest in the house and\nhas been living there some weeks\u2014Fedor Leonidovitch Smirnoff\u2014who has\ncompleted his university course in law, and is now serving his term in\nthe army.\n\n\u201cThe date is absolutely settled?\u201d I suppose.\n\n\u201cIf papa will take out the papers in time,\u201d says Katia.\n\nBut the new young man is on good terms with the father. He has evidently\nplenty of money of his own, and he is a _persona grata_.\n\n\u201cWhat of Sasha?\u201d I ask Katia aside.\n\n\u201cWe quarrelled,\u201d says she. \u201cGod, how we quarrelled! We were rowing in a\nboat on the Dnieper, and when I told him it was no good, we could never\nbe married, he shot at me with a revolver. I had to save myself by\njumping into the water.\u201d\n\n\u201cYou\u2019ve chosen a nice young man this time. Perhaps you are more likely\nto be happy with him.\u201d\n\n\u201cYes. Everybody likes him.\u201d\n\nFedor is certainly a relief after the sternness of Sasha. He is affable,\nhe is interested in the prices of all things, and is bourgeois, but he\nsays that success and money and luxury do not tempt him. He would like\nto give up everything and try and find out what life means. He would\nlike to be a wanderer as I am, or to go into a monastery.\n\nAll the same, the career assigned to him seems to be that of a lawyer,\nand as a lawyer, not as a vagabond, will he win the hand of Katia. He\nwill live with her as a wealthy bourgeois European, and not as a\nRussian.\n\nThis modern Kief is a mill where purely Russian types go in and\nEuropeans come out.\n\n\u201cOnce a European, always a European,\u201d says some one.\n\n\u201cA European may become an American,\u201d I hazard.\n\n\u201cBut he can never become a Russian again.\u201d\n\n\u201cWhat am I?\u201d asks Katia of me, \u201ca Russian or a European?\u201d\n\n\u201cI don\u2019t know. You are changing perhaps. But keep a Russian!\u201d\n\nOne evening, on Katia\u2019s advice, I took a sledge across the snow-covered\ncity to Solovtsof\u2019s theatre and saw _Jealousy_ performed, a story that\nhas had a vast vulgar success in Russia. It is by Artsibashef, the\nauthor of the most notorious books of the last ten years. He is the\nvoice of the bourgeois, of the new commercial middle-class Europeans\nbeing turned out at such an astonishing rate by the modern industrialism\nof Russia. He concerns himself almost entirely with sexual problems, and\nthe relation of woman to man. His outlook in life is something like that\nof Bernard Shaw, but his criterion in life is not racial progress so\nmuch as physical happiness. He mirrors the life of those whose aim is\nmoney, whose relaxation is feasting and flirtation. He reflects the\ngrowing non-Christian Russia, the increasing mass of Parisian types of\nmen and women obscuring the real Russia.\n\nA crowded theatre, nobody in evening dress, many women pretentiously\ndressed, many rich town-folk in the stalls, clerks and their sweethearts\nor their wives in other parts of the house. The play is very well\nstaged, well upholstered, and is vociferously received. What they are\ncheering is nothing more or less than a series of opinions about women,\na disparagement and uglification of the symbol \u201cwoman,\u201d of what is\nholiest.\n\nBut to quote the opinions gives the play.\n\n    In woman first of all it is necessary to awaken curiosity.\n\n    Women do not value those who pray to them.\n\n    Woman, of course, likes admiration, but only gives herself to the\n    man who despises her a little.\n\n    Men are most interesting when they are angry.\n\n    Woman is only interesting, vivacious, clever, when she is bathed in\n    the atmosphere of love.\n\n    Man is interested in his business, in sport, in thought, but woman\n    is only interested in herself, and if she seems to have interest in\n    other things it is only feigned. Her sole object is to make herself\n    more alluring, more interesting.\n\n    We seek Lauras and Beatrices, not knowing that such creatures are\n    only the incarnation of male fancy, and do not and cannot exist.\n\n    Girls are charming, but when you marry one you find her to be a\n    tedious _baba_ like the rest. At the piano they tinkle, \u201cI am a\n    princess, I am a princess.\u201d All young girls are princesses, but you\n    never come across a queen.\n\n    A woman lies in a way that a man would not wish to lie, and indeed\n    cannot lie. She lies with her whole being. When a man deceives he\n    grows cool, and in that betrays himself. But a woman returns from\n    another man\u2019s love specially languorous, caressing, and tender....\n    Sin must surely set her soul ablaze. Even the most sinful man is\n    ashamed of deceit, and that prevents him from lying effectively. A\n    woman quite sincerely reckons she has a right to deceive. She thinks\n    that to deceive not only does not humiliate her, but, on the\n    contrary, makes her more interesting.\n\nThe action of the drama shows two women, one who may be dismissed as a\nwanton, the other is a flirt who loves her husband best of all. The\nlatter coquettes in various ways with an officer, a student, and a\nsavage Caucasian prince. She leads them on to the last limit of\npropriety, and evidently finds her sole zest of life in the vanity of\nhaving lovers always expecting rendezvous and secret kisses.\n\nThe only words spoken on behalf of woman come from an old fellow who has\nbeen three times married\u2014and deceived and made foolish by three women in\nturn. He says:\u2014\n\nWoman is a magnificent, delicate instrument on which each can play all\nthat he can and will. Of course, put some Beethoven at the piano, and he\nwill find you a wonderful sonata; but put some giftless strummer there,\nand he rattles out a vulgar polka. We are just such giftless fools, and\nswear at the instrument because it produces no music. No, friends, you\nare wrong; woman is sensitive, hospitable, tender, poetic. God gave us\nwoman as an adornment of our lives; we ourselves have spoiled her and\ncomplain.\n\nThe play _Jealousy_ is a sort of public trial of woman, and when at the\nend the crazy husband of the woman who flirted but loved him best\nstrangles her, it is a sort of verdict, sentence, and execution in one.\n\nHow serious the trial is may be judged from the fact that each of the\naudience is given a pencil and a piece of paper and asked to record his\nopinion as to whether the man was justified in committing the murder.\n\nHow repulsive the whole thing! A play that should put \u201cWoman\u201d adequately\non the stage needs many women and the various kinds of men who need from\nwomen the things that women can give\u2014faith, love, children. For setting\nor for evidence it needs the world. The powers of life and death must\nstalk across the stage. The stakes for which men bid must be there, and\nalso the\n\n                          Stars silent over us,\n                          Graves under us silent.\n\n_Jealousy_ is the reflection of a shameful way of life. It is trivial,\nmean, parochial, the rage of talk for a day among the bourgeois of\nRussia, interesting now, as opposed to the story of Antony and\nCleopatra, interesting for ever.\n\n\u201cAnd what do _you_ think of woman?\u201d asked a Kief friend.\n\n\u201cWhy,\u201d said I, \u201cthe beast was a beast until a woman loved him. Then he\nbecame a man, even a prince. So it is with all of us. When a woman\nkisses a man, even an ugly, wretched, despised creature, he knows that\nhe has found grace and is precious in the sight of God. When a woman\nsmiles on a man she bids him live.\n\n\u201cThe world is kept fresh by women and children, by their faith and their\ninfluence and their prayers. It would have rotted away but for them.\n\n\u201cThe love and the faith of women empower men to do things. No man who is\nout on the adventurous tracks of life but has women behind him, and\ntheir love even far away keeps him alive. A woman has cords from her\nsoul to the far-off hands of man, and at her will can empower men to\nlift their hands and do things. She has spiritual nervous force.\u201d\n\n\u201cBut if these cords get broken?\u201d said my friend.\n\n\u201cAh, then indeed she is in a different position. She finds herself\nstranded in destiny. She may become a man\u2019s plaything or worse. Or she\nmay become a militant suffragist or a believer in secular education or a\npropagandist of eugenism and hygienics.\u201d\n\n\u201cIn England,\u201d says my friend. \u201cBut in Russia we have no woman\u2019s\nmovement. She becomes one of Artsibashef\u2019s women, no more; a man\u2019s\nplaything and fetish.\u201d\n\nEven so.\n\n                  *       *       *       *       *\n\nWhat has Artsibashef\u2019s play got to do with Russia? It has a good deal to\ndo with her because of thousands such as Katia who are at the\ncross-roads. With her cross, hard, but loving student Sasha she might\nhave been poor and unhappy, but, on the other hand, she would save her\nsoul\u2019s health. Whereas with her new-found bourgeois Fedor she may easily\nenter the world and the atmosphere of _Jealousy_.\n\nAmong those I visited at Kief was a certain Vassia, a poverty-stricken\ndoctor who worked from morning to night healing men and women, a\nspecialist in internal diseases but practising in a poor district. He\ndid not receive a fifth of his fees; he healed on trust.\n\n\u201cThey come to me suffering: how can I refuse to help?\u201d he would urge\nwhen people tried to harden his heart against those who couldn\u2019t pay.\n\nAn extraordinarily kind, impracticable fellow, with a flat in complete\ndisorder, with an adopted child but no wife; lazy and thieving servants.\nNeighbours have stolen much of his furniture, even the ikons from some\nof the rooms; and the candles burn in the empty corners from which the\nikons have been stolen! That is Russian.\n\nVassia and I were invited to an astonishing all-night feast given in\nhonour of Katia on the occasion of her last name-day before marriage.\n\nWe sat down to dinner at six, we got up from dinner at half-past eleven;\nwe went to the drawing-room and talked and sang till a quarter past\ntwelve, then we returned to the dining-room for tea and coffee and\ndessert.\n\nThe funniest moments were when the bride\u2019s father sat on the floor\npretending he was drunk, and when the bridegroom, to prove he was not\ntipsy, crawled under the table on all fours among the guests\u2019 feet and\nwent from one end to the other, and then jumped up and gave a military\nsalute.\n\nThey drank too much. They were near quarrelling at the end. One of the\nguests shouted in a loud voice that Katia\u2019s brother had played the piano\nlike a bootmaker.\n\nThen the toasts! They drank twice to everybody in the room, and the men\nkissed the hands of the women as well as clinking glasses with them. All\nthe bridegroom said at dinner was, \u201cSo-and-so, for what reason do you\nnot drink?\u201d though So-and-so was often half-seas over. They drank to\nabsent friends, to Freedom, to Truth, to English Literature\u2014\u201cLet us\ndrink to English Literature, \u2018urrah!\u201d\u2014to Russian dancing, to Katia, to\nKatia\u2019s figure (\u201cthank God she isn\u2019t like a telegraph pole\u201d), to Katia\u2019s\nfuture happiness.\n\nShe changed her dress between dinner and dessert.\n\nSome of the women present had a private view of the bride\u2019s linen\u2014eight\ndozen chemises at a hundred and forty roubles the dozen, and all the\nrest on a similar scale.\n\n\u201cFine batiste and lace,\u201d said an old lady present, rubbing her fingers\ntogether as if feeling the linen; \u201cfine batiste that at the first wash\ngoes into shreds from the chemicals the laundresses use. I wouldn\u2019t\naccept such garments as a gift. It is a sin to wear them. Nowadays, when\nyou live in a city and the washerwoman won\u2019t wash naturally, the only\nthing to do is to wear cheap things and replace them continually.\u201d\n\nWhat was interesting to me was the complete absence of attention on the\npart of the bridegroom. He could not have treated an enemy more\nnegligently.\n\nIt even prompted the German governess, who had unfortunately got a\nlittle drunk with champagne, to cry out\u2014\n\n\u201cThe bridegroom has not kissed the bride once; why is it?\u201d\n\nPoor Katia! she did not seem to have one true friend amongst all these\npeople, and was possibly marrying to escape from father and home....\n\nBut away from these problems! Thousands of sleigh-horses flog the\ngrey-white snow of the Kief streets, flocked with Christmas traffic. The\nsleighs are loaded with baskets of cakes and sweets. Men are driving,\ncarrying in their arms huge Christmas trees. There are men struggling\nwith little pigs and live geese and turkeys designed for the market or\nthe Christmas dinner. On the slippery sidewalks urchins are crying with\ncheerful irrelevance:\u2014\n\n\u201cFive copecks, aluminium wonder lights, cold fire without smoke, without\nsmell.\u201d\n\n\u201cFive copecks, warm socks to put inside boots or goloshes.\u201d\n\nIn the Jewish old-clothes market of the Podol there are tremendous\ncrowds, and much business is being done. The mood of Jewry is happy in\nthe Christmas orgy of trade. All is calm after the ritual trial, and the\nfear of persecution is all gone in the reality of good business. All\nKief seems to be in the streets buying; and the tram-cars tinkling their\nalarm bells are crowded to the last inch of the step-boards.\n\nBut somewhere there is another Kief, a quiet radiant city, silent but\nfor the footfalls of monks or pilgrims on the snow\u2014the sanctuaries,\nmonasteries, ruins, shops, hostelries of the Petcherskaya Lavra. This\nKief stands high on those cliffs of the Dnieper whence the Russians sent\ntumbling down their old god Peroun; it looks upon the river to which\nKing Vladimir at the dawning of Russian faith stepped down with his\nwhole army to be baptized. Yellow walls, half a mile long, twenty feet\nhigh, go down, alongside steep, snowy, rutty, over-drifted roads, from\nchurch to church. Peasant men and women in chestnut-coloured sheepskins,\nfur-edged and embroidered, are plodding up and down with bundles on\ntheir shoulders. Bright gilded domes of churches glitter above white\nwalls, and from many kolokolnyas come antique-sounding chimes. As you\nlook down from a tower you see beyond the thirty-five churches of the\nbeautiful Lavra the blue and white Dnieper, half frozen and snowed over,\nhalf free as yet from winter\u2019s grip\u2014you see beyond all the far snowy\nsteppes and forests of Little Russia.\n\nHere, in a historical sense, is Holy Russia, for the whole cliff on\nwhich the monasteries are built is holy ground. The foundations are\nhoneycombed with cells of the primeval hermits and saints of Russia. You\nenter dark and narrow passages in the rock, places in which you cannot\nstand erect, and you wander candle in hand from shrine to shrine in the\ndepths of the earth. An old monk with black cloak, grey hair, and yellow\nfive-times broken twisted candle, leads you from skeleton to skeleton\nwrapped in purple pall; shows you now and then a skull, a dried-up hand;\npoints out the picture of the likeness of the saint whose remains you\nsalute, indicating the nickname the hermit bore in the days when he was\nupon the world, thus: the industrious, the silent, the bookless, the\nfaster, the healer, the herbalist, and so on; thrusting the glimmer of\nhis torch into the intense darkness of the cell which the father had\noccupied when alive. All day long the peasants wander from sepulchre to\nsepulchre in this unlocked cemetery or dungeon of the dead, kissing the\ncoffins, laying personal ikons upon the relics in order that they may\nreceive special sanctification, dropping their farthings on the palls,\nlistening to services in remote underground churches, gathering unusual\nimpressions of death, tasting the sweet emotions of religion.\n\nIn the hostelries, where are accommodated upon occasion as many as\n20,000 pilgrims, you may wander at will and see peasant Russia sprawling\non sheepskins and reading holy books, or making tea. You may go into the\nrefectories and see 500 pilgrims sit down together to a free monastery\ndinner of cabbage soup and porridge and kvass, or you may sit with them\nyourself and eat. On this Christmas Eve just past I sat with such a\nparty in the twilight waiting for the first star to come out, the signal\nto make the holy meal of _Sotchelnik_. It was a different Russia from\nKatia\u2019s, this of the 500 uncouth, shaggy-headed men and women at long\ndark tables, waiting in front of huge Russian basins full of soup, as\nthe shades of night came down, and the lamp before the Virgin and Child\ngrew brighter and brighter.\n\nYou tread with gentle steps across the giving snow and enter one of the\nchurches, and find yourself in an irregularly grouped crowd of antique,\nhairy, patriarchal-looking men in sheepskins and birch-bark boots. There\nare no pews or seats, there is no electric light, but there is the gloom\nand effulgence of much gold and of many half-illuminated paintings and\nfrescoes. You stand with peasant Russia on a stone floor in the glimmer\nand shadow of an immense candle-lit temple. You pass through with a\ncandle to the front, to the altar-rail lit by scores of steady silver\nflames, the votive tapers of the pilgrims; you find yourself in the\npresence of a radiant line of calm, attentive, singing faces. This is\nHoly Russia independent of historical association. The music you hear in\nRussian churches robs you of the sense of time. On Christmas Eve in\nRussia you hear the music of the herald-angels, and see at the same\ntime, in the likeness of the listening Russian peasants, the shepherds\nwho heard the angels sing. You veritably escape from \u201cthe world\u201d and\nfrom \u201cto-day,\u201d and are so potently reminded of the beauty and mystery of\nman\u2019s life that you shake off all dull cares and the reproach of failure\nor success, the soil and stain of circumstance, and know that what is\n_you_ is something utterly beautiful before God.\n\nKief has been called many names\u2014the Canterbury of Russia, the Russian\nJerusalem, the Font of Russia\u2014but it may most truly be called the\nRussian Bethlehem, the place where Christ was born in Russia, adored by\nrude shepherds, sought by the noble and the wise.\n\n\n\n\n                                  III\n                          PEREPLOTCHIKOF AGAIN\n\n\n    MOSCOW, _February 1914_.\n\n\nI went to Moscow to see my old friend Vassily Vassilievitch\nPereplotchikof, the painter. He received me in his house in the Sadovia,\nin that mysterious sitting-room of his where scores of his paintings are\nalways standing with their faces to the wall, like very shy young\nmaidens who wait till it is their turn to be shown to society and to\ntheir prospective suitors.\n\nDuring the summer in America which I had tramped, he had been seeking\nimpressions on the barren Arctic island of Nova Zemlia. What a contrast\nin our fields of action! He in the silent snow-swept island; I on the\nluxurious mainland of the New World. Vassily Vassilitch prefers places\nlike Nova Zemlia, where, as it were, candles are burning in corners from\nwhich ikons have been taken away. We exchanged our impressions.\n\nNova Zemlia has only a hundred inhabitants, one steamer calls there in\nthe year. There is only one post. In winter there is three months\ndarkness without light; in summer two months light without darkness. The\nice and snow do not melt away even in July, and the colonists\u2014trappers\nand hunters\u2014live a stark life in opposition to the storm and stress of\nnature. They are dead to the world\u2014the world all dead to them until the\nprow of their one annual steamer comes into view on the ocean in July.\nThe day of its arrival they call their Easter, and they do not hold\nEaster according to the calendar in the dark and terrible spring, but\npostpone their holiday till life is born again with the coming of the\nship. Their resurrection day is when their brother-man comes again to\nthem. In the arriving of the ship they see Jesus walking towards them on\nthe sea.\n\nVassily Vassilitch told me this with a subtle emphasis. I felt rich in\nhaving Vassily Vassilitch as a friend, for I realised he was able to\ntell me sacred things. This evening of our seeing one another again he\nread me many poems which he had written \u201cnot to print, but for his own\npleasure.\u201d All that he says has a deep human interest, a significant\nemphasis and luminous suggestiveness that may be recognised in his\npaintings also.\n\nVassily Vassilitch left Archangel for Nova Zemlia one morning in July.\nThe boat steamed placidly and peacefully out of the vast and enlarged\nDwina into the White Sea, and then out of the White Sea into the cold\nand buffeting Arctic. On board were two Government officials going to\nconsider \u201cColonisation,\u201d an English artillery officer, an astronomer, a\njournalist from Archangel, a monk going to relieve another monk and\nspend the winter on the island, peasant fur-buyers, carpenters, and\nworkmen.\n\nThe monk was one of the most interesting characters, and told how a\nSamoyede once in a storm dug a hole in the snow and lay there three or\nfour days, and slept till it was over. When the blizzard ceased he broke\nout of his white grave and went home. He told how there was once such a\nstorm on Easter Eve that he and the villagers had to crawl to church on\nhands and knees. Coming home they were all blown about half a mile out\nof their course.\n\nFrom the hunting expeditions the islanders nearly always brought home\nyoung bears taken alive, and they fed them and reared them and\neventually sold them into menageries and circuses. The monk had two\nyoung bears one season and they were very much attached to him. They\nfollowed him everywhere and would take food from his hands alone. If by\nany chance he escaped them and got away by himself to do something they\nraised a _scandal_. However, on the return journey to Archangel the monk\nlost one of them. When they were some 250 miles out at sea one of the\nbears broke her fastenings, jumped into the ocean and swam away. And she\nswam all the way back to the harbour and was recaptured by the Samoyedes\nthere. The other bear gave a lot of trouble at Archangel by absolutely\nrefusing to be tended by any one else but the monk who had brought him.\nBut at last the monk exchanged his cassock with some one else, and it\nwas found that the bear at once transferred his obedience, and that he\ncould be managed by any one who wore the monk\u2019s garments. The monk\ntherefore sold the cassock with the bear, and both are now part of the\nstock-in-trade of a circus. In this case the habit did make the monk.\n\nThe boat had an open hatchway, and the captain was for ever crying out:\u2014\n\n\u201cMore careful, people! Don\u2019t fall down the hole. Once the Governor of\nArchangel fell down there; he didn\u2019t get hurt because he fell on a\nchambermaid who was passing. Once an official fell through and broke\ntwelve bottles of various drinks; he didn\u2019t get hurt either, but was\nmuch upset when we gave him the bill for the drinks. Another official\nwas reading a bit of paper and stepped over and fell on some baskets\u2014he\nalso didn\u2019t get hurt; but be careful all the same. And various ordinary\npassengers fell....\u201d\n\nBut, as it happened, some tremendous weather overtook the ship, and not\nmany dare move from their places in the cabins. So the hatchway remained\nopen without misadventure.\n\nIt was touching\u2014Vassily Vassilitch\u2019s account of their coming into view\nof the shore, and the whole population of the little colony standing\nstaring at the ship with greedy eyes, the first visitors to them from\nthe great family of mankind on the rest of the world, their Easter. Poor\nlonely ones! With what thirst they exchanged the first greetings and\nquestions!\n\n\u201cHow have you got on?\u201d\n\n\u201cAny sick?\u201d\n\n\u201cAny dead?\u201d\n\n\u201cHave you shot many bears?\u201d\n\n\u201cHow\u2019s trade?\u201d\n\nThe islanders had suffered very much from scurvy during the year. The\nday before the vessel arrived a man had died of it and Vassily\nVassilitch saw the funeral. It took place about midnight. From one of\nthe huts came the _klak_, _klak_, _klak_, of the nailing up of the\ncoffin. The coffin issued from the little village borne on a dog-drawn\nhearse, then followed the priest in his gilded raiment, the frantic\nwidow, the mourners. \u201cHoly God,\u201d they sang, \u201cHoly Strong One, Holy\nImmortal,\u201d and the dogs all whined and howled. In the bitter shadowy\nnight they bore the corpse away, over grey earth and rags of snow, far\naway to the side of a black tumbling river, and the midnight sunshine\ngleamed on all the snowy mountain peaks, catching the light from the\nhorizon where the sun seemed poised.\n\nVassily Vassilitch showed me a copy he had made of a diary kept by a\nRussian peasant who had died of scurvy. Two Russian peasants settled on\na desolate part of the island to spend the winter and hunt. It was\nsomewhat pathetic that the man doomed to die should have had the idea of\nkeeping a log-book. The story tells much of Russian patience,\nsimplicity, tenderness, pluck. I only quote a few entries from the\ndiary:\u2014\n\n    _November 30._\u2014Bear came to door of hut and began to gnaw the\n    carcase that was there. Snatched my gun, but he saw me and was off\n    and I dare not follow in the dark.\n\n    _December 5._\u2014Daylight was short. Hardly got a shot before it was\n    dark. Eve of the day of my angel. In the evening drank tea. Washed\n    my body at a basin for want of a bath. Changed my linen. Lighted\n    lamp before the ikon.\n\n    _February 1._\u2014Cloudy and windy. Shot some seals. Had great\n    difficulty in bringing them home. We have colds. Northern lights.\n\n    _February 28._\u2014Heavy weather. Both seriously ill. Extraordinary\n    pain. First the toes ache as if frozen, then it goes into the legs,\n    into the knees and muscles. Man must lie down. Over his whole body\n    and arms a rash breaks out.\n\nIn March the scurvy was too much for him; the diary is continued by the\nhand of his mate, who writes on April 16:\u2014\n\n    To-day Kulebakin (the former writer of the diary) was in pain and\n    delirium, but afterwards calmly and peacefully gave back his soul to\n    God. Weather cloudy to clear. No water. Dug the grave. All by myself\n    now. No one to talk to now. It is sad.\n\n    _April 21._\u2014Lighted a candle and burnt incense over Kulebakin, and\n    then carried him to the grave. Bright and sunny day. No water.\n\n    _April 23._\u2014The ice has cleared. Hung a torn shirt on the mountain\n    instead of a flag. I still wait on the chance of some one coming\n    from the settlement. It is very dreary. Pain in the legs. Walk with\n    difficulty. Need to gather strength against illness. Nothing to eat\n    but bread.\n\nAt this point the diary comes entirely to an end, and it might have\nseemed the writer was dead, but a peasant came from the settlement,\nrescued him, and carried him back, and he returned to Russia and\nrecovered. The astonishing thing is he came back again to Nova Zemlia,\nand wintered and hunted, repeating the experiment. A tough fellow!\n\nOne of the sights of Nova Zemlia is the cemetery, with its tumbled and\nbroken crosses. The dead sleep there in the Russian faith even as they\nsleep far away in tropical Turkestan and the pleasant borders of Persia.\nNot only a nation stretching from West to East, these Russians, but\ndiving four or five thousand miles from North to South. How do they\nsupport life in the Far North? They have to have their vodka there.[2]\nThere is a big supply of it on the ship for them. It will not, however,\nbe sold to them till all the business of fur-selling is accomplished and\nthe cargo brought on board, and the ship is ready to steam away. The\nsale of vodka begins only after the second blast of the hooter. The day\nafter the boat leaves the island there is an orgy of drinking, and in a\nshort while all the vodka disappears and there ensue months of enforced\nsobriety.\n\nThe island has a loving and striving priest who wrestles with the people\nfor their souls.\n\nVassily Vassilitch came upon him sobbing. There had been a case of\ncheating on the island.\n\n\u201cI try to make them good men and women,\u201d said the priest; \u201cI pray for\nthem. I pray with them, and yet see how they cheat and drink and forget\nall that they learn!\u201d\n\nVassily Vassilitch went right round the island calling at the various\npoints where there were inhabitants, painting a little, talking to the\npeople. It is a wonderful island, a continuation of the Urals, very rich\nin metals, very mountainous. There were no trees, however, and though\nthere were bright and beautiful flowers and birds and butterflies it was\never bleak and wind-swept. There was not a mosquito or hornfly in the\nisland even in July.\n\nComing home the ship passed through a field of icebergs. Vassily\nVassilitch for the first time in his life saw a mirage. It gave him the\nidea that all that he had seen on the island was really a mirage, a\ndream, an insubstantial pageant; that life itself was such.\n\nWhen he heard the last of the growling and snapping of the twelve or\nfifteen bears tied up on deck and stepped off on to the pier and sat\nonce more in an Archangel _droshky_, clattering over the cobbles of the\nmuddy town, he felt indeed that all that he had seen and heard was\nsomething folded and hidden away in the everyday, a wonderful,\nfantastic, even absurd and improbable dream.\n\n\u201cSome time, perhaps, after we die and awake elsewhere, we shall look\nback on life and say the same of it,\u201d said he.\n\nFootnote 2:\n\n  Before the vodka prohibition. How they get on now it would be\n  difficult to say.\n\n\n\n\n                                   IV\n                             AT THE THEATRE\n\n\n    MOSCOW, _March 1914_.\n\n\nAt Moscow, at one of the meetings of the Religious and Philosophical\nSociety, I met Namirovitch Danchenko, the manager of the Theatre of Art,\nand he invited me to see five or six pieces of the repertory. This gave\nme great pleasure and interest.\n\nAn interesting figure in the stalls of the theatre on the first night I\nwas there was Maxim Gorky, who had unexpectedly returned after eight\nyears\u2019 involuntary exile, and now was looking at the theatrical\npresentation of Dostoieffsky\u2019s novel, _The Possessed_, against which he\nhad been writing from abroad in such a way as to provoke all literate\nRussia to discussion. His hair cut short, his black blouse put aside for\nEuropean jacket and waistcoat and collar, the tramp-author looked\nsomewhat shorn of the mystery of his personality. As he tripped quickly\npast me, in one of the _entr\u2019actes_, in his light evening boots it was\neasy to think he used to be a more real character in _sapogi_. For the\nrest, he did not look in bad health, was even a little flushed with\ncolour. But his face was nervous, self-conscious. I should say it is not\nby any means the old Gorky that has returned.\n\nThere was considerable excitement in the theatre amongst those who knew\nof the novelist\u2019s presence, Moscow being crazy to welcome Gorky with\nbanquets and speeches and newspaper headlines, but being unable to do\nso, because Gorky\u2019s health will not stand excitement, and because he can\nremain happily in Russia only on condition that he keeps quiet.\n\nI was sitting next to M. Lakiardopulo, the secretary of the theatre.\n\u201cYou know how he has been slating us,\u201d whispered he to me. \u201cThere was a\ntime when on such an occasion Gorky would have stood up in his seat and\naddressed the house, saying, \u2018Why do you come to see such a thing? It is\nno good; it is reactionary, and only helps to put back the progress of\nRussia.\u2019 But he is afraid to do it now. He is not sure of the Russia to\nwhich he has returned.\u201d\n\nAround Gorky and the spirit of Dostoieffsky rage for the time being all\nthe questions of the hour in Russia\u2014Apollo _versus_ Dionysus, Progress\nand Westernism _versus_ Life understood as a religious orgy; Materialism\n_versus_ Mysticism. How weak is the power of the West may be seen in the\nguise of its champion\u2014Gorky with his foot in his grave, Gorky, whose\nwonderful literary gift Italy and Greece have withered.\n\nBut Gorky, frustrate as he seems, has effectually raised the question\nand set Russia thinking and differentiating.\n\n    I have a strange, strange feeling about Moscow (says he), a mournful\n    feeling.... Were the Moscow streets and the Moscow people like this\n    before, or do I only remark it now because I have seen what it is\n    like in the West? There, in Italy, amidst the brilliance and\n    magnificence of Nature, in the magnificent chaos of cities buzzing\n    with automobiles, humming with factories, you feel at least that Man\n    is not losing himself; you feel he is the master, the centre. His\n    voice is full-sounding, it is ever in one\u2019s ears, the voice of one\n    who is master of earth and master of his life. But in Moscow! On the\n    streets I feel the people are all voiceless. The pavements are\n    populous, lively, noisy; there are people of all kinds going to and\n    fro, but the actual human voice of mankind seems to be utterly\n    silent. The people are all gloomy, melancholy, above all, angry. The\n    women have widows\u2019 faces.... Is it possible it was like this when I\n    was here before?\n\nGorky, despite his experience in what may be called the absolute\nWest\u2014America[3]\u2014has come back enchanted with the West. The idea accepted\nin the revolutionary days that the West was good, the West was Russia\u2019s\nbright destiny providentially lighted before her for her to follow, has\ndied out almost unremarked. Gorky alone, all these eight years, has\nnursed it, and he has been writing stories and dramas which fall flatter\nand flatter on the ears of Russia. The Theatre of Art alone has refused\nin turn each of his last eight plays! No wonder the faces seem to him\npreoccupied.\n\nHe cannot understand why the Theatre of Art, in its working out of a new\nlife for the theatre in general, should take _The Brothers Karamazof_\nand _Besi_ (_The Possessed_). Were there not new writers who would\nbreathe the new ideals and new hopes of Russia into the work of the\nstage? Dostoieffsky was a genius, but in Gorky\u2019s opinion an evil\ngenius\u2014the evil genius\u2014the evil genius of Russia which Russia must\novercome, an abscess on the Russian body. Dostoieffsky was profoundly\nnational, yes, but he expressed the Asiatic side of the Russian. \u201cIf\nRussians give themselves up to Dostoieffsky they will become like\nChina,\u201d said he. \u201cIn each of us sits a Dostoieffsky\u2014we have to overcome\nhim.\u201d\n\nWell, the great fact of this month is that Gorky\u2019s protest has had the\nfullest publicity, and has been discussed at many hundred public\nmeetings and in numberless newspaper articles, and yet the great mass of\nthe people have supported the Theatre of Art and Dostoieffsky\u2014even\nalthough the performance of _The Possessed_ is but a poor experiment.\n\nThe difference between Eastern and Western literature may be aptly\ncontrasted. I read last summer in the letter of an American to an\nEnglish publisher something of this kind:\u2014\n\n    Mr. So-and-So\u2019s novel may be a success with you, but we shan\u2019t be\n    able to do much with it over here as it ends on a note of failure;\n    the reader must be quite sure that the hero and heroine, whatever\n    troubles they may have at the beginning, are going to win through in\n    the end. Anything that ends on a curse or a suicide or hysteria is\n    almost sure to fall commercially dead over here.\n\nNow the Russian considers failure and despair and cursing and suicide as\na glory, and success to be a reproach\u2014the likely destiny of Jews or\nearth-swallowers. America and the West prize the whole, the sound, the\nsubstantial banking account, the ideal marriage, domestic bliss, correct\ncollars and ties, creases where they should be on the right sort of\nattire, that glamour of materialism which Mr. Bennett so satisfactorily\nrenders in his descriptions of hotel apartments and the clothes of the\nsoulless. But Russia, even Gorky in his best days, prizes the barefooted\ntramp, the consumptive and disease-stricken, the imbecile, the\nimprovident, the man who has no sense of the value of money, the\npoverty-stricken student of Chekhof\u2019s _Cherry Garden_ who can refuse\nmoney, saying, \u201cOffer me two hundred thousand, I wouldn\u2019t take it. I am\na free man. And none of all that you value so highly is any use to me. I\ncan do without it on the way to higher truth.\u201d\n\nThe grandeur of the West, Gorky\u2019s \u201cmagnificent chaos of cities buzzing\nwith automobiles and humming with factories\u201d only prevent, _tolko\nmeshait_, as Russians say so constantly. Man\u2019s voice is loud because he\nhas to overcry noisy machines; it is loud also because, like a child, he\nis wildly excited over his toys. It is unjustifiably loud.\n\nBut Gorky, like a fond savage, would give up broad lands and a fair\nbirthright for coloured beads and toys.\n\nRound about _Besi_ rages also the question of the future of the theatre.\nMoscow is likely to become the literary capital of Europe; it is already\nthe theatrical capital. Whatever it is working out is likely in time to\naffect the whole stage of Europe.\n\nAlmost every one in Russian literature has contributed something towards\nthe question of the new development of the theatre. Strange to say, it\nis a question of the theatre and the producer, not a question of the\ndramatist. That is a starting-point.\n\nThe two fundamental ideas which are in contrast are again that of East\n_versus_ West, Materialism _versus_ Mysticism. One party derives the\ntheatre from the puppet-show and the elaborated Punch and Judy show,\nsuggests a theatre of dolls or types, and above all things heralds \u201cthe\nglorious cinema\u201d as the womb of the theatre-to-be\u2014that is the Western\nnotion of the theatre, a show to arrest passers-by, divert them and coax\ncoppers from them. The other party derives the theatre from the ancient\nmystery, and requires that in the theatre of the future the audience\nshall collaborate with those on the stage, the foot-lights shall be\ndisenchanted, there shall be mystical dancing and singing and horror and\nexaltation\u2014this is the Eastern notion.\n\nThe latter seems at first glance far removed from possible realisation\nin the present, a dream of the impractical even romantic and absurd. But\nwhen we remember that church and theatre were once one and the same, all\nplays being holy, and that our Mass or Communion Service was in a sense\na survival of the Holy Mystery wherein not only the actors, _i.e._ the\npriests and those who serve at the altar, took part but also the people\nthemselves, then it is seen to be not quite so remote.\n\nThe Shaw plays are remarkable examples of the developed Punch and Judy\nshow, where various bizarre dolls with funny faces reel off amusing\nspeeches, all of which are just audibly prompted by the man who holds\nthe strings. He tries to create the illusion that the dolls are flesh\nand blood\u2014for that reason he sometimes will have even a\ndoll-representation of himself on the stage, as in the case of Mr.\nTanner in _Man and Superman_. And if we are deceived for a moment or an\nhour and the illusion succeeds and we discuss the acts of Punch and\nJudy, and Judy\u2019s mother, and the Counsel for the Prosecution, and Toby,\nand the Judge, as if they were real people, yet when we get home we\nreflect after all it was all Shaw\u2014\u201cawfully clever, very funny, but it\nwas the man behind the red curtain talking all the while; we must tell\nso-and-so they ought to go.\u201d\n\nThe Ibsen play is more or less a game of chess; again observe the\nskilful moving of puppets on a board. His drama is specialised\nintellectually. It is interesting to keen minds, but not diverting, not\nso elementary as Shaw. _Peer Gynt_, however, is a mystery play, or could\nbe taken as such; there are parts in it not only for the prime actors\nbut for everybody in the theatre. The sad fact is that the theatre\naudiences are heavy. They are not quite so heavy in Russia as in\nEngland, for no one here considers his dinner as of any importance\nbeside being at the theatre; and indeed if you are not punctual at the\nTheatre of Art you find the doors are closed and you cannot get in. But\nall the same the people are heavy, clinging to their seats as if in them\nthey had found refuge. The moderns are not the Greeks. The minds and\nsouls of the modern Russians are at the disposal of the Hierophant of\nthe Mystery, but the bodies are more enslaved by gravity than lead. So,\nin the near future at least, there can be no active collaboration\nbetween audience and actors, no real disenchantment of that line of\nlamps separating the stage from the world. Perhaps in time choruses will\nbe devised for audiences\u2014even now in English music-halls where the\npeople sing the choruses of the popular songs there is a witness of the\npossibility of the realisation of such an idea. Perhaps in time a part\nof the public may take part in dances or may march with banners and\nemblems, or opportunity may be given to public characters of the day to\nmake their exits and their entrances, and make speeches not to be found\nin the books of words. But all this belongs to the thrice-interesting\nfuture, not to the tantalising present moment.\n\nAll that the theatre is doing now is to put the dramatist in his place\nand give scope to the producer and the Master of Ceremonies. The Theatre\nof Art, the Moscow Free Theatre, and in London, as a beginning,\nGranville Barker\u2019s theatre, are all working for a new, large, vital\nstage. In a sense it is futuristic work, for it takes no inspiration\nfrom the past, unless from ancient Greece. It regards all the work of\nthe last few thousand years as makeshift. It will work out something\nworthy of Man, something noble and enduring. Then again Man will have a\nvoice, and not that gay, confident, business cry to which Gorky has\nfondly given his ear. And that brings me back to _Besi_ (_The\nPossessed_), at which I was sitting with Gorky in front of me and the\ngenial secretary at my side.\n\n_Besi_, or, as it is entitled in the programme, _Nikolai Stavrogin_, is\nan example of the present work of the Theatre of Art. The theatre that\nwill produce _Pickwick Papers_ as a play and can set one of its own\nstaff to work out the libretto is not in need of dramatists at present.\n_Nikolai Stavrogin_ was arranged by Namirovitch Danchenko, and it is a\npresentment in some fifteen or twenty scenes of the vital portions of\nDostoieffsky\u2019s novel. It assumes that the public has read the book and\nknows it well, and so, subtly, makes the person sitting in his seat\ncollaborate, by supplying in his mind the missing links. The performance\ncommences at 8 P.M. and finishes about 12.30. All the while you are\nconsidering failure\u2014death to all Americans.\n\nIn the first scene, a very beautiful one, with little village church and\nworshippers and beggars and lackeys, the bells are set a-ringing and you\nopen the doors of the temple of your soul and admit the whole Russian\nworld of the suffering. The stage becomes the forecourt of your heart,\nand the many people in the mystery commune with your sympathies. It must\nbe said that from an English, even from a Celtic point of view, the\nstory is rather desperate, somewhat unredeemed; the dream-picture that\nyou see is rather the nightmare of some one who is too conscious of\nbeing ill himself\u2014the epileptic Dostoieffsky. Dostoieffsky\u2019s physical\nills and personal down-heartedness are interesting in his biography, but\nblemishes in his artistic work. All those long novels were written as\nalmost everlasting _feuilletons_, scribbled often while the printer\u2019s\ndevil was waiting, or writhed into black and white in the still hours of\nlonely poverty and feebleness, in dreary midnight hours in Petrograd. In\norder to understand them truly you need Dostoieffsky himself somewhere\non the stage, or in the heart.\n\nFootnote 3:\n\n  Gorky went to America to raise money to help the Revolutionary Party\n  in Russia, but was hounded out of the country as an immoral man. The\n  newspapers started a campaign against his private life, and despite\n  American sympathy for the cause of \u201cliberty\u201d he was forced to leave\n  the country. No hotel would take him in.\n\n\n\n\n                                   V\n                      THE MOVEMENTS OF THE PEOPLES\n\n\n    MOSCOW, _March 1914_.\n\n\nDuring the summer, in which I lived in a cottage in the Urals, there\npassed my window an endless procession of weary tramps, not in flocks or\ncrowds, in hundreds or in fifties, but in twos and threes day by day. I\nsaw them on the highway stamping their weak boots and bruised feet in\nthe deep August dust, trudging forward patiently, patiently. They would\ncome to the door, untie the black kettle that dangled from the pack on\ntheir shoulders, beg water to make tea, sit down to munch our\npeasant-wife\u2019s pastry, resting their ragged elbows on the unvarnished\ntable, holding a saucerful of hot tea in both hands, and sucking at it\nand breathing over it in manifest appreciation and satisfaction.\n\nI would ask one of them, \u201cWhat are you, brother, a pilgrim?\u201d\n\n\u201cNo, brother, we seek land,\u201d he would answer. \u201cWhere we live it is too\nclose\u2014we live too near together; we are going to Siberia to get land.\u201d\n\n\u201cAnd where do you come from?\u201d\n\n\u201cFrom Tambovsky Government, from Penzensky, from Nizhegorodsky,\u201d they\nwould answer. From all the more crowded parts of Central Russia. They\nwere _perecelentsi_, migratory Russians, children of the womb of\nnations, the race ever pushing out from the centre, extending Russia to\nthe East and the South and the North.\n\nWherever you go to-day you find on the confines of the Empire, and\nindeed beyond the confines, the wandering poverty-stricken\nemigrant-tramp; in Siberia, in Russian Turkestan, in Mongolia, Persia,\nTurkey. Anon he grows tired, or he finds his happy valley and settles\ndown, forming the nucleus of a new Russian colony, or adding to the\nstrength of one already existent. After him comes the Russian army,\nclaiming interests, and the Russian flag, claiming sovereignty or giving\nprotection; but it must always be remembered that the movement is first\nof all natural, it is not merely aggressively imperial. It is not even\nencouraged by the Government; thousands of the tramps die of privation\nevery year; thousands get thrown into prison for being, as is often the\ncase, _bez-passportny_ (without passports); the people they meet on the\nway call them fools going from bad conditions to perhaps worse\u2014but the\ntramps go on. They say they seek a better land, but God alone knows what\nthey really seek, what they imagine they may see at the next turning of\nthe long long road.\n\nIf you stay at Chelyabinsk, the eastern gate of Russia, you may see\nthousands of these wanderers. And it is interesting to compare their\ntype with those whom you see at Libava, the western gate of Russia.\n\nThrough Libava pass the greater number of those who are going to\nAmerica. Every ten days the Russo-Asiatsky Lloyd embarks a thousand or\ntwo thousand emigrants, every week vessels sail for London and Hull\ncarrying Russians who have booked by the Cunard and the White Star and\nother lines. From Russia there pass over to America more colonists than\nfrom any other country in the world\u2014upwards of 275,000 people every\nyear. A great number of these are Jews and Poles and Lithuanians. For\nmany years the number of actual Russians had been few; but in 1913 there\nwere of Russians alone more than of any other nationality in the world.\nThey are richer Russians these. They have money to show to the\ninspectors at Ellis Island; they have trunks full of clothes. They could\nnot carry their burdens on their shoulders; they have come to the port\nin trains. They are not melancholy and dusty and bearded like the\ntramps, but bright-eyed, well dressed, so as to pass muster at the\ninspection. They are making a bold bid for new life; they have had the\ncourage to pay for the new life with all the old; to take a jump in the\ndark, and trust God. They do not belong eternally to the road; and they\nare not carrying the cross on their backs, as are those melancholy\ntramps of Siberia.\n\nThe Siberian emigrants stop at many factories and mines and do a few\ndays\u2019 work, and are perchance shot down like dogs, at a place like the\nLena gold-washings, or they settle in a fever-stricken swamp and are\nswept away by pestilence. But for the most part they come to no harm,\ndying eventually of old age, full of memories, poverty-stricken all\ntheir lives, and yet in a spiritual sense rich, confessing always that\nthey were strangers, seeking something better than that they were\nleaving behind.\n\nBut they who go out at the western gate take their chance of strange\ndestiny. They are cast off from Russia and from that understanding of\nlife that Russia breathes. They go to be the most unfortunate class in\nAmerica, the simplest and therefore the most exploited; they go to do\nwork fitted better to black slaves; their young women, though they do\nnot know it, are often already sold into infamy whilst they breathe the\n\u201cair of freedom\u201d on the steamer; and often the men, contracted in gangs\nto the Argentine and Brazil to work on railways and plantations, are\nsimply living merchandise for which the labour agent who engages them\nreceives a substantial premium. They go to work as Russians never worked\nbefore, and to receive double the wages they would get in Russia, and\nthen to realise that money buys little or no extra happiness. Or they go\nto settle on the land and form a Russian community, as the Dukhobors\nhave done in Canada, the Molokans in California, the Adventists in the\nDakotas and in the backwoods of America, to forget that they are not in\nRussia, to be as much in debt to the agricultural machine manufacturers\nas they were in arrears in the payment of rent and taxes in the old\ncountry, to perish of starvation in lean years, to be persecuted by\neducational and sanitary officials, and to be spurred on once more to\nseek a happier country. Others are destined to enter the choir-dance of\nthe races with Jew and German and English and Irish, marrying the\nforeigner and merging the European in the new type\u2014the coming American.\n\nAt Odessa, the southern gate of Russia, the pilgrims are embarking for\nMount Athos and Palestine a thousand at a time, an unexpected delivery\nof bowed and aged men and women out of the depths of Russia. There you\nmay see another of the continual movements of the people of Russia, an\nastonishing procession this to those who are absorbed in the commercial\nlife of Russia, to those Jews and exiled Russians who write to the\nEnglish papers that the outward signs of Russian religion are \u201cthe\nmummery of the Holy Synod.\u201d At Odessa, and indeed on all the roads of\nRussia, there are many thousands of pious Russians, pack on back, staff\nin hand, on their way to the monasteries and holy places, to the\nsepulchre, to Kief, to the Hermitage of Father Seraphim, to New Athos,\nto many a little wayside shrine and monastery that only has its ten\npilgrims where the great ones have their hundreds and their housefuls.\n\nIt has been said that with an Englishman the conversation always, sooner\nor later, turns to sport, with a Frenchman to woman, and with a Russian\nto the subject of Russia.\n\nThis is true of the educated classes of society; but the peasants do not\ntalk of these things so much\u2014the peasants\u2019 talk nearly always turns to\nGod and religion. The Russians are always _en route_ for some place\nwhere they may find out something about God, and if there is a\nparticularly animated conversation in the hostelry of a monastery, a\nthird-class carriage, or a tea-shop or Russian public-house (_traktir_),\nit is almost always sure to be about religion.\n\nThe modern evangelical movement may almost be said to have had its birth\nin the famous but filthy public house, \u201cYama,\u201d where originally over\nvodka and beer, and later more commonly over tea, the question of\nsalvation was continually mooted. In the third-class carriage you will\noccasionally come across an old man who reads an antique Bible through\niron-rimmed spectacles. He has heard that a new sect has been formed by\nsome peasants in some remote village, and is off to discover \u201cwhether\nthey have found anything.\u201d\n\nThen what of those who march in chains from prison to prison on the\nroad? Often I have stopped my writing on a bright summer morning to\nlisten to an appalling sound\u2014the clank, clank, clank of fifty or sixty\nmen in fetters\u2014and I have looked out at a procession of unfortunate\nRussians, dust from head to foot, the sun flashing on the bright steel\nlinks on their legs and their bodies. They also belonged to the road.\nThey move us to the depths of sorrow or to hoarse anarchy; but they are\nof the road. Their vague shuffled footmarks are the writing of the\nfinger in the dust. They are symbolical. We also walk as they. Listen\nwith \u201cthe third ear,\u201d and you will hear the clangour of our chains as we\ntramp\u2014\n\n                               having unearthly souls,\n                   Yet fettered and forged to the earth!\n\nThe world is like a theatre, is it not? The theatre should reflect the\nworld and touch man to a remembrance of his mystery. He comes into it to\nbe stirred by pity and fear, not simply to be amused between dinner and\nsleep. He comes into it as to a Communion Service, not merely to\nreceive, but to partake. Such a theatre is the world, with its marches\nand processions, its lively and its heavy measures, its sacrifices, its\nwords of ancient wisdom from the lips of priests, words of prophecy from\noracles, the joyful choruses and jubilations, its sympathies and\nchoruses of sadness, its ramified manifold movements and\ncounter-movements. Most moving of all is the procession to the altar and\nthe songs we sing carrying our emblems.\n\n\u201cHaving been at home in many realms of the spirit,\u201d it is good to\nrealise this theatre in the heart. Having a personal knowledge of the\nroad to Jerusalem and to America, and of the pilgrims and tramps on the\nvarious roads of Russia, having even been marched six days along the\nroad under arrest on one occasion, it is good to realise all that is\nhappening at one and the same time in Russia\u2014the flocking to Jerusalem\nand to America, the trickling into Siberia and Mongolia and Turkestan\nand Persia, the tramping to the monasteries to find God, the tramping to\ncities and factories to get work, the third-class carriages of the\ntrains crammed with people, the uproarious taverns where is all manner\nof exchange of rude ideas, the beautiful churches alight with candles\nand paintings, the little theatres and cinema shows as crammed as the\nchurches, the bazaars and fairs, the prisons, the poor prisoners on the\nroad clanking their chains.\n\nEvery common sight is charged with significance. This is the source of\nthe Russian spirit and the genius of Russian literature and fine art.\nThus, for instance, when you mention \u201csmoke\u201d to a Westerner he at once\nthinks of factory smoke and that which pains the eyes or darkens heaven.\nBut to the Russian smoke is always\n\n                 That which comes forth out of the censer,\n\nthe smoke of the sacrifice, the smoke of our lives\u2014the sighs and regrets\nand fears and aspirations of men and women, our crooked smokes, which,\nin the language of Shakespeare, mount upwards to the gods.\n\nIn such an atmosphere Russians can forget personal anger when looking at\nthe chains on their convicts, and they can see in those chains emblems\nof human destiny. There is in Russia a whole beautiful sad literature\nabout chains and fetters. Hermits and holy men have even taken to\nwearing chains voluntarily as one of their rites of world-negation.\nDostoieffsky could find Siberia, after personal experience, to be the\nsupreme place for the understanding of the world.\n\nWe are encompassed about by mystery. Every common sight is a rune, a\nletter of the Divine alphabet written upon all earthly things. Man\u2019s\nheart is a temple with many altars, and it is dark to start with, and\nstrange. But it is possible with every ordinary impression of life to\nlight a candle in that church till it is ablaze with lights like the\nsky. That is the functions of ordinary sights\u2014to be candles.\n\nSo the night of ignorance is lit up with countless stars. It is not less\nnight but more, more beautiful\u2014\n\n             There\u2019s not the smallest orb which thou behold\u2019st\n             But in his motion like an angel sings.\n\nAt those places on the road where springs gush from the rocks the\npeasants have chalked the face of Jesus, so that the water seems to pour\nfrom His mouth. At these springs stop the pilgrims, the emigrants, the\nwayfarers, even the poor prisoners and their guards. That is one of the\nvisions of Holy Russia.\n\n\n\n\n                                   VI\n                       LET US GO INTO THE TAVERN\n\n\n    MOSCOW, _March 1914_.\n\n\nIn a sense the tavern is also a theatre or a church. It is a place of\nlife.\n\n\u201cI am glad you\u2019ve come,\u201d said a friend to me. \u201cKeep your ears open; this\nis the very bottom; everything springs from here. This is the\nchanging-house of the ideas of the common people.\u201d\n\nThere is no \u201cbar,\u201d in the English sense. On the long wooden counter are\nbottles and glasses, and plates of sausage and ham. But you do not\nlounge there and gossip over your glass. The Russian public-house is all\ntables and chairs, like the accommodation for a smoking concert. But\nsuch dirty chairs and tables!\n\nYou sit down; you are attended by a waiter. There is an army of waiters\nserving for 30s. a month and no tips. They are in white blouses, white\ntrousers, and white aprons, and they look as if they had strayed into\nthe filthy hall in their night attire. On one wall is a square\ncandle-lantern with the word TRAKTIR printed on it in decayed brown; on\nanother wall is an immense gilt ikon. The doors creak heavily to and\nfro, admitting customers unreadily\u2014how unlike the little swing doors of\nthe American saloons, so easy to open that you may slip in as it were by\naccident. At almost all the tables are working-men and women drinking\ntea, vodka, or beer, talking loudly.[4] There are many cabmen in their\nround fur hats and voluminous blue cloaks; many market-women in their\ncottons, with soiled coloured kerchiefs on their heads. You see twenty\npeople drinking tea to one drinking vodka\u2014they pour the tea into the\nsaucers, hold the saucers to their hairy mouths, and guzzle at the\ngratifying golden drink. But if you look about you will notice\nvodka-drinkers, some asleep, with their unkempt heads on the table\n(looking like tramps asleep in a free library); you see also men with\nred cheeks and fiery eyes not yet overcome by liquor, but ready to bawl\nand make a scandal at the least provocation. The atmosphere is heavy\nwith the smoke of the vilest tobacco in the world (_makhorka_). A blind\nmusician is playing the concertina, several people are singing, hawkers\nwith pies, with Bibles, with shirts, with pencils, with old clothes, are\ngoing from table to table offering their wares. There is tremendous\nbargaining and long-drawn-out haggling on the part of people who, it\nwould seem, do not really intend to buy, even at the last. There are\nbeggars, cripples, blind men, dwarfs, asking for alms in the name of\nChrist. There are drunken hooligans trying to get drinks for nothing.\nThere are antediluvian pilgrims hundreds of miles from home, not going\nto a shrine, but collecting coppers throughout all Russia for the\nbuilding of a new church in their far-away native villages. You may even\nsee upon occasion a peasant carrying a great church bell. You ask him\nwhy. He tells you the church of his village was by the will of God\ndestroyed by a fire, and that only the bell remains, and he is\ncollecting alms to build a new church and hang up the bell again.\n\nThroughout the whole tavern all day and almost all night is a clamour of\ntalking and an animated scene of gesticulating, unwashed, ragged men and\nwomen. Almost all the small business of hawkers, stall-keepers, and\nlittle traders is accomplished over vodka or tea in the _traktir_, but\nindeed the successful, even the millionaire, peasant merchant will step\nwithout a ruffle of dignity into the most miserable tavern of the city,\nand not be too proud to answer the taunts or questions of ragamuffins.\nThat is part of Russia\u2019s strength.\n\nThen, the home is not all-absorbing in Russia, and even the poorest\npeople like to spend the whole evening in the tavern drinking tea,\ntalking, talking, talking. No one would reproach a Russian for lingering\nthus away from his wife and little ones. Not much money is spent, man\nfor man. In three or four hours it often happens that a man spends no\nmore than five copecks (a penny farthing), and has only purchased a\nlittle teapot of tea and a big teapot of hot water, the tavern\u2019s\nsubstitute for the samovar.\n\n                  *       *       *       *       *\n\nKuprin tells the tale of a tavern in Odessa famous for one of its ragged\nmusicians, Sasha. He filled the public-house with the strains of the\nviolin, and every night the place was packed with men and women. Every\ntable was occupied, there was tea or beer or vodka everywhere, all the\nmen were smoking _makhorka_, the windows were all shut, and the air was\nof that warm, dense, suffocating character that the Russian people like.\nA din as of Babel pervaded the hall, and no one except those near the\nmusic could hear Sasha\u2019s tunes, yet every one felt that they were\nhearing.\n\nSasha would come in in the early hours of the evening, when people were\nfew, would take his first mug of beer and then begin to play,\nmournfully, melancholily. His were sad, heart-aching tunes, full, as it\nwere, of a world\u2019s sorrow. He sat in his accustomed place and brooded\nover his violin, seemingly uninterested in everything but the soul of\nmusic.\n\nThe windows of the tavern were crusted with ice or clouded with steam,\nand the shadows of men and women passed incessantly, some lingering,\nsome hurrying. But Sasha did not heed them, nor notice how many came in\nat the dark and dirty doorway from the street. Only when there got to be\na crowd he began to put aside his own repertory of songs, and take up\nthose that were suggested by the customers, that were shouted in his\near\u2014\n\n\u201cSasha, play _Maroosia_.\u201d\n\n\u201cSasha, play _The Nightingale_, play _Spring has passed by_.\u201d\n\nThen, till the small hours of the morning, he would play what people\nwanted him to\u2014sad songs, gay songs, marches, dances, country\nmeasures\u2014dances, dances, dances, every dance in Russia he played, and\nthe tables were crushed back and a space made and the people danced.\n\nEvery night, every week, every month Sasha was there, and the crowd and\nthe music and the air thick with _makhorka_ smoke. Not that the nights\nwere always the same. Events in the town, in Russia, had their echoes\nthere. In the time of the South African War Sasha played twenty times a\nnight the _March of the Boers_. During the festivities of the\nFranco-Russian Alliance he played the _Marseillaise_, which was\nfearfully popular with the dock-labourers. When the Japanese War broke\nout he played all those sad tunes about far Manchuria and fighting in a\nstrange land.\n\nAlas, the Japanese War made a great change in the tavern. Sasha was\ntaken for a soldier and disappeared from ken. For a year and a half no\nword was heard from him or of him. He was given up for dead, and the\ntavern lost its old attraction. At last, however, one night in came\nSasha, the same as ever, unhurt, untouched. He had been captured by the\nJapanese and held a year as a prisoner at Nagasaki. He had learned\nJapanese music. Not that anybody wanted it.\n\n\u201cPlay us the old tunes, Sasha; play _Maroosia_, play _To Odessa we\nsailed on the sea_.\u201d Sasha played that night all the old tunes.\n\nThe tavern became as of old.\n\nBut there was storm in the air. Every one was talking of revolution.\nSasha began to play the _Marseillaise_ again, and now with a different\nnote from that in which he had played when friendship with France was\nbeing honoured. In came the police and stopped him. They forbade the\nplaying of any Anthems whatsoever.\n\nThere was a _pogrom_ in the town; hired ruffians appeared in the streets\ninciting the population to the murder of the Jews. Not once or twice\nSasha himself was taken for a Jew and attacked.\n\nInto the tavern came the same ruffians, and tried to stir up the\ndrunkards to pillage and violence. Sasha was playing a tune of his own\nfancy when suddenly one of them, a converted Jew, jumped up and cried:\n\n\u201cThe National Anthem! Brothers, the National Anthem in honour of our\nadored monarch. The National Anthem!\u201d\n\n\u201cAnthem, Anthem,\u201d cried his mates.\n\n\u201cNo Anthems whatsoever,\u201d said Sasha, repeating the words of the\npolice-officer.\n\n\u201cWhat do you mean, you don\u2019t obey, you filthy Jew?\u201d answered the man.\n\n\u201cAnd you?\u201d said Sasha.\n\n\u201cI? What do you mean?\u201d\n\n\u201cI\u2019m a filthy Jew. All right, what are you?\u201d\n\n\u201cI\u2019m Orthodox.\u201d\n\n\u201cOrthodox! And for how much?\u201d\n\nThe whole tavern laughed.\n\n\u201cBrothers,\u201d said the ruffian, \u201cshall we stand the blasphemy of this Jew\nagainst Throne and Church any longer?...\u201d\n\nThere was a rush at Sasha. But he jumped up, and lifting his fiddle in a\nrage, smashed it on the head of the first who came up to him.\n\nSo Sasha was arrested as a revolutionary, and once more he disappeared.\nThis time every one thought he had gone for ever. It would have seemed\nproper to wear mourning for him. The tavern changed in atmosphere. In\nSasha\u2019s place came another musician, one of those who had sat and\nlistened to him in the old days and learned of him. One night, however,\nwhen they were playing the old tunes and the violin was gently crooning\nthe song _Expectancy_, a voice from somewhere cried out nervously:\n\n\u201cBrothers, Sasha!\u201d\n\nAll turned, and there stood the twice-raised Sasha, bearded, gaunt, and\npallid. The people flocked around him and cried to him and called on him\nto play. But the same nervous, frightened voice cried out again:\u2014\n\n\u201cHis arm!\u201d\n\nAll grew silent. Sasha\u2019s left arm hung broken and twisted and nerveless\nfrom his shoulder.\n\n\u201cWhat is it, brother?\u201d asked one.\n\n\u201cMuscle dried up, that\u2019s all,\u201d he answered.\n\n\u201cSo\u2014o.\u201d\n\n\u201cThen that\u2019s an end to _Chaban_,\u201d said one of the crowd, referring to\none of the most popular dances that Sasha played.\n\nBut Sasha took out of his pocket with his right hand a queer black\nwooden instrument which he had either made in prison or had had given to\nhim, and he put it to his lips and began to play.\n\nThen every one began to dance, and Sasha sat in his place, and all was\nas before. As Kuprin says at the conclusion of his tale, \u201cMan is for\nLife, but Art is For Ever.\u201d[5]\n\n                  *       *       *       *       *\n\nSuch is the orgy unrehearsed. So a tavern can be a popular theatre. It\ncan also be a church, a place of searching after God. In England you sit\ndown in church but stand in the public-house; in Russia you stand in the\nchurch but sit in the tavern; it humanises it, makes it more like a\nhome, makes it possible for the tavern to be upon occasion a kind of\nchurch.\n\nIt is a great national assembly-place.\n\nIn Russia you are not allowed to hold a public meeting without the\nspecial authorisation of the police and the presence of a\npolice-officer. But in the tavern is a great informal accidental\nmeeting; and a great deal is enacted there that the police have no power\nto stop. Thus, for instance, in recent years several sects have used the\ntavern as the place for their prayer meetings, and have had something\nequivalent to a Salvation Army gathering, not \u201cround the corner,\u201d but\nactually inside the public-house itself. The religious conspirators have\ncome as it were accidentally, one by one, have ordered their tea, and\nhave started an animated conversation into which, sooner or later, the\nwhole houseful was drawn.\n\nThe most famous public-house in Moscow is the \u201c_Yama_\u201d (The Pit), in the\nstreet called Rozhdestvensky, a public-house which Tolstoy much wanted\nto visit, a tavern frequented not only by the common people but by\nscholars and seekers, especially by those who style themselves\n_Bogoiskateli_, seekers after God. Here appeared at times such\nwell-known Russians as Solovyov, Bulgakof, Chertkof, Velikanof\u2014it was\nthe last who asked me to the \u201c_Yama_,\u201d and through whom I was able to\nhear a multifarious collection of the common people discuss religion and\nRussia and ghosts and the eternal questions.\n\nFrom the \u201c_Yama_\u201d have sprung several interesting sects, for example,\nthe _Bezsmertniki_, or deathless ones. Their doctrines, promulgated by a\nwretched consumptive who had both feet in the grave, was that it was\npossible to escape death. He held that health was faith in life, and\nthat disease was faith in death. Death came simply from lack of faith.\nThere were people living eternally but we did not know where to find\nthem. The _Bezsmertniki_ make pilgrimages to the East to seek those who\nhave been living for ages. Alas! the founder died before the eyes of his\nfollowers. \u201cHe lacked faith,\u201d said they, and the new religion continued.\nOne of the most ardent of them is a frequent visitor of the \u201c_Yama_,\u201d\nAlexey Yegorovitch, a stocking-hawker.\n\nSo much trouble came from the discussions in the \u201c_Yama_\u201d that the\npublic-house was closed by the Government. But as in the case of Sasha,\nso in the case of the \u201c_Yama_\u201d and the God-seekers. You can kill or\nmutilate the body, but you cannot kill the soul, the thing in itself.\nThe \u201c_Yama_,\u201d crushed in one tavern, broke out in another.\n\nI visited the \u201c_Yama_\u201d one Sunday. It was resuscitated in the \u201cBay\u201d\npublic-house in Malo-Golovinskaya by the Candlemas Gate. We sat down in\nthe tavern at 12 o\u2019clock, and over two glasses of tea talked for six\nhours and a half\u2014our only other sustenance being occasional hot cabbage\npies brought to us in trayfuls by a little serving-boy from the kitchen.\nThe tavern swarmed with religious characters, home missionaries,\npropagandists, Bible-hawkers. There was a strong detachment of Old\nBelievers; an old Baptist hawker of women\u2019s hose; many stall-keepers\nfrom Sukareva Market; Velikanof, a friend of Pereplotchikof; Victor\nKarlovitch, greasy and fat, who believes in evil spirits and feels\nattracted to Theosophy.\n\nThe talk went on evil spirits and was enlivened by many stories. A mad\nwoman had been taken to the New Jerusalem monastery near Moscow, and had\nhad a fit in church. After the fit she was found to be in her right\nmind, and it was said that the unclean spirit had been caught as it came\nout of her, and was now preserved in a jar of spirit and exhibited to\npilgrims as one of the sights of the monastery. Were there evil spirits\nor were there not? Was it not said that they passed out of Legion into\nthe swine? Did not the devils cry from the bodies of the insane, giving\nwitness to Christ as He passed them by?\n\nVelikanof told an amusing story of two peasants and a steam-engine. One\nof them held that it was an unclean spirit that made the engine go\nfoward; the other said it was just steam, no more, he knew.\n\n\u201cIt is an unclean spirit,\u201d the former repeated; \u201cI\u2019ll bet it is an\nunclean spirit.\u201d\n\n\u201cHow will you prove that it is?\u201d\n\n\u201cI\u2019ll bet you a quarter the engine won\u2019t be able to pass the ikon of\nMikhail the _Ugodnik_.\u201d\n\n\u201cVery well; done!\u201d\n\nThe ikon was brought to the railway lines. Presently thrum, thrum,\nthrum, the post-train left the village railway station. The first\npeasant stood himself on the lines and held the ikon in front of him\nwith both hands. The other stood by and watched. The train came on, but\nwhen the engine-driver saw the peasant barring the way and apparently\nflagging the train, he brought his machine to a standstill and cried out\nto know what was the matter.\n\n\u201cYou see,\u201d said the peasant, \u201cthe engine dare not pass the ikon. The\nquarter is mine; let\u2019s go and have a drink.\u201d\n\nAnother visitor to the tavern told a sort of Ingoldsby legend of a\nten-pound black cat whose favourite way of entering a house was by\ncoming down the chimney. Another, a peasant workman, made the\nastonishing statement that if you make a candle from human fat and light\nit you can see _all_.\n\nA long discussion was started on the difference between a man and an\nanimal. The sole criterion set by Christ was, \u201cBy your fruits are ye\nknown.\u201d A man is he who can sacrifice his life to an ideal. An animal\nhungers and at once looks about to satisfy his hunger. But upon occasion\na man says to his hunger, \u201cNo, I shall fast.\u201d A man feels blessed when\nhe suffers for conscience sake, but no animal feels blessed through\nsuffering.\n\nA contrast was drawn between Napoleon and Christ. Christ was offered the\nempire and crown of the world and knew that in Himself He had the power\nto take it, but He preferred to deny the world. In that He showed\nHimself the highest type of man. They of the world nailed Him upon the\nCross and cried up to Him, \u201cSave yourself.\u201d He could have saved Himself,\nbut He did not. He preferred to deny life. But Napoleon on the mountain\nfell down and worshipped Satan, and took for his portion the empire of\nthe world. Napoleon was an animal taking what his stomach whispered to\nhim.\n\nThe conversation went on\u2014Russia\u2019s great destiny was to carry the banner\nof the ideal, to sacrifice the material ends of life for the mystical.\n\u201cDirectly you make a step nearer to God you become aware of\ncontradictions in terms in the life you see about you; when you get\nreally near to God you enter into such a maze of contradictions and\nparadoxes that it is almost too much for the human brain,\u201d said\nVelikanof, quoting from a book that was being widely discussed in\nRussia, _The Pillar and the Foundation of Truth_, by the priest\nFlorensky. \u201cIt is for Russia to explore these contradictions and\nparadoxes.\u201d\n\n\u201cRussia has long dwelt in these paradoxes,\u201d said another. Russia offers\nto the world glorious paradoxes:\u2014\n\n\u201cAs a substitute for success it offers failure.\n\n\u201cAs a substitute for fine clothes it offers rags; and for fine mansions\nit offers taverns and log-cabins.\n\n\u201cAs a substitute for rich men it offers beggars.\n\n\u201cInstead of the march music of Progress it offers the choir dance of the\nMystery.\n\n\u201cInstead of Progress itself it offers Communion.\u201d\n\nI told them my belief that Russia is the hope of Europe, that we are all\nlooking to her, that she is the living East, the pole of mysticism, in\nopposition to America, the living West, the pole of materialism. This\npleased the _Bogoiskateli_ very much. They made quite sure it was not\nsimply a compliment, and then one of them added:\u2014\n\n\u201cYes, Russia is the hope of Europe, and Moscow is the hope of Russia.\u201d\nAnd another, an Old Believer, added to that:\u2014\n\n\u201cAnd beyond the Preobrazhenskaya Zastava is the hope of Moscow\u201d\u2014it is\nthere that the Old Believers have a vast and important settlement.\n\nAt half-past six the discussion broke up in the central part of the\ntavern and was left to be prolonged in separate groups. Perhaps later it\nagain became general. I went out, and eight who accompanied me suggested\nthat we go to another tavern two streets off and drink another glass of\ntea. This we did, and the talk went on and on as it goes on every day\nand hour in Russia, in every town or village\u2014talk about God and the idea\nof Christ and suffering, of what is necessary and what not.\n\nRussia is considered a country where speech is not free, and, indeed,\nlistening to such meetings as ours there are often plain-clothes\ndetectives. But the police could no more stop the mouths of the Russian\npeople or the current of popular opinion than they could drain or hide\nthe water of the ocean. In the monastery hostelry, in the third-class\nwaiting-rooms, in third-class carriages, in the muddy and crowded\nmarket-square, in the tavern, the Russian is always to be found eagerly\nasking, seeking, informing, emphasising, making points of exclamation.\nAll priests, policemen, post office officials, schoolmasters, squires,\ncommercial travellers, and Russian-speaking foreigners will bear witness\nto how they have been pestered with simple Russians asking for an\nexplanation of passages in the Bible, or asking questions about God. So\nRussia shows herself alive. Even the taverns, in which there is so much\ndrunkenness and debauch, the Russians have made into something like free\nchurches or open debating societies.\n\nFootnote 4:\n\n  Since the War vodka has of course disappeared.\n\nFootnote 5:\n\n  From _Gambrinus_, Kuprin\u2019s Works, vol. iv.\n\n\n\n\n                                  VII\n                             IN THE CHURCH\n\n\nI have been much struck with the many ruins of abbeys in England. There\nare many ruined abbeys that seem to need comparatively little\nrestoration to make them great places of worship. Kirkstall Abbey\noutside Leeds, for instance, is a grand pile of stone, and has room for\n1200 worshippers\u2014but it remains little more than a curiosity and a\nquestionable adornment of industrial Leeds. In Russia there are no such\nruins. Throughout the wide stretch of Russia there is not a single\nChristian ruin. Christianity does not tolerate ruins. Kirkstall would\nnever have been allowed to fall out of Christian service unless a\nheathen power like Turkey had gained possession of it. Russia, for\ninstance, in 1875, coming into possession of the ruins of early\nChristian churches on the newly-acquired Caucasian shore of the Black\nSea, at once set to work to restore them and to build new churches on\nthe old holy sites. Kirkstall was built in 1152; it struck me, looking\nat it, that at their best the Russians of to-day are not unlike the\nEnglish Christians of that date. They have the characteristics of early\nChristian fervour.\n\nThe most representative cathedral of Russia is quite a modern one\u2014that\nof St. Vladimir at Kief. It is much worth entering. A wonderful interior\npainted by the marvellous Russian painters, Vasnetsof and\nNesterof\u2014medi\u00e6val artists alive in the present, the eyes of the dead\nMiddle Ages opening again after a thousand years\u2019 sleep. All the walls\nand the pillars of St. Vladimir are painted by these wonderful artists.\nAt the north by the font is a vast representation of the birth of\nRussian Christianity, the stepping of the army of King Vladimir down\ninto the waters of the Dnieper to their first baptism. And away high\nover the altar in a background of dark blue is painted Vasnetsof\u2019s\nmajestical Mother and Child, whence naturally the congregation raises\nits eyes in adoration and aspiration. In the choir at the west is\npainted the story of Adam and Eve and their sin, and at the east is the\nwonderful Crucifixion and Resurrection, human birth balanced by\nspiritual birth, Paradise lost by Paradise regained. On the columns of\nthe church are immense figures of the warrior-saints of Russia, the\nchampions of Russian Christendom. When on Easter Eve this wonderful\nmodern cathedral is full of all manner of Russians, you have a complete\nand national picture\u2014another vision of Holy Russia. It is not necessary\nto pray or to fall upon one\u2019s knees. It is only necessary to exist in\nthe great choric throng and to look over a thousand heads to the awful\nand yet altogether lovely vision of the Virgin to feel one\u2019s heart\nalmost stand still and one\u2019s soul become rapt in wonder, awestruck,\nthrilled. You wish to stretch arms above the head and give yourself\ncompletely to the spirit of beauty, the Godhead. You lose the sense of\nthe Ego, the separated individual, you are aware of being part of a\ngreat unity praising God. You cease to be _man_ and become the _church_,\nthe bride of Christ.\n\nThe walls of all churches in Russia are painted all over with immense\npictures. This is dimly thought by Western people to be in bad taste.\nBut that is because the distance between the Western and Eastern\nchurches of Christ is as yet unbridged. The Russian has the child-soul,\nthe peasants get to heaven where we fail, because they are \u201cas little\nchildren.\u201d And the children like the pictures. Older and more staid folk\nwould not perhaps have thought of them. But they only need to go through\nthe spiritual experience of praying in a Russian church surrounded by\nthe painted cloud of witnesses to wish to be such children, and to feel\nthat the child-idea of painting the walls with the pictures of the\nheavenly host is a perfect felicity.\n\nThe Eastern Church abhors dumb walls and the restriction of movement and\nattitude implied by pews. Every wall and every pillar is painted with\npictures of the saints, and of incidents recorded in Holy Writ. Walls,\nblank walls, are always in the nature of prison walls. They separate us\nfrom other people. But the Russian, by painting the walls blue and\ncrowding them with the saints, imparts to them a character of infinity.\nHe gives to the worship a background of eternity. He paints in the\nspiritual landscape of the church.\n\nA great interpretive Russian writer[6] thus writes of the fresco and\nwall-painting:\u2014\n\n    In the West, where the Gothic arose, wall-painting naturally\n    disappeared. There was no place for it on the arrowy columns and in\n    the spaces between the windows. But in orthodoxy a continuous blank\n    wall begged to be covered with painting. An ikon, a little picture\n    in a square frame, was hung here and there, but still did not cover\n    or give voice to the senseless walls at which the eyes of the\n    worshippers gazed. In orthodoxy the wall must not be dumb, it must\n    speak. But the wall cannot speak by texts\u2014for which there are books.\n    The people in the church ought to see themselves surrounded by holy\n    scenes, pictures\u2014of immense content and of immense dimensions. Such\n    are frescoes. Only in orthodoxy are they possible, and indeed\n    without them orthodoxy is dumb, powerless, not expressed. Thirst for\n    such pictures among the Russian orthodox is great.\n\n    Frescoes make the walls live. The soul poured forth on the walls\n    calls to prayer, and says as much to the worshippers as does the\n    reading and the singing in church, not less.... The worshippers feel\n    around them the great background of historical Christianity. They\n    not only hear but see\u2014Christian history, they not only hear but\n    see\u2014the story of salvation, they not only hear but see\u2014the exploits\n    of the martyrs, the suffering.... They see the pageant of orthodoxy,\n    its splendid victories.\n\n    The great difference between our immense wall-paintings and mere\n    painting on canvas, the things that are exhibited in galleries and\n    academies, is that the one is national whereas the other is only\n    _personal_. Instead of nervous shrieking pictures, these minute\n    creations which hang on academy walls, we have something eternal,\n    everlasting, to which may bow their heads generation after\n    generation, to which will pray one human family, another human\n    family, another....\n\nThis is an orthodox Russian\u2019s view of one of the characteristic features\nof his own church. To the Russian it means so much. But to one who has\nworshipped in both churches, and is speaking for those who for the most\npart pray in churches that have dumb walls, there is a great deal more\nto note and to follow up in the consideration of this most interesting\nnew emblem in religion. Rozanof sets us on the highroad for a\nfundamental understanding of Russian orthodoxy, and what I call the\nEastern point of view in Christianity.\n\nThis praying in a church whose walls are \u201cthe great cloud of witnesses\u201d\nis a portentous matter.\n\nFirst of all, a word as to the _service_ in a Russian church\u2014the holy\nscene that shows itself if you go into vespers or matins, to a funeral\nor a wedding or a baptism, or a service for the remembrance of the dead,\nor any of the numerous occasions of religious gathering. There are no\npews, no chairs. There is always a crowd, a promiscuity of rich and\npoor, of well-dressed and tattered, a kaleidoscopic mingling of people\nand colours, people standing and praying, people kneeling, people\nprostrated, people pushing their way to the altar, people handing\ncandles over one another\u2019s heads, people pushing their way out,\nchurchwardens wandering about collecting alms, no irritation at the\npushing, no anger through discomfort. The lights are dim, being mostly\nthose of the worshippers themselves, of the candles they have lit before\nvotive shrines. There is no organ music, but an unearthly and\nspontaneous outburst of praise from the souls of the choir and the\nclergy and the laity worshipping together. It is a strange and wonderful\ncrowd where noble human faces, broad shoulders, and beautiful forms\npredominate rather than clothes or uniforms. No ranks of pews and\npeople, no \u201cman\u2019s order,\u201d only God\u2019s order, the varying and wonderful\nmultitude. And from the back and the sides, and from the pillars and\ncolumns look the pale faces of antiquity, the faces of the dead who are\nalive looking over the shoulders of the alive who have not yet died, all\npraising God, enfolding in a vast choric communion the few who in the\nchurch have met on the common impulse to acknowledge the wonder and\nsplendour of the mystery of God.\n\nAll the walls and the people and the priests are praising God. Whom do\nthey praise?\n\nWhom are we all praising? It is Some One or Something that has been\npraised for all time, and that will be praised for ever. Any narrow\nconception is necessarily wrong. It does not matter that many a\nworshipper has a low or superstitious idea of the God he worships. We\nare all comparatively narrow\u2014even the widest-eyed of us. It does not\nmatter that many deny intellectually that they are praising at all. We\nat least know by what we have heard, by bursts of universal praising\nborne in upon our ears, that all there is, is praising. That is one of\nthe reasons why frescoes touch the soul, they remind us of a truth we\nknow in ourselves that the face of every human being, good or evil, is\nturned towards God, as the flowers turn their blossoms to the sun.\n\nRussia has her modern frescoes, for she has rediscovered the art of\npainting on wet plaster. She has also her ancient Byzantine frescoes\u2014the\nexpression of the early Church. There is something in them all that\nexpresses the idea of choric praise, \u201cthe same yesterday, to-day and for\never.\u201d\n\nRozanof very suggestively remarks that archaeologists are poets, in that\nthey turn their backs on present-day reality and go to live with a time\na thousand or two thousand years ago, holding that time to be as great a\nreality as the present day. They realise that the Past lives. We make a\nmistake when we talk of the dead past. It is a great religious truth\nthat all that has ever lived lives for ever.\n\nWe are provincial dwellers in Time; we are, few of us, explorers, and\nmany who do explore Time, explore it as moles do a field. We do not scan\nthe vast stretch of Time from aloft. We are patient plodders, crawling\non hands and knees and peering and poring over little plots of eternity.\nFew, very few of us, have the poet\u2019s eye in a fine frenzy rolling. But\nif we had the poet\u2019s eye and the poet\u2019s point of view we could see the\n_time-that-was_ existent now, we could see it glowing and breathing and\nsinging. We could see every event and circumstance in history\u2014in living\naction, discharging itself and yet not getting discharged, rampant.\n\nKeats, looking at the bas-relief on a Grecian urn, had the true poetic\nvision. He realised the ever-living quality of a moment of life poised\nin a picture. So he looked at the living groups on the ancient urn and\nsang:\u2014\n\n               What men or gods are these? What maidens loth?\n               What mad pursuit? What struggle to escape?\n               What pipes and timbrels? What wild ecstasy?\n\nHe looked at the Greek shepherds with their pipes and heard the liquid\nmelody float away, and he cried:\u2014\n\n              Heard melodies are sweet, but those unheard\n              Are sweeter; therefore, ye soft pipes, play on.\n\nWhat enchanted the poet was that though the sculpture was all action, it\nwas only a single moment. He felt that all was living, all moving, all\nprocessional; but that all was fixed. He saw the eternity in the moment.\n\n                  Bold Lover, never, never canst thou kiss\n                  ... yet do not grieve;\n                  She cannot fade ...\n                  For ever wilt thou love and she be fair!\n\nHe sees the trees whose leaves will never fall, and the spring which is\nan eternal spring.\n\nA joy of art and of the eyes is the poising of a moment thus, and the\nshowing in a sculptured relief or a picture or a poem all that was\nhappening in the moment\u2014the eternal life that the moment holds, the\nmoment which we think passes, but which in truth never passes but ever\nis. We move past the landscape of Time and deceive ourselves that it is\nTime which passes us. It is we who pass by Time. The Time we have passed\nthrough remains. We can keep it in our view. We must go high into the\nheaven to see All-Time\u2014nearer to God, nearer to the central sun of\nglory.\n\nIt is to take cognisance of the infinite breadth of Time, a richer\nknowledge than that on which we pride ourselves, knowledge of the length\nof Time. There is nothing more touching that one man can say to another\nthan the recounting of all that is happening at one and the same time in\nthe Universe. But speech and writing have one great lack. It is that we\nmust spend time to write and we must spend time to read. We must write\none word after another, must read one word after another. But, joy of\nthe artist! in a picture he can give an immediate impression of many\nthings happening at the same time. The gazer at beauty has not to follow\nlaboriously word by word and line by line and page by page to find out\nwhat all was happening at one and the same time; he sees it at once and\ntakes it to himself at once in the painting. Especially in the fresco.\nHe sees the breadth of Time shown in the breadth of the picture, and the\nmultiplicity and variety in it.\n\nSo the sculptures and frescoes of the church touch the human soul. They\nare fragments of the breadth of Time, fragments of the pictures which\nMan writes on the breadth and surface of Time, fragments of the mystical\n\u201cGarment\u201d of which Goethe speaks. They are fragments of universal\npictures, fragments of the picture of the Universe grouped about the\nfeet of God. They have a choric and processional aspect. No matter what\nthe figures in the fresco seem to be doing, they have the aspect of\npraising God, of being part of a choric universe.\n\nHave we not noticed this in Nature, of which Art is the mirror? A dead\nman lying in an open coffin is like a piece of a fresco framed. The face\nof a dead man is a picture of a man going through a great gate. It has a\ngrand processional look.\n\nThe roll of history itself is a long strip of fresco. It is only too\nnarrow a strip. It is in the breadth of history that the beauty lies. If\nwe could only see in poised moments all people and all nature praising\nGod in all their various ways at one and the same time! That is the full\nroll of history\u2014to see the broad eternity in each moment. To see that is\nto see the great phantasmagoria, the infinite blending of all shapes and\ncolours, of all the runic and mystic manifestations which, seen in\nsmall, thrill us and puzzle us and perplex us in our mortal lives. It is\nalso a vision of the Last Judgment. I often think in these days of\naccusing God and quarrelling with Providence it will not be God that\njudges us, but we who give our judgment about Him. When the true and\nfull vision bursts upon us, we shall all cry Hosanna unto the Highest.\nThe whole universe, seeing itself and understanding itself, will burst\ninto one great cry of glory.\n\nHow that could come about, or what such a cry would mean, is beyond\nthoughts and words. We cannot be literal about it, and yet we have sense\nof it, and are able to strike chords of the great harmony or catch\nglimpses of the symphonies of colour and form. The strange picture is\nmiraged for us backward through Eternity and we catch glimpses of it. So\nit is in the Orthodox Church, in a crowd of pilgrims in a dim temple lit\nby the lights which the pilgrims themselves have lighted at the altars,\nenfolded in the great cloud of witnesses we sing praises to the One, the\nCentral One, the God of All.\n\nThere is nothing more wonderful than a real crowd, a crowd attracted by\na personality or an idea. At interludes throughout history we catch\nglimpses of gazing crowds, the\n\n          Armies of angels that soar, legions of demons that lurk,\n          Man, brute, reptile, fly\u2014alien of end and of aim\u2014\n\nthat rush into sight at once as you name the ineffable Name.\n\nThe New Testament pictures of Jesus standing in the midst of the crowd\nis the symbol for all time of the Church, \u201cJesus teaching among the\npeople, living in His heart the life of every one He saw, living from\nHis heart in living veins over the whole earth, the thousand people\nabout Him listening, calling, reviling, praying, the angelic spirits\ngazing at Him rapt, even the devils acknowledging Him from the bodies of\nthe possessed, the disciples bringing sick people to and fro at the\nMaster\u2019s feet.\u201d[7] This is just the same picture as the Russian Church\npresents to-day. It is the idea of that wonderful modern Russian\npainting, \u201cHoly Russia,\u201d where Jesus walks out of the ikon frame and\nstands enhaloed above the crowd of all sorts and conditions of Russian\nmen and women. It is the picture presented in the work of the great\nnovelist Dostoieffsky. Dostoieffsky\u2019s novels are pictures of great\ncrowds of Russian men and women in the presence of the mystery of Love.\nDostoieffsky\u2019s novel is a church, and in the church there is room for\nRaskolnikof, the murderer, and the little white-slave Sonia, room for\nthe sick and the suffering and the lustful and the pure. And even the\ndevils cry out from the bodies of _The Possessed_ acknowledging the\nChrist. Jerusalem of to-day, with its thousands of poor Russian pilgrims\nand its crowds, is such a church. Thither come not only the good and the\nrespectable, but the outcast, the criminal, and the drunkard; there is\nroom for them in the presence of the Sacred Face.\n\nThe little village church of any forest-side of Russia is also such a\nchurch. All Russia is such a church, and the world itself also, for\nevery face is turned to one idea of God as the flowers are turned to the\nsun. Hence we sing most felicitously the Hymn of the Three Children, so\npopular in the early church, the _Benedicite Omnia Opera_:\n\n    O all ye Works of the Lord ...\n\n    O ye Angels, O ye Heavens, ye Waters ...\n\n    O all ye Powers of the Lord ...\n\n    O ye winter and summer ...\n\n    O ye mountains and little hills ...\n\n    O ye children of men ... ye priests of the Lord, ye servants of the\n    Lord, ye spirits and souls of the righteous, ye holy and humble men\n    of heart, bless ye the Lord, praise Him and magnify Him for ever.\n\nFootnote 6:\n\n  V. V. Rozanof, _Wall-Painting_.\n\nFootnote 7:\n\n  \u201cThe Ikon not made by Hands,\u201d a Russian mystical story in _A Vagabond\n  in the Caucasus_.\n\n\n\n\n                                  VIII\n                          IN THE MARKET-PLACE\n\n\n    MOSCOW, _March 1914_.\n\n\nWhat a divine disorder! The peasants seem to have an instinctive sense\nfor grouping. No matter how much the crowd moves or how many changes are\nevolved in it, it is always a beautiful whole, a fair scene, with\nbalance of colour and form and sound. You see not a crowd but a nation.\nNo wonder the Russian produces a ballet which is bewilderingly beautiful\nwhen the peasants in their gait are true to themselves and to their\nnation. What troubles the eye in a Western crowd is the fact that every\none is afraid to be himself, to be true to personal impulses, and to\nwalk and dress and act as he likes. Stupid censure and the criterion of\nconvention robs our crowds of life, of diversity of colour and form. We\nin the West abhor a crowd as something disorderly in itself; we prize\nthe drilled squad, where each and every soldier looks as if turned out\nfrom one and the same factory.\n\nOne of the most wonderful pieces of stage production in Moscow this year\nwas Gogol\u2019s _Fair of Sorotchinsky_, presented at the New Dramatic\nTheatre, a picture of a Russian crowd and a market on a hill. The first\nscene shows a highway and an ox-cart laden with village girls and young\npeasants coming laboriously along it. They are on the way to the fair.\nThe second scene, the fair itself, takes one\u2019s breath away. The sun is\nblazing with a ten o\u2019clock in the morning full-armed effulgence, so that\nthe bright cottons of the peasant women, the chestnut-coloured\nsheepskins of the men, the ribbons hanging from the stalls, the black\ntangles of astrakhan hats, the trodden mud and puddles of the track, all\nglitter like bunting on a May morning; and the tilts of the shop-tents\nand stalls ascend the hill one beyond another to the sky-horizon, so\nthat behind the foreground, where the action takes place, there rises a\nmountain of irregularly ribbed canvas. All manner of people float in and\nout of the colour design: flirting village girls wearing bright beads;\nstalwart yokels standing about in the mud with hay-rakes in their hands;\nantediluvian monks with greasy, tangled hair, with wrinkled and wise\ncountenances, black and dirt-stained cloaks; tired pilgrims with huge\nbundles on their backs, wiping their sunburned brows with the backs of\ntheir grimy hands; beggars, drunkards. All the talking and bargaining\nand singing is allowed to mingle, and the customers stump about amongst\nthe stalls and the piles of golden melons and brown pottery, and ask\nprices and haggle. And the little story of the play shows itself when\nthe ox-cart of the first scene comes in with its burden of laughing\ngirls and swains. Mardzhanof, the producer, does not allow the life of\nthe fair in the background to slacken for a moment in order to emphasise\nthe main story. He lets the fair be the world, which always goes on no\nmatter what story is enacted upon it. Morning wears to noon, noon to\nafternoon and evening, and the ox-cart sets out again home.\n\nNecessarily there is design in the kaleidoscope of the market as shown\non the stage; but then the design is to show what a Russian fair is\nlike, and this of Sorotchinsky is a wonderful representation of the\nRussian crowd. Every one who went to the performance was struck with the\ncrowd, the way each small part was played by the actor and actress who\nhad it. There was not one of the great troupe who simply walked on and\nfilled a space; every one was realising a separate part. Such individual\nwork was necessary if the psychology of the Russian crowd was in any way\nto be represented.\n\nThe market-place is more secular than the theatre, the church, or the\ntavern, and yet in it you see the same wonderful national idea (as\nChesterton wrote of a similar idea, \u201cIt is as if we gazed long at a\ndesign full of disconnected objects, and suddenly they came together in\na huge and staring face\u201d)\u2014divine disorder, the disorder of the starry\nsky, instead of man\u2019s order, instinctive mingling instead of ranks and\npews, the live crowd instead of the dead crowd; or to translate the idea\ninto political phraseology, true democracy instead of collectivism, the\nballet of imagination rather than the regimental march of progress,\nhuman destiny as a mystery play rather than a problem play, enacted in a\nmysterious labyrinth rather than in a corridor of time or up and down an\neverlasting staircase of evolution.\n\n\n\n\n                                   IX\n                            THE RUSSIAN IDEA\n\n\nThose familiar with ideas can tell at sight a German idea, an American\nidea, a Russian idea, a Roman Catholic idea, and so on. Each nation has\nits fundamental idea, its mother idea, the idea of which all other\ncharacteristic ideas are children. As Dostoieffsky says: \u201cNo nation has\never been founded on science and reason; it has always grown about some\ncentral idea.\u201d\n\nIt is a remarkable fact that, although Russia is a great composite\nempire with an enormous number of small nations and tribes under\nher rule, she is not a country of mixed ideas. Her literature,\nart, music, philosophy, religion, her theatre, her dancing, is\nsomething intrinsically Russian. No Poles, Finns, Jews, Armenians,\nKirghiz, contribute to it. No German-Russians contribute to it. Of\nall the names by which Russia is known as a nation mighty in art\nand in thought, not one belongs to the subject nations. In\nliterature\u2014Dostoieffsky, Turgenief, Tolstoy, Gogol, Pushkin,\nChekhof, Gorky, Balmont; in painting\u2014Vasnetsof, Nesterof,\nVerestchagin, Sierof; in music\u2014Tchaikovsky, Korsakof, Mossugorsky;\nin philosophy\u2014Solovyof; in history\u2014Kluchevsky, Karamsim; in\ncontemporary journalism\u2014Rozanof, Menshikof, Doroshevitch,\nMerezhkovsky; even in Russian science, which is something apart\nfrom European science, Mendeleef, Metchnikof, all without\nexception are Russian names, the names of Russian people at once\nChristian and Slavonic. Nothing is contributed by Jews; nothing is\ncontributed by Poles; nothing by Finns. These people each have\ntheir own characteristic separate literature and religion and art.\nThey think in their own tongues, pray in their own churches, have\ntheir own characteristic ideas. There is not the blending we have\nin England, where we include in our national literature the works\nof, for instance, Disraeli, Zangwill, Conrad, Hueffer, and so\nforth, proud to be Jewish, proud to be Polish, proud to be German\nin extraction and yet speaking for England. The Russian idea is\nsomething purely Russian.\n\nThis is important not merely as a curious circumstance. It indicates the\nfact that the fundamental Russian idea should be something more easy to\nunravel, more evident, more mighty than other contemporary ideas. How\nmuch more easy, for instance, to determine just what is the national\nRussian conception of life than to determine ours, obscured and\ncomplicated by so many foreign elements.\n\nThere is a spirit abroad to-day which calls for the thing called\ncosmopolitanisation, in other words, for that process of the\nmongrelising of nations and ideas that is manifest to-day in America. It\nwishes the breaking down of national barriers\u2014intermarriage. The\ndoctrine seems to be promulgated chiefly by those Jews who have sold\ntheir priceless birthright, who have given up the Zionist ideal, and\nsettled down to think that they are no longer Jews but Englishmen,\nAmericans, Germans, what not. They talk of the United States of Europe,\nas if the United States of America were not sufficient of a problem and\na muddle.\n\nRussia is the strongest bond of nationality, being the purest and\nclearest of the nations. Germany, France, and England also tend to shake\nthemselves free, and seek to find and to be themselves.\n\nMy quest at present is to unravel the Russian idea, and present Russia\nas she is in her spirit and her passion. By seeing Russia in this way we\nhave a revelation of the majesty of a national idea. We obtain a notion\nhow we should look if we could see ourselves as we really are.\n\nRussia and England are akin, if it were only in the bond of\nChristianity. We have certain spiritual affinities. We could know\nourselves much nearer to one another, though that depends on us rather\nthan on Russia. She has much more to teach us than we have to teach her.\nIt is only kindness to our politicians and progressive workers that\ncould ever suggest that Russia was a blank sheet on which they might\nwrite what they chose. Russia, alas! may learn wrong things of us and go\nwrong\u2014Dostoieffsky\u2019s nightmare. The noisy middle-class Russia of to-day\ndoes indeed tend to follow after other gods. But for the moment I cannot\npause to give actual pictures of Russia going wrong. I am in quest of\nthe vital and fundamental idea of Russia, that which is the mother of\nher art, literature, music, of her religion and her traditional national\nlife.\n\nI am tempted to say that the Russian idea is an aspect of Christianity.\nHence the title of this book, _The Way of Martha and the Way of Mary_.\nRussia is the fairest child of the Early Church. Her national idea is\nidentified with one of the Byzantine aspects of Christianity. But it\nwould be impossible to deny that Russia draws her marvellous spirit from\nsomething earlier than Christianity. There is Nature-worship in the\nRussians; there is Scandinavian mythology; there is Oriental mysticism.\nThe remote past still lends impulses of passions, dreams, fears, hopes,\nto the rustling and blossoming present. Yet all its past has been\nabsorbed into Russian Christianity, though Russians have not yet\nexplored and reproduced in art all the significances of that mysterious\ntime in Russian history. We may say that the Russian idea is a Christian\nidea. Christianity has been great enough to include and say _yes_ to all\nthat was wonderful in the old.\n\nWhat then of Russian ideas? Of the Russian idea?\n\nWhen you first step into a Russian novel you come across symptomatic\nideas, and when you go into Russia you find them again in the life of\nthe people. Probably the most obviously characteristic thing is the love\ntowards the suffering, pity. Russia is a remarkably tender and\ncomforting nation. She is greatly concerned with her neighbour, and her\nheart is touched by his destiny. As Rozanof writes:\n\n    Is there one page in the whole of Russian literature where a mock is\n    made of a girl who has been betrayed, of a child, of a mother, of\n    poverty? Even the thief is an honest thief. (Dostoieffsky\u2019s _Honest\n    Thief_.) Russian literature is one continuous hymn to the injured\n    and insulted. And as of such people there must always be a multitude\n    in vain and gigantically-working Europe, it is possible to imagine\n    the shout of joy which breaks forth when they are shown a country, a\n    whole nation, where no one ever dare offend the orphan, the\n    destitute, in the moral sense never dares to look insultingly upon\n    the person left forlorn by circumstance, by destiny, by the break up\n    of life. Of such people there are only too many. And what can the\n    \u201ckings\u201d of Victor Hugo say to them, or in general, the manifestly\n    artificial subjects of Western writers? Russian stories can give\n    consolation. For besides being taken from the habitual common\n    everyday life they have a tenderness. The Western man can say:\n    \u201cThere is a country where I should not have been despised; there is\n    a country where I should not have been so coarsely insulted, where\n    every man would have taken my part and interceded for me, where they\n    would have taken me by the hand and raised me upon my feet again. I\n    am cursed, but only in my own country, not on the whole planet.\u201d\n\n    That is the effect of Russian literature. Its significance is not a\n    matter of the reviews of Western critics, not a matter of the noisy\n    fame which has overtaken it; it lies not in its material triumph,\n    but in a direct and absolutely unhampered affinity to the soul of\n    the simple and universal reader. To some the Russian song is always\n    pleasing.... No,\u2014bigger, better. There are souls to whom the Russian\n    song is the one thing necessary in life, to whom it is dearer than\n    anything else in life\u2014as to the hurt one, his mother; as to the sick\n    child, again his mother, perhaps neither a beautiful nor a virtuous\n    one. Virtue\u2014it is of course somewhat strange to ask virtue from\n    Russians.... \u201cThe Troika.\u201d... But one thing there always is in\n    Russia\u2014sympathy, responsiveness. Perhaps it sprang up in Russia, and\n    became exaggerated there just because so many people were crushed by\n    various \u201ctroikas.\u201d However that may be, to be sung to sleep with\n    Russia\u2019s cradle song many wish....\n\nThere is love towards the suffering one. It is part of a love towards\nthe destiny of the individual. There is a remarkable absence of\nconventional standards. You are not looked at askance because you seem\npoor. The tramps and pilgrims on the road are never made ashamed of\nthemselves. A contrast to America, where the tramp is an object of\nmirth, where he is regarded almost as an enemy of society. The Russian\ntakes the tramp in. He has real hospitality, and not only hospitality of\nhearth and home, the giving of food and a night\u2019s shelter, but also a\nmore vital hospitality, that of mind and heart. He wants to know all\nabout you. He asks you the human questions. He asks about father and\nmother and brothers and sisters, about your home and your calling and\nyour goal. In return he tells you the intimate things of his life.\n\nThis is not only a matter of the road. How often the most utter\nstranger, met in a railway carriage or a post-station or at an inn, will\nafter a remark about the weather or the crops begin to tell you the\nwhole story of his life. He assumes the hospitality of your heart; a\nsure sign that in general people\u2019s hearts are hospitable, that in\ngeneral there is a love towards destiny.\n\nAs a wanderer and a seeker I have myself experienced the ordinary\nmaterial hospitality of hearth and home, and also this of the heart,\nhaving often been poor, strange-looking, and enigmatical enough.\nRussians have not looked askance; they have been brotherly. They have\naccepted a stranger naturally and simply as they would one near to\nthemselves. More than that, knowing that I had a special quest, there\nhave always been those who came forward and helped me in the spiritual\nthings. Mysterious beings have, as it were, anticipated my coming, and\nhave stepped out and recognised and said: \u201cRead this; go to that one and\ntalk to him; see this Russian picture.\u201d They love to preserve the\nmystery too. I have known people who had the aspect of having dreamed of\nmy coming.\n\nThe first day I was in Vladikavkaz, an old tatterdemalion standing by\nthe bridge over the Terek came forward to embrace me and welcome me in\nthe name of God. I had never met him before; I knew no one in the town.\nWhen I left Vladikavkaz last, to make my long and possibly dangerous\nCentral Asian tramp, the most mysterious of my friends brought me a\nbeautiful little copy of Nesterof\u2019s \u201cMartha and Mary\u201d to keep me from\nharm. And one night, months later, in a remote Moslem town on the fringe\nof the desert, I had a strange experience of adventure and terror when,\nas it seems to me, I was literally saved by looking at the picture. The\ngiving of it was love towards destiny, hospitality of the heart.\n\nIt might be thought, however, that the Russian love stopped short with\nthe honest, the religious, the seeking\u2014that as long as a man could give\na decent explanation of himself and his mode of life the Russian was on\nhis side. But that would be to miss the real saliency of this love. The\nRussian loves the dishonest, the criminal, the despicable, the\nunpleasantly strange, the man who can give no explanation of himself, as\nmuch as she loves the other, even a little more than she loves the\nother; she has a \u201cweakness\u201d for the prodigal. Half her novels are\nexpressive of love towards \u201ccriminals.\u201d\n\nIn English novels the plot is so adjusted that the author has scope to\nmake a thorough out-and-out condemnation of the villain. He has a few\npages where he lays himself out to show how inexcusable the villain\u2019s\nconduct was, what an abject scoundrel, what a disgraceful creature he\nis. The condition on which you may describe sin is that you condemn the\nsinner. In life also, as well as in literature, we are condemnatory; we\nlove to pass judgment on others. How different in Russian literature!\nYou find no condemnatory spirit there. The author\u2019s whole passion is to\ndefend and explain the criminal, to evoke the tender sympathy of the\nreader. He makes you feel how strange, how pathetic, is man\u2019s destiny,\nhow sordid his life compared with his spirit. Over the portal of Russian\nlife and literature you might find the motto, \u201cNeither do I condemn\nthee.\u201d Russia feels that however mean, however ugly and strange a man\u2019s\nlife may seem, it is nevertheless a part of his great pilgrimage. He has\ngot to go through it, he is learning something thereby, fulfilling\nsomething sacred thereby. This is exemplified very remarkably in\nRussia\u2019s legal system where, for instance, there is no capital\npunishment except under martial law. A man commits a murder, but he is\nnot therefore condemned and hanged and turned over to God; he gets\nmerely a dozen years in Siberia, and he goes on with his life.\n\nDostoieffsky, when he was in Siberia with forgers and murderers and\nhighwaymen, was much concerned to seek out the gold in their character;\nand he remarks how a violent and dangerous man will even shed tears at\nthe sight of a child suffering. \u201cMurderers are much more simple than we\ntake them to be,\u201d says he in another place, \u201cso are we all.\u201d\n\nThe Russians are unashamed. Men and women confess voluntarily to having\ncommitted crimes or behaved abominably upon occasion. The man who lives\nan immoral life does not do so secretly to his wife. The black sheep of\nthe family is not hidden in the background, \u201cnever mentioned,\u201d or\nsubscribed for and sent to a distant colony; he is sitting at the table\nand is quite cheerful, and every one takes him for granted. No one is\nashamed to borrow or to be tremendously in debt; no one horror-struck at\nthe idea of visiting the pawn-shop. All which exemplifies the love\ntowards individuals and individual destiny.\n\nThis is why Russia is so free. It is almost a platitude to say that\nconventions determine the extent of personal freedom much more than the\nlaws of the realm or the behaviour of the police. Yet it is a fact lost\nsight of when people talk of tyrannous government. In Russia love is\ntowards the individual much more than towards the State. There is indeed\nno particular love towards the State. We British uphold the State; to us\nthe police and the police-system are almost sacred. We often condemn\nindividual behaviour in the name of the State. We abhor \u201cshirkers,\u201d\n\u201crebels,\u201d \u201cbreakers of the peace.\u201d Hence our comparatively limited\nBritish freedom. We believe in order. Our freedom is freedom within\nbounds. We allow ourselves to be disciplined along definite lines. In\nRussia it is different. There freedom often amounts to chaos. Even\nRussian order, _poryadok_, that which comes from Petrograd, is something\nborrowed from Germany to keep the nation together. Russians have no\ninstinct for order. Watch our best British troops marching\u2014they give you\nthe idea that each soldier has been turned out from a factory, and is of\none and the same type and size. They march like moving patterns. But the\nRussians march any-way; their order is of the lowest kind. It is even\ntolerated to have wives and mothers marching in the ranks with their\nhusbands and sons, carrying their bundles. Some men are marching; others\nare running. Each man has his own individual expression in his\ncountenance; he has not merely a regimental expression. Russia does not\ncare for ranks, for blocks of houses, for formal gardens, for churches\nwith pews. She likes the individual to do as he pleases. Hence a divine\ndisorder, a glorious promiscuity. The church perhaps shows the quickest\npicture of national life\u2014the kaleidoscopic mingling of people and\ncolours, the wonderful crowd encompassed by the frescoed walls, the\nfaces of the saints, the great cloud of witnesses.\n\nThe same picture, though modified by Western influence, is shown in the\ntheatre. Russia wishes the disenchanting of the footlights, the\nparticipation of the public in the action of the drama, the removing of\nstalls and chairs\u2014a divine disorder in the theatre. She believes in the\nemotional communion of the theatre\u2014the actors inspired by the people,\nthe people inspired again by the actors, the dance and interplay of\nhuman thoughts and emotions. Shut your eyes to the material world and\nyou realise there are no footlights, no separating river of light\nbetween the two worlds of stage and auditorium. There is a great and\nwondrous ballet of thoughts and impulses, hopes and fears, going forward\nand across and backward and across again between the priests of the\ndrama and the conspirators, the worshippers.\n\nThe church service and the drama, the church and the theatre have much\nin common. The Mass has much in common with the mystery play. And the\nmystery play was originally the Mystery\u2014at which you did not look, but\n_into_ which you were initiated. You participated in the action. You\nwere the victim sacrificed, or the priest, or one of the conspirators in\nthe orgy. You were made one in the sacrifice, as in the Mass you are\nmade one in the sacraments of bread and wine, symbols of the victim.\nShare is taken in the sacrifice, we consent unto the death. We are made\none. We get free from the idea of separation, from space and time,\nrealising the everywhere-here, the eternal present.\n\nIn such a form is the Russian notion of the world and his conception of\nlife. It is such a church, such a theatre, such a mystery play. It has\nits liturgies of beauty, its many processions, its sacrifices, its\necstasies; it is a great phantasmagoria of emblems. Nothing is without\nsignificance; every man has his part; by his life he divines it and\nfulfils it. Every common sight and sound is charged with mystery.\nEverything is praising, everything is choric, everything triumphant.\n\nTo recapitulate and restate this in aphorism: Russian life is remarkable\nby virtue of its love towards the suffering, towards the individual\ndestiny; by the absence of condemnation; by faith in life even if life\nshould express itself in meanness, sordidness, crime; a feeling for the\npathos and wonder of life as exemplified in the individual; no love\ntowards \u201cthe State\u201d or man\u2019s order, but great love towards the\nindividual and individual instinct; a consequent freedom, amounting at\ntimes to seeming chaos, a divine disorder such as the disorder of the\nstarry sky, as opposed to man\u2019s order, say the order in which stars\nmight be classified in a book; a disorder such as that of the flowers\nand shrubs of the forest, rather than order as in a formal garden; a\nbelief, then, in instinctive genius and divination by impulse of one\u2019s\nplace in the kaleidoscope of existence.\n\nWith such natural disorder comes an incapacity for \u201cdiscipline,\u201d\n\u201cefficiency,\u201d \u201cprogress.\u201d Life is a mystery play.\n\nWhence may be inferred the following differentiation of ideas:\n\nInstead of the God of the Ten Commandments, and the consequent ten\ncondemnations, the Russian acknowledges the God whose service is perfect\nfreedom.\n\nInstead of the simplification of life, a love of its complexity. The\nRussian says \u201cyes\u201d to the multiplicity of doctrines; he does not wish\npersonal destinies to be unravelled and straightened out by the State,\nstandardised and guaranteed by the State. He will not reduce the chess\nof life to the draughts of life. A religious belief in pure democracy;\nno belief in Socialism.\n\nInstead of belief in the Future, belief in an eternal Present.\n\nInstead of life understood as a march, life understood as a ballet.\n\nInstead of life understood as Evolution, life understood as a marvellous\nphantasmagoria.\n\nInstead of Time understood as a passage or corridor, Time as a\nlabyrinth.\n\nInstead of the world-ideal of garden cities and carefully planned parks\nand squares, a belief in the maze of the world.\n\nInstead of a belief in the coming of universal peace, a belief in the\nrecurrence of wars. No belief in the \u201cmaking virtuous of the world and\nall people.\u201d\n\nNo belief in any explanation as sufficient.\n\nNo prejudice against impossibilities; a cheerful acceptance of miracles,\ninfractions of the \u201claws of Nature,\u201d of the significance of dreams and\nvisions, of the design of destiny hidden in apparent accident; a\npredisposition towards superstition.\n\nA belief that in apparent failure lies a truer destiny than in apparent\nsuccess.\n\nA saying \u201cyes\u201d to the mysteries of the Birth, Crucifixion, and\nResurrection of Christ. The West would take Christ down from the cross,\nheal His wounds, and save Him. The East would not do that; she knows\nthat she must crucify Him.\n\n\n\n\n                                   X\n                             THE LABYRINTH\n\n\nMan is a labyrinth. He is masked, and there are masks over masks. When\nyou have gone past his first surface you come to a second. He is like\nthousands of overpainted frescoes. His soul is a mystic temple with a\nhundred and a thousand standing-places further forward or further back.\nHis soul circulates in passages, hides in caves or recesses, is missed\namong intricacies or complexities. It has the power of metamorphosis and\ncan lurk in the by-ways of his being in strange guise. It manifestly\ntakes possession of his body, or it dwells in dim caves and recesses, or\nmarches soundingly along corridors; it creeps insidiously through secret\nmazes; it dwells lingeringly in empty chambers, makes its exit\nstealthily by little doors leading as it were to vast reservoirs; or\nhurriedly it traverses many apartments to look from the outmost gate\nlike a newly risen moon. It is sometimes enthroned like a king or a\nqueen, or descending from the throne trails long robes over marble. Or\nit is abased to a slave or a prisoner and is confined in towers and\ndungeons serving tyrants for unknown ends; or it lies stretched on\ncouches, in trances, overcome in chambers of voluptuousness, escaping\nagain and again from the spell of enchantment and the stress of tyranny,\nfrom would-be masters too weak finally to enthral. There are issues of\njoy from many passages of pain. There are processions in the temple of\nthe soul; and sometimes the soul is a victim bound to be sacrificed in\nhonour of some conqueror, or it is the priest at the altar, or the\nconqueror-god to whom sacrifice is made. The sense of destiny in the\nsoul may rise to a majestic height of godhead, or may be extinguished to\nthe dull inanition of the worm or perverted to the fury of a devil. But\neven lying at great depths and in great darkness it sees the eternal\nstars, as the stars are seen even in the glare of the Egyptian noonday\nfrom the innermost chambers of the pyramids. It becomes upon occasion an\nenchanter, an Ariel who can summon fairies and sprites with pageants and\nchoruses, and make heavenly music in every passage and turn and cranny\nin the great labyrinth of man\u2019s being.\n\nThere are many labyrinths. Squares and circles and straight lines are in\nthemselves lies\u2014they are disjointed fragments of labyrinths. There is no\ntruth in them until they are pieced together. A labyrinth is something\nwhich cannot be drawn by mathematical instruments, which cannot be\nphotographed. It can be sensed, it can be conveyed to the mind by music,\nby a certain sort of impressionism in writing and painting. We have\nknowledge of the labyrinth of the world because our body and soul and\nbeing is a labyrinth, and part answers to part. We understand such music\nwith our whole bodies, not only with our ears; we see such pictures with\nthe soul itself, which is all eye, rather than with the mere physical\neye. It is truth\u2014heavenly harmony.\n\nA paragraph of good writing is a labyrinth: it is comprised in one\nbreath, and mirrors in its construction the natural stops and alleys of\nthe body. Every fruit is a labyrinth.\n\nAll disorder is a diviner order not understood: the order of the\nlabyrinth, the disorder of the starry sky, the disorder of the forest,\nthe disorder of the world, of a nation, of the web of intricacies on the\npalm of a hand.\n\nAll astronomy, astrology, geography, cosmography, botany, natural\nhistory, palmistry are more or less the tracing of the lines of the\nlabyrinth, our playful attempts to follow out the mystical maze of\nnatural phenomena.\n\nThe lines which men trace in their goings to and fro upon the world are\npart of the mystical tracery, so also are the tracks of the clouds, the\noutlines of coasts, the ramifications of the lines of rocks.\n\nReflections of the labyrinth are caught in many curious pictures and\npatterns: in the design on butterfly\u2019s wings, the markings on plumage,\nthe lines and mottling on birds\u2019 eggs, the frosting on the window-pane.\n\nAll the rest of nature seems unconscious of it; but we men are half\nconscious, and pause and stare continually at what we call astonishing\nor curious or wonderful things. Our life is a life of lisping and\nmarvelling. Every thrill is the accompaniment of a perception of part of\nthe labyrinth; death itself is our greatest thrill, and is perhaps the\nnecessary phenomenon of fuller initiation.\n\n\n\n\n                                   II\n                            MARTHA AND MARY\n\n\n\n\n                                   I\n                              THE _PODVIG_\n\n\nRussian Christianity is sharply in contrast with Western Christianity in\nthe characteristic idea of denial of \u201cthe world,\u201d as opposed to our\nWestern idea of accepting the world and \u201cmaking the best of it.\u201d An\nessential idea in Russian Christianity is denial of \u201cthe world,\u201d denial\nof this mortal life as real life, denial of material force as real\nforce, denial of speech as real speech. An act of denial is called a\n_podvig_, and a man who does some great act of denial is called a\n_podvizhnik_.\n\nThe act of Jesus on the mountain denying the road that led to the empire\nof the world in favour of the road that led to an ignoble death is a\n_podvig_\u2014denial of the world.\n\n\u201cTurning the other cheek\u201d is a _podvig_\u2014denial of material power.\n\nGoing two miles with the man who forces you to go one is a _podvig_.\n\nMary, breaking the precious box of alabaster which might have been sold\nin aid of the poor, accomplished a _podvig_.\n\nSimon Stylites, standing on the pillar when he might have been doing\n\u201cuseful work in the world,\u201d was a _podvizhnik_.\n\nThe hermits of the Thebaid were all doing _podvigs_\u2014renouncing the\nworld.\n\nFather Seraphim, who took an oath of silence and was silent thirty-five\nyears\u2014proving in himself that silence was golden\u2014accomplished a great\n_podvig_.\n\nIt is difficult in Russia to carry on a discussion of any point of\nreligion without coming to a consideration of this idea of the _podvig_.\nFor instance there is a saying in Russia, \u201cBlessed is he who can escape\nand yet chooses to take the punishment the world would give him.\u201d A\nstory is told in Russia that when Jesus was stretched on the cross many\nof those who had accepted his doctrines were in great distress not\nknowing that this had got to be; but they said among themselves, \u201cYou\nwill see: there will be a miracle. I wouldn\u2019t be in the place of these\nstupid and brutal Roman soldiers for worlds. You will see He will step\noff the cross, and amaze and conquer the world.\u201d And in their anxiety\nand excitement they cried out: \u201cSave thyself.\u201d Pessimists whispered to\none another sad thoughts, \u201cAlas, alas! has it not always been so in the\nworld\u2019s history; mankind has stoned the prophets of God. Now He is going\nto die, to perish miserably, and the whole new movement will be ruined.\nPeople who never saw Him work miracles will say He was a charlatan, and\nthat He never had any mission or any power. But we who saw Him raise the\ndead know He has the power to save Himself.\u201d But both the optimists and\nthe pessimists were wrong. They did not realise that the Man on the\ncross was giving the lie to the reality of death and to the material\npower of the Romans and the Jews. The giving the lie is the _podvig_.\n\nThat strange German fairy tale of the three sluggards is probably taken\nfrom conquered Slavs. There lies in it something of the Russian point of\nview. The old king gave his kingdom to the son who would not save\nhimself from the gallows-tree, even though a knife were put into his\nhand to cut himself down. The German version is that the king gave the\nthrone to the laziest of the three, but in reality he gave it to the one\nwho was most capable of denying the world.\n\nDostoieffsky had a habit of saying that he was glad to have gone through\npenal exile in Siberia, and he felt that those revolutionaries who fled\nabroad and did not accept the worldly judgment and punishment meted out\nby the Russian court were not true to Russian ideas and not in reality\nhelping Russia. He would have preferred that they accepted the cross\nwhich Russia put upon them. Dostoieffsky constantly refers to himself as\na slice from the loaf of Russia, a slice from the communion loaf\u2014a share\nin the sacrifice. Those who flee from punishment are outside the\ncommunion, they have no real portion in Russia. \u201cThe religion of\nsuffering\u201d does not mean \u201csuffering for its own sake,\u201d but rather the\nreligion of not avoiding suffering, not avoiding or trying to avoid\ndestiny. The religion of the _podvig_.\n\nA tempter once came to a hermit living in a cave, and told him about the\npain and misery and poverty of his fellow-men living in the world, and\nasked him what he would do if a million of money were brought to his\ncave and put at his disposal. The hermit crossed himself and muttered,\n\u201cGet thee behind me, Satan!\u201d The tempter was annoyed and urged his\npoint. \u201cBut what would you do?\u201d he asked.\n\n\u201cI should not alter my way of life,\u201d said the hermit.\n\nThat was a _podvig_, a denial of the reality of misery on earth, a\ndenial of the power of money to gain real happiness for man.\n\nOne of the most interesting of Russian mystery plays, Andreief\u2019s\n_Anathema_, is concerned almost wholly with this idea. A man after God\u2019s\nown heart succumbs to the temptation of thinking he can put the world\nright with money. He inherits a million from a relative who has died in\nAmerica, and he sets to work to alleviate human suffering. But the more\nsuffering he tries to remedy the more appears before him, till finally\nhe is drowned in suffering, and God says to Human Reason, \u201cNot by these\nmeasures shall it be measured, nor by these numbers shall it be counted,\nnor by these weights shall it be weighed, O Anathema, dwelling among\nnumbers and measures, and not yet born into light!\u201d\n\nThis idea is so pervasive, so characteristic, that I would call it an\nextra letter in the alphabet of Russian philosophy.\n\n                  *       *       *       *       *\n\nThe history of literature is the history of ideas.\n\nMan first made sounds to represent elementary ideas such as hunger,\ncold, warmth, danger, death. Then he made signs to represent sounds, and\ninvented reading and writing. The signs were systematised; they were\nsplit up into letters and then remade as words. Alphabets and\ndictionaries were made. Languages grew.\n\nAt first people spoke only of hunger, cold, pain, pleasure, fighting,\ndeath, and such simple things. They had perhaps only five hundred or so\nwords. But year by year they added to words as they discovered new\nthings in the world and in themselves.\n\nAt first clever men, brave warriors, intrepid hunters gave us words;\nthen philosophers and astrologers and historians; then priests and\nminstrels and poets. They named all the things on the world and their\nfeelings about the things; they named the ideas for which men fought,\nfor which tribes and nations fought. They named the things of which they\nwere afraid, the evil spirits in the darkness, in the forests, in the\nearthquakes and tempests. Last of all, when they found and considered\nthe great spirit of man, the spirit in themselves, they named the gods,\nand they named the transcendental glories and sorrows of man.\n\nThe minstrels struck their harps and sang of the great deeds of famous\nmen, and then poets without harps wrote of the same deeds, changing into\nwords the music of the harp as well. Priests burned sacrifices on\naltars, and the poets wrote of it and changed the smoke of the incense\ninto words. Great warriors fought before Troy, and the poets changed\ntheir passion into words. They sailed the terrible seas ten years to get\nhome, and the poets changed the storms into words. The poets found out\nthe assonances of mankind, what every one admired, and they gave to\nwhole generations watch-words, words that were battle-flags. The poets\ndescribed the gods.\n\nPoems were so much read that whole lines and verses were as familiar as\nordinary words, and people could quote a line of poetry and everybody\nwould know the idea that was meant. And when the name of a god or a hero\nwas mentioned there rose at once to people\u2019s minds stories about him,\npoems about him.\n\nStories became like extra words in the language. That is what the\nwonderful Greek stories such as those of Narcissus, Demeter, and\nPersephone, and the labours of Hercules became\u2014extra words in the\ndictionary or, better still, extra letters. For simple people took them\ninto their lives, and combined them with their own thoughts, and made\nnew words of their own. People learnt to use these stories in their\nprayers and in all their thoughts of mankind.\n\nSome nations like the Jews, the Egyptians, the Greeks, grew to great\nculture, and the peoples in their beautiful capitals struck thousands of\nharps and sang thousands of songs, whilst away in the backwoods and lost\nplaces of the world the rest of mankind lived almost inarticulate,\nalmost like beasts,\u2014in Germany, in Gaul, in what is now Russia, in\nBritain. But their upward movement was at hand. A new idea came into the\nworld and all the old order changed, giving place to new. The last of\nthe stories which became a word was the story of Christ on the cross.\n\u201cThe Word became flesh and dwelt among us.\u201d An extraordinary new letter\nwas given to the world, and people fitted it into their thoughts and\nmade new words, new languages, new cultures.\n\nThe savage races of Western Europe came turbulently to the knowledge of\nthe God-like in themselves, and threw the world into confusion,\nobserving the old words and stories and culture of the ancient world.\nThey followed the word-flags of Christianity, the watchwords. Once more\nthe making of language was first in the hands of clever artificers,\nbrave warriors, intrepid hunters, adventurous sailors. It passed into\nthe hands of medi\u00e6val philosophers, alchemists, and scholars, to\nminstrels, priests, and poets. At last they realised a wide and wondrous\nculture, and they took from the ancient world all the stories and extra\nwords and letters now called myths, and they added them to their own\nstories and words, as one might add strings to a stringed instrument.\nThey learned to praise God on many strings.\n\nTo-day we express ourselves with great orchestras as formerly, long long\nago, man, emerging from the animal, the rude Pan learned to express\nhimself on a simple reed.\n\nThe discovery of words has been the history of self-expression. Words\nhave no value in themselves. They are symbols or tokens of ideas in us.\nAnd when we find words continually adding themselves to our vocabulary\nand our culture, we know ourselves increasing in the knowledge of\nourselves and of the beauty and passion which lie latent in our souls.\nEducation in its highest sense is the learning of words and the learning\nhow to use them, learning the notes of the great instrument, learning\nhow to play the music of the ages, and to express with that music and\nwith that playing the passion and the mystery of our own souls.\n\nThe highest of literature, like the noblest of music, is that wherein\nthe great stories are used as extra letters and words. Rich writing is\nthat which is full of allusions which we all understand. Poor literature\nis often that in which the author is frequently making allusions to\nevents and stories which are known only to a few and have no strong\nsignificance. To use stories as words when the majority of people do not\nknow the stories is to write in a language that is not understood, it is\nto write in words that are not in use. The reality of a book that draws\nits allusions from the Bible and from the Greek myths and general\nEuropean history is immeasurably greater than one that is constantly\nreferring to the Koran or the stories of the Buddha or Zoroaster or\nKhrishna or Confucius. That is in itself an adequate defence of\nChristianity as a religion for us. Its stories are our stories. Its Word\nis the living Word. The other stories are not our stories. Christianity\nis our language. If ever asked to defend Christianity, the defence lies\nnot in the historical accuracy of Christian documents or the verity of\nrecords. Christianity is the _Word_. All words are at our disposal for\nthe expression of our passion and the sense of our mystery. The\nChristian story is the word that fits.\n\nOur golden deeds, the deeds we consider as golden, are our extra\nletters. Let the poets and musicians blend them into their music. Every\ntime a golden deed is made to sound beautifully in allusion a common\nchord is struck in the souls of men.\n\n                  *       *       *       *       *\n\nAnd the _podvig_ is an extra letter. There are many who claim that it is\nthe word itself; that denial of \u201cthe world\u201d is actually the _logos_ of\nChristianity. Even in Russia, where there is also the richer and grander\nconception of the Church, there are those who stand for the _podvig_\nonly, for denial of the world and material force only. Witness Tolstoy\nand many of his followers. It is even held by some that the whole of\ntrue and vital and historical Christianity is founded on\u2014\u201cIf thine eye\noffend thee, pluck it out; if thy right hand offend thee, cut it off.\u201d\nThe important sect of _Skoptsi_ go so far as to say that the begetting\nof children is sin, and they mutilate themselves, and in that way deny\nlife in the name of the spiritual life.\n\n\n\n\n                                   II\n                    THE HERMITAGE OF FATHER SERAPHIM\n\n\nThinking of the _podvig_, I made a pilgrimage to the hermitage of Father\nSeraphim, a few hundred miles from Moscow.\n\nOver treeless wastes and desolate commons, where far-away churches on\nthe sea of snow look like ships sailing under full canvas; through\nsnow-blown forests of pines, through woods of tall birch trees; very\nseldom past villages or human beings\u2014to the holy city of Arzamas in the\nGovernment of Nizhni-Novgorod. A night in an inn among the many churches\nof Arzamas, and then on the road across fifty miles of desolate\nsnow-covered moor that lie between the city and the great monastery. I\nhear of the terrible hurricane that has swept southern Russia, and the\nflood that has drowned hundreds of poor fisher-folk and workmen on the\nshores of the Azof. To-day there is bad weather all over Russia. It is\nten degrees colder, it still snows, and a high easterly gale is blowing\nup the fallen snow and the drift-tops and drift slopes in blinding\nclouds that look like engine smokes and volumes of vapour. A bitter day.\n\nThere are no pilgrims on the way, the weather is too heavy for them.\nOften as you stand and try to go forward over the uneven road, the wind\nsets you sliding backward on the clumps of ice, and you suddenly blunder\ninto two feet of soft snow. You come to little cottages on the Sarof\nside of which stand drifts higher than the cottages themselves; they\nlook like cliffs, and the snow blowing off unceasingly and tempestuously\nabove the cottage roofs looks like long white grass going in all\ndirections at the sport of the gale. In the afternoon the snow ceases to\nfall from the sky, but it still rises in smokes and sprays over the\nrolling plains. Far away on the horizon to which I am journeying the\nblack line of the wolf-haunted forest is visible. At night I sleep in a\npeasant\u2019s hut, on felt spread on the floor. A whole family goes to sleep\nin the same room, and as I lie stretched flat on this primitive couch,\nresting my weather-beaten limbs, each of the others says his prayers\nbefore the many ikons. There are many ikons in the room, and besides\nthem, holy oleographs enough to give the idea that the bare wooden walls\nhave been papered on some religious design. Chief among the pictures is\na representation of the Tsar and the Grand Dukes giving their shoulders\nto the triumphal carrying of the relics of the Father Seraphim, on the\noccasion of the canonisation of the Russian hermit and _starets_.\n\nFather Seraphim was a saintly monk and ghostly counsellor of the type of\nFather Zosima, familiar to English readers of _The Brothers Karamazof_.\nHe accomplished extraordinary holy exploits during his youth and middle\nage, conquering the flesh and denying the world, and in his old age\nbecame famous for his godly sagacity and humility. When he died his body\nwas reputed to have in it holy charm, and thousands of peasants brought\ntheir sick and their blind, and their sins and their sorrows to the\nmiracle-working relics. Finally the Empress, wishing to have a male\nchild, abode at the monastery and prayed, and Father Seraphim gave\nRussia a Tsarevitch. The Tsar named Seraphim as a saint, and the shrine\nof Sarof, already astonishingly sought of pilgrims, gained a great\necclesiastical distinction. Hence this grand oleograph on the wall.\n\nI slept as one sleeps who, after weeks in town, is one day surcharged\nwith open air. Next morning the whole family was up before dawn, and the\nsamovar was on the table in the grey light of sunrise. A man from the\nvillage decided to accompany me to Sarof.\n\n\u201cHaven\u2019t been there for four years,\u201d said he, \u201cand now I\u2019m homesick to\nsee it again. I think I\u2019ll go and pray a little.\u201d\n\nWe talked of Father Seraphim on the way.\n\n\u201cIs the cell still there where he fed the bear with bread?\u201d I asked.\n\n\u201cYes, it\u2019s there; about five versts from the monastery away in the\nwoods. There is a shrine there now. You\u2019ll see the stone, too, on which\nhe prayed a thousand days and a thousand nights without moving away. And\nthe spring that he found. Many people have been cured there. It\u2019s quite\nunusual water. Will you bathe?\u201d\n\n\u201cPerhaps,\u201d said I. \u201cBut the weather\u2019s cold.\u201d\n\n\u201cNo one ever takes cold there,\u201d said the peasant. \u201cIt\u2019s quite safe. The\nwater is very very cold. But there\u2019s something about it. You take it\nhome, it doesn\u2019t go bad like ordinary water.\u201d\n\n\u201cHe was a great saint, this Father Seraphim!\u201d\n\n\u201cOf course; he was a God-serviceable man, he did many _podvigs_.\u201d\n\nWhen we arrived at the monastery in the holy wood we were accommodated\nin a cell, and a novice brought in the samovar at once. No passports\nwere required, no charge was made. We found at the monastery some two or\nthree hundred other pilgrims, most of whom had been there several days.\nA pleasant collection of churches, hostelries, little shops, and\nwork-sheds set on a fair hill among ancient pines, a peaceful shelter\nand sanctuary after the wild weather and desolation of the moors. We\nwandered about the buildings in the dusk, listened to the antique\nchimes, and then returned to sleep a few hours before the midnight bell\nto the first service of the morrow. About one in the morning we left our\ncells and all muffled up and mysterious followed other pilgrims across\nthe soft new snow to the door of the Cathedral of the Assumption. Then\nin the witching hour of night we entered the church\u2014such an immense\nchurch it seemed, barely lit by the few struggling tapers, and we such a\nfew people in it. The peasants, however, paid no attention to numbers,\nand they stood and prayed and crossed themselves and gave the responses\nfor hours and hours, at last receiving the blessing of the priest,\nkissing the cross in his hand, being marked on the brow with holy water,\nstepping up to the altar and kissing through a hole in some canvas a\npart of the remains of the saint. There was nothing touching in the\nservice except the demeanour of the pilgrims, no music worth mentioning.\nOur leaving our beds to come and stand for hours on the cathedral floor\nwithout an inclination to shirk or go out was a _podvig_\u2014an inbred part\nof the Russian character now.\n\nI went to a fuller service later in the day, in a church much more\nalight with candles, taken by a deacon with a deep spirit-summoning\nvoice, and mellowed by wonderful choral accompaniments, a long service\nrequiring patience from the aged folk who came to take part in it.\n\nA seventy-five-year-old dame explained in one of the monastery\ndining-rooms, as some twenty of us with wooden spoons sat round four\nhuge Russian basins of soup and helped ourselves together\u2014\u201cI felt I\nmight die before it ended, but I prayed to the holy _Ugodnik_, Father\nSeraphim, to ask God to give me strength to stay till the end of the\nservice.\u201d\n\n\u201cWhy not to God direct?\u201d I asked.\n\n\u201cIt\u2019s not for a poor creature like me to trouble God to attend to me,\u201d\nsaid she. \u201cNo, I ask the _Ugodniki_, if they have time, to go to Him and\nask Him at a convenient moment....\u201d\n\n\u201cAs to the Tsar,\u201d said some one.\n\n\u201cBut God has time for every one,\u201d said another, \u201cand can attend to\neverything at once....\u201d\n\n\u201c_Pozhalui_, I suppose so ...\u201d said the old woman meekly in a cracked\nvoice, and went on with her soup.\n\nI talked with one of the monks about Father Seraphim. What a character\nthe Russian hermit was; there is material in his life for the pen of\nanother Carlyle writing a new Past and Present. He was silent all those\nthirty-five years, and then opened his mouth. Alas! no one could tell me\nthe first words that he spoke. He was actually silent all the time that\nNapoleon was ravaging Russia, during the time when he was in occupation\nof the holy mother of Russian cities, Moscow. Napoleon was popularly\nunderstood in Russia as Antichrist, and when the news of the terrible\nFrench sacrilege spread over Russia there were all manner of extravagant\nrumours about the end of the world.\n\nBy this time Seraphim had obtained a name of great sanctity. Sick men\nhad been restored to health by drinking from the hermitage well, the\nleprous had discharged their disease by touching the garments of the\nholy but silent man. So when Napoleon came to Moscow, the crowd appealed\nto Seraphim to work a miracle.\n\n\u201cThey are burning our sacred shrines,\u201d they cried, \u201cthey are using our\ncathedrals as places of execution, they are murdering our priests and\nour pilgrims. Is it naught to thee, Father?\u201d\n\nBut Seraphim was silent.\n\nAnd others said, \u201cHe is called Napoleon, but he is in reality\nAntichrist. Lead us, O Seraphim, against him in the name of the Lord.\u201d\n\nBut Seraphim was silent. His face retained unchanged its look of\nexaltation; his uplifted eyes still seemed bent on some unearthly\nvision; his attentive ears seemed to be listening to some other voices.\nThe old monk never spoke a word. Napoleon and the world had no power to\nshatter his vision. Napoleons might come and go, but the truth to which\nhe was a witness remained unchanging, unchanged. And if Napoleon had\ncome to Sarof and pulled the hermitage down about Seraphim\u2019s ears, the\nold monk would still have prayed on in silence.\n\nAlmost every characteristic of the Father and every circumstance of his\nlife had something in it that is emblematic and suggestive. In his old\nage, when he became so famous, he received thousands of letters, most of\nwhich, however, he answered without opening! It is told how in his old\nage the light of sainthood shone from his brow, and on one occasion a\nholy man coming to visit him in his cell found the light too strong for\nhis eyes and shielded them with his hands.\n\n\u201cWhat is the matter?\u201d said Father Seraphim.\n\n\u201cThe light shines from your head, O holy one.\u201d\n\n\u201cDo not be afraid,\u201d said the Father. \u201cYou also are bright as I am or you\ncould not have seen me thus. I see you also a shining one. Thank God\nthat it has been given to miserable Seraphim to see a manifestation of\nthe Holy Spirit.\u201d\n\nThe Father during his hermitage scooped out of the trunk of a\nlightning-stricken oak the coffin that should hold his remains when he\ndied, and he pulled it in at the door of his hut, slept in it at night,\nand prayed beside it by day.\n\nHe was an extraordinary ascetic, and yet in the picture that you get of\nhim in his old age, when he relaxed his asceticism, he is distinguished\nby the warmth of his love and the sweetness of his counsel. The pilgrims\nwho come to him he calls his \u201cjoys\u201d; before even the wicked he falls\ndown and he kisses their feet. When he gives his benediction he also\ngives a handful of that dried black bread, _sukaree_, with which he fed\nMishenka, the bear which he tamed in the woods\u2014Father Seraphim\u2019s bread\nwhich came down from heaven, the bread of the _podvig_.\n\nMy pilgrim acquaintance took me to the various shrines, and we knelt and\nkissed the thousand-day stone still standing before the great rough-hewn\ncross that the saint made, kissed the ikons, crossed ourselves before\nmany forest shrines, and eventually came to the far shrine where\nSeraphim spent so many years in the wilderness. Here an aged monk,\ntaking the place of the _starets_, asked us our Christian names and\nwhere we came from. He had a great sack of _sukaree_ similar to that\nwhich Seraphim had dispensed, and he gave us each a handful with his\nparting benediction. At the well, now made into an elaborate bath-house,\nmen one side and women the other, my pilgrim had a bath. It struck me as\nrather interesting that the monks of Sarof had fitted a dozen or so taps\nto Seraphim\u2019s natural spring and conducted it through pipes\u2014that is the\ntrue ecclesiastical function, to put taps to living water.\n\nI went into the bath-house and watched some peasants stand under the\nfrigid douche, and when my friend had put his clothes on again\u2014without\ndrying himself\u2014we took each a bottle of the water and put it in our\npockets.\n\nThen away again from Sarof and home over the snow. I carried the\n_sukaree_ and the water from the well that I might give them to the old\ngrandmother at Vladikavkaz when I went south\u2014the actual _sukaree_ with\nwhich Father Seraphim fed the bear! Some weeks later when I went to the\nCaucasian city I call my Russian home I took the old lady my gift from\nthe Father. Next day behold her doling out half-thimblefuls of the water\nto her visitors and giving them each a crumb of the comfort of St.\nSeraphim to eat.\n\n\n\n\n                                  III\n                       TOLSTOY\u2019S FLIGHT FROM HOME\n\n\n    ASTAPOVO RAILWAY STATION.\n\n\nFrom a historical figure to a contemporary figure. From the simplicity\nof a medi\u00e6val choice such as Seraphim\u2019s to the difficulty of the choice\nthat confronts a modern.\n\nNothing in Tolstoy\u2019s life is so interesting to me as the circumstances\nof his death, his flight from home to the monastery, his perishing on a\nwayside station like some aged pilgrim broken down on the way to\nJerusalem. The story is such a beautiful, pathetic, touching one that\nthe station of Astapovo may well be an object of pilgrimage for people\nwho can feel in themselves the poignancies of life, and who are\ninterested in the destinies of mankind.\n\nNot a place for sightseers, however! A dreary journey at the rate of\neighteen miles an hour and at the end of it all this little station on a\nby-line. In the waiting-room are peasants in rags, in sheepskins, in old\nblouses, peasants sleeping on forms; bundles on the floor, heaps of\nbundles, tied-up sacks, ancient green trunks. On one side of the room is\na grandfather\u2019s clock, on the other is a little wooden chapel with ikons\nand votive candles. From the clock to the chapel runs a long\nlinoleum-covered bar, and on the ikon side of it are scores of fresh\nloaves, while on the clock side are vodka and wine. On the top of the\nclock burns a paraffin lamp. There is praying and disputing and\ntea-drinking, children crying, bundles, boxes, pointsmen with dim\nlanterns, a mouldy-looking gendarme, and it is five o\u2019clock in the\nmorning.\n\nOut of the lingering train they brought Tolstoy into just such a room\nand to such a scene. \u201cThey brought him through here,\u201d says the heavy\nbearded man behind the bar, \u201cand they put him first in the woman\u2019s room\nand then took him to a room in the stationmaster\u2019s house.\u201d\n\nThe man behind the bar has trained his whiskers to look like those of\nTolstoy, and is vain enough to ask me: \u201cDid you not take me for\nTolstoy\u2019s double? Some are frightened when they see me and think I am\nTolstoy\u2019s ghost. Am I not like him?\u201d\n\n\u201cDid you look as like him _then_? What did Tolstoy\u2019s friends think of\nyour appearance?\u201d\n\n\u201cThey laughed.\u201d\n\n\u201cDid you have many people here?\u201d\n\n\u201cNot many strangers, fifteen of the family, twenty correspondents, a\ngeneral from Petrograd, two doctors.... I put them all up and fed them.\u201d\n\nA gruff, astonishing old fellow, this double of Tolstoy. A strange\ncoincidence that Tolstoy should die at his station. He is heavy,\nawkward, unpleasant-looking, like a Guy Fawkes effigy of Tolstoy; and as\nyou watch him cross the waiting-room it seems as if his hair might fall\noff and prove to be a wig, and as if one might pull his beard and\nwhiskers away.\n\nBut he is quite obliging to me, and shows me the marble tablet in the\nstationmaster\u2019s wooden wall, and directs me to the room in which\neverything stands just as it did then, which is being preserved so _for\nall time_\u2014if Time spares Tolstoy\u2019s memory.\n\nThe first I ever heard of Tolstoy was the discrediting whisper, \u201cHis\nwife banks his money; everything is in his wife\u2019s name.\u201d And later on,\nwhen I came to Russia, coupled with national pride in Leo Nikolaevitch\nwas always the rumour: \u201cWhen he wants to go to Moscow he travels\nfirst-class; he does not go on foot as he advises others to do. He\ncounsels us to live simply while he himself lives in style at Yasnaya\nPolyana. He disbelieves in doctors, but when the least thing is the\nmatter with him doctors are in attendance.\u201d I suppose no one really put\nthese things in the balance against Tolstoy\u2019s sincerity\u2014unless, perhaps,\nit was Tolstoy himself.\n\nTolstoy was evidently heavily oppressed by the worldly life in which he\nseemed to share and which he seemed to countenance. It was mirrored in\nhis soul as the everyday reflection of life, the luxury, feasting,\ndrinking, trivial conversation, and vulgar pride of his home.\n\nSome time in his life, perhaps several times, Tolstoy must have been on\nthe point of running away. In order to make his personal life correspond\nto his teaching, it would have been necessary to give up his wife and\nfamily and the life they insisted on living. He ought to have gone out\ninto the wilderness and become a hermit or a pilgrim. So he would have\nmade his personality and doctrine into one great snow-crowned mountain\nand holy landmark in the national life of Russia.\n\nTolstoy failed to do this, not through weakness, but because he felt he\nwould lift a heavier cross and would be truer to his own ideal if he\ncontinued to lead his life in \u201cthe world,\u201d in the midst of the\nfrivolities and luxuries which did not pertain to him. He would live his\npersonal life against the background of this stupidity, his flesh nailed\nto that cross.\n\nHis life will not stand out in relief till some one writes the evangel\nof his life. As yet Tolstoy is merely a great man, the author of _Anna\nKarenina_ and _War and Peace_. Few know the real significance of his\nlife. But certainly it may be said of him, despite calumnies and\nappearances, \u201cHe had no possessions on earth; he always confessed to\nbeing a stranger and a pilgrim here. He did not believe that machinery\nor medicine or law were of any value to the soul of man. And though he\nlived in the midst of wealth he lived very simply.\u201d\n\nA very brilliant old man at Yasnaya Polyana. You went away impressed\nwith his brilliance, and even if you were inclined to scoff you still\nacknowledged he was great. But greatness was not much to Tolstoy; it was\nsurely nothing to him that he remained _great_ to the end. The chief\nfact about him was that for many years he was really _old_ and confused\nin spirit, troubled. In his heart of hearts he was not sure that he was\nliving the true life. He felt a doubt that the emptiness and vanity\naround him were his own emptiness and vanity. The world was too much\nwith him; the vision forsook him.\n\nIn the blaze up of the candle before death he saw his way and sought\nsanctuary from the world, fled....\n\nAnd he perished on the road, with his back to Yasnaya Polyana and the\n\u201cworld.\u201d In the room where he died are the poor two-foot-six by\nfive-foot-six iron bedstead, the table with medicine bottles, a chair,\nthe enamel basin they washed him in. It is all to remain as it was on\nthe day that he died. Pleasant symbolism! The world will also remain the\nsame: it will remove his body to Yasnaya Polyana, and quarrel over the\nprayer to be said over the grave; it will quarrel over the rights in his\nautograph manuscripts; it will publish the old man\u2019s love-letters; it\nwill rig up in Moscow a facsimile of Astapovo Station and the room where\nhe died; it will arrange ten-year jubilees, fifty-year jubilees,\ncentenaries; build statues ...; but those who seek to know the true\nTolstoy, the real man who had this strange life-journey, will hear the\nwhisper, \u201cBe of good cheer; I have overcome the world.\u201d\n\n\n\n\n                                   IV\n                             BACK TO MOSCOW\n\n\nThe Russians are considerably more interested in religion and religious\nideas than other nations. Perhaps that is due to the greater national\ngrowth and greater national changes: questions about destiny rise to the\nsurface of each man\u2019s mind. The appetite for religious discussion is\nrobust and eager. You go to a debate which begins at eight in the\nevening. Some one reads a lecture which lasts three hours and then there\nis a three hours\u2019 general discussion. The room is packed, no windows are\nopen, but every one is keen. A roar of general conversation ensues at\nthe ten-minutes interval every hour and a half.\n\nA curious story enacted itself whilst I was in Moscow this spring. A\njournalist discovered a group of Hindu philosophers doing a turn at a\nsmart cabaret restaurant. In the midst of a vulgar music-hall programme\nthey were performing rather beautifully on their native instruments.\nThey seemed somewhat out of place; and the journalist, knowing English,\nsought them out and entered into conversation with them\u2014as you can at\nthe cabaret, where performers mix pretty freely with those who have come\nto eat and be amused. Two days later the story of the Hindus appeared in\none of the Moscow newspapers. Their leader was the chosen missionary of\nSufism, and was going through all the world preaching a new gospel. He\nhad had a considerable fashionable success in London and Paris, and at\nthe latter city a Russian hearing his music\u2014which was in itself an\nillustration of Sufism\u2014had said, \u201cCome to Russia; I\u2019ll arrange\neverything for you.\u201d\n\n\u201cI\u2019d like to,\u201d said the Hindu; \u201cI have long wished to go there.\u201d\n\nThe Russian brought a form of contract and engaged the missionary and\nhis fellows to play every night for six months in cabaret restaurants\nand music-halls in Russia. But the Hindu averred that he thought he was\nsigning an agreement for a lecturing tour.\n\nReaders of this story in the morning newspapers were much touched, and a\nlady whom I know sought out X\u2014\u2014 at his hotel, questioned him, and found\nthat he was indeed a serious religious man, desirous of spreading the\ngospel of Sufism in Russia. And she promised to rescue his mission.\n\nIn a week or so she had arranged a meeting for him, and X\u2014\u2014 came with\nhis fellow-Hindus and their instruments and gave a lecture and rendered\nsome music. Several of the most cultured people in Moscow were present.\nMme. Ivanova, the wife of Viacheslaf Ivanof, interpreted for him\nsentence by sentence, and afterwards question by question, and answer by\nanswer. The lecture amounted briefly to this: \u201cFirst there was the One\nand then all was peace, happiness, bliss. Then the One became the many,\nand there will never be peace, happiness, bliss again until the many\nbecomes the One. Therefore we should strive towards the One and get rid\nof the sense of the many.\u201d\n\nThe lecture lasted about an hour, and the Russians were pleased,\ncurious, earnest. They took the Hindu seriously, and questioned and\ncross-questioned without mercy. The gentle prophet gave the sweetest\nreplies, delicately evading, politely agreeing, playfully turning\nsimplicities into paradoxes and back again, and all his terms of speech\nwere definite and simple. He never took refuge in anything vague or\nemotional, treated the infinities and the immensities like little toys\nor bits of toys. Everything was clear to him, everything simple; he was\nabove all things playful. But the Russians sent question after question\nand would not take evasion or smile at playfulness, till at last at\nhalf-past eleven the gentle Eastern begged to be excused if he did not\nanswer any more questions as he was tired. Indeed he seemed worn out.\nBut the Russians had a feeling of disappointment. For them the evening\nwas only beginning.\n\nThe question of the many and the One, the world or the cell, the many\ncares of Martha or the one devotion of Mary, would keep any Russian\naudience speculating for an indefinite length of time.\n\nIn Moscow in March I met again Mme. Odintseva. A great change had come\nover her life. Her husband had been killed, her fortune lost, and she\nhad changed her religion. When I met her first she was a Theosophist, a\nmodern Hypatia whose home was a temple, an elegant woman surrounded by\npictures and volumes of poetry, her own especial rooms all scented with\nrose de Shiraz. Now all was changed in her life; no pictures, no poets,\nno perfume, no elegance, and she had exchanged Theosophy for evangelical\nChristianity. The particulars of her husband\u2019s death had evidently been\na terrible shock to her. He had been in the habit of paying blackmail to\na band of revolutionaries or depraved police, and one night he either\nfailed to bring the money demanded of him, or he quarrelled with his\npersecutors, or he got tired of life and committed suicide. He was found\nshot dead, in a lonely spot a mile from his home. A note appointing the\nrendezvous was found, but the writer was never traced. His wife\nnecessarily does not tell what she went through in mind and soul, but\nthe astonishing result was visible in her new life and home in Moscow.\nAll was in disorder, everything had become coarser, harder. She herself\nwas much stouter, had given up vegetarianism, dressed very simply, read\nonly volumes of sermons and the New Testament, referred all questions to\ntexts in the Gospels, and went to prayer-meetings every other night.\n\nI accompanied her on one occasion. We went to what may be styled the\nlowest sort of Evangelical meeting in Moscow. There is no Salvation Army\nthere. This was something in the nature of a slum shelter meeting. The\npreacher was an enthusiastic barber. There were five or six hundred men\nand women present at the meeting, and a gendarme stood at the back to\nsee that nothing objectionable was said.\n\n\u201cWe have converted three gendarmes,\u201d said Mme. Odintseva in my ear. We\nsat on forms at one side of the room, and could survey the whole meeting\nwithout turning our heads. The men present were straight from toil,\ngrimy, unkempt, wild-looking. A few years ago the same type of workman\ngrasped a revolver in his pocket and thought of barricades and\nrevolutions. Now he has a New Testament and sings hymns in dark rooms,\nthe tears stealing down his face the while.\n\nAs they sat waiting the opening of the service they looked a stolid,\nheavy, unemotional crowd, the pale broad-browed women with shawls on\ntheir heads, the heavy, unshaven, clumsy men in ill-fitting clothes\nheavy with dirt. But they all changed under the influence of religious\nfeeling. There was a consciousness of unanimity in this low, vast,\nirregular room. Something not to be put down in words communicated\nitself from man to man. No one had come there to sleep through the\nsermon or, like Yourgis at Chicago, to get out of the cold. There was\nattention to the reading of the Scriptures, a communion of melancholy\nlove and passion in the singing of the simple hymns, testifying and\nconfessing with sobs and gesticulations in the midst of the prayers,\nhappy cries of pain and anguish from people whose sole confession was,\n\u201cI am unworthy, Lord, an unworthy one; O Lord, have mercy!\u201d\n\nThe barber\u2019s sermon was simple and sweet. \u201cRead the Gospel, brothers;\nthe whole sense of your lives is in the Gospel. If you are in doubt\nwhich way to act turn to the Gospel; do not ask other people, do not try\nto remember what other people have done, but be guided directly by the\nwords of God. And if you have sinned, and if your past life has become\nunbearable to you, do not despair, turn to the Testament; it is just one\nbig forgiveness from beginning to end.\u201d\n\nMme. Odintseva was anxious that I should like the barber; he was a\nfavourite of hers. Frequently during his sermon she whispered in my ear,\nand called my attention to points she considered good. Yes, the barber\nwas interesting; he was giving a new criterion to the people, a new\ntouchstone for good and evil.\n\nAfter his sermon we concluded with ten minutes\u2019 private prayer and a\nlast hymn. In England the private prayer would have been silent, and\nthere would have been that strange surcharged silence which suggests to\nthe mind that there might be an explosion if one were to light a match.\nBut in Russia though they had borrowed the idea they had understood its\npractice differently. The prayer was not silent.\n\nWe all stood up to pray, and as we stood there began a murmuring and a\nmumbling and a calling, a general muttering and a crying, a sonorous\nclamour, hands waving, faces thrown upward toward heaven, faces drooping\nand sobbing, every one saying his own prayer, and every one saying\ndifferent. It was a music, a symphony of pain and anguish from an\norchestra of human hearts. I did not pray, but looked about me and saw\nthe people swaying as if a wind were blowing among them. There seemed to\nbe no silent lips, and the barber-pastor prayed with the rest,\nindistinctly and personally and yet vocally. Far away, beyond the low\nroof of the meeting-room, a mysterious and understanding God heard each.\n\n\n\n\n                                   V\n                       THE RELIGION OF SUFFERING\n\n\nNietzsche wrote of religion disparagingly as an intoxicant, and yet by\nhis own religion he was intoxicated. No one ever acted more strangely or\nbecame more excited under the influence of personal religion than\nNietzsche. It is no reproach to religion that it changes reasonable\nbeings to emotional beings. And yet there is associated with religion a\nfalse emotionalism and sentimentalism that we call morbidity, a desire\nto be miserable and to make other people miserable, a wearing of weeds\non festival days, pessimism and \u201cGod grant we may all be as well two\nmonths hence,\u201d a living with death and a loving of the gruesome.\n\nGloominess is a danger for the Slav soul as with us it is for the\nCeltic. The bright energy of the Teuton is lacking. It is not worth\nwhile _making_ things or working for _position_. The mind is free and\nquestioning. There is no sense of\u2014\n\n                     Who sweeps a room as for Thy laws\n                       Makes that and the action fine,\n\nor of\n\n                    The trivial round, the common task,\n                    Will furnish all we ought to ask.\n\nNature is \u201cvainly sweet,\u201d and the eye looks out on the recurring pageant\nof the seasons with unutterable ennui and sadness. And in life the petty\ncircumstances, if congenial, are but playfully pleasant, but if\nuncongenial, seem surcharged with malice.\n\nThe river that runs through life is easily dammed, floods the whole\nbeing of a man, and becomes stagnant, whilst poisonous mists lower over\nhim. The joyful current ceases.\n\nIt is a common disaster in Russia, the falling into a morbid state. A\nRussian poet writes:\n\n       All earthly perishes, thy mother and thy boyhood.\n         Thy wife betrays thee, yea, and friends forsake;\n       But learn, my friend, to taste a different sweetness\n         Looking to the cold and Arctic seas.\n       Get in thy ship, set sail for the far Pole,\n         And live midst walls of ice. Gently forget\n         How there you loved and struggled;\n         Forget the passions of the land behind thee;\n       And to the shudderings of gradual cold\n         Accustom thy tired soul,\n         So that of all she left behind her here\n         She craveth nought whatever,\n       When thence to thee floods forth the beams of light celestial,\n\nwhich is a beautiful poem written for those who have become morbid. It\nis a beloved poem, and you may come across it written laboriously and\nexquisitely on tinted paper. But those who read it and love it will\nnever \u201cstep into the ship, set sail for the far Pole\u201d; it is not an\ninvitation to join Shackleton, not even figuratively. It is for those\nwho love and nurse their sorrows. They have not the power nor the wish\nto move. They are transfixed by mournful ideas, ideas that sing through\nthe air as they come, like arrows, and yet console as with music. As\nanother poet (Brussof) writes:\n\n           On a lingering fire you burn and burn away,\n             O my soul,\n           On a lingering fire you burn and burn away\n             With sweet moan.\n\n           You stand like Sebasti\u00e0n shot through with arrows,\n             Without strength to breathe,\n           You stand like Sebasti\u00e0n shot through with arrows\n             In shoulder and breast.\n\n           Your enemies around you look on with mirth\n             Bending the bow,\n           Your enemies around you look on with mirth\n             Increasing the woe.\n\n           So burns the funeral pyre, the arrows stinging gently\n             In the eventide,\n           So burns the funeral pyre, the arrows stinging gently\n             For the last time,\n\nwhich indicates a favourite mood in Russian poetry. Students say such\npoetry over to one another in their rooms of an evening, teachers in\nprovincial towns say such verses to their women friends, local\njournalists talk of them, gentle souls of either sex take down the book\nfrom the shelf and turn to the familiar page and live with the poet\u2019s\npain. Such is the melancholy of the cultured, a morbid yet touching\nmelancholy. It is refined. The thoughts are scented, and it is\nliterature and not life which is lending some one expression. But lower\ndown in society, where there is less reading, life itself gives the\nterms of this outlook. So the coffin-maker in Tchekhof\u2019s\nstory\u2014\u201cRothschild\u2019s Fiddle\u201d\u2014has a ledger in which he notes down at the\nend of each day the _losses_ of the day. All life expresses itself to\nhim in losses, terrible, terrible losses. Smerdyakof, Dostoieffsky\u2019s\nmost morbid conception, catches cats and hangs them at midnight with a\nceremony and ritual of his own invention.\n\nThe old beggar pilgrim sings with cracked voice as he trudges through\nwind and rain:\n\n                  I will go up on the hi-igh mounta-ain\n                  And look into the mi-ighty de-ep,\n                  A-and see about me a-all the earth\n                  Where I fre-et and ve-ex my soul.\n                  Ah, Eternity, it is but The-e I se-ek,\n                  Little gra-ave, my little gra-a-a-a-ve,\n                  You are my e-everla-asting ho-ome.\n                  Yellow sand my be-ed,\n                  Stones my ne-eigh-bours,\n                  Wo-orms my fri-ends,\n                  The da-amp earth my mo-other,\n                  Mo-other, my mo-other.\n                  Take me to e-e-ternal re-est.\n                  O Lord have me-e-e-e-ercy![8]\n\nIndeed, many such examples might be adduced to show the pre-occupation\nof the Russian with the idea of death. The funeral service music is\nfavourite popular music. In the procession of moods in the soul of the\nyoung man he comes comparatively rapidly to \u201cworms my neighbours.\u201d The\nexcessive number of suicides in Russia may be explained by the\nextraordinary liability of the Russian soul to falling into a morbid\nstate.\n\nBut we are all of us, even the merriest hearts that \u201cgo all the way,\u201d\nsubject to morbid moods, to fits of depression, black hours when we are\nready to deny the world, our ambition in it, our own life, our greatest\nhappiness, and live wilfully in an atmosphere of grief and pessimism,\nloving sorrow for its own sake, lamenting for the sake of lamentation.\nWe love what Dostoieffsky calls self-laceration. We must every month or\nso deliver ourselves up to Giant Despair and be cudgelled.\n\n                The darker the night the clearer the stars,\n                The deeper the sorrow the nearer to God,\n\nsays a Russian proverb, but these recurrent moods are not really sorrow,\nthey are a being morbid. They have nothing in common with the suffering\nthat comes from destiny itself, nothing of the circumstances of going\ninto the wilderness, or taking the road with the burden on one\u2019s back,\nnothing of the pangs of new birth, of the _podvig_.\n\n                  Who never ate his bread in sorrow,\n                    Who never spent the midnight hours\n                  Toiling and waiting for the morrow,\n                    He knows you not, ye Heavenly Powers.\n\n\u2014Who never ate his bread in real sorrow. Life is of this sort, that if\nyou will stake all of it for a new life you will get the new life. But\nwhen you really do give up all the old and dear, that is a dark and\nterrible hour, the hour of renunciation, of the _podvig_.\n\nAnd on the road of life itself there is a great gulf between the\nvigorous and Teutonic \u201cWelcome each rebuff that turns earth smoothness\nrough\u201d and the morbid and Oscar Wildean \u201cliving with sorrow,\u201d a great\ngulf between Father Seraphim kneeling a thousand days on a rock, and the\nsad \u201cintelligent\u201d who reads to himself in the evening hour:\n\n             To stand like Sebasti\u00e0n shot through with arrows,\n               Without strength to breathe,\n             To stand like Sebasti\u00e0n shot through with arrows\n               In shoulder and breast.\n\nTolstoy in his later years was morbid. I suppose if the psychology of\nTolstoy\u2019s life were to be followed out we should be surprised at the\nfrequent recurrence of morbid and despondent moods. Nothing seems more\ncharacteristic of his later years than fruitless quarreling with the\nlife of Yasnaya Polyana, threatening to run away, lamentations,\nself-lacerations. But now and again in relief Tolstoy did actually flee.\nHe took the road to Moscow to live like a simple artisan and earn his\nliving by carpentering, or he set off for a monastery where some famous\nmonk lived in his cell, and sought relief by confession and Christian\nintercourse.\n\nThat going forth on the road, a-seeking new life, is characteristic. At\ntimes one would think half Russia is on the road. Utility has been flung\naside, the chances of gain have been passed over, the so-called duty to\nwork and fulfil your place in the state has been flung to the winds, and\nthe Russian is out on the dusty road, wearing out his boots, thinking,\ntrudging, praying, recognising\u2014finding what his soul desires. That is\nnot morbidity, but a noble form of life.\n\nAnd many promise themselves wholly to God and enter monasteries or\nconvents, and there find happiness, the bright ray of destiny they\nsought with their eyes in a dark world.\n\n                       Every morning, noon, and night\n                       Praise God! says Theocrite\n\n\u2014that is not a morbid life, though a life of denial. It does not mean\nthat every one who would live well should enter a monastery or a\nconvent, it only means that some one whose soul craved such a life has\nfound his way. How we have suffered in England from the difficulty of\ngiving one\u2019s soul to God in that way. Those who would have been monks\nand sisters have had to give themselves in other ways. There are\nthousands of other ways. Every one who is living well has found a way.\nThe way meant renunciation, hardship, sorrow\u2014but not morbid sorrow, the\nsorrow which leaves you as you were, as the cloud of gnats wailing by\nthe tree and the stream leave the tree, leave the stream, just as they\nwere, just what they were.\n\nThe differentiation between morbid sorrow and real sorrow, between\nself-laceration and the tribulation that comes of destiny, is important\nif we would understand aright what the Russian means by the \u201cReligion of\nSuffering.\u201d\n\nThe religion of suffering, of which so much is said, is a term easily\nmisunderstood, meaning differently in the mouths of different people.\nThe political propagandist holds that the Russian people are melancholy\nbecause their institutions are so bad, and that the religion of\nsuffering is the religion of revolution, a growing resentment against\nthe government.\n\nThe morbid Russian will say that the religion of suffering is the\nknowledge of the truth that _only_ in suffering and near to death can\nyou understand anything about life. He will deny that anything else can\nteach you.\n\nThe peasant pilgrim will interpret it as the religion of taking to the\nroad and bearing the cross; being a beggar for Christ\u2019s sake; refusing a\nlift on the road to the Sepulchre, holding that where Christ walked it\nis not for them to ride.\n\nAnother will say it is the religion that helps you to face suffering,\nand point to Tolstoy\u2019s story of the death of Ivan Ilyitch. Ivan Ilyitch\nwas a man who had no religion, and had never faced suffering in his\nlife, an ordinary bourgeois of the type of lower intelligentsia, jovial,\nselfish, cynical, fond of cards and of his dinner, and having no other\nparticular interest in life except an ambition to make more money.\nSuddenly he is stricken with cancer, and lives for years in increasing\npain till at last he dies in agony. He has no spiritual comfort; pain\nquite o\u2019ercrows his spirit. The truth is, no pain really conquers the\nspirit, the spirit always triumphs at the last, even if the body is\nrendered useless by the struggle. But this truth is lost in the\nirreligion of Ivan Ilyitch. It would seem it would have been better if\nhe had lived a more regular and healthy life in his youth, but that is a\nfalse moral. The fact is he had never faced the solemn mystery of life,\nnever taken his ordinary human share in suffering, and so was lost in\nthe hour of pain. But perhaps there were more spiritual gleams in the\nend of Ivan Ilyitch than Tolstoy tells us of. Tolstoy was a moralist.\nBut in any case Ivan Ilyitch presents a contrast to a religious Russian\non his death-bed, in his last agony, gripping tight in his hand a little\nwooden cross, his eyes upon the ikon of his patron saint before which\nthe candle is burning.\n\nAnother will say, the religion of suffering is that which helps you to\nface life, which is perhaps another way of saying that it is the\nreligion which helps you to face death ... the religion which prompts\nyou to take risks and will face no dangers. He is losing his soul. In a\ngreat war he wakens up and offers himself\u2014and saves his soul. Or in the\nordinary course of things, in the \u201cweak piping times of peace,\u201d he\nresolves to make a leap in the dark and get life, he gives up the old\nfor the new\u2014he saves his soul, and out of his sufferings springs a\nglory.\n\nStill it is not for every one to make this leap in the dark. Villagers,\nthe peasants of a countryside, have obviously no call that way, or\nseldom a call that way. They have not the need that the townsman has,\nthey have satisfying visions of truth, from nature, in their way of\nlife, in their traditional customs. _Brand_ was probably wrong trying to\nlead his village flock up among the glaciers and avalanches to make a\nchurch of ice. He should have preached such sermons and made such\nappeals in towns. He would have led people from the towns. Nevertheless\nthere has been a cult of _Brand_ in Russia, especially since Ibsen\u2019s\nlong drama was produced at the Theatre of Art, and many divinity\nstudents and young priests have been touched by his vigorous onslaught\non the quiet lives of simple folk.\n\nOn the other hand, there have not been wanting vigorous opponents to\n_Brand_ and the \u201cGod of the Heights,\u201d and I have even seen the scientist\nworking to relieve pain put in opposition to _Brand_ working to increase\nthe pain and sorrow in the world. But in that opposition lies a\nmisconception. Crucifixion under chloroform does not conquer death and\nsin, and there is no sleeping-draught for the young man on the threshold\nof life who has got to dare and suffer and die many times before he\nemerges at his noblest and richest.\n\nDostoieffsky voiced the religion of suffering for Russia, he suffered\nhimself, and in his personal suffering discovered the national passion.\nHe sanctified Siberia, redeeming the notion of it from that of a foul\nprison and place of punishment to a place of redemption, and finding\none\u2019s own soul. He did not find Siberia an evil place, but on the\ncontrary, found it holy ground. These men came face to face with reality\nwho had lived till then in an atmosphere of unreality. The roads of\nSiberia were roads of pilgrimage. Dostoieffsky sent successively his two\nmost interesting heroes to tread those roads\u2014Raskolnikof and Dmitri\nKaramazof. Tolstoy develops and materialises the idea in the story of\nKatya and Neludof.\n\nThen in his novels Dostoieffsky generally shows the suffering ones,\nnever suggesting the idea that the suffering should be removed. He has\nno interest in the non-suffering normal person. He prefers a man who is\ntorn, whose soul is disclosed and bare. He feels that such a man knows\nmore, and that his life can show more of the true pathos of man\u2019s\ndestiny. Such people think, dream, pray, hope, they are infinitely\nlovable, they are clearly mortal. Hence a pre-occupation with suffering,\na saying _yes_ to suffering when the obvious answer seems to be _no_,\nand _Let this cup pass from me_. It is perhaps because the West has\ntaken it for granted that suffering is an evil thing, and has set itself\nconsciously the task of eliminating suffering from the world that the\nEast has emphasised its acceptance of suffering. Nietzsche noted what he\ncalled the watchword of Western Europe\u2014\u201cWe wish that there may be\nnothing more to fear.\u201d He despised that wish. The East does not despise\nthe wish, but finds it necessary to affirm its own belief more\nvigorously. It accepts many things which the West considers wrong in\nthemselves\u2014War, Disease, Pain, Death.\n\nFootnote 8:\n\n  Cited by the priest Florensky, who copied down the song as he heard it\n  (_The Pillar and Foundation of Truth_).\n\n\n\n\n                                   VI\n                            THE TWO HERMITS\n\n\nAlthough self-laceration and being wilfully gloomy are frequent in\nRussian life the idea of repentance is not popular, there being no\nparticular passion for righteousness and consequently no insistence on\nsin as something deadly in itself. In Russia you never hear that the\nwages of sin is death. The man who sins is even thought to be nearer to\ngrace than he who never sins, the prodigal nearer than his elder\nbrother. \u201cSin committed is nothing to grieve over. What is done can\u2019t be\nhelped. Hurry on and do something else, don\u2019t waste time in penance or\nrepentance.\u201d There is no idea of penance in connection with the Russian\nChurch, and consequently no \u201cindulgences.\u201d Russia has escaped the evil\nof thinking that it is possible to pay for past actions and neutralise\ntheir effect. Even in asceticism the Russian has no idea of paying for\nsins by fasting and praying and mortifying the flesh. And he who sets\nout on pilgrimage does not do so as a penance for sin, he is not trying\nin any way to make up to God for sin. His act is an act of praise, a\npromise, his asceticism is a denial of this world in honour of the world\nto come, a denial of the world\u2019s peace in praise of the peace which\npasseth understanding, a denial of the world\u2019s truth in allegiance to\nthe Holy Ghost, a showing forth in symbolic act of the glory of man\u2019s\nheavenly destiny.\n\nThe story of two hermits given by the Russian philosopher Solovyof gives\na Russian point of view.\n\nIn the desert in Egypt two hermits were saving their souls. Their caves\nwere quite near one another but they never entered into conversation\nunless it were to sing psalms at one another or call one another by name\nnow and then. In this way of life they passed many years, and the fame\nof their sanctity spread beyond Egypt and into many lands. But in course\nof time the devil, mortified by their holiness, succeeded in tempting\nthem. He snared them both at the same time, and, not saying a word to\none another, they gathered the baskets and pallets which in their long\nspare time they had plaited from grasses and palm leaves, and they set\noff together for Alexandria. There they sold their work, and on the\nmoney they got for it they spent three gay days and nights with\ndrunkards and sinners, and on the fourth morning, having spent\neverything, they returned to their cells in the desert.\n\nOne of them wept bitterly and howled aloud. The other walked at his side\nwith bright morning face and sang psalms joyfully to himself. The first\ncried:\n\n\u201cAccursed that I am, now am I lost for ever. I shall never out-pray my\nhideous sin, never, never. All my fasts and hymns and prayers have been\nin vain. I might as well have sinned all the time; all lost in one foul\nmoment! Alas! alas!\u201d\n\nBut the other hermit went on singing, quietly, joyfully.\n\n\u201cWhat!\u201d cried the first hermit. \u201cHave you gone out of your mind?\u201d\n\n\u201cWhy?\u201d asked the joyful one.\n\n\u201cWhy don\u2019t you repent?\u201d\n\n\u201cWhat is there for me to repent of?\u201d asked the joyful one.\n\n\u201cAnd Alexandria, have you forgotten it?\u201d asked his companion.\n\n\u201cWhat of Alexandria? Glory be to the Almighty who preserves that famous\nand honourable town!\u201d\n\n\u201cBut what did we do in Alexandria?\u201d\n\n\u201cWhat did we do? Why we sold our baskets of course, prayed upon the ikon\nof holy St. Mark, visited several churches, walked a little in the town\nhall, conversed with the virtuous and Christly Leonila....\u201d\n\nThe repentant hermit stared at the other in pale stupefaction.\n\n\u201cAnd the house of ill-fame in which we spent the night ...\u201d said he.\n\n\u201cGod preserve us!\u201d said the other. \u201cThe evening and night we spent in\nthe guest-house of the patriarch.\u201d\n\n\u201cHoly martyrs! God has already blasted his reason,\u201d cried the repentant\nhermit. \u201cAnd with whom did we get drunk on Tuesday night? Tell me that.\u201d\n\n\u201cWe partook of wine and viands in the refectory of the patriarchate,\nTuesday being the festival of the Presentation of the most Blessed\nMother of God.\u201d\n\n\u201cPoor fellow! And whom did we kiss, eh?\u201d\n\n\u201cWe were honoured at parting with a holy kiss from that father of\nfathers, the most blessed Archbishop of the great city of Alexandria and\nof all Egypt, yes and of Libya, and of Pentapolis, and of Kur-Timothee\nwith its spiritual court, and with all the fathers and brothers of his\ndivinely appointed clergy.\u201d\n\n\u201cAh, why do you make a mock of me? Does it mean that after yesterday\u2019s\nabominations the devil has entered into possession of you. You embraced\nsinners, you accursed one.\u201d\n\n\u201cI can\u2019t say in whom the devil has found a home, in me or in you,\u201d said\nthe other, \u201cin me when I rejoice in the God\u2019s gifts and His holy will,\nwhen I praise the Creator and all His works, or in you who rave and call\nthe house of our most blessed father and pastor a house of ill-fame, and\ndefame the God-loving clergy, calling them sinners as it were.\u201d\n\n\u201cAh, you heretic!\u201d screamed the repentant hermit. \u201cArian monster! Thrice\naccursed lips of the abominable Appollonion!\u201d\n\nAnd the repentant hermit threw himself upon his companion and tried to\nkill him. But failing to do that he grew tired of his efforts, and the\ntwo resumed their journey to their caves. The repentant one beat his\nhead on the rock all night and tore his hair and made the desert echo\nwith his howls and shrieks. The other calmly and joyfully went on\nsinging psalms.\n\nIn the morning the repentant hermit made the following reflections:\n\n\u201cJust think of it. I had earned from Heaven especial blessings and holy\npower by my fasts and my _podvigs_.[9] This has already become evident\nby the miracles and wonders I have lately been enabled to perform, but\nafter this that has happened, all is lost. By giving myself up to\nfleshly abomination I have sinned against the Holy Ghost, and that sin,\naccording to the word of God, will be forgiven me neither in this life\nnor in the life to come. I have thrown the pearl of heavenly purity to\nbe trampled under feet by swine, by devils. The devils have taken my\npearl, and, no doubt, having stamped it into the mire, they will come\nafter me and tear me. Well, well, if I am irrecoverably lost whatever is\nthere for me to do out here in the desert?\u201d And he returned to\nAlexandria and gave himself up to a life of debauch. Eventually, on one\noccasion when he was hard up he conspired with other vagabonds, fell\nupon a rich merchant, killed him, and robbed him. He was tracked down,\ncaught and tried in the courts. The judge condemned him to death and he\ndied without repentance.\n\nBut his old companion continued his holy life, his\n_podvizhnitchestvo_[10] attained a high degree of sanctity and became\nfamous through the many miracles wrought at his cave-mouth. At a word\nfrom his holy lips a woman past the age of child-bearing yet conceived\nand brought forth a male child. When at last the good man died, his\nshrivelled and worn-out body, suddenly as it were, blossomed in beauty\nand youth, becoming translucent and filling the air with a heavenly\nperfume. Over his holy relics a monastery was built, and his name went\nforth from the church of Alexandria to Byzantium and thence to the\nshrines of Kief and Moscow.\n\nThe lesson of this story is, according to Varsonophy, who told it, that\nthere are no sins of any importance except despondency. Did not both\nthese hermits sin alike and yet but one of them was lost, namely, he who\ndesponded?\n\nVarsonophy was a pilgrim from Mount Athos, who used to say, \u201cEh, eh,\ndon\u2019t grieve about your sins, be done with them, they don\u2019t count. Sin\n539 times in a day but don\u2019t grieve about it, that\u2019s the chief thing. If\nto sin is evil, then to remember sin is evil. There is nothing worse\nthan to call to mind one\u2019s own sins.... There is only one deadly sin and\nthat is despondency, from despondency comes despair, that is more than\nsin, it is spiritual death.\u201d\n\nFootnote 9:\n\n  _Podvig_ is a Russian word for holy exploits and victories, especially\n  for those consisting in a denial of the world. See Chapter on\n  _podvigs_, page 111.\n\nFootnote 10:\n\n  _Podvizhnitchestvo_ = the life of going on doing _podvigs_, the\n  continuance of denial of the world.\n\n\n\n\n                                  VII\n                   AT THE CONVENT OF MARTHA AND MARY\n\n\nOne Sunday I went to the convent of St. Martha and St. Mary in the\nBolshaya Ordinka on the other side of the Moscow river. It is a\nwonderful institution, belonging to the new Russia and yet being part of\nthe old, a young dainty stem with leaves sprung from the rugged\nmany-wintered tree of the Russian Church. Like St. Vladimir\u2019s Cathedral\nat Kief, its beauty lies not in any antiquity or ruin. It is a new\ninstitution; it is served by young people; and has new life, new\ninterest, and ideals. It is the convent of which the Grand Duchess\nElizaveta Federovna, the widow of the Grand Duke Sergius, whose murder\nwas contrived by Azef the Jewish agent-provocateur during the\nrevolutionary period, is the abbess.\n\nThe remains of the Grand Duke were deposited at the shrine of St.\nAlexey, and praying there, the grief-stricken widow promised herself,\nher life, and her estate to God. The beautiful sister of the Empress\nfound her way from desolation and the tomb to a bright and spacious and\nyet devoted life, and she was consecrated and took the veil.\n\nOne of the first deeds of her new life was to purchase a building site\nin one of the poorer parts of the city, and to have it consecrated for\nthe building of a convent and churches. A temporary church was put up\nand services took place from the first. The first plans were realised in\n1907; the sisterhood was already formed and had begun work by February\n1909. The Grand Duchess is the abbess and there are about a hundred\nsisters. Every one is young, every one is active. No woman over forty\ncan enter the sisterhood, no one also who is weak physically or likely\nto be unable to perform the arduous labours for and among the poor which\nthe sisters impose upon themselves.\n\nThe convent combines in its ideal the imitation of both Martha and Mary.\nEach sister dedicates herself to \u201cGod and her neighbour.\u201d She would sit\nat Jesus\u2019 feet like Mary, and be occupied with many things like Martha.\nBut certainly the idea of Martha and service stands first in their\nminds. Their religion is the religion of good deeds. They visit, clothe,\ncomfort, heal the poor, and all but work miracles, flowers springing in\ntheir footsteps where they go. They receive and consider thousands of\nletters and beggars. They perform work which is often left to the\nmunicipalities and Care committees in the West, but the work is much\nmore fruitful since it is done in the Name of Christ rather than in the\nname of reason. In some convents the sisters are divided into Marthas\nand Marys, and there is a question when a new one takes her place\u2014a\nMartha or a Mary? But in the Martha Marinskaya all have to be Marthas.\nEach sister has a specific calling and name, _e.g._ the letter-writer,\nthe purchaser, the guest-receiver: there are medical sisters, church\nsisters, kitchen sisters, and so on.\n\nThe service in the convent church is open and free. All and sundry may\ngo in. And yet necessarily one is in a way a guest, a visitor. It is a\nvery gentle and delicate experience to stand on the stone flags of the\nwide church beside fifty or sixty maidens in white and avow allegiance\nto the same emblems, praise the same splendid Creator and God.\n\nI came to the service, but I also wished to satisfy a desire to see the\nfrescoes and wall-paintings by Nesterof. The rood-screen, the apse, and\nthe sides have been painted by that great artist, and two or three of\nhis most beautiful pictures are the surface of the walls.\n\nThere is a large picture, the whole width of the church, a presentment\nof Holy Russia at the margin of a birch forest; plains and folding\nvalleys and uplands and broad acres in the distance. In the foreground\nbright green grass thick with purple labiate and yellow rattray, an\nopening in the forest, delicate silver birches on each side and tiny\npine trees, seedlings of pine-trees. In the opening all manner of\ncharacteristic Russian \u201cpoor folk\u201d gazing, praying, kneeling, crying.\nFor a haloed Christ stands among the birch trees and receives all who\nwill come to Him.\n\nThe Russian peasant believes that Christ wanders on his roads\u2014\n\n                                      the heavenly King\n                    Our mother Russia came to bless\n                    And through our land went wandering;\n\nand he is quite right, believing that. The thought, almost by itself,\nconstitutes the idea of \u201cHoly Russia.\u201d\n\nThe most beautiful picture in the church is the dedicatory Martha and\nMary\u2014\u201cThe Master is here and calleth thee\u201d[11]\u2014a panel in front of which\nstood a sister all in white like a statue, little candles in front of\nher, a stout six-feet wax candle beside her.\n\nA tall and portly priest with long hair, whimsical and gentle, took the\nservice\u2014Father Mitrophan; and he walked to and fro, now with the people,\nnow behind the sacred gates. A score of sisters in black veils and with\nblack crowns on their heads sang in the choir. A sister stood at a\ncounter by the door and sold candles. A congregation of sisters,\nfashionable visitors, peasants, working-people, and beggars grouped\nthemselves miscellaneously in the wide, open, light-filled body of the\nchurch. Of course there were no seats. It was pleasant to be there;\nthere was good air, a fragrance occasionally of flowers, and a sense of\nyoung women in a certain mood towards God. We sang, assented, crossed\nourselves, bowed. The sixty sisters all in white prostrated themselves,\nand there was a billowy flood of white linen on the floor. And the black\nchoir sang, gently, pitifully, sweetly, exaltedly, with _pale_ voices.\nIt was their church, their temple. They expressed themselves there as a\nmaid expresses herself in her private room at home. The gentle Nesterof\npaintings pertained to them specially. They were chosen by them.\n\nIn the midst of the service in come the convent waifs, children of the\nchildless, two dozen little boys in green blouses, two dozen little\ngirls in blue frocks and drab pinafores. And they stand in the midst of\nthe church. They are so small, they might be the children of dwarfs.\n\nFather Mitrophan comes out to deliver his sermon, and we all move up\ncloser towards the altar rails so as to hear him. He is higher than we,\nand looks a shepherd with a flock about him. A gentle sermon: \u201cYou have\nparents in the flesh, you have also parents in the Spirit. There are\nearthly families, there are also spiritual families; worldly intercourse\nand heavenly intercourse. Our parents bore us and then as soon as\nconvenient brought us to the font to give us back to God. The parents\nwere not present at the baptism because they were only parents of the\nflesh, but the guardian angels were present because they were parents of\nthe Spirit. To-day is the day of St. Afanasief and of St. Sergey,\nspiritual fathers, to whom we must look for guidance and love. What do\nthey teach us? Why, first of all, to do things, to work. What a worker\nwas St. Paul, for instance, writing fourteen epistles. We mustn\u2019t be\nlazy! We shan\u2019t get anything without making effort. Fast day comes; we\nsay it doesn\u2019t matter much, we\u2019ll eat ordinary fare. It\u2019s time to go to\nchurch; you say to yourself, \u2018No, no, don\u2019t need to,\u2019 and you take a\nstool and a book of church verses and sing to yourself pleasantly and\ncomfortably. No, no, it won\u2019t do. The Fathers of the Church didn\u2019t go\nlazy like that, or where should we be....\u201d And so on, in a sententious\nmanner and sing-song tone, nodding his head and pronouncing many of his\ndicta in a colloquial tone of voice like an old woman saying proverbs.\nHe had an Orthodox voice. There is such a thing in Russia, a voice and\nmanner in which the Church and the Church service are reflected. It\ncommunicates itself to the worshipper and is often a superadded grace of\npersonality in a man or woman, a certain Byzantinism in expression, a\nholding oneself like a figure in a fresco.\n\nAmen! A crossing of ourselves; the sermon is ended. The crowd about the\naltar breaks up, and we spread ourselves out in the fresher spaces of\nthe church once more, and the _pale_ singing of the black-robed choir\nrecommences as the conclusion of the liturgy is sung. The sixty sisters\nprostrate themselves together in a billowy mass once more. Worshippers\ncross themselves before the altar and go out. The Communion bread is\ntaken and the service is over. The waifs march out; we all come out.\n\nIt is good to have been at prayers with the sisters, just as if one had\nspent a few hours in perfect mood in a garden. It took my mind back to a\nmorning in an immense London church when I came in late and was taken up\nand put in a seat just underneath a picture of the Virgin. At the\nVirgin\u2019s feet were armfuls of lilies. I had a sense, I have it now\u2014all\nflowers are flowers at the feet of the Virgin.\n\nFootnote 11:\n\n  The Frontispiece of this book.\n\n\n\n\n                                  VIII\n                           THE WAY OF MARTHA\n\n\nThe way of Russia is more the way of Mary, and yet no people are more\ngiven to working for their neighbours and being actively kind than the\nRussians. There are many Marthas among them. They visit the poor, bring\nfood to the hungry, clothe the wretched. They work for the suffering\npeople around them. Almost every cultured Russian of grace or character\nhas some social or personal responsibility or care, the passion to put\nright the affairs of some unhappy family, the will to raise drunkards\nand law-breakers from spiritual death. It is national and natural, and\nit is strange that this should be the characteristic of a people who\nalso have a passion for going into the desert and saving their souls.\n\nBut it is impossible for every one to go into the desert or take to a\ncell, and indeed the impulse to go away does not come to every one, and\nwhen it does come it is seldom sufficiently strong to break down the\nties of everyday life and make a road of the affections\u2014the narrow road\nthat leads away from the world. Even among a mystical people the great\nmajority remain behind in \u201cthe world\u201d and have the normal life, serve\nman as well as God, marry, have children, work as well as pray, and live\nthrough six everydays to one of incense and song. The Church has its two\naspects, that of Martha and of Mary, and it is with the way of Martha\nthat we are generally more familiar, though many may look lingeringly\ntowards the wilderness, feeling that perhaps after all the better part\nis to be found out there.\n\nThe way of Martha has come into some discredit in the West owing to the\norganisation of charity, the reliance on parliaments and philanthropical\nsocieties and committees rather than on individual volition. As a\nsubstitute for love towards one\u2019s fellow-man have appeared many\nthings\u2014voting for a candidate, appeals to policemen and to magistrates,\nprison, sending a young man to the Colonies, trusting to the\ncourt-missionary ... that is the way of \u201cthe world\u201d and not the way of\nthe individual. However much \u201corganisation\u201d there may be, there will\nalways remain as a fundamental idea of the Church personal love towards\none\u2019s neighbour and care for him. Such love when seen is something that\nconvinces in itself, like the action of the good Samaritan.\n\nThere is a family I know in Russia, the V\u2019s. To come into touch with\nthem is to touch something that works miracles like the hem of the\nsacred garment. Yet all in the family are Marthas, they are all of the\nspirit of good deeds: there is nothing particularly contemplative about\nany of them. Most interesting of all is the youngest of the children,\nLena. She is being brought up in an atmosphere of altruism. She is only\ntwelve years old, and is like a plant springing up in a flower-garden;\none can watch her growing more beautiful from day to day. She is gentle,\nquick, and tender. She has many desires and is eager, but when Julia her\neldest sister tells her to do one thing or another, perfectly obedient\nand submissive. She is slender and wistful like a girl in one of\nNesterof\u2019s pictures. She has the intense pleasure of a child, and when\nwe read _Alice in Wonderland_ together I wondered at the gladness of the\nlittle girl. Grown-up humans are often so constrained and polite when\nyou read a paragraph to them. You can never be quite sure that they are\nnot secretly bored. On her birthday Lena _gives_ presents to her sisters\ninstead of receiving them, and has been brought up to feel that it is a\njoy and privilege to give. When distant relatives or friends from far\naway come to visit the family, Lena gives them presents. One day she was\ndebating what was the very biggest present she could make to a lady who\nwas staying at the house, and she decided to give away one of her little\npet tortoises. Once Vassily Vassilitch brought her a present, a big book\nwith pictures. How vexed Julia seemed! \u201cYou spoil the child bringing her\npresents without any special reason!\u201d said she. She was sorry that he\nshould be giving, and not Lena or she herself.\n\nJulia is so self-denying that some years she goes without a greatcoat\neven for the coldest winter weather. All her money goes to other people.\nBut she is not at all proud of her good works. She is just simple and\ncheerful, a quiet though impulsive woman. You never hear her laugh\nloudly, but there is always a sort of kind warmth and cheerfulness in\nher face. She will give up a book, her time, her means of making a\nliving, her pleasure, to whatever appeals to her; and the whole house in\nwhich she lives is founded on altruism. Occasionally there comes to\nvisit them a friend who is also extremely unselfish and altruistic. Then\nsometimes there are some amusing, even absurd scenes\u2014contests in\naltruism.\n\nThe family is vegetarian, for no one in it would cause any animal pain.\nThey have even scruples about killing flies and troublesome insects, and\nrather catch them and put them out of the window than destroy them. One\nday Julia showed me with horror an article from the _Russian Word_ on\nthe fate of lost dogs. The State voted a certain amount of money for\npoison to destroy ownerless dogs, but the police, instead of killing\nthem with poison in a humane way as intended, hired the worst type of\ncriminals in the town gaols to beat them to death for a few copecks in\norder that they might peculate the greater part of the money voted.\n\u201cSuch ugly things are part of the background of our everyday life,\u201d said\nI. \u201cThey are hidden from us, but they are always there, none the less.\u201d\nJulia could not believe it.\n\nOne summer I spent some days with the family in a big country-house in\nthe province of Kaluga. The estate was an island in a loop of a little\nriver. I spent one morning watching the fish which swarmed in the water\nof the river, and I longed for a rod and a line. Not that I ever caught\nmany fish in that way. But when I was seven years old some one gave me\nIzaak Walton and a fishing-rod, and I slept with _The Compleat Angler_\nunder my pillow. I had visions of great captures of fish. The one thing\nwanting was a grasshopper. Izaak was always talking of grasshoppers, and\nI had lost faith in worms and paste. But though I heard grasshoppers in\nmany country banks I could never find one. Here at Dietchino were both\ngrasshoppers and fish in manifest abundance.\n\nIn the little river were perch and gudgeon and chub, minnows, pike. I\nwatched the sinister shadows of the pike. They moved about like sharks,\nand every now and then there would be a splash as if a branch had\ndropped into the water, and I would see six or seven little fish jumping\nbodily out of the water as a murderous pike rushed at them, and they\nfled in terror. The fish seemed pretty hungry. I caught several\ngrasshoppers and rather cruelly threw them on to the surface of the lake\nand watched the perch snatch them away. A sad end for the grasshoppers,\nbut a better luncheon for the fish. Lena and her next sister, Olya, were\nmuch horrified at my action, though they were too kind and well-trained\nto say more than \u201cOh!\u201d when I mentioned it. Later Olya told me how one\nevening she had seen that on one of the lines left by the village boys a\nfish was caught and struggling, and how she came next morning and the\nfish was still on the hook and not taken in, and she thought it so\ncruel, and wrote a letter to the boy and pinned it on a tree near by.\n\nSome time after that we went out one day and watched the fish. Little\nLena had three biscuits in her coat pocket in case she should be hungry.\nBut she broke up two of them and threw the bits to the fish, and we saw\nthem come and eat the fragments with as much avidity as they had taken\nthe grasshoppers I provided. We were out for a walk; Lena and I went on,\nand she kept one remaining biscuit in case she should be hungry.\nPresently along the road came a familiar dog and fawned around us\ningratiatingly. \u201cPoor dog!\u201d said Lena, \u201cit\u2019s just had puppies, it is\nvery hungry,\u201d and she took out her last biscuit and gave it to the dog.\n\nThe little girl has an almost perfect character, and the fact that she\nwill never do or think anything unkind has a constraining effect on\nelders in her presence; and yet she is an open-air little girl, and rows\nand bathes and plays games and goes long walks, as any boy might wish\nhis sister to do.\n\nEach of the four sisters has inherited consumption, and though not\nactually in consumption they have all a certain fragility and\nslenderness. Their only brother died of consumption, a clever boy, who\nnever for a moment permitted grief to enter the hearts of those who were\ntending him. All was mirth and laughter at his death-bed. Joke after\njoke, idea after idea put forward. All agreed that it would be absurd to\nwear black for such a one. And the sisters and near friends went to the\nfuneral in bright summer dresses. They were of those who hope all\nthings, believe all things.\n\nThis winter Julia was chiefly engaged arranging popular lectures on the\nOriental religions\u2014\u201cin order to give an interest in religion to those\nwho had fallen away from Orthodoxy and had now no religion at all.\u201d She\nhad set a room apart for meetings and given it the atmosphere of a\nchurch, and there was a library of several hundred volumes to which\nvisitors referred frequently. She kept open house, and I have often been\nthere in the evening when there were more than a dozen visitors sitting\nat the long table of the dining-room having tea. There would be all\nsorts of people, some real seekers, others of a friendly gossipy type.\nMany of them were really foreign to Julia\u2019s nature and temperament,\nwrapped up in themselves and consequently not able to realise what a\nsweet and wise and wonderful woman their hostess was. But all were\nwelcome.\n\nJulia\u2019s grandmother, a very gentle and simple old lady of eighty, always\npresided on these occasions, and if she were not drinking tea, a space\nwould be cleared on the tablecloth and _patience_ would be laid out. She\nis always in black, has large eyes and fine brow and a magnificent Roman\nnose, regards the cards intently, and puts them one upon another\ndeliberately and solemnly as if she knew all their secrets and were the\nQueen of Spades herself. But she listens to all that is said, and can\nrepeat almost the whole of the conversation after the people are gone.\nShe is of the old Orthodox Russian type and dwells under the ikons. No\nmeal is ever begun without her grace being said. And she also has the\ngentle spirit of altruism. Every other Sunday night a rather obstinate\nold lady who belongs to the Evangelical Christians comes and sits beside\nher and reads in a loud distinct voice a volume of Spurgeon\u2019s sermons in\ntranslation. And the old lady asks no questions, always seems to be\npleased, and goes on putting out her cards and making up her patience\npack in sympathetic silence.\n\n                  *       *       *       *       *\n\nJulia has lived in France and England, and she especially likes the\nEnglish. \u201cThey have learned to be so kind,\u201d she would say. \u201cThey take\ncare not to injure people\u2019s feelings when they talk. They are gentle,\nand they are not unjust, they are fair. They are centuries in front of\nus Russians in that way.\u201d\n\nThat observation struck me very forcibly when I heard it; for Julia has\nherself an English manner. She is like an English lady of quality of the\nbest type. She has that something which she admires in us expressed in\nherself.\n\nIt is good that the standard notion of an Englishman which one finds in\nRussia is something which corresponds to this praise which Julia gave\nus. The Russians see us at our best, that is, as we really are, and they\nadmire us. They like our quiet kindness and fairness. They admire our\npassion for social reform and \u201cputting the world right.\u201d\n\nJulia also is \u201chelping to build the kingdom of heaven upon earth,\u201d\nhelping to make the world really ready for the Master when He comes\nagain. She is an _Eager-Heart_, who would even give up her chance of\nsheltering the heavenly Babe and wondrous Mother in order to take in a\nhuman babe and earthly mother homeless in the snow.\n\nThat is the way of Martha, the finding of Christ in the suffering human\nbeing in the world, the realisation of \u201cInasmuch as ye did it unto the\nleast of these ye did it unto Me\u201d as contrasted with the way of Mary\u2014the\ndenial of the world and of the reality of the suffering in it, the\npouring of the ointment on the feet of Christ instead of selling it and\ngiving the proceeds to the poor.\n\nThe way of Martha implies a great number of workers and the consequent\nnecessary organisation\u2014a church. It has its priests, its temples and\nbuildings, its ceremonies and sermons. The hermit needs no church, no\ntemple or priest, but the worker in the world needs everything.\n\nHence the pomp and splendour of the Church is associated with the way of\nMartha. Its faith is carried like a great banner wherein is depicted a\nworld set free, a kingdom of heaven upon earth. The ranks of the world\nare understood as grades of authority in the great business of\nwell-doing, and kings and men are consecrated with solemn rites to the\nservice of God. We are enrolled as soldiers of the heavenly King and\nneed a religious music which is military, and appeals of sound and\ncolour which stir the heart.\n\nSo in Nesterof\u2019s picture of Martha and Mary,[12] Martha is painted in\nresplendent rose and is in the forefront, whilst the mystical-faced Mary\nis darkly robed and stands behind her sister. So in Christianity all\nthat is visibly and obviously splendid is associated with the way of\nMartha\u2014the wonderful cathedrals, the soul-stirring processions, holy\nwars, solemn rites and pageants. Martha is always to the fore and\nsplendid, and goes to meet Christ, whilst her sister Mary remains in the\nbackground at home in faith.\n\nFootnote 12:\n\n  The frontispiece of this book.\n\n\n\n\n                                   IX\n                           MARTHA\u2019S TRUE WAY\n\n\nThe view I take of the miracles is this, that no one _met_ Jesus or\n_saw_ Him who was not miraculously affected in some way or other. The\ndeaf began to hear, those who had never spoken in their lives had their\nlips unsealed, the cripples found out that they had the souls of men,\nthe sick were as if they were well, scales fell from the eyes of the\nblind, and he who never saw anything in his life was suddenly awake to\nbeauty. The outcast and the vile learned to believe in themselves; even\nthe dead became alive. When John asked, \u201cArt thou He who should come, or\ndo we look for another?\u201d it was sufficient to answer, \u201cThe blind see,\nthe lame walk, the lepers are cleansed, the deaf hear, the dead are\nraised, to the poor the gospel is preached.\u201d\n\nAnd the miracles never cease. As they happened two thousand years ago,\nso they happen to-day. We have the vision, and our infirmities fall\naway: we see, we hear, we praise. Christ is ...\n\n                 The subtle alchemist who in a trice\n                 Life\u2019s barren metal into gold transmutes.\n\nThere is much of the Gospel written by men who had not the vision, or by\npolitic priests. Many ecclesiastics of the early Church could not\nunderstand the mystic story, and misunderstanding it they yet strove to\ndefend by every means in their power the authenticity of their\nmisreadings. Explanations, local colour, even absolute inventions were\ninterpolated in the sacred writings in order to prove that certain\ndogmas were right, in order to prove that other dogmas were wrong. They\nactually raised Lazarus materially from death, instead of leaving what\nwas probably the original story, the fact that Jesus convinced Martha\nand Mary that Lazarus was still alive in the presence of God. Not that\nthe Gospels are the worse, or that we would have them otherwise. There\nis an added poetry in the marks which time and life make on any living\nthing. And the Gospels have been crucified as He of whom the Gospels\nwere written was crucified before them.\n\nMost explanations of the miracles are true, but inadequate. They often\nlead to confusion of thought and the emphasis on the material facts and\noutward manifestation rather than on the spiritual facts and inner\nreality. It is true that Christ \u201cwent about the world doing good,\u201d and\nthat He is to us \u201can ensample of godly life,\u201d but the good that He did\nwas spiritual good.\n\nThe works of our Marthas get a great deal of their inspiration from the\nhealing of the sick and the ministry to the suffering. Progress itself,\nthe whole modern reform movement as far as it associates itself\nconsciously and verbally with Christianity, identifies its inspiration\nwith that touching of Christ\u2019s soul which did not permit Him to pass one\nsuffering man without healing him.\n\nBut it is often forgotten that the good which He did was spiritual good.\nThe true way of Martha is not so much giving money to the penniless,\nclothes to the ragged, medicine to the sick, homes to the houseless,\ndecent dwellings to those who live in slums, as it is to make the poor\nknow that all these things are nothing and of no account; as it is to\ntouch their hearts and give them a new outlook upon life. Martha has\nalso to make the blind see, make the deaf hear, the mute speak, and to\nraise the dead. As it is, it frequently happens that the poor, receiving\n\u201ccharity,\u201d are left angry, and so become poorer thereby, and the blind\nfind themselves in a greater darkness, and the deaf in a more deathly\nsilence.\n\nWe look on our fellow-creatures with dull eyes, and our personal\ncharacter and spiritual beauty is not sufficient to lighten up the\nlandscape and the faces of the people around us. There is no light about\nour heads, and people touching the hem of our garments feel no contact\nwith mystery. So we do not reveal Christ to men. Though all is within\nour power. Martha\u2019s ordeal is as great a one as Mary\u2019s, her consecration\nas vital. We cannot go out carelessly and minister to the poor, for if\nwe do, we perform no miracles. And without miracles the poor are not\nsatisfied.\n\nThe true Martha has the wishing heart, and her fingers are full of\nvirtue. She is an argument in herself, and her presence without words\nworks true miracles, revealing the mystic meaning of Christ in herself,\nand causing every one who _meets_ or _sees_ her to be miraculously\naffected in some way or other.\n\n                  *       *       *       *       *\n\nObviously the service of Martha is always personal. Therefore nothing\nanonymous is Christian, and philanthropical societies, parliaments,\nreform movements, and the like are doomed to failure unless they are\nserved by men and women with Christ-faces.\n\n\n\n\n                                   X\n                            MAKING WEST EAST\n\n\n                    ... who made West East\n                    And gave to Man\n                    A new heaven and a new earth,\n                    As Holy John hath prophesied of Me.\n\n\nThe West seems to have the tradition of the way of Martha, England\nespecially. Our Victorian era, of which the popular teachers were\nKingsley, Carlyle, Ruskin, was essentially an era of work and deeds\nrather than of faith. As children, we in our prime to-day were brought\nup on the gospel of work. Thoughts about one\u2019s soul were considered\nrather ignoble: they were smoke that we had to consume ourselves. We\nwere urged to forget the question of our souls and _work_. The whole\nworld was working, all the factories of England sang together. Every man\nin England, from the highest to the lowest, knew when he wakened each\nmorning that he had that day some real and indispensable work to do. The\nchild must learn his lesson in that light. \u201cIf I hear of an artist of\npromise,\u201d says Ruskin, \u201cthe first question I ask is, \u2018Does he work?\u2019\u201d\nRuskin dismissed Whistler, who painted rather in the way of Mary,\nbecause he obviously did not work. All great men whatsoever worked.\n\n                 The heights by great men reached and kept\n                 Were not attained by sudden flight,\n                 But they, while their companions slept,\n                 Were toiling upward in the night.\n\nIf you want to be a Knox or a Luther or a Cromwell or a Frederick or a\nBismarck you must work.\n\nThe spirit of industry seemed to be Christianity itself. In reading\nFroude\u2019s history one seemed to gain the idea that the Reformation meant\ngetting rid of idleness and monks and abbeys, and substituting noble\nlabour, honest craftsmen, and factories. It is a modern misapprehension.\nThere was a time when we used to sing a hymn extravagantly opposed to\nthe gospel of work\u2014\n\n                          Doing is a deadly thing,\n                          Doing ends in death.\n\nWe have a reputation for work. Most Russians would be incredulous if\ntold that Englishmen had ever sung such words. Yet they have, and we\nknow that we are not like the ants who have always been working and\nalways will work. We have been out of love with work before and will be\nagain.\n\nDuring the Victorian era every Englishman had his coat off and was\nworking for all he was worth, perspiration on his brow, grime on his\nbody, the clangour of machinery in his ear. Carlyle found his generation\nworking, and gave it his blessing in effective phrase, and was so\nobsessed by his own message that he gave up his own quest, his own\nseeking, and lived in the British Museum, pondering, grubbing,\nscratching, and turning forth volume after volume of dull Frederick, and\nhe forgot his own soul and the man who wrote _Sartor Resartus_ and _The\nHeroes_.\n\nAnd although this work, work for work\u2019s sake, is not a Christian thing,\nit is associated in the mind with what I call the \u201cway of Martha.\u201d It is\nan exaggeration of her sweet serviceableness, a supposition that she had\ngone crazy and had not only become cumbered about with many things, but\nwas so cumbered that she could never in all her life spare a moment to\ncome to the Master. Be that as it may, England had a fairly clear and\nsimple notion of her creed. Work pleased her. Popular opinion was on the\nside, not of the parson who did nought, but of the old farmer \u201cwho\nstubbed Thornaby Waaste.\u201d Tennyson sang work and the goal of work\u2014\u201cAll\ndiseases cured by science,\u201d \u201cthe Parliament of the World,\u201d \u201cthe rule of\nthe meek upon earth.\u201d We gave our shoulders and our hearts and our lips\nto the work, though indeed not much of the last, for in those days\nsilence was golden.\n\nNow silence is golden only for those who do not know what to say. A\nchange has come about, is coming about. Work has ceased to be holy.\n\n\u201cTo labour is to pray.\u201d \u201cDo the duty which lies nearest to you, that\nwhich is doablest.\u201d \u201cDo noble things, not dream them, all day long ...\u201d\nsuch was the message of Victorian literature. And yet in that literature\nthere was a note of discord, and that was the voice of Browning, the\nfirst of the moderns, and he wrote:\n\n                     Not on the vulgar mass\n                     Called \u201cwork,\u201d must sentence pass.\n\nAnd again:\n\n             Thoughts hardly to be packed\n             Into a narrow act,\n         Fancies that broke through language and escaped;\n             All I could never be,\n             All, men ignored in me,\n         This, I was worth to God, whose wheel the pitcher shaped.\n\nAnd again:\n\n               He fixed thee midst this dance\n               Of plastic circumstance,\n           This Present, thou, forsooth, wouldst fain arrest:\n               Machinery just meant\n               To give thy soul its bent,\n           Try thee and turn thee forth, sufficiently impressed.\n\nThe way of Martha had given place to the way of Mary. My elders read\n_Rabbi Ben Ezra_ to comfort one another:\n\n                  Grow old along with me!\n                  The best is yet to be,\n              The last of life, for which the first was made;\n\nand they read it because of a secret sense of failure. But the poem, and\nthe message of Browning in general, came to those of my generation with\na different force. When I was twenty I lived with the poem, as did those\nI loved; I carried it with me wherever I went; it burned, it blazed in\nmy mind. It was a triumphant song. All the beauty of the time seemed to\nradiate from it, and as I recall it to-day and write the old words down,\nit brings back to me the fields, the hills, the roads, lime blossoms,\nroses, faces of the summer when its meaning was first absolutely and\nclearly mine. What was it in the poem? It was the modern movement. It\nwas good b\u2019ye to the old. It was a sight of one\u2019s own immortality and\nPsyche herself, the ever-lovely one.\n\nBut necessarily I cannot write down what it meant. Suffice it that I can\nremember how a boy of this time reacted to the touch of Browning.\nBrowning was a wonderful turn in English thought.\n\nIt was not simply one poem of Browning that broke away from\nVictorianism. We had held that there was no greater satisfaction than\nthat of the craftsman in the work of his own hands. His was the real\n_Imitatio Christi_ when he made something with his hands and saw that it\nwas good. Then we read _Andrea del Sarto_, despising\n\n                 This low-pulsed craftsman\u2019s hand of mine,\n\nknowing that the artists who failed reached a heaven denied to him.\n\nFrom Browning\u2019s day on we have been moving away from Martha and coming\nto Mary. The note-books of those young ones who loved thoughts began to\nbe filled with verses, sayings, apothegms of a new character, and many\nof the elder ones to whom we read what we had found were blind and deaf\nto the new ideas. I remember one old literary man and artist who used\nalways to say, \u201cI take my stand with Jim\u201d\u2014meaning that he held with St.\nJames that faith without works is barren. He belonged to the old.\n\nI admit we were not sober in our judgments. We went to see Ibsen and\nBernard Shaw, and it was easy to agree that Nora was right when she fled\nfrom her home and her husband to save her soul, and we thought that the\nimmoral and unprincipled Dubedat was sooner to be saved than the\nhard-working slum doctor. We saw in Solveig, who stayed in the\nbackground and prayed, the true type of womanhood, and understood how\nPeer Gynt through her could be saved. We read Nietzsche, that mad\nChristian, a sort of Mary who hated her sister Martha, calling out in\nanger that man had ceased to be man and had become merely _neighbour_.\nWe entered the domain of Russian literature, and read Dostoieffsky and\nChekhof and Gorky, and so fell under the spell of Eastern Christianity,\nwhere we remain to-day.\n\nThe taste of England has been steadily changing this last ten years, and\nthe current becoming deeper and broader. Russia and the East have been\ncoming steadily nearer, and more and more of us have turned our backs on\nwork and service and that Divine materialism\u2014the raising of the poor.\nNot that we are on the way to becoming a philosophic and reflective or\nascetic nation, or even in the way of singing again \u201cDoing is a deadly\nthing\u201d; but more and more of our nation is attempting to take to itself\nand re-express the other aspect of Christianity\u2014the way of Mary.\n\nEven in the North of England, where the land is devoted to work and the\ntowns are little more than barracks of workmen, there is a noticeable\nand, even from a capitalist\u2019s point of view, an alarming change of\nspirit. The \u201cworkers\u201d are rebellious. It is not that they want more\nmoney or lighter hours or better conditions. They simply don\u2019t want to\nwork. The rising generation is disinclined to settle down, and the time\nis coming when there will be difficulty in getting labouring hands, when\nit will be difficult to buy them. The gloom of our industrialism is\ndestined to be broken.\n\nAs yet, however, those who represent us in politics, literature, and art\nbelong to the old. Mr. Lloyd George with his care for the poor is a\nMartha. Mr. Bonar Law is a Martha also. H. G. Wells, with his World set\nFree, and his rooms with rounded instead of squared corners to help the\nwomen to sweep, is a Martha. Our poets are not Marys, and it is\nnecessary to go to Francis Thompson or Rossetti to find a mystic poet.\nOur painters, Peter Graham, Farquharson, Leader, and others whose works\ndeck Academy walls, are occupied with the outward appearances of things\nrather than the transcendental. And since Watts is dead we have not even\na mystical portrait painter, but all admire the gift to show in the face\nmoney, importance, style, meat. Our people are worth painting, but there\nis no one to paint them. We need an English Serof to show the true\nkindred and spiritual relationship of faces.\n\nOn the stage we admire Russian opera and Russian ways. We show _The\nDynasts_ in the same way as it would have been shown in Moscow, or\nnearly so. There first of all the new tendency is showing. Unfortunately\nwe have a long battle against American humour and vulgarity, American\nmaterialism and the capital that would exploit our stage. Otherwise our\nstage would change at a greater speed. Still the difference in the way\nShakespeare is produced in England is an index of the change. When we\nproduce _Hamlet_ as it is produced at the Theatre of Art, Moscow, we\nshall have traversed the whole distance between the way of Martha and\nthe way of Mary as far as the stage is concerned.\n\n\n\n\n                                   XI\n            THE ECCLESIASTICAL CHURCH AND THE LIVING CHURCH\n\n\nStrange that there should be a feud between the Church and the Theatre!\nThey were originally one and the same, and as it is the Church remains a\nholy theatre where day after day is enacted the same holy mystery. In\npassing: how much nearer the Theatre is brought to the Church by the\nconstant repetition of the great classical and mystical dramas such as\n_Hamlet_. The reason for the religious distrust of the Theatre which\nexists in all countries,\u2014in England in the Free Churches; in Russia in\nthe Orthodox Church,\u2014lies in the degradation of the Theatre, the making\nit a show of wild beasts, a stage for indecent dances and comic songs,\nan arena for combats of athletes. The common townspeople are not and\nnever can be the pupils of Hypatia. They will have their indecencies and\nvulgarities, wild beasts, acrobats, invitation to sin. The showman has\nusurped the place of the mystagogue, and money-making has replaced\nreligious service or service to art and culture as a motive of\ntheatrical production. The Theatre to-day, even if it aspire to be\nserious, has unclean hands, and the Church not unfairly regards it as\npart of the stock-in-trade of the evil one.\n\nAn interesting exemplification of the relation of Church and Stage is\nfurnished by Oscar Wilde\u2019s _Salome_. To the Christian, to look at the\ndance of Salome is to glance into the charnel-house where all is decay\nand worms and death, and to see there the head of one of the saints with\ncelestial aureole. But the dramatist has turned the interest to the\ndance itself and made you say that it is interesting: he has dwelt on\nthe jewels, the crimsons, the thick lips, the luscious movements. Every\neffort is made to make you agree with Herod, and the best way to do that\nis to suggest to your body and soul the same feelings towards the dancer\non the stage as Herod felt towards the daughter of his brother\u2019s wife\u2014so\nthat you would give her anything, even the pure body of the saint that\nis in your keeping. He would give you a place with the worms and the\nspirit of decay, and let you end as Herod ended, eaten by the worms at\nthe last. No aureole for you!\n\nBut the Church suggests the aureole for you, and if _Salome_ were\npresented as a mystery-play the whole interest of the populace would be\ndirected towards the sainthood of John the Baptist. When Oscar Wilde\u2019s\n_Salome_ was produced at Petrograd, Russia made short work of it. On the\nfirst night, at the first public performance, some one stood up in the\nmiddle of a scene and shouted in a bass voice:\n\n\u201c_Spustee zanavess!_\u201d \u201cLower the curtain!\u201d and the curtain was lowered;\nand _Salome_ has not been repeated there from that day to this.\n\nWho it was said this is rather a mystery, but it was doubtless some one\nwho had the voice or the ear of Orthodoxy. Russia probably gained by\nthis prohibition. A pity, however, that many other plays quite as\ninjurious are allowed their way to the perversion of private morals and\nthe corruption of public taste. Indeed it would be a gain to Russia if\nthe Church would cease looking at the Stage from a merely ecclesiastical\npoint of view. The fault of the clergy is their pride in their own order\nand their institutions. The clergy, ministers of the living Church of\nChrist, should in nature be the humblest of people, so humble in fact,\nso meek and unresentful, that it would be necessary occasionally to\nprotect them from the enmity of the secular world. As it is, in their\npomp, they are proud. They despise the Stage and often prohibit plays on\nquite wrong grounds, incidentally depriving not only the theatre and the\npublic, but the Church also, of something helpful to the cause of\nEastern Christianity and of all real Russian values. The prohibition of\nAndreef\u2019s _Anathema_, performed at the Theatre of Art in Moscow, is an\nexample. Though this prohibition was at the instance of the Archbishop\nof Moscow the play was in essential teaching profoundly helpful to\nEastern Christianity. It was written by a man who belonged to the\nrevolutionary movement, but it was only the more remarkable and the more\npowerful thereby. It was in substance a refutation of Westernism and the\nideals after which secularist Russia was striving. A pious and\nphilanthropic Jew inheriting immense wealth, millions of American\ndollars, resolved in his simplicity to save the world, feeding the\nhungry, clothing the ragged, giving money to the needy, medical aid to\nthe suffering. The drama shows the futility of this dream, and at the\nend the mob of enraged and suffering humanity stone the philanthropist\nto death. Not by material but by spiritual things could their sufferings\nbe assuaged.\n\nThe archbishop who stopped it was probably never in a theatre in his\nlife, and no doubt condemned it on hearsay, and from a complete\nmisapprehension of the significance of the drama.\n\nThe Church of the future in England, and probably in Russia, will have\nto come into alliance with what may be called the right side of the\ntheatre. For occasionally in the theatre people worship as much as\nothers do in the Church. Many young people whose families have lapsed\nfrom the Church find their religious life functionised in the book, the\ndrama, the opera, the symphony. They are not _communicants_ in the\nliteral sense, they are outside the church walls and the shut church\ndoors, but they are inside the living Church. They have a common word\nwith people inside church walls. Their chorus of praise swells from the\nother side of the walls, and in some countries the secular chorus of\npraise to God has considerably more volume than the official\necclesiastical chorus. Somehow in church one rather resents the choir,\nespecially in the _Te Deum_, when they are singing it to some\n\u201cGod-forsaken\u201d curious tune that a pedant musician has chosen. It is\ngood when the whole church can lift one great voice. And outside the\nchurch the greater congregation rather resents the church-goers. They\nwould sing _Te Deum_ also.\n\nThe relation of Church and Stage exhibits the confusion of religious\nvalues at present existing. The same confusion exists with regard to the\nChurch and Literature\u2014many of the great classics of Russian literature,\nlike Gogol\u2019s _Dead Souls_, the monks would regard it a sin to read. The\necclesiastical Church takes no useful stand with regard to what is\nhelpful, what harmful, in past and present literature; it is left for\nthe living Church to find out for itself and do what it can without\norganisation. Even in the domain of Holy Writ there is a confusion of\nwhat the living Church believes, and what mere ecclesiasticism lays\ndown. At least one fundamental idea in Christianity has been overlaid,\nand, as it were, frustrated by the Church itself\u2014the idea of the Holy\nGhost. The Holy Ghost has been conventionalised and made terrible. It\nhas become the most inscrutable and awe-inspiring aspect of the Trinity,\nwhereas it should be the most familiar and consoling, Christ saying\ngood-bye to his disciples in that last long sweet talk where He calls\nthem friends, tells them that after He is gone away from them there will\ncome a new consolation, the vision of Truth.\n\n\u201cI will pray the Father and he shall give you another Comforter that he\nmay abide with you for ever; even the Spirit of truth whom the world\ncannot receive, ... the Comforter which is the Holy Ghost, whom the\nFather will send in my name, He shall teach you all things, and bring\nall things to your remembrance, whatsoever I have said unto you. Peace I\nleave with you, my peace I give unto you: not as the world giveth, give\nI unto you. Let not your heart be troubled, neither let it be afraid....\nIf the world hate you, ye know that it hated me before it hated you. If\nye were of the world the world would love his own: but because ye are\nnot of the world, but I have chosen you out of the world, therefore the\nworld hateth you.... When the Comforter is come, whom I will send unto\nyou from the Father, even the Spirit of truth, which proceedeth from the\nFather, He shall testify of me: And ye also shall bear witness, because\nye have been with me from the beginning.\u201d\n\nAnd in the cross-examination before Pilate, Jesus said, \u201cMy kingdom is\nnot of this world: if my kingdom were of this world, then would my\nservants fight, that I should not be delivered to the Jews.... To this\nend was I born, and for this cause came I into the world, that I should\nbear witness unto the truth.\u201d\n\nTherein lies the true idea of the Holy Ghost, the Holy Spirit\u2014it is the\nvision of Heavenly Truth that gives the lie to worldly values, worldly\ntruth. By virtue of this Holy Spirit the blind see, though they have no\neyes, the deaf hear, the dumb speak, the dead live, mortality itself is\ndisproved. The mysteries of the Pentecostal mitres, of the gift of\ntongues, and the conventionalised notion of what is called the \u201csin\nagainst the Holy Ghost,\u201d have stood in the way of the simple and\nbeautiful conception of the comforting vision of Truth. The Church, with\nits keys of heaven and hell, and its arrogation of the power of anathema\nand excommunication, has preferred to lay its emphasis on those texts\nwhich may seem to imply the dreadfulness of offence against a certain\nmore inscrutable aspect of the Trinity. There is nothing in the Gospels\nbut love of man, forgiveness of man, and nothing is more pitiful than\nthe man who, having a glimpse of the Truth, yet denies it or wilfully\nconfuses it with magic or unclean power.\n\nBut the _Filioque_ clause of the Creed is alone sufficient to exemplify\nthe confusion of ecclesiasticism and the living Church. There are many\nwho think that the two Churches of England and Russia are kept apart by\nthis clause alone. England holds that the Holy Ghost, the Holy Spirit,\nproceeds from the Father and from the Son, Russia that it proceeds from\nthe Father alone. Russia\u2019s basis is St. John, XV. 26, \u201c... the Spirit of\ntruth, which proceedeth from the Father, he shall testify of me.\u201d \u201cWhat\ndoes it matter how it is put?\u201d cries the living Church. But\necclesiastical pedantry is strongly entrenched, and whenever the\nquestion of the intercommunion of the two Churches is mentioned there\narises that fatal phrase\u2014\u201c_Filioque_\u2014and from the Son.\u201d\n\n\u201cDoes not one of your Thirty-nine Articles lay down that the Holy Ghost\nproceeds from the Father _and from the Son_? And is not assent to the\nThirty-nine Articles obligatory upon your clergy? Why, then....\u201d To\nwhich one can only answer in one\u2019s heart:\n\n                 Thirty-nine Articles,\n                 Ye precious little particles,\n                 And did God really make the world by you?\n\nThe same confusion exists with regard to the Church and Life. That which\nthe living Church of Christ possesses is a spiritual communion, not a\nset of dogmas or a set of points of ecclesiastical law. If a man is\nreally touched to go to church, if he has the impulse from the heart, it\nis not in order that he may hear dogma. He goes to blend his voice and\nhis thoughts with the voice and the thoughts of humanity in hymn and\nprayer. But to-day many misconceptions arise. Carlyle could not go to\nchurch because the sermon bored him. Many stay away from churches\nbecause they can\u2019t stand so-and-so\u2019s sermon. As if the sermon were part\nof the service! In old days the sermons were often delivered outside the\nchurches after the service was done. The priest came through the\nworshippers, went out into the church square, and rising to a platform\nor \u201coutside pulpit\u201d harangued the everyday crowd. The function of the\nChurch service is not to be a frame to a sermon, even a clever or\nprofound or inspiring sermon. Its function is praise.\n\nA Jew writing for an important Russian newspaper about the state of the\nChurch of England remarks that \u201cdogmas make many leave the Church, and\nthose who stay remain to preach ethics,\u201d and he goes on to praise ethics\nas the function of the Church, leaving out of account, and evidently\nhaving no notion of, the Church as a temple of religion, a place of\ncommunion and aspiration. Surely the preaching ethics is a work begun by\nparents and confirmed by the schoolmaster. Christ did not die on the\ncross or forgive the thief who recognised Him in order to preach \u201cThou\nshalt not steal!\u201d Yet such a confusion of ideas remains in the mind even\nof the cultured.\n\nStill, the whole world and the universe is an orchestra praising God,\nand, remembering that, it is impossible to say there is real confusion\nor final confusion. It is as impossible to classify and show series of\nlike things, for the imagination tells you that every instrument in the\norchestra is diverse. Hence I am open to misconception when I write of\nconfusion or when I classify, as for instance when I talk of Marthas and\nMarys. There is confusion and there is order. Nothing is fixed, all is\nin motion, the kaleidoscope is ever moving. So it would be wrong to say\nthat all who were in the way of Martha were in towns working for the\npoor, or that all in the way of Mary were away in the desert saving\ntheir souls at the feet of the Master, or that the priests in their\norders and vestments with their processions and grandeur were all in the\nway of Martha, or that the hermits of the desert did not upon occasion\ncome like Paphnutius to Alexandria to save Tha\u00efs, the dancing-girl. The\nsisters love one another; and though it is not written in the Gospels,\nthere were certainly occasions when Mary might have been seen cumbered\nabout with many things whilst Martha sat with her Lord.\n\n\n\n\n                                  XII\n                         WITNESS UNTO THE TRUTH\n\n\nThe purely Eastern aspect of the Church is the way of Mary, the\nspiritual, meditative, introspective, mystical way, and this is ever the\nstrength of the whole Church. It is even the strength of the Protestant\nchurches, though there the spiritual life is more private. In Orthodoxy\nthe voice speaks from the desert right into the ears of the everyday\nmundane crowd. The people are enjoined against sloth in the name of the\nfathers of the desert. They sing their hymns in praise of those who have\novercome. They are encompassed round about with \u201cthe crowd of\nwitnesses,\u201d the ikon faces and frescoed saints of the church walls, the\nthousands of those who have died in the Lord looking on whilst we run\nwith patience the race that is set before us.\n\nOur work is in the world, our passion is for the realisation of good\nworldly hopes. We pray for the King, the Emperor; we own a true\nallegiance to a God-guided C\u00e6sar, and are ready to render to such a\nC\u00e6sar the things that are his. We pray for the administrative bodies and\nfor Parliament, may they go forward to the raising of the poor, the\nhealing of the sick, the raising to a life of knowledge those who are\ndead in ignorance. We pray for our fellow-man and for ourselves. We band\nourselves in a Christian order, and confirm in ourselves the resolve to\nfight against sin, ugliness, unhappiness. We promise to give time, to\ngive money, to work for the Cause. This is all in the way of Martha. But\nthese thoughts and prayers are made in a temple where the light is the\nlight of candles placed before shrines of the Unseen. A vision\naccompanies the Christian man. Though his passion is towards the things\nof this world he is encompassed and enveloped by the atmosphere of\nanother world. The remembrance remains his that C\u00e6sar is not God, nor\nC\u00e6sar\u2019s officers the angels of God, nor this world the real world, that\nthe poor we have always with us, that our true citizenship is of another\nrealm.\n\nThe work of Martha fails, fails again; the poor multiply, sickness\nbecomes a plague and scourge from God, the ignorant increase, peace\nbecomes war, the progressive work of centuries topples down like Babel,\nkings or emperors become killed, allegiances of millions are changed,\nfamous Christian workers and organisers who have given their whole life\nto the Cause go out to death with grey hairs, all their life-work made\nas nought before their eyes. The passionate soldier-saint goes out in\nfailure. The lukewarm mediocre man and the cheerful happy-go-lucky\nmortals, the ordinary folk, the witty ones, the dull ones, the run of\nmankind as we call them, also go out, looking at the failure of ideas to\nwhich they have vaguely or earnestly given assent. But Christianity does\nnot fail. Thousands of years hence this young religion of Christianity\nwill be more triumphant, splendid, vital, than it is to-day. And this by\nvirtue of the mystical and transcendental aspect of the word.\n\nThe service of the Church is more than a consecration of duty. It is a\nbearing witness to the Truth, a watching till He come, an expectancy, a\ngetting into position for a great procession, a carrying of banners and\nemblems, a joining in a universal hymn sung not only by ourselves but by\nall the dead. The light of the Church is the light of transfiguration,\nnot the light of common day, it is the light of the halo round the\nsaint\u2019s head.\n\nYou enter a church, such a temple, for instance, as the Cathedral of the\nAssumption in Moscow. At a step you are in the precincts of a different\nworld. You have overstepped a frontier line, and the language has\nchanged, just as when in Europe you cross a boundary and the language\nchanges, say from German to Russian. The people are looking a different\nway, not Westward as to the Emperor but Eastward as to God. You are in a\nnew kingdom; but as your thoughts go back to the street you left you\nrealise that the kingdom is not from thence.\n\nThe faces in the ikons are not the faces of men. The figures are twisted\nand strange. One asks: \u201cWhy did not the Byzantine painters paint the\ntruth? There never were men looking as these men. Why these\ncopper-coloured and flame-coloured faces? Why the unearthly expression\nin eyebrows and eyes? Men never looked like that.\u201d The answer is: the\nearly Christian painters did not wish to paint earthly truth. Their\nobject was to indicate the unearthly nature of man, his citizenship of\nanother world. They wrote into the features of every saint, \u201cBe of good\ncheer, I have overcome the world.\u201d This was one of the earliest\ntraditions in the Christian Church, and has been handed down from\ngeneration to generation in the books of _ikonopis_ or ikon-painting.\nThere is a way to paint a Christian saint, and that way has to be\nfollowed in the Eastern churches. He must be represented as a witness\nunto the Truth, a face that at least at last owns no allegiance to the\nmonarch in the West, but only to the God in the East, the face of an\narchangel or of one who sings continuously, \u201cHoly, holy, holy, Lord God\nAlmighty, which was and is and is to come.\u201d One may belong to a mighty\nempire, but the citizenship of those within the Church is of a mightier\nand grander and vaster empire. The thrill of the new national hymn is\nthe greater, the characteristic uniforms and robes have the more\nreverence in their associations.\n\nThe vestments of the priests astonish one. They are gorgeous past\nbelief. Whence comes that gold brocade? It was cut in another world. At\nleast, that is its intention, that is what it would signify. Who are\nthey in white robes? Why do the priests at the altar walk so stately?\nWhat is that new _tempo_ to which they have learned to move and to swing\nthe censer?\n\nAnd the voice of the clergy, that unearthly bass, that profound groaning\nand seeking of notes that man does not utter, that voice as of Jesus\ncommanding the soul of the dead Lazarus to return to the awful and\ndreadful corpse? The service in the Slavonic tongue, not in the everyday\ntongue....\n\nAll these things bear witness unto the Truth and are the emblems of our\nallegiance to the kingdom of Christ, marks of our other citizenship, the\nvisible emblems and symbols of our hope, our love and passion. Hence it\nis possible to sing with angels and archangels. Failure in the work of\nMartha loses significance as failure. Failure is even good, it is one\nmore sign, an involuntary ritual, telling of our truer destiny.\n\nSo though the way of Mary is consummated in the desert, in the cell, in\ngiving up the world, in pilgrimaging, praying, fasting, and only a few\ncan necessarily take to that way, yet it is that way which speaks\ntriumphantly in the Church. The great majority of human beings must\nalways remain behind \u201ccumbered about with many things,\u201d though loved by\nthe Master they will not be able to sell everything, take up the Cross\nand follow to the place of the Skull. They will keep the commandments of\nChrist and enter on set occasions the temples we have set up. They will\nreceive confirmation in their life and in the love of the Lord, they\nwill pray for what they will, and confess themselves. They will praise\nand be in communion. They will recognise that they belong to another\nkingdom, and their hearts will swell with the triumphant and passionate\naffirmation of the Godhead which each finds in his poor conditional\nexistence as man. The way of Martha and the way of Mary.\n\n\n\n\n                                  XIII\n                        THE FESTIVAL OF THE DEAD\n\n\nAt Easter I was at my old home, Vladikavkaz, and on the second Tuesday\nafter Easter Sunday went through one of the most characteristic of\nRussian holidays\u2014Krasnagorka. It is half-Christian, half-pagan\u2014a\nfestival of spring and of new life, but celebrated almost entirely in\ngraveyards and cemeteries. At Krasnagorka almost the whole population of\nthe town goes on an outing or a picnic\u2014to the cemetery.\n\nEarly in the morning I received a message from a Russian friend, \u201cCome\nto our church; you\u2019ll see an interesting sight.\u201d The church was crowded,\nbut I got in, for nobody objects to your pushing. It was an unusual\nservice. The whole centre of the floor of the church, a space of some\ntwenty feet by seven, was covered with napkins in which lay lumps of\ncake, brightly coloured eggs, basins of rice and strawberry jam, basins\nof rice and raisins. In each basin, and there were some hundreds of\nthem, a lighted wax candle was stuck in the rice and gave a little\nflame, and beside each lay the little red book in which the peasant\nrecords the names of his relatives as they die.\n\n\u201cWhat is it all for?\u201d I asked. \u201cIt is the food for the dead,\u201d my friend\nanswered.\n\nA priest and a deacon were standing at the near end of the spread of\nilluminated food, and they read aloud from sheaves of papers the names\nof dead persons whom members of the church had wished to have\nremembered. Each person who had brought in food for sanctification\nbrought also a slip of paper with the names of his dead. It took hours\nto read them all out, and when at last the task was finished, the deacon\ntook a smoking censer, and walking round the feast flung incense over\nit, the chains of the censer rattling as he made the Sign of the Cross.\nWe sang once more the festal hymn of Easter, _Christos voskrese iz\nmertvikh_\u2014\u201cChrist is risen from the dead,\u201d\u2014sung at every service until\nAscension, and then, after kissing the cross in the priest\u2019s hand, each\nperson sought out his special basin of rice and pieces of cake and bowl\nof coloured eggs and moved out of the church.\n\nAt the door of the church stood many beggars, six or seven bearded,\ntattered, and dirty old men, and a score or so of women and children.\nAll the old men had their mouths open, and each worshipper, as he made\nhis exit, helped a beggar liberally to rice and jam, scooping out great\nspoonfuls with wooden spoons and poking them into the open, waiting\nmouths. Many beggars had cotton bags hanging from their necks, and into\nthese were promiscuously flung spoonfuls of rice and raisins, eggs,\nbiscuit, cake. The beggars were told to eat what was given them in the\nname of the dead. My friend fed at least ten beggars before she left the\nchurch, and gave eggs and bits of cake, but she did not give all that\nshe had. A great quantity was reserved for a spread in the graveyard.\n\nMany cabs were waiting at the church door, and the worshippers stepped\ninto them with their napkins of sanctified food, and drove to the\ncemeteries of the town. From ten o\u2019clock in the morning until sunset,\nthe cemeteries were as thronged with people as Hampstead Heath on\nWhit-Monday.\n\nNearly every grave in a Russian churchyard has seats round it, and it is\npossible to go to the family grave and sit down and think a little, or\npray a little when you wish. I went to the graveyard where my friend\u2019s\nsister lies buried, an acre of cypress and pine and gentle mounds, where\nthe dank earth seems like bed-clothes laid over the dead. To-day this\nwide melancholy collection of green mounds and wooden crosses was alive\nwith the laughter and songs of children. On the heaps of mouldering\nearth samovars were humming, and little candles gleamed against a\nbackground of lilac blossoms and spring flowers.\n\nMy friend and I sat down. The mother of the dead one came, deep in crape\nand laden with gifts. We planted our candles, and on this grave as on\nall the others round about the wan flames flickered. We took\nbright-coloured eggs\u2014our Easter eggs dyed purple and crimson and\nbrown,\u2014dug holes in the mould with our fingers, buried the eggs, covered\ntheir brightness over with mould again. Then we put down slices of\nEaster cake on the grave, and emptied there saucers of rice\u2014that the\ndead one might share in. We sat on the crazy wooden seats around, and\nlooked at the earth and were silent.\n\nThe mother went away to find a priest, and presently brought a\npurple-cloaked greybeard to sing over the grave and burn incense. His\nred and wrinkled face was all red and fresh from the open air, for he\nhad been in the graveyard all day singing over the graves. He was tired,\nbut he raised his head and his voice and called forth his little\nmemorial prayer in an antique musical bass: \u201cGrant to her who has passed\naway, O Christ, to obtain Thy unspeakable glory.... Give rest, O Christ,\nto the soul of Thy servant....\u201d We all stood around, silent and\nawe-stricken, and listened and crossed ourselves, and kissed the cross\nin the priest\u2019s hand.\n\nHe received a rouble, then went away to another grave; beggars besought\nus; and as if they had not been satisfied at the church door, but were\ntaking enough to last them a whole year, they received helping after\nhelping of rice and cake and eggs. This, I felt, was the great beggars\u2019\nday in the year. They were important people. They were necessary to the\nfeast. Strange that they should appear as proxies for the dead and eat\nfor them. A beautiful reminder that in the living we find all our dead\nagain.\n\nWe had stood to meet the priest and to give the beggars the food we had\nbrought, so now that the beggars had eaten all the rice and raisins and\nrice and jam and had gone farther to eat at other graves, we sat down\nagain in the still presence of the green mound and we talked of the\nvirtues of the dead one, of how old she would have been and how beloved\nshe was, and of how often she had been remembered, and how soon we\nshould join her. Evidently the mother assumed that what she said was\nheard by her whose body lay in the earth. We were all quietly joyful\u2014not\nsad. We had the spirit of children making believe; we had also the calm\nfaith and knowledge of elders\u2014that there is no death, that those who\nhave passed out of sight have not ceased but are alive for evermore. I\nfelt the Russians, and indeed mankind altogether, to be very dear at\nthis festival; they were doing things that must touch those invisible\nones who know more than we do and look on, bring tears to the eyes of\nangels, and not as often in man\u2019s history and the spectacle of his\ncivilisation and abomination call down the wrath of higher powers.\n\nWe talked ... and then as we became silent again we heard the music of\nman\u2019s life, and listened with our souls.\n\nAt some graves there was boisterous jollity, at others terrible anguish\nand grief. Near where we sat a woman lay moaning on the grave of her\nhusband, her red tear-washed cheeks and her lips on the earth; and she\ncalled to him with sobs, telling him all that had happened during the\nyear, how the children were, how often they had thought of him. It was\nheart-rending to listen to her. And yet, mingled with her terrible\nlament, came the sound of mumbling priests, the buzz of conversation,\nthe laughter of children wrestling among the graves and gambling in the\neggs that had been given them, the tinkle of the guitar and of light\nsongs, the strains of the concertina.\n\nWe walked by winding ways across the graveyard and saw many an old man\nand woman knocking at the door of the earth they would soon enter,\ndropping placid tears and thinking what it would be like some years\nhence when they would be under the earth and this festive crowd of live\nbeings above, candle-lighting, feasting, singing, thinking, praying. And\nthere were young men and women walking arm-in-arm, looking brightly into\none another\u2019s eyes, strengthening their bonds of love and of life. There\nwere also little children, boys and girls, thoughtless, indifferent to\ndeath and to the dead, waiting for the older people to go away, so that\nthey might forage among the graves and dig up again the red and blue\neggs that had been buried there.\n\n\u201cAre they allowed to do that?\u201d I asked in horror.\n\n\u201cYes,\u201d said the sister. \u201cEvery one knows that directly evening comes and\nwe elders go home the poor children will come and dig up the eggs and\ntake them away, and take also the wild flowers we have brought. Let\nthem! It is quite good that they should. You know it is the festival of\nspring and of life.\u201d I realised that she was right. It is the way to\ngive to the dead\u2014give to the beggars and to the children. The dead get\nwhat we send them, surely.\n\n                  *       *       *       *       *\n\nStrange to notice in this acre of God some graves that had not been\nvisited this day\u2014old graves. I reflected on many a country walk in\nEngland, culminating in a visit to an old church and graveyard, and the\ntracing of the names and dates of people long since passed away. It is\nsomewhat strange. When we are in an old graveyard and looking at the\ngraves of people who have died centuries ago we feel, instead of grief,\na sort of quiet satisfaction, and that even when those whose burial is\nrecorded are of our own name and family. We dare not even contrast our\nfeeling with the poignancy that is attached to a new grave\u2014with its\ngarish stone, fresh clods, and wilted flowers.\n\nI often wonder where the dead are. Neither in heaven nor hell, I\nsuppose, nor waiting for a last day and dreadful judgment, nor going\nthrough the circles of purgatory, nor just simply under the earth....\n\nWe know that they exist and are alive, and the knowledge is of that more\ncertain kind that does not spring from our mentality but is felt in our\nbodies. The grief we have when sons or daughters or fathers or mothers\ndie is a _physical_ anguish, and is akin to the pains of birth. Some one\nhas been cut off, deceased\u2014cut off from us. Even in a dream to lose one\nof those _nearest_ to us is to suffer a sort of physical mortification,\nto weep senselessly, lose control of nerves, and be prostrated.\n\nThe fact is we are all one. Even the death of some one who is quite\nremote jars upon the soul.\n\nWe were talking one evening of death and some one said to me:\n\n                    \u201c... to die and go we know not where,\n                  To lie in cold obstruction and to rot,\n\n\u2014that is what I fear in death. They tell me I am a pagan, but I feel the\ndead are under the earth. I hate to think of lying in a damp churchyard\nand decaying all alone, through days and nights and spring rains, summer\nstorms, autumn winds, winter snows. The rain must be terrible for the\ndead\u2014to be all wet and old like a fallen leaf.\u201d\n\nAnother said he did not mind the idea of lying under the earth in the\nrain and changing into mould. It was gentle and restful. And it was\nbeautiful too, for flowers would rise from where the body slept. One\nrecalled the lines:\n\n                     Oh, never blows the rose so red\n                     As where some buried Caesar lies;\n\nand another, the beautiful lines of Nash:\n\n                       Worms feed on Hector brave,\n                       Dust hath closed Helen\u2019s eyes.\n\nBut to my mind came some words said to me by Algernon Blackwood the\nfirst day we met:\n\n\u201cYou know we all came out of the earth; somehow or other we have got to\nget back to her. The Earth is not dead, she is living.\u201d\n\n                  *       *       *       *       *\n\nHe was right. And the dead under the earth are in living care. All that\nis is One and is beautiful. Life and death make a unity. Everything in\nthe world and without it, in the past and in the future, is to me a\nunity, and I am calm and happy in it. In me, in you, are all the\ndead\u2014they crowd behind my eyes and look out, one above another\u2019s\nshoulders like the people at a great spectacle. There are myriads of\nthem\u2014I hold them. In this sense they are under the earth, in that you\nand I are earth, and they are in us, and look out of us. We are all\nwindows through which there glance at times faces of each of all there\never have been.\n\n\n\n\n                                  III\n                        THE DESERT AND THE WORLD\n\n\n\n\n                                   I\n                         A CHAIN OF HAPPENINGS\n\n\nWinter changing to summer I gave up life in towns and set off upon a new\nadventure. In May I was looking at Bokhara and the gay-coloured\nmeditative Mohammedan world. In June I was tramping across Russian\nCentral Asia the way the pioneers go to find new land and new life. My\nroad companions were people who had given up the old and were seeking\nthe new\u2014not farther West but farther East. By July I had crossed to\nsouthern Siberia, and was away on the Altai Mountains when the War with\nGermany broke out. In the autumn I returned in the wake of the mobilised\nRussian army, and was in Moscow during the first month of its\nenthusiasm, then at Libau and Vilna and Warsaw, at Petrograd, and home\nto England. I wrote my book on the War. All the winter I wrote and spoke\nfor Russia. Life resolved itself into lectures, speeches, addresses,\nmeetings, and all with the view of making Russia and especially Russian\nChristianity better known in England. Time flies in such a way, and very\nquickly it was May again and time to set out upon a new adventure. So I\ntook up my quest of Martha and Mary once more and set out for Egypt,\nhoping to be able to go from Egypt to Russia the way Christianity came\nto her. For a great deal of Russian Christianity came from the Egyptian\ndeserts and had its source in the life led there by the hermits during\nthe first five centuries after Christ.\n\nDoubtless the quiet life of the hermit saints had more power to change\nthe world than all the clangorous wars of their time, than the talk and\nthe gossip and the cheering and the hooting, than the foes laid low or\ntyrants raised to power. There is a beautiful passage of Nietzsche\u2014\u201cThe\nthoughts that change the world come on doves\u2019 feet. The world revolves\nround the inventors of new values; noiselessly it revolves.\u201d So if we\nwould know what sort of a Europe is going to be, or of Russia what sort\nof an East she will be\u2014\n\n               Oh! Russia, what sort of an East will you be,\n               The East of Xerxes or of Christ?\n\nit is necessary to seek the ideas of to-morrow in the quiet places where\nthey lurk unseen, not in the clash of the Great War. The trenches are\npungent with fumes, the earth itself deaf from the sound of artillery,\nboth Nature and Man\u2019s work lie blasted and ruined along a long but\nnarrow stretch of land\u2014that is the front, the War, the biggest and only\nthing in the world. But I must leave it and go southward and eastward to\nthe places where ideas are born.\n\nIn May when I left England the streets of London were flocking with\nmerry crowds; there was a vigorous popular optimism in the air. At night\nthe Soho restaurants were packed, the theatres ablaze with the glamour\nof success. Paris was different. One European capital was bright;\nanother silent, vigilant, and clad in serious garb. The enemy was\nencamped and militant and near. South to Marseilles, to the vivacious,\nlight-hearted, southern port! The ship by which I sailed for Egypt was\npainted an austere leaden colour to resemble a man-of-war or armed\nmerchantman, and so deceive the enemy lurking under the waves\u2014a masked\nship. We were delayed a week in the port through lack of labouring\nhands; for every one had gone to the War. We watched liner after liner\ngo out of the harbour laden with young soldiers going to fight the Turk\nand win Constantinople.\n\nMy slow ship left the land and slipped away through the night as it\nshould, towards Egypt, unhasting, unresting, over the calm shadowy\nMediterranean ... an almost fourth-dimensional progress, a mysterious\nmagical journey. The stars looked through soft vigils and possessed a\nmystery; they dreamed over us as we went. We disturbed nothing; we went\non. I sat up in the prow of the vessel and looked forward\u2014the eye of the\nboat.\n\n                        ... Everything is akin to me\n                    That dwells in the land of mystery.\n\nThe ship is masked; its colour is the colour of the waves at night. The\nship is pleased. A shadowy blue-grey ship going forward calmly, equably,\nyet triumphantly, ever gently forward, towards the unknown, the\nmysterious....\n\n\n\n\n                                   II\n                              THE HERMITS\n\n\nThe first effort of the Apostles towards the establishment of\nChristianity was along the way of Martha\u2014the sharing out of the money\nand the starting of a sort of Christian-socialist state. But life taught\nthem that this was impracticable, and they and all the early Christians\nsoon found themselves working and living and praying in an altogether\ndifferent way\u2014driven into the wilderness, stoned out of cities, hounded\ninto gaol, faced with the horrors of torture or barbarous execution.\nThere were soon more Christians in the desert places of the earth,\nliving in caves and in forests, than there were in the towns and\nvillages. Some fled from persecution, others were driven by the Spirit;\nand no doubt all, when they found themselves cut off from the world,\nbegan to share in the meditative idea of Christianity. They obtained the\nconsolation of wanderers, and found a new significance in the promise of\nthe Comforter. They had visions; they met the resurrected spirits of\nthose who had died in the Lord. The strange life they had to live\nbrought a romantic mystery into the possibilities of the road and the\noutside world, so that when one met a stranger there was the doubt that\nhe might be an angel, that he might even be the risen Lord Himself. The\nheavens opened, and sweet music accompanied the vision of the Grail. The\nstigmata appeared on the hands and bodies of those who had attained to\nunity with Christ.\n\nYet those who went out into the wilderness, alike those who fled\npersecution and those who went out voluntarily to seek and be alone with\nGod, were tempted \u201cof the devil\u201d as they phrased it. The town and the\nworld which they wished to overcome tempted them back. They had left\nbehind in \u201cthe world\u201d fathers, mothers, brides, children, friends,\nmoney, position, pleasure. They lived on locusts and wild honey and\ngrains and roots\u2014and they longed for the good meat of the city. They\nwere ragged, unwashed, bruised, unkempt\u2014they longed for the freshness of\nthe bath, white linen, and clean clothes. Their bones ached and they\nwere tired\u2014they longed for soft beds. They were solitary and longed for\ncompany, longed especially for the company of women. And the devil who\ntempted them was a dragon that could never be killed, which, slain, but\nchanged to a different shape. The temptation was put forward in new\nguise, and the lure of sin more subtly baited. They entered into the\ntemptation of Jesus as they entered also into his sufferings.\n\nThey drew men unto them. All those whose minds were troubled by the\nmonstrous woman\u2014Babylon\u2014thought of the Christian solitude in the desert.\nIt became a not infrequent phenomenon\u2014the going into the desert \u201cto save\none\u2019s soul.\u201d The wild places of the earth began to have names and fame.\nHermits lived in places where no one had ever lived before, and the\ncurious came out to see them. By their spiritual virtues they made the\ndesert, which was barren in the material sense, blossom as the rose.\n\nThe caves in the mountains by the Dead Sea filled with anchorites, and\nthe holy men looked upon the dead salt lake that had once been the gay\nworld of Sodom and Gomorrah. The mountain supposed to be the mountain of\nChrist\u2019s temptations became honeycombed with the abodes of\nworld-forsakers. \u201cIf a man does not say to himself in his innermost\nheart, God and I, we are alone in the world; he will never find rest,\u201d\nsaid one, and betook himself to Mount Sinai. The Virgin Mary sailing in\na boat with St. Thomas and St. John was wrecked off the coast of\nMacedonia and miraculously washed ashore on the mountain of Athos; and\nin due course there appeared on the strange uninhabited mountain an\nantique Greek, lean, long-haired, unutterably devout, and he lived in a\ncave and meditated on the Mother of God. Another followed and another,\ntill a laura was founded.\n\nThe hermits gave Christianity a new bias. One has only to compare an\nascetic\u2019s dream, the majesty and the mystery of the Revelation of St.\nJohn, with the sweet reasonableness of the Gospels ... \u201cA sower went\nforth to sow,\u201d and the like ... to see how great is the change in the\nspirit of the Church under the influence of the anchorites. Such a\nsentence as\u2014\u201cTo him that overcometh I will give of the hidden manna, and\nwill give him a white stone, and in the stone a new name written, which\nno man knoweth saving he that receiveth it,\u201d comes straight from the\ndesert and is part and parcel of the spiritual fervour of the early\nChurch.\n\nThe hermit based his life on Christ\u2019s wanderings in the wilderness and\nHis denial of the world, on the idea of bearing the Cross, and on the\npromised second coming of Christ. As Christ renounced the power of\nchanging stones into bread, so they renounced the power of bread, the\nfeeding of the hungry, _i.e._ service in the world, the way of Martha.\nAs Christ refused the throne of Caesar when the devil was ready to show\nhim the way to obtain it, so they refused to try to establish Christ\u2019s\nkingdom in a material form. They denied all material power\u2014denied that\nthe power of Caesar was real power, that physical force had power, that\nmoney had power. St. Arsenius, the anchorite, was offered all the\nrevenues of Egypt by the Emperor Arcadius and asked to use them for the\nhelp of the poor, the hermits, and the monks; but Arsenius refused,\nsaying that such work would be worldly and was not for him. The same\nArsenius inherited a great fortune, his cousin\u2019s estate, but refused it.\n\n\u201cWhen did my cousin die?\u201d\n\n\u201cTwo months ago,\u201d he was told.\n\n\u201cOh, then the estate is not mine, for I died long before that,\u201d said\nArsenius.\n\nHe had died to the world, and to money among other worldly things.\n\nThe hermits also denied the physical senses\u2014our ordinary sight, hearing,\ntouching.... \u201cGrieve not that thou art without what even flies and gnats\npossess,\u201d said Antony, the father of Egyptian hermits, to blind Didymus;\n\u201crejoice that through thy physical blindness thy spiritual sight has\nbecome more clear.\u201d The hermits took upon themselves oaths of silence,\nwent into remote places where was the most abject barrenness of earth,\nthe utter negation of all physical life and material power. Not content\nwith the privations of the Sahara they went into abominable marshes like\nthe soda swamps of Nitria, where they mortified even the most innocent\nof the senses, the sense of smell. They strove to be as it were dead in\nall the physical body and limbs, and in the physical senses. \u201cUnless a\nman imagines to himself that he has been lying for three years in the\ngrave and under the earth, he will never die to himself,\u201d said Moses the\nEthiopian, a simple negro anchorite, who though he seemed black in the\nbody was all white in the soul.\n\nIn this denial they did things which seem fantastic to the modern world.\nThey dug their graves in advance and lived in them till they died. They\nstood on one leg, the foot of the other leg on their knee, their arms\noutstretched as if crucified to the air; they climbed to the height of\nancient pillars and remained there praying for years. Pachomius is said\nto have prayed for days together, standing with outstretched arms as\nimmovably as if his body had been fastened to a cross. His eyes were\nlifted upward at a strange angle and were full of light, he gazed in\nfixed rapture as if his eyes were resting on a celestial vision. In this\nPachomius praying thus an artist might show a picture of what the hermit\nstood for. These hermits were not foolish; they were mighty and\nwonderful like the living word of God itself. They were living\nhieroglyphics.\n\nIt must be remembered that Christianity had to overcome a world of\nphilosophy, had to absorb all that lay in the philosophy of the East, in\nthe religions of Egypt and Greece, and of the Jews. Thanks to the\nhermits, Christianity took to itself all that was vital in all extant\nideas. By the life and death of Jesus the seed of Christianity was sown,\nthrown into the spiritual life of the world, and instead of springing up\nimmediately and bearing fruit, it sent its strength downward like the\nseed of a mighty tree; it grew deeper into the spiritual world rather\nthan higher, became more mysterious and secret rather than manifest and\nclear.\n\nTo-day Christianity is of different portent. But in those days the\nenthusiasts, visionaries, and saints did not clearly know what\nChristianity was: Christianity was not clear to them; they sensed it, it\nhad possession of them, they were in a state of exaltation because of\nit. Christianity was growing through them, growing deeper. Their\nintellectual conceptions of what Christianity was and was not were often\nquite mistaken\u2014but the vision they could not express was authentic. The\nnew idea was in the air. Hence, for instance, the gift of tongues.\nPeople listening to the apostles were caught by the idea, even though\nthe language spoken was foreign to them. Christianity was imparted by\nenthusiasm alone, by the gait, the gesture, the expression of\ncountenance of the believer, the living hieroglyphic; and it did not\nmatter that the apostles spoke one language and the listener another.\nThe spirit of truth sat in the faces of the apostles like tongues of\nfire and spoke for them. In those days many who had never seen an\napostle dreamed and became Christians, heard a voice from heaven, were\nstruck blind by the heavenly vision like Saul, whose mind on the way to\nDamascus was far from Christianity, but whose soul was so near that even\nat the stoning of Stephen there could have been but the thinnest\npartition between him and the great splendour. Many people in those days\nwent about in strange apprehension\u2014as if the world were coming to an\nend, and quite truly a world, that of the Romans, was coming to an\nend\u2014and suddenly they were aware of the mystery, and without a word of\nproselytism gave up everything and went to the desert.\n\nNeedless to say, the number of Christians grew, and the reputation of\nthe Christians grew. Persecution soon ceased, and presently it became\nsuch a mark of distinction to be a Christian that all the mundane crowd\ncame in and called itself Christian. Some of them were Christian in name\nonly, and their children in superstitious obedience. Even till to-day\nChristianity is cumbered about with the descendants of this mass of\npeople, the great crowd who vaguely assent to the term Christian but\nhave only a remote conception of what Christianity really is. The\nriotous and lascivious population of Alexandria supporting worldly\nCyril, though Christian in name, was nothing less than an obstacle to\nChristianity, an opaque mass between the light shining in the desert and\nthe north whither the light should shine. Still, when \u201cthe world\u201d came\nin and called itself Christian there were a great many who took their\nconversion seriously, and of these, many went to the desert and schooled\nthemselves to become hermits, tried the life to see what it was like.\nAmmon and his bride were dressed, ready for their nuptial festivities,\nwhen the revelation came to them, and on their wedding-day they resolved\nto forego the worldly tie of marriage and live in the desert as holy\nbachelor and virgin. They dwelt in Nitria and entertained thousands of\nyoung men and women of the rich and cultured world and meditated on the\nhermit\u2019s life, Ammon receiving the men at his cell, his bride the women\nat hers. After some time Ammon, who was rich, founded a monastery, and\nhe and his bride agreed to part, she going to a distant place to\ncontinue her work, he remaining to establish his. Ammon became abbot of\nthe monastery, and under him were four thousand monks; this was in the\nevil-smelling swamp of Nitria, on the fringe of the Sahara, some forty\nmiles west of what is now the Alexandria-Soudan railway. People began to\nflock to the desert. There were tens of thousands of hermits and monks\nand consecrated virgins waiting for the coming of the Bridegroom of the\nChurch. These Christian converts gave to the desert the largest human\npopulation it has ever had. There were four hundred monasteries in the\ndesert of Nitria alone. It was possible to invent such an anecdote about\nthe younger Macarius the anchorite as that some one gave him a bunch of\ngrapes and he, being so altruistic, took it to a neighbouring anchorite,\nthat anchorite to another, and so on, till the grapes had made the whole\ncircuit of the Sahara and came back to Macarius again, preserved all the\nway by the virtue of the self-denying hermits.\n\nThe desert had an atmosphere of Christianity. Many aged solitaries like\nArsenius and Paphnutius took to the road with sacred missions. The\nhermit\u2019s life was not always continuous cave-dwelling. St. Arsenius, a\ngracious genius, went to the councils of Emperors; we read of men like\nPaphnutius returning to \u201cthe world\u201d at the obedience of the heavenly\nvision and saving people whom the Lord needed. Tha\u00efs, the courtesan of\nAlexandria, was taken from the midst of her gay life and brought to a\ncell in the desert. The anchorites found for her this beautiful prayer,\n\u201cThou who formed\u2019st me have mercy,\u201d and Tha\u00efs was saved, though she\ndied. And she was numbered among the Marys. No hermit setting out upon\nthe road took away money with him or had thought for the morrow. That\nwas a golden rule in their ways; money counted for nothing. Serapion the\nSindonite sold himself as a slave in order that he might save those who\nwere slaves of the world; and he put the money he received as the price\nof himself in a pit and covered it with earth. He was a perfect servant,\nand by his humility and sweetness touched the heart of his master and\nmistress, who soon learned to say the Lord\u2019s Prayer with him and were\nconverted to Christianity. One day they said to Serapion: \u201cWe are\nunworthy that you should be our servant and slave, take back, we pray\nyou, your freedom!\u201d\n\nSerapion replied that he thanked God for the day when his mission was\naccomplished, and thanked his master and mistress for his freedom. Then\nhe went to the pit where the purchase money was buried and brought it to\nhis two converted friends. They were much astonished, and implored\nSerapion to keep the money. But he refused though they wept, and he set\noff for the desert once more, cared for by the Lord.\n\nNothing counted in Egypt except Christianity. Monasteries and churches\nsprang up all over the land. The rich women who gave up all for Christ\u2019s\nsake gave their jewels to the adornment of the screens and altars in the\ndesert churches, and it was thought to be the best place for jewels,\n_fruitlessly sacrificed_ to the spiritual. The wealthy bequeathed their\nestates to the Church, hoping thereby to find grace in heaven; and the\nChurch employed the wealth so gained for the building of new monasteries\nand the employment of Byzantine painters and metal workers, for the\nupkeep of their institutions, and for alms. It seems the new wealth did\nnot altogether spoil the life in the desert. Egypt was particularly\nsuited to be the mysterious source of contemplative Christianity and its\nspiritual power\u2014the greatest deserts in the world, the emptiest\nlandscape, the incomprehensible Nile coming out of the depths of\nmysterious and untrodden Africa, the ancient monuments of religion, the\nSphinx, the pyramids, the obelisks ... the oldest domain of man, a land\nof tombs. But for the Mohammedan hordes Egypt must have remained the\ntrue holy land of Christianity. As it is, the life lived in Egypt at\nthat time is certainly the spiritual inspiration of the Eastern Church\ntill this day.\n\nIt is somewhat astonishing to reflect that in the early centuries of our\nera Christianity in Egypt was alone with the ancient monuments of Egypt,\nand that those monuments were in a considerably greater state of\ngrandeur that they are to-day. There was very little robbing of the\ntombs and destruction of old buildings before the coming of\nSaracens\u2014those terrible robbers and destroyers. Egypt has now become\nassociated with Mohammedanism in a secondary way. But in the days of the\nhermits there were none of those mosques which guides delight to show\none now as part of the interest of Egypt\u2014the alabaster mosque, the\nmosque of Sultan Hassan, all built with stolen stones. But Christianity\nand the worship of Isis were side by side, the Egyptian religion of\ndeath side by side with the Christian religion of death to the world. No\nwonder that the early Christians embalmed their dead, and that they\npainted the faces on wood as the Egyptians had painted the faces of the\ndead on the cases of the mummies, or that regarding hieroglyphics they\nbegan to paint Christian hieroglyphics\u2014the frescoes peculiar to the\nEastern Church. Paphnutius flinging a stone at the Sphinx learned his\nmistake when he saw a look of sadness come over the face, and the lips\nseemed to murmur to him the name of Christ.\n\nThe influence of Egypt went northward. As the gospel is read facing the\nnorth, and the belfries of Eastern Churches calling the people to\nworship are put northward of the holy building, so the whole Church\nlooked northward. Constantinople was the capital of the Eastern World.\nThe embalmed bodies of the saints who had died in the desert were taken\nthither, the faces of the dead were painted into the fresco and the\nikon. Hermits appeared in all the desolate mountains and rocks of Greece\nand Bulgaria and Asia Minor. Christianity crossed the Black Sea, and\nhermits appeared in the Caucasus, and stately cathedrals were built on\nthe shores of the sea. Christianity sailed up the Russian rivers and hid\nin the Russian forests. Only in the year 988 was Russia officially\nconverted to Christianity, but long before that the Christian hermits\nand missionaries had appeared. St. Andrew himself is said to have been\nthe first to come to Russia. The religion that came in was the religion\nof the hermit, and the faces on the ikons were the faces of anchorites\nwho had died in Egypt or Asia Minor. Christianity took various aspects,\nbut its vital source was the spiritual life of the hermit in the\nwilderness.\n\nAnon, Egypt was overrun by the Turks. The jewels were plucked from the\nscreens and ikon-frames, the monasteries and churches were pulled down,\nthe monks and hermits put to the sword, and practically the whole\nmaterial evidence of the existence of Christianity was swept away as if\na storm of the dead sand itself had come over it. One year the desert\nwas a-tinkle with Christian bells, choric with Christian psalms; the\nnext year all was desolation, and when an ancient hermit missed by the\nArabs came to Nitria he found not one human being there, and he lived\namongst the ruins of monasteries and chapels as if the place were the\nremotest and most solitary in which a world-forsaker could dwell. In its\nturn, also, Constantinople fell, and the Hellespont and Bosphorus, the\nissue to Russia, became Mohammedan. Eastern Christianity receded to\nGreece, was shut away in Russia. And Greece and Russia, and especially\nRussia, have preserved the direct traditions of the early Church and\nwhat Christianity originally meant. With them has remained the spiritual\nfervour of the hermits.\n\n\n\n\n                                  III\n                             IN THE DESERT\n\n\nBetween the Nile and the Red Sea lay the desert of the Thebaid, and the\nremote monastery of St. Anthony is now reached after two days\u2019 camel\nride from the station Beni Suef. The desert of Scete where Arsenius\nlived\u2014the desert where Philammon the hero of \u201cHypatia\u201d learned to be a\nmonk\u2014is on the Upper Nile. What was Nitria is now Wadi el Natrun, and is\nreached by three days\u2019 camel ride from the Pyramids, or _via_ Khatadba,\none of the stations on a loop of the Cairo-Alexandria railway. The\nshrines of the hermits are in the hands of the Copts, a simple Christian\npeople, said to be the lineal descendants of the ancient Egyptians. The\nCoptic Church is an Eastern one, and it is the lineal descendant of the\nChurch of Egypt that flourished in the first centuries of Christianity.\nOnly whereas the Church of Egypt was a brightly living church, the\nCoptic Church is going on in a tradition. What is valuable in the Coptic\nChurch to-day is that it has slept through many centuries unchanging,\nthat it has never been rich and pompous, never erudite, never\npleasure-loving. It has withstood the Arabs through dwelling in the\nwilderness and fortifying its churches and monastery walls and being\nhard. It has never had the opportunity to thrive. So it has preserved\nthe traditions and something of the spirit of early Christianity, and in\nthe half-ruined temples of the desert you may see the stigmata of\nChrist.\n\n                  *       *       *       *       *\n\nI had some difficulty finding out about the monasteries: no one goes to\nEgypt to visit Christian shrines, so my desire to know where the ancient\nhermits had lived sounded strange and unwonted in the ears of most\npeople. But at length, through the Bishop of Jerusalem and Marcus Bey\nSimaika, the leader of the Coptic community in Cairo, I got a letter\nfrom the Patriarch and full directions as to how to reach the desert\nshrines. I chose to go to Nitria.\n\n                  *       *       *       *       *\n\nOut of sight of the grey triangles of the Pyramids, out of sight of\neverything, and over the even, empty desert, white, yellow, burning,\nrose-lined on the horizon, glaring ... heat and light beat upward from\nthe sand on which and into which the terrible and splendid sun drives\nits armies all day. The air is so dry and light that one seems to have\nlost weight. There is a feeling of unusual exhilaration.\n\nI came on horseback to an oasis, not a bountiful and delectable oasis\nwith shade of palm trees, fruit to pluck above the head, and cold water\nbubbling from a spring below, but a poisonous marsh overgrown with reeds\nfull of reptiles and blood-sucking flies. There are good and evil oases.\nThis was the marsh that gave its name to Nitria\u2014the soda marsh. The\nhermits chose it because it was even worse than the desert. My black\nhorse prances along on somewhat doubtful turf, and then once more to the\nloose and heavy sand blown into waves and undulating like the sea. On\nthe horizon lies the strange blunt silhouette of the first of the\nmonasteries, and without a trace to follow, we plunge through the sand\ntowards it. We come up to it at last, an enigmatical-looking building\nwhich has the shapelessness and silence of a ruin. How silent it is!\nWhat a deathly and unearthly silence! It seems hardly possible that\nhuman beings are living there. The cream-coloured walls are lined,\npatched, broken, gigantic. It is a rectangular fortress. There is but\none entrance, and that is a small one and heavily barred. There are no\nsteps in the sand; if yesterday had any footfalls the wind has smoothed\nthem away, and the breathless silence is one which it seems almost\npossible to hold in one\u2019s hand.\n\nFrom the high yellow battlement an old loose rope hangs down, and is\nevidently connected with a bell.\n\nJingle-jangle-jangle! I ring the bell and wait expectantly. There is a\nlong silence and I ring again, jingle-jangle, jangle-jangle-jangle! Then\nsome one comes and laboriously undoes the little door, and a\ndishevelled, bare-footed monk appears. I present the letter which I bear\nfrom the Patriarch, and am admitted. The monks are pleased; all shake\nhands. I sit on one divan, and five of them on another. One novice\nwashes my hands, another brings me a glass of a brown-coloured drink\u2014it\nis medlar juice and water, and is full of the fibre of the fruit. This\nfinished, he brings me a glass of pink sugar water, then coffee all\nround, thimble-fulls of sweet coffee. The abbot, a fine-looking fellow\nwith regular features, broad face, black moustache and beard, and with\nan open space showing the freshness of the lower lip, is talkative. He\nhas a towel wrapped round his brows for turban, and fingers black beads\nas he talks. Next to him is a comfortable-looking monk in a blue smock\nand white knitted skull-cap on his head. Next to him, an old fellow with\nwizened bare legs and feet, old yellow rags on his grizzled head, ragged\nblack cassock over his grey underclothes.\n\n\u201cWhat do you do all day?\u201d I asked.\n\n\u201cPray, read, sing,\u201d they answered.\n\n\u201cWhat do you think of the war?\u201d\n\n\u201cThe war does not touch us. If they come and kill us, we don\u2019t mind, but\nwe pray each day that God will bring it soon to a close.\u201d\n\n\u201cIf the Arabs come, what will you do?\u201d\n\n\u201cIf they shoot at us we will throw bread to them, that will be our\nreply.\u201d\n\n\u201cDo you have many visitors?\u201d\n\n\u201cNot many.\u201d\n\n\u201cDo the Russian pilgrims come here to pray?\u201d\n\n\u201cYes, some.\u201d\n\n\u201cAre you content to live out here in the Sahara whilst all sorts of\ngreat events are happening in the world, and content to have no news and\nnever mix with the people of the city? In England we\u2019re too busy, one\ncouldn\u2019t escape to a place like this even if one wanted to.\u201d\n\nThe abbot gave me a remarkable reply:\n\n\u201cI think there is room for everybody: one seeks money, that is his way;\nanother prays, that is his way; another does his duty and ploughs, that\nis his way. There are many ways. You know of Martha and Mary. Martha was\nright, but Mary\u2019s good part was right also.\u201d\n\nHow touching it was for me to get this true reply in this remote\nmonastery, and to hear of Martha and Mary in the first half-hour of\nconversation with the monks. My mind was preoccupied with the ideas of\nMartha and Mary, and here was this simple Coptic abbot using almost the\nsame terms to express himself as I might use myself.\n\nThere were in this monastery about sixteen monks, and in the desert\naltogether there may be about one hundred and fifty. Once there were\nthousands of holy men and hundreds of monasteries. There was gold in the\nmonasteries, there were jewels and pictures. Not an inch of the little\ndesert temples but was covered with Byzantine fresco.\n\nBut the Saracen came and murdered the cultured clergy, and tore away the\njewels, as was fit, and rolled down many a wall, wrecked many an altar.\nThere was a sixty years\u2019 gap in the Christian history of the desert.\nThen a wilder type of Christian took possession, Arabs who had been\nconverted, or enslaved Copts who had forgotten their own language and\nlearned that of their masters. They brought Arabic gospels and\nliturgies. They repaired some of the ruins of the old monasteries and\nchurches, and they put up Arabic inscriptions and painted out the old\nCoptic frescoes and hieroglyphics with frescoes of their own conception.\nThey built round their temples impregnable fortress walls with\ndraw-bridges at a height of forty feet above the level of the desert.\nThey withstood sieges and persisted ... to this day.\n\nThe abbot showed me round the monastery. The buildings were all a\npatchwork of ruins and repairs and changes. The frescoes had been\nwhite-washed out in nearly every part. The old stained glass, broken and\nshapeless, was mortared in with new glass. And yet there was a real\nodour of antiquity in the place. The patterns in the ikons were but dust\npatterns, and the face of the Virgin crumbled away as the abbot took the\npicture down to show me. In a niche here and there left by accident were\nthe original frescoes in wonderful purple and crimson, pictures of the\nchoric saints, their faces and bodies all of that unearthly and mystical\nshape and colour by which the early Christians loved to represent\ncitizenship of heaven and denial of the world.\n\nThe lectern had a nail on which to fix the candle. The communion cup was\nswathed in the oldest vestments of the monastery. In an ordinary\ncupboard with easy-swinging wooden door I was shown the mummies of the\nsixteen Patriarchs of the Coptic Church. Sixteen Patriarchs in a\ncupboard, each wrapped in his robes and tied up compactly! The Abbot\nunwrapped one a little and showed me the dried brown flesh. The\nseventeenth Patriarch, he from whom I had my letter, will find a place\nin this cupboard in his turn.\n\nIn one of the churches I was shown the box with the sacred remains of\nMacarius, the primitive hermit in whose name the monastery had been\nfounded.\n\nThey showed me the books from which the service is read, all hand-copied\nvolumes. I wondered especially at a copy of the New Testament, written\nages ago in Coptic and now spattered on every page and every paragraph\nwith new and ancient spots of candle grease.\n\nFrom the vault of one of the churches hang seven old dusty ostrich eggs\nby long strings. A monk explained to me that as the ostrich looks to its\negg as the most precious thing in life, so they look to God in their\nprayers\u2014at least, the egg is to remind them.\n\nWe went into the fortress church, the only entrance to which is at a\nheight of forty feet by a bridge from the outer rampart. They showed me\nhow the bridge could be drawn in and the monks be secure from assault of\narms. Up on the ramparts a novice had his duty beside a pile of bread\nand a stoup of water. When Bedouin beggars ring the monastery bell, he\nlowers them bread and water in a basket. \u201cWe give away twice as much as\nwe eat ourselves,\u201d said the Abbot, showing me the bakery. Here were\nhundreds of wheaten loaves in long stone receptacles, good bread, but\nmade dirty so that the monks should not get to prize it. They showed me\nilluminated books a thousand years old, showed me the scrivener\u2019s cell\nwhere among many quills a monk still copies the Scriptures day by day.\nThey showed me one chapel the whole floor of which was covered with\nchillies drying, showed me the long room where every evening all the\nmonks gather about the Abbot to read the gospel and discuss its\nmeanings, showed me the massive doors, two feet thick, of wood and iron,\nmeant to resist the Arab. In one room was a small cask, and the Abbot\ntook a tin mug and drew me a little wine\u2014communion wine. I drank half;\nhe finished.\n\nThe monks were most kind, simple and loving. It was an amusing spectacle\nat lunch. I lunched; every one else waited on me. A beautiful Abyssinian\nboy washed my hands, two monks shelled eggs all the time and filled my\nplate, two others stripped cucumbers for me, another kept helping me to\nhot milk soup in which slabs of sugar were dissolving. The Abbot stood\nabove me with a feather-brush waving the flies off me. Every one was\ntalking. There was especial interest in the questions which the\nAbyssinian boy who had washed my hands was continually trying to put. He\nwas a beautiful stripling who could have been posed for Christ Himself,\nbut for the fact that he was black. He was tall and gentle, with large\nliquid eyes. He was not a monk, but a pilgrim stranded in the desert. He\nhad been on his way to Jerusalem, and had been turned back from Port\nSaid because of the War. He was anxious to hear from me whether I knew\nof any way of getting to Jerusalem now. The Abbot was the only one who\nknew Abyssinian, and he interpreted. Alas! I could give him no hope of\ngetting through to the Holy Sepulchre.\n\nI lunched, and slept a little, and the brethren of the monastery slept.\nThen my horse was brought out to me and I rode away across the sand.\nBefore going, I went to the western side of the monastery and looked out\nover the Desert. Thousands of miles it went on, level, empty, burning,\nand yet mysterious. Some Coptic hermits have wandered forth into its\nmystery and are living the antique life of the anchorite out there. At\nleast, so the Abbot told me, though he couldn\u2019t say where they are or\nhow they live. Only now and again, at rare intervals, some one of them\ncomes back to the monastery to communion and then disappears once more.\n\n                  *       *       *       *       *\n\nI rode away to Bir Hooker, where I stayed the night. That is on the\nother side of the salt marshes. There an enterprising British company is\nproducing thousands of tons of caustic soda annually. The antique\nhermits chose this spot in the Desert because of the death-dealing\nodours which intensified their denial of the world, but in another era,\nbehold British business men doing in the way of trade and worldly gain\nor duty what these others do in the name of denial of the world. As the\nAbbot said: There are various ways of serving God, the way of Martha and\nthe way of Mary.\n\nStill, the manager of the caustic soda works, a shrewd and circumspect\nScotsman of Protestant temperament, would like to have the sixteen\nPatriarchs buried decently and, if he could, spend three days in each of\nthe monasteries tidying up. \u201cIt\u2019s not showing due respect to the dead,\u201d\nsaid he, \u201cnor is it sanitary, nor decent. I\u2019ve nothing to say against\nthe monks; they are simple and kind and hospitable. But they\u2019re just\n_wasting_ their lives. They\u2019re doing nothing, making nothing.\u201d\n\nThe manager would show the monks how they ought to keep house. But\nbetter still, he would clear them all out. They are very good, very\nkind, there is nothing against them, but what are they _doing_, he asks.\nTheir lives are pure waste. They don\u2019t produce caustic soda.\n\n                  *       *       *       *       *\n\nI go to my room to sleep, and then at midnight come out again to see the\nfull moon flooding the vast plain of sand with light, and to realise\nonce more the breathless and perfect stillness of the desert.\n\n\n\n\n                                   IV\n                               THE WORLD\n\n\nFrom the Desert back to the town, to \u201cthe world,\u201d to the hurly-burly of\nCairo and the flesh-pots of Egypt! It is war-time, the summer of 1915,\nthe Turks are being fought on the Peninsula of Gallipoli. The city is\nfull of soldiers, sunburned Australians and New Zealanders who have not\nyet been in action but are being kept lest the Arabs should come out of\nthe Desert and strive to efface the English and French civilisation of\nthe banks of the lower Nile and so add more ruins to the ruins of Egypt.\nThe city is majestical with its broad streets, white stone palaces and\nstately mansions, its wondrous river and its mighty bridges. The\ndryness, cleanness, and whiteness of a city that knows no rain; the city\ngleams in a vast supply of sunshine. The wind blows all the time from\nthe Desert, and wafts heat in the face as from a furnace. A city of life\nand gay energy. The fountain of life plays rapidly and brilliantly all\nthe time, throwing up all colours, forms, faces. There is a sense of\nresplendent and tremendous gaiety. No one comes to Cairo to be an\nascetic and mortify the flesh. But every building, every sight and\nsound, says, \u201cLife, life, life.\u201d All around is death\u2014the Desert which is\ndeath itself, the Pyramids which are tombs, the old cities and ruins\nwhich are the bodies of ancient civilisations passed away. But every\nsight and sound in the oasis of the great city says\u2014Live, be gay, let\nthe pulse beat fast, let the heart go and be glad, let the eyes sparkle\nand burn, let the lips form words of passion and pleasure.\n\nThere is a sense of an immense antiquity which in contrast with the\nlittle second of the present moment makes the latter less important,\nless holy. There is a subtle smell in the air, an odour that makes the\nhead a little dizzy and the hands a little feverish as you walk; it is\nthe actual odour of antiquity, a finest dust in suspension in the wind,\nthe dust of decay from past ages. All that dies in Egypt becomes dry,\nand only after centuries turns to dust and loses form. That which rots\naway in a year in our northern clime keeps its semblance for a thousand\nyears in Egypt. The stones of the houses of native Cairo were many of\nthem quarried by the ancients; the wooden beams and joists have lasted\nfrom the days of the Pharaohs, and only now are gently crumbling. Here\nthe very stones can be used to manure the fields. Subtly, secretly, the\nseventh foundation is always crumbling away and passing in dust into the\nDesert air. The smell in the air is partly the fine dust of mummies, of\nthe bodies that were once erect and nervous and vivid, gay and\nfelicitous and moving, the mysterious flocking humans of thousands of\nyears ago.\n\nThe streets roll forward with flocking crowds\u2014dark faces, brown faces,\nsallow faces; red caps and straw hats and little turbans and smocks and\nburnous; negroes, Copts, Arabs, women in white veils, women with dark\nveils; Europeans, soldiers, hawkers, mendicants, post-card sellers,\nnewspaper vendors. Along the centre of the broad sun-swept roadways\ncrash the electric trams; the rubber-tyred cabs and wide-hooded\nvictorias follow pleasantly; the motor-cars proceed; the military\nauto-cycles pant; and the heavy ox and buffalo carts of the natives\nblunder along at the sides. There is doing everywhere, happening, being.\nVoluminous and promiscuous action floods and surges through the city\nwith the traffic. It is life everywhere. And yet mingled with life there\nis death. There is plague in Cairo, and every now and then the eyes rest\non a native funeral procession, one procession, two processions, five\nprocessions, ten processions all following one another. They are in\nevery street, and they go past with their strange pomp of death, with\nthe body and the mourners and the keeners and professional howlers. The\nbrightly living crowd on the footways each side of the road pause a\nmoment and think, \u201cSome one has died,\u201d and pass on, oblivious, intent on\nlife.\n\nIn luxurious hotels gentle and beautiful Nubians are handing out\ndelicate fare, rich dishes cooked and served in that sought-out and\nmagnificent style that Egypt has inherited from ages of epicurism. And a\nwonderful assembly of officers and ladies, rich pleasure-seekers and\ntourists from the Mediterranean shores, invalids, receives\u2014sitting at\nflower-decked tables in great halls. Many restless souls fall into the\nrhythm of Egypt and feel themselves part of a great and satisfying\ngrandeur. It is borne in upon the mind that the rich have always lived\nin a certain way in Egypt, and that the grandeur of Pharaoh and of\nAntony and Cleopatra are one and the same with the grandeur of to-day. A\nliving thread of crimson and gold runs through the centuries of Egypt\nand is caught to-day, unbroken. Cairo is the capital of the Desert, and\nyet I do not know. It seems to me even at midday, when the sun glares\nover the stones, that somehow the Desert does not exist, or that it is\nin profound darkness, and that Cairo is a city all lamps, an island of\neffulgent light encompassed on all sides with darkness. It is barely\ncredible that the sun of Cairo is the terrible sun of the Sahara, the\nsun whose monstrous arms clasp thousands of miles of scorched sand and\nwasted world, that the sun may not even notice Cairo as it looks on the\nDesert. But those who live in the cities of Egypt are enough unto\nthemselves.\n\nA strange impression, in the afternoon, to go down side streets and\nobserve the throngs of young men, unsteady on their feet but bright-eyed\nand thirsty-lipped, greedy, eager; the strong-limbed sun-burnt Colonial\nsoldiers dancing with Arab girls, the caf\u00e9-chantants, shooting-saloons,\nbars, bad houses, the barrel-organs, the smell of the air.\n\nOne can spare a questioning thought as to the homes of the soldiers.\nThey come to Egypt from a fresh Colonial country, from good homes, pure\nwomen who are their mothers, gentle and innocent girls who are their\nbrides. They nobly offer themselves to fight for their race against a\nfalse idea and a predatory nation. Tears fall at their departure.\nPrayers accompany them. But though bound for France and England they\nsuddenly find their destination changed to Turkey, and they are put\ndown, for convenience, in Egypt. They are dumped upon this mysterious\nand astonishing country as if one bit of dry land were just the same as\nany other, and without any notion of the spiritual significance of being\nstranded here. No blame to any one. Providence directs the destinies of\nmen and women.\n\nThe first army that came were the wildest, boldest, and they plunged\nright away into the sin and gaiety and dangerous pleasures of the city,\nconducted by the money-grubbing but ingenious and smiling Arabs to the\ngambling dens, dancing-houses, and strange parlours of the back streets.\nThey were cheated, swindled, robbed whilst drunk, robbed whilst asleep,\nbut they saw strange sights and tasted unusual pleasures, sating the new\neyes and lips which Egypt had given them. At last, the time drawing nigh\nfor their departure for the Dardanelles, they resolved to get back part\nof what they had lost in the back streets of the city\u2014certain things\nthey could never get back\u2014and they went down in force and sacked the\nhouses and rushed the Arabs and Arab women to the streets and took back\nwhat they could find. There was a great riot. The native police were\ncalled out, and they fired at the screaming mob. Such scenes were\nenacted in the city that brought to mind the continuous street-rioting\nin Alexandria in the old early-Christian days. But what is most\nsignificant in the sight of these fine young men in the city is the\nrealisation of the impure strain they take back with them from Egypt to\nthe women and the children of Australia and New Zealand.\n\n                  *       *       *       *       *\n\nNight comes over the stately city, and the Europeans in their white\nclothes come in greater numbers into the streets. The great remote\nstaring moon stands over the broad highway and arched bridges. Heat\nseems to be generated through the haze in the sky, but a light dry\nbreeze is ever blowing, and the pungent sweetish odour of the city is in\nthe nostrils. In the contrast of darkness and night silence the clangour\nof Eastern music is more stirring. It stirs the body, not the soul, and\nis like the sensuous music of Nebuchadnezzar, the music of cornet,\nflute, harp, sackbut, psaltery, and dulcimer. Dark women with gold\nornaments hang out from curtainless windows or lurk just inside doorways\nand dark passages, ready to coil snake-like upon a prey. In the roadways\na shouting, calling crowd. In the taverns they are singing \u201cTipperary\u201d\nand \u201cWe won\u2019t go home till morning\u201d; some men are standing on the\ntables, others are trying to put gawky Arab girls through the steps of a\ntango. The music jangles. The whole street has a collective voice, a\nstrange tinkling and murmuring uproar.\n\nA tall, lank, loose-jawed, genial Copt would show you the haunts of\nevil, and offers his services to procure you pleasure. You have said\n\u201cNo\u201d to him; he stands there where you left him on the pavement in his\nlong cotton rags, smiling gently and cogitatively\u2014the same type as stood\nin the city of the Pharaohs in the old days of the Israelitish bondage.\nIt is strange to reflect that they find in the mummies of those who\nlived so many thousands of years ago the marks of \u201cthe city\u2019s disease,\u201d\nand the sign of the impure strain. There is a community of sin. What was\nin ancient Egypt is in the world to-day and was not invented in any\nrecent time but has been carried on from one human being to another, to\nmany others, and from them to others still.\n\nI look at the mummies of Egypt, at the bright pictures of the people,\nfresh as if painted yesterday. These paintings on the coffin-lids live,\nthey are the real people. You know that the brown, dry bodies wrapped in\nthick folds of linen did once walk, and were the beautiful society of\nsome era five or six thousand years ago. There is in Cairo the unwrapped\nmummy of the majestical Pharaoh who would not let the children of Israel\ngo. As you look at his face time is bridged over, and you see how brief\na space is our vaunted history of man and what parochial dwellers in\ntime we are, rolling our eyes and hushing our accents when we speak of a\nhundred or a thousand years, as if those seconds of being were of vast\nextent, tiring the angels to get over them. There lies old Pharaoh,\nbrown, but still in the flesh. He has a Roman nose, distinguished\nfeatures, the face of a man of learning; there is a look of Dante about\nhim. His neck has shrunk to the size of a bird\u2019s neck and his head\nrather dangles on it, but it is an actual head and an actual face.\n\nPharaoh is unwrapped, but beside him stands an unopened pupa case; the\nlinen is fresh as when new, and daintily folded and tied as on the day\nof burial five thousand years ago. A lotus flower lies in the coffin; it\nlooks as if it had been picked last month and had wilted a little, and\nyet it may have been picked by the princess herself, and she was a\ndaughter of one of the Pharaohs\u2014perchance even of her who found and\ncherished the baby Moses.\n\nWhen you read of Jacob in the Old Testament, that\u2014\n\n    ... the physicians embalmed him. And forty days were fulfilled for\n    him; for so are fulfilled the days of those which are embalmed: and\n    the Egyptians mourned for him threescore and ten days. And when the\n    days of his mourning were past ... Joseph went up to bury his\n    father: and with him went up all the servants of Pharaoh, the elders\n    of his house, and all the elders of the land of Egypt ...\n\nyou realise that there is perhaps somewhere a mummy of Jacob, and a\nmodern might see him face to face.\n\nTime flies. But the distance is near. I would like to imagine one night\nin ancient Egypt. The faces on the coffins, as I look at them, lid after\nlid, are quite realisable, those broad cheeks and bright eyes.... I\nsuppose one could find five thousand mummies who in their lifetime were\ncontemporaries, and one night they are all thinking about much the same\nthing. Something is toward at the Court; their chairs or carriages or\nchariots come for them; they are decked out, they have their jewels in\ntheir hair, their fine garb, their vanities, spites, triumphs,\nvexations, loves, ambitions. They dwell in their present moment, eyes\nburn, hearts beat faster, lips frame vain words. The same moon is on\nhigh, the same odour in the air. They bend their gaze towards the\nthrone, they flock towards the throne as if the touch of it were\nmiraculous. Vanity of vanities! The Israelites had to go out to the\nDesert to find the ten commandments and the Mosaic laws. Vanity of\nvanities\u2014and is it not _all_ vanity? Is not the life of the ascetics in\nthe Desert vanity also? No, for they have denied the world. They have\nsaid _No_ to Egypt and gone into the wilderness to seek a promised land.\nIn their shrunken pearly faces is written a different allegiance from\nthat of Pharaoh. They deny that this world is our world, that our life\nis our true life, that death is really death.\n\nBut we do not condemn the gay crowd that imagination has summoned from\nthe linen wrappings of the tombs, nor the glimmering of khaki and\nburnous in the purlieus of Cairo in that moment we call 1915. Mankind is\none and indivisible.\n\n                  *       *       *       *       *\n\nOutside the city stand the three triangles and the woman\u2019s head, signs\nwritten in the sand which might cause all people to know that there was\nsome mystery about Cairo.\n\nThe dead are sleeping and you cannot wake them. There are crowns on\ntheir heads, and they sleep that fixed, unearthly, steady sleep,\nundisturbed, untouched, uncorrupted. Egypt that was is dreaming Egypt\nthat is. Out in the Desert sits the Sphinx with an I-am-that-I-am\nexpression on its face.\n\n\n\n\n                                   V\n                               ST. SOPHIA\n\n\n    ... new Jerusalem, coming down from God out of heaven ... as a bride\n    adorned for her husband.\n\n\nKingsley remarks that though Cyril thought he was establishing the\nkingdom of God upon earth, he was in reality establishing a sort of\ndevil\u2019s kingdom. The kingdom of God was independent of Cyril. And yet,\nof course, a great deal of the material success of Christianity was due\nto Cyril\u2014if Christianity can really have such a thing as material\nsuccess. Cyril was a sort of C\u00e6sar to whom must be rendered the things\nthat are C\u00e6sar\u2019s. And in his day imperial C\u00e6sar himself had become\nChristian, and kings were to arise who would claim as a divine right,\nnot only the things that are C\u00e6sar\u2019s but also the things that are God\u2019s.\n\nThey were in their day accounted great, and there was noise about them\nand lights, and throngs of those who flock to noise and light. But\nthough some were mighty instruments of the Divine Will, the spiritual\npower did not proceed from them but from the silences and the\nobscurities and privacies of life. But for the holy men in the desert\nCyril could no more have gloried and lasted than could a blossom without\nroot. And on the other hand, Cyril and his like, and what they stood\nfor, were in one sense the blossom and fruit of the seed sown by the\nhermits. It was the hermits who gave the spiritual impulse to\nAlexandria. Alexandria in turn gave new hermits to the desert\u2014as new\nseeds fall from flowers in autumn. Such is the unity of the Church.\n\nIt seems at first as if the rude cave or cell of the hermit cannot be\nreconciled with the splendour of the churches of their time, with, for\ninstance, the wondrous cathedral of St. Sophia, as if the wretched cave\nor hole in the earth were a contradiction of the great marble temple,\npainted and gilded and set with all manner of gold ornament and precious\nstone\u2014and yet there is this obvious reconciliation, that the one is the\nseed, the other the blossom; the one the prayer in secret, the other the\nreward made openly; one the white light, the other the rainbow of\nCreation.\n\nThe first centuries of Christianity were a wild time. Many religions and\nphilosophies were in the throes of glorious death, exchanging their\nmortality for Christian immortality. The music of change streams upward\nin wild, rapturous, sensuous, and agonising melody. Ten thousand\npassions and tragedies of conflicting import ravish the senses, and the\nheart leaps and the blood dances in the veins at the spectacle of death\nbecoming life, or the heart sinks and the face pales at the dread of\nlife turning to death. Only the calm soul sees the myriad colours blend\nat last and become reconciled in the whiteness of Christ.\n\nAnd that whiteness into which the other creeds must merge is the Holy\nWisdom, the Sancta Sophia, with the name of which the early Eastern\nChurch identified itself, representing the Bride of Christ as a new\nAthene, Sophia, the Christian Wisdom.\n\nThe Holy Wisdom distilled from Isis and Athene and thousands of other\ngoddesses and conceptions that died to become Christian, the water of\nlife distilled from all the magical fluids of antiquity. The wild waste\nof passion and colour, the almost barbarous pageantry of the early\nChurch, is the pageantry of autumn; the reds and browns and yellows, the\nflame-colours and death-colours, that go before the whiteness of\nChristmas.\n\nThe cathedral of St. Sophia itself, the beautiful symbol of the Bride of\nChrist, is the representation of the death of thousands of creeds to\nbecome immortal in the new Christian conception. There is not an idea\nthat is being transmuted that does not find its counterpart in the\nsacred edifice.\n\nA mystic wrote: \u201cSt. Sophia was not born or created, but was built.\u201d A\nrelic, the dust or bones of those who had died for the faith, was built\nbetween every tenth stone in the walls of the cathedral. The walls were\nof granite and marble; the pillars of porphyry, malachite, and\nglimmering alabaster; the floor of polished marble; the doors of cedar\ninlaid with ivory and amber. Its height was as the height of heaven, its\nbreadth as that of the earth. They brought the glory and honour of the\nnations into it. Trees of silver with lights for fruit sprang from the\nfloor, like the tree of life in the midst of the City. Silver boats with\noil and floating wicks hung from the domes. The stone canopy above the\nambo bore a great cross inlaid with diamonds and pearls. Above the\nscreen which shut off the choir were twelve columns overlaid with\nsilver, and between them representations of the Jewish prophets, the\nHoly Family, and the four Evangelists\u2014the past, the present, and the\nfuture of Christianity. The altar was raised upon a throne of gold, and\nwas formed of thousands of precious stones and gems and pearls that had\nbeen crushed to dust and diffused in molten gold\u2014as if of the pure lives\nand passions of all men a wine had been pressed into a precious chalice.\nOn all the walls and on many of the pillars were painted the pageant of\nthe Church, the prophets walking with God, the Saviour revealing God,\nthe saints and martyrs and champions living and dying for the truth.\nThere was not a religious history nor a Christian life that did not find\nits counterpart or emblem in the frescoes of St. Sophia. The cathedral\nand the idea of Sophia functionised every true conception and beautiful\nlife lived in its day. It was \u201cThe Word\u201d written in stone, and standing\ninstead of the ruined and almost illegible tablets of Moses. It was the\nwhite stone in which the new name was written.\n\n                  *       *       *       *       *\n\nThe idea of St. Sophia is reduplicated throughout the Eastern Church. It\nis a-gleam in millions of ikons, endeavours to paint the _all_ of\nChristianity and the living breathing Church itself, the Bride. It is\nthe inspiration of such a cathedral as that of St. Basil, that\nmarvellous medi\u00e6val passion in stone built by Ivan the Terrible in the\nRed Square of Moscow\u2014hence its many colours, its extraordinary diversity\nof shapes, its harmonisation of incongruous angles and solecisms of\nform, its many chapels and standing places by which the Byzantine\narchitect endeavoured to suggest that each and every one who entered the\ncathedral might find a particular place where it was most fitting he\nshould stand and praise, a particular chapel where he might kneel in\nsecret. Astonishing to find the architectural idea coming up again in\nsuch an unlikely place as New York, in the cathedral of St. John, which\nwill be the largest church in the world, and pre-eminently the cathedral\nof the West. Into the walls and body of this new cathedral bits of every\nkind of stone existent in America are being built. St. John, built from\nthe substance of the world, will be the counterpart of St. Sophia, built\nof the substance of the other world, and having the dust of martyrs\nbetween each tenth stone\u2014the cathedral of the way of Martha and the West\nbalancing the cathedral of the way of Mary and the East.\n\n                  *       *       *       *       *\n\nRoman Catholicism was founded on the rock of apostolic succession. St.\nPeter\u2019s represents the House built upon a rock, the House that shall\nsurvive all storms and tempests. Eastern Christianity or Orthodoxy was\nfounded on St. Sophia, the Holy Wisdom; and whereas Catholicism is a\nHouse built on the earth, Orthodoxy is a House vouchsafed from heaven,\nthe new Jerusalem coming down from God out of heaven ... as a bride\nadorned for her husband.\n\nThe word is one and the same. But the Roman Catholic is the least free\nof individuals, religiously. The rock of apostolic succession is the\nrock of infallibility. And whereas a foundation of wisdom implies\nfreedom of individual thought, a foundation of infallibility implies\nintellectual and religious servitude. A Roman Catholic who thinks for\nhimself in religious matters has already begun to be a heretic and has a\nsin to confess to his father confessor.\n\n                  *       *       *       *       *\n\nThe service in one of our London churches frequently ends on the\nantiphone:\n\n                    I am the Living Bread,\n                    Which came down from heaven.\n                    Whoso eateth Me shall live for ever.\n\nEven among the least religious people the sitting down together to a\nmeal makes a certain intimacy. The loaf which is broken for you and me\nand another goes to make flesh and blood in each of us. Without any\nreflection or thought we know that we are nearer because we have broken\nbread together. At the symbolical meal, Communion, we are consciously\nnearer. By virtue of the bread that was broken for us we know ourselves\nnearer to one another.\n\nUnity is the deepest knowledge. There are moments when one feels one\nwould with deep emotion offer one\u2019s ego and individuality upon the altar\nof unity, when one would cease to be John Brown or Ivan Ivanovitch, and\nbecome one with the human race, giving up one\u2019s rich treasure of\nmemories and experiences, character, developed intelligence, dear\nidiosyncrasies. In the depths of that humility is discovered a new\ngraciousness and love, a new faith.\n\nOnly at death do we pass completely to the unity, though in life at rare\nmoments we can apprehend it. That unity is not necessarily the unity of\nthe family, of the human race as a family; it may be the human race is\nafter all only one human being\u2014Sophia, the Bride of Christ.\n\n\n\n\n                                   VI\n                          FROM EGYPT TO RUSSIA\n\n\nOn the quay at Alexandria flocks of Russian peasant pilgrims with great\nbundles on their backs, men and women who had been in Jerusalem when the\nGreat War broke out, or at Mount Sinai in the desert seeking remote\nshrines and holy men. As Smerdyakof said, \u201cNo one in these days can move\nmountains into the sea by faith, unless perhaps one man in the world, or\nat most two, and they most likely saving their souls in secret somewhere\nin the Egyptian desert\u201d; and the peasant pilgrim, through the traditions\nof his Church, always looks to these deserts for spiritual power.\n\nBesides the Christian pilgrims are hundreds of refugee Jews driven out\nof Zion by the belligerent Turk, many of them patriarchal types of great\npiety, long-bearded men with multiplex wrinkles on their brows.\n\nMy ship goes riding over the sea to Greece, passing the seven churches,\nthose candles lit in the dim dawn of Christianity, passing Cyprus and\nPatmos and a thousand nameless islands where lived mystics, hermits, and\nwriters of the early Church. We carried ikons brought from Jerusalem to\nbe carried back to Russia. The pilgrims sang Christian hymns; the Jewish\npatriarchs, with phylacteries on their brows, read the Mosaic books and\nthe prophets. Nearly every one on the boat was bound for Russia. We went\nthither the way these things have ever gone, from the desert northward\nover the sea. Not in vain does the reader of the Gospel stand facing the\nnorth; not in vain is the belfry of the cathedral built on the northern\nside. The direct message of Christianity has been the message that has\ngone northward.\n\nThe cathedral of Christianity, our St. Sophia in large, may perhaps be\nimagined in this guise.\n\n                         North\n                       \u2014-||\u2014-\n                      (        )\n                      | S    S |\n                      | U    I |\n                      | R    A |\n     +\u2014\u2014\u2014\u2014\u2014\u2014\u2014\u2014+        +\u2014\u2014\u2014\u2014\u2014\u2014\u2014-+\n     |  England                         Greece |\n     |                                         |\n    == WEST    Stalls of the choir where stand  ) JERUSALEM\n     |         the martyrs and the saints      |\n     |    Rome        | | | | | |              |\n     +\u2014\u2014\u2014\u2014\u2014\u2014\u2014\u2014\u2014\u2014\u2014\u2014\u2014\u2014\u2014\u2014\u2014\u2014\u2014\u2014-+\n                         EGYPT\n\nEgypt is the choir of the cathedral where stand the martyrs and the\nsaints singing in white robes. Through the gates at the north and the\nwest come those who hear the sweet tidings and the heavenly music.\n\nThe journey from Egypt to Russia is like going across our great Sophia\nfrom the splendid choir to the multitudes who have come out of the\nforests to listen.\n\nChristianity went over the waves to Athos and Tsargrad, to the Greek and\nRoman cities of the Black Sea shores, and up the mighty rivers to Kief\nand Novgorod and Yaroslaf, down the great Volga, driving the Tartar\nbefore it, across the forests and along the rivers where lived the\nprimeval nature-worshippers of Russia, brought by knights in armour, by\npriests and bishops, engendered by hermits and martyrs, enforced\neventually by princes and monarchs, interwoven with the splendour of\nmedi\u00e6val chivalry. Russia became officially Christian in 988, when King\nVladimir and his hosts were baptized in the Dnieper at Kief. A cathedral\nof St. Sophia, \u201cmother of Russian churches,\u201d springs up at Kief, St.\nSophia appears at Novgorod, St. Sophia at Yaroslaf. At the time of our\nEdward the Confessor Russia was as fervently Christian as England. And\nthe seed, no doubt, had sunk deeper or had been wafted into remoter\nsolitudes. There was room in Russia for Christianity to mature in the\npopular mind.\n\nAt last the Turks streamed across the Levant, and severed the Christian\nworld in two. Foolish and na\u00efve Mahomet came stamping into the great\ncathedral of Sophia on horseback, shouting out at the foot of the\nsublime altar, \u201cThere is no god but God, and Mahomet is His prophet.\u201d\nLegend says that on that day a priest was celebrating Mass at the altar,\nand he prayed that the body of Christ might be saved from profanation.\nAs an answer to his prayer the stones gaped, and priest and Host were\nenclosed, as the relics had been that in earlier days were placed\nbetween the tenth stones. The priest was probably murdered as he broke\nthe bread, and, it is true, he has been taken into the wall and has\nbecome part of the Bride.\n\nLeopards have their dens where Christian hermits once prayed to God, and\nthey do not know that the ground is holy ground. And the ferocious yet\nsimple Turk has it not in his power to profane Sancta Sophia. When the\ntime comes he can be driven back to the wilds whence he came.\n\nConstantinople falls. But Christianity does not fall, rather it grows.\nRussian Christianity is saved from much ecclesiastical exploitation,\nLevantine corruption, and materialism by the severance of the earthly\ntie, the break-up of the patriarchate of Tsargrad. After the Turks took\nConstantinople Russian Christianity was fed by the angels. Hence its\nfair face to-day.\n\nOver the sea to Russia, to the Kremlins round the many-domed churches,\nto the gleaming ikons, to the great choruses, resplendent and triumphant\nOrthodoxy; to the land where ever day and night there is witness, where\nthe young men see visions and the old men dream dreams; to Kief, to\nNovgorod, to Moscow, to the Kremlin, to the great pink-walled hill that\nstands above the mother-city crowned with churches. Bowing at the\nIlinskaya, baring the head to enter at the Spassky Gate ... my eyes rest\non the wan wall of St. John the Great. I climb to the belfry and let my\nfingers pass lovingly over the bulging bells. I light a candle in the\ncathedral of the Assumption. I walk across the broad open spaces where\nNapoleon\u2019s cannon are ranged and listen to the sad slow chime of the\nKremlin clock giving the hours and the quarters. Here again is a holy\ncity standing above a merely worldly city, this walled hill over\ncommercial Moscow, this Sophia exalted above Prudentia.\n\nIn the first autumn of the War, when I was at Moscow, I used to go to\nthe Kremlin last thing each night. They were beautifully starry and\npeaceful nights. The churches and the low pavements that wander among\nthe cobbles were flooded with silver, the toothed battlements and\nantediluvian old towers of the Kremlin walls seemed gigantically\nexaggerated in silhouette, and yet, though exaggerated, in a way truer,\nas if the ordinary vision of them we had by day was not correct, as if\nthey were really in themselves of enormous importance and\ncorrespondingly enormous proportions. The moat of the Moscow river lay\nmurky below, and afar among the vast congregation of the houses of the\ncity a lamp burned here and there as if before votive shrines.\nMotionless sentries stood in front of the cathedrals. One\u2019s own steps\nechoed startlingly. The single liquid melody of the Kremlin chime broke\nout and poured away\u2014_ding_, _ding_, _ding_, _ding_, _dong_, _dell_,\n_dell_. Holy Russia was watching.\n\nI went into a cathedral: still many candles were burning. I walked along\nthe walls: lamps were alight before holy pictures set in the old bricks.\nThere was a perfect stillness and serenity. I paused, and the mind went\nacross Moscow and beyond it fifteen hundred miles to Poland and Germany\nand Austria where was another scene, a more exterior scene and\nmanifestation of the life of Russia,\u2014Russia in arms against a false\nideal. Russia was serene though Russia was in deadly struggle. The heart\nwas beating faithfully, strong hands were smiting the foe.\n\nIn the night the hundreds of Napoleon\u2019s black cannon had a sinister\naspect, each one seemed pointed at me. The mind went back to their real\nhour of history when from them death blazed forth; when instead of this\nstillness and serenity the thunder and tumult of battle was around them.\nThey are death\u2019s heads of what once were live guns; they are greedy as\ndeath, menacing as death\u2014harmless also as death. Away above them among\nthe glittering stars stand the gold crosses of the churches, the\nsplendour of God. The mind\u2019s eye takes in hundreds and thousands of gold\ncrosses, waving, dipping, lifting, triumphant, the grand processional\naspect of the Church. Even at this moment how many are dying, how many\nsouls are passing. In the Kremlin in the still night Holy Russia is\nwatching. Away on the battlefields the brave are dying. Look, in the\nKremlin you see their crosses among the stars; listen, you hear the\nheavenly chorus swelling as they join the great procession of the\nChurch.\n\n                  *       *       *       *       *\n\nFrom Egypt to Russia, and then from Russia West once more to England.\nThe tempestuous War still rages, and in the seasons of history it is\ndeep winter. Ravenous winds lash the bare trees, howl through the\nchurchyards. Or the wind dies down awhile and bitter frost sets in, and\nthe merciless hungry stars stare at the dead earth. Or heavy clouds come\nover and the snow sifts down, becomes deeper, communes with the breeze,\nwreathes itself in fantastic drifts. On the still branches of the forest\nthe snow is balanced, or only disturbed by ravens flitting awkwardly\nfrom one tree to another. It is the winter of history, but the season\nwill change. Under the crusted streams the water is flowing, flowers are\nrising under the snow, flowers from the living seed. The seed lives\nthrough the four seasons, and the seed is the Word of God.\n\n\n\n\n                               APPENDICES\n\n\n\n\n                               APPENDIX I\n                          WAR AND CHRISTIANITY\n\n\nAmong the Russians, as among other nations, there are many whose\nconscience does not permit them to bear arms and fight, many who believe\nthat war is evil in itself, and that it is unchristian to oppose force\nwith force. Russia has its non-resisters, Dukhobors, Molokans, Quakers,\nwho either obtain official exemption from military service, or who\nsuffer punishment for refusing to obey the call. And among the mass of\nthe Russian people who as yet do obey the summons and shoulder the gun\nfor the Fatherland, the question is frequently raised, \u201cCan we reconcile\nChristianity and war? Can we reconcile the spirit of Russian religion\nwith the using of brute force to overcome a wrong or to defeat an\nenemy?\u201d\n\nNot that any great number of the Russian peasant soldiers ask themselves\nquestions about the ethics of war. They go forward gladly to fight for\nthe Tsar, and to defend their country. With them fighting is a\ntradition\u2014Christianity is Christian warfare, not warfare with sin and\ndisease and crime, but war against the heathen. Since the pagan god\nPeroun was rolled down the cliffs, and the army of Vladimir stepped into\nthe Dnieper and was baptized as one man, Russian Christianity has been a\nChristianity in arms, in arms against Tartar and Mongol and Turk. The\nspirit that prompted the Crusades perseveres. That is why a war against\nthe Turk is a great national war; it is still something in the nature of\na great religious pageant. More than half the man saints on the Russian\nCalendar are warriors, and the rest are simply monks and hermits.\n\nStill as wars go on they change in type. Fighting has ceased to be a\npraising of God. There is no raining of splendid blows on the Saracen\u2019s\nhead. War for the common soldier has ceased to be fighting, and has\nbecome \u201cobeying orders.\u201d The soldier does not even know whither his shot\nhas sped. He seldom or never shoots at a man; he shoots at a vague\ngeneral man called the enemy. He also knows that no one is trying to\nkill him personally, and that he in his turn is also part of a vague\nimpersonal man\u2014the enemy of the man on the other side.\n\nWar becomes a standing to be killed for one\u2019s country, and an obeying of\norders.\n\nIt is a noble and a Christian thing to die for one\u2019s native land. It is\nalso one\u2019s duty to obey the orders of those put in authority over us.\nThe question is, Are those who direct the war acting in a Christian\nspirit? They in their turn obey orders of those in authority over\nthem\u2014the Generals, the Commander-in-Chief, the Government, the Tsar.\nThey must render to Caesar the things which are Caesar\u2019s.\n\nIs it then Christianity in the Tsar to make war, or to answer force by\nforce? Some Russians say, \u201cIt depends on the cause. A war to protect\nlittle Servia is a good and Christian war.\u201d Others say, \u201cIt does not\ndepend on the cause. No cause, not even the best in the world, can\njustify the carrying on of war; of that wholesale and organised murder\nwhich goes by the name of war.\u201d So we come to the Russian pacifists, and\nthose who believe that any peace is better than the justest war. They\ndeclare that war is evil in itself. They offer no compromise on the\nsubject. In time of peace the Pacifists have a great following, and they\nseem to be in a majority; but when war breaks out a great number who\nmerely sympathise, but do not absolutely believe, fall away and leave\nthe true Pacifists standing, as they have stood in each war up till now,\nin a hopeless minority.\n\nThey hold that war is a survival of barbarism, or, to put it in the\nwords of Solovyof, \u201cSomething like cannibalism, a barbarous custom that\nmust in time be isolated and localised among the more savage regions of\nthe world, and then slowly but steadily disappear till it becomes merely\na historical curiosity.\u201d\n\nThe simplest way to test this notion of war would have been to survey\nthe modern history of the civilised world and see if war between\ncivilised community tended on the whole to be less. But here and now as\nI write is the vast conflagration of the German war. If this war had not\ncome about it might have been possible to say, \u201cMan is on the whole\ntending towards universal peace.\u201d The Spanish-American War was scarcely\na war at all. The South African War was an example of the power which\ncould be brought to bear on an uncultured and wild people to make them\nbehave themselves and be peaceful. The Russo-Japanese War was begun in\nthe misconception that the Japanese were yellow devils, and if the\nRussians had known with whom they had to deal they could have arranged\nmatters. The Italian-Turkish War was simply a cultured nation taking\nover territory of the wild and warlike Turks, and so precluding war for\nthe future. The wars in the Balkan States were the natural conflicts of\nwild tribes not yet properly civilised. Up to that point war could be\nexplained away, but then we come to July 1914 with its European\nconflagration, and the Pacifist inference cannot be made.\n\nFor the time being war is redeemed from the imputation of savagery by\nthe great German conflict. It can no longer be classified as a\ndisgusting practice such as cannibalism or sutteeism.\n\nBut the minority, those who still take peace as a golden rule, are even\nnow unconvinced. At the best they hold that this war is a war to prevent\nwar in the future, a war for the establishment of the Federation of\nEurope, a war that will make possible universal peace.\n\nStill they hold that notion as a makeshift opinion. They would never in\nthe palmy days of peace have thought it possible that mankind would go\nto war in order to get a better peace afterwards. They held that war was\nalways avoidable, and that you could not by Satan cast out Satan.\n\nThey hold that nationally as individually we should give back good for\nevil. Amongst the educated Russians there are many pacifists, many\nnon-resisters, a number also of quaker-like people who refer all war\narguments to the one simple commandment\u2014\u201cThou shalt not kill!\u201d\n\nMany Russians hold that Christ substituted for the Jewish law \u201cThou\nshalt not kill!\u201d the moral principle \u201cThou shalt not hate!\u201d And they\nunderstand the chastisement of war as performed more in sorrow than in\nanger.\n\nThose who try to follow out literally the patterns of behaviour set out\nin the Gospel ask what would the Good Samaritan have done if he had come\nearlier than he did and had met the man who fell among thieves just at\nthe moment when the thieves were attacking him with apparently murderous\nintent. Would he then have had to pass by on the other side like the\nLevite, or should he have fallen on his knees and prayed, or should he\nhave rushed to the physical assistance of the man who was being\nattacked. Many held that it would have been the Samaritan\u2019s duty to\ndefend his neighbour with all the means in his power. As the General\nsays in Solovyof\u2019s conversation, \u201cI prayed best when giving commands to\nthe horse-artillery.\u201d So in August 1914, when Austria fell upon Servia\nand Germany fell upon Belgium, Russia in the East and Britain in the\nWest rushed generously to give their physical assistance to the nations\nin distress. America, like the Levite, averted his eyes and said, \u201cIt is\nno concern of mine.\u201d\n\nThe action of Britain and Russia is no doubt popular Christianity. It is\nthe way of the world. Christianity was not preached to nations but to\nindividuals.\n\nThe true Christian attitude of the man who falls among thieves is to\ngive up his money and strip off his clothes and hand them to the thieves\nsaying, \u201cWould to God there were more for thee!\u201d He would offer no show\nof defence, but, on the contrary, would rejoice. For in taking away\nmoney and clothes they took away earthly material things, things that\nshould be lightly prized. To have given them freely and affectionately\nto those who wanted them was to blossom spiritually or, to use another\nfigure, it was to quicken the circulation of love. And directly he gives\nup these things the Good Samaritan comes along and he, out of pure\naffection, gives from his superfluity the means to the naked one to be\nclothed and restored.\n\nIf the Good Samaritan had come up in time he would as a Christian have\nbeen ready to give his things also to the thieves. Or if the thieves had\nbeen actuated by the impulse of murder, he would have fallen on his\nknees and prayed. Such is the way of those who deny \u201cthe world,\u201d and\nwith it deny also the power of physical force.\n\nSomewhat of this interpretation of Christian impulse is given in the\nfollowing Russian conversation taken from the book on War and\nChristianity written by the great Russian philosopher, Vladimir\nSolovyof:[13]\n\n    _Prince._ He who is filled with the true spirit of the Gospel will\n    find in himself when necessary the ability by words and gestures,\n    and by his whole spiritual demeanour so to act upon the soul of his\n    unhappy brother who would commit a murder, that the latter will be\n    suddenly overwhelmed and converted, and will see the error of his\n    ways and turn away from the wrong road.\n\n    _General._ Holy Martyrs! Is that the way you\u2019d have me behave\n    towards, for instance, the Bashi-Oozooks, who in Asiatic Turkey\n    massacre the women and children of the Armenian villages. You think\n    I ought to stand before them making touching gestures, saying\n    touching words and making a tender religious appeal to them.\n\n    _Mr. Z._ Your words would not be heard owing to the instance of the\n    murderers, and if heard would not be understood since you know not\n    one another\u2019s languages. Then as regards gestures, as you will of\n    course, but I should have thought that under the circumstances the\n    best gesture one could think out for the occasion would be the\n    firing of a few volleys.\n\n    _Lady._ But, seriously, could the General have explained his\n    Christian sentiments to the Bashi-Oozooks?\n\n    _Prince._ I did not at all assume that the Russian army should have\n    acted according to the spirit of the Gospel when dealing with the\n    Bashi-Oozooks. But I do say that a man filled with the true spirit\n    of the Gospel would have found even the possibility then of\n    awakening in dark souls that good which lies hidden in every human\n    being.\n\n    _Mr. Z._ You really think that!\n\n    _Prince._ Not a whit do I doubt.\n\n    _Mr. Z._ Well, do you think that Christ Himself was sufficiently\n    filled with the true spirit of the Gospel?\n\n    _Prince._ Is that a question or a joke?\n\n    _Mr. Z._ I put the question because I\u2019d like to know why Christ did\n    not so apply the true spirit of the Gospel as to awaken the good\n    hidden in the souls of Judas and Herod and of the Jewish chief\n    priests and of the wicked thief of whom we commonly forget when\n    speaking of his repentant brother....\n\nWhich confuses the issue because Christianity is not a converting of\nnon-Christians to itself, it is a way of bearing oneself with regard to\nthe world and God, a witnessing of the truth. This life is not truth.\nFor that reason among others, Christ does not save Himself from death;\nmaterial gains on earth are not real gains, so to the man who would take\nthe coat the cloak is given also; the kingdom of this world is not a\nreal kingdom, so Christ turns His back on the Devil when the presidency\nof the world is offered to Him on the mountain. When St. Peter smote off\nthe ear of the High Priest\u2019s servant, Christ restored the ear as a sign\nthat His kingdom could not be won by the sword. When war is brought to\nthe test of Christian idealism, especially as interpreted by the\nRussians, it is found to be of the world\u2014a rendering to Caesar of the\nthings which are Caesar\u2019s.\n\nNevertheless, if we say that war is unchristian, or if we hold that\nthose waging war are by their very behaviour unchristian, we are wrong.\nWe are mistaking the true spirit of Christianity. For Christianity is no\nrule which people must obey; it is no set of rules for people. The\ndeepest thing in Christianity is personal choice. Those who are saved\nare those who personally choose. If a man goes to bear arms for love of\nhis country, if he offers his life as a sacrifice on the altar of his\nFatherland, he is still a true Christian though engaged in violence. Or\nif a man stands out to refuse to go like the peasant in _Peer Gynt_, who\ncut off one of his fingers so as to be rejected by the army doctor, we\nstill have Christianity exemplified in personal choice and in the\nreadiness to sacrifice material things for spiritual gain.\n\nWhat, then, of the peasant soldiers who presumably make little choice?\nOf them it must be said, they are Christians on the emotional plane, not\non the intellectual. By their splendid enthusiasm it is evident that the\npeasants do make an emotional choice. Perhaps in that choice lies their\nChristianity with regard to war.\n\nThey are Christians also in that they do not regard death as something\nterrible. Death for them is a sacrament, a new baptism, a second time\ngoing down of the warriors of King Vladimir to the River Dneiper.\n\nFootnote 13:\n\n  _War and Christianity_, by Vladimir Solovyof, now translated into\n  English\u2014Constable\u2019s Russian Library.\n\n\n\n\n                              APPENDIX II\n                      THE CHOICE OF EAST AND WEST\n\n\nAn interesting new domain of study is opening for the Bible student in\nthe comparison of what the various nations have taken to themselves in\ntheir understanding of the Gospels. Translation itself inevitably\nchanges the emphasis, the _accent_ of various passages. And Slavonic\nperception, British perception, German perception, American perception\nnecessarily differ. It is a truism to say that we each take from a book\nonly what we wish to take from it. To one who knows Russia and has the\nfeeling for Eastern Christianity, there is no more enthralling\noccupation than to read the Gospels with an eye to discovering which\nparts Eastern Christianity has emphasised, which parts Western\nChristianity has taken; which parts, for instance, Russia has\nemphasised, which parts America has emphasised.\n\nOne evening in Vladikavkaz I had a long talk with Russian friends about\nthis difference in emphasis, and we went through the whole of St.\nMatthew and discussed many texts of the New Testament.\n\nWe started with the Beatitudes, as they are the beginning of the\nChristian teaching. We agreed that \u201cBlessed are the poor in spirit\u201d was\na stumbling-block to the West, a phrase that preachers had to interpret\nvery carefully as having a meaning other than \u201cBlessed are the\npoor-spirited.\u201d In Russia, however, it is perhaps the most important\nbeatitude\u2014at least, two of my Russians held it to be so. In the Russian\ntranslation it runs, \u201cBlessed are those who are beggars in spirit.\u201d\nRussia sees blessedness in the state of beggars, in the state of those\nwho have nothing; a beggar in Russian is one who has no earthly\npossessions. The beggar is a national institution. No one purely Russian\nin temperament wants to get rid of the beggar\u2014the man who has nothing.\nEven Gorky calls the beggar the bell of the Lord, the reminder to man\nthat he can have no true possessions here in the world.\n\nThe second beatitude, \u201cBlessed are they that mourn,\u201d we also took to\nmean more to the East than to the West. The East feels the blessing of\nmourning, the West the blessing of being comforted.\n\nThe third beatitude, \u201cBlessed are the meek,\u201d meant more to the West we\nconcluded. We in England and America look forward to what Tennyson calls\n\u201cthe reign of the meek upon earth.\u201d We remember the promise that the\nlion shall lie down with the lamb. One of the most popular of Western\npictures is that of the child carrying a palm-branch, \u201cA little child\nshall lead them.\u201d The East, however, feels that the lions will always be\nlions, that \u201cthe world\u201d will remain \u201cthe world\u201d without much change,\nfull of the faithless, the cruel, the predatory, mingled with the\nfaithful, the gentle, the self-abnegatory.\n\nThe fourth beatitude, \u201cBlessed are they who hunger and thirst after\n_righteousness_, for they shall be filled,\u201d seemed to me to be also a\npurely Western one. America and the West have taken it specially to\nthemselves. It has been the watchword of the Puritans. But my friend\nVera astonished me by reading it, \u201cBlessed are they who hunger and\nthirst after _truth_, for they shall be filled,\u201d and on looking at the\nRussian translation I found indeed that the word was _pravda_ and the\npopular sense was nearer \u201ctruth\u201d than \u201crighteousness.\u201d That difference\nmeans a great deal to a national outlook.\n\n\u201cBlessed are the merciful\u201d we took to be a Western beatitude, \u201cBlessed\nare the pure in heart\u201d to be Eastern. \u201cBlessed are the peace-makers\u201d has\nbecome a very Western idea, and King Edward the Seventh was sung to the\ngrave as a saint as King Edward the Peace-maker. \u201cBlessed are they who\nare persecuted for righteousness\u2019 sake\u201d is in Russian \u201cBlessed are they\nwho are persecuted for the sake of truth\u201d\u2014for theirs is the kingdom of\nHeaven. \u201cBlessed are ye when men shall revile you and persecute you and\nsay all manner of evil against you falsely, for My sake, for great is\nyour reward in heaven\u201d is taken equally by West and East, though the\nEast feels more that the reward is within you, whereas the West thinks\nof a reward after death.\n\nWe considered the Temptations in the Wilderness. First, it was Eastern\nto go into the wilderness at all. It would have been more Western to go\ninto the town and find salvation in work, in \u201cdoing the duty that lay\nnearest.\u201d\n\nThe teaching of the temptation to turn stones into bread has an Eastern\nemphasis. The Russian, says, \u201cI would not if I could.\u201d The Western is\never coming to the Russian and saying, \u201cLo, your people are starving;\nbut see how undeveloped your country is, you have gold, you have oil,\nyou have coal, you have all manner of precious things in your soils and\nyour rocks; say but the word and they can be changed into bread, and\nyour starving may be fed.\u201d But the Russian says, \u201cBread is not so very\nimportant; what is important is the word that proceedeth from the mouth\nof God.\u201d\n\nThe second temptation, that of suicide or of nihilism, of casting\noneself down from the Temple, is something the West has understood more\nclearly. The East continually succumbs to this temptation, and the\nRussian is ever \u201ctempting God.\u201d\n\nThe third temptation has a great Eastern emphasis; Jesus, in lofty\ncontemplation of the world and of His own genius, understands that He\ncould be a new Alexander and be king of the whole world. He could reign\nin wonderful glory, and could enact perfect laws for mankind and issue\nthem with the authority of a king. But He denies the world and its glory\nin the name of the life of the Spirit. The typical earnest American of\nto-day, if he saw a chance of ruling all the worlds and felt that he had\nin him the Divine message, would almost certainly take the opportunity;\nbut the typically serious Russian, or at least the Russian monk, would\nprostrate himself on the ground, saying, \u201cGet thee behind me, Satan, for\nit is written, \u2018Thou shalt worship the Lord thy God, and Him only shalt\nthou serve\u2019\u201d\u2014\u201cHim only,\u201d that is, not mankind.\n\nOn the strength of this introduction I have gone through the main\nteaching of the Gospel, and have made the following differentiation of\nhow East and West have taken or emphasised or avoided the thoughts and\nwords of the New Testament. We are somewhat tired of the comparison of\nthe Authorised and Revised Versions, or of the English translation with\nthe original Greek texts. Here, I fancy, is something more vital; a\ncomparison of the way the teaching has been generally understood by the\nmasses of the people in the Western and Eastern Churches. I am not\ncomparing the opinions of the authorities in both Churches, but the\nopinions which hold sway, which make ethics. By this means it may be\npossible to make what would be a valuable historical record of the\nposition of the progress of Christianity to-day.\n\nThe way of the West\u2014what may be called the way of Martha\u2014is easier, more\nhuman than the way of the East\u2014the way of Mary. Thus at the\nTransfiguration the disciple cried out, \u201cMaster, it is good for us to be\nhere: let us build three tabernacles.\u201d It was not at all necessary to\nbuild three tabernacles. The good part was like that of Mary\u2014to sit at\nJesus\u2019 feet.\n\nBut to take the teaching in the order it is given in St. Matthew\u2019s\nGospel: \u201cYe are the salt of the earth\u201d has been printed in red ink in\nthe Bibles of the West, and it is generally thought to refer to the just\nand upright, the elder brothers, the stand-by\u2019s of the community as\nopposed to the prodigals.\n\n\u201cLet your light so shine before men that they may see your good works\nand glorify your Father which is in Heaven,\u201d has in the West become a\nweekly exhortation to give a good alms at collection-time. This is an\ninstance of materialism. The spendthrift East takes its stand more with\nSt. Peter, who was able to say, \u201cSilver and gold have I none; but such\nas I have give I to thee.\u201d The giving of money is the least of the good\nworks in the power of the East; \u201cAm I so bankrupt of grace that my\nfunction is to give money?\u201d the Eastern may exclaim.\n\n\u201cIf thine eye offend thee, pluck it out\u201d means more to the East, where\nin the monastic life of the Orthodox Church the lusts of the flesh are\nmortified\u2014that is, made dead; where hermits wear heavy chains and take\noaths of silence, or hide themselves from mankind. It is witnessed in\nmany sects, such as the Skoptsi, who deny the world by defunctionising\nthe body!\n\n\u201cSwear not at all\u201d is a simple admonition, appealing directly to the\nWestern mind. In Russia the swearing in ordinary conversation is thick\nas the weeds on a waste. A curiosity in Russian swearing is the common\nexpression _Yay Bogu_, which means really, \u201cYes: I say it to God,\u201d but\nwhich through carelessness and iteration has become equivalent to\nsomething like our \u201c\u2019s\u2019truth.\u201d In America, however, the adjective\nGod-damn is commoner than any other unpleasant expression in any\ncountry.\n\n\u201cResist not evil. Who will take away thy coat, give him thy cloke also;\nand who forces thee to go a mile, go with him twain; and whosoever shall\nsmite thee on thy right cheek, turn to him the other also.\u201d This has\nbeen taken more seriously by the Eastern Church. In the West it is more\n\u201ca counsel of perfection,\u201d or the words and the sentiment are taken as\nan ornament of Christianity. Agnostics and non-Christians make a mock of\nChristians because they do not turn the other cheek. The teaching is\nconsidered of so little importance that it is a Christian act to give a\ncad a thrashing, and the clergyman well versed in the noble art of\nself-defence is by no means a rarity. In Russia, non-resistance is a way\nof overcoming the world and putting Satan behind you. Going two miles\nwith the man who forces you to go one, giving the cloak to the man who\ntakes the coat, turning the other cheek, are _podvigs_, holy exploits,\ntaking the uniform of Christ\u2019s not saving Himself from the Cross.\n\n\u201cGive to him that asketh thee, and from him that would borrow of thee\nturn not thou away.\u201d This has authority in Russia. In England we do not\ngive for the asking, and to borrow is disgraceful. In Russia giving and\nlending are scarcely virtues; they are a condition of life. America is\nalso ready to give and lend, but not so much to persons as to societies,\nfunds, hospitals, new priesthoods.\n\n\u201cLove your enemies\u201d is the _podvig_, the holy exploit once more, by\nwhich the world is overcome, and is very real in Russia.\n\n\u201cPray for them which despitefully use you\u201d: this is essentially a\nteaching that has Western acceptance. The Russian does not pray much for\nhis enemies.\n\n\u201cBe ye perfect!\u201d This is a Western ideal, to be perfect. The East does\nnot strive to be better than it is now.\n\n\u201cDo not your alms before men\u201d is generally disregarded by West and East.\n\n\u201cWhen ye pray, use not vain repetitions\u201d: the West has obeyed this\nmonition. The prayers of the East are indeed not unlike the prayers of\nthe heathen. The Lord\u2019s Prayer has meant much more to the West than to\nthe East.\n\n\u201cWhen ye fast, be not of a sad countenance\u201d: the West, except in the\ncase of the Roman Catholic Church, does not fast. The Roman Catholic\nChurch, though Western in its locality and constitution, is in many of\nits customs Eastern\u2014for example, in the celibacy of its clergy, in the\nmonastic life it affords, in its fasting, in its repetition of prayers.\nA wide gap, however, divides it from Eastern Orthodoxy, and as wide a\ngap separates it from the leading spirit of the West, the latter being\ndecidedly Protestant. Dostoievsky, in the story of the Grand Inquisitor\nin _The Brothers Karamazov_, treats Roman Catholicism as a great\nconspiracy to defeat Christianity, and that point of view is taken very\nseriously by Russians to-day. Roman Catholicism indeed provides a holy\nway of life, and puts its members in a true position with regard to life\nand the world, but it does so by authority. Little is allowed to spring\nfrom personal initiative, and truths are not so much personal\nexperiences as priestly guarantees. Roman Catholicism stands to one\nside, and this comparison of the spirit of East and West does not\ngreatly involve her.\n\n\u201cLay not up for yourselves treasures upon earth.\u201d To this the East has\npaid heed. Russia is the greatest spending nation in the world. No money\nis saved. Every rouble is spent as it is obtained. In England and\nAmerica children are actually given money-boxes and taught to save their\npennies!\n\n\u201cTake no thought for your life, what ye shall eat or what ye shall\ndrink; nor yet for your body, what ye shall put on\u201d: this is obviously a\nteaching which conditions the ragged and disorderly and unconventional\nEast. In England and America one might almost think the opposite ideas\nhad been recommended, seeing how we cherish the right crease in the\nright sort of attire, how we strive to be in fashion.\n\nBut \u201cSeek ye first the kingdom of God and His righteousness; and all\nthese things shall be added unto you\u201d is something which obtains the\nhearty belief of the West.\n\n\u201cTake no thought for the morrow\u201d has an Eastern accentuation.\n\n\u201cSufficient unto the day is the evil thereof\u201d is taken by the West as a\ncynical utterance. The West believes that Christianity means,\n\u201cSufficient unto the day is the good thereof.\u201d The West says each day is\nfull of blessing; the East says each day is full of suffering.\n\n\u201cJudge not, that ye be not judged\u201d: no one pays much attention to this.\n\n\u201cWhy beholdest thou the mote that is in thy brother\u2019s eye\u201d\u2014a reproof to\nthe West, not needed in the East. America is terribly censorious and\ncritical of the neighbour. Russia has no censure.\n\n\u201cAsk, and it shall be given you\u201d the West has believed. It has, however,\nasked for material things. The East has taken rather, \u201cSeek, and ye\nshall find.\u201d\n\n\u201cWhatsoever ye would that men should do to you, do ye even so to them\u201d\nis in great favour in the West.\n\n\u201cEnter ye in at the strait gate\u201d: this is quite Western in adhesion.\n\n\u201cBeware of false prophets.\u201d Both churches have gladly taken this phrase\nto use against schismatics and dissenters.\n\n\u201cBy their fruits ye shall know them.\u201d This criterion the West has\nadopted. Easternism may be said to regard the barren tree as holy. At\nleast, it never curses the barren.\n\nThe story of the wise man who built his house upon a rock has edified\nthe West.\n\nTo the story of the scribe who wished to follow Jesus, but who\napparently wished to do so and remain comfortable and well-off at the\nsame time, and to the story of the disciple who wished to bury his\nfather first, but to whom was said, \u201cLet the dead bury their dead,\u201d the\nWest has paid little or no attention, whilst the East has taken it to\nhimself.\n\nThe fact that Jesus sat down and ate with publicans and sinners is in\nthe spirit of the East; the West prefers ever the company of the just.\nThe West is glad to have the action of Jesus explained in the following\nverse: \u201cThey that be whole need not a physician, but they that are\nsick.\u201d\n\n\u201cProvide neither gold nor silver nor brass in your purses.\u201d Alas, all\nWestern weal believes that it is founded on gold. If any good work is to\nhand, the first thing is to raise a fund.\n\n\u201cWhen they deliver you up, take no thought how or what ye shall speak\n...\u201d: this has always been most helpful to persecuted nonconformists and\nheretics.\n\n\u201cI came not to send peace, but a sword\u201d is overlooked in the West. The\nWest thinks that Christ proclaimed peace. And the peace that was before\nthe Great War was thought to be a wonderful fruit of Christianity\u2014the\npeace of mutual jealousy and fear, the great commercial peace of the\ntwentieth century, that Kipling calls the \u201cPeace of Dives\u201d:\n\n                 The whole wide earth is laid\n                 In the peace that I have made;\n                 And behold, I wait on thee to trouble it.\n\n\u201cHe that findeth his life shall lose it; and he that loseth his life for\nMy sake shall find it\u201d: the West emphasises this thought. Carlyle gave\nit great force in his gospel of work. \u201cForget your troubles,\u201d says the\nWest; \u201cthrow yourself into work and lose yourself\u2014then you\u2019ll soon find\nyourself.\u201d The East will not work in that way.\n\n\u201cCome unto Me, all ye that labour and are heavy-laden\u201d has been comfort\nto the West.\n\nIn the matter of healing on the Sabbath the Western is rather on the\nside of the Jews.\n\nThe question, \u201cWho is my mother and who are my brethren?\u201d has not been\nacceptable to the West. The West would have preferred Jesus to be a\nmodel family man, not only loving mother and brothers and sisters, but\nhaving a wife and children about him. The Eastern Church takes its stand\nwith the early Christians and the denial of earthly ties. Sometimes news\nis brought of father or mother or brethren to the wonderful Russian\nhermits such as Father Seraphim, but they coldly repel the tidings with\nChrist\u2019s words, \u201cWhosoever doeth the will of God, the same is my brother\nand sister and mother.\u201d\n\nCasting the wicked into the fire\u2014this idea lingers in America, but it is\ndead in Russia and in England.\n\nThe confession of Peter, and the prophecy, \u201cThou art Peter, and on this\nrock I will build my Church,\u201d the Roman Church has necessarily taken to\nitself.\n\nThe Transfiguration on the mountain\u2014the possessed about the foot of the\nmountain\u2014is taken as an Eastern understanding of life. The light of\ntransfiguration is the halo about the head of the hermit; the possessed\nbelow make the hurly-burly of the world whence the hermit made his\nescape. \u201cThe light of transfiguration,\u201d I heard Prince Trubetskoi say in\na lecture at Moscow, \u201cis the light of haloes, the light of Holy Russia,\nthe light of friendship.\u201d\n\n\u201cLet us build three tabernacles\u201d is, as I said, Western.\n\nThe West has believed Jesus in that He answered the question, \u201cWho is\nthe greatest in the kingdom of heaven?\u201d by taking a little child and\nsetting him in the midst of them.\n\nThe West has allowed its eyes to rest on the parable of the Talents, but\nthe East has had more appreciation of \u201cThe first shall be last, and the\nlast first.\u201d\n\nThe West has insisted on \u201cRender unto Caesar the things that are\nCaesar\u2019s,\u201d but it has avoided the condemnation of the Pharisees; the\nGospel of St. Matthew reveals itself as the gospel of the kingdom of\nheaven as opposed to \u201cthe world.\u201d But the West has sought to find \u201cthe\nworld\u201d holy. Western Christianity was started by the conquest of worldly\narmies, but Eastern Christianity was founded on the example of hermits,\neunuchs, stoics, philosophers, fanatics. It had all the advantage of\nproximity to the place where Christianity started, all the advantage of\nthe traditions of Greek and Roman philosophy. Despite all our study of\nGreek and of history and of philosophy at the schools, and despite the\nRussian\u2019s lack of study, yet the latter is nearer to the ancient spirit;\nbut he has lived historically in direct relation to Byzantium, and has\never had before his eyes living examples of the way to live a Christian\nlife.\n\n\u201cMany are called, but few are chosen\u201d has had great influence in the\nWest, but the power of the text is waning. Protestantism is becoming\nmore philanthropical, easy-going, and generous than it was in the days\nof persecution.\n\nThe idea of the Second Coming of Christ is a strange will-o\u2019-the-wisp of\nlight that cannot be tracked and is difficult to account for, breaking\nout ever and anon unexpectedly where you would think it had for ever\ndisappeared. At present it is seen in many places, East and West.\nOriginally it was a very powerful sentiment, but after two thousand\nyears of waiting hope has died down, and it is seldom that whole\nsocieties sell up all their worldly goods and repair to the valley of\nJehoshaphat to wait the great day.\n\nThe story of Mary pouring the precious ointment on Jesus\u2019 head rather\nthan selling the ointment and giving the proceeds to the poor, is the\nway of Mary rather than the way of Martha.\n\nHere perhaps ends the Gospel of St. Matthew as far as definite sentences\nof teaching are concerned, and probably sufficient ideas have been taken\nout and compared for the purpose of this differentiation.\n\nAs regards the acts of the Gospel, there remains the consideration of\nthe miracles. The healing of the sick, the lame, the blind, has become\nthe example of the West, and what Christ did by miracle they do by\nscience. The East, however, insists on the miraculous, and to-day in\nRussia thousands of miracles are performed annually at the sacred\nshrines. Whether these miracles are genuine or no is a moot point. Many\ncertainly are no more than ecclesiastical contrivances for gaining\npopular support for ikons and shrines. Many are said to be the result of\nthe faith of those who ask the miracle. At Kief and Sarof and New\nJerusalem many a blind man receives sight, many a crippled woman\nstraightens herself out, many a sick man is restored to health. The\nEastern Church lays stress on the miraculous; the miracle, however, is\nesoterically understood as mystery. The Russian has an extraordinary\ncapacity for belief.\n\nThere remains the Crucifixion, of which I will say no more than that it\nis the greatest _podvig_, the crown of the life of Jesus. For the West\nit is the Resurrection that is emphasised. As I wrote in _With the\nRussian Pilgrims to Jerusalem_: \u201cFor the Orthodox, He was dead; for the\nProtestant, He is alive for evermore.\u201d So two churches combine to make\none truth, and the hand-maidens of the Lord, Martha and Mary, are shown\nto be indeed two sisters, not only in kindred but in spirit.\n\nTHE END\n\n_Printed by_ R. & R. CLARK, LIMITED, _Edinburgh_.\n\n\n\n\nBOOKS BY STEPHEN GRAHAM\n\n\n    =A TRAMP\u2019S SKETCHES.=\n\n    =WITH THE RUSSIAN PILGRIMS TO JERUSALEM.=\n\n    =WITH POOR EMIGRANTS TO AMERICA.=\n\n    =THE WAY OF MARTHA AND THE WAY OF MARY.=\n\nThese four books, published by Macmillan & Co., form a sequence of which\nthe _Tramp\u2019s Sketches_ is like a prologue or a promise. The Pilgrim book\nis of the Way of Mary; the America book is of the Way of Martha; and the\nfourth book, _The Way of Martha and the Way of Mary_, knits the other\nthree in one.\n\n\n_Other Volumes._\n\n    =RUSSIA AND THE WORLD=: An Account of how Russia is affected by the\n    War. Fifth Edition.\n\n    =VAGABOND IN THE CAUCASUS=: Mr. Graham\u2019s first book.\n\n    =UNDISCOVERED RUSSIA=: A Presentment of Holy Russia.\n\n    =CHANGING RUSSIA=: Written in 1912.\n\n\n\n\nBy STEPHEN GRAHAM\n\nWITH THE RUSSIAN PILGRIMS TO JERUSALEM\n\nIllustrated. 8vo. 7s. 6d. net.\n\n    _THE ATHEN\u00c6UM._\u2014\u201cM. Jusserand\u2019s _Pilgrim Life in the Middle Ages_ or\n    Burton\u2019s or Doughty\u2019s accounts of their pilgrimages to Mecca are\n    books of secure repute. Mr. Graham in _With the Russian Pilgrims to\n    Jerusalem_ gives us a companion volume.\u201d\n\n    _THE MANCHESTER GUARDIAN._\u2014\u201c\u2018Many think in the head,\u2019 wrote Francis\n    Thompson, \u2018but it is thinking in the heart that is most wanted.\u2019 It\n    is because this book has been pondered, and the events it describes\n    lived \u2018in the heart,\u2019 that it possesses such grace and distinction.\n    Those who have followed Mr. Graham and have watched his style\n    becoming with every volume he has written a more and more\n    close-fitting and appropriate garment for his thought, will not be\n    disappointed. It is his best work\u2014gay, beautiful, and tender; gay\n    with the spirit of youth, beautiful with the spirit of poetry, and\n    tender with the spirit of worship.... Compare these reverent and\n    radiant pages with the bright semi-cynicism of _Eothen_, and you get\n    a measure of the distance the English spirit has travelled since\n    1844.\u201d\n\n    _THE NATION._\u2014\u201cThe Russians have not been broken by Russia. Mr.\n    Stephen Graham, in his beautiful and remarkable book, throws this\n    great truth into vivid perspective. Not for him the \u2018grey days\u2019 of\n    Tchekhof or the hoarse challenge of Gorky\u2019s exultant mood, not for\n    him the symbol of Andreyev\u2019s Red Laughter.... This Englishman does\n    not dwell upon the Russians\u2019 suffering, but upon their immense hope;\n    he is preoccupied not by their material poverty but by their\n    spiritual wealth.\u201d\n\n    _THE DAILY MAIL._\u2014\u201cMr. Stephen Graham is favourably known as the\n    interpreter of modern Russia and more particularly of the peasant.\n    To that task he brings every accomplishment. He has sympathy; he has\n    the insight of genius and the heart of the poet. He has a rare and\n    precious gift of style.... He seems to have divined by some flash of\n    intuition the psychology of the Russian. This book will add greatly\n    to his already great reputation. It is a pleasure to praise such\n    work. Here he has given us an extraordinarily beautiful and\n    interesting account of an extraordinarily interesting\n    achievement.... It breaks entirely fresh ground. It makes a deep and\n    universal appeal.\u201d\n\n    _THE WESTMINSTER GAZETTE._\u2014\u201cThe best book on Russia written by an\n    Englishman.\u201d\n\n    _THE OUTLOOK._\u2014\u201cSomething more than a book of travel, a spiritual\n    Murray\u2014a very remarkable piece of work ... at once simple and\n    extraordinary.\u201d\n\n    _CHURCH TIMES._\u2014\u201cWe are sure that the student of human nature and\n    the student of religion alike will find a deep interest in this\n    book. Its merit is the complete sympathy and the true insight with\n    which it describes the child-like faith of the Russian peasant and\n    his passionate love of the Saviour who died for him.\u201d\n\n    _MERCURE DE FRANCE._\u2014\u201cC\u2019est une longue aventure o\u00f9 l\u2019on se croirait\n    report\u00e9 au temps des croisades, et l\u2019auteur dessine en quelques\n    traits nets et durs des types \u00e9tonnants. Voil\u00e0 un livre \u00e0 lire pour\n    quiconque veut \u00eatre int\u00e9ress\u00e9 et oblig\u00e9 de r\u00e9fl\u00e9chir.\u201d\n\n    _THE TIMES_ (in a leading article Feb. 5, 1914).\u2014\u201cNo living English\n    writer has made investigations so patient and so wide into the\n    habits and manners of the great dumb masses who are the body of the\n    largest and the least-known nation in Europe.\u201d\n\nLONDON: MACMILLAN AND CO., LTD.\n\n\n\n\nBy STEPHEN GRAHAM\n\nWITH POOR EMIGRANTS TO AMERICA\n\nIllustrated. 8vo. 8s. 6d. net.\n\n    _THE NATION._\u2014\u201cMr. Stephen Graham is a real super-tramp, and in his\n    aspect of the world and his fellows there is always a touch of the\n    pilgrim\u2019s sanctity. He feels an attraction, partly \u00e6sthetic, often\n    sentimental, to people of simple and religious life, and especially\n    to the Russian peasants, whom he depicts as the simplest and most\n    religious of all mankind. He loves the beauty of untouched nature,\n    and of man pursuing the primitive and traditional methods of\n    pasture, plough, or loom. He is always conscious of a spiritual\n    presence behind phenomena, and is strongly drawn by emotions of\n    pity, sympathy, and fellow-feeling, as by the qualities of humility\n    and indifference to material things.... Of all English writers on\n    America Mr. Graham is almost the only one who tells us certain\n    things that we really wanted to know.\u201d\n\n    _SPHERE._\u2014\u201cNot one of the well-known writers who from the days of\n    Dickens and Thackeray to our own has written his experiences of the\n    United States has proved so attractive.\u201d\n\n    _TIMES._\u2014\u201cOf these three travellers (Henry James, H. G. Wells, and\n    Stephen Graham) Mr. Graham has at least the advantage of extreme\n    contrast.... His book is full of humanity, sensitive with the love\n    of peace and beauty.\u201d\n\n    _GLASGOW NEWS._\u2014\u201cWith a fairly comprehensive knowledge of the books\n    on travel in America published in the past twenty-five years by\n    English authors, the present writer has not a moment\u2019s hesitation in\n    declaring that _With Poor Emigrants to America_ is immeasurably the\n    best among them all. It is not only an unusually informative book;\n    it is a work of spiritual genius, precious by reason of its\n    revelation of as unique and beautiful a character as surely has\n    dignified the trade of letters since the period of Lamb or\n    Goldsmith. Stephen Graham is something far more rare than an\n    \u2018interpreter of Russia\u2019 or a philosophical \u2018tramp\u2019; his quiet voice,\n    if he be spared, is likely to sound even more distinctively and more\n    impressively above the noisy chatter of his contemporaries. It is\n    perhaps a little unfortunate that his interest should be so much\n    engaged with Russia, for we grudge to Russia an expositor who, we\n    think, might be better employed in writing about his own race, but\n    then we must admit that but for the influence of Russia we might\n    perhaps have had no Stephen Graham.\u201d\n\n    _SPECTATOR._\u2014\u201cAn extremely interesting record, with many penetrating\n    illustrations of the contrast between Russian and American ideals.\u201d\n\n    _FIELD._\u2014\u201cThe book is full of Mr. Graham\u2019s philosophy, but that\n    philosophy largely reveals itself in the narration of his\n    experiences both on board ship and on land. They are narrated with\n    an abundance of anecdotes and with a charming simplicity of style\n    which make the book delightful reading.\u201d\n\n    _LIVERPOOL POST._\u2014\u201cThis is a book of sheer delight which will compel\n    most readers to finish it at a single sitting. It tells his story in\n    the free and effortless style which Mr. Graham uses so magically.\u201d\n\n    LINDSAY BASHFORD in the _DAILY MAIL_.\u2014\u201cThe best of his books. Mr.\n    Graham is the modern poet-pilgrim; his is the vision of wide roads\n    and long deliberate journeys; his the gift to understand the heart\n    of the poor and the wanderers. Each day\u2019s little events, each casual\n    encounter, each wayside talk or tiny adventure has its deeper\n    significance, and resolves into the deeper human movements he seeks\n    for as he goes, and which he interprets for us. I do not know of any\n    books of contemporaries which have a more intimate appeal, which\n    speak with more friendly confidence of the actual life of human\n    beings in our world to-day than do these wonder-books of Mr. Stephen\n    Graham.\u201d\n\n\nLONDON: MACMILLAN AND CO., LTD.\n\n\n\n\nBy STEPHEN GRAHAM\n\nA TRAMP\u2019S SKETCHES\n\nExtra Crown 8vo. 5s. net.\n\n    _ACADEMY._\u2014\u201cTo have read _A Tramp\u2019s Sketches_ is to have been lifted\n    into a higher and rarer atmosphere. It is to have been made free,\n    for a few hours at least, of the company of saints and heroes. This\n    much we owe to Mr. Graham, who has added to English Literature a\n    book that, if we mistake not, is destined to endure.\u201d\n\n    _SPECTATOR._\u2014\u201cLike Jefferies\u2019 _Story of my Heart_, but the author is\n    much more occupied with men than Jefferies was. Unlike most books of\n    its kind _A Tramp\u2019s Sketches_ has indisputably a genuine passion\n    running through it.\u201d\n\n    _ENGLISH REVIEW._\u2014\u201cIt is a delightful book, redolent of the open\n    air, of the night, of the great silences of expanse, and yet full of\n    incident, of real spiritual and material sympathy, both with the\n    \u2018black earth\u2019 and the monks of the monasteries, whose hospitality he\n    enjoyed, and with his fellow-comrades on the road. It is life that\n    interests the author.\u201d\n\n    _PALL MALL GAZETTE._\u2014\u201cDescriptions of Nature are apt to become\n    tiresome, but we have not been wearied once in reading these pages;\n    and this is not, we believe, altogether due to Mr. Graham\u2019s fine\n    style, his ever-adequate perception of the right word, but because\n    of his sincere and absolute love of Nature in all her moods. Here is\n    no pretence, no make-believe. He writes of the mystery and beauty of\n    the sea, the night, the sunset, the moon, and the stars in words\n    that seem at times to take colour from that which they describe.\u201d\n\n    Mr. ALGERNON BLACKWOOD in _COUNTRY LIFE_.\u2014\u201cThey are the notes of a\n    spiritual pilgrim going towards the new Jerusalem. The writer\u2019s\n    passionate worship of Beauty, his love of simplicity, his charity,\n    his courage, all these make a strong appeal. He has in him poetry\n    and vision.\u201d\n\n    Mr. WM. PURVIS in the _SUNDAY CHRONICLE_.\u2014\u201cStephen Graham walks the\n    earth in the garb of beggary, and sees unusual types and meets\n    incredible men and women and analyses his emotions, and worships the\n    Great Spirit in vague fashions; and writes excellently about it all.\n    He wishes there were more like him; and so do I.\u201d\n\n    _DAILY NEWS._\u2014\u201cThis robust book, a classic of educated yet wild\n    vagabondage.\u201d\n\n    _LIVERPOOL COURIER._\u2014\u201cMr. Graham found pleasure, even joy\n    everywhere, and he has an almost inspired faculty for making the\n    reader see things as he sees them.\u201d\n\n    _THE QUEEN._\u2014\u201cThe whole book is full of beautiful things.\u201d\n\n    _IRISH TIMES._\u2014\u201cNot a chapter, scarcely a page, which cannot be\n    re-read with profit and delight.\u201d\n\n    _GLASGOW HERALD._\u2014\u201cTold in language that is always adequate and\n    luminous.\u201d\n\nLONDON: MACMILLAN AND CO., LTD.\n\n\n\n\n \u25cf Transcriber\u2019s Notes:\n    \u25cb Text that was in italics is enclosed by underscores (_italics_).\n      Text that was in bold face is enclosed by equals signs (=bold=).\n    \u25cb Footnotes have been moved to follow the chapters in which they are\n      referenced.","title":"The Way of Martha and the Way of Mary","tradition":"scripture-revelation","translated_text":null,"word_count":70264}