Political events had tended to concentrate absolute power in the hands of the Grand Princes of Moscow, beginning with Ivan III. But no counterbalancing power had arisen in Russian society; there was no independent life, no respect for the individual, no public opinion to counteract the abuse of power. In the beginning of the sixteenth century, Russian society had reached the extreme limits of development possible to it under its unfavorable conditions. The time for the Russian Renaissance had arrived. It is well to remember that at this time in other parts of Europe also the spirit of despotism and intolerance was holding individual liberty in check. This was the age of Henry VIII., of Catherine de Medici, of the Inquisition, and of the Massacre of St. Bartholomew. In this century of transition, the sixteenth, the man who exerted over the spirit of the age more influence than any other was Maxim the Greek (1480-1556), a learned scholar, a monk of Mt. Athos, educated chiefly in Italy. He was invited to Russia by Grand Prince Vasily Ivanovitch, for the purpose of cataloguing a rich store of Greek manuscripts in the library of the Grand Prince. To his influence is due one of the most noteworthy books of the sixteenth century, the "Stoglava," or "Hundred Chapters," a set of regulations adopted by the young Tzar Ivan Vasilievitch (afterwards known as Ivan the Terrible), the son of Vasily, and by the most enlightened nobles of his time at a council held in 1551. Their object was to reform the decadent morals of the clergy, and various ecclesiastical and social disorders, and in particular, the absolute illiteracy arising from the lack of schools. Another famous work of the same century is the "Domostroy," or "House-Regulator," attributed to Pope (priest) Sylvester, the celebrated confessor and counselor of Ivan the Terrible in his youth. In an introduction and sixty-three chapters Sylvester sets forth the principles which should regulate the life of every layman, the management of his household and family, his relations to his neighbors, his manners in church, his conduct towards his sovereign and the authorities, his duties towards his servants and subordinates, and so forth. The most curious part of the work deals with the minute details of domestic economy--one injunction being, that all men shall live in accordance with their means or their salary--and family relations, in the course of which the position of woman in Russia of the sixteenth century is clearly defined. This portion is also of interest as the forerunner of a whole series of articles in Russian literature on women, wherein the latter are depicted in the most absurd manner, the most gloomy colors--articles known as "About Evil Women"--and founded on an admiration for Byzantine asceticism. In his Household Regulations Sylvester thus defines the duties of woman: