The czar who at this time governs Russia has emancipated the Russian peasants, he has abolished the servitude of the glebe. He has had to break with his past, disavow the acts of his ancestors, acknowledge their faults, and repair them. He has had to struggle against immense interior difficulties, against the interests of the lords, against routine, against the spirit of domination, against cupidity. In spite of all this, Alexander II. is emancipator of the serfs--a title far more glorious than those given by flattery to Peter I. When the servitude of the peasantry was still in existence in Russia, lords were not wanting who held to their serfs the following kind of language: “How happy you are! You are delivered from all care for your own existence or for that of your families! When you have finished the work which you owe to me, you can do whatever you think best. You enjoy in peace the fruits of the earth, the pleasures of the country, the free air of the fields. I consider you as my children. I take care of you. Your interests are mine. Your family joys are mine, and mine also are your pains. How happy you are!” In fact, if we are to believe certain authorities, nothing was wanting to the happiness of the Russian peasant, serf of the glebe; it was a perpetual idyl. In spite of that, all Europe pitied him. And why? Because the peasant could not go whither he would, and because, if he were not sensible of the privation of this liberty, it was because he had been rendered incapable of appreciating it. Now, there are peoples who are chained to the glebe, not by the body, but by the soul. They have each their lord, and, provided that they accomplish the work which their lord imposes upon them, they are, for the rest, free to employ their time as they please. Care is taken of them, of their families, of their material interests, and especially they are unceasingly reminded that they are free, and that their lord has nothing more at heart than their liberty. They are indeed free to do many things; but one liberty is wanting to them--their body may go whither they desire it, but their soul is chained to the glebe. Study being granted to them, and the knowledge of that which is passing in the world being no longer refused to them, they discover on the earth a church which calls herself divine, and charged to conduct all souls to heaven. They study her; they are not alarmed at objections; they know how to make allowance for human weakness in her children, and even in her ministers. They find in this weakness itself one argument more in favor of the divinity of this church. They admire the courage, full of gentleness, of these bishops. It is truth, it is God, who speaks by her. These souls desire God, and they are therefore drawn towards her, because they lift themselves up to God. At this moment a heavy weight holds them back; wishing to soar towards heaven, they find themselves chained to the glebe.