Alexander Nevski was one of the few great men whose names stand apart from the tumultuous throng that crowd the early pages of Russian history. He was a wise statesman, and a brave soldier. His victories over the enemies of his country were not less remarkable for completeness and brilliancy, than his measures of domestic improvement were distinguished by prudence and foresight. The Danes, the Swedes, the Lithuanians, and the Teutonic knights severally gave way before him: he enlarged the bounds of his territory, inspired his army with a fresh spirit of activity, rebuilt several Russian cities that had been destroyed during the Tatar invasions, and founded others in well-chosen situations. Russia, under his sway, might have redeemed her fallen fortunes; but the unnatural hostility of the feudal princes to the grand princedom, their hatred to any chief whose virtues elevated him above them, and their ruinous conflicts amongst themselves upon insignificant grounds of quarrel, paralysed the efforts of Alexander, and deprived him of the power of rendering that service to his country which he was eminently qualified to confer. His fame was so universal, that his death gave opportunity to the display of a fresh burst of superstitious feelings. His approaching decease was said to have been notified to the metropolitan by a voice from heaven; and as the body lay in the coffin, the dead man was said to have opened one of his hands, as the prayer of absolution was spoken by the officiating clergyman. These miracles obtained Alexander a niche amongst the Russian saints; and, less in honour of his real merits than his attributed powers, he was duly canonised after death. Some centuries subsequently, a monastery was raised to his memory by Peter I, and his relics were removed to St. Petersburg with extraordinary ceremonies of devotion. An order of knighthood was afterwards instituted in his name, which ranks amongst its members some of the monarchs of Europe. These facts connected with the reputation of Alexander Nevski in Russia are memorable, as proofs of the veneration in which he was held.[d] The khans committed a serious fault in preserving a grand prince; it was a still more striking one, and a consequence of the first, to place in his hands a sovereignty disproportioned to those by which he was surrounded, to select him for too long a time from the same branch, and to give him armies to establish himself, and the means of seducing even themselves by the most costly presents. The consequence of this was, that the appanaged princes dared not enter so readily into a contest with the grand princes, who were already more powerful than themselves, and were so formidably supported. Not daring to contend with them, they turned their arms against each other, and thus enhanced by their own weakness the strength of the grand princes.