princes took vows before their death, and died in the retired sanctuaries of the religious houses. The monks of the Greek religion, loaded with the spoils of friends and enemies, lived in fortified dwellings, like the nobles of other lands, and were defended by formidable retinues. The primate held a court superior in magnificence to that of the grand prince, and surrounded by boyars, guards, and all the luxuries of the east, he possessed almost unlimited power over life and death; he was the first person who was consulted on all questions of difficulty, and, as a means of exhibiting the supremacy of his station, he instituted public ceremonies, at which the princes assisted, holding the bridle of the ass on which he rode. This tendency of the church to outgrow the space wherein its roots were laid, was greatly forwarded by the fertilizing contributions which flowed in upon it from all quarters. Whenever a phenomenon in the physical world alarmed the superstitions of the people, the major part of the population bequeathed their wealth to the monasteries, with the hope of propitiating the favour of Heaven and securing happiness in the next world. The corruptions of the church of Rome had already crept into the administration of the Greek faith. The system of donations that prevailed in Papal Italy, where even the kingdoms of earth were bartered for the kingdom of heaven, had set an example of which the Russian clergy were not slow to avail themselves. It was, perhaps, a natural conclusion that the clemency of the Godhead could be purchased in a country where earthly justice and exemptions from punishments were sold for pecuniary considerations.