In 1652 the Patriarch of Moscow died, and Nikon, who had steadily advanced, was appointed to fill his place. For the next six years Nikon was chief favourite and councillor, and his story is so characteristic of the time that it must be briefly told. He was the son of a provincial peasant: a man of robust constitution and conscience, and of no small ambition. His success as a ruler of monks had won for him the archbishopric of Novgorod, and he knew how to capture the nervous and superstitious monarch. He claimed visions, and his shrewdness was at least supported by a vigorous will. Before long the Tsar was little more than an instrument of his will, and an abject spiritual pupil. He would protest with tears that he was unworthy to wear the crown, and it was only by reliance upon the Patriarch’s strong counsel that he was dissuaded from abdicating. The Tsar, like his predecessors, loved the elaborate ritual of the Church, and Nikon interested him in the work of ecclesiastical reform. The Slav translation of the Bible was very corrupt, and the corrupt texts and ancient superstitious usages were to be rooted out. While Poles and Swedes and Turks threatened--while the country rotted in ignorance and economic folly--an immense zeal was concentrated upon the purification of the text of the Scriptures and upon such grave issues as the shaving of the beard, and the number of fingers that one must use in making the sign of the cross. The court was purified of “heretics” and the forces of the Empire were put at the Patriarch’s disposal for the purification of the entire country. Easy-going Russia had as yet not recognised its many heresies. Provided that one repudiated the Pope one was esteemed orthodox; and indeed most of the priests and monks were too densely ignorant to examine a man’s orthodoxy. It was now seen that a vast amount of heresy existed in Russia, and every weird phase of dissent was truculently persecuted. Whole colonies of monks were infected, and in places their monasteries sustained for several years the attacks of imperial troops. Nikon was astute as well as ambitious. He would invite some ragged popular fanatic of Moscow to drink wine at his table, and would make great nobles tremble before his power. He acquired enormous wealth, made an impressive display of pomp and luxury, and contrived to indulge the heavy sensuality which then belonged to all classes. Russia had become an autocracy. Nikon would make it a theocracy.