Page:Russian Church and Russian Dissent.djvu/186

Rh clergy were thrown open to all, and children of priests were freely admitted to other careers. While in theory, and before the law, these distinctions of class and caste have been abrogated, practically they still exist as a marked characteristic of Russian society, and their persistence springs from the difficulty of rapidly effecting radical changes among a people imbued, above all others, with regard for ancient usages; the long-continued Levitical organization of the parish clergy created habits of life and thought not to be easily eradicated, and, as a matter of fact, the clerical body still remains a class apart.

The inheritance of priestly rank tended to make the charges and the emoluments of the office also hereditary, and to establish, for the priest, a quasi vested right of proprietorship in the parish living. The pope endeavored to transmit his curacy to his children, not only as a legacy to a son, but also, when he had no son to succeed him in his charge, as a marriage portion for a daughter; and these pretensions, very generally realized in practice, came near securing the force of law. They were the more leniently considered by the authorities of both the State and the Church, from the necessity, devolving upon them at the death of a pope, of making provision for his family, and from their natural wish to impose this burden upon his successor; the situation was also further complicated by the circumstance that, usually, the parsonage and dwellings belonged, not to the parish, or to the village, which gave only the land necessary for the pope's support, but to the incumbent himself, and the new-comer was obliged to arrange with the heirs to obtain possession; as marriage was obligatory upon him, the simplest mode of settlement was for him to marry into the family; he could not espouse the widow, to