Page:Russian Church and Russian Dissent.djvu/23

8 throne it no longer feared persecution, and, relying on the temporal power, it gradually fell into subjection and tutelage, a condition fatal to its true development: it submitted to the encroachments of imperial authority; human passions proved stronger than religious convictions, and its patriarchs and prelates, eager for advancement, appealed to the emperor in their mutual quarrels and contentions, striving by subserviency and compliance to conciliate his favor. The theocratic theory of its independence of principalities and powers gradually yielded to servility and dependence; civil authority became paramount over the Church, influenced or dictated its decrees, and was the supreme judge and arbiter of its destinies. Spiritual life within it became dead, and its religion degenerated to scholastic investigation and metaphysical disquisition on barren points of doctrinal belief; its intellectual activity, though great and in constant exercise, wasted its ingenuity and energy on the study of the historical, exegetical, dogmatical side of Christianity, and neglected the practical application of its precepts to the daily life and conduct of men. The fathers were busy in establishing precise definitions, in collecting and transmitting to posterity the lore and learning of the past, augmented and explained by their comments, rather than in endeavoring to improve humanity in the present; nor was this disputatious spirit peculiar to dignitaries of the Church, it pervaded all classes of society; in the words of Gregory Nazianzen, "this city is full of mechanics and slaves, who are all of them profound theologians, and preach in the shops and in the streets. If you ask a man to change a piece of silver, he informs you wherein the Son differs from the Father; if you demand the price of a loaf, you are told by way of reply that the Son is inferior to the Father; and if you inquire