Page:Russian Church and Russian Dissent.djvu/37



the death of Vladimir, in 1015, bloody and fratricidal strife between the appanaged princes desolated Russia until Yaroslav, his son, succeeded in uniting the whole kingdom under his sway.

Yaroslav, great among the greatest of Russian monarchs, followed his father's example. He sedulously fostered the growth of the Church as an element of his own power. With its growth its national character was developed. It evinced its jealousy of foreign influence by the election, in 1051, of Hilarion, a native Russian, as metropolitan, without reference to Constantinople. Churches were multiplied in all the cities, and the first monastic establishments were founded. The most celebrated of these, from the great influence which it exerted upon the civil and religious destinies of Russia, and from the profound veneration in which it is and always has been held by the people, merits more than a passing notice.

A pilgrim from Lubetsch became a monk in the Holy Land, under the name of Anthony, and was distinguished for exemplary humility and devotion. His superiors marked his vocation for cœnobitic life, and, giving him their blessing, ordered him back to Russia, prophesying the success which would attend his labors in his native