Page:The Spirit of Russia by T G Masaryk, volume 1.pdf/220

194 police absolutism were in the hands of a widely ramified "black cabinet," which supervised all domestic and foreign correspondence. The most highly placed dignitaries were not exempt from the attentions of this cabinet.

The facts that have been adduced suffice for the condemnation of tsarism in the past as well as in the present, for the condemnation of the entire system. Theocratic cæsaropapism cannot be justified if it can be upheld only by such means—it cannot be true that the absolute tsar governs by God's grace, it cannot be true that God commends obedience towards the tsar, it cannot be true that such obedience is enjoined by conscience. The existence of the white terror under Nicholas proves that section four arbitrarily incorporated by him in the state fundamental laws, the section referring to the theocratic essence of the tsar's supreme authority, is false. Absolutism has no foundation either in religion or morals.

The deduction we have to draw from this reaction which has now lasted for many years applies also to the state church, the theoretical and practical basis of tsarism. From the first the church has defended tsarism against the opposition and against the revolution, and now the church has approved the reaction, has approved the black hundred, has availed itself of the services of that body in the interest of reaction. Finally, in the elections for the fourth duma, the church openly intervened on the side of reaction. The synod, Sabler the chief procurator, and the hierarchy, organised the.election of numerous members of the clergy, in order to secure the presence in the fourth duma of a clerical party far larger than the one which had existed in the third, and it was designed that these clerical deputies should be led by some of the hierarchs, who were likewise to secure election. But the result of the elections was a disagreeable surprise to the reactionary ecclesiastics, for whereas there had been forty-four priests in the third duma, there were but forty-three in the fourth.

The aim of the synod and the hierarchy was to transform the clergy into thoroughly pliable police tools of the anticonstitutionalist reaction. With this end in view a program was drafted whose two main points were as follows. In the first