their early history were identified with spiritual life, as distinguished from the Dissenters whose dissent was only a matter of ritual, we find that the Stundists have been more than influential—they have simply revivified them. The voices of the Stundist martyrs from their prisons and places of exile in Siberia and the Caucasus, and the patient heroism of their lives amidst the cruellest persecution, have stirred sects like the Molokans as a trumpet-call stirs a soldier. It is, however, impossible to do more than allude to some of the direct and indirect efforts of this great movement. And the very fact already alluded to, that high and low in all parts of the empire are talking rationally about the Stundists, and discussing their peculiar views, may do far more to bring about the wished-for day of freedom than the most eloquent appeals on behalf of liberty addressed to the Czar or to the Holy Synod.
At the present time there seems little sign of the dawn of that bright day. The persecution has never raged more cruelly than at present; the state of terrorism has never been more pitiable. Lynx-eyed police, and priests and Orthodox missioners with the cunning of foxes, abound in the villages inhabited by Stundists. Their object is no secret—it is to trample out every vestige of Dissent wherever it appears. We have already described their loathsome procedure, and have seen that nothing is too mean for them in the carrying out of their revolting programme. The Stundists are, in a great degree, panicstricken and disorganised, and if we are to take their present condition as an indication of what will be, should the fires of persecution continue, the outlook for Russian Protestantism is gloomy enough. But will the persecution continue? Already there are signs that the State is getting tired of acting as the drill-sergeant of the Church. It is beginning to feel that the bitter cry of the Church for
