renders the action of Vladimir entirely different from that of Clovis when he forced the Franks to follow him in adopting his newly accepted religion. This was indeed a great missionary era. It has been reckoned as part of the Dark Ages; but that judgment only applies to Western Europe. This period saw the spread of the gospel over Bulgaria, Hungary, Bohemia, Saxony, Denmark, Norway, Sweden, Poland, and lastly, to a considerable extent over Russia.
We must not, therefore, regard it as a mere act of subserviency to tyranny, that on the demand of their master multitudes of the citizens of Kiev with their wives and children flocked to the Dnieper, and there received baptism from the Greek priests who had come over to welcome them into the Church. Still, the impressiveness and sincerity of the scene must have been maimed by the ugly threat which accompanied the prince's invitation, for he had issued a proclamation on the day before the ceremony, that "whoever, on the morrow, should not repair to the river, whether rich or poor, he should hold him for an enemy."
The acceptance of Christianity by Vladimir and his people from Constantinople opened the way for intercommunication between Russia and the Byzantine Empire. Commerce followed the gospel. Art and culture came in its train. A Christian civilisation now began to spread slowly through Russia. The consequence was that in the course of the next century this country, which we are now accustomed to think of as the most backward of European nations, became more advanced than Germany or even France. She took a foremost place in the early part of the Middle Ages. Byzantine culture was now at its height and incomparably superior to the rude condition of the Western nations; and Russia now came in for a share of this rich civilisation. This was seen most evidently in the erection of churches, which Vladimir zealously carried on throughout the towns and villages of his dominions. Like Rameses ii. in Eygpt, like Hadrian and Constantine and
