completely conceals the whole meaning of Christ's teaching.[1]
And I really repudiated the Church, ceased to observe its ceremonies, and wrote a will instructing those near me, that when I die they should not allow any servants of the Church to have access to me, but should put away my dead body as quickly as possible—without having any incantations or prayers over it—just as one puts away any objectionable and useless object, that it may not be an inconvenience to the living.
As to the statements made about me, that I devote the 'literary activity and the talent given to him by God, to disseminating among the people teachings contrary to Christ and to the Church,' and that, 'in his works and in letters issued by him and by his disciples in great quantities, over the whole world, but particularly within the limits of our dear fatherland, he preaches with the zeal of a fanatic the overthrow of all the dogmas of the Orthodox Church and the very essence of the Christian faith'—this is not true. I never troubled myself about the propagation of my teaching. It is true that for myself I have expressed in writings my understanding of Christ's teaching, and have not hidden these works from those who wished to become acquainted with them, but I never published them
- ↑ One need only read the Prayer-Book, and follow the ritual which is continually performed by the Orthodox priests, and which is considered a Christian worship of God, to see that all these ceremonies are nothing but different kinds of sorcery, adapted to all the incidents of life. That a child in case of death should go to Paradise, one has to know how to oil him and how to immerse him while pronouncing certain words; in order that after child-birth a mother may cease to be unclean, certain incantations have to be pronounced; to be successful in one's affairs, to live comfortably in a new house, that corn may grow well, that a drought may cease, to recover from sickness, to ease the condition in the next world of one who is dying,—for all these and a thousand other incidents there are certain incantations which, at a certain place, for a certain consideration, are pronounced by the priest.—L. T.
