CHAPTER CXXVII.

Last conversations and partings with Prince Michael and with the Archpriest.

ON

N Monday, June 28 [N.S.], I went back by Oranienbaum to Petersburg, and next day took leave of Prince Michael. He said he had talked with M. Skreepitsin about unity, and they agreed that it would be a very good thing if the Emperor would build a handsome church in London, and have the services celebrated in English there. I said, "And if he would found and keep a small monastery at Oxford." Skreepitsin had agreed with me in praise of the Archimandrite Philaret. I said, "Nothing can be done by us till we have settled the controversy of life and death among ourselves. When the New Sect' gets the ascendency all will be in effect done, but now we can do nothing."

Wednesday, June 30 [N.s].-I saw M. Mouravieff at the Synod, and was invited to be present on Friday to witness the nomination of Athanasius, the Rector of the Seminary to be Bishop of Tomsk.

On Thursday, July 1 [N.s.], I called on, and took leave of the Archpriest Koutnevich, and he talked to me of my visit to Moscow. He hoped I should retain

a friendly recollection of the Russian Church after my return to England. I said I could never feel like the Metropolitan of Moscow, who was "plenissime beatus" in having the communion of only a part, even though it was the largest part, as the Roman, or the most perfect and purest, as he might think the Eastern.

He said, "We desire unity most heartily, but we cannot, in order to obtain it, make little of those doctrines or rules of conduct which we have received from antiquity." He also said that if, as I seemed to think, the true Church is divided, and the Eastern particular Church perfect or nearly so, so as to be justified in refusing her communion to the Latin and British till they reform, and if the Latin and British, in spite of more or less of error or corruption, have preserved their essential existence, what is left to both parties but to cultivate such friendship and charity on the basis of what we have in common, as may flow from a common desire to be true followers of Christ, and to obtain, if it be His will, eventual unity?

I said, "I think the divided portions of the Church, and divided members too, even individuals, should never rest till they are reconciled, and if your portion of the Church is perfect, it should help ours, which I

freely confess is very imperfect."

"How could we be

a help to you?" he replied. "For instance," I said, "if you could give communion to members of the Latin and British Churches on the ground of those essentials which they agree with you in holding. If the true Church is really divided, a more fatal error cannot be conceived than this, viz., that the more healthy and perfect part should withdraw, as you now do, from the body; for, by withdrawing, it loses all influence whatever, and makes the case of the rest desperate; whereas, by closely cohering and using its healthy influence upon the rest, it might expel the disease. If, on the other hand, the Latin and British Churches were really apostate in the strictest sense of the word, your withdrawal would be justified indeed, but your want of zeal, energy, and power to evangelize and convert them, and your inconsistency in still virtually acknowledging them to have part in the Church, would be utterly inexcusable and inconceivable."

He said, "Our Church would most willingly do whatever she rightly could for the restoration of unity, which she much desires; and if your Bishops would only write to the Synod, the Synod, I can answer for it, will show every disposition to correspond with them, and consider, and examine, and treat of whatever they propose." I answered, "That does not seem at all

likely, or indeed possible, at present for various reasons, political as well as religious. We have too much to do at home first. I only wish that in the meantime we may on each side cultivate a better and more accurate knowledge of each other."

He suggested also that the Church of England should resume the correspondence of the last century; to which I replied that the present Anglican Established Church could never admit herself to have been represented by the non-juring Bishops, or take up and confirm a correspondence begun by them; the Scottish indeed perhaps might. But there was, I said, in my opinion, a radical fault in that correspondence, in this, that it assumed essential division to exist, and proposed a vague treaty for concessions; whereas our best and simplest and only safe course would be to do by a Synodal act the very same thing which I have now done myself as an individual, viz., redemand our ancient intercommunion on the assumption that we have preserved on both sides continuously one and the same immutable faith, thereby calling in question the rightfulness of our actual separation, and throwing it on the Orientals to make their objections, and show cause for repelling us, we offering at the same time all explanations which may be called for on essential doctrine, and such concessions as may be prudent or possible in secondary matters of opinion, discipline, or ritual.

I gave him on parting a copy of Bishop Andrewes's "Private Devotions," in Greek and Latin, which he seemed much to value, noticing that they contained Prayers for the departed, the Intercession of Saints, the Eulogy of the Blessed Virgin, and faith in the Real Presence. He gave me in turn a copy of Archbishop Platon's "Notices of Russian Ecclesiastical History."

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