Ноябрь 1879 г.

I thank You, my all-merciful God and Savior, who for the second time saved me from the death of sin through my faith and repentance: once in church during Matins and again upon my arrival home for evading giving alms to the poor in the amount they desired (for baths and for shoes), due to my hardness of heart and my stinginess. Oh, how great are the joys of Your deliverance, given to me, a great sinner, every day! How great is Thy mercy, Thy long-suffering upon me, the accursed! How obedient, quick to obey, kind, benevolent, all-powerful, all-righteous, wise, all-encompassing, all-simple, all-holy, immutable, unchangeable in Your truth, holiness, mercy, all-powerful, for You are eternally righteous, holy, merciful, all-powerful! I am blessed by You, I am delighted by You, by Your perfections! God! You give me, who dies spiritually every day and many times, Your life, justification, peace, space through my repentance. You perform glorious miracles on me every day, reviving me, dead, with extreme goodness. My soul is the daughter of Jairus, resurrected by You, Lord, every day. And my sinful bleeding, hourly, many years - who stops, stops, cleanses, heals? My Lord Jesus Christ. Glory to Him, the Savior of all! Six and a half o'clock in the evening. I repeatedly fell into great, grave sins today, starting from eleven and a half o'clock in the afternoon until now: I indulged in gluttony, delicacy, intemperance: at eleven and a half o'clock I feasted on the birthday boy Kozma Kovrigin (pie, grapes, apples, wine, tea), at three o'clock - at Kozma Volkov's (again grapes, apples, wine and a piece of pie), at home at three and a half o'clock dined (cabbage soup, meat, roast). As a result of gluttony and the extremely large number of beggars asking me for alms (more than a hundred people), I became extremely irritable, touchy, began to scold the beggars, evade them, and through this even more hellish arrows began to shoot at me. I sinned before the Lord with anger towards the poor, contempt, irritation, impatience, stinginess, greed, earthly passion, self-love, selfishness, and dislike. I destroyed the law of the Lord, I fell away from Christian love, I did not have mercy on the members of Christ, I insulted them, I grieved the Holy Spirit, I grieved the lover of Christ. In his hearts he called Anna a cursed servant for the malfunction, becoming very irritated. But in deep repentance I ask the Lord for mercy and forgiveness for all my grave sins. I experienced such spiritual distress today that I have not experienced it for fifteen years. How many times did the Lord have mercy on me this evening and how sweet was the Lord’s mercy for me when I left the Duma guard room from the church watchman Nicholas! And again I fell into sin through the poor, and again I was shown mercy for repentance. I thank the Lord, who delivered me for my deep repentance from the greatest hellish fire and oppression. Why don’t I give alms to the poor, although there are many of them, with desire, zeal, and simplicity of heart? Why with annoyance, reluctantly, under compulsion (often), with pity for money, and not for your neighbor? Why addiction to money? Why kill yourself with frustration and greed? I am sure that it is reckless and absurd on my part to be angry at the multitude of beggars, for they are driven to me by extreme need and a hopeless situation, and one must only pity them as those who truly deserve pity, and give to them, if possible, with meekness and diligence. After early mass. I thank the Lord for the gift of serving the early liturgy in the Assumption Church and for reviving me through the service and communion of the Holy Mysteries. Reconcile yourself to me, O Lord, All-Merciful. Evening, six and a half hours. I thank the Lord, who through my prayer took away from my womb and from my heart a great tightness, among other things, through my abstinence (I ate very little at dinner). Saturday. Evening. I thank You, Lord, for You have performed in me miracles of deliverance and resurrection of my soul, which was constantly dying in sins: since You delivered me, at the end of classes at the gymnasium, from the anguish of my heart and distress over the offense against me with tears from the student Chekaevsky, who received a score of 4 in a quarter of the year, and not 5, as he had hoped; another time in the cathedral, just before Vespers or at the beginning of Vespers before singing, the Lord cried out from the sorrow and distress that befell me for running away and avoiding giving alms to the beggars who asked for money for clothes; and for the third time at this very moment he delivered me from hellish cramped conditions and scorching fire, which befell me in Divine truth for new hard-heartedness towards the poor, for anger at them, for furious, reproachful words and for reluctant, not from the heart, giving alms. Oh, how often I, accursed and all-passionate, anger the Lord, grieve His goodness, blaspheme His generosity with my deeds, my passions, grieve the Holy Spirit of the Comforter! Morning. I thank the Lord for the repeated miracles of delivering me from the sorrows and distress that befell me yesterday for my sins, and for the gift of tearful tenderness during the all-night vigil, and for sublime thoughts and feelings, especially during the censing of holy icons. The all-evil enemy tried to constantly set me on fire internally, confuse, oppress, instill fear, gnaw at my soul, sarcastically, pour out his poison into it, but through the prayer of repentance the Lord delivered me from all his intrigues and slander, and I served the all-night vigil without stumbling. I thank the Lord also for overcoming the ethereal enemies during the service of the all-night vigil at Brown’s house: here the enemy tempted me with girls, but by the grace of God and by not paying attention to his machinations and by concentrating all my attention on prayer and glorification, I overcame him: having stumbled once at the litany of petition, I repeated it again and overcame him. Alexander Gavrilovich Britnev (merchant of Kronstadt) hanged himself from drinking: his death was very sad and terrible! Father Peter Klepachevsky and Dean Trachevsky served the funeral service. The deceased was sometimes extremely impudent in his words and impudently scolded the spiritual authorities: the Metropolitan and others, so because of him I was embarrassed for a long time. Remember not, Lord, his unrighteousness. During Matins yesterday, I earnestly prayed to the Lord, may the rector’s heart change from a money-loving to a God-loving one, from a hard-hearted one towards the poor to a kind-hearted one, may he be of the same mind with the word of God and with the Church of God, may he stop swearing at the bounty of God, holding back wealth and collecting it without knowing whom, despising the poor for so many years, and me together, who gives them from the mercies of the Lord, ridiculing and vilifying and expressing his indignation at me for that. I ask this, that through this Christian faith and piety there will be prosperity and affirmation, charity, warmth and nourishment for the poor, and glory to God, for His generosity to us is great, great and innumerable. When I prayed for this, the ethereal enemies strongly scorched and oppressed me, but through the prayer of faith the Lord drove them away and gave me the dew of grace. Away from me, the stinking dog, my enemy, constantly seducing me and swearing at the creation of God, pure, beautiful, beautiful, with useful and beautiful members, with which may the most honorable and magnificent name of the Father and the Son and the Holy Spirit, our All-Creator God, be glorified; away with the scolder of the members of procreation, procreation, child-bearing. Oh, what sweetness do I need other than the sweetness of the Lord and His grace! Truly, this sweetness is holy, incorruptible, life-giving, peaceful, eternal! May I love this one holy sweetness always and forever. You are the Sweetness of my soul, Lord! I thank the Lord, who delivered me during the late liturgy in the Assumption Church from the greatest distress that occurred as a result of my satiation the night before at Brown’s: with great faith, in repentance, I prayed to the Lord for deliverance, and the Most Merciful One bowed down to my mercy. I was greatly relieved. He received Holy Communion in a life-giving way. He said the lesson of his composition. However, the tightness, as a consequence of the strength of the stomach, continued to be in me. It took place during baptism in Tsepov’s house with his nephew Yegor Nikolaevich Gulyaev in the cellar from the action of grace and long speaking. Monday. I thank the Lord, who delivered me today during Matins from heartbreak. Three and a half o'clock in the evening. What I did very badly was that today at ten in the morning I ate hard-boiled malt and black bread, a small slice with butter and two slices of a roll with tea. It was hard until three o'clock and beyond. You no longer need to eat or drink in the morning, and there is no need. Wake up! Singing dirges and funeral songs over a suicide means playing with your beliefs or allowing others to play with you. Didn't the deliberate suicide trample on faith, all the Sacraments, all the grace of Christ? Did he not reject Christ and His grace, like Judas? And we are ready to let Judas into heaven because of money, but will he be warm there? I have no good deeds, I only sin gravely every day and through faith and repentance I acquire the mercy of my Master and God, the Lord Jesus Christ - my faith saves me. So, there is no escape for me from work. If faith, even in You, saves the desperate, save me by faith, Lord: for I believe that You are my God, Creator, Provider and Savior. And every day, all the experiences of salvation convince me that the Lord will save me for the sake of faith in Him. I thank the Lord, who delivered me yesterday in the apartment of Markov Yakov [Kalinich] from the nasty seductive thought and feeling that clung to me from looking at a seven-year-old baby sleeping face down on the bed. Oh, how the crafty defiler catches me every minute with his abominations! Oh, perverter of God's beautiful creations - humans! O corrupter of nature, created pure and incorruptible! Curse you and your deeds forever and ever! Ten o'clock in the morning. With all my heart I thank the Lord for mercifully delivering me from hellish oppression and devilish fire, which befell me before Matins and tormented me at the beginning of it for being upset with the poor and for avoiding giving one of them (to whom he gave alms a short time later). I sincerely, with all my heart, with all my thoughts, with all my strength, condemned myself for destroying the law of the Gospel, the law of love, meekness, mercy, for insulting Christ the Savior Himself in the person of the poor, His members, for saddening the Holy Spirit of the Comforter, for addiction to the world, the flesh, and money; I resorted to the Lord’s plagues, raised for me, and received salvation for faith and repentance, and after that solemnly, calmly read and sang the canon of Matins and stichera. I thank the Lord for the new and greatest salvation of me by the grace of Christ from the soul-sucking anger towards my wife for defecating uncleanness in the dining room. Oh, how I was sorely tempted, I became a zealot of the devil’s malice, falling away from the love of Christ, not keeping His words, His commandments about meekness, humility, and patience! By sincere and long repentance, self-condemnation of myself, threefold, sincere denial of Satan and all his works and all his service and his pride and sincere union with Christ, I finally got rid of the hellish flame, cramped conditions and sorrow and the wrath of God, and I felt so peaceful, spacious, cool, calm! I praise the Lord, who has mercy on me beyond words. Because of such a trifle (my wife defecating in the dining room without me) and such a temptation, I was subjected to such embitterment, such fire, such cramped conditions! What kind of networks do we walk among every day? How the devil seeks to devour us like a roaring lion! And all because of addiction to the world, to the flesh! And all because of our pride, lust, impatience, anger! How can I condemn any of those who have fallen and are perishing from the wiles of the devil! We must pray fervently for everyone, that the Lord will deliver them from temptations according to His great mercy! (Alexander Gavrilovich Britnev). Seven and three quarters o'clock in the evening. I thank You, Lord, for You have shown Your mercy to me, Your servant, at this hour and at this minute, from cramped conditions and sorrow through the prayer of my repentance, and I was upset with my wife for her arbitrariness regarding the table. I don’t need to feel sorry for anything and find fault with my wife in her housework. Twelve o'clock at night. I thank the Lord for the great salvation of me in the apartment of the fisherman Berzin before the unction of his wife Alexandra Nikiforovna from the cramped conditions and sorrow that befell me for not giving one beggar the required mercy (I gave little, like others). I brought deep repentance to the Lord for my hardness of heart, and the Lord had mercy on me. Another time the Lord delivered after leaving Grechukhin, where he looked at the girls with passion; I sincerely condemned myself for the unclean movement of my heart, and the Lord had mercy on me. To love the Lord with all your heart means, by the way, not to give any place to sin in your heart and to surrender everything to God, His truth and holiness. To love God with all your heart means to resist every sin with all your heart, with all your strength, with all your mind, and to hate every sin with all your heart, with all the strength of your soul; if he is attracted by sweetness, despise sweetness, considering it to be sweetened devilish poison; if it entails grief, endure bitterness, misfortune, misfortune; if despondency, cowardice, fear and fear - despise despondency, cowardice, fear and fear; if envy, pride - resort to humility, firmly, sincerely wish the best for everyone; if laziness, coldness, relaxation - try to have ardent zeal, cheerfulness (etc.); if you blaspheme God and the saints, diligently glorify the Lord and His saints, in whom He Himself created an abode for Himself (Lutherans, calling themselves evangelists, have forgotten this truth and do not honor the saints of God); If you grumble against God and people, endure the troubles that happen, failures, hardships, illnesses, sorrows, do everything opposite to the enemy and sin and do good, the opposite of evil. If the love of money, hardness of heart, stinginess or luxury, extravagance, gambling - try to give alms diligently, willingly, adhere to moderation in everything; if you are selfish, disobedient, stubborn, willful, learn obedience for God’s sake; If you are suspicious, suspicious, or judgmental of other people, try to think good things about people, but carefully judge yourself, for you know yourself well, but you don’t know others: who among people knows what is in a person except the human spirit that lives in him [1 Cor. 2:11]! Pray for all the living and the dead as for yourself. The Church teaches you prayer [...], common prayer - learn from it. I sinned before the Lord and my neighbors by being angry with the poor and with those who do what is contrary to me. I am damned: because of the air in the room I quarreled with my wife and lost the spirit of grace, I saddened the Spirit of the Comforter. What is more valuable: room air or the soul and the Holy Spirit, who revives everyone? What is more disastrous to lose: clean air or the grace of the Holy Spirit, peace, truth, space, joy in the Holy Spirit? I thank my many-merciful and all-generous Lord Jesus Christ for the greatest salvation from my greatest misfortune and hardship and from the fire of hell, which befell me righteously for anger and irritability towards my wife, for her habit of opening the door to my bedroom and letting in unclean air from other rooms. All-merciful deliverance from my Master and Lord followed through my all-zealous prayer of repentance in the apartment of Arkady Ivanovich Shlyapnikov before the all-night vigil at home; The Lord truly brought my soul out of hell, out of hell into coolness and peace and the dew of His grace. I served with boldness, without stumbling. During the all-night vigil in the Assumption Church, the ethereal villain-tempter repeatedly embarrassed, weakened and oppressed me with his slander and temptations during the censing of the polyeleos, when he saw the elder maiden Brown, and while reading the Gospel - reading it, I completely relaxed my soul at the end of the reading, either from the blasphemy that had taken place, or from the face of Deacon Poletaev, addressed to me, and extremely ghastly and restless finished reading it; after this, sorrow and distress, from which the Lord delivered me for my repentance and for reading the canon to the Archangels; then, when reading the prayer to Christ, the Light, the true enemy again usually caught him, confused, darkened, weakened him at the end of the prayer, and I didn’t say it out of loss of myself; from this death, from this fire, the Lord again delivered me through my prayer and gave me grace and strength to calmly perform a prayer service to the Mother of God and [the Archangels]. Then, during the service of the all-night vigil in the apartment of Nikolai M. Imenov, the enemy repeatedly embarrassed and killed me, especially at dismissal and during the reading of the Our Father before the appetizer and during the blessing of the meal, and for faith and repentance the Lord delivered me from his wiles and barking 78 and gnawing. Oh hellish dog! My Lord will completely defeat you and deliver you completely! I absolutely hope for this. Amen. Away with all partiality for face, all partiality, all earthly, unclean, carnal, selfish predilection, all discrimination between the faces of the strong, the rich, the noble, the learned and the simple, for before God and the Shepherd all are equal in Christ of God. The Lord daily cleanses, forgives, covers your sins with His ineffable mercy and saves you from corrupting consequences, renewing you many times every day. And forgive your neighbors for their sins and mistakes against you, cover them with your love, your condescension, your patience. Do not be upset with your neighbors for their mistakes, shortcomings, even for their malice, deceit, envy, but pray for them, may the Lord correct them and may they not perish in their sins. There is an abyss of sins in all of us, and therefore it is necessary to mutually tolerate each other. If you forgive people their sins, then your Heavenly Father will also forgive you, and if you do not forgive people their sins, then your Father will not forgive you your sins [Matthew 6:14–15]. Love your neighbor as yourself. In everything you want people to do to you, do so to them [Matthew 7:12]. If you want people to be simple, kind, forgiving, fair, merciful, sincere, patient towards you - be like that yourself towards people. If you want people to wish you well, be kind to everyone. Eleven o'clock in the evening. I thank the Lord, who has made me worthy by His grace to perform the late Divine Liturgy in the Assumption Church without stumbling and to partake without condemnation of the Divine Mysteries for peace, revival and renewal. I thank the Lord, who delivered me repeatedly during and after Vespers in church and especially in the Kudryavtsevsky wing (at the sailor's clerk opposite the Literary Factory) after a prayer of repentance for my carnal thoughts and feelings regarding the [unreasonable] Theoktista (I repented all the way), and finally delivered me in the apartment of the one whose baby I baptized; Finally, the Lord miraculously delivered me from the great distress that befell me for my anger at my wife and at the beggar when I came home. Once and for all, away from me is malice in all its forms; once and for all, away from me is carnal uncleanness and carnal sweets, which corrupt the soul and body and remove me from my God, the incorruptible, eternal sweetness. Away with all worldly vanity, all sin, which through guile, cunning and violence separates me from God. In the church, especially in the church, the souls of believers and those seeking God are united with their Prototype, First Principle and Creator, especially during the liturgy and communion of the Holy Mysteries, their kind, reverent conversation 79 with Him, their thanksgiving and glorification, their betrothal to God. The church is the earthly heaven with the throne of God, the Mother of God is always here, all the Heavenly Powers are here, all the holy saints of God are here - these perfect people. I thank the Lord for mercifully delivering me from the devil’s malice, which happened during Matins from indignation at Nikitin’s sexton Adrian for his negligence in singing and reading and for his constant coughing. For a long time I fought with the enemy, suffering from his hellish fire, but the Lord accepted my repentance and had mercy, turning the fire into dew, into the dew of His grace. Glory to You, Lover of Humanity! I thank my Lord Jesus Christ for His quick and greatest help during the wedding of telegraph operator Nikolai and Evdokia in the Church of the Correctional Company. I was embarrassed by the opposition of the sexton of Kamenograd, who, however, fulfilled my desire to bring a deacon, but, having prayed and fallen to the throne of grace, I received forgiveness, cleansing and peace and crowned the whole wedding with great boldness, with complete sincerity and truth of the heart, and although the enemy intensified to sting and weaken my heart, but by the grace of Christ God I was able to over the machinations of the enemy. God bless! At the end of the wedding, on my way home, I was subjected to great embarrassment and wounded by the enemy through the beggars who pursued me, for in my soul I was indignant at them; but, having come home and sincerely repented, I received great mercy and forgiveness in peace from the Lord. I thank the Lord, who is long-suffering to me, the self-loving, gluttonous, money-loving, stingy, hard-hearted, evil, prodigal, partial person. Do not humiliate a person in your thoughts or in your words and actions, no matter who he is, for everyone is in the image of God, everyone has been redeemed by Christ, with His most pure blood, but respect everyone, elevate them in your thoughts, in your opinion, so that God will exalt you, and people will exalt you and honor you, for with what measure you measure, it will be measured to you [ Matthew 7:2]. Be condescending to people’s mistakes and weaknesses without pandering, cover them with love, generosity, and patience. After early mass. I thank the Lord, who comforted me with His deliverance from sorrow and distress during Matins and who gave me peace and boldness during the reading and singing of the canon and stichera in praise and verse. I thank the Lord, who honored me with the celebration of the liturgy in the Duma Church and the communion of the life-giving Mysteries. I thank the Lord, who delivered me from anger and irritation and its harmful consequences that befell me upon arriving home, where I found the air in my room unclean. I prayed, repented earnestly, falling before the Lord many times, and received forgiveness in peace, deliverance from internal corruption, [sickness], fire and death. Four o'clock in the evening. I saw, I saw, Lord, Your mercy and Your life-giving power in me, a sinner, during a lesson in the third grade of the gymnasium (after the remark of the unreasonable director Janisch about not reading the lives of the saints to children), when the enemy brought oppressive despondency and melancholy with indignation to my heart - in Your name I killed the death of the heart, and peace reigned in my soul with spaciousness and boldness. For someone who loves his neighbor, someone else’s grief is his own grief, someone else’s joy is his own joy; he lives one life with him, and for someone who doesn’t love there is no other person’s grief, for him, even if the grass does not grow in the field, even though all the cities burn down, even though their waters drown, he does not sympathize with anyone except his family and friends. My greatest, most precious possession is God, as He is for everyone who sincerely believes and is devoted to Him; Having Him, I do not envy the rich and the rulers of the earth themselves, kings or those of my brethren who, with little labor, receive the same as me, neglecting either praise and thanksgiving to God, or alms, or their repentance, or the property of God. Wealth for them is a bond, a burden, a darkness, like for Judas. They will not stay long and will give place to another. Resurrection. I thank the Lord, who kept me incorruptible last night when I was lying on my left side; The Lord fulfilled my prayer. Director Janisch, for whose resignation I prayed last night because of gambling and the debasement of the lives of saints, appeared to me in a dream at night extremely kindly and won me over in his favor. What does this mean?.. Was I hasty in drawing a false conclusion about him?.. Yesterday’s tightness, as he noticed, apparently was from the devil. May the Lord continue to be patient with us. Evening. I thank the Lord, who showed me great help and mercy during the service of the vigil and early liturgy in the cathedral, when he delivered me many times from the snares of the enemy after the prayer to Christ, the true Light, and especially during mass after the great entrance, even more after the communion of the Holy Mysteries, which revived me, and after the communion of children, some of whom I despised and did not love in my heart for their untidiness and disgrace, for which he sincerely repented in his heart before the Lord and received mercy and deliverance from demonic possession, oppression and torment. I was very irritable during the water prayer service for Sofia Vasilievna Subbotina, which the sexton Kamenogradsky did not want to serve at her request. I thank the Lord, who has now delivered me from the greatest spiritual trouble and sorrow and cramped conditions that befell me during my baptism in the house of Nikolai Michigin, at the home of a craftsman; I remembered the rich circle of Father Superior Paul ([67] rub.) and his stinginess, hard-heartedness and unmercifulness towards the poor and in general his lack of communication with his brethren and neighbors, and I envied him (there is something to envy! - the dust and stench of the demon, the share of Judas!), although my share is not small and in general is always satisfied, in abundance, with all the benefits to poor relatives! For a long time I carried in my soul this misfortune, this tightness, this scorching fire, this death, although I constantly repented; came to the cathedral, repeatedly fell to the throne of mercy and grace, and when he completely condemned himself and repented, asking for sincere forgiveness from the Master and Lord, then he received perfect peace, space, great and rich mercy. Is it because my eye is evil that the Lord is good [Matthew 20:15] and wants to give our superior much more than me? Let me learn the lesson: be content with your lot and not look enviously at your neighbor’s larger lot! The Lord knows what he is doing. But I myself am money-loving, stingy, hard-hearted, voluptuous, greedy, and I must strive in every possible way for my correction at every hour. And not about my brother, who is older than me. I see the bitch that is in my brother’s eye, but I don’t smell the log that is in my eye? Or what do I say to my brother, leave him alone, so that I may remove the mote from your mind and this forest from my eye? May I first remove the logs from my hair (truly the logs), and then I will see that the mote is removed from my brother’s hair [Matthew 7:3–5]. In deep repentance, I thank the Lord for quickly hearing and delivering me from the sorrow, cramped conditions, confusion and inner fire that befell me for not giving alms to the poor before Matins under the pretext that they did not want to work, as the janitor at Ksenia Lvovna Nikitina’s house said, raking the snow from the panel. I took his words into account, became upset at the poor and did not give to anyone, and this day is the day of John the Merciful, Patriarch of Alexandria; I sinned against the memory of Saint John, I insulted her with my hardness of heart. Six o'clock in the evening. I sinned very seriously just now (half an hour ago), beating one beggar in the face and tearing him off by the hair and scolding others for following me relentlessly when I walked with the Holy Mysteries to the sick woman. My sin is all the more great because I carried the Holy Mysteries with me in the Persians. Oh, impudence on my part! Oh, ingratitude! Oh, inattention! Oh, my sinful passion! Before the face of the Lamb of God, who takes away the sins of the world and mine, I appeared as a tormenting wolf! Before the Lady Theotokos and before the hosts of Angels, I committed such insolence, for which, as a priest, I should be defrocked, like one who beats a faithful one! We have sinned, we have sinned gravely, Lord! My only hope in my sins is Your invincible love for mankind, Your mercy for those who repent, for there is no sin that overcomes Your love for mankind. And I repent with all my heart: forgive me my great crime: my hardness of heart, my beating, my rage, my love of money, my lust, my malice, my envy, my greed, my satiety. I notice that when I eat meat, I become more lascivious, fiercer, angrier! I don’t eat meat at all! Today I avoided the beggars in different directions, changing direction, and finally I met them at Korshunov’s house: they found me. I shouldn’t have shied away from them, but walked straight towards them, then I wouldn’t have been so angry with them. And walking because they have nothing to do and because they are cold and hungry is healthier than standing in one place. The Lord sent me their share: I received two rubles for the demand. This is how the Lord always sends: He pays off the debt purely for His poor, but I am unfaithful, cowardly, passionate. The sting of earthly addictions stings me and forces me, flogs me into daring actions. Morning, four hours and forty minutes. For the glory of God. The Lord performed on me last night the greatest, divine miracle of His mercy, forgiving me for my small repentance, my great, grave sin - anger at the poor and beating them with my hand. When I came to the sick [Z...] Vera Gavrilovna and prepared the Holy Gifts in the holy chalice, I knelt down and shouted several times from the depths of my soul: Lamb of God, take away the sins of all, take away the heavy sinful burden from Me, and as it is gracious, the rain forgives my sins 81 - and the same with the final words: the rain is tears of tenderness, and - oh, miracle! The Lamb of God, who takes away the sins of all, took upon myself my present sins and delivered me from the scorching fire, cramped conditions, shame, mental and physical relaxation, and I read prayers for the sick woman and talked with her calmly. Glory to my Lord! Glory to His mercy and patience! But what will I tell myself as a moral lesson? Will I continue to treat beggars this way? God forbid! I must go towards perfection, I must willingly give to those who demand, no matter how many there are, and not only other people’s property, but also my own, for the Lord is an inexhaustible source of mercy and generosity. May the rich become scarce - the Lord will wonderfully replenish! Today is our wedding day: twenty-four years have passed of God’s mercies to us since the day of our marriage. We thank the Lord. Do not continue to deprive us, unworthy ones, of Thy mercy, not because of our deeds, but according to Thy mercy, remember us, for the sake of Thy goodness, O Lord [Ps. 24:7]! Be patient with our sin and grant time for repentance and correction of life. Send a letter with money to Vasily Ivanovich and Daria Ilyinichna X rub [as in the manuscript. – Ed. ] . A prayer service of gratitude to the Lord God and the Most Pure Mother of God for their mercies to us. After Matins. Our poor Kronstadt townspeople are pitiful, extremely pitiful: they have no housing, no food, no clothes, they cannot go to church because of their clothes and cannot, together with other parishioners, offer prayers in church, praise and thanksgiving to the Lord, neither go to confession nor partake of the Holy Mysteries every year, and for many years do not approach the source of life and immortality. They are rejected, forgotten, despised by everyone. Who will take pity, warm, nourish, take care of their salvation, enlightenment, intercession, if not the Church, who, if not the shepherds of the flock of Christ? After all, they are sheep of the same flock. It is a sin for us if we do not take care of them or if we continue to revile them and reject them, and, perhaps, even beat them if they persistently ask us for alms. Yesterday my rage against the beggars and the beating of one of them brought strong corruption, a destructive fire, into my soul and body. I have done more harm to myself than to the beggar; deservedly and righteously punished himself. I thank the Lord, who through my prayer delivered me from the stifling and nasty lust that crept into my heart in the apartment outside the city at the candle maker Ivan Stepanov’s while looking at his good-natured daughter-in-law Ekaterina. We need to pray for her and her drunken husband. Grant them, Lord, according to their faith. But let me honor the image of God in men, and let me not make any person an object of lust, let me not humiliate and defile myself, let me not degrade the image of God and let me not dishonor the Creator. What kind of Joseph will open his granaries for his hungry brethren and deliver them from death by starvation [Gen.41:56]?.. But for many, many of us, the past years have been years of great abundance, not to say wheat and various fruits of the earth, but an abundance of money, and many of us, as in the Gospel granaries [Luke 12:18], have a lot of these treasures lying without any movement or use that could have been done without of particular harm to themselves, those who own them turn them into bread for hungry brothers. Open these granaries - and first open your heart's ears to the word about alms. Listen not to my word, but to the Lord’s: do you hear what He says about the man who had a rich harvest in the field, and what fate awaits those who gather for themselves, and not those who grow rich in God? It is enough for you to save money and build larger granaries instead of smaller ones: these are your granaries - the hands of the poor. Doesn’t the fate of banks founded by private individuals and the fate of money lent to interest make you understand? How unreliable are these banks, these granaries of the rich and the poor!.. Now is the time of high prices for everything, a difficult time even for wealthy people (I’m not talking about the rich, for whom high prices are not sensitive). How difficult the present time is for poor people! The rich should know and feel this and sympathize with the poor. This is required by our Christian faith, this is required by our mind, our heart, our conscience, the duty of community and mutual assistance. Do not judge these hungry and half-naked too harshly, have a sense of leniency and compassion... ([Attack] the hard-heartedness of the rich and their granary.) If they, in your opinion, are not worthy of bread and clothing, then are you worthy? And if they are not worthy, correct them, give them something to do... But who listens to me? There is no one here who could arrange something better for these poor Kronstadt beggars. Oh, the times! Oh, morals! Repentance was shown to the prophet Isaiah when in a vision he saw the Lord on a high and exalted throne and Cherubim around Him. He said: I am a damned man! I would like to glorify God, but my lips are unclean. One of the Seraphim, taking a burning coal from the heavenly altar with tongs, flew down to him, touched his lips and said: behold, this touches your lips, and your iniquity is taken away, and your sin is cleansed [Isa. 6: 1–7]. We are all subject to the strong temptation of various passions: pride, impatience, anger, rage, irritability, vindictiveness, suspicion, greed, envy, gluttony, drunkenness, fornication, greed, ambition, pride, vanity, laziness, negligence, willfulness, stubbornness, contradiction, despondency, melancholy, sadness - because We must be forgiving to each other, not get irritated and not irritate anyone. Why beat someone who has been beaten and beaten? I mean that the one who has sinned has already been beaten from his sin or from the devil and has punished himself, although, however, there are sinners who do not feel their sins and remain unpunished from their conscience. Pray for all those near and far sincerely, for in heartfelt prayer we can come into spiritual contact with everyone with our love, although we do not see others all our lives; prayer unites everyone, warms, sanctifies, strengthens. Pray for each other to be healed, says the Apostle [James 5:16]. For example, you cannot see or talk to a sovereign, but by sincere prayer for him you can bring him closer to you, to your heart, as if he were with you and talking with you. He will be in your heart, and you can warm his heart with your love and assist him in his deeds. Think about everyone this way. Prayer can do a lot: it inclines the Lord to us for mercy, it brings down from heaven the Mother of God (the appearance of the Mother of God to St. Sergius), holy Angels and holy saints of God. In God we all have close contact, a living connection, even if we were separated by vast space and time or power, dignity, title, condition. Reading and singing in the church destroys the machinations of the enemy. Morning. Four and a half hours. I thank the Lord, who delivered me from mortal oppression and heartfelt despondency and powerlessness after the great entrance to the liturgy, which was served at the cathedral, and who rejoiced me after communion of the Holy Mysteries of His Body and Blood with joy about salvation, mercy, heavenly life, peace, space, joy, boldness. I rose from the dead after receiving communion. Oh, what mercy of God! Oh, what supernatural grace is given to us sinners in the Holy Eucharist! Glory to Thee, Lord! But I lost this wonderful, life-giving grace upon my arrival home due to my passionate habit because of an empty chance: I saw the doors opened by my wife to my bedroom and the study with the prayer room; I got angry with my wife and shouted at her, starting to grumble at her and scold her, why is unclean air blowing into my room, as if the spiritual, internal air, or the breath of the Holy Spirit, which I was honored with through communion of the Holy Mysteries, is not infinitely more valuable. As a result of this, I immediately lost peace, spiritual life, freedom, space, boldness, love, light, strength of spirit - and again oppression, sorrow, scorching fire, shame, death of the spirit. I ran again with repentance to the Lord, whose mercy is immeasurable and whose love for mankind is endless; I hoped that His love for mankind was invincible by our sins, for there is no sin that overcomes God’s love for mankind [cf. Matthew 18:22 ], and by long and sincere falling into His mercy received mercy. The old grace returned to me again. I went to the birthday boy Stepanov, an eminent merchant. There I sinned - I drank too much. Be like salt for the brethren in cases of outbreak of their passions, taking away their rottenness with constant meekness, a wise word or fatherly punishment. Those who, feeling their deep spiritual poverty, poverty, guilt in countless sins and in deep inner repentance often cry out with the Church: Lord, have mercy, will ask for eternal mercy after death and here on earth, the mercy of God and everything necessary for temporary and eternal life, for all the blessings of this life are the only mercy of God towards us unworthy, and not our merit, such as: food, drink, clothing, housing, property, positions, titles, ranks, distinctions, honor, good parents, king, rulers, mentors, shepherds and teachers in faith and piety and guides to eternal life and immortality. Likewise, those whose souls, in humility and repentance, continually ask the Lord and the Church for spiritual gifts in the litany of petition: grant, Lord, they will receive what they ask without fail and holiness in all their lives, and a peaceful Angel, a faithful mentor, and forgiveness of sins, and everything good and useful for the soul, and a peaceful, repentant life for the rest of their life, and, as the crown of all spiritual blessings, a Christian life, a painless, shameless, peaceful death, they will be worthy of giving a good answer at the Last Judgment of Christ. To develop in the science of worship Christian ideas about God, the all-good, all-righteous, about God as the Creator, as the Father, Judge, Provider, Giver of all good things for soul and body, as the Source of holiness and truth, as the Savior from sins; develop ideas about the eternity of God and the eternal blessings prepared for those who love God, about the eternity of the human soul, ideas about the image of God in man, about the fall of man and his restoration; about the Church of God on earth as an ark of salvation from the flood of sin, as an inn on the way to the heavenly fatherland, in which Christian travelers receive spiritual food and drink, and guides to eternal life, and spiritual doctors, and mentors; the idea of ​​the Head of the Church, the articulation of the church, its tripartite composition: heavenly, earthly and underworld; about mutual assistance and mutual care, about the breadth and space of Christian love that embraces all people, the whole world (prayers and litanies); about the purpose of the Church to save everyone, to attract to itself everyone who wants salvation and does not want it (due to the delusion of the heart), about the power of the Church and her prayers: she is omnipotent because of her omnipotent Head; about the power and saving effect of the Sacraments, about the divine establishment of the degrees of hierarchy: episcopal, priestly and deaconal; about the greatness of the spiritual gifts sent down through these sanctified faces to believers, or about their greatest benefit, salvific value, necessity for a sinful world, about the greatness and benefit of their work, about the duty of great, sincere love and respect for them (to honor them primarily with love for their work [1 Thess. 5:13]; everyone should understand us as servants of Christ and stewards of the mysteries of God [ 1 Cor.4:1 ]); about the need to attend divine services, about the salvific nature of the divine service itself, about its wise structure over the centuries, about its inspiration by God, about its universal suitability for all times and for all people; the Church contains all the immeasurable abundance of the gifts of God’s grace, God’s love and mercy, God’s wisdom and power; in it there is enlightenment for souls - the very Sun of truth, Christ God, who constantly speaks in the Gospel and in the entire structure of worship; here is all healing for souls sick with sin and corruption, here is the merciful, healing, cleansing, sanctifying, reconciling with God and with oneself and strengthening the grace of God in the various Sacraments; here is grace, sanctifying the marital union and the natural birth and upbringing of children; here is the grace of sonship to God (in baptism), and the betrothal of the Holy Spirit - and everything, everything necessary, all the divine powers for life and godliness [2 Pet. 1:3]. (Look at yourself, priest, as an organ of the Holy Church, omnipotent in Christ, and in this faith, in this conviction, draw all your strength to help your spiritual children and save them.) I thank You, Lord, for the abyss of Your generosity, which You surprised me with this morning during Matins, delivering me from the oppression and great sorrow that befell me for hard-heartedness towards the poor and evasion of giving alms to two of them (he had previously given to nine people), also for the offense against the woman Paraskeva, who left the rule of confession in church, and after Matins for the same hard-heartedness towards the poor, who approached the poor by deception in the second once for alms (for some); because of the few who received it, I refused with indignation to all the others. Oh, how serious was the death of sin, separating the soul from God through the violation of His commandments, especially the commandments of love, meekness and kindness, mercy, simplicity, abstinence, purity, obedience! The punishment for hardness of heart, for malice of the heart, anger, irritability, envy, stinginess, greed, love of money, love of glory is severe: the fire of hell burns and scorches in the bones of the hard-hearted, the evil, the stingy. Oh, let me not become like the evil one (the devil), but the good one (God) through all goodness [3 John 1:11]. God! Have mercy on me, for I have greatly angered Your immeasurable kindness towards me and towards all people, having blasphemed Your generosity by deed. I thank the Lord, who delivered me from oppression and death of sin before serving the Liturgy at the cemetery in the church; I thank you for the tears of tenderness and unfaltering service, for the life-giving, wonderful communion of the Holy Mysteries, then for deliverance from internal embitterment towards the women who were close to me in spirit and received the Holy Mysteries: Paraskeva Kovrigina and Anna Obedkova. I thank the Lord for his help during the service of the prayer service in the apartment of Mr. Boyle in the Walriedt house and for his boldness, for the all-night vigil in the cathedral, which I served with tenderness, for the unfailing service of the all-night vigil; while saying the prayer to Christ, the True Light, at the end of it, he became confused by the wiles of the evil one, which caused confusion and wounding of the spirit. But through the prayer of repentance and falling at the throne of grace, he was healed and calmed down. I thank the Lord for the tender prayer for the people when they approached the kissing of the Gospel and after reading it, may the Lord fulfill all my prayer in all its fullness and power. Amen. A censer with coals and incense is a powerful weapon in my hands; this is a sign of the grace, strength, and power given to me by God to pray for people all over the world, especially members of the Holy, Catholic and Apostolic Church; this is a sign of the fiery, fragrant grace of the Holy Spirit, breathing on all believers and those who are ready in heart with the fire and fragrance of His holiness and all grace-filled gifts. The censer also serves as an image of the Mother of God, who carried the Coal of the Divinity in Her womb. I thank the Lord for deliverance from the devil’s pressure and heartache, which happened to me in the gymnasium in the fifth grade (and partly in the third) due to the unpreparedness of the students... Through the prayer of inner faith and repentance, the Lord destroyed the machinations of the devil in me: I calmed down. Resurrection. I thank the Lord for the new and great deliverance of my unworthiness from the cramped conditions, sorrow and spiritual death that befell me for being upset with a British soldier (a former gardener in Catherine Boulevard) for an untimely demand on a sick woman (I read the rule for the service) and with a woman who asked to serve a prayer service in the house where the sick woman was. For my repentance and faith, I have been rewarded with mercy and the sweet peace of God. Evening. I thank the Lord, who showed great mercy to me, unworthy, in delivering me from cramped conditions before mass, then after the great entrance; I especially thank the Lord for granting me life-giving, with boldness, communion of the Holy Mysteries and for the teaching that I compiled and spoke with great power. I thank the Lord for His boundless mercy, which was shown to me during Vespers, when I had just had a big disagreement with my wife because I let a servant, Evdokia’s servant, leave the house for twenty minutes. Truly, the Lord performed a glorious and marvelous miracle on me, snatching me for repentance and faith from the mouth of the murderous serpent, who swallowed me up due to my foolishness, impatience, and obstinacy towards my wife. I was extremely embarrassed and cramped. Truly the Lord delivered my soul from the lowest hell and from bitter spiritual death. Let me remember this and let myself beware of sin for the future, and let me not have any enmity against my wife, for it was not she, but the devil who caused her to rebel against me angrily and not want to submit to me as I should. For the sake of piety, the enemy fights against me and against the pious servant. I thank the Lord for the wonderful, supernatural help I received during Vespers, when the Lord dissolved in me the countless webs of sins and the machinations of the disembodied enemy and gave me peace and freedom. I thank the Lord for deliverance from the wiles of the demons and for His help during the service of Matins, which I performed warmly. I thank the Lord, who performed the miracle of reconciling my wife with me and me with her, despite the extreme efforts of the enemy, the devil, to prevent us from reaching the world. I thank the Lord, who has made me worthy to perform the Liturgy without stumbling and to partake of the life-giving Holy Mysteries. Great is His mercy towards me. Do I crucify my flesh, my gluttony and carnal pleasure, because of which I daily sin many times against God and my neighbors, secretly and openly, willingly and unwillingly? Oh, damned me. I make friends with the flesh, I indulge, I please it and, therefore, I always anger the Lord, for no good thing lives in me, that is, in my flesh [Rom. 7:18], as the Apostle says and as daily experience confirms. And this wickedness of the flesh, its enmity against God and His law, against love for Him and my neighbor, is reflected in me especially when I am called to serve my neighbors in their mortal danger: then it turns out that there is no true, deep, pure and holy love for my neighbor in me, but there is selfish, crafty love, or only the ghost of love - crafty, carnal love more for oneself than for one’s neighbor, thinking about self-interest and thirst for self-interest! Oh, what madness it is to desire self-interest in view of the death of your neighbor, which should clearly demonstrate the vanity and insignificance of all earthly goods as temporary and charming, leading to sin and alienation from God. I thank the Lord for the destruction in me of all the machinations of the enemy throughout the day - during matins, during mass (crowdedness and pressure in the heart), and for the miraculously life-giving communion of the Holy Mysteries. I thank the Lord for destroying the machinations of the ethereal enemy during the all-night vigil, especially during the reading of the Gospel and at the end of the all-night vigil. Thank you for your bold, unswerving, good-will service of prayer in the new premises of the commercial club, at its steward’s office, in the presence of educated people. I thank the Lord for his gracious service in N. Sidorov’s two stores. But forgive me, Lord, the sin of demonic fear when turning to the West and saying absolution, fear, because of which I was crazy, hastily said absolution and did not pronounce the name of the great Saint Nicholas. Grant me, Lord, the grace to be completely daring during every divine service and during every turning to the west in prayer at the great entrance to the liturgy, when reading prayers, dismissals, and other things. I earnestly pray to You, Lord, and deliver me from real demonic possession, Lord! Nikolai Sidorov slyly rewards us for our diligent prayer for him, being generous to Oboe beyond measure: for two prayer services he gave two rubles - sparingly with an annual income of forty thousand. Thanks to him: now he sent me three rubles worth of fruit. Ethereal enemies are extremely constant and persistent in their malice and intrigues towards a person; against their constancy and tenacity, and man must be constant and persistent in resisting them even to the end. With this persistence in resisting them, we, with God’s help, will defeat them to the end, for they, evil demons, are very weak against the truth and against the power of God. All the righteous knew this from experience. And I experienced this, although I am a sinful person. You should never be faint-hearted or lose heart when faced with temptation, but always trust in the mercy of God. Yesterday during the liturgy after the great entrance, at which I did not clearly pronounce the names of the royal family due to demonic confusion, cooling of the heart, powerlessness, mortification, the enemy throughout the mass extremely pressed and embarrassed me for my cowardice (I must stubbornly resist him at such exits), and only at the end of the mass, when I consumed the Holy Mysteries with reverence, I defeated him, the accursed one, with Blood Christ, and I felt light and calm. At Vespers, he also embarrassed me, and because of my haste at dinner at a new commercial club, I did not say the great and petitionary litany, but the intense litany, strengthened by faith and trust in God, pronounced it all loudly, and the dismissals in the same way, and the last litany at Compline. Lieutenant-Commander Nikolai Rykachev falsely reported me to the governor that I allegedly outraged the people with my sermons. But let the governor call me and force me to read my sermons, then he will see whether Rykachev, the editor of Vestnik, told the truth. For false denunciation, he should be arrested or the case transferred to the magistrate's court. Let him ask those who heard my sermon: they know what I said. If you believe Rykachev, there is no need to speak the truth from the church pulpit at all. But this will not happen. The Lord is strong to protect me. Tell the governor how dozens of hungry people wait for me every morning at six o’clock, at seven and eight, at twelve, at three o’clock, at six o’clock, at eight, nine and ten o’clock in the evening. I hurt the pride of some people in the word, but pride must be sacrificed to the truth of God, the Gospel, and not be angry for the word of truth. I thank the Lord, who yesterday, after communion of the Holy Mysteries, especially after the perfect use of them, destroyed the long and evil, painful, shy violence of the devil, which was the result of my intemperance and voluptuousness the day before (at dinner at the new club). Oh, how great and ineffable, invincible is the mercy of my Lord towards me! How inexpressible, saving, life-giving the power of His Mysteries! At the prayer service for the salvation of the sovereign, the enemy set me on fire with anger and contempt for one person, but I did not succumb to his malice by the grace of God and escaped the cramped conditions and scorching fire. You, Mr. Governor, reward good, efficient, serviceable officials and officers, generals, and do not stop their jealousy for service. It would be ridiculous. So it would be unreasonable to stop me in my zeal for serving my God; do not reward me - God is my reward, but do not persecute me for the truth of God that I preach. We must praise Father Pavel Trachevsky, the rector, for the fact that he is not embarrassed and does not lose heart in solemn meetings and prayers, but calmly and indifferently treats the gathering of all the nobility and tinsel splendor, although one cannot approve of his indifferent, heartless attitude to prayer, I won’t say careless, perhaps to some extent. But I have an extreme – a fear of demons in such solemn crowded meetings and the suppression of speech and language. God forbid! In the next week, the 27th Gospel about the crumpled woman, about her healing by the Savior [Luke 13:10–17]. Theme: every sin writhes the soul, distorts, disfigures, weakens; Thus, malice, envy, greed, stinginess, prodigal uncleanness, drunkenness, gluttony, despondency, idleness, laziness, often infect the body itself with diseases and lead to premature decrepitude, old age and finally to the grave. The Lord alone heals the cramps of all sin. And how many babies the enemy, by God’s permission, subjects to painful writhing from fear and other disastrous accidents! To develop the idea that every sin disfigures, distorts and weakens a person’s soul, bends it to the earth through various passions, so that a person cannot recline and look at heaven, where his true, eternal, incorruptible, unshakable fatherland is - the Lord alone heals the soul from this terrible sinful illness and man’s complete drooping to the earth and regardless of heaven, grief, to God, from this painful addiction to earthly things, soon goods that disappear and seduce the senses, from this anger, pride, arrogance, vanity with empty rattles and sparkles, from this immersion in sensuality. Modern man, with all his senses, is mired in sensuality - five pairs of oxen 82, from this, many, many are seized with unbelief, free-thinking, [if they repent] unbelievers before the Divine gaze and the gaze of the saints of God; Almost all people are bound and twisted by countless sins: one is crippled by ambition, another by envy, another by fornication, another by passion for food and drink, and others by all of them. Merciful God! See our common misfortune, our sinking into sin for our sake and disregard for the height of Your Heavenly Kingdom, and come and correct us Yourself, heal us, like a crumpled woman who was kept bound by Satan for eighteen years, and teach us to look at grief, to direct our hearts to grief, thoughts, desires, intentions, all our will, all our lives to strive for You, the God of life. And nasty, crafty, blasphemous thoughts, fearful, fearful, often and very often wreak havoc on our souls. The Lord alone is able to free us from them through repentance. You have been given the lamp of reason of the word of God: cut away these thoughts with the help of grace, and for your struggle you will be rewarded by God. Satan caught us all in his fishing rods, tied us all with his hellish fetters, although many, many do not know that they are connected (so cunningly and slyly, inconspicuously, the enemy holds them on his bait). The Lord alone destroys the fetters of Satan, the fetters of our sins and imparts to souls the directness of justification, deliverance for sincere repentance, consciousness of sins, heartfelt contrition, for the firm intention to correct themselves from them. If you work with your mind, your heart becomes cold for prayer; one must constantly observe the harmony of the mind and heart, especially observe that the heart does not grow cold towards God, towards the Mother of God, towards the holy Heavenly Powers, towards the holy saints, towards neighbors living and dead. I thank the Lord, who visited me today during the service of Matins with His mercy and generosity and quick and glorious deliverance from the all-evil and all-evil demonic wiles, firstly, during the Midnight Office, secondly, during the reading of the Gospel, as before reading it, thirdly, when saying the prayer to Christ, the True Light, which I firmly pronounced in full, and finally, at the end of the dismissal of the first hour, when the disembodied enemy wounded me because I said dismissal while the sexton was singing the doxology Glory to the Father and the Son and the Holy Spirit... Lord, have mercy three times and, therefore, interrupted him and stole the words of dismissal somewhat out of fear of demons. The enemy tormented me for this, and I often fell to the throne in repentance and begged the Lord to have mercy on me, and He had mercy and pacified my soul. During the Midnight Office, I also fell before the throne of God, and soon He who sat on the throne saved me. Against the merchant Ivan Sidorov, he cried out to God at the throne (in the Pokrovsky chapel) about his insolence, curses, and his slander against us, the council members. Judge, O Lord, those who offend us, overcome those who fight [Ps. 34:1]. This is because of the carpet to the royal doors. I thank the Lord, who has given me the grace to perform the entire Divine Liturgy without stumbling (with the great entrance and prayer for the Synod and the Metropolitan) and to receive life-giving communion of the Holy Mysteries. However, the enemy pressed, burned, bit, confused me with movements of hostility, which I stopped with the grace of the Holy Mysteries and drove away from myself. During Vespers, the enemy troubled me greatly with fear and powerlessness of heart and tongue while pronouncing the great and petitionary litanies: at the first I overcame the adversary with grace, and at the second I could not overcome him out of a feeling of fear and heart powerlessness, with which he entangled and killed me because of my intemperance at the birthday party of Alexander Murashev, the merchant (I drank a glass of vodka and a glass of wine and ate well, tasty and satisfying) and because of kissing tobacco smokers. After the special litany, which I said firmly, I also said the petitionary one firmly, for at one time I stopped at the third petition and could not speak further, having been accepted twice and three times. The voice was very strong and sonorous. He confessed those who were fasting very reluctantly (for often); Alex's christening. Moiseevich Fedorov, the officer, performed the prayer service with difficulty. I thank the Lord for His gracious, everlasting, vigilant providence for the poor: yesterday He sent me forty rubles for the poor widows and orphans. As soon as the sacrifice of voluntary alms begins to come to an end, He now makes up for it, adding again generously. Oh, my joy, Lord! Glory to You! Oh, goodness! Oh bounties! Oh, watchful eyes! Evening. I thank the Lord, who made me worthy to perform the late liturgy without stumbling force and to partake of the life-giving Divine Mysteries, although under a strong and grave temptation from the all-evil and all-evil Belial, who fought hostility towards the sexton for the hasty singing (what are you persecuting me, about the sexton?), which did not allow me to read the prayers intelligently on liturgy. There were many birthday girls; The governor's old mother-in-law was there and served the funeral service. Secret hostility, rivalry, jealousy. The collided 83 woman depicts us, downcast in thoughts, feelings, aspirations, enterprises, in our entire lives: we cannot contemplate grief, we need to use a lot of effort and skill to contemplate grief. But the apostles, martyrs, hierarchs, saints and righteous ones looked at grief, imputing everything earthly into their minds 84. We, the priests, who must look upon grief, since we wear a high dignity, have ourselves bowed down, even during the liturgy, like a slutty woman, we cannot without labor, and great labor, grief, have hearts dragging along the earth, nailed by habituation to the earth. The enemy almost tilted everyone towards earthly things and turned them away from heavenly things. Why this absurdity? After all, a person by his divine nature should look at the mountain, and his body should be straight, facing the sky? - From the Fall! But now, when the Lord has redeemed us and raised us to heaven, opening the entrance to it, we must certainly look to the mountain where Christ is, to philosophize on the mountain, where Christ is seated at the right hand of God [ Col. 3:1 ]. Before me is as if the Most Holy Virgin or the mental Bridegroom Himself, the Most Pure Lord Jesus Christ. I thank the Lady Most Holy Theotokos, who quickly, like lightning, delivered me from the devil’s prodigal thorn in the flesh while I was going to light a candle to Her icon in the Assumption Church before Sunday Matins. I thank the Lord, who has given me the grace to read loudly, without stumbling, heartily, with much strength, the Sunday morning Gospel, to say all absolution and a prayer to Christ, the true Light, a small absolution and the usual forgiveness during early mass. I thank the Lord for deliverance from cramped conditions and embarrassment after the great entrance, at which I did not pronounce the entire title of the heiress and her son, and after the prayer for the Holy Synod and the Metropolitan, whose title I did not pronounce. Thank you for the life-giving communion of the Holy Mysteries, for the teaching, for the prayer behind the pulpit, read in its entirety loudly, with boldness, and for the release. In the evening I brought upon myself cramped conditions and sorrow for my obstinate treatment of the poor, for stinginess, love of money, pride, malice, lust and satiety, and I suffered for a long time; finally, at a christening in the house of Westphalen, the Lord had mercy. Eleven and a half o'clock in the afternoon. I thank the Lord with all my soul for mercifully delivering me from the cramped conditions and sorrow that righteously befell me for my obstinate and hard-hearted treatment of the beggars who surrounded me early in the morning (at six o’clock), and for not fully satisfying their requests, especially one of them, who asked for supports, and then at seven o’clock after Matins. The first time the Lord saved me for repentance in church while zealously falling to the throne, the second time after Matins at home when I zealously confessed my sins to the Lord. I sinned by breaking my fast unnecessarily by eating cream and meat soup and thus inflaming carnal passions by giving them abundant food, especially adultery internal to the heart. I sinned by eating many times during the day, albeit little by little. Many are called, but few are chosen [Matthew 22:14]. Contrary to the words of the Savior, others open the entrance to the supper of the Kingdom of Heaven to everyone without exception, claiming that God is merciful and will have mercy on everyone, and thus people populate heaven with unrepentant drunkards, and fornicators, and thieves, and molesters, and murderers, etc., thinking falsely that God will save us even against our will and that He can make a clear sun of both a heretic and a villain, thief and an adulterer, and a hard-hearted money-lover, and an arrogant offender, who sent away with his scrip many families or individuals he had ruined. No: God is not mocked [Gal.6:7], the wicked will not dwell 85 with Him, the wicked will abide below the eyes of God [Ps.5:5-6]. Let the wicked be lifted up 86, it is said, and let him not see the glory of the Lord [Isa.26:10]. Others completely reject both heaven and hell and preach the complete destruction of the individual and man himself (although they themselves see and know from science that in nature, in fact, there is no death and destruction, but in it everything is almost reborn, transforming, passing only from one type of being to another, and, therefore, all the more must man, the best creation on earth, be resurrected), utter daring blasphemy against God, rejecting the truth of God, the infinite truth and His holiness, faithfulness to Himself and faithfulness, immutability of all His verbs. Here on earth, decent people do not allow into their homes people who are more or less dishonest, drunkards, public thieves, swindlers, and villains, but before the face of God, whose darkness is much brighter than the sun, they bring in all sorts of unrepentant sinners and, it seems, completely forget about the holy saints of God, the most devoted friends of God, who endured all sorts of labors out of love for Him and His law, struggles, temptations, countless torments from the wicked who endured the greatest, incredible feats of self-purification and sanctification by the grace of God. They settle together the godless Nero and the apostles Peter and Paul, not to mention other godless tormentors who trampled upon all virtue and all human rights. Man voluntarily became like foolish cattle [Ps. 49:13] and in such a bestial state he died, and now the doors of heaven are opened to him - what consistency is there?.. Behold, everything written in the word of God will be fulfilled and - one iota will not pass away. Here, twice, miraculously, powerfully, quickly, graciously, the Lord delivered me through the prayer of repentance from the grave sorrow, oppression and confusion that befell me righteously for my unrighteous anger towards the sexton Adrian (during Matins) and towards the poor after Matins. O riches of mercy! Oh, the riches of Your bounties, O Lord! Glory to Your goodness! Glory to Thy truth and mercy! Glory to Thy shrine! I thank the Lord for the multitude of blessings shown to me today and yesterday, especially today; firstly, early in the morning the Lord delivered me from the filth of sleepy night dreams through my prayer; secondly, during Matins he saved me from being angry with sexton Adrian for his extremely fluent reading and singing; thirdly, the Lord granted me the ability to perform the early liturgy without stumbling and to partake of the life-giving Holy Mysteries; fourthly, when, while communing the Holy Mysteries with the old maid Paraskeva Kovrigina, I was upset with her for approaching them before the baby and for that an evil demon tormented me, the Lord delivered me through His atoning Blood, that is, through faith in her, when I sincerely repented; fifthly, the Lord delivered me from heart death, sorrow and cramped conditions during the funeral service for Ivan Matveyevich Drozhin, when I sincerely repented, and after that I felt excellent until three o’clock in the evening; at three o’clock in the evening, when I was with Mr. [B...] and insincerely caressed their little child because of the enemy’s action because of the thought that he was not Orthodox, and for that I was tormented in my soul by crampedness and sorrow, the Lord delivered me from sin when I sincerely repented; sixthly, the Lord saved me during Vespers from the oppression and sorrow that were the result of grief over the sexton Adrian. When I fell heartily to the throne, the Lord cut off my sin and gave me peace and freedom. Glory to the Lord! After the all-night vigil. I thank and extol the justice and endless mercy of my Lord Jesus Christ, who delivered me from the cruel torment of the devil [...]. For a long time, in repentance and confession and self-condemnation, I fell to the throne of grace and mercy during the all-night vigil, and three quarters of an hour after my stumbling, the Lord had mercy on me, granting me peace and deliverance from oppression and shame. Oh, may I not look with partiality at any maiden or woman, may I despise the flesh of both myself and others, its beauty and color as fading, may I love souls created in the image of God and redeemed by the blood of God! May I not be an idol myself, attracting the gaze of others to myself with something carnal, may no one’s face be an idol to me, may I love everyone unfeignedly in the Lord! Yes, I am not afraid of the vain fears of demons, dreamy, charming, deceitful, chimerical, but I fear the one Lord in all circumstances of life: in sins or virtues, for we must glorify Him and pray and thank Him with trepidation! I tied my wife and for this reason I can’t come [Luke 14:20]. Of course, there is an addiction to women in general and negligence for the sake of this addiction about saving the soul and pleasing God. An honest marriage and childbearing have nothing to do with it: they are not guilty and do not distract from God. Ten and a half o'clock in the evening. Now the Lord has delivered me from the oppression of the enemy through the invocation and application to my heart of the sweetest all-saving name of the Lord. Why am I embarrassed by the fact that the wife of my fellow priest Peter humiliates and slanderes me in absentia, calling me an ignoramus because I know ordinary women and ordinary people in general, who, in her opinion, are ignoramuses who understand nothing about church reading and singing? These stupid words show that she herself is an ignoramus of great hands and, in addition, an impudent, boring woman. She is deplorable. I know my people, who and what they are. I know how they believe in God, know and love Him, I know their love and humility towards me, their zeal, devotion, their willingness to lay down their lives for the Lord and even for me, I know how very, very many in the city love me, how they glorify me, unworthy of glory, and I am not embarrassed by the daring speeches of the wife of our priest Peter. She herself does not know God and, with her wealth, has forgotten Him. May the Lord understand her sorrow. May the Lord not impute to her slander and blasphemy against me, for I am a sinner, very sinful. It would be pure evidence of your conscience, and do not be afraid of crooked interpretations of your actions and crafty slander and gossip from people - however, do not give a reason for them, if possible and in accordance with justice. The devil has always aroused criticism, slander, and slander against pious people among wicked people. Barking (Church Glav.) – machinations, deceit. Razglagolati (Church Glav.) – talk, talk. Purely (Church Glorious) – doubly so. Troparion of the Great Repentant Canon of St. Andrew of Crete, Canto 1. An allusion to the parable of those invited to the wedding feast - Luke 14:19. Slyachenny (Church Slavic) – crouched, hunched over. Umety (Church Slavic) – droppings, litter. Settle in (Church Glav.) – settle in, join. Take (Church Slavic) – meaning to be taken, taken away, removed.