Февраль 1879 г.

I thank the Lord for His great grace, given to me yesterday during the marriage of officer Slavinsky in the Assumption Church (in the Duma) in the presence of many officers, merchants, women and all kinds of people. The enemy greatly ate up and confused me, instilling dreamy fears, and in some places he overcame me, and in others I, by the grace of God. The wicked one forcibly snatched away my marriage and prayer services from me and did not allow me to speak them out; Deacon Peter was partly the reason, often looking around in all directions and thereby confusing me. After marriage, I felt that the enemy in me was confusing, oppressing, irritating me, but I fell to the throne of grace with repentance, faith and hope that the strength of God’s mercy would break the demonic strength - and so it happened: the enemy was reflected from my heart, and I calmly went to the wedding, to the feast. I thank the Lord. I thank the Lord for the grace given to me today to celebrate the Liturgy in the Assumption Church (about Evdokia) and for reviving me with the life-giving Mysteries. Yesterday's champagne gave me a slight headache. I sinned before God: I drank five glasses of champagne. Dinner at nine o'clock in the evening was rich and luxurious. Do not, Lord, make this a sin for me. On Wednesday he ate skoromnoye at the wedding feast. Gluttony overcame me: at dinner yesterday I ate quite a lot of liver and boiled meat, soup with croutons and pepper, and that is why during the all-night vigil I did not have a clear, powerful voice, but it was rattling, powerless, for example, during magnification, and on leave I could not speak at all due to the intensified influence of the devil on me. After the all-night vigil, to strengthen my nerves and clear my voice, I ate Crimean apples, washing them down with plenty of wine (sherry), but this is a new delicacy. The devil, seeing me not protected through abstinence, attacked me at night: during Matins he appeared in the form of an affectionate woman, elderly, married, and began to lavish me with feminine courtesies, with which I became carried away, but, thank God, I woke up in time. This is what sleepy dreams meat-eating, milk-eating, and wine-drinking lead to! Save me, God, from corruption and desecration. I read prayers against desecration. Meat-eating and over-eating in general causes heaviness and decay of the body and soul. Eat vegetables, avoid meat. I thank the Lord, who delivered me from the demonic stumbling block during the all-night vigil at the litany and blessing of the loaves; as before, he overcame me at the end of prayers and exclamations. This grace was given to me for tenderness with tears, for deep repentance. Candlemas. Today I slept for a long time in the morning, and last night I drank quite a lot of sherry wine and ate apples, some meat broth and milk, all this together had a very bad effect on me: my soul became hardened, it lost the grace of God, it became dead, I was in great cramped conditions all morning and almost the entire mass before communion; the voice was unclean, rattling, the devil attacked me with all his cruelty. Only after communion did I come to life. The trouble is not to abstain in the evening: I greatly anger my Lord, I worship idols, I count my stomach to God [Phil.3:19]. The marriage after mass was celebrated without stumbling, victoriously; another marriage in the cathedral was also celebrated very well; After this, a prayer service was served at Captain Boyle's, anointed and enthusiastic; then, seduced by the beauty of Boyle’s sister, he felt tightness and fire in his soul. My repentance is repeated, God’s great deliverance; The wedding ceremony after is solemn, almost imperturbable. During early mass, I felt very difficult from the machinations of ethereal enemies, who oppressed and confused me with various worldly addictions, especially greed (the prosphyra are small and empty), hostility and dislike, and irritability (for the prosphyra). And when I confessed and condemned myself that because of such trifles as small prosphora with tanned and empty tops, I was violating the main principle of the law of God - love for God and neighbor, and that, by hating my neighbor even for actual errors and vices, I myself became a criminal of the entire law of God - then I suddenly felt at ease, for I realized the absurdity of my feelings. However, then new passions appeared (a nice white silk scarf I bought), and the tightness returned to me again; I was struggling with my addictions again; Only after communion of the Holy Mysteries did I completely overcome the passions of the flesh and calm down completely. I am a damned man: I put earthly things above the Creator and cleave to them and retreat from God and my neighbor in my heart! How terrible it is to cling to the world! Truly, whoever wants to be a friend of the world becomes an enemy of God [James 4:4], for he despises God and his neighbor and loves empty, ephemeral things. I confess before You, Lord, that You have saved me tenfold, or rather, countless times, from my countless falls into sin, embarrassment, wounding, oppression, the shame of sin and spiritual death, and again raised me up, pacified me, healed me, expanded my heart, removed my shame and gave me boldness and glory, an abundance of life (I came that they might have life and have it in abundance [ John 10:10 ]). Thus You renewed and revived me, a sinner without number. I praise You, thank You, exalt You. Behold, the fiftieth year of my life, O Lord, do me good without number in every possible way. Glory to You, endless love, countless bounties! During the Liturgy, the priest must be completely taken with grief and his thoughts must not for a moment grovel on the earth, and his heart must have an attachment to anything earthly, for he accomplishes the mystery of the reconciliation of people with God, the mystery of Christ’s sacrifice for the world, the mystery of the resurrection of Christ in the image of the general resurrection of Christ, the mystery of human incorruptibility and immortality, the mystery of deification. The human soul has an infinite price, for it is in the image of God and for it the blood of the Son of God was shed. But the body is perishable, like the earth. People willingly learn to laugh at other people's vices and shortcomings from fables and comedies, but they do not want to learn self-knowledge, repentance, correction, the commandments of Christ from the Gospel and the Holy Fathers. Corrupted century! Our ancestors were better in this regard. And how they adore secular, often immoral writers! How many idols do we have! On February 4 (Sunday) sleep. As if for some reason I came to the metropolitan, and he received me extremely rudely and contemptuously, while at the same time he treated me simply and even cynically 2 with some close associates (this is from the enemy). I thought a bitter thought: I felt very sad, I cried, he noticed it; I said the reason - he changed, caressed me, kissed me on the chest and took me off of him and put two small crosses on me; I was surprised at such a change in the archpastor and left comforted. In the science of worship, it is necessary to change the applied part: how one should behave during worship, when singing or reading well-known hymns or readings of the Holy Scriptures, and during well-known sacred rites. Otherwise, there is something in the head or in the memory and in the thoughts of those who are coming, but often there is nothing in the heart. Resurrection. I thank the Lord, who has given me the grace, through my prayer, with a burning heart and a fiery tongue, to glorify Him at the all-night vigil and at the liturgy with a clear, pure, sonorous voice, like a trumpet. My chest was clean and healthy, firstly, because I did not eat anything thick and mealy in the evening and drank tea with cream, and drank some good sherry at night, secondly, because of the clean air in the bedroom and, thirdly, and most of all, because of the strong grace of God that cleansed my heart. But at the end of Matins, an incorporeal enemy almost ate me, catching me in an addiction to a certain size of prosphora: for a lamb, I came across a small prosphora, empty at the top, and I was extremely indignant in spirit and was upset at the prosphora maker that she shamelessly seemed to be making a profit on the prosphoras, but the next prosphoras were of the proper size and shape, and they calmed me down, or through the prayer of repentance and faith I calmed down and at the first hour he said the dismissal completely, completely, festively, with all the saints, but out of embarrassment he could not pronounce the dismissal of the matins itself. Received life-giving communion. I sing to the Lord. Ten and a half o'clock in the evening. I thank the Lord, who had mercy on me three times and again, who walked along the road and repented of my severity towards the poor and stinginess, and instead of cramped conditions gave me space, instead of death life, instead of despondency boldness; I thank the Lord, who delivers me from all-delightful 3 fornication. Walk, speak and act with meekness and quietness everywhere, with all people and with the least of the poor, because God works in us both to will and to do according to His good pleasure [Phil.2:13]; He walks in Christians, dwelling in them, as it is said: I will dwell in them and walk in them; and I will be their God... and you will be My sons and daughters, says the Lord Almighty [2 Cor. 6:16–18]. After early mass. I thank the Lord, who delivered me from great oppression and sorrow during Matins, oppression that befell me with the righteous judgment of God for hard-heartedness and small alms to the poor and for malicious thoughts about the abbot and hostile feelings towards him, of which I sincerely repented, promising the Lord not to think evil about my brother and to always overcome evil with good and not to suspect great evil in my neighbor. He came to a complete conviction in the complete absurdity, savagery, and destructiveness of all sin and in the perfect wisdom and life-giving nature of all virtue. Eleven and a half hours. I constantly fall from sin to sin, damned, and all due to a lack of Christian love for God and neighbor and an addiction to earthly goods, especially the love of money. Once I stumbled while saying absolution in Pavlovsky’s house, after receiving communion from the wife of Nikolai Fedorovich Tombov, and lost peace, boldness, freedom, receiving confusion and ulcers in my soul, from which the Lord saved me for repentance; then, entering the church and seeing the archpriest in a white robe with stars and [remembering] his hundred-ruble [mug], I envied him and felt hostility for his fanfare and vanity, but then, extremely wounded and embarrassed by my sin of envying the abbot, I turned to repentance, calling and thanking God that my right hand is full of God’s gifts, and asking tenderly the Lord to forgive me my sins and lead me by His grace to His simplicity, holiness and truth - and the most merciful Lord has now had mercy on me. Then, leaving the church and walking home, I met beggars who persistently asked me for an amount that I did not want to give (I gave less than what I wanted), and when they persistently asked, I gave one with anger and reluctantly ten kopecks, and to the other, having given five kopecks, I became very angry with him, scolded him and pushed him; After that, I was again in confusion, crampedness, giving way to fire, and again I turned to the Lord with repentance, begging Him to forgive me my sins out of infinite mercy, for He Himself said that one should leave those who fall into sins seventy times sevenfold - and the Lord, invincible in mercy, again had mercy on me, forgiving me for my repentance, my insolence, my rudeness and malice, my greed. and my hardness of heart. I praise His bounty. But I sincerely blame myself for being stingy and hard-hearted despite the Lord’s increased generosity to me, for now I have received three rubles in income for my small labors. I willingly spend money on sweets, on fashion, on books of little use, but on alms, which is most necessary and is the true life of my soul, reluctantly, with vexation, and often with anger. Isn’t the Lord always able to reward her for her and will he not reward her a hundredfold? O I, ungrateful and unmindful of the mercies of God, and unfaithful, not [...], unloving! I also portray myself on photographic cards as meek, calm, loving, radiant! Five and a half o'clock in the evening. Again, I repeatedly fell into the sin of hard-heartedness and disregard for the poor due to their large number, especially when I went to the gymnasium (at that time there were, however, few of them), and for this I was punished (and even for being satiated at twelve o’clock, when I ate plenty of fresh fish) with the greatest crowding during my entire first lesson (from half past one to half of the second hour); after the first lesson between classes, I begged the Lord for repentance, and He gave me peace and freedom, although not completely, due to my intemperance. Walking to Vespers, I again met crowds of beggars after I had dismissed the crowd of thirty or more people at about three o’clock; again persistent demands, again my indignation at them and embarrassment and indignation at the abbot, completely indifferent to poverty and poverty. It's cramped again; After Vespers, I diligently fell in repentance to the throne of grace at the Intercession and did not go away empty-handed and unheard, but received mercy and peace. Glory to the Lord! Tuesday. God! Packs 5 Your mercy embraces me, calms me and expands my heart, consoling and cheering me after such sorrow, cramped conditions, after the scorching fire, which depressed me after I quarreled with the sexton Dimitri Ivanovich Kamenogradsky during Matins due to his failure to sing the verses of the Sretensky Canon according to the eighth song (the celebration of the holiday) and singing, as it seemed to me, the stichera on Praise was not on the voice in which you are supposed to sing: not the fourth, but the sixth; I repented, condemned myself, asking the Lord, the King of Peace, for mutual reconciliation between me and the sexton, and the Lord granted me peace. O good-obedient, quick-to-obey, kind-hearted, good-doer, glory, glory, glory to Thee! Yesterday at about six and a half in the evening, pressed and depressed by my sins, I deliberately went into church to fall before the throne of God's mercy and ask for forgiveness of sins, and I was not ashamed, but received what I wanted. The Lord gave me peace and space. I thank the Lord, who had mercy on me on the way to the gymnasium from Gostiny Dvor from the merchant Terentyev, where I bought cloth for my nephew Andrei. While writing the address, I stopped at the word peasant and did not want to write, but then I overcame false shame and wrote what I should have, but for my guile and pride the Lord punished me with inner languor and cramped conditions, from which the Lord delivered me for my unfeigned repentance. I thank the Lord. I thank the Lord, who through the prayers of His Most Pure Mother gave me deep, filled with abundant tears, when I read the canon of the Most Holy Theotokos Hodegetria and peace that surpasses all understanding before I go to bed. I thank the Lord, who has now given me His righteous peace through the prayer of repentance in my grief and anger at the abbot, Father Paul, for his wickedness, that he ordered to hide the Octoechos and Menaea for my sake, so that I would not read the canons from these books, the canons laid down by the charter. But may my service to You, Lord, be not in letter, but in spirit, in truth, in peace, in meekness, in humility, kindness, obedience, in proper things and deeds, and not in zeal, bitterness, disobedience. But give some reason, Lord, to the rector of the church, who violates the rules and [limit] of the holy fathers and serves the Midnight Office and Matins not according to the rules and distorts the Divine service. There were no bows to the ground (except for the first hour at Matins), instead of “Alleluia” they sang “God the Lord”! Octoechos and Menaea were deliberately taken and hidden. But grant me, Lord, the grace to preserve for this abbot, albeit an evil one, the respect and obedience and appropriate Christian love befitting his rank and years, so that my soul will not be darkened and disturbed by hostility towards him; Lord Himself, enlighten his heart’s eyes, darkened by love of money and unmercifulness; Teach him yourself to walk the path of truth and respect Your service. If he is a dean, then he observes order in service and in all life. I know Your mercies towards me, O Lord, Your wonderful obedience and [not ashamed] in anything for Your sake. Morning, eight o'clock. Eleven and a half o'clock in the afternoon. I thank the Lord, who granted me victory over the evil in my heart, confusion and distress through my prayer. Grant me, Lord, always to have control over my passions and not to be embittered towards anyone, even if some insidiously embitter me. Wake up! (Concerning indignation and anger at the rector who hid the church books of Octoechos and Menaea, so that I would not glorify God, the Mother of God and the saints). Morning, eight o'clock. I thank the Lord, who has called me this day to serve the early liturgy and to partake of His most pure and life-giving Mysteries. But I condemn, accuse and condemn myself for a stupid addiction to a new fox fur coat, hung in the main altar, and for the vain fear during the liturgy that it would be stolen; this vain fear and this apprehension have fatally divided my heart and separated it from the love of God and the life of God; my soul was mortally struck, confused, oppressed, darkened, bound by this apprehension and fear. I could not resist in the firm faith and hope in God that He is the only priceless eternal treasure, vital, holy, righteous, all-sufficient, and that He is also my giver, the keeper of all my benefits, given and multiplied from His generosity. I should have been completely calm regarding my perishable treasure and with all my strength held in my mind and heart to the incorruptible treasure, the incorruptible robe - my Lord Jesus Christ, but I gave a place in my heart to the devil through concern for the vain robe, perishable and fleeting, and was exposed to the incorruptible robe - the grace of Christ, peace, holiness, truth, freedom, joy in the Holy Spirit, and was in sorrow, cramped conditions, fire. I sinned against the Lord in my insane passion - my fur coat remained intact, unharmed, untouched by anyone - but how the enemy exposed himself in me during temptation, what sorrow, crampedness, darkness, bonds, death there was! Ten o'clock in the afternoon. Behold, my dear and sweet Savior, I was vouchsafed, and again and again at this hour, to receive great mercy from You - the salvation and healing of my soul and body from the great sorrow, cramped conditions and fire that oppressed me for neglecting the request of a beggar, who asked me, in addition to the ten kopecks given to him, for another thirty for travel to St. Petersburg, and for being upset with him and calling out to the city guard. Here I am now peaceful, free, watered with heavenly coolness by mercy and healing from the Lord! Glory to You! During the proskomedia and at the beginning of the Liturgy of the Catechumens, the Lord, through my prayer, delivered me from sorrow and oppression. Glory to the Lord! Nine and a half o'clock in the evening. A new triumph of God's mercy in me, a sinner! I became very angry with one beggar who approached me asking for money for a passport, and I said various impudent, cruel words to him, walked away from him in anger in the opposite direction, but finally promised tomorrow, February 9, to write a note about him to the bourgeois elder. For anger and stinginess and hardness of heart, I was punished by God with great hardship, shame, sorrow, death, and abandonment of God. I repented strongly and prayed to God for the forgiveness of my sins, walking along Sobornaya Street, and finally the mortal barriers within me collapsed, sorrow, cramped conditions, and death passed; I came to life, I was reconciled, my heart expanded - I was reconciled with God. Glory to the Lord! After that, I calmly talked with Olga Afanasyeva, a pious woman and widow, in Tretyakova’s house (on Sobornaya Street). The strength of God's mercy crushed the strength of my sins. Ten o'clock in the evening. I am amazed at the cunning and extreme self-love of my old man: for myself I do not regret any means to eat, drink, warmly, cleanly, comfortably and beautifully, to furnish my apartment with taste, to have at hand a lot of books of every kind, in all branches of knowledge, but for a poor person, for many poor people, in the hundreds of poor people who come up every day, I am sorry to give little by little alms for daily bread, for clothes cheap, for an apartment, for passports, and when they insistently ask, I lose my temper, get irritated, sometimes fight (today I severely tore one of them by the beard for begging), although I have plenty to give and although I have plenty of all kinds of food and clothes of better quality. Oh, my accursed pride and covetousness! Oh, satanic cruelty! Oh, the absurdity of a greedy, proud, stingy, selfish heart! Until now I have not learned to give alms with love! Until now, I was nothing despite all the many distributions of alms! Until now, I have never pleased the Lord with a pure, loving heart! I did not have meekness, humility, simplicity, kindness, purity, chastity, constancy in love! Damn man I am! In memory of my mother Theodora. Early mass for Irina Rumyantseva; served without a deacon on the occasion of the death of Deacon Peter Alekseevich Sofronov. I thank the Lord for the greatest victory by the grace of God of spiritual wisdom over the carnal, which mortally pressed upon me during the proskomedia regarding small prosphoras; By the grace of God I despised everything carnal, realizing that the devil fights against us extremely through loaves of bread (as in the desert with the Lord) and gluttony and carnality in general, that the belly is Christ. I thank the Lord for his wonderful, great help in serving the liturgy and the non-judgmental communion of the Holy Mysteries of Christ. I thank the Lord for a new victory in the cathedral during the liturgy, celebrated by the rector, Father Paul, against whom I was moved in my heart by momentary embitterment for negligence in the service; For a long time I repented and prayed at the throne of God in the Peter's chapel, finally the goodness of God defeated my malice; I was at peace. Oh, cursed me, beggar of love! I am so poor in love that for every empty thing I am ready to become embittered, angry, and despise a person, while love covers everything, endures everything, is long-suffering. I especially should not be indignant and despise a person, hate him when I see him doing evil, untruth, or when it seems to me so, for the devil usually slanders his neighbors in order to instill evil and hatred towards them. Although my neighbor does evil and does bad things, I should not be angry with him, but should pray for him with love. I thank the Lord for the word given to me on the forgiven resurrection (today) and for His great mercy in my service of the liturgy and for the communion of the Life-giving Mysteries. All morning before mass and partly after, I had a headache; At about two and a half hours she stopped hurting. I thank the Lord for His great help to me during Vespers, which through His haste I served well. Before performing the baptism at the sexton Zrelov, I became angry at the sexton Adrian Nikitin for his rude, although truthful response to my suspicion that he had marked the handkerchief given to me at the christening at Khrabrov ([Sinebryukhovskie baths]). Here the passions were expressed in me: covetousness, pride, malice, extreme pride, worldly addiction. I didn’t have to ask Nikitin for the handkerchief, but left it behind him, just as I left it after, giving it to him. I blame myself with all my heart. I thank the Lord, who put humility and repentance into Adrian’s heart: after the christening I went home to repent of my sin, and he ran out into the corridor and asked me for forgiveness and thereby softened my heart, pacified my troubled soul. Monday of the first week of Lent. I thank the Lord for the successful service of Matins, Hours and Vespers with the great canon of St. Andrew of Crete, rationally, cordially, sincerely, calmly, gratefully accomplished. But during Vespers, I was terribly tempted by evil demons through the altar watchman Procopius, who flooded, contrary to my wishes and request not to light the stove, which emitted smoke during Vespers and unpleasantly and harmfully affected the sense of smell and the head in general and the entire body. I became all agitated, angry, enraged, and scolded him at the altar for disobedience and drunkenness, for even now he was drunk. For a long time I languished, kicked, suffered from demons, from these spirits of evil in high places, and I barely got rid of them through prayer, repentance, self-condemnation, self-reproach. Yes, I suffered from demons because of my pride, lust, carnality, impatience, pride, contempt, malice, gluttony, covetousness, fornication, laziness, negligence. I blame myself for impatience, for not indifferently tolerating yesterday during vespers the little child from the flooded stove in the altar and getting angry with the drunken watchman Procopius, shouting at him after vespers and scolding him. It is necessary to grieve the voluptuous flesh in order to humble, tame it, and crucify it. At night, voluptuousness was extremely disturbing, and I was constantly almost protected by the sign of the cross; This [vulgar] voluptuousness came from the sweet almond milk and sweet apple jam that I ate in the evening, and from the onions and mushrooms. The wife is unskilled in the spiritual - she is one flesh, lives in the flesh, not knowing spiritual life at all. God! Teach her, raise her from the earthly and carnal to the heavenly and spiritual. Yes, God, grant me greater wisdom. I thank the Lord, who fulfilled my prayer to grant me the unfaltering, heartfelt reading of the canon of St. Andrew of Crete. God! The idle life of my sister-in-law, sister Anna, confuses me: teach her to work, teach her to stay at the place of her service and occasionally visit our house... Idleness corrupts her here and there. Wasn’t she the one who made almond milk yesterday?.. Isn’t it because of her that the milk’s effect is unfavorable? God! Forgive me: maybe I'm sinning. But there is little good from those who do not pray. After Matins, nine and a half hours. I thank the Lord for deliverance from acute temptations during Matins and for the successful, zealous, fiery, stumbling-free service of Matins. The temptation came at the end of the Midnight Office. Great is the name of the Lord, and His mercy is inexpressible upon me. Now I drank a glass and a half of sweet tea with a soft roll: do not put this into my sin and as an obstacle to me from my bodiless enemies. May Your grace overcome sweetness and carnal food. Wake up! Sincerely be well-wishing to everyone, even an unkind and ill-intentioned, ill-wishing person, for this is how it befits, this is how the Lord commands, commanding to love even enemies and do good to them [Matthew 5:44], and because goodwill to everyone is a true gain for the well-wisher himself as the greatest gift of God, and ill-will is a great evil, a great loss for the ill-wisher himself, torment, conviction of conscience, proving that all ill-wishers will be punished by God. At night on this date, the demon of fornication was extremely worried about almond milk and, perhaps, apples with grapes and grape wine. With all my heart I thank the Lord for the grace of boldness and sincerity in the service of Divine services and I pray to the Lord that this grace will never depart from me, until my last breath, that I may never look at human faces (display of persons) in the church of the glory of God, that for me everyone will be equal before the face of God, both great and small, and noble and simple, and handsome and ugly in appearance, for it is all the same All sinners are created in the image and likeness of God. I sinned yesterday - I ate before Vespers and therefore had to endure a strong struggle with the enemies of salvation while reading the Great Canon of Andrew of Crete, for my heart became white, rough, cold, dead. But I thank the Lord, who gave me help from above and strengthened me with His grace, which I earnestly asked for. And the Lord clearly helped me many times during all the daily services. Evening. I thank the Lord for his great mercy to me during the service of Matins, Hours and Vespers with the Liturgy and Vespers with the Great Canon: the Lord gave me the greatest help, for I was extremely weak, especially during Vespers, from a headache due to a constipation of the stomach. I thank the Lord for His greatest mercy towards me in forgiveness for the sake of my great, tender repentance for my sins: hard-heartedness and rage at the poor, abuse and cursing at them (scoundrels), because they chased me far (to the Engineering Garden). Even today the Lord my God has been kind and gracious to me. Glory to the Lord! During Matins, Mass and Great Compline, I was embarrassed for a minute, twice because of the shine of the cross, which I saw in the glass of the images of the evangelists (on the royal doors), and once because I regretted a good kamilavka (during mass), as if it would become dusty from the incense (while saying the prayer, Lord and Master of my life 6). It’s better to walk around in a smoky kamilavka and despise the eyesight of the people and give up absurd vanity, paying attention to the decoration of the soul, and remember that my kamilavkas will last me a lifetime - and therefore do not value them. I thank the Lord, who healed the heavy pain in my head. After eating mashed peas at home, cod stew, buckwheat porridge and almond milk, I walked fairly through the air and felt healthy. Glory to the Lord! The Apostles are the divine clouds of the Lord Christ because they were watered with His life-giving grace and watered the countless hearts of people with this grace, just as rain clouds water a thirsty land; they were like clouds, for they were above all earthly passions, they always had grief in their minds and hearts and, like clouds, flowed around the whole earth. That is why they were brought on the clouds to the burial of the Mother of God. The rector hid the fraternal money that the late Deacon Sofronov had in the amount of seventy rubles, testified that he had no money left, while according to my calculation, he had ten thousand money left, judging by the income he received and by his stinginess: he never sewed clothes for himself, the children do not have decent linen. His son, Vasily Petrovich, knows about money. If it is true that orphans have no money, then may the Lord arrange for the daughter of the deceased to marry the first deacon in this place; if there is money left, then the Lord will not allow her husband to take the first place of deacon, and the second, on a clerk’s salary, so that there will be no offense to Deacon Poletaev, who served for a long time in the rank of deacon on a deacon’s salary. Grant me, Lord, not to complain or be upset at the abbot for his untruths, lies, concealment, but to give him due love and respect, and to submit his sins to Your righteous judgment, for You righteously judge every day and hour of every person; Grant me the grace to fulfill all righteousness. If he takes away from me, then You will reward me for what was taken away in abundance, and he will bear the sin. He is rich, but his wealth will not save him from death. Proud, rich and godless Sinebryukhov is wonderfully punished by the righteous God, having suffered the collapse of the bank he founded. How much he hurt poor people! Will their tears fall before God? Couldn't the same thing happen to our banker abbot? Lord righteous! You weigh this, everything is possible for you, it is possible for you to turn a hard-hearted rich man into a poor one or turn a hard-hearted man into a kind-hearted and merciful one. But for twenty-one years I have seen his contempt for the poor and for me, who observes the poor, and for the parish trusteeship I established, which he also did not want due to his callousness of heart. Will this continue until the end? Will the truth prevail? Will not the injustice of hard-heartedness be solemnly punished? Let's wait. But God grant him, the abbot, many more years of prosperity - perhaps Your generous gifts will turn his heart to mercy. Grant us, Lord, eternal memory of death, so that we may not completely lose our way from the path of truth; teach us humility and prudent walking in this temporary life. When you give alms, do not be bored and do not become discouraged and do not complain, knowing to whom you are giving - to the One who said: Do for Me [Matthew 25:40], for we are all His members; for everything you will be rewarded both in the temporary and in the eternal life. Due to my greed, I made the greatest mistake last night by eating twice: after the christening in Tretyakova’s house at the innkeeper’s (mushroom pie) and half an hour later at home (buckwheat porridge with Provençal butter). By doing this I burdened myself and clogged my stomach, and this was in the first week of fasting, which must be strictly observed. Oh, senseless cattle! Oh, damned one! Have mercy on me, fallen one, my God! During Compline, while reading the canon of St. Andrew of Crete, I was powerless to utter some words, as well as during the subsequent prayers and the final litany, due to my incontinence: my heart weakened, hardened, and became dead at certain words; [I remember], by the way, I did not say a word to the Unit about the Trinity. Why? Because I myself was double in heart, working for the world and my belly and God, I myself must be a pure unit in serving God, not in the least double in my thoughts and heart, but must completely, completely strive towards God, without any attachment to any earthly objects. Yesterday in church I sang in the stichera (on the verse), so that we would not be idolaters, idolizing the womb, but with a pleasant fast to please the Lord, and I forgot this, did not keep these words. And what wonderful stichera and troparia! What saving moral teachings! But as long as you sing, until then you sympathize with everything that is beautiful in the divine service; you leave the church or immediately in the church, after finishing the singing, and forget about what is useful and saving. Oh, absent-mindedness! I don’t eat porridge - I don’t know how to eat it properly so as not to clog my stomach. Oh, the worldly merger to which I have fallen! I subjected the soul, created in the image of God, adopted by God, to earthly dust, earthly empty splendor, soft, beautiful clothes, food and drink, money and, under the pretext of piety, many books! Every worldly addiction constantly beats me, oppresses me, deadens my soul, for example, addiction to the shine of gold (a brilliant cross), to food and drink, clothing, jewelry in general - and rightly so for my madness and departure in heart from the Lord. But grant me, Lord, to despise everything earthly as vain and transitory, corruptible, and to love You alone with all my heart - my most perfect life, my perfect contentment and bliss! Life-streaming You are my source, Lord; From You daily I draw streams of life that drive away my cramped conditions, my sorrows, my destruction, my darkness and shed peace, freedom, boldness, strength, light, vigor, and courage into my heart. I thank the Lord for His great and glorious help during Matins, especially at the Great Litany, during the reading of the prayer Save Thy people, O God, and during the reading of the canon. But after reading and singing the canon, entering the altar, I saw the rector, Father Paul, fiddling with the vessel; I approached him to greet him, he was cold as usual, extremely reserved, uncommunicative; I went, embarrassed, to speak the petitionary litany and vaguely, with omissions, spoke the last exclamations, especially to the Most Pure One; then I went to the altar (embarrassed again) and greeted him again; he was cold; the face is motionless and emotionless. This saddened and chilled and confused me even more; I remembered his coldness towards alms, towards worship, towards the brethren, his life exclusively for himself - and I completely lost interest in him, a dormant hostility towards him awoke in me, and Satan deeply confused and wounded me; I barely finished matins. The rector came to my misfortune because of my weakness. I repented for a long time of my anger and hostility; I prayed to the Lord to wholeheartedly pour out love into my heart for the abbot, to see my own sins and not to condemn my brother Paul the abbot, who, like me, is constantly judged by God alone, and to diligently fulfill the primacy of the whole law of God about love for one’s neighbor, without which it is impossible to love God, and not to suspect only evil in him, but to remember that there is also good in him: kindness, meekness, quietness, which are in me no. I was punished for my sins and by my own sins. Saturday of the first week of Lent. I confess to You, the Lord Knower of the Heart, my Judge and Savior, my great grief at the rector Father Paul, which happened on Friday at the end of Matins, because he came to tinker with the vessels during the service and added a new disorder to his generally negligent attitude towards the service of God, disdaining God's service by fiddling around in the closet. This could have been done, I think, not during the service and not in the morning. I was extremely embarrassed during the service and could not speak due to my nervousness and touchiness (he did not greet me when I said hello) the litany of petition and the prayer of St. Ephraim the Syrian, the prayer to Christ, the True Light and dismissal. I confess, Lord, that I myself am the greatest sinner and have no love for the abbot for his dislike for me and his negligence towards faith and worship. But I must cry for my sins and not look at the sins of others, especially the abbot, seeing not to see them, for it is not my business, but God’s to judge him; the bodiless enemy, I see, arouses in me hostility towards him, and this is a grave sin; I have been robbed by the enemy, I must respect and love the abbot and fervently pray to God for him, so that the word of truth may rightly rule and shepherd the sheep of Christ and us, the younger shepherds. Grant me, Lord, the grace to love him, respect him, pray for him, be forgiving of his weaknesses and shortcomings, for You are his Judge. But may he not offend my sense of piety, may he not quench my spirit with his careless attitude towards Thy service, be merciful to me in this, O Lord, may he not enter the holy altar during my service unnecessarily, for his wandering around in the altar quenches and kills my spirit; he is an accomplice of the devil, for I was terribly tempted for his sake yesterday during and after Matins, a whole legion of demons came with him. I thank the Lord, who delivered me from the hordes of demons who wanted to consume me completely; The Lord listened to the prayer of faith and hope - and drove them away and gave me peace. They aroused in me extreme involuntary hostility towards the abbot: I became terribly agitated and fell into extreme confinement and fire, hellish fire. And he served Matins with the grace of the Lord until the arrival of the archpriest with great zeal and tenderness, especially when reading the canon and singing stichera. I thank the Lord for the unfailing service of the hours, vespers and the Liturgy of the Presanctified Gifts; at the end there was a grave temptation from the spirits of malice because of Petrova (nee Vyakhireva), who did not notify her of her desire to receive communion at the Presanctified Mass. Only through intense prayer of repentance and faith in the propitiatory and cleansing power of the Holy Mysteries did I break the anger and confusion within myself. I see my untruth, my capricious, angry, impatient heart, which sometimes becomes embittered even at innocent babies brought to communion, or at adults, men and women, who for some reason do not suit my character, in face or clothing or some other appearance, for example, due to poverty. It has been noticed that the enmity towards the rector comes from the same whim of mine, from the same malice of my heart, my partiality; among other things, I didn’t like the abbot for a long time because of his face, which was unpleasant at times. So, the eye of my heart is painful, deceitful, unclean, sinful, passionate, and that is why people do not appear to me in their true, present light and form. Create in me a pure heart, O God, and renew a right spirit in my womb [Ps. 50:12]. Saturday of the first week of Lent. Yesterday from two and a half o'clock in the evening to nine in the evening I confessed to two hundred people. My wife brought in an income of fifty rubles plus twelve. Today I served Matins with God’s help regularly, with tenderness, but also with the great struggle against invisible enemies that preceded the reading of the Six Psalms. After Matins I slept for about two hours (I got up very early in the morning). He served Mass first with strong heartfelt relaxation and mortification, with a captivating impurity of heartfelt sensations and thoughts, with deep repentance and an appeal to the Savior for help, which he received (glory to the Lord, who has mercy on me wonderfully, clearly!) after reading the Gospel - and then he served loudly, with feeling, although not without obstacles and under oppression from invisible enemies; He received Holy Communion life-giving and gave Holy Communion to the people with feeling. God! What an abyss of Your mercy! How many and what kind of people’s sins have we forgiven in Your name! And they were all forgiven, according to Thy word [John 20:23], and cleansed by Thy Blood, and my immeasurable sins were immediately there. O Lamb of God! Take away the sins of all! Glory to You, glory to You, glory to You! Ten and a half o'clock in the evening. God! The glory of Your grace, given to me, unworthy, is in abundance, so that simple hearts and simple people, seeing and hearing my unworthy service and my word and my unworthy face, love me with great, extreme love, ready to sacrifice everything for me. God! Teach me to imitate them in their love: as they love me for Your sake, so Teach me to love You for Your own sake and them for Your sake and in You with extreme love. Wake up! Morning, four and a half hours. When I am performing divine services, the enemy often suddenly comes to me, frightens and weakens me, mortifies my heart, completely cools me towards some saints and living and healthy members (especially high-ranking ones) of the Church and the Fatherland, and brazenly captivates my heart, which is not protected and strengthened by fasting and fervent prayer and unceasing contemplation of God. Lord, have mercy and help me, who is drowning. By the grace of God, I have not known a doctor for a long time and I am healthy, for in the infirmities that sometimes occur, the Lord Himself, the Physician of souls and bodies, and the richly poured fresh, life-giving air, heals me. For this I thank my Lord, my King, my Savior and my Almighty and All-Good Physician. Holiness should be the inalienable property of every Christian as his natural element, like the clean air of a clean home or spring air, especially the air of meadows and forests, breathing aromas. And the majority of people are of the opinion that holiness supposedly belongs to the chosen few. This is a misconception: everyone must sanctify themselves and try to live holy, for everyone Christ founded the Church and established sanctifying services, for everyone he gave the prayer Our Father, in which everyone says: Our Father, who is in heaven, hallowed be thy name, and these words mean that we must all live holy and withdraw, abhor sins. I served the All-Night Vigil in the Assumption Church with deacon Rambov 8 Andrei Mikhailovich Lebedev diligently, loudly, with God’s grace and read three canons: Octoechos two and Triodion one, - and the temptation of malice that was on the sexton Zrelov, which embarrassed me, he repelled with the same grace, and finished the entire All-Night Vigil decently, but did not ask for forgiveness from the people. But at the liturgy (with the deacon), due to the lack of confirmation of my heart in God because of gluttony and satiety, yesterday evening (at Anna [Obedkova’s] widow, to whom I gave two rubles for clothes for the children), I was tempted at the great entrance, I did not pronounce the names of the empress, the heiress and their son from an incomparable demonic embarrassment, and after that, crampedness and embarrassment haunted me throughout the mass until communion, and after communion I was miraculously revived, comforted, expanded in my heart, abstaining in the Lord, but I prepared spare Gifts, not without embarrassment and fear because of my sins; He finished the mass well, without stumbling, both in the pulpit and dismissal. I thank the Lord, who snatched me from the jaws of the murderer. He caught me, and catches me incessantly, to devour me. Oh, if the Lord would grant perfect self-control during the liturgy and any other public and solemn, crowded service, to fear no one except Him, the Lord God! For this I need prayer, fasting, constant contemplation of God, reading the word of God, complete kindness, purity of heart. Give it, Lord! Ten and a half o'clock in the evening. I thank the Lord, who has now destroyed my disdain and anger for the entire ceremony on the occasion of the farewell, funeral and burial in Bose of the deceased pious sovereign, Grand Duke Vyacheslav Konstantinovich, which I read about in the newspaper “Son of the Fatherland”; I developed these hostile feelings because of my deceased father, about whom I had heard a lot of bad things. But it is not my business to judge the highest persons - the highest God judges them all. And in all their untruths, they are worthy of special regret and fervent, loving prayer for them, as they are exposed to the greatest temptations of earthly greatness, wealth, luxury, glory, servility, voluptuousness, and pride. The same must be said about all the rich, unmerciful, noble, and learned. They are worthy of the greatest regret, because, being strongly deceived and overwhelmed by passions, they have no helm and miserably perish in their seduction and in their passions. After death, their souls are worthy of special pity, as helpless, as terribly in misery from tormenting demons and ready to plunge into the abyss of eternal torment. Oh, how I am punished by God for being bitter even against the dead Grand Duke, not only against the living! Sorrow, oppression, the scorching fire of hell tormented me, and I repented with tears of the insolence I had committed, of bitterness, of malice and envy, and I earnestly and benevolently prayed for the repose of the soul of the deceased Grand Duke Vyacheslav Konstantinovich, as a fellow member of our spiritual, as a brother, as a poor and distressed soul, as in dire need of the sincere prayer of living members of the Church. I thank the Lord for giving me understanding. By the grace of God, I edifyingly spoke in the apartment of the tanner Zakharia Ivanovich Sidorov about the bounties of God surrounding us, about the saving powers of God, hidden especially in the holy Sacraments of the Orthodox Church, about the extremely ever-present closeness to us of the Lord Jesus Christ (I am with you all the days until the end of the age [Matthew 28:20]), especially in the life-giving Mysteries; on the other hand, about our carelessness, our negligence about our correction and salvation. I opened my mouth - and the Lord gave me a word of wisdom with spiritual salt. Thanks be given for this to the Lord, who gives the word to the One who preaches the gospel with much power 10. For I am incapable of myself of conceiving what is good from myself, but my ability is from God [2 Cor. 3:5]. Who or what is more beautiful, brighter, sweeter, more honest, more desirable, [more precious], richer, more faithful, more reliable, firmer, more fragrant than our Lord Jesus Christ? No one and nothing, for He is the infinite Source of all beauty, light, sweetness, everything that is most venerable in the world, truly desired, precious, enriching, faithful, reliable, solid, world-loving. So why do we often or incessantly chase after vanity, the transitory beauty of faces or clothes and in general earthly beauties in things or faces, after worldly splendor, after worldly sweetness, after local desires that harm the immortal soul and the perishable body, often unclean, dishonest, after earthly wealth, unfaithful, separating from God, for you cannot, it is said, serve God and wealth [Matthew 6:24]? Are we not in extreme delusion, are we in a state of madness? Galatians chapter three. Jesus Christ was depicted before your eyes, as if he were crucified among you [Gal.3:1]. Based on these words, we place the crucifixion of Jesus Christ in our altar behind the throne, that is, a cross with the image of the crucified Lord Jesus Christ, so that those who look at it constantly learn the mystery of the cross, the love of Jesus Christ crucified for us, love each other, please each other, bear each other’s burdens, bring prayers to God the Father about the name of His Only Begotten Son and learn to crucify their flesh with passions and lusts. God! Teach me to look at every poor person as at You, according to Your word [Matthew 25:40], and at every Christian as at Your member - with respect, meekness, condescension, with love, goodness, purity, in simplicity, having mercy on each poor person from the heart, just as many treat me, clothe me, put on shoes from the heart. Wake up! God! I thank You for delivering me from the great diabolical tightness and snare that I was subjected to while speaking the litiya for the deceased Paraskeva Chuprakova and after her, walking along the way from the Technical School along Lord’s Street to the Petersburg Gate. When I approached the Vladimir Church, the Lord completely delivered me from the snare and oppression of the enemy, listening to me repent and earnestly ask for mercy. Then I thanked the gracious Lord, abundantly merciful and gracious. Nine o'clock in the evening. I thank the Lord for His great mercy towards me, shown in delivering me from the extreme tightness of the enemy in my heart, which befell me for stinginess and hard-heartedness towards the poor, for the rage, reproach, curse addressed to them by me. For an hour and a half I was in this cramped space during a long walk, and only at the end, from increased faith and hope and sincere prayer, the power of the enemy in me ended that time - I felt light and spacious. Another time, my Lord delivered me from the cramped conditions in the apartment of the painter Volkov in Tsepov’s house. Every authority appointed by God is due honor and glory according to its dignity, as it is said: to whom is honor, give honor [Rom. 13:7], therefore the king is surrounded by the greatest glory and honors, ceremonies; mayors and military leaders have their just honors, are furnished with special splendor, receive honorary guards, have a special separate place in the church, and enjoy special military honors. And I especially pay tribute to everyone and sincerely, and pray for all the authorities, especially the current authorities. I thank the Lord, who gave me the grace to talk with a parishioner prone to drunkenness (painter and painter Kozma Efremovich Volkov) and pray for him. Thank God, he took the good path; establish him, Lord! Crush his heart with Thy fear - the fear of death and Thy coming judgment. He is a talented person, he reasons well. Illuminate his mind and heart with Your light, O Blessed and All-Merciful! And illuminate all sinners like him, and me among them, with Your light, so that we may firmly follow Your path, the eternal path. Four o'clock in the evening. According to Your countless bounties, Lord, grant me to be generous to my family and not to be upset because of many, as it seems to me, burdens, not to be upset with my wife and skimp on the table, but let everyone be happy with everything, and may love reign between us. Wake up. I thank the Lord for delivering me from the oppression and torment that befell me for greed and stinginess. When a lot of selected foods and drinks are placed in front of me, it’s nothing, I’m glad about it, but when on my part in front of others, sometimes I feel sorry for the devil’s delusion and my own addiction. Deliver me, Lord, from this madness, from this absurdity. I thank the Lord for His great mercy in delivering my unworthiness from hellish fire, embarrassment and cramped conditions that befell me righteously for grief at home and for stinginess regarding the table, for I fervently repented, prayed to the Lord and Lord of the life of my house and on the way to the christening of the [Punagin] captain (in the house of Semenov) and before the very christening, which I performed life-givingly, without stumbling. by the grace of God. I thank and praise the Lord my Savior for the wonderful revival of me today during the reading of the canon and the singing of it, as well as the stichera in the stichera, and especially after I venerated with faith the holy ark with the holy Presanctified Gifts. Glory, glory, glory to our Lord Jesus Christ! [To Zhevertov] a letter about the undercoat. Six o'clock in the evening. I glorify the wondrous miracles in me of God’s mercy, performed by His power this day at twelve o’clock in the afternoon and at one hour and a half. While going to the gymnasium, I met several beggars, refused their request, and then gave alms; then I came across a beggar who arrived from St. Petersburg, urgently asking for help, and I angrily refused him twice and three times, and for this I suffered painful cramped conditions and sorrow, from which I tried to get rid of by diligent repentance for my pride, dislike for my neighbors, self-indulgence, carnality, gluttony, gluttony, drunkenness (wine drinking), hard-heartedness, love of money, stinginess, greed, severity, obstinacy, envy, pride, malice, voluptuousness, laziness, negligence and similar sins. And now the mercy of God has overcome my sins: I am miraculously saved, delivered from them, revived, peaceful, comforted, widespread in my heart. I came to the gymnasium - the trustee of the educational district of St. Petersburg, Prince Mikhail Sergeevich Volkonsky, arrived, who was in my two lessons, and I behaved very freely, boldly, and the students answered very well, so he was very pleased and said: very good, and said goodbye to me by hand. I thank the Lord for this success. When I repented to the Lord, I among other things said a repentant song within myself: Lying in the abyss of sin (in all the power of these words), I call upon the unsearchable abyss of Thy mercy 11 (in all the power and truth of these words), and after them the saving power of God immediately descended into my heart. Another time, the Lord clearly saved me from an inappropriate feeling of voluptuousness upon entering the sixth grade; I looked up to the Lord in repentance and self-condemnation - and received forgiveness, cleansing, peace, freedom, after which the trustee soon entered the classroom again; Thus, the Lord corrected me in a timely manner and quickly, an indecent moral cripple. Yes, without the Lord, even for one minute I am pitiful, poor, wretched, abominable, and poor, and blind, and naked [Rev. 3:17]. The Lord gives me every good, deliverance from every misfortune, abomination, passion. I thank the Lord, who has marked this day for me with His life-giving power and His great mercy in delivering me from my sins and my troubles, when I repented in heartfelt prayer to Him, the all-righteous, all-holy, all-knowing, all-powerful, all-bright, all-red, all-merciful, all-long-suffering. This was before the memorial service (in the town council) for the watchman’s wife Martha, who died after giving birth. Glory to the Lord! God! May I not live without You for a single moment. My sin was anger at the poor. I thank the Lord for yesterday’s repeated deliverances from my sins and my cramped conditions, especially in the Toluzakovs’ apartment. He sinned by eating fish, and even by eating and praising, pleasing his feelings beyond measure. Oh, charming one! 12 Oh, self-decorator! Five o'clock in the evening. I thank the Lord for His great mercy given to me during the service of the early liturgy (Sturgeon) in the Assumption Church, for the Lord revived me when I was dead, healed the sick, strengthened the weak, comforted the faint-hearted, and extended the oppressed. Soon after mass, I became upset with the poor and thus lost my peace and freedom, but in repentance the Lord again accepted and had mercy on me when I went to Mr. Brandt at Nikitina’s house for money for the benefit of the poor. Evening. As a result of overeating on fish at dinner, during the all-night vigil at the end before the dismissal, I was subjected to abandonment from God and a grave temptation from the devil, which I could not overcome during the dismissal and reading the prayer to Christ, the true Light. As a result, acute vulnerability from the enemy, irritability, anger on the street and at home. I performed the unction of old woman Kurganova poorly - a new ulcer; I come home, fall before the Lord in repentance and tenderness, and soon I felt the mercy of God in myself in the hallway (at nine o’clock). I received new mercy from God while walking along the street and repenting of my severity towards the poor, whom I had upset at that time. I blame myself for the fact that yesterday I performed unction without love and heartfelt respect for the poor old woman Kurganova, whom I helped somewhat, and in general quickly and carelessly, both because of the previous temptation in the church (release and prayer to Christ, the true Light and with the poor on the street), and because of the cramped air (addiction to fresh air), and because of the passion for a walk. I have sinned against the Lord! How many of his absurdities, outrages, and passions the enemy has planted in me! In the hallway after the all-night vigil, during the prayer of my repentance, the Lord dissolved the network of my many sins, with which the enemy tormented me and brought me to despair. Glory to the abyss of God's mercy! But I am sinful and weak beyond number and alien to the love of Christ. From the time when God became man and deified us and raised us to heaven and seated us on the throne of the Divine with His Father, should we cleave to the earth, should we work for the insatiable womb, which is about to be abolished along with all the breasts that have a temporary purpose for our body, composed of bodily elements? Should we live in dislike, disagreement, laziness, negligence, greed (our greatest self-interest is the acquisition of the righteousness of Christ), voluptuousness, vanity? No, our destiny is too high, the future life is beyond measure glorious and blessed, for us to cling to what is empty and transitory, like a dream, like smoke. Watch and beware with all your might that the devil does not spit in your heart and in your prayer when performing the Sacraments and prayers; Confirm your heart in love for God and your neighbor, in sincere love, unfeigned, impartial, do not know the face in prayer: beautiful or ugly, pleasant or unpleasant to see, rich or poor, old or young, noble or simple, learned or uneducated - before God we are equal, in soul we are all the same in the image of God, and in body we are all dust and ashes. Yesterday at the memorial service for the deceased servant of God Anna Kurganova (and before at the unction, and earlier at confession and communion), the enemy put into my heart, alien to love, partial, selfish, disgust and hostility towards the unseemly face of the deceased and cruelly abused me, brought me into confusion, crampedness, darkness, shame, which did not allow me to pray for the deceased. For a long time after that I was in confusion, shame and cramped conditions and deeply repented of my lawlessness, walking along the street and sitting in a room in Tsepov’s house (before the christening), and the Lord wonderfully, gloriously saved me, accepting repentance and granting deep peace and defeating Satan, who spat on me. I performed baptism solemnly, zealously, calmly, with the greatest boldness. Glory to the Lord, my deliverer! I thank the Lord for the wonderful renewal of me during the service of the Liturgy of Basil the Great, for the gift of abundant tears and for the communion of the Holy Mysteries, which gave me, a dead man, life. After mass, the enemy was about to kill me for my anger towards one woman who was zealous towards me (Ekaterina Step.), who withheld my hand, but when I repented, God forgave me. God bless! And how much evil, impatience, partiality, self-interest, gluttony, lust, laziness and negligence I have. An abyss of evil! O my sweetest Savior, save me! (But all our neighbors are members of Christ and our own members, the flesh and blood of Christ, our flesh and blood). So, the devil always, at every step, tries to mock us, sowing in us the tares of malice, pride, envy, partiality, voluptuousness, greed, vanity and vanity, hatred of man, contempt, despondency, fear, fear, false shame, gluttony, gluttony and drunkenness, wickedness, suspicion of evil towards our neighbors, disobedience, reluctance, waywardness and stubbornness, severity and obstinacy, 13 lies, slander, etc. The enemy also abuses our neighbors through us, despising them for old age, decrepitude, lack of appearance of face, for poverty and for the fact that the poor often turn to us asking for alms and cannot give us anything, for we are ready to use everything from everyone, and ourselves we regret giving to others. Oh corruption, oh self-love, oh selfishness and love of God, and unkindness, inhumanity! Here is a picture of a man! Here's your photo, man! Here is your, better to say, scotography, that is, the obscurity of your soul! You love to paint yourself in different positions in a photography studio, wanting to show people, family, friends, acquaintances your outer side, but do not forget to paint your inner man in the light of the Gospel and conscience, know the face of your soul, how ugly, nasty and gloomy it is due to your sins and many different, countless passions, how they have completely distorted the majestic features of the image of God in you, how you are all ulcerated, covered in scabs and wounds, all the stench, for you have coldly stained your soul with sins 14. Now fasting - take a photograph of your soul, bring into the light the secrets of darkness, expose yourself, tell your iniquities to God, who knows everything, so that you may be justified; repent, imagine your sins in the palm of your hand - this will be a soul-helping photograph of you, for through sincere, deep repentance a person is enlightened, freed by the grace of God from the darkness of sin. I thank the Lord for the abyss of His mercy poured out on me at this hour for my repentance in malice, anger and rage against one retired beggar who came from Ryazan to collect alms, when here and without him, I said in anger, there are countless beggars. Anger and rage killed my soul, depriving it of peace, silence, freedom, light and plunging it, along with my body, into confusion, oppression, sorrow, scorching fire of hell, shame and ugliness. I repented deeply in the narrowness of my soul and begged the Lord to have mercy on me, for the sake of the abyss of His bounties to show me all the depth, all the strength of His Divine mercy, and after a long prayer the Lord descended into my soul, as into hell, dissolved the bonds of curse and death and in His blessing resurrected me, killed by my passions. Glory to Your long-suffering and mercy, O Lord! Eight o'clock in the morning. I thank the Lord for the grace of unfailingly celebrating the memorial service for Anna Ivanovna Kurganova this morning at nine o’clock. Oh, if it were even better to always perform requiem services and funeral services for every Christian soul! Grant, Lord! Create in me a pure heart [Ps. 50:12] and establish it, O God! I thank the Lord for receiving the Holy Mysteries at the Presanctified Liturgy! Grant, Lord, the grace to perform all the prayers and sacred rites of the liturgy before all the powerful and noble people of this world and not be ashamed or afraid of anyone when performing a holy deed! God does not look at the face of a person [Gal.2:6] - and when I perform a divine service or Sacrament, let me not look at anyone’s face, but let me do the work of God with reverence. Always have respect for yourself as a person, and especially as a priest, and cast aside cowardice and slavish timidity and fear, which are unusual for a priest as a servant of Christ God, as one who corrects the highest service - the service of freedom. Let not your sins frighten you, for there is no man without sin, and the Lord is the Lamb of God, who takes away the sins of the world [John 1:29] and yours. Morning. I thank the Lord, who showed me His greatest help during the service of the memorial service for Anna Ivanovna Kurganova last night at six o’clock; By the grace of God, I said all the litanies without stumbling, defeating the adversary, who was accustomed to fight, confuse, darken and bring me down. I praise the Lord. Oh, if only the Lord would grant this in all services! And he boldly said goodbye, looking cheerfully and boldly at everyone present. God! I thank You, because You had mercy on me, who repented, and You gave me peace instead of confusion and space of heart instead of crampedness; I repented of looking to myself, and not to You, the Source of life and my shrine (I thought about my photograph). Let me always look to You, and not to myself, for I am vanity, and You are the truth and the eternal life. Ten and a quarter o'clock in the afternoon. I thank the Lord, who gave me His help during the litia for the deceased Anna (the same one). I performed the litia with great boldness, without stumbling, in the truth of my heart, with much strength. Oh, grant me, Lord, to always sincerely and unfalteringly, with firmness, perform all parish services and requests. Walking home from the takeout, I met, as usual, beggars, sixteen in number, waiting for alms (twenty were in the morning before Matins, who were given two kopecks each). Annoyed by the fact that many people came several times, but not knowing who exactly, this time with displeasure, reluctance, and contempt, I gave them only a penny each, having said before: I’ll treat you now. After this, sorrow and distress came over me, I began to repent and with difficulty begged the Lord for forgiveness, peace and freedom, for I often sin the same. I thank the Lord for mercy. Six and a half o'clock in the evening. I thank the Lord for His holy and strong help during the service of the all-night vigil and prayer service at the Boyles in the second officer corps; The cry of the Most Holy, Most Pure, Most Blessed One was twice left unspoken due to the devil’s delusion and due to my impurity of heart, but in the next cry I was strengthened by grace and finished it to the end, but stole the release because of the false fear of demons and was thereby greatly wounded by Belial 15 and killed spiritually: there was melancholy, crampedness; I looked up with the eyes of my heart to the Lord in repentance, sitting with the old woman Varvara Alex. Boyle, and received mercy and life from the Lord. I praise the Lord. Coming out of Boyle’s, I met annoying drunken beggars, brazenly begging, or, more correctly, persistently, in a drunken state, begging for alms, as if for boots, and following me, despite the prohibition, - and again I got irritated, wounded with anger and gave one of them to the policeman - to be put in the police, and he hit one girl, annoying and dissatisfied, lightly in the shoulder with his fist. I have sinned against the Lord! Again I lost the grace of God, and there was a burning fire, scorching in my bones, and I became weakened and wounded everywhere and, having come home, with sighs and groans, on bended knees, I begged the Lord to have mercy on me for the sake of the ulcers on the hand and foot of my Lord Jesus Christ, for the sake of mercy from His ribs with the flowing Blood 16. And again the Most Merciful had mercy on me, raising me from the dead. Oh, how many sins I have! I thank the Lord, who had mercy on me when I was upset with all the authorities in the city, with the Petersburg Chamber, with the merchants, with the spiritual brethren because of the countless number of poor people living idlely and asking me for alms every day; I repented of my grumbling and glorified the generosity of the Lord throughout my priesthood in Kronstadt, for I was never in need and the Lord always sent to the poor through good people. Here the meaning is shamelessly, unceremoniously. Prelest (church glory) – deception, seduction; wandering, evasion. Simplicity (church glory) – sincerity, purity; integrity, integrity. Packs (Church Glav.) - again, again, again. Prayer of St. Ephraim the Syrian. Rambov is the popular name for the city of Oranienbaum, now the city of Lomonosov. Contempt (church glory) – arrogance, pride, disdain. The exclamation of the priest before the reading of the Gospel at the liturgy. Irmos of the 6th song of the canon, voice 2. Charmer (church glory) – deceiver, seducer. Stropotny (Church Slavic) – crooked, uneven; deceitful, wrong. See the troparia at the Sunday Lenten Matins of Repentance, open the doors for me... Belial (Heb.) – lit.: insignificant, worthless. In the Bible, this word is applied to all depraved, wicked and evil people, but especially to Satan, as the main culprit of all wickedness and evil. Irmos of the 6th song of the Sunday canon at Matins, tone 4.