Май 1882 г.

Great confusion before Matins, which began at home due to the curiosity of my family in my desk and sometimes the theft of my things, real or imaginary; Both at home and in church I struggled and prayed for a long time to get rid of this dream. Finally I got rid of it, and a blessed peace reigned in me before confession, but not for long: while reading exapsalms 140 I noticed that a candle was burning over my head, contrary to my order, for it was dripping on my head and on the carpet of the royal doors, and again I was confused and could not calm down, and spoke the litany stealthily, truncated, the ends of exclamations; at the end of it again repentance, and again deliverance; after a special litany before Christ, the true Light, again a sharp temptation, again victory and deliverance; before the prayer service of the Iveron Mother of God, evil stubbornness, reluctance to serve, prayer for help and salvation - and again deliverance from evil stubbornness and peace of heart; then, during the reading of the canon and prayer to the communicants, there was a terrible closeness of death several times, again prayer and falling to the holy throne - and again sovereign, all-merciful deliverance, salvation and help. Upon arrival home, new temptations, and again, through prayer, double deliverance. After mass. The adversary tormented me terribly today before mass, during it, especially before communion and after communion of the female communicants (because of Paraskeva Ivanovna Kovrigina: why does she come first and stand in front of everyone - and she is not to blame for the primacy, since others do not come first), and when I read prayers of thanks in front of the royal doors, I was also terrified of the enemies who were mortally pressing me, but I finished reading in cramped and then cowered for a long time before the Holy Chalice before consuming the Holy Gifts, until the Lord had mercy and delivered me from my enemies, and I calmly used them. I came home and there was trouble again: Pasynkova turned out to be inattentive to me, turning her face away and offering her hand. Again a prayer of repentance, and again deliverance. Glory to God, who did not allow Satan to devour me. And it was already terribly, deadly crowded. What is it like in hell for sinners! It's terrible to think about. He looked, was seduced, was hurt, confessed, prayed, shed a tear, and was healed. Glory to God, our Savior and Doctor! O voluptuous, absurd flesh, instrument of the devil! Let the flesh, hostile to God, be crucified with passions and lusts. After the all-night vigil. I thank the Lord for His holy help during my celebration of the all-night vigil in the cathedral for taking away coldness of heart and bestowing tenderness, firmness and boldness, cordiality when reading the Gospel, when adversaries try to steal my mind and heart and deprive me of the word of the Gospel, not allowing me to utter other sayings and words. Thank you for saying the prayer to Christ, the true Light. Who will return to me the original purity and beauty of the image of God with which I was created in the beginning by my Creator? You, Lord Jesus Christ, came into the fallen world to restore the image in us. Rise up, O Lord! Grant us that which in the beginning belonged to us as property and which constitutes the inalienable property of the ranks of Angels and all the councils of saints who rejoice in heaven. Wake up! Amen. May 2, 82. Morning. Resurrection. On Sunday he celebrated late mass in the cathedral; spoke the word immediately after the Gospel by order of his superiors; by the grace of God he served with tenderness, read the pulpit well, with feeling, without haste, but in the end he was embarrassed by the breath of the enemy and missed it, starting with the words: For every gift is good... - to the words: we send... Vast spoke, strengthened, at first decently, then weakened in his heart from the action of the enemy. After mass at Kalinin, he baptized with stumbling blocks, but also with victory at the beginning and in the middle... at the end he weakened, struggling... He dined... drank champagne, bitters, and not a lot of port wine. Soon my head started to hurt (in the evening and throughout the next day, however, until three o’clock). The exposure of a tooth in the left lower gum was still on Saturday evening after the all-night vigil, the sharpness of the tooth pricked the tongue painfully. I pressed with my hand, wanting to squeeze it in, but it didn’t help, and these were painful symptoms before the rainy weather, which began on Monday morning and continues to this day. On Monday, the elder Nikitin had a temptation after looking at a photographic portrait of his wife in his absence, an unclean feeling, justification, passing it, a calm state of mind; Alexander Murashov had a treat with tea, sausage, and good Madeira. I ate sausages with great pleasure, quite a lot (for occasionally), and at night in a dream I almost experienced fornication from the vision and touch of the drowned woman I saved (allegedly), a beautiful woman: the devil takes on all sorts of forms and uses all sorts of tricks to catch him in his nets. I woke up, crossed myself, got up, washed, and prayed. There was no desecration - thank God... Eat less meat or not eat it at all in order to mortify passions. I thank the Lord for the greatest, quickest, most blessed deliverance, salvation, revival and help after secret, intensified prayer: firstly, in the Khrushchevs’ apartment before the prayer service, secondly, in Gerasimov’s house in the apartment of his clerk Dubilin before and during the celebration of the Sacrament, thirdly, in Lower Shirokaya Street in the house (near Timofeev) where the penitent Olympias lives. And in the house of Moses, during a prayer service, the enemy overpowered me with girlish charm, and I could not defeat the adversaries and was bitterly embarrassed and wounded (I forgot Dovmiliya the boatswain, whose daughter Pelagia is the birthday girl). But this temptation gave me the energy to pray harder and fight the demons in Gerasimov’s house before performing the Sacrament. Wednesday. My heart is extremely unclean: many passions have taken refuge in it for a long time and live, the beginning and root of which are sinful pride, vanity, pride, malice, hostility, hatred, envy, greed, lust, gluttony, gluttony and drunkenness, laziness, negligence and countless other passions, on which, as on his strings, the devil plays disastrously in our hearts whenever he wants. Woe to us sinners who have sold ourselves to the enemy through our passions! Almighty Savior, Lord Jesus, save us! The enemies have a strong intention through passion, especially through fornication, to corrupt the image of God in man, to turn him away from God and finally destroy him. Know this, people, and beware in every possible way of sensuality, greed, malice, anger, disobedience, pride, and envy. After gymnasium and vespers. I thank my all-merciful Savior and God the Lord Jesus Christ, who delivered me, for the sake of faith and warm repentance and invoking His name, from the great sorrow and cramped conditions to which I was subjected when boarding a cab to go to the gymnasium; from Shchegolev’s house all the way I was tormented by the poison of the serpent’s malice and prayed all the way, asking for mercy and deliverance, and only when I climbed the second staircase from the second to the third floor, I was delivered in the name of the Lord from the torment of the enemy, I became revived, calmed down, and my heart expanded. I left the secondary begging of beggar boys; however, I had to hurry. Then, before Vespers, the Lord saved me from distress: all out of calculations of stinginess and hardness of heart, lack of faith, addiction to earthly goods, lack of hope in God’s Providence and in reward according to giving due to the lack of desire for eternal blessings, eternal beauty, sweetness, inexhaustible, heavenly wealth. Enlighten, Lord, the eyes of my heart. Resurrection. I thank the Lord, who accepted my sincere repentance in anger at the sexton Mikhail Alex, for the report about the mother in labor (40th day of purification), awaiting prayer, and for the mother in labor herself, who seemed to come to church at the wrong time (before early mass), and who delivered me from hellish cramped conditions and sorrow and gave me peace and belly. I thank the Lord for my repeated deliverance from the snares of the enemy and oppression, especially after the great entrance, after the confused, crumpled dismissal and prayer behind the pulpit. I could not calm down for a long time before consuming the Holy Gifts, but I finally calmed down. I thank the Lord, who, after secret prayers, delivered me from the horned, poisonous, deadly demons that were bursting and killing my insides before the royal service and during the royal solemn prayer service in the cathedral and after it; I thank the Lord and the Lady, whom I begged before the prayer service in the apartment of Marya Ermolaevna Estafieva for the Grechukhins; It was terrible for me, weak, from the enemies, the horned ones confused and burst my soul, but were defeated by the invocation of the sweetest name; I thank the Lord for his great help during Vespers and giving me sweet singing, for his help at christenings in Gavrilov’s house (on Kronstadt Street), in the house of Gerasim Murashov in the apartment of Paraskeva Ivanovna Oleinikova, for deliverance from bad thoughts and for the pacification of my soul. Friday. I sinned gravely before God, before the Mother of God, before the holy Heavenly Powers, before all the saints, before all the members of the body of Christ - Christians and before all people in that, walking with the Holy Gifts, the most pure Body and Blood of Christ, I with annoyance, reluctantly, maliciously and stingily gave money to the poor, especially one poor man who has a father, a mother, and a sister sick (and he was decently dressed), telling him with bitterness: “Should I take care of the whole world,” and gave him only a ten-kopeck piece with irritation and anger. And he reluctantly and annoyedly gave too little to many, but meanwhile he received a ruble for the demand and other people’s money was to be distributed. Oh, malice, ingratitude, greed, lust, envy! Damn one, do I love money more than my neighbors who need it? Isn't money for a person, isn't it for his needs? Man is not for money, but it turns out from experience that man exists and lives and works for money. Woe to me, the accursed one, who has perverted the order of life indicated by God and introduced his own disorder. Enlighten the eyes of my heart, Lord, and correct my uncorrected heart, let me look at everything earthly as if it were dust and not attach my heart to anything, so that I may not sin against You, for all sins are due to earthly attachments. Glory to the victory of Divine mercy over my malice, for when I repented with all my heart and cried out to God for mercy and to change my heart from evil to good, the Lord soon showed me His mercy, delivered me from the scorching fire of my soul and gave me, unworthy, coolness and peace! And my anger, and my ingratitude, and my self-interest, and impatience, laziness for good deeds, and carnality, in general, my addiction to this life is like a passing dream! Love for God and neighbor is the element, the life of every sincere Christian soul, and its fruits are truth, peace and perfect joy in the Holy Spirit, a blissful life still here on earth. Three o'clock in the evening. I send heartfelt praise to the infinite mercy of God, for when I, with sincere repentance, in fervent prayer, turned to the Lord with a request for deliverance from the oppression and sorrow that befell me for being angry with a beggar and tearing off his hair with both hands (oh, insolence and impatience!), He forgave me and poured out His rich mercy on me. It was in the house of Gerasim Murashov in the apartment of Prokopiy Oleinikov. I thank the Lord, who poured out the mercy of His salvation on me at the very beginning of the day before the early liturgy in the Assumption Church at the end of seven o’clock in the morning: I came to the church and saw Arseny, the deputy headman, whom (Arseny) congratulated with the Angel and gave him his hand, and he took it and simply greeted him, without blessing or kissing his hand. So what? Due to the action of the disembodied enemy, hostility against him flared up in my heart, which with much work of repentance, self-reproach, and prayer, I defeated by the grace of Christ; then, at the beginning of the liturgy, he again defeated the enemy’s fear and delusion, then, with the difficulty of overcoming the enemy’s slander, he served the entire liturgy sincerely, heartily, zealously; I read the entire passage behind the pulpit with great boldness and a triumphant spirit, said the dismissal in good order, served the requiem service well, but stole the end and suffered for it, but was delivered from deadly oppression by the grace of God; Burachok served a prayer service decently, having first prayed earnestly for deliverance from the temptation of the enemy, fear and cramped conditions; he served on the military ship “Krasnaya Gorka” with great boldness and strength, defeating the great timidity and cowardice inflicted by the devil; he stole the vacation, shortened the holy water prayer; dined; it was difficult from wine and beer and a hearty lunch. At the gymnasium I barely finished two lessons, dozed off heavily, then again a prayer service in the Kudryavtsevsky wing, number nineteen, again a treat, refused, returned home, slept until six o’clock in the evening for the all-night vigil. I thank the Lord for salvation. Ten and a half o'clock in the evening. I thank the Lord for the great and repeated help at the prayer service with Sofia Andreevna Leontyeva and at the all-night vigil with prayer service with Marya and Elisaveta Semyonov, and for overcoming the machinations of the devil, and for the sweet revival by the grace of the Holy Spirit after overcoming the enemy’s machinations. If only the master of the church had known at what time the thief would come, he would have been vigilant and would not have let his house be broken into [Luke 12:39]. And we, sinners, slumbering and sleeping in everyday worries and passions, constantly allow the spiritual thief to undermine the houses of our souls. Resurrection. How often do I, accursed, multi-passionate, consume food and drink in excess, not only sober, but also stimulating! How I violate my nature! But how both sin and the culprit of sin, the devil, rape me! How brazenly he attacks and overthrows me, but with abstinence and fasting this could not have happened to me! I glorify the ineffable, great mercy of God, revealed in me this morning upon my arrival home from a prayer service with Stefanida Avvakumovna and Alexei Petrovich Yudin on the occasion of the name day of their son Nikolai. At this prayer service, while reading the Holy Gospel, the enemy caught and killed my soul with his vain fear after I saw Yudin himself (who was not present at the beginning of the prayer service) and thought about the great secret almsgiving of his wife Stefanida through me. Then I could not overcome the deadly sting of the serpent in me and prayed poorly, embarrassedly, in cramped conditions, with large gaps, for it was hard, even hard for me to die from my enemies because of alms money, of which, however, I do not steal a penny, but give everything little by little to the poor. Having barely finished the prayer service in silence, I left, killed by the enemies, and so I continued walking home; At home I began to earnestly pray to the Lord for deliverance from my adversaries and to grant me a right conscience, peace, salvation, freedom, and - oh, unspeakably great mercy! now I have been awarded deliverance, salvation, peace, space, boldness. Glory to God the Savior! Amen. Eight o'clock in the morning. He sang and read Matins with the greatest boldness and pleasure. Six o'clock in the evening. I preach the greatest mercy of the Lord to me, shown on the way to the gymnasium, when I, being in extreme cramped conditions and sorrow over the words I said to a beggar boy: “Ask these gentlemen (for alms)” (and here was the proofreader of the Kronstadt Messenger Deitmer), after which it became very difficult for me, I walked and repented with all my heart. The Lord forgave me at the Technical School, but the words were spoken against our home. Then repeated mercy, swift according to my faith, shown to me in Yakovleva’s house and apartment (Novaya Street) during and after a prayer service (bulging of the chest), then in my kindergarten during extreme tightness of heart after repentance and secret prayer. Tuesday. I thank my Lord for his wonderful help during the prayer service with Mr. Schauman at six o’clock in the evening: with sincere feeling, without stumbling, I performed the prayer service with a prayer of gratitude and a song to You, God, we praise, with complete release. I receive countless benefits from the Lord every day, and He is always merciful and generous, unenviable towards me - why am I, the accursed one, harsh, furious and hostile, angry towards those to whom I give alms every day, angry because I am forced to give them what they ask for? Envy, stinginess, pride, self-interest are the reason for this. This dog, this [dog] that stinks, rages and barks with malice at the Lord Himself, this, I say, sin, this culprit of sin, the devil, slandering everything that is holy and dear to God and God Himself, drive with contempt in all its countless forms and manifestations, drive it into the most secret refuge - in the heart, in the depths of it, do not spare it, just as it does not never spare you, beat him, the murderer, beat him, the murderer of the Lord Himself in the flesh, away from all his and his harmful caresses: rude, strictly, commandingly, boldly, boldly, always treat him - rude, impudent, blasphemous, ugly, terrible, soul-destroying. You begin to pray - he alienates you from the Lord God, from the Mother of God, from the holy Angels and from the holy saints of God, he is ready every minute to slander them, to blaspheme them through your own weapon - the heart, just as he slanders people to you, how he blasphemes, despises, hates through you often innocent people, the most gentle babies: why do they have facial features? unpleasant, rude, why is he a crybaby, why is his face ugly, unclean, etc.? Under various pretexts, he seeks hatred towards everyone. Oh, hundred-headed, evil, most crafty monster - sin! He, sin, swears at the Lord and His saints and to me, the accursed, when I serve the Lord, glorify Him, His saints, or beg them, or with the hope of their prayers and their intercession I want to reinforce in myself and in other people the hope of God’s mercy and salvation from our sins - he, sin, at that time will sparkle in me something inappropriate, absurd, will outrage me and will not allow me to speak out. words of prayer, praise, thanksgiving, dismissal, and thus kills my soul robberly, mercilessly, boldly, brazenly, from around the corner. Deliver me, Lord, from his wickedness. After Matins. I thank the Lord, who poured out the rich mercy of His salvation on me at the beginning of Matins, who delivered me from deadly oppression and sorrow and who bestowed righteousness, peace, freedom, boldness, strength and spiritual strength. He sang and read the canons with the greatest jealousy, loudly. (Before Matins I was upset with the poor, I treated them rudely, contemptuously, I violated the entire law of the Gospel, which consists of love, meekness and gentleness, abstinence, non-covetousness, holiness and chastity, obedience, patience - all these laws I broke and am breaking, damned one.) And after Matins, after the zealous service, I again violated the law of love and meekness and humility and fell into pride, anger, stinginess, impatience. I repent, Lord! The divine service of the Orthodox Church is a constant prayerful, grateful, laudatory communication of her faithful children with God, with the Mother of God, with the Angels and with all the saints, an unceasing, living conversation with God and with the saints, or Divine, miraculous secret action with the goal of recreation, purification, reconciliation with God and the Angels, with the saints, with earthly people, sanctification, renewal, deification and immortality, is the most living, personified memory of the entire life of Jesus Christ on earth, His miracles, His teachings, His commandments, His suffering, death, burial, resurrection and ascension into heaven and the sending down from God the Father of the Holy Spirit, is the hope of our common resurrection and future endless life. At lunch, unnecessarily, on a whim and for the sake of gluttony, he broke his fast (he ate cod in butter and eggs, drank coffee and tea with cream), and in addition, at ten and a half o'clock in the morning he drank wine and ate red stuffed fish, and through all this he became satiated (he dined without needing lunch) and lost the grace and help of God when he performed a christening in the Garbko house: the enemy so darkened and overpowered, I was embarrassed by the fact that, for the sake of haste, I secretly read all the prayers: I tried to pronounce them - and could not; then he officiated at the wedding with extreme difficulty, barely able to pronounce the words, but could not speak others out of false shame; I felt that the enemy reigned in me, I was spiritually dead, there was no sincere feeling in me, but confusion, lustful darkness and false shame, an extreme struggle with opposing forces. The fussy swallows, migratory guests, have arrived. It's raining at night, and the red fish makes me want to vomit. Evening. Twelve o'clock. O carnal, soul-destroying addiction! How often because of you I am embarrassed, lost, exhausted, dumb, blushing, dead. During Vespers, because of the sight and passion for female beauty, I could not pronounce the great litany, and the addiction served as a stumbling block for me; Meanwhile, aren’t all people equal in God, for God’s sake and in God? What's the difference? All are equal as members of Christ (one Head is Christ, one body of Christ, equally existing in the image of God and redeemed by His most pure blood; in Christ Jesus there is neither male nor female [Gal.3:28], but Christ is all and in all [Col.3:11]). Further, during prayer at Burachok’s, my food addiction confused, weakened, and killed my soul (while praying, I thought about what my zealous spiritual daughter had prepared for me in the apartment of the tanner Kuznetsov). But when I confessed my sin before God in sincere repentance, walking along the road to Kuznetsov, the Lord released me, bound by the enemy’s bonds. I thank my Savior and Deliverer Jesus Christ. Newspapers take up a lot of my time, which is necessary for eternity. Addiction to earthly goods is my powerlessness, my distress, death, confusion, darkness, extreme misfortune, and clinging to the Lord and to His commandments is the source of all good. And people consider earthly blessings to be: the possession of earthly hearts according to the flesh, earthly beauty, earthly carnal pleasures, satisfaction for a blind, senseless, one-day-old womb, possession of wealth, earthly distinctions, magnificent clothes, the use of all kinds of entertainment, for example, theaters, cheerful feasts, cheerful dachas, and so on. After early mass. I offer my heartfelt thanks to the Lord God for deliverance from grave temptations and disturbances of my soul during Matins and early mass, especially during Matins. At the very beginning of Matins, the Lord, through my prayer, delivered me from the oppression and plague of the enemy. While reading the Six Psalms, I noticed a dripping candle above my head and was indignant, lowered it and ordered it to be extinguished, then I saw smoke in the altar from the sloppiness of the altar watchman and became even more indignant. I could not speak the Great Litany for fear and embarrassment; in confusion I returned to the altar and in shame and disgrace from my cowardice and impatience I repented, falling to the holy throne and asking for mercy and protection, and the Lord had mercy, miraculously granting peace to me, confused and dead. The canon read with great zeal and loudness, stichera for the Feast of the Ascension (giving), too, pronounced the litany slowly but loudly (however, he spoke the petitionary litany extremely vaguely, incompletely, ended with the powerlessness of the heart, killed by invisible enemies), only the special litany, the release was stolen; then, extremely embarrassed and mortally struck in my heart, I repented, asking for the great, wonderful, ineffable, speedy mercy of God, and received it, calmed down from extreme excitement and spoke the prayer to Christ and the Light boldly. Vast release all over. He served Mass without stumbling, but with extreme weakness of heart. The instrument of service - my heart is indecent, nasty, weak, does not glow with love for God and neighbors, as it should when offering such a universal, terrible, all-saving, all-giving Sacrifice for the whole world. At the funeral service he stole his leave and suffered for it, but was pardoned after repentance and died. And at home the Lord showed mercy after repentance, for I continually fall into sin through hardness of heart, stinginess, bitterness, and contempt. Why were the great saints of God righteous, strong and blessed: John the Baptist, the great Isaiah, Jeremiah, Ezekiel, Daniel, Elijah, Peter, Paul, Andrew, James, John, Nicholas the Wonderworker and other countless saints? – By faith, trust in God, complete and undivided love for Him, perfect non-covetousness, purity, mercy, abstinence, devotion to God, obedience, patience. What is our faith, our hope, our beginnings of love for God and neighbor, our peace of mind, if not our love, our addiction to the flesh, to the world and its perishable goods, to acquisitions, to earthly splendor, to earthly sweets, to the beauty of clothes and various decorations? No one can serve two masters: for either he will hate one and love the other... You cannot serve God and mammon [Matthew 6:24]. After early mass with matins. During Matins, I was subjected to a very serious temptation due to my sensitivity, effeminacy, pride, voluptuousness, impatience, dislike, suspicion, resentment, when we began to [read] the eighteenth kathisma in verse with the choruses: Blessed are you, Lord and Savior, save me: since it seemed to me that the sexton Mikhail Al. Bystryakov did not want to echo me in singing and, as if with embitterment, suddenly fell behind, although he soon began singing with me again; I was offended by this, and it was enough for the disembodied enemies to enter my heart and take possession of it, confuse, crowd out, kill me, and I served like one killed, read unfamiliar verses and sang well, but when I had to pronounce the familiar litanies for the dead and ordinary, I was speechless, unable to speak from the tightness, confusion and death of the heart, and two litanies, the supplicative and the special, was completely forced leave. What sorrow, crampedness, bitterness, death there was - even if you cried and gnashed your teeth, it was so bitter! A hundred times I cursed (I say this, although in reality not so much) my resentment, my impatience, my pride! And after early mass, during an explanation with the sexton, it turned out that my opinion was completely false and all the bitterness was flattery and a chimera and the machinations of evil demons. But I had enough of this tormenting chimera at Matins and Mass, this bitterness, this acute temptation. God is also merciful that through my earnest repentant prayer during Matins (while singing the Most Honest) in the altar while kissing the Holy Altar in repentance, the Lord healed me so much that I felt both coolness and some freedom in my soul, although later, from a hasty and concealed reprimand at the small litany, I again became somewhat embarrassed and the prayer to Christ, the True Light should have been sung, and not read. At the early mass, the enemy continued to oppress and kill, although thanks to the merciful intercession of the Lord, he performed the mass quite decently, without stumbling, with the exception of the prayer behind the pulpit, in which he missed the words You glorify those and others almost to the end according to the action, according to the violence of the enemies; I stole my leave at mass and memorial service. Before the consumption of the Holy Gifts, the enemies were extremely oppressive, suppressed, depressing, disgraced, inducing despondency, but faith in the redemptive, cleansing, deifying power of the life-giving Mysteries suddenly sovereignly delivered me from all the deadening machinations of the enemy, and, using them, I rejoiced in spirit about my glorious salvation. Gluttony extremely spoils me, makes me of little faith, faint-hearted, impatient, touchy, unloving, for love is patient, kind,... does not get angry, does not think evil [1 Cor. 13:4-5]... All my life and every day and hour I need to learn how to worthily serve the Divine Liturgy, filled with holiness, truth and Divine love, unspeakable greatness, peace that surpasses all understanding. The priest celebrating the Liturgy must be filled with love, kindness, meekness, humility, patience, truth, aversion to sin, non-covetousness, must have a heavenly mind and a heavenly heart, not bound by any worldly attachments and passions, he must be all in God and all of God and only touch the earth with his body, but be in heaven with his heart, trampling all earthly things like dust, like decay, like hay How does love for one's neighbor manifest itself? Among other things, and especially in forgiveness of insults, forgiveness and patience for mistakes, in kindness towards him when he becomes embittered or reviles, disobeys or is indifferent to reprimands, advice, admonitions, for then one must pray earnestly for him, so that God Himself will enlighten him. Without communion of the Holy Mysteries, even for one day, two or three days, not to mention a week, I do not have true life in me, it becomes extremely impoverished in me, and when I begin to serve Vespers, Matins and the Liturgy, I am subjected to extreme weaknesses and temptations, and only after communion of the Holy Mysteries do I overcome them, calm down, and become strengthened in spirit. Glory to the Lord for this, who strengthens my fallen and mortified being with the Holy Mysteries. Holy Trinity Day. Glory to the Holy, Consubstantial, Life-Giving and Indivisible Trinity, merciful, preserving, satisfying and saving us! The Most Holy Theotokos is the incarnate shrine, rightness, meekness, humility, simplicity, love, goodness, mercy, the power of God, light, wisdom, unspeakable greatness, indescribable beauty, incomparable purity, surpassing that of the angels, the totality of all perfections: thus the Lord magnified and adorned His Mother! Glory to Thee, Lady! With Your God-pleasing prayers, help us all, adorned with the name of Your Son and God, to achieve perfect holiness. Amen. Our nature is extremely prone to sin, greedy for sin, and if God’s Providence had not warned us against sins, removing temptations, reasons, occasions, occasions, convenient moments from us, we would have committed every and the most terrible sin. Glory to the gracious, wise, cheerful providence of God, which watches over us according to His ineffable goodness! After late mass. It serves me rightly today at mass (before and just before mass) I had severe temptations: once because of Deacon Nicholas, who, as if through inattention, did not kiss his hand during the blessing, and about this sin of suspicion and my bitterness, I begged the Lord; then extreme tightness and sorrow, devilish pressure due to yesterday’s satiety with milk, cottage cheese with an unleavened and thick layer of cream, also fear and cowardice about the upcoming prayer for the seditious - and here I begged the Lord and read the prayer with God’s help slowly, with the feeling of unfailingly; then, however, the crowding continued until the communion of the Holy Mysteries, and it was extremely difficult for me to serve. I cursed my gluttony - this is idolatry every day! I could not read the prayer behind the pulpit for fear of the devil; he stole the leave and crushed it. I read the prayers at Pentecostal Vespers intelligently and with feeling. We who are alive are continually being given over to death for the sake of Jesus, so that the life of Jesus may also be revealed in our mortal flesh [2 Cor. 4:11]! What happened to the heavenly Apostle happens daily to me, a multi-passionate, spiritual dead man. Whit Monday. Upon arrival from St. Petersburg. I thank the Lord, who surprised me with the miracle of His mercy and salvation during mass in the Trinity Alexander Nevsky Lavra, celebrated by Metropolitan Isidore in the building with Bishop Hermogenes and the newly ordained Bishop Arseny; looking intently at the Metropolitan, I deceived myself in my heart - and, damned, I despised the Bishop in my heart and immediately died in spirit, but now having repented with all my heart, sincerely condemning myself, my thoughts and movements of the heart and having given due honor, respect and love to the rank and face of the Bishop, I miraculously rose in spirit from the dead, came to life, rose up, and was at peace; another time, at mass, another inner unclean thought killed and desecrated me from an evil unclean view of [...] youth, but now he condemned this thought, this movement, calling on all-conquering grace, as he called for it before, and rose again, came to life again. And before mass, riding in an omnibus 141 and sitting next to the annoying Paraskeva Kovrigina, I was indignant at her and hated her for her persistence from me, but I also died in spirit, and having repented heartily, I came to life. Glory to the Lord! Cleanse us from all defilement 142... This is also defilement: coldness, laziness of thought, heart, will for sincere fulfillment of prayer, for doing, fulfilling the commandments of God, for love of God and neighbor, for repentance, for glorification, thanksgiving; the defilement of sin is the ever-present gluttony, gluttony, drunkenness, fornication, carnality, selfishness, envy, pride, ambition, stinginess, covetousness, cowardice, timidity and fear, unbelief, despondency, despair, partiality, contemplation, servility, suspicion, condemnation, peevishness, frivolity, inconstancy, ingratitude. The words of Yakov Ivanovich Kupriyanov (on the St. Petersburg ship) regarding the rooting in the hearts of people of the first instructions and impressions in youth are remarkable: they must be remembered, they must be cut to death on the nose of every educator. The words of Bishop Pavel Verkhovsky that by receiving rewards we gain externally, but internally we lose morally (through our addiction to them and to earthly well-being in general, through increased self-love, ambition, pride, vanity, through the heart falling away from love for God and neighbors, for you cannot, it is said, work for two masters [Matthew 6:24]), are quite fair and significant. Sincere repentance consists in declaring to every sin the enmity committed against it, in the dissolution of all union with it, all communication, all solidarity. This complete determination to leave all connection with sin in all its forms is expressed in the words of denial of what was announced before receiving Baptism: I deny Satan, and all his works, and all his ministry, and all his pride. Is this how we repent? Isn’t our repentance just one form, a letter without spirit? Every man is a lie [Ps.116:2]. So, even when reading the model of all prayers - the Lord's Prayer Our Father, we constantly lie, not doing what we say, what we ask; We say: Hallowed be Thy name, but we ourselves do not try in the least to live holy, according to the Scripture: be holy in all your actions [1 Pet. 1:15], we do not glorify, but blaspheme the name of God with our lives, deeds, and passions; We say: Thy Kingdom come, but we constantly allow sin and the devil to reign in us, and he completely dominates us; We say: Thy will be done, but we ourselves consider it as a duty to fulfill our deliberate will, passionate, disastrous, blind, insane; We say: our daily bread is our rain this day, but we ourselves indulge in gluttony and luxuriate in food and drink, and, calling bread a common property and overindulging in it, we do not willingly share with the poor, but consider ourselves only the possessors of God’s gifts and are overly concerned about the future; we say: forgive us our debts, but we ourselves reluctantly part with the sins that possess our souls, we do not sincerely repent; we say: we leave him as our debtor, but we ourselves exact for trifles, we quarrel over trifles; We say: do not lead us into temptation, but we ourselves, blindfolded, go to all kinds of temptations, to every sin; We say: deliver us from the evil one, but we ourselves give ourselves over to the evil one; We say: For Thine is the Kingdom, but we ourselves want to be kings and masters in our lives, we rely on ourselves, on our own strength, on our connections, on wealth, on power, on people, we seek our own glory, and not God’s glory in everything. Throughout the Lord's Prayer we lie and deceive ourselves and the Lord, but God is not mocked [Gal.6:7]. How to get rid of violent, nasty, crafty, blasphemous, fear-inducing thoughts of the devil? So I suffer from them, many, many suffer from them. At half past twelve o'clock in the morning on May 19, heavy warm rain began without a thunderstorm with a southerly wind. Glory to God in Trinity! We waited a long time for this blessing, about a month and a half, and finally we waited with joy. Great is the mercy of God, truly divinely great! It was not because of our iniquities that he made us eat, O Lord, but because of our sins he rewarded us to eat [Ps. 103:10]. Cold and cloudy. I cannot, Lord, ever adequately thank You for the endless Your mercies that are revealed to me every day; I want to describe them - and I forget many. Every day during Matins, and when there is mass, especially during mass, You graciously deliver me from the poison of sin and from the machinations of the ruler of the world, you give me life, peace, freedom, boldness, taking away death, languor, confusion, crampedness and fear, and not only during the service, but at every time of the day you visit me with Your power, destroying in me the power of sin and death. For this, glory and thanksgiving to You, O most merciful Lord! What mercy I was honored with yesterday during early mass, when, being dead in sins, I was honored with tears of tenderness for repentance and was revived by Your goodness, especially after receiving the Holy Mysteries, and with boldness I performed the entire liturgy. And then, when, at a memorial service on Malaya Ekaterininskaya Street in the house of Rasskazovaya, the ethereal villains poured their deadly poison into my soul, putting their wickedness into my heart, and I, going to the gymnasium for an exam for eighth-grade students, prayed to the Lord for mercy all the way (the path), You had mercy on me and gave me peace upon entering the gymnasium, and I felt reborn, free. And during Vespers, what a mercy it is to fall before the holy, terrible and life-giving throne! What solemn joy, what jealousy, delight during the singing of the stichera! My soul has flown into Your word! And after the evening funeral service, from what cramped conditions You saved me after the prayer of repentance that, out of fear of demons, you did not say the dismissal of the funeral service! Then, at the prayer service in Krayushkin’s house in the outbuilding, what peace You gave me, what freedom during the prayer service! Glory to Thee, that despite the multitude of enemy intrigues and bitterness, You pour out a multitude of Your mercy on me and every minute you drive away the one who seeks to destroy me from me, like an evil dog. When we stand up for prayer, it is not suddenly, not immediately that we feel the desire and zeal for prayer, for conversation with God, with the Mother of God, with the Guardian Angel, but after we sincerely feel (if we feel) our poverty, sinful impurity, weakness, damnation, blindness and nakedness and extreme need for God and His mercy, and when we feel - let us know how good the Lord is. And at the beginning of prayer and sometimes during its continuation, we are often absent-minded and inattentive, the head and heart are alien to God, and the Mother of God, and the Guardian Angel, and the soul is lethargic, drowsy, relaxed, dead. Arise, O sleeper, we must often sound the trumpet, and rise from the dead, and Christ will give you light [Eph.5:14]. What causes such relaxation and mental sleep? – The pleasures and worries of life, the various passions of the heart for earthly treasures: where your treasure is, there will your heart be also [Matthew 6:21]. Thursday. After mass at the cemetery. After countless temptations and demonic embitterments, before mass, before leaving, he went into the cathedral to venerate the holy altar with a prayer for deliverance from the oppressive, deadening, evil suspiciousness regarding his family, who often go to the secret table; also on the road; in the room where the deceased Anna lay, he bowed down in the cramped space, asking for only one need: love, walking in truth and righteousness - and the Lord had mercy; then, after the words of the litany and dismissal were hidden and after the requiem, he again [worshiped] before the Lord in cramped conditions and again received. In the cemetery church, before mass, during mass, he was wounded and delivered many times; After mass, the Lord consoled me without number with the communion of the Holy Mysteries, miraculously reviving and deifying me. Oh bliss! Oh, celebration! Oh peace! Oh freedom! O light yoke! Friday. I thank the Lord, who quickly and solemnly delivered me for my repentance and prayer from my deadly bitterness and anger towards the wife of Archpriest Peter Lamanov, Anna Petrovna, because she sent her former servant to me for alms, but she herself did not give her anything. The Lord sent me deliverance in Klimov’s wooden house (on Novaya Street) before the prayer service of the birthday girl Elena; The Lord created a second great deliverance in Karolyi's house number eighteen during a prayer service also for the birthday girl (in the fourth crew there was a wonderful view of the northern part of the bay), when I thought about using for the benefit of the poor some of the income from the prayer service with the captain of the first rank, Konstantin Grigorievich Skryplev (meant). I repented, considered money to be dust, which should not be thought about during prayer and not have the slightest attachment to it, which has a detrimental effect on the soul and separates us from God, Who is the only thing needed. The Lord created the third deliverance at a prayer service with Mr. Skryplev, and more than once; The Lord granted the fourth deliverance and salvation in peace at my home through a prayer of repentance and good judgment, when I fell into heartfelt voluptuousness through sight of the girl; the fifth deliverance in the apartment of Elena Ivanovna Yakovleva before and during the prayer service. (Yesterday and today it is very cold.) The devil, with his foul, deadening breath, infected, desecrated, perverted, killed us, and every day without number he tries again to curse at us with his foul breath of various abominations of sin, and we have not yet completely hated sin, for example, even gluttony and delicacy, because of which in the beginning we were erupted and defiled in the person of our forefathers, then anger, wickedness, pride, disobedience, impatience, stubbornness, envy, greed, laziness, negligence, suspicion, anger, blasphemy, ill will, malice, gloating, partiality, cowardice, fear, false shame, voluptuousness, sinful daydreaming, stinginess, gluttony and drunkenness, idle talk, idle listening, covetousness, recklessness, unfriendliness, inconstancy, strife, quarrels. Let us love the Lord and each other with a pure heart, let us be zealous for the truth of God and let us do it every day and hour with all our hearts. Oh, how good it is to work for the Lord, to love the Lord! After the cathedral memorial service for the empress. I thank the Lord, who gave me sincerity and tenderness during the service of the requiem and deliverance from the deadening devilish insensibility, and then from the caprice of the heart and embitterment towards a fellow servant. After small vespers. I was tempted with the sexton of Kamenogradsky: he did not want to sing the dogmatist about the Incarnation and the glory of the Mother of God and angered me because he did not want to sing the Troparion of the Theotokos before the quiet Light; then on the poem it’s the same. It’s bitter to see a fish in the rector: he is as cold as ice towards the entire church service and has little sense; he wants to see all members of the clergy as such. And for twenty-five years I have been serving with such a cold man who has not said a single word of approval to me for all my zeal for the service and who would be glad if there were no correct praise to the Lord; he has only a soulless, short form, one form in the service of the Lord. Amen. May the Lord crush and soften, and melt his heart like wax. Visit him with sorrows, O Lord, so that he may not cease to be forgotten in his wealth, the tuna received from You, the all-generous Lord. The twenty-sixth summer he does not want to feel Your bounty, he does not share his great wealth with any of the poor! Who will get what you have prepared? [Luke 12:20]. I thank the Lord, who delivered me from painful voluptuousness, which kindled and desecrated my heart through the gaze of the beautiful face of a girl, and who gave me enlightenment, purification, peace and freedom with the transformation of my heart from the charming, corruptible into true, life-giving love. Glory to the Savior and Benefactor God! Resurrection. I thank the Lord, who surprised me with His powers and His mercies during my early liturgy in the cathedral. The evening before, I was at the Markovs’ and ate and drank something sweet (black caviar with a round sticky bun, a bun with cheese and butter, fruit). This gluttony resonated with me with extreme heaviness: my heart became dead, and I begged the Lord in repentance to have mercy and revive me, and the Lord did not leave me with His mercy, destroyed the bonds of death, and gave me life again to spiritual existence. But just as my sins continued to tempt and kill me, and I again, repenting, prayed to the Lord for mercy and revival, then again I, the accursed one, was granted mercy and life, especially after the great entrance, at which my enemies always mortally wound me, not allowing me to pronounce the name of Empress Maria Feodorovna calmly and separately from the heir. Received life-giving communion; The servant of God Aquilina spoke the prayers before communion without stumbling; I didn’t read the entire pulpit, but I said a good word. At the prayer service I did not read all of the Gospel; for my repentance I was pardoned for my timidity. After early mass and after being at home, he went for a walk on the wall to the sea and got upset with the beggar, tore his hair out, and wounded his own soul; having strongly repented, he was pardoned and pacified; Commander Pilkin served a timid prayer service in a house in the garden; he did not say much in the Gospel, litany, or prayer; he repented after the prayer service and was pardoned. I visited Repnikov and prayed for him, who was sick. What will happen to him - the Lord knows. Today at Matins the Lord did with me the great mercy of deliverance and revival. Glory and thanksgiving to the all-righteous, most merciful Lord who constantly has mercy on me. How to explain the words of the Lord Jesus Christ: whoever loves a son or daughter more than Me is not worthy of Me [Matthew 10:37]? The incident led me to the clearest interpretation. One very needy student came to me with a request to lend him a certain amount for his needs, but, distributing every day to many people in need, I found it difficult to give him the required amount and sent him to one rich neighbor, who had only one big daughter in his care, telling him that he would probably give you, because for him your amount was a drop in the ocean (the neighbor had seventy or eighty thousand), but the neighbor, in response to his request, answered him that his daughter grumbles and scolds him for giving to the poor, and he puts all the money in the bank, leaving the smallest amount for himself; and besides, the rich man said, some of my debtors have not yet paid me their debt, so I cannot give it to you. So you see, because of partial love for his daughter, who wanted to take advantage of all the great wealth of her father, the rich father refused to help the poor student, although the latter explained to him the hopelessness of his situation. And always, every day, for many years, this rich man refused to all the poor who stood in large numbers in front of the house in which he lived, both because of his greed for money and because of the wrong, worldly love for his daughter, who vigilantly watched over her father, no matter how he gave alms. This is how the rich neighbor loves his daughter more than Christ God, in the person of the poor, who asked him for mercy every day and was refused. Is he worthy of Christ God and His Kingdom? Unworthy. The Lord did not receive from him, the rich man, when His brothers were in need; neither will the rich man receive from Christ when he himself needs a drop of God’s grace. Because you did not do it to one of the least of these, you did not do it to Me. With the same measure you use, it will be measured to you [Matthew 25:45;7:2]. Whoever loves the world does not have the love of the Father (to the Heavenly Father) [1 John 2:15], that is, for example, who loves to read only secular books and newspapers and does not read the Gospel and the writings of the holy fathers or books of spiritual content in general, who loves to be in theaters and worldly entertainment gatherings, but does not and does not like to be in church and stand during worship services, who loves only secular conversations and does not like spiritual conversations that have a sacred character. To say in a sermon in my defense why I love to be with ordinary people and talk with them. I am scolded for communicating with ordinary people. He who loves God often and willingly remembers His holy name with reverence and joy. Therefore, the Church teaches us to often say the Trisagion Prayer: Holy God... Most Holy Trinity, have mercy on us, doxology: Glory to the Father and the Son and the Holy Spirit... Lord, have mercy... Our Father; and our need, curse, poverty, misery, blindness and nakedness encourage us in everything and always to turn to God in prayer, God’s incessant benefits to us prompt us to often thank Him, His wondrous perfections call us to praise Him daily. The time of worship is, as it were, the time of the future world judgment. During the service in the church, the following still stand before God: the king and the warrior, the nobleman and the commoner, the rich and the poor, the learned and the ignorant; here everyone is equal and human pride is trampled upon - not like in worldly gatherings arranged for only the rich or noble. Tuesday. After matins and early mass from Alexandra Mikhailovna Ivanova (née Semenova). I thank the Lord, firstly, for deliverance from grief, secondly, for holy zeal during the reading and singing of the canon and stichera of the Forerunner and the Mother of God, thirdly, for the grace of tenderness and tears during my liturgy and for deliverance from countless enemy intrigues, especially after the great entrance, fourthly, for the non-judgmental, life-giving communion of the Holy Mysteries, wonderfully for me rejoicing, encouraging, encouraging, strengthening, renewing. I sing to the Lord, for he is glorified in me [Exodus 15:1]. So much for fasting: I ate too much twice in one day: at lunch, buckwheat porridge and in the evening at the birthday boy’s with halibut pie, and this was done by the priest who served the early liturgy that day and was honored to partake of the most pure, most heavenly, life-giving, terrible Mysteries of Christ our God. What animal greed! What inattention to yourself and your salvation, and to your title and ministry, and to such a great Sacrament of salvation and eternal life! Oh, woe to me, a sinner who dwells in such a shameful habit! When will I take care of the only thing needed - the salvation of my soul and the souls of the people entrusted to me?! About unfeigned love, selfless to God and to one's neighbor, about sincere, constant prayer, about frequent, diligent reading of the word of God and the writings of the holy fathers, about deeds of love and mercy, about non-covetousness, about abstinence, about meekness and kindness, patience and humility? Time is approaching the end and the answer for my entire life! Why am I not constantly preparing? I hardly slept all night, or rather, I slept restlessly and often woke up from overeating and a full stomach! If I don’t know how to eat my favorite foods, then I shouldn’t eat them. Despite the fact that I am so sinful and constantly irritate God’s love for mankind, the Lord, in His ineffable compassion, has mercy on me, the accursed, and when yesterday I cried out to Him from my soul to grant me the grace of forgiveness and a life-stream of grace for my soul, deadened by satiety, He revived me, relieved me, and consoled me. So today, by His wonderful mercy, I will serve the requiem mass at the cathedral and again partake of the life-giving Mysteries. May this communion not be for my judgment, but for the healing of soul and body, as usual. After Matins. I thank the Lord, who surprised me with His great mercy by reviving me, dead with sins, during Matins, when I fell to the life-giving throne in repentance with living faith in Him who sat on it; I rose from the dead after that now and read the canons with delight and galloping of the soul. Glory to God the benefactor! After Matins, when I came home, I was again wounded and died with instant voluptuousness of heart, but, having strongly repented, I received wonderful forgiveness, permission and deliverance from the Lord and lay down to rest and slept sweetly. During Matins, I fell into the sin of suspicion regarding the rector about hiding money for Kudryavtsev’s wedding, which hurt and killed me, but when I condemned myself for suspicion and falling away from love and returned to my duty, to love by the grace of God, then I was healed and rejoiced. God bless! The Lord surprised me with His great mercy by invoking His sweetest name in repentance during the prayer service and especially after it in the apartment of the servant of God Martha Mikhailovna (house [...]): I was overcome, with malice, scorching and crowding, by the human adversary, not allowing me to sincerely pronounce the words of prayers and litanies, especially the Gospels, which I had not read: Ask, and it will be given... [ Matthew 7:7 ] - and to the Most Holy Theotokos: In those days... And at the end of the prayer service I was in shame of face and oppression of my soul [...], but when I sincerely prayed that the goodness of God would overcome my malice and His grace would surpass all my sins, then the triumph of God’s mercy took place in me: I was healed of malice, having been delivered from fire and oppression. I thank the Lord for His great goodness. Going to matins and meeting beggars asking for alms every day, I told them with grief and a complaint against them that even in the summer they do not work, but they expect food and clothing from me and that it costs me dearly (good people give), and then, when one beggar at the cathedral began to ask for clothes, I hit him with a cane out of frustration, but with my anger I wounded my soul and came to the church in cramped conditions and sorrow, with dead soul and began to fervently repent and pray, falling to the holy throne (at the Intercession), and God, rich in mercy - oh, miracle! raised me up, killed by my sins, forgave my iniquity, my insolence, anger, malice, love of money, stinginess, pride, lust, ingratitude, lack of faith, lack of hope. Oh, damned me! I insult, despise, hate, revile, beat the members of Christ, whereas I should give alms with eagerness, zeal, humility, joy, and patience. After all, the Lord gives to the needs of the poor! After Matins, again a meeting with many beggars, again grief, reproaches, screams, especially at one beggar with a mutilated foot, whom I shouted at and sent back from where I came, for there are many beggars without him, although I gave him five kopecks - and again wounding and death to the soul, sorrow, hellish burning, loss of boldness, and again repentance, and again pardon. Glory to [God’s] immeasurable mercy, but to me, careless and lazy to please the God of my life, shame and disgrace! Eleven o'clock in the afternoon. I thank the Lord for His great mercy, shown to me through the prayer of repentance for my hardness of heart upon leaving the apartment of a poor shoemaker, whose infant daughter was sick, for whom I prayed, but even earlier the Lord had mercy on me when I repented of another case of hardness of heart at our house. I prayed about it in my home. But now the Lord delivered me through a prayer of repentance in a voluptuous look at the breasts of a girl - a look that mortally wounded me and killed my soul. Who will deliver me from this body of death?.. No good thing lives in me, that is, in my flesh [Rom. 7:24,18]: because of addiction, because of love for the flesh, I fall every day into countless and grave sins; it is necessary to crucify it without fail with passions and lusts, it is necessary to eat bread and water, and not to feast on it during Lenten times. I know who and what my Lord Jesus Christ is for me, what power, what light, what life that revives my deadness, what peace, what purification, what a source of holiness and truth, what boldness, what unfading, most pure beauty, what sweetness, what glory, what ineffable goodness! Without Him I am damned, poor, blind, poor and naked! Do not be discouraged by temptations: your Lord is with you, He is always the same and always strong and wants to help you and allows temptations in order to admonish you, punish you, cleanse you, make you wise for salvation, establish you, make you unshakable. About the calling to the apostleship, about the labors of walking and preaching and about the wonderful works of mercy of the Lord. On the third week after Pentecost. What has the Lord not done for you, O man, and what have you done and are doing for Him? For you, He came down from heaven, became incarnate, lived among men, worked, walked from place to place, preached, did countless acts of charity, working miracles, healing and raising the dead, feeding the hungry; for you I endured insults, reproaches, beatings, spitting, beatings, strangulations, suffering on the cross and the most severe and blasphemous death. For you I sent the Holy Spirit on the apostles and through them on all believers. For you I poured out a sea of ​​grace, or countless Divine powers, so that you could be saved in every possible way; for you the grace of Baptism, or the bath of rebirth - oh, unspeakable mercy! For you, sonhood, or adoption of you to God; for you the seal of the Holy Spirit, for you the grace of repentance, forgiveness and resolution of your sins; for you - oh, miracle! – the most pure Body and the most pure Blood of the Lord; for you the grace of healing and [bodily] ailments in the Sacrament of Anointing; for you the Church is a heavenly school, and a heavenly physician, and a house of spiritual food, and a house of consolation, and a church of praise and glorification of the Trinitarian God, and a treasure of all gifts of grace. - What are you doing to save yourself? Tell me honestly, are you doing anything? Didn’t he give himself up entirely, with his whole being, to vanity and decay? Has he not humbled himself to the level of dumb cattle, for it is said: a man who is ignorant of honor has become like dumb cattle and become like them [Ps. 48:13]? After Matins. I thank the Lord, who, through the prayer of repentance, delivered me from the lust of voluptuousness that tormented and killed my soul, as a result of an instantaneous glance and wounding. Do you really know, man, the consequences of every sin? Sin defiles the soul, separates it from God - the source of our life, confuses the soul, worries, darkens, stings, scorches, torments, kills, shames. Fear sin like a biting serpent. Friday. I thank You, Lord, for You surprised me with Your ineffable mercy (during Matins in the Intercession chapel), raising me from the dead and giving me wondrous streams of Your life for repentance with faith and falling to the Holy Throne with faith and hope. It’s five o’clock in the evening just before vespers (in church). Again the Lord visited me with the greatest mercy, delivering me through the prayer of repentance and falling to the holy life-giving throne at the Intercession from the deadly charm of voluptuousness and granting me justification, purification and sanctification, peace, space, belly, boldness. Glory to the Lord! Ten o'clock in the evening, in my kindergarten. I thank the Lord, who graciously accepted my repentance in the movement of voluptuousness that killed my soul. I thank the Lord who gave me life and peace. [...] in me for every day and hour of spiritual life and death - life after making sincere repentance of sin and with the soul standing in truth and holiness, and death after creeping into sin or committing sin - they firmly convince me to stand firmly in goodness and with all my might to flee from all sin. Amen. In teaching the subjects of the Law of God, I notice a lack of scientific conclusion and application of what has been learned to the case. We must pay strict attention to this. There is one Being who truly loves me and saves me - my Lord and God, and after Him or with Him and in Him the Most Pure, Most Blessed Mother of God, the holy Angels and holy men of God, akin to me by nature. May I also love Him with all my being and in Him all His friends. I thank the Lord, who surprised me (at six and a quarter o’clock in the morning in church) with His life-giving mercy by delivering me from the mortal distress that befell me for the abbot’s suspicion of hiding ten rubles for Kudryavtsev’s marriage, for I repented of my suspicion, greed, and selfishness, and the Lord had mercy. Compare the grace-filled state of your soul and the state of slavery to the passions of life: gluttony, greed, envy, malice, voluptuousness. What an infinite difference! What lightness there is in the state of justification and virtue, and what heaviness in slavery to passions! Glory to the Lord, who arranged this! Sin separates the soul from God, from the world, from His light and power, and unites it with the devil, who is the source of all evil, all misfortune. Bowing at the waist and on the ground in prayer, kneeling and lying down serve as gymnastics for the soul and body, gymnastics of humility, reverence, labor, depressing the multi-passionate flesh, concentration in prayer and protection from lethargy and distraction. In order not to sin in viewing things or persons (in general, animate or inanimate objects) and in using them, one must firmly know and remember the intention of the all-good and all-righteous Creator, who created every creature and every thing with a known, definite, good, useful, wise purpose. If we fail to remember or lose sight of this intention, with our depravity and passion, we can easily look at beings and things incorrectly and use them incorrectly and harmfully, sinfully and uncleanly. And how much we have distorted in life, and above all ourselves, our lives. Saturday. I thank the Lord for the mercy of revival through the prayer of repentance during Matins and for the solemn reading and singing of the canon and stichera of the dead on the Sabbath; I began mass at the mortification of my soul from invisible enemies, but through my prayer the Lord again revived me with the breath of the Spirit of grace, for from yesterday’s gluttony and drinking two glasses of vodka, my heart was extremely weakened. An extremely grave temptation came to me from the sexton, who did not sing the sacrament (although I said it clearly), but who read the canon; this upset and confused me, upset me, so that I could not properly pronounce the prayers to the communicants, I believe, Lord, and Thy Supper, but May it not be for judgment or condemnation, I completely missed it out of embarrassment... It was hard, very hard for me... Only by constantly looking to the Lord and calling on His name did I overcome the tormenting adversaries. At the prayer service for the martyr, I read the Gospel with extreme difficulty and did not finish it, because my enemies bound my [...], my heart, thoughts and tongue... killed me, and again the Lord, called upon diligently, delivered me, consoled me, strengthened me. December 6, 1880. As a keepsake. Our father, rector Pavel V. Trachevsky, wanted unjustly, through deception, to take possession of one hundred and fifty rubles sent by Sidor Bogdanov to Athos to one hieromonk, whom this money did not find alive and therefore was sent back to the Kronstadt post office. The money letter did not say from whom it was sent, and therefore it was not difficult for a person who regards money as an idol to succumb to the temptation to profit from a hefty sum. The abbot, who has tens of thousands in capital, succumbed and persuaded the girl Tatiana Ostrova, his spiritual daughter, to use this money, teaching her to say that this money is her property, and, if necessary, to give a few rubles for the issue. Fortunately or unfortunately for Father Pavel, the real owner was found, and the money jackpot slipped away from Father Pavel. But why did the Island maiden intervene here? Since she sometimes sent money to Athos, the post office thought that she had sent this money too, and asked her when they met if it was her money? She also lacked the honesty to refuse them decisively, and she promised to consult with Father Paul, as her spiritual father, and he gave advice to say that the money was hers. What an example for schismatics! What, they will say, are the Nikonian Orthodox priests: they are ready for any baseness for money! (At the postmaster after the all-night vigil.) It is written according to the rule to get to know the people who surround us and serve with us. Father Superior Pavel V. Trachevsky charges himself a fee for confessional testimonies to the bride and groom, and a considerable one: for example, from the sailor Captain Ivan Ivanovich (the assistant chief of the port) he took five rubles and did not give it to the sexton. (To his characterization.) Father rector Pavel Trachevsky did not allow the son of the late Dmitry Stepanovich Kurmashev to bring his father’s body into the cathedral for the funeral simply because he, the rector, was not invited to the funeral services, which I served as the spiritual father of the deceased. When the merchant Vasily Mikhailovich Kudryavtsev, an ace of Kronstadt, came to pay his respects to him, the rector, the archpriest could not resist - he allowed the funeral service to be held in the cathedral, however, because he, the rector, was invited to take him out, serve the liturgy and the funeral service. He allows himself everything, he performs funeral services for everyone in the cathedral, whose funeral services he goes to, but he does not allow us when we serve for the dead, he does various [harassments]. April 24. Today, during Matins, Father Superior for some reason ordered the priest Father Taratin to hurry up and omit the songs of the canon that I was reading (the ninth canto). Stichera were not sung during praises. I was confused and prayed for unanimity and that the Lord would put respect for the decrees of the holy fathers into the abbot’s heart. During Holy Week in the Assumption Church, he also mercilessly omitted the service, extremely shortening it arbitrarily. [The paragraph is crossed out by Father John’s hand and the following entry is made. – Edg.] It was a misunderstanding and a mistake on my part. What is written above is incorrect - nothing like this happened. God bless! From the evening of August 19, Wednesday, I ate some quick soup and liquid juice from roast meat and a little milk, breaking my fast unnecessarily, and at night there was an extremely strong temptation for fornication. O I, accursed glutton and carnivore! How long will I break my fasts and lose my salvation, or destroy my salvation, destroy my inner church? How long will I not eat bread and water? Drinking beer with an acute cough is harmful: I could not sleep for a long time and coughed in bed for a long time after drinking beer (as of August 8, 1881). Mikhail Yakimovich Gorbov in Moscow. In St. Petersburg, near the Semenovsky Bridge on the corner of Gorokhovaya, house No. 59, apartment 24 (Warsaw tavern). The owner of the apartment is Philip Kruchinin (Kallishekovich). God! Remind me of everything that You deigned to instill in me regarding serving You during the past days and years of my life - a multi-passionate life, so that I may glorify You and formulate a living science of worship for our Holy Orthodox Church. Wake up! When compiling a science of worship, take as a guide the Catechism of Philaret 144, especially the treatise on the ninth member. Father Paul, the rector, must participate in spiritual ceremonies, firstly, out of indispensable duty, secondly, for the order and splendor of religious processions and, thirdly, because as long as he is alive and well, I do not want to take precedence in the church. To the Pilkins for tea, to Vasily Fedorovich Nikitin, to the Sturgeons. Lamanov in the second grade on April 5, 1882, my book to read. In the fourth grade, Nikolaev and Belevich. Either money, or women, or the noble and rich of this world, or elegant clothes, silk and velvet, or shiny military tinsel, or sweet and cheerful food and drink, or the rich, conspicuous furnishings of our homes, or the learning of this world, seduce our eyes, souls and hearts, draw us into sins and addictions, turn us away from God, from the only thing we need, and kill our souls, then there are darkened, weakened, desecrated, cooled, coarsened, dulled. Oh, how persistently and terribly the devil works through our sensuality and takes us into his power! Who, faithful and prudent, will escape from his snares? Only one who has renounced the world, from threefold lust: the lust of the flesh, the lust of the eyes and the pride of life [1 John 2:16], who has renounced malice and united himself with goodness and the All-Good. There, there, I want to go to heaven, where there is eternally pure air of pure souls, where there is clear, unflickering light, where there is imperishable, spiritual food and spiritual drink that does not burden or corrupt the soul, where there is imperishable, radiant, unblemished beauty, where there is imperishable, ever-present sweetness, where there is eternal, unbreakable freedom of spirit, where unshakable peace. Look with your mental eyes, what precious pearls of virtues - holy men of God of every rank, status, age - reside in heaven! Imitate them in the troubled life here and you will be saved. On Lazarus Sunday in the evening during the all-night vigil, I drank a cup of quick milk due to the burning sensation in [my legs] and soreness throughout my body. Earlier, he drank a glass of almond milk with a bun in the first officer’s wing with the cook, who invited her to talk some sense into her son; however, he did not come; his unhappy wife was there; and drank sherry wine, ate grapes and oranges. Forgive, Lord, those who work the belly foolishly. Broadcasting and proud is the daughter of the rector’s father who spewed out the evil treasure of her heart about me and my wife regarding washing clothes in our common laundry. There are two of them (they don’t want to count the four of us: two nieces and pupils), and Anna Konstantinovna can supposedly wash herself outside the gate! What malice and insolence in these words! May the Lord enlighten her! Remarkable: Father Superior Pavel V. Trachevsky on Peter and Paul Day went out with a cross for only fifty-two rubles along Gospodskaya and other streets parallel and intersecting, Father Peter Klepachevsky on the North Side thirty-two rubles (only!), and Father Alexander Taratin only twenty-seven rubles on the mountain, and traveled for six hours, from eleven and a half to five and a half in the evening (June 30, 1881). I brought the most - fifty-one rubles from Posadskaya and other streets, being the next one in the cathedral (I did not serve Compline with Little Vespers). Stefanida Avvakumovna at the end of July 1881 donated the ninety rubles I needed... Thank God! 1882 On Epiphany. Father Alexander Taratin walked with a cross along Gospodskaya Street for two days and provided the brethren with a collection of sixty-nine rubles; Father Pavel Trachevsky, dean and rector, along Posadskaya and delivered forty-five; I delivered forty-nine rubles along Severnaya; Father Pyotr Klepachevsky was on the mountain and delivered forty-six rubles (seven rubles were given by Nikolai Ivanovich the merchant). Father Paul can be extremely unfair, proud, absurd and stupid. On Saturday of Bright Week, he did not order to wash and sweep away the rubbish and dirt - whole pounds of grass that had accumulated during not only two weeks, Holy and Light, but the entire Lent, so that it was shameful to see the astounding uncleanness of the church. I asked and hired people to wash and sweep the floor and the salt and steps, beat the dust out of all the carpets, begged another carpet from the merchant Denisov for the church floor and, like a bride, cleaned, cleaned and decorated the church, but before that I extremely scolded the rector in absentia. Regarding the Kronstadt bourgeois beggars: complaints are heard from everywhere about their laziness and free food from alms. So the watchman of the English house and the English church says the same thing. However, because of this circumstance, I should not be upset with them: this is sinful and strikes my soul with sorrow and distress. Protasova, the wife of a retired soldier (in Denisova’s house on Medvezhaya Street, below) was given a loan of five rubles on Wednesday, January 21, 1881, for a period until February 22. The scribe of the Kronstadt gymnasium was given a loan of ten rubles on February 18 (until March 21). In the sermon on Zacchaeus. The doors of the Kingdom of Heaven are closed for you by the Lord, like foolish virgins who did not take with them the oil of good deeds and thought too late to buy it. Having accepted the registered burghers into our midst, it was necessary long ago to take care of installing them in places or assigning them to some kind of business and not leaving them without anything to do and starving and freezing on the streets. You will say: how dare he speak against us in our own church, denouncing our vices, but I will say: this has been lacking until now; All the big and small newspapers have long expressed the bitter truth about city government in general and in particular, but the word of the church, the gospel, the church’s salt has not been given to it, the illumination of its affairs with the light of the Gospel has never been done, which is why it gets confused in an impenetrable labyrinth, and does not do the things that need to be done. You will say: we have charitable institutions: a city almshouse, an orphanage, but I will say: for the city this is too little - it is proper to do something, and we should not leave the townspeople assigned to the city society: you accepted them - your business is to accept them - and cherish with them: they should not die of starvation, they should not wander around without any purpose or cause for so many years. At least come to our aid, to the parish guardianship: nonresidents sympathize with us, and their townspeople turn their faces away from the guardianship, from their own business. I know that my word will be unpleasant to many and I will be reviled for it, but I am not afraid. I speak in the name of God, in the name of the Gospel, and I have been given the power to reprove, to rebuke, to plead, for we too are accusers in Christ, this time we have the mind of Christ [1 Cor. 2:16]. If the city government itself does not want to get down to business, then let it force the philistine government to submit to it and take up the matter; Let’s say there’s a lot of my own business, but even this is not someone else’s. Do not drink beer, very little wine, eat as little fish and meat as possible, so that the flesh does not become possessed by fornication. Less sweets, less. My wife’s behavior against me is wild: sometimes she looks after me to the point of self-forgetfulness, sometimes she evilly contradicts and opposes me, where I should echo and agree. She loves only herself in me, and when I want to do something against her wishes and right, she, like a beast, takes up arms against me. Father Superior Pavel Vasilyevich Trachevsky, when the Slavs - Czechs and others were in Kronstadt and in the Assumption Duma Church, opened the royal doors for them and led them through them to the holy throne, which is not permissible for the king in his worldly clothes on ordinary occasions. This characterizes Father Paul as a man for whom there is no sacred shrine and, as it were, everything is permitted, everything is for sale. So, it seems to him that in our worship there is a lot of unnecessary things, a lot is out of place. This is from the God-wise holy fathers of the Church of God! A pitiful state of mind and heart that have not experienced the light, life, power, and sweetness of our worship, truly wondrous and Divine. Outsiders feel this, but the shepherd of the Church does not feel this, remaining dead and indifferent to him! Why? Because the love of money, ambition and vanity tempered his heart. To Tolbukhin, to Osetrova, to Olga Afanasyevna, to fellow countryman Volkov, to father Vasily Saltykov, to Adamovich. Ask for a cool salary for 1880. The book was given to Anna, the servant of Ilya Yakovlevich Murashov, to read, on January 2. Grapes, apples, sardines and tea perfectly relieve stomach constipation and clear out clogged stomachs. At night you should not eat meat or game or drink tea with cream or milk, because all these foods are stimulating to the flesh. January 4, 1881 Pryadilnaya street, house No. 9, apartment No. 33, Ekaterina Alex. Ratch. December 19, 1880 For breaking the fast on Friday evening, I was punished in the truth of God with severe torment from Belial, hidden and nested in my heart for voluptuousness. Let me preserve abstinence and fasting in order to defeat and trample upon the wiles of the demons. Petersburg. Thirteenth line. Bolshoi Avenue, Rudakov House No. 18, apartment No. 4 (Elisaveta Vasilievna Burachki with her daughters). Prayer service to Feodora Ipatievna. Father Alexander was called to Bolshakov for the funeral service for his wife in my absence; the next evening Bolshakov wanted to call me and did not call me. Father Alexander continued to walk - don’t walk for long in the evenings. God! Grant me the grace of contentment with what I have, and to have the only property of You, to be enriched by You, by Your grace, by love for You and in You for all people, especially those close to me in the faith, and not to fall away from love, considering it the greatest wealth of the soul. Away with the selfishness that blinds the eyes of the heart, which confuses, oppresses and humiliates the soul, separating us from love for God and neighbor, dragging us down, striking the soul with a mortal blow. Oh, how crazy, how terrible is self-interest! A person who, by the grace of God, has every contentment, if he is accidentally deprived of a few rubles through other people or personally because of himself, then he loses heart and becomes not himself, walks gloomily, is sad, tormented, oppressed in himself. And when I did not think about this self-interest and trusted in God, I was calm, content, and happy. Oh, heart, sick with corruption, madness of passions, evil, proud, full of idols! May God and His wonderful Providence be glorified! That is, the Six Psalms read at Matins. Omnibus is a multi-seat (15–20 seats) horse-drawn carriage. Prayer to the Holy Spirit “Heavenly King.” Nazirati (Church Glav.) – to observe; look in. Philaret (Drozdov; 1783–1867), saint, metropolitan of Moscow. An outstanding church and political figure. Born in Kolomna, in the family of a deacon. He studied at the Kolomna Seminary, and from 1800 - in the philosophical class of the Trinity Seminary; studied ancient Greek and Hebrew with special diligence. In 1808 he took monastic vows. From the same year - inspector, and from 1812 rector of the St. Petersburg Theological Academy; Professor of Philosophy and Theological Sciences. From 1817 he was a bishop, from 1826 until the day of his death - Metropolitan of Moscow. Outstanding preacher; his theology was expressed primarily in his sermon, which affirmed the ideals not so much externally as of internally active Christianity, completely following the authority of the Holy Scriptures and the Holy Fathers. He is the author of several historical and theological works. Perhaps the most important work of the saint’s life, as well as his most important contribution to Russian literature, was his many years of work translating the Bible into Russian. Author of the Catechism, a book about the Orthodox faith that has gone through countless editions. In 1994 he was canonized. His memory is celebrated by the Holy Church on November 19 (December 2).