, and worship God in
the way that seemed good to them. But to the Russians of that time such
notions were still more repulsive than the innovations of Nikon. These
men were Orthodox to the backbone--"plus royalistes que le roi"--and
according to Orthodox conceptions the founding of a new Church is an
absurdity. They believed that if the chain of historic continuity were
once broken, the Church must necessarily cease to exist, in the same way
as an ancient family becomes extinct when its sole representative dies
without issue. If, therefore, the Church had already ceased to exist,
there was no longer any means of communication between Christ and His
people, the sacraments were no longer efficacious, and mankind was
forever deprived of the ordinary means of grace.

Now, on this important point there was a difference of opinion among
the Dissenters. Some of them believed that, though the ecclesiastical
authorities had become heretical, the Church still existed in the
communion of those who had refused to accept the innovations. Others
declared boldly that the Orthodox Church had ceased to exist, that
the ancient means of grace had been withdrawn, and that those who
had remained faithful must thenceforth seek salvation, not in the
sacraments, but in prayer and such other religious exercises as did not
require the co-operation of duly consecrated priests. Thus took place a
schism among the Schismatics. The one party retained all the sacraments
and ceremonial observances in the older form; the other refrained from
the sacraments and from many of the ordinary rites, on the ground
that there was no longer a real priesthood, and that consequently
the sacraments could not be efficacious. The former party are
termed Staro-obriadsti, or Old Ritualists; the latter are called
Bezpopoftsi--that is to say, people "without priests" (bez popov).

The succeeding history of these two sections of the Nonconformists has
been widely different. The Old Ritualists, being simply ecclesiastical
Conservatives desirous of resisting all innovations, have remained a
compact body little troubled by differences of opinion. The Priestless
People, on the contrary, ever seeking to discover some new effectual
means of salvation, have fallen into an endless number of independent
sects.

The Old Ritualists had still, however, one important theoretical
difficulty. At first they had amongst themselves plenty of consecrated
priests for the celebration of the