re them of a place in my
Father's kingdom."

However, they did not heed him, and horrified at such lack of faith,
Israil presented the Governor-General with a formal document on "the
Second Coming of Our Saviour Jesus Christ." Still the souls of his
contemporaries remained closed to the revelation, and while he
meditated upon their blindness and deplored their misfortune, he was
suddenly seized by their equally faithless representatives and
transported to the farthest limits of the country.

There he found many of his old disciples, and proceeded to form the
sect of the "inspired seers." He taught them with all earnestness that
they would shortly see the Lord, Saint Simeon, and the Queen of Heaven,
and soon after this, when in a state of ecstatic exaltation, they did,
as by a miracle, behold God surrounded by His saints, and even the
Infant Jesus.

But a new era of persecution was at hand for Israil. Heaven was
merciful to him, but the powers of the earth were harsh. However, the
more he was persecuted, the more his followers' ardent belief in his
"divinity" increased, and their enthusiasm reached a climax when the
police had the audacity to lay hands on "the son of the Lord." But
Israil was quite unmoved by the fate of his earthly body, or by the
prospect of earthly punishment. His soul dwelt with God the Father,
and it was with the profoundest disdain that he followed the
representatives of evil.

During the trial his disciples loudly expressed their belief in him,
and what seemed to strengthen their faith was the fact that Israil,
like the Divine Master, had been betrayed by a "Judas." They believed
also that his death would be followed by miracles.

Israil himself desired to be crucified, but Heaven withheld this
supreme grace, and also denied his followers the joy of witnessing
miracles at his graveside. The Holy Synod contented itself with
sentencing him to lifelong imprisonment at Solovetzk.

We may add that the founder of the "inspired seers" left, at his death,
several volumes of verse. Unhappy poet! In the west he might have
been covered with honour and glory; in the far north his lot was merely
one of extreme unhappiness.

CHAPTER XXI

THE RELIGION OF SISTER HELEN

Sister Helen Petrov, of the convent of Pskov, declared in a moment of
"divine illumination" that the Church had no hierarchy, that priests
were harmful, that God had no need of intermediaries, that men should
not commun