The Saint Paul globe. (St. Paul, Minn.) 1896-1905, 1899-01-09
Tolstei $ Spirit Wrestlers
True Story of the Doukhoborts. Their Religion
of Love Their Prosecutions and Sufferings.


name compared with this record of
shame. To make the story clear
summary of the facts leading up to
the prosecutions is necessary.
In, view of the cars recent declara-
tion for universal peace, 1t may De
asked, Has rolstoi succeeded in Inn
pressing his Quaker belief on the
throne?' He has certainly been the
first Russian to secure any practical
means of escape for the huhteo
Christians of the Caucasus.
Fer more than a century Russia has
pursued these people with torture,
confiscation, exile and often death, pc
cause they preferred their Quaker
faith TO the spectacular Greek church
and the corruption of its political ALL
anceS.
ALL EYES ON AMERICA.
At last the government has been IN
duced to let the people go, ana ten
thousand of them are establishing
themselves in various places in can
ada and America.
Their enemies have denounced them
as free lovers and polygamists. Ih1s
is Indignantly denied by eminent stu
dents of their religious history. Iner
IDEAS of marriage and the sacredness
of the family are similar to those OIL
the Quakers, who also suffered perse-
torture and death-all for conscience
sake-until William Penn got their
prisons opened and coloniZed them IN
America Tolstoi defends these CHRIS
tians of the Caucasus in the spirit OF
William Penn.
They are known in Russia as the
Doukhoborts, meaning spirit Wres-
tiers. Tolstois appeal to the car, with
powerful address graphically sum-
mariZing the innumerable illegal out
RACES committed against them and the
confscation of their property, mas
brought relief in the form of exile,
with permission to find homes in Eng
- land and America.
EMINENT MEN WORKING. =
Tolstoi and his friends have obtained
the cooperation of eminent men In
different parts of the world. The COM
mittee in the United States is COM
known banker, who is the treasurer;
William Dean Howells, New York;
James Adams, Chicago; William
Lloyd, Garrison, Boston; George Dana
Boardman, Philadelphia; H. Q. Mel
son, ST Louis; Bolton Hall and Ernest
H Crosby, New York.
Mr.. Aylmer Maude, the wealthy
Englishman who became fascinated
with Count Tolstoi left his business in
England and abandoned his home ties
for a residence with the great Russian
reformer, has come as personal rep
resentative to establish the eXiles on
their American farms.
He has given land to a colony of $50
of the sect In Purleigh, Essex county,
England He finds them good farm
ers and excellent neighbors and peace
full subjects of the government. There
are also colonies in Manitoba and OF
tawa. The government of Canada not
eriU
bounty, but exempts them from mill
tary duty in Difference to their religi-
Gus convictions and faith.
The colony on the island of Cyprus
Will soon receive the members yet re-
naming in Russia. Their sufferings
for century have been at times I'M
speakable, but the more they have
been tortured and pillaged the greater
has been their faith in the religion
for which they have endured naIneless
atrocities, even unto death
The entire history is collected from
personal and official sources, many
times investigated, revised and sifted
and with much omitted, not because
doubtful but for reason of policy in
negotiating with Russia for permission
to leave the country.
Who are these Spirit Wrestiers? TIE
public are asking
They first appeared in the neighber
hood of st. Petersburg, in the middle
of the last century. BY the beginning
of the present their doctrine had be-
come so clearly defined, and the num-
Der of their followers mad so greatly
increased that the government and
the Greek church. considered this sect
to be peculiarly obnoxious, and so
started cruel persecution.
SPIRIT WRESTLgRs' BELIEF.
The foundation of the Spirit Wrest-
lers' teaching consists in the belief
that the spirit of God is present in the
soul of man and directs him by it's
word within him.
They understand the coming Of
Christ in the flesh, His words, teaching
and suffering in a spiritual sense. The
object of the sufferings of Christ in
their view was to give us al Example
of suffering for truth. Christ contin-
ueS to suffer in US even now, wher we
do not live in accordance with the be-
hests and spirit of His teaching. The
whole system of the Spirit Wrestlers
is penetrated with the gospel spirit of
love.
"Worshipping God in the spirit" the
Spirit Wrestlers affirm. They hold that
the outward church and all which is
performed in it and concerns it has no
Importance for them The church. they
gathered together, united, in the name
of Christ
They pray inwardly at all times,
while on fixed days corresponding foS
convenience to the orthodox holy days.
they assemble for prayer meetings, at
which they read prayer and sing
hymns, or psalms as they call them,
and greet each other fraternally with
low bows, thereby acknowledging ev-
cry man as bearer of the Divine
Spirit The teaching of the Spirit
Wrestlers is founded on tradition, call
ed by them the Book of Life" be-
cause it lives in their memory and
hearts 1t consists of psalms, partly
formed out of the contents of the Old
and New Testaments, partly composed
Independently. From one to another
for generations the psalms have been
handed down indelibly committed to
memory.
The Spirit Wrestlers base alike their
mutual relations and their relations to
other people-and not only to people
but to all living creatures
on love, and therefore they hold ali
people equal, brethren.
They extend this idea of equality also
to the government authorities, obed-
fence to whom they do not consider
binding upon them in those cases when
the demands of these authorities are in
conflict with their conscience; while in
all that does not infringe what they
regard as the will of God they willingly
fulfill the desire of the authorities
They consider murder, violence and ir
general, all relations to living beings
not based on love as opposed to theil
conscience and to the will of God They
are Industrious and abstemious in theil
lives and always truthful in theil
speech, accounting all lying great sin