The times., 1901-05-20
A PROTEST FROM ToLSToY.
The Aged Russian Author Attacks
His Defamers.

PARIS. May 19.-Count Leo ToIstoy. the
famous Russian author and reformer,
who was recently accommodated by the
Holy Synod of the Greek Orthodox
Church is i'll with intermittent fever and
suffering from hepatlcal pains.
The Russian Government has ordered
that all kilograms addressed to Toistoy
he intercepted
Count ToIstoy has replied to the writ
of communication launched at him by
the Holy Synod. He starts by quoting
Coleridge: He who begins by having
Christianity better thar truth will pro-
ceed by loving his own sect or church
better than Christianity. and end in low
ing himself better than all" That. Toll
stoy contends. is exactly the position of
his assailants He himself has pursued
the contrary course.
81 began by loving the Orthodox
Church more than myself: then 1 loved
Christianity more than the Orthodox
Church: now l love truth more than all
else
lie says the writ of communication
is Illegal. arbitrary, uujustihable, men
dacious, 1ibelous, and calculated to pro-
mote evil sentiments and unworthy deeds;
that it's issue has already so stirred the
hatred of bigots that he is daily threat
ened with assassination.
.'I have renounced the Church that calls
itself Orthodox he continues, because
| wished to serve God. I followed every
preoept of the Church. and am now con-
WINGED that it's teaching is, theoretically,
an astHte and noxious lie. and, practically.
a mixture of gross superstition and witch
craft. That is why l inserted request in
my win that no priest should be allowed
to approach my body.
Yes. it is true. / deny an incomprehen-
sible trinity, and the fable regarding the
fall of man. which IS absurd in our days.
1t is true. I deny the sacrilegious story of
a God born OF a virgin to redeem the
human race. But God-spirit. God-love.
God the sole principle of all things, l do
not deny. l believe in eternal life. and
believe that man is rewarded according to
his deeds here and everywhere, now and
forever
1T is said I deny ali the Sacraments.
That is perfectly correct. The marriage
of divorced persons seems 20 me in formal
contradiction with evangelic teaching.
Periodical forgiveness of sins encourages
immortality.
The teaching of Christ is disfgured,
transformed into grossest sOrcery-ablu-
ton, JUNCTION, movements of the body, in
carnations, degiutition of pieces of bread
all of which has nothing to do with that
teaching which only commands men to
love one another, not to render pad Tor
evil. not TO judge others. not to kill.
Yet those who make a business of lies
declare in their books. their newspapers.
and their catechisms that Christ never
forbade swearing (taking the OATH; that
he never forbade murder (capital punish
ment and war;, and that the doctrine OF
non-resistance to evil Is an invention, a
Satanic ruse Of the enemies of Christ
They behave like the brigand who mur-
dered a whole family of five or six persons
in order to steal an old clock and forty
kopeks.
IF Christ could come back he would
sweep them out with their ikoms and other
instruments of witchcraft.
Il believe that the will Of God was never
so clearly, so precisely explained as in the
doctrine of the man Christ; but one can
not regard Christ as God and offer prayers
to him without committing the greatest
sacrilege. If another doctrine were to
arise that satisfied me better l should not
hesitate to adopt 1t, for nothing matters
to God but truth