y felt
that he was neither in his own hands nor in God's, but was subject
to something else. All he could do then was to obey the starets, to
restrain himself, to undertake nothing, and simply to wait. In general
all this time he lived not by his own will but by that of the starets,
and in this obedience he found a special tranquillity.

So he lived in his first monastery for seven years. At the end of the
third year he received the tonsure and was ordained to the priesthood by
the name of Sergius. The profession was an important event in his inner
life. He had previously experienced a great consolation and spiritual
exaltation when receiving communion, and now when he himself officiated,
the performance of the preparation filled him with ecstatic and deep
emotion. But subsequently that feeling became more and more deadened,
and once when he was officiating in a depressed state of mind he felt
that the influence produced on him by the service would not endure. And
it did in fact weaken till only the habit remained.

In general in the seventh year of his life in the monastery Sergius grew
weary. He had learnt all there was to learn and had attained all there
was to attain, there was nothing more to do and his spiritual drowsiness
increased. During this time he heard of his mother's death and his
sister Varvara's marriage, but both events were matters of indifference
to him. His whole attention and his whole interest were concentrated on
his inner life.

In the fourth year of his priesthood, during which the Bishop had been
particularly kind to him, the starets told him that he ought not to
decline it if he were offered an appointment to higher duties. Then
monastic ambition, the very thing he had found so repulsive in other
monks, arose within him. He was assigned to a monastery near the
metropolis. He wished to refuse but the starets ordered him to accept
the appointment. He did so, and took leave of the starets and moved to
the other monastery.

The exchange into the metropolitan monastery was an important event in
Sergius's life. There he encountered many temptations, and his whole
will-power was concentrated on meeting them.

In the first monastery, women had not been a temptation to him, but
here that temptation arose with terrible strength and even took definite
shape. There was a lady known for her frivolous behaviour who began to
seek his favour. She talked to him and asked him to visit her. Sergius
sternly