assured him)--he could not help being pleased at it, and could not
be indifferent to the results of his activity and to the influence he
exerted. He thought himself a shining light, and the more he felt this
the more was he conscious of a weakening, a dying down of the divine
light of truth that shone within him.

'In how far is what I do for God and in how far is it for men?' That was
the question that insistently tormented him and to which he was not so
much unable to give himself an answer as unable to face the answer.

In the depth of his soul he felt that the devil had substituted an
activity for men in place of his former activity for God. He felt this
because, just as it had formerly been hard for him to be torn from his
solitude so now that solitude itself was hard for him. He was oppressed
and wearied by visitors, but at the bottom of his heart he was glad of
their presence and glad of the praise they heaped upon him.

There was a time when he decided to go away and hide. He even planned
all that was necessary for that purpose. He prepared for himself a
peasant's shirt, trousers, coat, and cap. He explained that he wanted
these to give to those who asked. And he kept these clothes in his cell,
planning how he would put them on, cut his hair short, and go away.
First he would go some three hundred versts by train, then he would
leave the train and walk from village to village. He asked an old man
who had been a soldier how he tramped: what people gave him, and what
shelter they allowed him. The soldier told him where people were most
charitable, and where they would take a wanderer in for the night, and
Father Sergius intended to avail himself of this information. He even
put on those clothes one night in his desire to go, but he could not
decide what was best--to remain or to escape. At first he was in doubt,
but afterwards this indecision passed. He submitted to custom and
yielded to the devil, and only the peasant garb reminded him of the
thought and feeling he had had.

Every day more and more people flocked to him and less and less time was
left him for prayer and for renewing his spiritual strength. Sometimes
in lucid moments he thought he was like a place where there had once
been a spring. 'There used to be a feeble spring of living water which
flowed quietly from me and through me. That was true life, the time when
she tempted me!' (He always thought with ecstasy of that night and of
her who was now