Nikolay Alexandrovich Motovilov(May 25, 1809 - January 27, 1879) - the Simbirsk and Arzamas landowner, an interlocutor of the Monk Seraphim of Sarov and his first biographer, long-term trustee of the Seraphim-Diveevsky monastery.

Biography

From August 9, 1823 to 1826, Nikolai Alexandrovich studied at the Imperial Kazan University. For some time, Motovilov in Kazan, preparing for entering the university, studied at the boarding school of the German Leiter, a graduate of Leipzig University.

At the age of 22, Nikolai Motovilov was healed by Father Seraphim from a serious rheumatic disease with relaxation of the whole body and removal of his legs, which lasted three years.

Nikolai Motovilov wrote down the teachings of the Monk Seraphim about the purpose of the Christian life and many of the prophecies of the holy elder about the future of Russia and Diveyevo. At the place where in November 1831 the monk had a conversation with Nikolai Motovilov about the acquisition of the Holy Spirit, the Temple of the Holy Spirit of the Sarov monastery was later built.

According to S. A. Nilus, in his youth Nikolai Motovilov was in love with E. M. Yazykova, he unsuccessfully tried to get her hand, until in 1832 he received a final refusal. Ekaterina Mikhailovna four years later became the wife of the Slavophile A.S. Khomyakov.

Nikolai Motovilov died peacefully at his Simbirsk estate. According to his will, his body was brought to Diveyevo, where he was buried in the Church of the Nativity of Christ and was buried near the Kazan Church, not far from the grave of St. Alexandra.

In Soviet times, the graves at the altar of the Kazan Church were destroyed, the area was asphalted. The only landmark of this holy place was the old birch on the grave of Motovilov. In the 1970s, they tried to uproot it, but this did not succeed.

In the summer of 1991, before the festivities for the transfer of the relics of St. Seraphim to Diveyevo, with the blessing of Patriarch Alexy, the asphalt was opened, the crypts were discovered, and the place of the graves was marked. Now the grave of Nikolai Alexandrovich Motovilov has been restored and is a place of prayer.

Family

In 1840, Nikolai Alexandrovich married Elena Ivanovna Milyukova(May 30, 1823 - December 27, 1910), niece of the Monk Martha of Diveevskaya. Her father often went to work with Father Seraphim, and after the death of his wife he entered the Sarov Monastery as a monk. From the age of 5, Elena lived in a monastery. But later, by direct obedience to Father Seraphim, she married Nikolai Motovilov and together they helped the monastery a lot. Foreseeing this, the priest ordered to call her from an early age "the great mistress."

In the marriage of Nikolai Alexandrovich and Elena Ivanovna, six children were born. Mrs. Motovilova lived until the discovery of the holy relics of Seraphim of Sarov in 1903, and told her contemporaries about her personal observations.

According to the publication: Gainers of the Holy Spirit. M .: Niola-press, 2006. Page number after the text. This is the publication of materials about Met. Rafail Prokopyev, who considers himself a descendant of Motovilov. See materials about Seraphim of Sarov, especially Basin's article. Materials for the first time op. Strizhev: Motovilov N.A. Life and works of N.A.Motovilov / Comp., Ed. text and approx. A. Strizheva. M., 1996.S. 88 - 124.

August Monarch, Most Merciful Sovereign!

Due to my loyal desire to have the happiness of the lowest personally to report to Your Imperial Majesty about the prophetic words of the great Elder Seraphim, the Minister of the Imperial Court of your Count Vladimir Fedorovich Adlerberg instructed me to treat Count Alexei Feodorovich Orlov Department (Confidant I and Chief 1844-1856), and it was conveyed to me that I, not in the least embarrassed by any fear, set out everything that I know on this subject on paper in the whole space and the full essence of it in words as short as possible, and if I can, then I would not seek the happiness of personally all-submissively reporting this to Your Imperial Majesty.This is the meaning of the form in which Your Highest Will was conveyed to me, All-Merciful Great Sovereign Emperor, but how to comprehend space with brevity, the safe non-shyness of an oral, all-given report with the inevitable caution of the presentation of the same on paper, and, n Finally, think about the offer not to look for opportunities even for one moment to enjoy so much that everyone wants

(On the letter, the resolution of Nicholas I. In His Majesty's own hand is written in pencil: “March 15, 1854. If he, as a loyal subject, has not forgotten his oath, then he must carry out my order and convey on paper what he has to say to me: then I will decide whether I should to call him or not ”N [Nikolay]).

Your loyal subject and the delightful happiness of seeing the Precious face of the Most High Personality of Your Imperial Majesty, when your generous availability, All the most dense Monarch, is so great that it does not hide you from the very last of your loyal subjects. They tell me that the confusion of the present situation of our Fatherland; Unwittingly, it becomes the main reason that it will hardly be possible for me to deserve the greatest happiness for me personally to see you, from the bottom of my heart my unhypocritically beloved Monarch. But really two or three, and a lot of four minutes are enough, perhaps, for the Highly gracious listening to the words of the great Elder Seraphim - words almost only in the modern state of our Fatherland and should be brought to the notice of Your Imperial Majesty - it will take so much time from your great concerns about the steadfastness of your power, and how the words of the great Elder can be a hindrance to the happiness of the Russian land, when they are only from him, for your Highest Personality, without which there can be no happiness on the Russian land, and only apply. And was it ever on paper that what I have set forth has been brought to your most comprehensive knowledge of even one word of my truth without it being either misinterpreted, or even devoted to a perfect default, in the hope that I will never in any way be worthy of happiness personally to see you, Sovereign, and to report everything to you with all the utmost justice. And do not be so kind as to think that I dare to express myself so fully without having any reason to do so. No, Your Imperial Majesty, no one more than mine has the undeniable right to such a way of thinking, although it is very unrewarding for me, but nevertheless inevitably forced from me by inevitability.

In order to prove my true words, I should only, albeit in brief outlines, but gradually tell all the circumstances of my life, which served as the main and concomitant, as well as the final incentive reasons for this, but in order not to really use your most merciful Highest attention for evil. , I dare just give one example: Your Imperial Majesty is probably aware of the case of two Diveyevo women's societies.

shinakh - the essence of that case, officially stated, is available in the Holy Governing Synod, this case began at my request, but was it officially presented, as in fact everything related to it was set out by me on paper; here is the shortest account, my own, of his true and real nature.

The Yaroslavl landowner, Colonel Agafya Simeonovna Melgunova, nee Belokopytova, a veil of the Kiev Florovsky convent, in the nuns of Alexander, was honored in a dream to receive from the Mother of God a notice that she should not end her life in Kiev, but go to the North of great Russia, and there The Queen of Heaven will show her the place where, after her death, by the grace of the Mother of God, a virgin monastery will be established, to which she will bring down Her blessing from Iberia, Athos and the Kiev-Pechersk Lavra, equal to those three holy places with her heavenly blessing. (Her blessing common to all these four places is that She promised herself for three hours every day to be Herself in each of these places - and not one of their inhabitants would be allowed to perish).

Nun Alexandra saw the second apparition of the Mother of God in the Nizhny Novgorod province of the Ardatovsky district, in the village of Diveyevo, in the very place where the two-altar church of the Nativity of Christ and the Nativity of the Most Holy Theotokos was later built by the great elder Seraphim. The old woman of God, after many years of monastic labors, carried out near that place, finally, six months before her death, settled with her three sisters against this place, about which the Queen of Heaven told her in a vision that this is exactly the one that will belong to the great monastery , predicted to her in the Frolovsky Kiev-Pechersky Monastery, and dying, she gave the commandment to the Hierodeacon of the Sarov Hermitage Seraphim to take care of the spiritual improvement, which once, according to the premonition of the Mother of God, was founded that great monastery.

After her death, others gathered at her place of residence to those sisters who came with her and who remained after her, and a community was founded, which contained a charter and a prayer rule, the same as the rule of the Sarov desert. Meanwhile, the hierodeacon, later hieromonk Seraphim, succeeding in spiritual, succeeding in monastic exploits in the wilderness

seventeen years old, where he was vouchsafed to postpone fasts -3 days and 7 days, two, three, four and six weeks and, finally, 72 days - and after that fight with demons for 1001 days and 1001 nights and received a complete victory over them, which I myself conveyed from mouth to mouth. And after all this, with five years of silence in seclusion, having achieved complete, like the prophet Moses the God-seeer, a gracious inner and outer enlightenment, he decided to take up the welfare of the community mentioned above, which was under the command of Ksenia Mikhailovna Milovanova, and wanted to teach them the simplicity of life and the easiest acquisition of the grace of the Holy Spirit exactly in the same way that he learned from many years of his own blessed experience, but she began to obey him a little, saying that they had already been given a charter by the builder Pakhomiy, the head of the Sarov desert, and she did not agree to innovations, tea, that through observance and of the former rule, she and her sisters will be saved; and the great Elder Seraphim, seeking not his own strength, but his neighbor's hedgehog, left them alone and turned to the former, completely excommunicated from any communication with any deserts, but the Mother of God appeared to him, ordered to establish a new and second community in Diveyevo in a field near the village of one of only maidens, on the condition that widows never live in it, gave this community a new and unprecedented rule, and by Herself an invented and law-ordained charter, communicated orally during Her appearance to the great elder Seraphim, and ordered him to found a new monastery to cut down a two-part mill from the Sarov forest and to attach to it in the order indicated by Herself the cells; from the former community, take 8 sisters, named by Her Herself, and to them only then add those whom She herself will deign to indicate to him, and at the place mentioned above, where Her second appearance was to nun Alexandra, to arrange in honor of the Nativity of Her Lord's Son Jesus Christ and Her own two-altar church, in which Her virgin sisters from the newest community should be chosen as deaconesses to serve the altar, and the church itself will be subordinated to the agency of this maiden community, promising that his own relics, as well as the relics of the primordial Alexandra, will once rest in the lower Nativity of Her Church - and, many others adding to this about this second virgin Diveyevo

the community of predictions, commanded that the place of the estate of this community be surrounded by a ditch and a rampart made by the labor of the sisters of the community - that everything was fulfilled by the great elder Seraphim - and in Diveyevo since the establishment of this new nicknamed Mill, two communities began to exist, completely separate, not at all subordinates, although not devoid of, nevertheless, the Christian communion of the monastery; and from these two communities for a special apparition of the Mother of God, and the night of September 3 to him, on September 4, he commanded me on behalf of the Mother of God herself to serve his own virgin community and, folding my hands with the hands of two sisters of this community, he told me : “As the Mother of God gave me this community from hand to hand, so I, by Her command, transfer my ministry to this Her great monastery after your death, serve the Heavenly Queen throughout your life and preserve everything in her, as God herself The mother in her, through me, the wretched Seraphim, deigned to arrange. And in the coming summer we will work with you on these three beds ”. Announcing to all the sisters that the Mother of God had appointed me to be their feeder for all my life, he let me go to Voronezh.

Upon my return, from where I learned after his death that there are two communities in Diveyevo, and in Kulikovo, Tambov province, Temnikovsky district, a third begins with the blessing of the same great Elder, and taking upon himself, according to the commandment, his service to his own community of Melnichnaya virgin Diveyevo, and in my opinion my own, not without the will, however, of God, which would take a long time to explain here, and two others, I wrote to the Chief Prosecutor of the Most Holy Governing Synod Count Nikolai Aleksandrovich Protasov on January 14, 1838 about the existence of three different communities named above, and about the different in favor of their separate for each donation of my lands; and, finally, being a special blessed healing on the night of June 1 to June 2, 1842, given to me from a severe bruise throughout my entire body and a dislocation of my left leg and two ribs in my left side, I made sure that my request of June 1 of that 1842 was valid and pleasing to God with the order to send it without fail to the name of Right Reverend John, Bishop of Nizhny Novgorod and Arzamas; I not only sent it then - and the Right Reverend immediately to the Most Holy Governing Synod, but after that by repeated

requests for the observance of all my conditions for the donation of land, laid down by me and inclined only to observe the commandment of the great elder Seraphim and certainly the will of the Mother of God herself, through him first, and then directly through the last third blessed endowment announced, repeatedly insisted on the return both Diveevsky communities of their former identity; but through that about the indispensable forever uncorrupted, through their arrangement such, the will of God all-perfect fulfillment, violated by an unjust union; And he expressed all this not in words, but on paper, referring to the very laws that spoke in my favor, and did this not through some lower and secular place, but through the Most Holy Governing Synod. And through so much a great place and all my above-mentioned prudent and just insistence, only only by the fear of God and love for the Mother of God from me, I tried to bring to your highest knowledge; but with what have all such long and persistent efforts of mine been crowned? My conditions are ridiculed, I myself have been exposed as bothering, do not know what, the union of the communities is attributed not to a false report about their existence, forced by the unjust insistence of one of the members of the Most Holy Ruling Synod, but by the Highest will of Your Imperial Majesty, although from you, however, the whole correctness of the present state of affairs of the Diveyevo two communities is completely hidden by various perverse interpretations of the will of the great elder Seraphim and slanders against me; and through whom was all this done? Through the Holy Governing Synod, and the slander against me has been cocked - through the senator! How, after all that, forgive such a question of mine, Your Imperial Majesty, I dare, through written presentation on paper, to all the submissiveness to bring to the Highest knowledge of your secret of Divine predictions about you and your Russia, while I am commanded to faithfully report it only from mouth to mouth ...

If you deign to doubt in me whether I am not a traitor and whether I dare to bother Your Imperial Majesty with malicious intent, then I dare to present to Your most intense attention, Great Sovereign, what blood is poured in my veins from my father's side.

Motovilovskaya. My ancestors - Slavic rulers, equal in the rights of the current nobles, were honored to participate together with Gostomysl in calling Rurik, Sineus and Truvor to reign the Russian land, which although I know only from our family legends, however, there is no doubt, but with Pozharsky and Minin there were also two Moto-Vilovskys. My ancestors during the liberation of Moscow and Russia from the Poles and then during the enthronement of the All-August House of the Romanovs to the All-Russian throne; of them from Evsevy Semyonovich Smirny-Motovilov, the governor of Irkutsk or Tobolsk, my great-grandfather, court adviser Mikhail Semyonovich Motovilov, who worked together with Field Marshal Minikh in the overthrow of Biron and opened in the Sarov desert the act that Empress Yelineseterev needed for the Empress Tsesaveterovna, comes in a straight line during her accession to the All-Russian throne, and during all the time of her almost thousand-year nobility in the Russian state, the Motovilovs, serving as stolniks and colonels, centurions of the streltsy regiments and in regional cities, which are now provincial, never betrayed either God, the Tsar, or the Fatherland, serving both the One and the other, and the third always by faith and righteousness; and on the maternal side, I dare, pointing to the late foreman Nikolai Alekseevich Durasov and all of his sisters who come from, to conclude that she is from the same family and, in his house was raised, had the happiness of repeatedly enjoying the high favor and all-increasing attention of the great grandmother Your Sovereign Empress Catherine the Great, which was also awarded to my parent, who began his service at the highest court of Her Majesty and only because of his grave illnesses, and throughout his life that depressed him, was forced to retire.

Forgive my madness, Your Imperial Majesty, if I dared to remember the merits of my ancestors, and if I myself didn’t deserve to do anything for you, Great Sovereign, and once again, most graciously, if I could ask every one of the great dignitaries surrounding the throne Yours, although half of the obstacles in life were put in place, by which they removed me from the opportunity to be useful to Your Imperial Majesty, could they at least do something good for you? And if they have no one

did not interfere with your service, Great Sovereign, then why was it not only that I was not allowed into government service for 14 years in a row, but even now, and during my second visit to your northern capital, they suggest that I not seek a personal all-subject representation to Your Imperial Majesty , then how you yourself will not deign to hide yourself from the last of your soldiers?

Forgive the magnanimous sincere innocence of my loyal speech, and if you can, then do not reject, once again I beg Your Imperial Majesty, my persistent request with all the most merciful permission to allow me to orally report to you the words of the great Elder Seraphim, who told me about you, Great Sovereign, that you are in my soul Christian, which many do not dare to say about themselves, that Seraphim, to whom it was announced from God that his death would be like the death of seven youths who slept in the Ephesian cave. And about him it has been made clear to me that he will rise before the general resurrection from the dead in the reign of Your Imperial Majesty and is the only one only for you, Great Sovereign, about which in the fullness of everything and the above, explaining to everyone in the full justice, according to the duty of the Orthodox Christian loyal conscience, which I am ready to confirm with an oath, I completely surrender myself to the All-powerful will of Your Imperial Majesty, and if All-Merciful deign to allow me to reveal to you a secret, which Sh did not exaggerate, only because, only because of your only ever-present judgment, the aristocratic and a fair assessment of her, then I will ceaselessly bless the Lord, who has put it to your heart, in good time to listen favorably to my loyal speech about her. If not, then having endured for twenty-two years and not opening it to anyone, I will take it with me to the grave with an unashamed conscience that I was hiding the talent entrusted to me from the Lord through His great servant Seraphim. »Your Imperial Majesty's most loyal slave, titular councilor, honorary superintendent of the Korsun district school, a member of the Nizhny Novgorod-Ardatovsk prison committee and a candidate for the position of the Simbirsk conscientious judge

Nikolai Alexandrov, son of Motovilov.

SECOND LETTER TO EMPEROR NICHOLAS I

[Word of the great elder Seraphim]

All-August Monarch, Most Merciful Sovereign!

Having the happiness with my own eyes to see Your Imperial Majesty's own handwritten Highest Command about the all-subject report of the words of the great Elder Seraphim on paper, I hasten to immediately fulfill your most sacred All-August will for me.

Having told in detail about Elijah the Thesbite and about Abessa, the military leader Davidov, about Gideon, the leader of the Israelite people, he concluded that there are still many people faithful to God in Russia, although spiritual corruption and many are distracting from God, and, having said that it is necessary to serve the kings, since Abessa, who was ready to sacrifice his own for the life of David a hundredfold, and adding that, like Gideon, the people of God need to await the call and election of God, and then, acting in God, not despair, if their zeal for the Fatherland did not received a proper assessment, because love for the Tsar and the Fatherland is pleasing to God, and if people did not appreciate, then God will reward, - he asked me what exactly attracts me to Petersburg; I said that the desire to serve there Your Imperial Majesty; why there, and not in another place, I replied that, being closer to you, in case of need, I would immediately be ready to shed my blood to the last drop, if it were needed for your all-powerful health, and to be, if possible, how much God It will be pleasing to help, useful to the Church of Christ. He replied: “Your zeal is pleasing to God, and He will not forsake you for it, but since according to the first word of the prophet - during favorable obedience to you and on the day of salvation help you - then jealousy, although for God and not for reason (that is prematurely), then not only is it displeasing to God, but there is also a sin. So now your trip is not on the road - and this is your very zeal for the Emperor, if people who dislike him learn about him prematurely, it can harm you, and you take care of yourself. But do not peck about the Sovereign, the Lord will preserve Him. He is a Christian at heart, which they cannot say about themselves

some even from spiritual great persons. The Emperor was great] ”Emperor Peter I Alekseevich, for which he was justly named the Great and Father of the Fatherland, and by faith in the Lord, the faith of His Imperial Majesty cannot be compared; Judge for yourself: Peter the Great lived at a time when the first boyars treasured the tsar at one glance, as the mercy of God, and all silently obeyed the Tsar, it was so easy for him to rule. But now the people are not that people, and if for all this change the Sovereign is obeyed and his enemies tremble, then our Lord Jesus Christ Himself and the Mother of God help in everything for the unfeigned faith of his Orthodox, here he is even higher than Peter the Great and it is for her that God helps him in everything and in his days will exalt Russia so much above all her enemies that she will become superior to all the kingdoms of the earth and not only will we not have to learn anything from foreigners, but they will also have a chance to visit ours. Let the Russian land learn from us and the Orthodox Christian Faith and a pious life by this faith; and there will be many, many at first before all sorrow for the Emperor and will repeatedly seek his head and the abdomen of the Royal family, consecrated to God, but the Lord will always protect him and his entire August Royal House; for the sake of one righteous, the whole family is saved, that it speaks of the three for the sake of, and in his sovereign family, look, your love of God, how many holy relics are from his crowned flesh and blood, I think that there are more than a dozen saints of God, so they are all prayer books for the family him and his sacred Imperial Person; even if his august parent, the most pious Empress Maria Feodorovna, is like a mother to all orphans and needy people, but this is only a matter of holy wives, and if that is great in a common man, all the more so in a sacred royal personage pleasing to God, and the Emperor in Bose, the reposed All-August parent of his, Emperor Pavel Petrovich, how he loved the Holy Church, how he honored her holy statutes and how much he did for her good, few of the Russian tsars, like him, served the Church of God; and the Lord will help His Imperial Majesty and even much more help the Lord to do for the Holy Orthodox Church of ours and the one true, immaculate Apostolic Ecumenical Church of Christ in the whole universe, but before that there will still be a lot of grief for both the Sovereign and the Russian Land to endure; will rise

against him, not only external enemies, but also internal ones, and this is how the atom will be: the rebels who rebelled against the Emperor during his accession to the throne boasted that although the ladder had been mowed, but the roots remained, although they did not boast of God. , and this, however, is true, for the main chiefs of this malicious intent, having betrayed those whom they themselves involved in this evil intent of their own, but themselves remained on the sidelines, and so they are looking for and will seek the destruction of the Emperor and the entire Family his Tsar, and they will repeatedly be looking for whether it is possible to somehow exterminate them, and when their repeated attempts fail, they will take on something else - and they will try, that if they can, then all the positions of government would be all people, or agree with them, or at least not harmful to them. And they will in every possible way restore the Russian Land against the Emperor; when even then they will not succeed, since they will want to, for in places the private disturbances they cause will soon be stopped by the grace of God, then they will wait for such a time when it will be very difficult for the Russian Land and, in one day, in one hour, having agreed in advance, they will raise a general revolt in all places of the Russian Land; and so many of the employees will then themselves participate in | their malicious intent, then there will be no one to appease them. And at first a lot of innocent blood will be shed, its rivers will flow through the Russian Land, many of your brothers, nobles, and clergy, and merchants, disposed to the Emperor, will be killed; but when the Russian Land is divided and one side will clearly remain with the rebels, the other will clearly become for the Emperor and the integrity of Russia, then, your love for God, your zeal for God and for the time. And the Lord will help the just cause: he will stand for the Tsar and the Fatherland and our holy Church, and the Lord will keep the Tsar and the entire Tsar's Family with His invisible right hand and give complete victory to those who have raised arms for Him, for the Church and for the benefit of the indivisibility of the Russian Land; but not so much blood will be shed here as when the right-wing side standing for the Emperor gains victory and out-catches all the traitors and delivers them into the hands of justice. Then no one will be sent to Siberia, but everyone will be executed - and then even more blood will be shed, but this blood will be the last, cleansing blood, for after that the Lord will bless His people with peace and exalt the horn of His anointed David, His servant,

a husband after His own heart, the most pious Sovereign Emperor Nikolai Pavlovich - he was approved and, moreover, will be approved by His holy right hand over the Russian Land. So why should we lose heart, your love for God: if God is for us, whoever is on us - their Bo will be presented, these are the pre-elect, their pre-elect, these and sanctify, sanctify them, and glorify - these and watch over; why should we lose heart, your love for God, if God is for us, who is against us - understand the heathens and obey, as God is with us, those who can obey, as God is with us, and if you can pack, you will be victorious, as God is with us - so - then, your love for God, God is with us and there is no way for us to lose heart. "

In inexpressible joy, I just wanted to say: "So bless me, father, I will go to Petersburg this hour and try to see the Emperor and give him all your words," and he, covering my mouth with his hand, said:

As you don’t understand: not now, but after; now is not the time, but after, when you will see Jerusalem through the prophet, we will make a howl. The Lord Himself will lead you then, and will Himself make it according to your heart to say good things about Jerusalem. And now you need to take care, and the Lord will preserve the Sovereign and bless him and the Russian Land with every blessing, both in the earthly and in the heavens; during your mouth to mouth, report all my words to His Majesty - then what you think now, say. "I asked what, he answered:" All that is for the good of the Tsar, the holy Church and the Russian Land, God will then put it to your heart - then you will not be afraid and erect everything to the Imperial Majesty, but what is it like for you and before repeatedly said: Lord and the Mother of God themselves will arrange your path for good, and the poor Seraphim's prayers to them for you will be with you everywhere. "

That's all, Your Imperial Majesty, that Father Seraphim, in this unforgettable conversation for me, deigned to talk about Your Imperial Majesty and added, from the most powerful ancestors of Your Imperial Majesty, who by faith and righteousness pleased God. "

Here I should also remember how, after the death of the great elder Seraphim, I myself was told about his resurrection from the dead - and it was confirmed that

three times: in 1835, in 1847 and in 1851, but I do not know if Your Imperial Majesty would like to know about that.

After that, having expounded in the shortest possible words about the conversation of Father Seraphim and falling down to the highly consecrated feet of your feet to the face of the earth, I implore you in the most humble, unemotionally subservient manner, the Great Sovereign, that I dared to bother you with the most submissive to your mouth by asking To the Imperial Majesty - this was indeed the desire of the great elder Seraphim. Most mercifully forgive me.

Your Imperial Majesty's most loyal slave, titular councilor, honorary superintendent of the Korsun district school, member of the Nizhny Novgorod-Ardatovsky prison committee and candidate for the position of Simbirsk conscientious judge Nikolai Alexandrovich Motovilov.

I have a temporary residence in St. Petersburg, 1st adm. frequent 1st quarter, in Bolshaya Millionaya Street, in the house of Countess Zubova, at Mozalevsky No. 4.

PAPER NOTE TO EMPEROR ALBKSANDR II

In secret.

The original draft, written on April 15, 1866, in my grave illness, in the village of Rozhdestvenskoye, Tsylne identity

To His Imperial Majesty

To the most pious Autocratic

To the Great Sovereign Emperor

Alexander Nikolaevich the Autocrat of All Russia, the Most Merciful Sovereign

In 1854, when Your Imperial Majesty was Tsarevich Tsarevich, Heir to the All-Russian Throne, I had the privilege of giving you a memorandum about some of the disasters of my life, mainly on my grave affairs with the Tatars of the villages of Malaya and Bolshoi Tsyln and the villages of Besturleev Vesturleev

the same, and about the lands granted to my ancestors, Cyril and Daniil Motovilov from Arzamas, in 1703 and 1704. And with your own hand, the Great Sovereign, you wrote on that note: "Help Motovilov." ->

But Your Highest Imperial Majesty's command, which I put on the view in the Land Survey Office on those matters, has not yet been fulfilled.

And at the request of my memorandum dated October 20, 1861 addressed to the Minister of Internal Affairs about permission for me to open the actions of my Savior Transfiguration Bank and on the same subject with another memorandum dated August 13, 1861 addressed to Metropolitan Isidor to the Holy Governing Synod about permission for me to build on my, for the benefit of this bank, the support of the Cathedral of the Mother of God The Joy of all Joys in Diveyevo is not half a word to me yet, neither the one nor the other has not been answered. And you can't even talk about other matters - so all my zeal for the benefit of Your Imperial Majesty is drowned out, that, for example, according to my papers: 1st - to Adjutant General Baron Wrangel on one sheet of a possible tax and an urgent need for the burnt-out city of Simbirsk, and 2nd - to Senator Zhdanov about the really essential and most important reason for the Simbirsk fire and the tireless preparation by the well-known party of that All-Russian revolution, about which the great Elder Seraphim, back in 1832, on Easter Sunday, said that it was through reforms, a Decembrist conspiracy to settle into Russia having, will happen and about which my own handwritten on two sheets, in 1854 in March a note submitted to His Imperial Majesty should be kept in the III Department of His Majesty's Own Chancellery, then on paper on one sheet to Baron Wrangel and this last, on 4 sheets to Mr. Senator Zhdanov, absolutely nothing has been answered so far. Whereas my last paper is of high state importance, because to the question of His Excellency, how can I prove that the Polish revolt and all the other, petty, but, nevertheless, all-destructive Russian revolts are the essence of the adjustment of only one Decembrist-Russian agitation and who - are the main Decembrists. I answer: what about them is explained in precise and clear clarity in the 1862 edition of Ryleev's life, published in Leipzig. And what's all

What is more surprising is that the great Elder Seraphim himself, in 1832, at four o'clock on Holy Easter, speaking about the Decembrists, just deigned to remember them by name, and therefore, in fact, he let me into St. Petersburg, that these people, having learned my wild devotion to the Emperor, your all-powerful parent, and my complete lack of solidarity with their church and monastery, ruinous, regicidal and anti-Christian abolitionist trends, not only will they not allow me to see the Emperor, they will not give me any progress in the service, but at all wiped off the face of the earth. For even though they have completely surrounded the throne of His Majesty Sovereign Nikolai Pavlovich, he is a Christian in his soul, and that is only his one hundred great true faith in God and is his only protection from all of them.

It is my duty of the most resigned shield to report that before Mr. Zhdanov was presented with the last, on 4 pages, a draft memorandum to Senator Zhdanov (because for some reason he was unwilling to let me in for some reason, it was whitewashed), I was excited, not adorable, but true to me in a dream in Bose deceased Sovereign Emperor, your parent, who promised to tell you about this phenomenon to me sacredly. A vision, extremely significant and no less important, which I saw many years ago on the night before the capture of the famous fortress of Kare by the troops of Your Imperial Majesty. When he, the Great Sovereign, deigned to console me with the assurance that he was not only completely forgiven, pardoned, saved, blessed from the Lord God, but also placed near the great elder Seraphim. And I heard about the Decembrist all-pernicious actions from him and, even more in detail, from Father Seraphim himself.

Before submitting the paper to Mr. Senator Zhdanov, how from the attached descriptions of these visions, all mercifully deign to please, he ordered me to act as Father Seraphim predicted in 1832, about which on two pages of my note about the Decembrists, exposed by the great Elder Seraphim, twelve years ago back through Count Orlov, all submitted.

And even after that, in a special, from the great Elder Seraphim, a sacred notice, given to me on the 1st day of April 1865, about the death of Lincoln, albeit not ardent,

but still an abolitionist. And as he put it, the great Father Seraphim, the Lord and the Mother of God not only displeases such terrible oppression, ruin and unrighteous humiliation, which prevailed over all the Decembrists, ardent abolitionists, is happening everywhere in Russia, but also the very grievances of Lincoln and the North Americans, The southern states of slaveholders are wholly disliked by the goodness of God. And therefore, on the image of the Mother of God, the Joy of all Joys, who, by that order of him, Father Seraphim, was sent to the President of the Southern, namely the slave-owning States, was ordered to affix it with the signature: "For all death of Lincoln."

But I admit frankly that, Eminence Philaret's request, remembering the softening of the words in my memorandum on June 1, 1861, against the insults of Bishop Nektarios, which consisted in the apostolic expression: "Breathing forgiveness and murder - not a word in a very angry mood", dared to weaken the power of the divinely inspired , sacredly secretly spoken to me of the speech of b [atyushka] o [ttsa] Seraphim and signed: "For all victory over the serpent, Lincoln, and the northern abolitionists", or complete dominance over the entire North, etc .; in detail, exact lists from both sacredly commanded signatures under both the images of the Mother of God and to the president of the slave-owning States, and to Pius IX, are hereby presented in exact copies.

So, I will continue that, in addition to that, he, b [atyushka] o [ts] Seraphim, sacredly, but for me it is quite clear, told on behalf of the Lord Your Imperial Majesty the most submissive to report that concerning the Eighth Ecumenical Council it is extremely urgent at the present time , as, firstly, for the unification of the holy Churches of God under the single head of Christ the Life-Giver and under the single Protection of the Most Holy Theotokos, so, secondly, the complete and complete anathematization of all the abomination of the deviation from the holy universal faith of Christ, or the abolitionistic leveling of everything on light, that is, in Russian - Decembrism, and in a universal way - Freemasonry, Freemasonry, Illuminatiism and all their Jacobin thrones of church and monasteries of saints of the ruinous and regicidal Baregonian government - absolutely godless and completely anti-

Christian, concentrated mainly in the lodges: Simbirsk, Moscow, St. Petersburg - in Russia, New York - in North America, Calcutta - in the East Indies, London, Frankfurt-am-Main, except for small lodges of Swedish, Prussian, German , Austrian, Italian and others, world-wide headed in the Union Club in Paris - as in the universal centralization of everything God-repugnant, anti-monarchical and pan-revolutionary in the world.

Even if it should have been to Your Imperial Majesty in April 1865 to send me another third icon of the Poor Mother b [atyushka] o [ttsa] Seraphim Joy of all Joys, but that you already have two of those, 1854, which I have submitted to you ... And one in Sevastopol, and the other in the big cathedral of your Winter Imperial Palace, it was ordered to me only with decent filial loyal reverence to all the most beloved Our Imperial Majesty, would it please you to take it out of careless storage somewhere in the sacristy, and like me now With the permission of the Socellary of this Council, I saw it cracked, but excellently and then graciously preserved under No. 537, and beautifully put this Cathedral of the Blessed Virgin Mary in your church in a decent icon case, opposite the local main one, near the royal gates of the icon of the Most Holy Theotokos, in the likeness with that in a separate icon case, against the local icon of Christ the Savior. And since an ulcer is coming to St. Petersburg (that is, cholera, and maybe the ulcer of conspiracy, which manifested itself with a shot on April 4, the assassination attempt of the terrorist Karakozov on Emperor Alexander II, which I explained on July 27), then will you not please All-most graciously the highest command to deign to deign with a decent priestly service and everywhere with lithium and water consecration, and sprinkling with holy water to enclose your Winter Palace and all of St. Petersburg with this icon, to go around your entire capital and residence. And the Lord, both in 1854 and now, will completely deign to hide both you and your northern capital from the all-destructive ulcer, and during the priestly service and bypassing both the palace and St. To her, the Lady of our Ever-Virgin Mary, the Mother of God, about whom I was still in 1854

I knew and frankly through his Excellency the Minister of the Imperial Court, he gave an all-submissive report.

And then even more inferiorly and on behalf of Father Seraphim himself, his great elder then, on the 1st day of April 1865, who also appeared afterwards.

All this until now has been written by me in my grave illness, lying, indeed, on my deathbed. And the night of April 15-16 stopped this draft of my manuscript. And the next day, April 16, from the stories of the world mediator, Prince Nikolai Nikolaevich Ukhtomsky, I learned about the vile and vile act of the bastard who calls himself Karakozov. Who he really is, I cannot say, but I was infinitely sad that they testified to him, whether he was in his mind. And all the noise of celebrations, speeches and other things to infinity, because of a deep feeling that internally does not approve of all this, I do not like it to infinity.

What would I write next in my last short note dated April 14 or 15, 1865, all subject, now I cannot say, but my two dreams, or better, visions about Emperor Nikolai Pavlovich, who died in Boz, on the morning of this July 27, and forgive me that such a bad pen, but still I will write.

The first dream was on the eve of the capture of Kars.

After the death of His Majesty, the same agitation-revolutionary parties began to dissolve all kinds of slander against him. And although I was deeply convinced, asserting myself in the words of the great elder Seraphim about him, that all this is a lie, but, nevertheless, my heart endlessly grieved for my unforgettable Tsar Emperor, a benefactor.

And now I have a dream: the Sovereign Emperor Nikolai Pavlovich and the Sovereign Empress Alexandra Feodorovna seem to be entering the small dining room of the Winter Palace, where I, by the highest order, had the good fortune to be invited. And the Emperor said to me: "For a long time, even during my life, I wanted you to regale with our royal bread and salt, but it was not possible, then you can eat with us now." His Majesty the Sovereign Emperor seated me on the right side at a round table, and Her Imperial Majesty Empress Alexandra Feodorovna seated me on the left side. And when I began to eat, I saw that he, like Archbishop Anthony,

He began to chew quickly, and thought: "And how the Emperor pisses on both cheeks." And the deceased His Majesty smiled, turning to me, and said: “Well done! First, |||) about your king and master, and you shouldn't think so impolitely, but I know that you didn't think in spite. And secondly, you yourself told me on behalf of the great Elder Seraphim that n is a Christian at heart. But do Christians die - they are, according to Christ, the Life-Giver, and they themselves are always alive, so I rested for a while, until the future of all common Resurrection from the dead in flesh, but in my soul and spirit I am alive, healthy and in the mercy of God I am, and I am not only forgiven of all sins mine, for there is no man like him who will live and will not see the death of sin - but he is also saved, and has mercy, and in everything is permitted forever. And not only was he blessed by the Lord God, but for my great love for the great elder Seraphim and placed near him in the Kingdom with Knife. And what you wrote to me about the regicidal thirst for the Decembrist revolution, Elder Seraphim has now conveyed about all this even more and in the most detailed form (that is, before the capture of Kars). But what did you not convey to me in detail then? "

And I answered: “Your Imperial Majesty! If, disdaining Count Orlov's slanders against me and spitting on his warnings, you then deigned to admit me in the most merciful way to a secret audience, then I would fearlessly have the opportunity to convey to Your Imperial Majesty not only that the revelation of God I had the good fortune to learn from the lips of a saint Seraphim about Decembrism, but also the fact that, being guided by his divine instructions and the unceasing help of God during many years of wandering around Russia, I had the opportunity, not in word, but in deed, to learn about the further course of that godless and repressive agitation. For after the release, most graciously granted by you in 1833 from the arrest of Simbirsky, through the Minister of Justice Dashkova, all true Christians accepted me as a martyr for the faith of Christ. For I was unjustly arrested for my healing in Voronezh on the 1st day of October 1832 and for writing a full service and akathist to Saint [Tikhon] Mitrofan, and hitherto not allowed by the Holy Synod to print, and for my alleged, brief, as if my partnership with Alexei Petrovich Ermolov, and with

Mikhail and Alexander Nikolaevich Muravyov, and Andrei, their brother, whom with Norov, who was later, since 1854, my personal boss, the Minister of Public Education, I in the simplicity of my heart called my companions on my travels to holy places. Then, I repeat, the servants of Christ considered me a martyr for my faith, and the slaves of the Antichrist and revolutionaries, reformers without reforms, considered me a great conspirator, but escaped arrest, they also took me for their fellow revolutionary and were utterly frank with me. "

Yes, - His Imperial Majesty deigned to answer me, - and the great Elder Seraphim told me about this. But as far as it became that you wrote to me in your letter that you as if you never told anyone about this before 1854, this is not entirely true.

Yes, - I answered, - forgive me, Sire. I got excited and in my fervor forgot that when some conspirators, also flaming up and making mistakes, often declared their desire to exterminate your entire august imperial family, then I, in the words of a great elder, whom they still respected even with their revolutionary spirit, had the happiness of disassociating them from their kingship designs.

That's the same, - said the Emperor, - the great Elder Seraphim also told me about this. And we remember you and often talk about you, and we wish you in everything for the benefit of the Church of Christ, our Imperial House and all of Russia brilliant and all-victorious, invincible in everything success.

Here is the whole, in all its wonderful details, the great dream on the eve of the surrender of Kars, about which I gave a short note in 1861 through Princess Varvara Arkadyevna Gorchakov, along with some anecdotes about Suvorov, which I heard in my childhood almost from my uncle, the Suvorov colonel Tishchenko, also informed the former governor-general Alexander Arkadievich Suvorov-Rymniksky.

But here is a description of another, also wonderful dream, on the eve of 30 days before the execution of the second, who was shot for the Simbirsk fires, before the arrival of Senator Zhdanov in Simbirsk. ,.,.

I saw that as if I were in Simbirsk (living, however, by

about the burning of Simbirsk in my estate and the place of my homeland, Simbirsk district, village Rozhdestvenskoye, Tsylne, too). And that, as if by the highest command, they were calling me to see the deceased Bose Emperor Nikolai Pavlovich at the Simbirsk Pokrovsky Monastery. And I went straight to the small wooden chambers of the late Right Reverend Anatoly, where on some occasion the Right Reverend Eugene was accommodated, supposing that the Sovereign Emperor had probably already deigned to stop, but I was shown a small, cleanly tidy outhouse behind the cemetery, like a deserted hermit cell, opposite which in the front garden, beautifully decorated with magnificent flowers, the Sovereign Emperor Nikolai Pavlovich deigned to sit, on the same chair of Emperor Peter the Great, located in St. this and His favorite place of Peter the Great's solitude.

When I had the good fortune to approach His Imperial Majesty, the Emperor deigned to me to say:

What does it mean, Motovilov, that during my life you yourself volunteered to serve me, and now I myself am calling you, but I’ll not get enough of it. Is it possible that you, imitating others, decided to change us too ?!

I calmly said:

No, Your Majesty. But no one told me that you deign to demand me.

Ah, ”said the Emperor, addressing those around him,“ is not my dispute with you fair that you are lying to Mo-tovilov, as if he had forgotten me and my Imperial House, the Holy Church and our holy Russian land? Well, thanks for showing up immediately. I knew you and firmly believed that I was not mistaken about you.

As soon as the Sovereign Emperor disposed to utter this, then just obliquely from this place, near the Cathedral of the Intercession of the Mother of God, the earth shook over the tomb of our last holy fool Andrei Ilyich (about whom and his life there is a story in the magazine "Wanderer"), and he is from under the lids of his cast-iron monument he came out, resurrected from the coffin and, doing his usual foolishness, waddling from side to side, in his variegated red shirt, and uttering the usual sounds:

"A-aa-a", began to approach directly to His Imperial Majesty. And the Emperor, having deigned to stand up and folded the first three fingers of his right hand in the Orthodox Christian fold of his fingers, and crossing himself correctly, and not with a handful, the usual example, deigned to say: “Well, thank God, these two (which means that I am among Christ's sake counting the holy fools) now they will help in everything. "

And as soon as he deigned to utter this sovereign speech with all mercy, as they report to His Majesty that from His Imperial Majesty, the most pious reigning Emperor Alexander II Nikolaevich, a courier arrived to him with dispatches. And they gave him four of my manuscripts, half folded sheets and in four colors - white, pink-red, blue and green, tied crosswise with silk wide ribbons.

And the Emperor, turn at me, deigned to say to me:

And this is your papers; you know their essence. And I, as I once told you, and I know them even better than yours from the stories of the great elder Seraphim about them, and I myself will deal with my son to sort them out. Well, you begin to act as the great Elder Seraphim commanded you to act for our benefit.

I told His Majesty:

With the greatest joy, with all my heart, I am ready to serve Your Imperial Majesty. But that's not the point. It is necessary that not only the highest permission was granted to me, but that none of the gentlemen ministers, like the Minister of Finance Brock, would no longer interfere with me in anything in the service of Your Imperial Majesty. You and your all-thickest son, and your entire imperial family, whom of them you would like to admit into your secrets, should know what I intend to do for God, for you and Russia. And I will try to do even more than I promised and I promise with the help of God. But your ministers do not have any right to this, except for Count Vladimir Feodorovich Adlerberg, and if that were so, then long ago everything that was godless and evil would have been exterminated by God-indicated to me through the great Elder Seraphim, by grace-filled means.

But since the death of Your Imperial Majesty, in spite of all your love and all your mercy to me, and instead of you, giving me your two obeisances through the lord

Minister of the imperial court, the words were conveyed to me that you remember me as one of the first leaders in the war on the Postoperative question, and I am humiliated, rejected. They oppress me, cut me off like a dog, and my life in the rank of a conscientious judge is worse than any hard labor - how can I at least somehow serve God and you and Russia according to the words of the Lord indicated to me through Seraphim. After all, like Elijah the prophet, the priests of the revolution, the Decembrists, the tsaredushi-bodies and, the enemies of God, the Tsar and the Russian kingdom, are also looking for my soul.

Well, don't worry about that anymore. I'll fix it all myself. And myself: I'll tell you to my son Alexander. Look, fulfill and serve us terribly with faith and righteousness.

I am ready and will, with the help of God, serve God, you and Russia. Serve as the great Elder Seraphim instructed me with revelation, and the Great Seraphim convincingly asked

E. I. Motovilova

FROM MEMORIES OF HUSBAND NIKOLAI ALEXANDROVICH

After my marriage to Nikolai Alexandrovich, in spite of my young years, I soon had to take up the management of the farm and estates. Although Nikolai Alexandrovich himself did not stop doing all this, but, noticing my ability to manage the affairs of the estate, he hastened to transfer all these concerns to me in order to more freely do what he was constantly attracted to: Nikolai Alexandrovich, being a secular and family man, led a spiritual life.

For a long time I did not understand this direction of my husband, and on this basis, we happened to have misunderstandings.

Nikolai Alexandrovich, wherever he was and whatever he did, had a thought “immersed in God,” he was all burning with love for God, for the Mother of God and for His holy saints.

He often went to holy places and had a great acquaintance with the ascetics of that time, of whom there were many. It happened that I accompanied him on these visits to holy places.

We were in Voronezh with Archbishop Anthony (this, in the words of the Monk Seraphim, the great bishop of God); he had a great gift of clairvoyance and great spiritual love for my husband. Once upon arrival in Voronezh, for some reason, I decided to postpone the communion of the Holy Mysteries, especially since we were to leave soon, but Nikolai Aleksandrovich asked me to go with him to the Right Reverend to ask him about it. Before we had time to ascend to him, he, blessing us, turning to me, said: “During the trip, mother, in no way and for no reason

leave to proceed to the Holy Mysteries: I find in the case of a case with you the action of the enemy of our salvation. " We often visited Zadonsk, where my husband's spiritual friend, Father Zosima, was the archimandrite. The first time I saw him was upon arrival in Zadonsk, in a church. I see a rather young monk comes in and bows to the ground in front of the removed icons, and I thought: "This is how young he is, and he already has some deeds."

At the end of the service, Nikolai Alexandrovich went with me to tea with Father Archimandrite, and I was very surprised to recognize him as a monk whom I saw in the church. Over tea, turning to me, Father Zosima suddenly says: "Here, mother, some people think that I am still young, and indeed a great ascetic, only this is all wrong, I will soon be fifty years old."

We visited the famous ascetic Parthenius of Kiev, knew Ignatius Brianchaninov, Feofan, Bishop of Tambov, later Vyshensky's hermit, and knew many, many people and whom Nikolai Alexandrovich visited. But most of these trips Nikolai Alexandrovich made alone: ​​the farm and family kept me at home. It happened that Nikolai Alexandrovich was delayed for a very long time, and I began to worry about his absence. Once, I remember, for a whole month I had no news of him from Voronezh. In great sorrow, I went to a monastery, where there was a hermit named Margarita, in order to have spiritual support and consolation from her. I entered her cell and suddenly, from behind the partition where she constantly stayed, she shouted to me: “Do not grieve, do not grieve! Today your husband will be at home. " Indeed, in the evening Nikolai Alexandrovich returned home. "

Great servants of God and great bishops were at that time! Bishop Eugene was in Simbirsk, fires often happened in the city, and residents were very worried, fearing a big fire, since the buildings were wooden. Bishop Eugene said: "Do not worry, there will be no big fire while I am alive, but when I die, there will be a great fire."

When he died, they began to strike the bell according to custom, and on the other side of the city they began to sound the alarm - a fire broke out, which greatly devastated the city.

But where, where I have not been, and I have not seen Sarov better! Good-

Slovenian, God-saved Sarov! According to the greatness of their exploits, his ascetics became like the ancient desert Fathers!

And Nikolai Alexandrovich, wherever he went, wherever he was, and everything constantly attracted him to Sarov and Diveev. In winter, without a hat, while visiting Diveyevo, according to the commandment of Father Seraphim, he walked around the groove every day and sang loudly: "Oh, all-singing Mati!" According to the commandment of Father Seraphim, he loved to put many candles in churches to the holy icons and did not spare any expenses for this.

All-night vigils were often served in our house, and Nikolai Alexandrovich himself read the Six Psalms, while streams of tears flowed from his eyes, and his whole mind was "grief."

Once it happened to our son-in-law, Prince N, to be with this, and at the end of the service he began to express his surprise at this. The next day he and Nikolai Alexandrovich went to inspect the estate. Nikolai Aleksandrovich rode with the coachman in one carriage drawn by a troika, and our son-in-law rode in another and rode behind. The road ran along a high bank near the river. Suddenly Nikolai Alezheandrovich's horses got scared of something, rushed and flew straight from the cliff with the carriage into the water; in one minute Nikolai Aleksandrovich threw off his hat and, turning his gaze to the sky, loudly began the 90th psalm "Alive in the help of Vyshnyago."

Having flown from the cliff to the edge of the river, the horses plunged into the water and, as if held back by what force, stopped and remained in a standing position, and neither Nikolai Alexandrovich nor the coachman received any injuries.

Upon his return, our son-in-law said that "Nikolai Alexandrovich's prayer is really great, and that an obvious miracle happened, since there could be no salvation due to the steepness of the coast."

Yes, Nikolai Alexandrovich in faith was firm and strong as a stone; he can be called a confessor of faith.

Always revolving in the highest spiritual and secular circles, Nikolai Alexandrovich often denounced the mood that had already begun then in the desire for various reforms in our Orthodox Church. In these cases, both in writing and orally, he defended the integrity, sanctity and inviolability of these rules. Once in a crowded meeting there was a conversation about this, and Nikolai Aleksandrovich expressed the harsh truth; - I

imperceptibly began to jerk him, wanting to stop the excessive fervor of his speech. “Why are you pulling me,” he exclaimed. You have cognized the words of my eternal life, and by them your neighbor, who is in error, can be saved. " So I am afraid of the one who denounces me, who said: “You are crafty and lazy slave! Why is not my silver worker in the store? " So, mother, where the Spirit of God visits a person, speak there. "

For the Mother of God, Nikolai Alexandrovich had a special love, often read the paraclises to her, repeating them many times. Once someone at one big dinner, knowing this, allowed himself to say something about the Mother of God.

Then, not being ashamed of those present at the dinner, Nikolai Alexandrovich began to literally smash the joker, telling him such truth that all those who were at the dinner sided with Nikolai Alexandrovich, and the joker was left to leave the meeting with dishonor.

Nikolai Alexandrovich's love for his neighbor was great, he wanted everyone to be saved; our peasants often came to him on business, and, leaving aside the matter, he tried to explain spiritual subjects to them, and it is true that our peasants were distinguished by rare religiosity. Nikolai Aleksandrovich told me that Father Seraphim told him, “that everything that bears the name of the“ Decembrists ”,“ reformers ”and belongs to the“ everyday-improving party ”is true anti-Christianity, which, developing, will lead to the destruction of Christianity on earth, and partly Orthodoxy, and will end with the accession of the Antichrist over all the countries of the World, except for Russia, which will merge into one whole with other Slavic lands and make up a huge national ocean, before which other tribes of the earth will be in fear. And this, he said, is as true as two times two makes four.

So, I repeat, out of ignorance I told Nikolai Alexandrovich that he should, if he wants to lead such a lifestyle, go to a monastery, and not be a family man. To this he answered me the following: “Father Seraphim told me that monasteries are a place for higher spiritual perfection, that is, for those people who wish to fulfill the commandment:“ If you want to be perfect,

do everything and follow Me. " But the fulfillment of all the other commandments spoken by the Lord is, however, an obligation for all Christians, so, in other words, the passage of spiritual life is obligatory both for a monk and for a simple family Christian. The difference is in the degree of cultivation, which may be large, may be small. ** And we can, - added Father Seraphim, - to go through the spiritual life, but we ourselves do not want to! Spiritual life is the acquisition by a Christian of the Holy Spirit of God, and it begins only from the time when the Lord God the Holy Spirit, although only briefly, begins to visit a person. Until that time, a Christian (be it a monk, be a worldly person) leads a general Christian life, but not a spiritual one; there are few people conducting spiritual life.

Although the Gospel says, - said Father Seraphim, - that it is impossible for God to work and mammon and "it is difficult for one who has riches to enter the Kingdom of Heaven," the Lord revealed to me that through the fall of Adam man became completely darkened and became one-sided in spiritual reasoning, for in the Gospel it is also said that what is impossible for man is possible for God; therefore God is strong, he will teach a person how without spiritual destruction, being in the conditions of secular life, a person can serve God in spirit. “My yoke is good and My burden is easy to eat,” and it is often blocked by such burdens (out of excessive fear of serving mammon) that, having taken the keys of spiritual understanding, it turns out that they themselves do not enter, and they prevent others from entering. So, after falling from extreme sinful blindness, man became one-sided.

Many saints, Father Seraphim said, left us their writings, and in them everyone speaks of the same thing: the acquisition of the Holy Spirit of God “through various deeds, through the practice of various virtues, but mainly through unceasing prayer. And truly, there is nothing in the world more precious than her. Reading their scriptures serves to know what exactly should be achieved. The Lord often leaves our petitions and even those who are called spiritual ones without fulfilling, and all because they live according to the flesh, and not according to the Spirit: “Those who live according to the flesh cannot please God,” says the holy apostle. "Those who are led by the Spirit are the sons of God!" Thus, the latter cannot be denied by the Lord in their petitions.

True, Nikolai Alexandrovich always had a prayer, ascended to God, in his mind and heart, and very often with Vtom he began to receive communion. Holy Mysteries of God. In addition, Father Seraphim showed him and explained to him what it is to Sing the presence of the Holy Spirit of God and how to understand His Manifestations.

Having reached old age, Nikolai Alexandrovich, as predicted by Father Seraphim, painlessly and extremely quietly departed to the Lord.

Some time after his death, I received letters from Abbot Zosima from Zadonsk and from nun Euphrosyne from Kiev, who simultaneously informed me that on the day of his death Nikolai Alexandrovich appeared to them and asked them not to leave me, his wife, with spiritual support.

At the request of Nikolai Alexandrovich, his body was sent from the Simbirsk estate for burial in Diveyevo. Assuming that the body of Nikolai Alexandrovich would be transported rather quietly, I ordered that it be sent three hours before our departure. And an amazing thing! When we followed him, we could not catch up with him until Diveyevo. We will arrive at the station, they say that we have just left, we are starting to drive the horses, but we cannot catch up. So Nikolai Aleksandrovich hurried to Diveyev, dead, as he had been there always and constantly during his life.

A large slab was laid on the grave of Nikolai Alexandrovich; it is not known how tall birches sprouted through it in several places. These are heavenly candles, which he set to God during his lifetime.

The text "Memoirs of EI Motovilova about her husband Nikolai Alexandrovich" is published according to "Psychic Reading".

Saint Seraphim was born in 1759 in Kursk into a merchant family. At the age of 10, he became very ill. During his illness, he saw in a dream the Mother of God, who promised to heal him. A few days later, a procession with the local miraculous icon of the Mother of God was performed in Kursk. Due to bad weather, the procession took a shortcut past the Moshnins' house. After his mother applied Seraphim to the miraculous image, he began to quickly recover. At the age of 18, Seraphim firmly decided to take monasticism. His mother blessed him with a large copper crucifix, which he wore all his life over his clothes. From the very first day in the monastery, exceptional abstinence in food and sleep was a distinctive feature of his life. He ate once a day, and even then not enough. I ate nothing on Wednesdays and Fridays. Having asked the blessing of his elder, he often began to retire to the forest for prayer and contemplation. Soon he became very ill again and for three years had to spend most of the time lying down.

He was tonsured a monk when he was 27 years old. He was given the name Seraphim, which in Hebrew means "fiery, burning". Soon he was ordained a hierodeacon. He justified his name with an extraordinary prayer burning. He spent all the time, with the exception of the shortest rest, in the temple. Among such prayer and liturgical works of St. Seraphim was honored to see angels co-serving and singing in the temple.

In 1793, the Monk Seraphim was ordained a hieromonk, after which he served daily and received the Holy Mysteries throughout the year. Then Saint Seraphim began to retire to the “distant wilderness” - into the wilderness five miles from the Sarov monastery. Great was the perfection he achieved at that time. Wild animals: bears, hares, wolves, foxes and others - came to the ascetic's hut. The old woman of the Diveyevo monastery, Matrona Pleshcheyeva, personally saw how Saint Seraphim fed the bear that came to him from his hands. “The face of the great old man seemed especially wonderful to me then. It was joyful and light, like an angel's, ”she said.

According to the special vision of the Mother of God, at the end of his life, St. Seraphim took upon himself the feat of eldership. He began to accept everyone who came to him for advice and guidance. Many thousands of people from the most diverse strata and states began to visit the elder, who enriched them from his spiritual treasure, acquired by many years of deeds. All met St. Seraphim meek, joyful, thoughtfully sincere. He greeted those who came with the words: "My joy" To many he advised: "Acquire (acquire) a peaceful spirit, and thousands will be saved around you." Whoever came to him, the elder bowed to the ground and blessed everyone, kissed his hands himself. He didn’t need those who came to tell him about themselves, but he knew what was in his heart. He also said: “Gaiety is not a sin. It drives away fatigue, and from fatigue there is despondency, and it is not worse. "

This chapter is taken from the conversation of the Monk Seraphim of Sarov with N.A.Motovilov. She has recently gained wide popularity and is justly considered the most precious pearl of the Orthodox teaching on salvation.

This manuscript was found in 1903 by S.A.Nilus in the papers of the late Motovilov, transferred to him by his widow Elena Ivanovna.

ON THE. Motovilov, a wealthy landowner, healed by Saint Seraphim from an incurable leg disease, spent his whole life near the great elder. To this "servant Seraphimov," as he called himself, we owe much information about the life of the monk, and he was also the only witness of the great triumph of Orthodoxy, manifested by St. Seraphim in 1831 in the dense forests of Sarov, which has now become the property of the entire Church.

Invitation

“Truly, truly, I say to you:
believing in Me, the works that I do,
and he will do, and he will do more than these ... ”(John 14:12)

“Once,” Motovilov writes in his notes: “it was in the Sarov Hermitage, shortly after my healing, at the beginning of the winter of 1831, on Tuesday the end of November, I stood during Vespers in the warm Cathedral of the Life-Giving Source on an ordinary one, as well as then it always happened, in my place, right in front of the miraculous icon of the Mother of God. One of the sisters of the Diveevskaya Mill Community came up to me. The name and existence of this community, separate from the other ecclesiastical, also Diveyevo community, I had no idea at that time. This sister told me:

Are you a lame gentleman whom our father, Father Seraphim, healed just recently?

I replied that it was me who was.

Well, so, - she said, - go to the priest - he ordered to call you to him. He is now in his cell in the monastery, and said that he would be waiting for you.

People who, at least once during the life of the great Elder Seraphim, who were in the Sarov Hermitage and even though they only heard about him, can fully comprehend what inexplicable joy my soul was filled with at this unexpected call of him. Leaving the hearing of the Divine Service, I immediately ran to him, to his cell. Father Seraphim met me at the very door of his vestibule and said to me:

I was waiting for your love of God! Just wait a little while I talk to my orphans. I have a lot to talk with you. Sit down here!

At these words, he pointed out to me a ladder with steps, made, probably, to close the chimneys of the stove and placed opposite the stove, with its mouth in the vestibule, as in all double cells of the Sarovs. I was about to sit down on the bottom step, but he said to me:

No, sit higher.

I switched to the second one, but he told me:

No, your love of God! If you please sit on the very top step. And, having made me sit down, he added:

Well, sit here and wait, when I, having talked with my orphans, come out to you.

Batiushka brought two sisters into his cell, one of whom was a girl from the nobility, the sister of the Nizhny Novgorod landowner Mantorov, Elena Vasilievna, as the sisters who stayed with me in senets told me about it.

For a long time I sat waiting for the great old man to open the doors for me too. I think I sat like that for two hours. Seraphim's cell attendant, Pavel, came out to me from another, closest to the entrance to the vestibule of this cell, and, despite my excuses; persuaded me to visit his cell and began to give me various instructions on spiritual life, which in fact had the goal, at the instigation of the enemy, to weaken my love and faith in the merits of the great elder Seraphim before God.

I felt sad, and with sorrow I said to him:

I was stupid, Father Paul, that, having obeyed your convictions, I entered your cell. Father Abbot, Niphont is a great servant of God, but even here I did not come to the Sarov Monastery for him and I do come, although I respect him very much for his shrine, but only for one priest, Fr. Seraphim, about whom I think that even in ancient times there were few such saints of God, gifted with the power of Elijah and Moses. Who are you who are imposing on me with your instructions, while I guess you don't even know the way of God yourself. Forgive me - I am sorry that I listened to you and went to your cell.

With that, I left him and sat down again on the top step of the ladder in the senses of my father's cell. Then I heard from the same Father Paul that the fathers reprimanded him for this, saying to him: “It is not your business to talk with those who long for the word of the wretched Seraphim and come to him in Sarov. And I myself, poor man, do not tell them my own thing, but what the Lord has pleased me to reveal for edification. Do not get in the way of your own business. Know yourself, and never dare to teach anyone: God did not give you this gift - after all, it is not given to people for nothing, but for their merits before our Lord our God and according to His special mercy and Divine look on people and His Holy Providence ”. I am writing this here for the memory and edification of those who value both the little speech and barely perceptible character trait of the great Elder Seraphim.

When about two o'clock the elder had a conversation with his orphans, then the door opened and the father, Fr. Seraphim, seeing off the sisters, said to me:

I have detained you for a long time, your love of God. Do not exact. Here are my orphans needed in many ways, so I, poor, and consoled them. Come to your cell.

In this cell, his monastery, he talked with me about various subjects related to the salvation of the soul and to the life of the world, and ordered me and Fr. Guriy of the Sarov hotel, the next day, after early Mass, to go to him in the nearby wilderness.

It was on Thursday. The day was overcast. There was a quarter of snow on the ground, and a rather thick snow crumbs poured from above, when Father Fr. Seraphim began a conversation with me on his closest pazhninka, near the same nearby wilderness opposite the Sarovka river, near a mountain close to its banks.

He placed me on the stump of a tree he had just cut down, and he himself stood squatting opposite me.

The Lord revealed to me, - said the great elder, - that in your childishness you zealously wanted to know what the purpose of our Christian life is, and you have repeatedly asked many great spiritual persons about this ...

I must say here that since I was 12 years old, this thought persistently disturbed me, and I, indeed, addressed many of the clergy with this question, but their answers did not satisfy me. The elder did not know this.

But no one, - continued Father Seraphim, - has definitely told you about this. They told you: go to church, pray to God, doing the commandments of God, do good - this is the goal of Christian life for you. And some were even indignant at you because you were busy with disagreeable curiosity and told you: do not seek your higher self. But they didn’t speak as they should. Here I, poor Seraphim, will explain to you now what this goal really is.

Prayer, fasting, vigilance and all other Christian deeds, no matter how good they are in themselves, however, the goal of our Christian life does not consist only in doing them, although they serve as the necessary means for achieving it. The true goal of Christian life is to acquire the Holy Spirit of God. But fasting and vigilance, and prayer, and alms, and every good deed done for Christ's sake are the means for acquiring the Holy Spirit of God. Note, father, that only for the sake of Christ a good deed done brings us the fruits of the Holy Spirit. Still, what is done not for Christ's sake, although good, does not represent a reward in the life of the century to come, and in this life it does not give the grace of God either. That is why the Lord Jesus Christ said: "Everyone who does not gather with Me, he scatters that" (Matthew 12:30; Luke 11:23). A good deed cannot be called otherwise than gathering, for although it is not done for Christ's sake, it is nevertheless good. Scripture says: "In every tongue fear God and make righteousness his delight" (Acts 10:35). And as we can see from the sequence of the Sacred narrative, this one doing righteousness is so pleasing to God that Cornelius, the centurion, who feared God and did righteousness, appeared an angel of the Lord during his prayer and said: “Send to Joppa to Simon Usmar, where you will find Peter, and That one speaks the verbs of the eternal life, in them you and all your house will be saved ”(Acts 10: 5-6). So, the Lord uses all His Divine means to give such a person the opportunity for his good deeds not to lose the reward in the life of the Divine Life. But for this we need to start here with the right faith in our Lord Jesus Christ, the Son of God, Who Came to save sinful people, and by acquiring the grace of the Holy Spirit, Introducing the Kingdom of God into our hearts and paving the way for us to acquire the blessedness of life in the age to come. But that is what limits this pleasure to God of good deeds that are not done for Christ's sake: our Creator provides the means for their implementation. It remains for a person to either implement them or not. That is why the Lord said to the Hebrews: “If they did not see it faster, they had no quicker sin. But now you speak, we see, and your sin abides on you ”(John 9:41). If a person, like Cornelius, takes advantage of God's pleasure in his work that was not done for Christ's sake, and believes in His Son, then this kind of work will be imputed to him, as if done for Christ's sake and only for faith in Him. Otherwise, a person has no right to complain that his good has not gone into business. This never happens only when doing some kind of good for Christ's sake, for good, for His sake, is done not only in the life of the next century, the crown of righteousness intercedes, but also in this life fills a person with the grace of the Holy Spirit, and moreover, as it is said: “Out of measure God gives the Holy Spirit. The Father loves the Son and gives all in His hand ”(John 3: 34-35).

So it is, your love of God. So in the acquisition of this Spirit of God is the true goal of our Christian life, and prayer, fasting, vigilance, alms and other virtues for Christ's sake are only means to acquire the Spirit of God.

What about acquisitions? - I asked Father Seraphim - I don’t understand something.

Acquisition is the same as acquisition, - he answered me, - do you understand what acquiring money means? So it is all the same the acquisition of the Spirit of God. After all, you, your Love for God, understand what acquisition is in the worldly sense? The purpose of the worldly life of ordinary people is to acquire or make money, and among the nobles, in addition, to receive honors, distinctions and other awards for state services. The acquisition of the Spirit of God is also capital, but only gracious and eternal, and it, like money, bureaucratic and temporary, is acquired in the same ways, very similar to each other. God the Word, our Lord God-Man, Jesus Christ likens our life to a marketplace, and calls our life's work on earth a purchase and says to all of us: “bathe, I will come again. redeeming time, as the days of deceit are "(Luke 19:13, Eph. 5:16), that is, gain time to receive heavenly goods through earthly goods. Earthly goods are virtues done for Christ's sake, giving us the grace of the All-Holy Spirit. In the parable of the wise and foolish virgins (See: Matt. 25: 1-12), when the foolish ones lacked oil, it is said: “When you go, buy it in the marketplace” (Matt. 25: 9). But when they bought, the doors to the bridal chamber were already closed and they could not enter it. Some say that the lack of oil among the holy fools means that they lack good deeds in their lifetime. This understanding is not entirely correct. What is this lack of good deeds for them, when, although they are holy fools, they are nevertheless called virgins? After all, virginity is the highest virtue, as a state of equal angels and could serve as a substitute in itself for all other virtues. I, poor man, think that it was precisely the grace of the All-Holy Spirit of God that was lacking. Creating virtues, these virgins, in their spiritual foolishness, believed that the only Christian thing is to do some virtues. We did it, virtue and so, and did the work of God, but before they received the grace of the Spirit of God, whether they achieved it, they did not care. About such and such ways of life, based only on one creation of virtues without careful testing, whether they bring and exactly how much they bring the grace of the Spirit of God, and it is said in the fatherly books: the bottom of hell. "

Anthony the Great, in his letters to the monks, says about such virgins: “Many monks and virgins have no idea about the differences in wills operating in man, and they do not know that three wills are at work in us: the first is the will of God, all-perfect and all-saving; the second is one's own, human, that is, if not harmful, then not saving; and the third, demonic, is completely pernicious. " And it is this third enemy will that teaches a person either not to do any virtues, or to do them out of vanity, or for one good, and not for the sake of Christ. The second - our own will - teaches us to do everything to please our lusts, or even, as the enemy teaches, to do good for the sake of good, not paying attention to the grace they acquire. The first - the will of God and all-saving - consists only in doing good only for the acquisition of the Holy Spirit, as an eternal treasure, inexhaustible and not able to be fully and adequately appreciated by anything.

It is this, this acquisition of the Holy Spirit, in fact, is called that oil, which was lacking among the holy fools. That is why they are called holy fools, for they have forgotten about the necessary fruit of virtue, about the grace of the Holy Spirit, without which no one can be saved, for: "By the Holy Spirit, every soul lives, and it rises with purity, brightens the Trinity Unity in sacred secrecy." The Holy Spirit Himself dwells in our souls, and this is the very absorption of His Almighty into our souls, and the coexistence with our spirit of His Trinity Unity and is given to us only through the all-round acquisition of the Holy Spirit from our side, which prepares in our soul and flesh the throne of God, all-creative with our spirit, according to the immutable word of God: “I will dwell in them and I am like, and I will be in God for them, and they will be in My people” (2 Cor. 6:16). This is precisely the oil in the lamps of the wise virgins, which could burn lightly and for a long time, and those virgins with these burning lamps could wait for the Bridegroom, who came in midnight and enter with Him into the palace of joy. The holy fools, seeing that their lamps were extinguished, although they went to the marketplace to buy oil, did not have time to return in time, for the doors were already closed.

Marketplace is our life; the doors of the bridal chamber that were closed and did not allow the Bridegroom were human death. The wise and holy virgins are Christian souls. Oil is not deeds, but the grace of the All-Holy Spirit of God received through them inside our nature, transforming this (that is, nature) from this into this, that is, from corruption to incorruption, from spiritual death to spiritual life, from darkness into light, from the den of being ours, where passions are tied like cattle and beasts, - to the temple of the Divine, to the luminous palace of eternal joy in Christ Jesus our Lord, Creator and Deliverer and Eternal Bridegroom of our souls. How great is God's compassion for our misfortune, that is, inattention to His care for us, when God says: "Behold, I stand at the door and make sense!" (Rev. 3:20), meaning by the doors the course of our life, not yet closed by death.

Oh, how I wish, your Love for God, that in this life you would always be in the Spirit of God!

“In what I find, in that I judge,” says the Lord. Woe, great woe, if He finds us burdened with cares and sorrows of life, for who will endure His anger and who will stand against the face of His anger! That is why it is said: “Watch and pray, lest you enter into trouble” (Mark 14:38), that is, do not be deprived of the Spirit of God; for vigilance and prayer bring us His grace.

Of course, every virtue done for Christ's sake gives the grace of the Holy Spirit, but most of all it gives prayer, because it is, as it were, always in our hands as a weapon for acquiring the grace of the Spirit. Would you like, for example, to go to church, but either there is no church, or the service has ceased; you would want to give to a beggar, but there is no beggar, or you have nothing to give; you would want to keep your virginity, but you do not have the strength to fulfill this according to your constitution or according to the efforts of the enemy's intrigues, which you cannot resist due to human weakness; you would want to do some other virtue for Christ's sake, but you also have no strength, or you cannot find a chance. And before prayer, this does not apply in any way: everyone always has an opportunity for it - the rich and the poor, and the noble and the simple, and the strong and the weak, and the healthy and the sick, and the righteous, and the sinner.

How great is the power of prayer, even of a sinful person, when it ascends from the bottom of your heart, judge by the following example of Holy Scripture: when, at the request of a desperate mother who lost her only-begotten son, abducted by death, a harlot wife who got on her way and even from just She was not cleansed of her former sin, touched by the desperate grief of her mother, cried out to the Lord: "Not for the sake of the accursed sinner, but tears for the sake of the mother grieving for her son and firmly convinced of Your mercy and omnipotence, Christ God, resurrect, Lord, her son!" ... - and the Lord raised him up.

So, your love for God, the power of prayer is great, and it most of all brings the Spirit of God, and it is most convenient for everyone to correct it. We will be blessed when the Lord God finds us vigilant, in the fullness of the gifts of His Holy Spirit. Then we can boldly hope to be caught up in the clouds, to meet the Lord in the air (1 Thess. 4:17), Coming with glory and much power (Matt. 24:30) to judge the living and the dead (2 Tim. 4: 1, 1) Pet. 4: 5) and give commendation according to his deeds (Matt. 16:27, Rom. 2: 6, Rev. 22:12).

Behold, your love for God, for the great happiness you deign to consider with the poor Seraphim, being sure that he is not deprived of the grace of the Lord. What are we talking about the Lord Himself, the source of the ever-scarce source of all goodness, both heavenly and earthly? But by prayer we are rewarded with talking with Him, the All-Merciful and Life-giving God and our Savior. But even here it is necessary to pray only until God the Holy Spirit descends on us in the measures of His heavenly grace known to Him. And when He delights in visiting us, then we must already stop praying. Why then pray to Him: “Come and dwell in us and cleanse us from all filthiness and save, O God, our souls”, when He has already come to us, in the hedgehog to save us, who trust in Him and call on His holy name in truth , that is, in order to humbly and lovingly meet Him, the Comforter, inside the temple of our souls, hungry and thirsty for His coming.

I will explain this to your Godliness with an example: behold, even though you would have invited me to visit you, I would have come to you at your call and would like to talk with you. But you would still invite me: welcome, de, please, please, they say, to me. Then I should against my will have to say: what is it? Out of your mind or something? I came to him, and he kept calling me. This is how it relates to the Lord God the Holy Spirit. That is why it is said: “Abolish and understand that I am God; as he once talked with Adam in Paradise, with Abraham and Jacob and with my other servants, with Moses, Job and the like.

Many people interpret that this abolition applies only to the affairs of the world, that is, during a prayer conversation with God, one must abolish from the affairs of the world. But I will tell you according to Bose that although it is necessary to abolish from them during prayer, but when, with the omnipotent power of faith and prayer, the Lord God the Holy Spirit deigns to visit us and come to us in the fullness of His ineffable goodness, then it is also necessary from prayer be abolished. The soul speaks and is in the rumor when he does the prayer; and during the invasion of the Holy Spirit, one must be in complete silence, hear clearly and intelligibly all the verbs of the eternal life, which He then deigns to proclaim. At the same time, one must be in complete sobriety of both soul and spirit, and in the chaste purity of the flesh. So it was at Mount Horeb, when the Israelites were told that they would not touch their wives in three days before the appearance of God at Sinai (See: Ex. 19:15), for our God is "a fire consuming all unclean things" (Heb. 12:29), and nothing can enter into communion with Him "from the filth of flesh and spirit" (2 Cor. 7: 1).

Well, but what about, father, to be with other virtues, done for Christ's sake, in order to acquire the grace of the Holy Spirit? After all, you only wish to speak to me about prayer.

Acquire the grace of the Holy Spirit and all others of Christ for the sake of virtues, trade them spiritually, trade those of them that give us the greatest profit. Collect the capital of the blessed excess of the grace of God, put them in the eternal pawnshop of God from immaterial percentages, and not four or six per hundred, but one hundred per one spiritual ruble, but even that is an infinite number of times more. For example: prayer and vigilance gives you more of the grace of God - watch and pray; fast gives much of the Spirit of God - fast; more alms gives - do alms, and thus reason about every virtue done for Christ's sake.

Here I will tell you about myself, wretched Seraphim. I come from Kursk merchants. So, when I was not yet in the monastery, we used to trade in goods that give us more profit. Do the same you, father, and, as in the trade business, it is not the power to just trade, but to get more profit, so in the Christian life it is not the power to just pray or any other good deed to do. Although the Apostle says: “Pray incessantly” (1 Thess. 5:17), but why, as you remember, he adds: “I would rather speak five words with the mind than thousands of tongues (1 Cor. 14:19). And the Lord says: “Not everyone speaks Mi, Lord, Lord! will be saved, but do the will of my Father ”(Matt. 7:21), that is, he who does the work of God and, moreover, with reverence, for“ cursed is he who does the work of God carelessly ”(Jer. 48:10). And the work of God is: "Let you believe in God and to Him He sent Jesus Christ" (John 14: 1, 17: 3). If we judge correctly about the commandments of Christ and the apostles, then our Christian business consists not in increasing the count of good deeds that serve the goal of our Christian life only by means, but also in extracting more benefit from them, that is, in the acquisition of the gifts of the Holy Spirit.

So I wish, your love of God, that you yourself would acquire this ever-inexhaustible source of God's grace and always reason to yourself whether you are found in the Spirit of God or not; and if - in the Spirit of God, then blessed be God! - there is nothing to grieve about: even now at the Last Judgment of Christ! For "in what I find, in that I judge." If not, then we need to figure out why and for what reason the Lord God the Holy Spirit has deigned to leave us, and again seek and seek Him and not lag behind until the sought-after Lord God the Holy Spirit is satisfied and is again with us by His grace ... But our enemies who drive us away from Him must be attacked so long as their ashes are swept away, as the Prophet David said: “I will marry my enemies and I will comprehend, and I will not return. them, and the statues cannot, fall under my feet ”(Ps. 17: 38-39).

That's it, father. So, if you please, trade spiritually virtue. Distribute the gifts of the grace of the Holy Spirit to those who demand, following the example of a kindled light, which itself shines, burning with earthly fire, and other lights, without diminishing its own fire, kindles into light to everyone in other places. And if this is so in relation to the earthly fire, then what can we say about the fire of the grace of the All-Holy Spirit of God? For, for example, earthly wealth, when it is distributed, becomes scarce, while the heavenly wealth of God's grace, the more it is distributed, the more it multiplies in the one who distributes it. So the Lord Himself deigned to say to the Samaritan woman: “Drink from this water he will thirst again, and drink from water, from the south I will give him, it will not thirst forever, but the water from the south I will give him, there will be a source in him ever-flowing into the everlasting belly” (Jn. 4: 13-14).

Opportunity - rebirth, new being, new life.
From the prayer of St. John Chrysostom to Holy Communion.
Torzhische - a marketplace (Matt. 20: 3), a national assembly, a gathering (Matt. 23: 7; Luke 11:43; 20:46)
Purchase - bargaining, trading turnover, making a profit (Matthew 22: 5; Luke 19: 13-15)
Compare: “The essence of the way is that those who think are right to be to their husband, both the last of them see into the bottom of hell” (Proverbs 16:25). Or in Russian: "There are paths that seem straight to a person, but their end is the path to death."
From the antiphon of the 4th tone in the morning.
The vertep is a cave, besides.
Life of the Monk Benedict (Comm. 14 March): “A farmer of a certain son, who died on the hand of carrying, approach the Monk, begging him to resurrect his son. The monk, however, bow his knee with the brethren to prayer and verb to God: Lord, do not despise my sins, but on the faith of the person who prays for the resurrection of his sons, and give your soul to this body. To the sacred prayer that has not yet died, the dead body begins to show strength in itself. Take the Holy One by the hand, raise up the child alive and well, and give him to his father. "
From prayer to the Holy Spirit.
Eternal belly - eternal life.
More, better.

Seraphim's servant - under this name is known to everyone Nikolay Alexandrovich Motovilov... His name is inseparable from the life and works of the Monk Seraphim of Sarov. The fate of this ascetic, ardent zealot and confessor of the Orthodox faith is unusual.

Motovilov's merit is invaluable: spiritually communicating with the Monk Seraphim, he preserved for us the smallest details of his luminous life, witnessed how the face of the saint miraculously exuded a blessed uncreated light ... The Mother of God herself placed Motovilov in the service of the Diveyevo monastery. It was through Motovilov that we learned the teaching of St. Seraphim about the acquisition of the grace of the Holy Spirit as the goal of Christian life. Any of these deeds would be sufficient to acknowledge the extraordinary merits of the Christian. Motovilov, on the other hand, received a lot. He had a remarkable literary gift. His notes, abundantly quoted by the spiritual writer S. Nilus, are read with intense interest. Motovilov went through moral martyrdom both in the hostile environment of the Freemasons, and among his own, the Orthodox. Steadily throughout his life, realizing the behest of the Monk Seraphim about the preservation of the order established by the Mother of God herself in the virgin monastery of Father Seraphim, Motovilov was repeatedly subjected to unjust attacks and slander.
Even today, when more than 100 years have passed since the death of "Seraphim's servant", the controversy about his personality does not subside. And this, in our opinion, only confirms that in Motovilov there was true foolishness in Christ. Along with the flourishing of the Diveyevo monastery, interest in his personality is constantly growing. Recently, the TV channel "Russia" showed the film "Motovilov's Diary". Nikolai Alexandrovich was played by the People's Artist of Russia Alexei Petrenko, a believer Orthodox. Motovilov requires close attention to himself, first of all, as a spiritual, and not just a historical person. But until now there is no coherent story about the life of the ascetic. Is he not worthy of this? Of course, the absence of many documents, still unpublished, buried in the depths of Russian archives, does not make it possible to make such a story complete enough. However, not so long ago the archival materials discovered by researchers, and just a careful reading of the already known publications about Motovilov and his time, can significantly expand the knowledge about the main milestones in the life of "Seraphim's servant".

"Seraphim's servant", Nikolai Alexandrovich Motovilov, was the chosen one of God. He was not yet born, and his path was already determined by God. It happened like this. His father, Alexander Ivanovich Motovilov, in his youth, out of ardent love, nailed to Marya Alexandrovna Durasova. The Durasovs were the Motovilovs' neighbors on the Simbirsk estates. It was an old noble family. Not surprisingly, Motovilov was refused. We read about its reasons from the spiritual writer Sergei Nilus: "Brought up in St. Petersburg, who managed to get used to the life of the capital, Marya Alexandrovna Durasova ... did not want to leave with her husband in the village lull and refused him her hand."
Disconsolate in his grief, Motovilov Sr. decided to leave the world. He became a novice of the Sarov desert. Passing obedience at prosphora, he began to prepare for tonsure. But that was not what the Motovilov family was prepared for!
“Once, tired of the unfamiliar work, Alexander Ivanovich had a wonderful dream: Saint Nicholas himself, who had long been the patron saint of the Motovilov family, entered the prosphora and said:“ Not a monastery is your path, Alexander, but family life. In marriage with Mary, who rejected you, you will find your happiness, and a son will come from you, you will call him Nikolai - God will need him. I am Saint Nicholas and have been appointed to be the patron saint of the Motovilov family. I was it when one of your ancestors, Prince Montvid-Montvil, served in the army of Demetrius Donskoy. On the day of the Battle of Kulikovo, the Tatar hero, who defeated the warrior-monk Oslyaby, rushed with a sword at the Grand Duke himself, but Montvid with his chest repulsed a directed fatal blow, and the sword stuck into my image, which hung on the chest of your ancestor; he would have pierced your own relative, but I weakened the force of the blow and with the hand of Montvid struck the Tartar to death. "
This wonderful dream completely changed the intentions of the novice Alexander. He left the monastery, again proposed to Marya Alexandrovna, and this time, by God's will, he received consent. At this time, he bore the rank of lieutenant. From this unusual marriage, predicted in a wonderful dream, the future "Seraphim Servant" was born.
It is impossible not to mention additional information about the Motovilov family. The pedigree of Nikolai Motovilov, known today from archival searches, dates back to the middle of the 16th century, to a certain Mikhail Motovilov. In the middle of the 16th century, the Motovilovs, patrimonials of the Pereyaslavl-Zalessky district, are known. At the beginning of the XUP century, the Motovilovs, patrimonials of the Kholmogorsk and Yaroslavl districts, are known. According to the legends of ancient genealogies, the Motovilovs descend from Fyodor Ivanovich Shevlyaga, the brother of Andrei Kobyla (mid-11th century), the ancestor of the reigning family of the Romanovs, Sheremetevs and others. One of the sons of Fyodor Shevlyaga, Timofey Motovilo, was the ancestor of the Motovilovs and Grabezhevs. Nikita Motovilo was a clerk (1566). In HUP c. many Motovilovs were stewards and solicitors. The Motovilov family was divided into two branches, included in the UI and UP part of the genealogy book of the Yaroslavl, Saratov and Simbirsk provinces.
The Brockhaus and Efron dictionary says that there were many solicitors in the Motovilov family. The generic commitment to professional activity remained with the Motovilovs for a long time. So, among the remarkable judicial figures of the 19th century, Georgy Nikolaevich Motovilov (1833 - 1879) is known, from the nobility of the Simbirsk province, about whom the famous lawyer of the 19th century A.F. Horses.
Little is known about Alexander Ivanovich Motovilov. By his mother, he belonged to the Repyev family of landowners. Lieutenant Ivan Mironovich Repyev is the great-grandfather of Nikolai Motovilov and the grandfather of Alexander Motovilov. His wife Agrafena gave birth to his daughter Khristinia, the grandmother of "Seraphim's servant". For a long time, the Motovilovs settled in the Simbirsk Territory. In 1726 dragoon Ivan Shishelov sold land on the Tsylna River to Captain Vasily Mironovich Repyev and his brother Lieutenant Ivan Mironovich Repyev. In 1730, Vasily sold his entire share to his brother Ivan. In 1764, Ivan Motovilov died. His daughter, Khristinia Ivanovna, married Motovilov and in 1763 bought land (15 quarters) along the Tsilne river from the guard of the soldier Yakov Nagatkin. She died in 1791, leaving her three sons - Nikolai, Alexander and Evgraf - at the village of Rozhdestvenskoye, Tsylna, and in other places 318 quarters of arable land and 150 dessiatines of hay mowing. In 1811, after the birth of his son Nikolai, second lieutenant Alexander Ivanovich Motovilov further increased his land allotment, having bought a plot of land of 34 dessiatines 403 sazhens from the noble girl Anna Fedorovna Kishinskaya. Even before this purchase, starting in 1794, Alexander Ivanovich, along with his brother Nikolai Ivanovich, were suing the Tatars of the neighboring villages of Bolshaya and Malaya Tsylny over land. The Tatars complained that the Motovilovs “always inflict extreme constraint on them in the possession of the land and hay mowing, and now the Motovilovs, having taken over the offended, took possession of their effort, almost their last land: they plowed and sowed bread up to 600 acres, yes they cut down up to 200 dessiatines of hay in the Tatar dachas, of which they brought up to 500 carts to their village ”. However, this dispute was resolved in 1818 by the Simbirsk Chamber of the Civil Court in favor of the Motovilov brothers.
Nikolai Alexandrovich Motovilov was born on May 12, 1809 in the village of Rozhdestvenskoye, Russkaya Tsylna, Simbirsk district, Simbirsk province. As stated in the case at the request of N.A. Motovilov on entering it into the noble book, “... according to the books for 1809, filed from the clergy and clergy, the Simbirsk province and the district, the village of Tsylny, in the note among those born under No. 35 it appears and is recorded as follows: that 1809 of May On the 12th, in the village of Tsylny, the son of Nikolai was born to the town of second lieutenant Alexander Motovilov ... ”.
Little Nicholas was baptized on his third birthday, May 14, in the church of his native village of Tsylna. “The former priest Procopius Petrov, the sexton Nikolai Nikolaev, the sexton Alexei Petrov, the priest Alexander Yemelyanov was the successor of the Simbirsk district, and the priest of the Trinity Church was praying and baptism was performed.”

CHILDHOOD

Most likely, Nikolai Motovilov grew up in his fiefdom, in the Simbirsk province, although the Motovilovs also owned land in the Nizhny Novgorod and Yaroslavl provinces. In the Simbirsk province, Nikolai Alexandrovich inherited several villages and villages, in which about three hundred souls of peasants were found. The main estate was located in the village of Rozhdestvenskoye, Russkaya Tsylna, also. It is impossible to say for sure what the estate was under the father of Nikolai Motovilov - Alexander Ivanovich. But the archives preserved a description of the estate in the form it looked like after the death of Motovilov's son, Fleet Lieutenant Ivan Nikolaevich Motovilov. From this description it follows that the Motovilovs had a significant amount of land in the village: only 450 dessiatines. According to these descriptions, the Motovilovs' house was made of wood, and one half was two-story, covered with iron. The inventory notes that "the house has two porches and a balcony overlooking the garden" (GAUO. F. 1, op. 19, d. 18., ll. 67 - 71 rev.). The house had a kitchen, a pantry, two barns, two cellars, a bathhouse, a hut for the gardener, and one more hut with a Russian stove, a porch and two doors, and an outbuilding for the manager. There was also a cattle yard, quite large, with many sheds, with huts for cattlemen, with seven barns, a barn, a cowshed, a coach house, with cellars. There was also a horse yard - three stables with a coachman and so on. There was also a wooden four-winged mill. Typical for those places, the estate of middle-class landowners.
Not all of Nikolai's parents were in the estate: they went to their estates in other provinces, went, especially in winter, to Simbirsk. Maybe they took little Nikolai with them.
What was Simbirsk at that time and what could be the upbringing of Nicholas? The Simbirsk province was inhabited by an elite, well-born nobility. It was from Simbirsk that the expression "columnar nobility" came from. The pillar - as a support to the Imperial Throne - originally became the city's coat of arms. The Simbirsk nobles were distinguished by their wealth and, as a result, independence, and, moreover, by their extraordinary solidarity. Tsar Nicholas the First himself, sending the next governor I.S. Zhirkevich to Simbirsk, warned him about this, saying that the former governor, Zagryazhsky, "did not know how to maintain his title properly."
This solidarity of the nobles had, among others, the reason that the Simbirsk province was a traditionally strong Masonic center. An Orthodox nobleman, a true Christian, was not always comfortable in the Simbirsk province. Obviously, Motovilov's father, Alexander Ivanovich, being a man of honor, an adherent of the oath and loyalty to the Tsar and the Fatherland, experienced considerable difficulties in his midst. He perfectly saw what was happening around him. Most likely, he received offers from his fellow nobles to enter the Masonic lodge. That is why he strove to educate his son in the true Orthodox faith and in rejection of Freemasonry. Father “saw the death of Freemasonry, which, as a novelty, as the last word of European education, began to be carried away by the most prominent provincial figures.
- Look, mother, take care of Kolya from the Freemasons, if I am gone! In my name, order him not to go to their godless society - it will ruin Russia!
Motovilov himself heard such speeches from his father ... Motovilov remained the implacable enemy of this secret and essentially deeply revolutionary society throughout his life ”(Nilus, 113).
Surprisingly, seven-year-old Motovilov remembered the words of his father, and this will then seriously affect his whole life. True, in Simbirsk, not everything was completely permeated with Freemasonry. Here, from time immemorial, the faith was strong and outstanding religiously personalities fought. The general atmosphere in the city has always been of a high religious spirit. In the days of Motovilov's childhood, there were frequent trips of the Simbirians to the great ascetic of the Russian land - the Monk Seraphim of Sarov. And he said to them: "Why do you work to come to me, the wretched one, - you have better than me, your Andrey Ilyich ..." Indeed, Andrey Ilyich Ogorodnikov, now glorified by the Church in the face of saints, was the soul of old Simbirsk of the 19th century, his patron and guardian angel. He was a man of great talents, everyone in the city knew and loved him.
Blessed Andrei Ilyich was revered by all Simbirians, regardless of which class they belonged to. Then it was a small noble-merchant town, so that the life of Andrei Ilyich passed, one might say, in front of all the townspeople - that is why many episodes of his life were preserved in the people's memory. Wooden Simbirsk burned several times, but during the life of Andrei Ilyich, there were never large devastating fires in the city. However, after the death of the saint, the fires in Simbirsk resumed.
From early childhood Andrei Ilyich took upon himself the feat of silence and explained himself with gestures. All the townspeople knew that every action of Andrei Ilyich had a secret meaning. If he gave money to someone, then the person was promoted by success in business or promotion. If blessed Andrew gave a person a chip or a handful of earth, then this was a sign of imminent death. He often warned people about death, preparing them for Christian death, and by coming to their house and stretching out like a dead man, he lay down under the icons in the front corner.
The blessed one not only gave up shoes and clothes. His asceticism exceeded all imagination. There are cases when he could pull out cast-iron pots directly from the fire. Andrey Ilyich kissed the boiling samovar many times, and moreover, if he doused himself with boiling water, he did not suffer at all because of this. The townspeople often saw him standing barefoot in the snowdrifts all night long. Often he stood almost naked at the crossroads of streets and, swaying from side to side, shifting from foot to foot, repeated: "Bo-bo-bo." He especially often stood in the snowdrifts of the night in front of the altar of the Ascension Cathedral, which was located on Bolshaya Saratovskaya Street. There he was more than once found standing in the snow by the priest V.Ya. Arkhangelsky, who was the confessor of the blessed one. In severe winter frosts Andrei Ilyich stood in the cold water of Lake Marishka. Blessed Andrew died in 1841.
Motovilov's father, Alexander Ivanovich, left the children (Nikolai and his younger sister) orphans when the future "Seraphim's servant" was in his eighth year, in 1816. However, the father managed to plant a spark of genuine love for God in the souls of his children.
By this time, the Monk Seraphim of Sarov, who had been in seclusion for a long time, was already receiving people. Apparently, immediately after the death of her father, Motovilov's mother, Marya Alexandrovna, felt the need to consult with someone from deeply spiritual people, how she should live further, how to raise children. Who could replace the great old man for her at this moment? It was relatively close to go to him. And most importantly, God's Providence ruled here. As a child, at almost an angelic age, Motovilov first got into the cell of the Monk Seraphim. All his further life passed under the invisible care of the elder. And no matter how his life paths went aside, sooner or later he had to return to the Reverend, to become a witness and helper of his great deeds.
At that time, the Motovilovs probably lived in the village of Britvino, Nizhny Novgorod province, Lukoyanovsky district. It is known that it was from there that little Kolya Motovilov and his mother left for Sarov to the Monk Seraphim.
We remember that the first prophecy about the fate of Motovilov was given to his father in a dream. But it was quite general. Then Saint Nicholas said that the son of Alexander Ivanovich would be needed by God. Now, during a trip to the Reverend, another prediction was made about his unusual fate and, moreover, a more specific one. However, it was not the Monk Seraphim himself who said this. In Arzamas, one revered blessed one by all met with Maria Alexandrovna Motovilova and predicted her boy's extraordinary fate, "a force incomprehensible and rejected by the world, but pleasing to God." There is almost no doubt that this venerable blessed one of Arzamas, who gave such a faithful prophecy about the fate of Motovilov, was the ascetic of the Alekseevsk community, noblewoman Elena Afanasyevna Dertyeva. At the time described, it was she who was the most remarkable person in the city of Arzamas. This is evident from her life story. It was to her that those who wanted to receive spiritual advice were sent (Historical information about the city of Arzamas, collected by Nikolai Shchegolkov. Arzamas. 1911, pp. 166 - 169).
It was already a stone's throw from Arzamas to Sarov, and soon Maria Alexandrovna and her son arrived in the Sarov desert. A seven-year-old boy was struck by the sight of Father Seraphim's cell. In this cell, in front of the image of the Virgin of the Joy of all Joys, there were seven large candlesticks with lighted candles. There also saw little Nikolai a bench on which Father Seraphim slept, and on the bench there was a stone that served as his headboard. All this, and especially a stone instead of a pillow, greatly struck the boy's ardent imagination. Many years later, he will remember all this in the smallest detail. Motovilov also remembered something else. When he got bored during the conversation of the Monk with his mother, he began to frolic, as far as, of course, the tightness of the monastic cell allowed. Father Seraphim objected to his mother's stern hail:
- The angel of God plays with the baby, mother! How can you stop a child in his bakeless games! .. Play, play, baby! Christ is with you!
Fifteen years later, Nikolai Alexandrovich will again meet with the Monk Seraphim, but under circumstances that forced him to seriously listen to his every word. From that time on, the elder will clearly and firmly lead him along the thorny path of Christian life. But, apparently, this short, but unusual and providential meeting of Father Seraphim and his future "servant" was also needed. Even then, the prayer of the Reverend determined the entire life path of Motovilov, preserving it in difficult moments of life, not allowing him to spiritually stumble and abyss.
It is not known how Nikolai Alexandrovich's life went from eight to fourteen years. Nikolai Aleksandrovich left only a few words about this time in his manuscripts, but they also paint a vivid picture of his spiritual maturation. These words have come down to us thanks to Sergei Nilus: “Is it family piety, so characteristic in those days of noble families who lived on their estates, is it an early acquaintance with people of spiritual feat, with whom the pious mother loved to spend time, is it preselection that manifested itself in a significant dream father, but in Motovilov early religious curiosity woke up, giving him a lot of grief in adolescence and adolescence.
Having learned during the study of the Holy Scriptures about the Trinity in the One Being of God, he strove to explain this dogma to himself by the phenomena of visible nature, which caused confusion not only with his simple-hearted village mentors, but also teachers of the law who prepared him for admission to Kazan University.
- Father! he asked his mentor. - Here you teach me that a person consists of body and soul. But we were created in the image and likeness of God, therefore, we are also threefold in essence?
- Well, aren't you a heretic! Truly a heretic! I tell you: do not seek the higher yourself! Where are you going, where are you going, I ask you!
And the verbal admonition of the "heretic" was usually followed by instructive admonition, from which the enlightened one wept a lot.
The mother was also very upset, fearing the excessive, as it seemed to her, inquisitiveness of her child. In those good, simple times, mature people believed simply and childishly. "

KAZAN UNIVERSITY

For some time, Motovilov studied at the boarding school of the German Leiter, a graduate of Leipzig University. Unfortunately, almost nothing is known about Leiter or his boarding house. One thing is known: Leiter was a Protestant, but a good teacher. In Kazan, as a home teacher, he was popular. In particular, he taught in 1805 - 1809. children of Messrs. Molostvovs - a noble family known in Kazan. He later opened his own boarding house. It was from this boarding house that Nikolai Motovilov was admitted to the Imperial Kazan University on August 9, 1823. Motovilov's mother, Maria Alexandrovna, assigned her Nikolai to the Leiter Lyceum with the hope of a good preparation for the university. I entered the Motovilov University as a self-employed student. That is, Maria Alexandrovna had to pay for his studies, and our student lived in the apartment of Professor Karl Fuchs. This was practiced in those years. So Leiter "handed over from hand to hand" Motovilov to his compatriot, a German, the famous professor Fuchs. Fuchs was also a Protestant, but everyone in Kazan loved him. He was a man of exemplary diligence and morality.
Karl Fedorovich Fuchs was a curious person. It is impossible not to say a few warm words about him, since Motovilov apparently had to learn a lot from him and, in addition, Karl Fuchs played an important role in his life. He was born in Germany in 1776. His father, a professor of history and eloquence, was from a priest's family. And he taught theology, philosophy and oriental languages. Karl Fuchs's mother was the daughter of a professor of medicine, founder of the botanical garden in Herborn. That is why Karl Fuchs showed interest in medicine, natural science and oriental studies at the same time. At 22, he defended his doctoral dissertation, which was assessed as "a worthy contribution to the history of drug science." Fate decreed that he ended up in Russia. In the spring of 1805, an embassy delegation followed from St. Petersburg to China, which included Karl Fuchs, the assistant to the chief ambassador's doctor. He liked Kazan, and he stayed in the city forever. And I was not mistaken! Over time, he will become an honorary citizen of Kazan, the rector of the university.
Fuchs was a versatile gifted person: natural scientist, ethnographer, writer, public figure. But first of all, Fuchs was a wonderful doctor. Contemporaries admitted that there was no house in Kazan that was not visited by Dr. Karl Fedorovich Fuchs. As a diagnostician and therapist, he was unmatched in the city. He was a sociable and cheerful person. He was equally loved among Russians and Tatars, adults and children, simple and noble. Despite even religious beliefs, he was allowed to visit sick Tatar women. At Fuchs University he taught a course in natural history, was later appointed dean of the medical department, and in 1824 - 1827. he was even the rector of the university, which played a role in the life of Motovilov.
The students were very fond of Fuchs, and not only Nikolai Motovilov was closely associated with the professor. The well-known Slavophile writer Sergei Aksakov, also a student of his own, left memories of how passionately he wanted to get into Fuchs's house and how he succeeded: “I came to him under the pretext of some invented ill health. In the professor’s office I saw boxes hanging on the walls in which, behind the glass, stuck on pins, perfectly preserved and dried, such adorable butterflies such as I had never seen. I was completely delighted and hastened to explain somehow to Fuchs my passionate love for natural history and an ardent desire to collect butterflies. was very pleased. He immediately showed me all the necessary tools, explained in detail how to handle them. "
Karl Fuchs was keenly interested in literature and art. He was the only foreigner in the Society of Russian Literature Lovers. Fuchs's house kept his botanical, zoological, mineralogical, numismatic and other collections, a library and a collection of paintings. A creative atmosphere reigned in the Fuchs house, the professor's wife, Alexandra Andreevna, was also an enthusiastic person, a writer, she, on the advice of her husband, studied the life of the Tatars and Chuvashes. She was a highly educated lady, the owner of the literary salon in Kazan.
Apparently, the selfish student Motovilov, who lived with the Fuchs, had occasion to attend literary meetings. After all, he undoubtedly had a literary gift, as can be seen from his notes. Such celebrities as the poets Pushkin, Yazykov, Baratynsky, the famous German scientist Humboldt, the famous statesman Speransky stayed in the Fuchs house. Motovilov had to live in this house while he studied at Kazan University. It was a fairly large two-story mansion for provincial Kazan, which has survived to this day and even became a protected architectural monument. Perhaps Divine Providence has preserved for us the only house in which Motovilov lived, since the ancestral house in Tsylna has long ceased to exist.
By the time he entered the university, Motovilov was fourteen years old. In adolescence, a person often departs from the Church for some time. Life unfolds bright prospects in front of an inexperienced imagination, a young man plunges headlong into a new, unknown and such an attractive life - and forgets everything that his soul used to live under the watchful eye of his parents. Motovilov did not escape this either:
“Well, mamma,” he often used to say to his mother, “you have these“ temptations ”again!
"Temptations" he called the pilgrims and nuns whom Motovilova liked to greet at her place. Hearing Nikolenka's conversations, not always modest and about immodest objects, with downcast eyes and fingering the rosary, with a sigh and, as it were, quietly whispered to themselves, it happened:
- Temptation!
The cheerful Motovilov did not like them at that time. Against the rainbow background of the joy of the noisy light to which his heart was drawn, these humble figures with fasting faces, in black robes, the elderly, with the Jesus prayer on their lips, should have seemed to him such a dark and unattractive stain ... "
However, through the prayers of the Monk Seraphim, the Lord preserved the soul and heart of Motovilov for high asceticism. As often happens, it was the misfortune, and then the miracle that happened to him, that sobered the young man. In half of the university course, which means that somewhere in 1824-1825, a strange incident happened with the student Motovilov, about which he himself speaks rather vaguely in his notes: “This incident plunged me into such an abyss of despair that I could not survive it , for he had to lose his honor of the nobility, and the rank of nobility, and be given to the soldiers. " Motovilov's wife, Elena Ivanovna, explained this case. The incident that shocked Motovilov so much was a kiss he threw in the university corridor to a young lady. This kiss was noticed by the authorities, who gave it such importance that Motovilov considered himself completely dead. He was especially frightened by the thought that he would inflict inconsolable grief on his mother. And he loved his mama as best he could love his pure filial Russian heart.
In the center of Kazan was the well-known Black Lake. It was a favorite place for walks of many Kazan citizens. Here he loved to spend time, among other things, the future writer, and then a student, Leo Tolstoy. On a dark night, a sixteen-year-old student left Professor Fuchs's apartment for this lake with the intention of drowning himself. “He was already ready to throw himself at him, - writes S. Nilus, - but some invisible force suddenly chained him to the place from which he wanted to throw himself into the water, and in the night darkness, over the gloomy waters of the Black Lake, he suddenly saw the image of the Kazan Mother of God is in bright light. Illuminated by the wondrous light, the Face of the Most Pure One looked reproachfully at the young suicide and disappeared without a trace in the darkness of the night.
This was the first sign in his life. "
No one knows what happened then in the soul of Nikolai Alexandrovich, what he thought and felt then. One thing is clear: the vision turned his whole being. From now on, his life had to inevitably enter a different channel. He returned to the Fuchs house as a different person. The intercession of the Mother of God herself strengthened him, and the story that threatened him with expulsion from the university no longer seemed so terrible to him. And in fact - everything worked out. Everyone's beloved and respected Professor Fuchs, who was at that time the rector of the university, assured the prosecutors that "he vouches for Motovilov," as for a highly moral young man. It is unlikely that the young man Motovilov told anyone other than his own mother this story.
What else can be said about the Kazan period of Motovilov's life? Is that the fact that in his autobiographical notes he dully mentions some books about Masons that he managed to find in Kazan. After reading them, he clearly understood that Freemasonry is "true anti-Christianity." It was then that Nikolai Alexandrovich remembered the words of his father: "Look, mother, take care of Kolya from the Masons!" He says in these notes and that there were then in Kazan "extraordinary visions that predicted fate and announced to go against Freemasonry." Was it not the Mother of God herself who said this to him on the Black Lake on that unforgettable night, which began with despair and ended with a joyful revelation?
We have no reliable information about the time of his life in Kazan after this event. We only know that on July 8, 1826, he graduated from the university course and received the title of a real student, which Motovilov was proud of all his life and signed as a "real student" even in his mature years in official documents. Even the stichera, which he composed to Emperor Alexander II in April 1866, he signed as a full-fledged student of the Imperial Kazan University. Upon leaving the university, he received a graduation certificate, which noted very good "ability, diligence and behavior", as well as the fact that in the faculty of language he attended a full course of sciences, including such as theology and church-biblical history. history of philosophical systems, Slavic language, logic ("very good"), Russian poetry, church eloquence, general history and geography, general Russian statistics, Russian literature, Latin ("good"), Greek and French ("fair") ... The testimony stated that Motovilov "completely attested to the knowledge he had acquired with satisfactory answers on a legalized test." The first to sign this document was the rector of the university, doctor of medicine and surgery, public ordinary professor, state councilor and cavalier Karl Fuchs.
Motovilov's mother, Maria Alexandrovna, had been waiting for this happy moment for a long time. Now her Nikolenka is quite an adult, she will serve, take on her shoulders the care of the family estates, help raise her younger sister! Her soul rejoiced and was eager to thank the Lord. Perhaps this is how the idea arose to go with his son on a pilgrimage to Kiev. In the same year, 1826, we went. However, man proposes and God disposes. On the way to Kiev, Maria Alexandrovna unexpectedly died, leaving in the care of Nicholas all the estates and a fifteen-year-old girl, his sister, Praskovya.

Date of publication or update 01.02.2017

4. Saints, revered sisters and benefactors of the Seraphim-Diveyevo monastery.

4.2. Reverend wives of Diveyevo.

4.2.14. Nikolai Alexandrovich Motovilov.

Next to the graves of the monastic wives of the Diveyevo lies Nikolai Alexandrovich Motovilov (1809-1879), "the servant of the Mother of God and the Seraphim", as he called himself. Father Seraphim healed Nikolai Alexandrovich at the age of 22 from a serious rheumatic disease with relaxation of the whole body and removal of his legs, which lasted three years.

Before his death, the Monk gave Motovilov the commandment to serve the Mill Community. A wealthy nobleman, Nikolai Alexandrovich became one of the main donors and benefactors of the Diveyevo monastery. In difficult circumstances for the Diveyevo monastery, Motovilov always ardently and fearlessly defended the life of the monastery according to the precepts of the Queen of Heaven and St. Seraphim.

Father Seraphim revealed to his young friend his innermost visions and prophecies about the future of Russia and Diveyevo, many of which Nikolai Alexandrovich wrote down. In "Discourse on the Purpose of Christian Life," Father Seraphim simply and clearly explained to Motovilov that the purpose of a Christian's life is to acquire the grace of the Holy Spirit. At the same time, the Lord granted Nikolai Alexandrovich to see the Monk in a state of inspiration from the Holy Spirit and to dwell in Him himself.

Being a secular and family man, he led a spiritual life and was all burning with love for God, for the Mother of God and the saints.

Nikolai Alexandrovich always strove to Diveyevo. When I was here, I never wore hats and walked along the Kanavka every day, in spite of the bad weather. I used to crawl on my knees when it was slippery. He died peacefully on January 14/27, 1879 at his Simbirsk estate. For burial, his body was transported to Diveyevo. The service was for Nikolai Alexandrovich in the Church of the Nativity of the Virgin.

In Soviet times, the graves at the altar of the Kazan Church were destroyed, the area was asphalted. The only landmark of this holy place was the old birch tree on the grave of Motovilov. In the 1970s, they tried to uproot it, but this did not succeed.