The Gulag Archipelago [Volume 1]: An Experiment in Literary Investigation

by Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn

The newspaper Petrogradskaya Pravda, in its issues of March 8, 9, and 10,12 confirmed the peaceful, successful outcome of the talks, and spoke favorably of the Metropolitan. “In Smolny they agreed that the church vessels and ikon coverings would be melted down into ingots in the presence of the believers.” Again things were getting fouled up with some kind of compromise! The noxious fumes of Christianity were poisoning the revolutionary will. That kind of unity and that way of handing over the valuables were not what the starving people of the Volga needed! The spineless membership of the Petrograd Pomgol was changed. The newspapers began to howl about the “evil pastors” and “princes of the church,” and the representatives of the church were told: “We don’t need your donations! And there won’t be any negotiations with you! Everything belongs to the government—and the government will take whatever it considers necessary.” And so forcible requisitions, accompanied by strife, began in Petrograd, as they did everywhere else. And this provided the legal basis for initiating trials of the clergy.13