The universal geography : earth and its inhabitants

470 KTTSSIA IN EUROPE.the uprava, or administrative committee, and the mayor (golova, or "head ").latter, being intrusted with the executive, has powers superior to those of the bodynaming him.The new judicial organization is considered as the most liberal of all thereforms introduced since the emancipation, and in certain respects this is the case.Hitherto the courts, and especially the juries, have given proof of that clemencywhich is so characteristic of the nation. During the trials the accused are notbound to incriminate themselves, and the procurator, or president, generally sumsup with great impartiality. Nevertheless the direct interference of the Stateis already making itself felt, and the procedure followed in political cases hasbeen frequently modified since the first of these charges was heard in 1871.No definite law regulates the press, which is still mostly subject to theprovisional enactment of 1865. Preventive censure has been abolished in the twocapitals in favour of certain original works, translations, journals, and compilations,authorised to appear after depositing from 3,000 to 5,000 roubles as a security fortheir good behaviour.TheThe Church.— Army and Navy. — Finance.The Czar is not, as is generally supposed, the spiritual head, but only the protector,of the Graeco-Russian Church. Of all the Czars Paul I. alone attempted toassume the priestly functions, and even to say mass. But he was prevented fromdoing so by the remark that he had been twice married. According to the Russiancatechism the only head of the Church is Jesus Christ. Nor can the legislativeand executive departments be united in one person, the first being expresslyreserved to the councils, the second to the national synods and the bishops. Sincethe time of Peter the Great the government of the Church, formerly intrusted to apatriarch, has been confided to a " Most Holy Synod," appointed, however, by the Czar.This assembly, presided over by the St. Petersburg and Novgorod Metropolitan, iscomposed of a few prelates, succeeding each other by rotation ;but a lay procurator,sometimes a general named by the Czar, is the medium of the sovereign pleasure,proposes and promotes all questions, sees to the execution of all decisions. Nosynodal act is valid without his confirmation, and he further possesses the right ofveto against all decrees of the assembly opposed to the will of the prince. Undersuch an administration the Russian Church has been thoroughly centralized. Thebishops have become simple ecclesiastical prefects, proposed by the Synod—that is,the imperial procurator—and named by the Emperor from a list of three candidates,the first of whom is nearly always chosen. Each bishop is, moreover, assisted bya diocesan consistory, whose members are appointed by the Synod. To facilitatethe action of the central power the Church has been divided into eparchies, orbishoprics, whose limits nearly always coincide with those of the civil governments.Of the sixty eparchies those of St. Petersburg-Novgorod, Kiev, and Moscowalone bear the title of metropolis, nineteen that of archbishoprics. The " popes," orpriests, are allowed to marry but once only, and widowers mostly retire from the