Ivan Schouisky, the brother of the deceased usurper, now stepped into the dangerous post which death had so suddenly rendered vacant.  He was a weak man, assuming the most pompous airs, quite unable to discriminate between imposing grandeur and ridiculous parade.  He soon became both despised and detested.  This state of things encouraged the two hordes of Kezan and Tauride to unite, and with an army of a hundred thousand men they penetrated Russia almost unopposed, burning and plundering in all directions.

Under these circumstances the metropolitan bishop, Joseph, a man of sincere piety and of very elevated character, and who enjoyed in the highest degree the confidence both of the aristocracy and of the people, presented himself before the council, urged the incapacity of Ivan Schouisky to govern, and proposed that Ivan Belsky, a nobleman of great energy and moral worth, should be chosen regent.  The proposal was carried by acclamation.  So unanimous was the vote, so cordial was the adoption of the republican principle of election, that Ivan Schouisky was powerless and was merely dismissed.

The new regent, sustained by the clergy and the aristocracy, governed the State with wisdom and moderation.  All kinds of persecution ceased, and vigorous measures were adopted for the promotion of the public welfare.  Old abuses were repressed; vicious governors deposed, and the rising flames of civil strife were quenched.  Even the hitherto unheard-of novelty of trial by jury was introduced.  Jurors were chosen from among the most intelligent citizens.  Though there was some bitter opposition among the corrupt nobles to these salutary reforms, the clergy, as a body, sustained them, and so did also even a majority of the lords.  It was Christianity and the church which introduced these humanizing measures.

Among the innumerable tragedies of those days, let one be mentioned illustrative of the terrific wrongs to which all are exposed under a despotic government.  There was a young prince, Dmitri, a child, grandson of Vassili the blind, whose claims to the throne were feared.  He was thrown into prison and there forgotten.  For forty-nine years he had now remained in a damp and dismal dungeon.  He had committed no crime.  He was accused of no crime.  It was only feared that restive nobles might use him as an instrument for the furtherance of their plans.  All the years of youth and of manhood had passed in darkness and misery.  No beam of the sun ever penetrated his tomb.  All unheeded the tides of life surged in the world above him, while his mind with his body was wasting away in the long agony.

     “O who can tell what days, what nights he spent,
     Of tideless, waveless, sailless, shoreless woe.”