“Creator of heaven and earth, extend thy blessing to these thy new children.  May they know thee as the true God, and be strengthened by thee in the true religion.  Come to my help against the temptations of the evil spirit, and I will praise thy name.”

Thus, in the year 988, paganism was, by a blow, demolished in Russia, and nominal Christianity introduced throughout the whole realm.  A Christian church was erected upon the spot where the statue of Peroune had stood.  Architects were brought from Constantinople to build churches of stone in the highest artistic style.  Missionaries were sent throughout the whole kingdom, to instruct the people in the doctrines of Christianity, and to administer the rite of baptism.  Nearly all the people readily received the new faith.  Some, however, attached to the ancient idolatry, refused to abandon it.  Vlademer, nobly recognizing the rights of conscience, resorted to no measures of violence.  The idolaters were left undisturbed save by the teachings of the missionaries.  Thus for several generations idolatry held a lingering life in the remote sections of the empire.  Schools were established for the instruction of the young, learned teachers from Greece secured, and books of Christian biography translated into the Russian tongue.

Vlademer had then ten sons.  Three others were afterwards born to him.  He divided his kingdom into ten provinces or states, over each of which he placed one of these sons as governor.  On the frontiers of the empire he caused cities, strongly fortified, to be erected as safeguards against the invasion of remote barbarians.  For several years Russia enjoyed peace with but trivial interruptions.  The character of Vlademer every year wonderfully improved.  Under his Christian teachers he acquired more and more of the Christian spirit, and that spirit was infused into all his public acts.  He became the father of his people, and especially the friend and helper of the poor.  The king was deeply impressed with the words of our Saviour, “Blessed are the merciful, for they shall obtain mercy,” and with the declaration of Solomon, “He who giveth to the poor lendeth to the Lord.”

In the excess of his zeal of benevolence he was disposed to forgive all criminals.  Thus crime was greatly multiplied, and the very existence of the state became endangered.  The clergy, in a body, remonstrated with him, assuring him that God had placed him upon the throne expressly that he might punish the wicked and thus protect the good.  He felt the force of this reasoning, and instituted, though with much reluctance, a more rigorous government.  War had been his passion.  In this respect also his whole nature seemed to be changed, and nothing but the most dire necessity could lead him to an appeal to arms.  The princess Anne appears to have been a sincere Christian, and to have exerted the most salutary influence upon the mind of her husband.  In the midst of these great measures of reform, sudden sickness seized Vlademer