Serbia in Light and Darkness | Page 9

the Turks, our rulers and educators during five
hundred years. Our ancestors were accustomed to see human blood
spilt every day. They were accustomed to hear about strangled sultans
and viziers and pashas. And, besides, they lived through the record of
all the crimes ever written in history; the Turks arranged a horrible
bloody bath in executing their plan of killing all the leaders and priests
among the Serbs! It happened only a hundred years ago, in the lifetime
of Chateaubriand and Wordsworth, in the time of Pitt and Burke, in the
time of your strenuous mission work among the cannibals. Our
ancestors lived in blood and walked in blood. Our five hundred years'

long slavery had only two colours--red and black.
And yet I will not accuse the Turks but ourselves. Neither our kings of
old, nor our ancestors before the enslavement set us the example of
killing kings. Rather the strangers that conquered and ruled our country
set us such an example. But it is our fault for having followed an
abominable example like that. I confess our sins before you, and pray:
Forgive us, good brothers! Forgive us, if you can. God will not forgive
us. That is the belief of our people. God is merciful, but still He does
not forgive without punishment. God is righteous and sinless, and
therefore He has right to punish every sin of man. But it were a
monstrous pretension for men to punish every sin, being themselves
sinful, very sinful. We will forgive all your mediaeval, if you will
forgive us our modern sins. Remember! God will begin to "forgive us
our trespasses" only at the moment when we all forgive the trespasses
of all those that have sinned against us. He will forgive us then,
because He will not have anything more to punish. God's mercilessness
begins when our mercifulness ends. God will rule the world by justice
as long as we rule it by our mercilessness. He will rule the world by
mercifulness when we forgive each other, but not before.
To forgive the sins of men means for us nothing more than to confess
our own sins. To forgive the sins of men means for God nothing less
than to let the events be without consequences. And it contradicts
human experiences or science.
It contradicts also the experiences of our kings of old. They saw and
heard of the sins punished, and they feared sin. They regarded humility
and mercifulness as the greatest virtues. On the day of the "Slava,"
which means a special Serbian festival of the saint patron of the family
(every Serbian family has its patron among the saints or angels which it
celebrates solemnly every year, instead of celebrating their own
birthdays), on this day our kings themselves served their guests at the
table. It was a visible sign of their humility before the divine powers
that rule human life. Besides, on every festive occasion in the royal
court was placed a bountiful table with meat and drink for beggars and
the most abject poor. The king was obliged by his Christian conscience

and even by national tradition to be merciful. How the people regarded
the kings is clear from popular sayings like these:
Every king is from God. If a king is generous he is from God, as a king
should be from God. If a king is narrow and selfish he is from God, as a
monkey is from God.
A wise king speaks three times to God and only once to the people. A
foolish king speaks three times to the people and only once to God.
Speaking to God a wise king thinks always of his people, and speaking
to the people he always thinks of God. A foolish king thinks of himself
always, whether he speaks to God or to the people.
Every king has a crown, but every kingly crown stands not on a kingly
head.
A gipsy asked a king: Of how much value are your riches? The king
replied: Not more than your freedom.
The smile of the king is medicine for a poor man, the laugh of the king
is an offence for the mourning one.
A king who fears God has pity for the people, but a king who fears the
people has pity for himself.
The face of a good king lends splendour to his crown, and the crown of
a bad king lends splendour to his face.
The sins of the people can only sooner bring the king before God, but
the sins of the king can push the people to Satan's house.
The belief of our kings was the same belief which Saint Sava preached,
their hopes were his hopes. God is the eternal and powerful king of the
world; Christ is