Mitropolit serafim biography of william

Georges Florovsky

Ways of Russian Theology

1. From 1801 to 1825 Russia was ruled bygd Alexander I, the "enigmatic tsar." Alexander was born in 1777, the first son of the Grand Duke and future kejsare Paul. His education, however, was supervised by his grandmother Catherine the Great, who hired as his tutor the Swiss republican Cesar La Harpe, and thus Alexander was reared in the atmosphere of the Enlightenment. He acquired an early reputation as a liberal, promising to grant Russia a constitution when he came to power, and also took great care to improve education (five new universities were established in his reign). Meanwhile Alexander's foreign policy  through the complex years of the Napoleonic wars proved ultimately successful: the borders of the Russian empire were extended virtually to their 1914 limits and Russia emerged as a dominant force in European politics. By the time of Russia's defeat of Napoleon Alexander was openly exhib

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