SERBIA IN LIGHT AND DARKNESS

BY

REV. FATHER NICHOLAI VELIMIROVIC

WITH PREFACE BY THE ARCHBISHOP OF CANTERBURY

WITH 25 ILLUSTRATIONS
(Not provided in this edition)

LONGMANS, GREEN AND CO.
39 PATERNOSTER ROW, LONDON
FOURTH AVENUE & 30th STREET, NEW YORK
BOMBAY, CALCUTTA, AND MADRAS

1916

AUTHOR'S NOTE.

The aim of this volume is to give to the English-speaking people some glimpses into the past struggles, sufferings and hopes of the Serbian nation. I have tried to describe the Serbian life in light, in its peace, its peaceful work, its songs and prayers; in darkness, in its slavery, its sins, its resistance to evil and battle for freedom.

It is only the peoples which suffer themselves that can understand and sympathise deeply with the Serbian soul. I dedicate, therefore, the following pages to all those who suffer much in these times, and whose understandings are enlarged and human sympathies deepened by sufferings.

I will take this opportunity of expressing my warm and respectful thanks to His Grace the Archbishop of Canterbury for his kind assistance and generous commendation of my work in England.

My gratitude is due to the Rev. G.K.A. Bell and Dr. E. Marion Cox for their help in the revision of these pages.

NICHOLAI VELIMIROVIC.

London, April, 1916.

CONTENTS.

PREFACE BY THE ARCHBISHOP OF CANTERBURY

PART I

LECTURES ON SERBIA
ENGLAND AND SERBIA.
SERBIA FOR CROSS AND FREEDOM.
SERBIA AT PEACE.
SERBIA IN ARMS.

PART II

FRAGMENTS OF SERBIAN NATIONAL WISDOM

PART III

FRAGMENTS OF SERBIAN POPULAR POETRY

ILLUSTRATIONS.

H.M. KING PETER
CROWN PRINCE ALEXANDER
PREMIER N. PASHITCH
KING MILUTIN
SOLDIER ON GUARD
THE GOAT-HERD
DURING TURKISH RULE IN SERBIA
THE MONASTERY OF CETINJE
THE SECOND SERBIAN REVOLUTION OF 1815
THE MONASTERY OF KALENIC
SERBIAN SOLDIERS WITH AN ENGLISH NURSE
SERBIAN OFFICERS UNDER ADRIANOPLE IN 1912
THE CATTLE MARKET
A TYPICAL MONTENEGRIN LADY—H.M. QUEEN MILENA
PEASANT TYPES
THE SUPERIOR OF A MONASTERY
KING PETER AND THE TURKISH GENERAL
WOMEN DOING THE WORK OF MEN
From a photograph by Underwood and Underwood

From a photograph by Underwood and Underwood
SERBIAN WOMEN CARRYING WOUNDED
From a photograph by kind permission of Mr. Crawfurd Price
WAITING FOR A PLACE IN THE HOSPITAL
From a photograph by Topical Press Agency
"MY MOTHER"

SPLIET-SPALATO

A SERBIAN REFUGEE

SPINNING BY MOONLIGHT

DUBROVNIK-RAGUSA

PREFACE

BY THE ARCHBISHOP OF CANTERBURY.

The presence of Father Nicholai Velimirovic in England during the last few months has brought to the many circles with which he has been in touch a new message and appeal enforced by a personality evoking an appreciation which glows more warmly the better he is known. But this little book is more than the revelation of a personality. It will be to many people the introduction to a new range of interest and of thought. He would be a bold man who would endeavour at present to limit or even to define what may be the place which the Serbia of coming years may hold in Eastern Europe as a link between peoples who have been widely sundered and between forces both religious and secular which for their right understanding have needed an interpreter. Of recent days the sculpture and the literature of Serbia have been

brought to our doors, and England's admiration for both has drawn the two countries more closely together in a common struggle for the ideals to which that art and literature have sought to give expression. It is not, I think, untrue to say that to the average English home this unveiling of Serbia has been an altogether new experience. Father Nicholai's book will help to give to the revelation a lasting place in their minds, their hopes and their prayers.

RANDALL CANTUAR.

LAMBETH, Easter, 1916.

PART I

LECTURES ON SERBIA

ENGLAND AND SERBIA.

Delivered for the first time in the Chapter House of Canterbury Cathedral. Chairman: the Lord Archbishop of Canterbury.

THE SIGN OF THE CHURCH OF ENGLAND.

YOUR GRACE, LADIES AND GENTLEMEN,

To come to Canterbury, to visit this Sion of the Church of England, that has been my dream since my fourteenth year, when I for the first time was told of what a spiritual work and of what an immortal glory this place has been the home. I dreamed a beautiful dream of hope to come here silently, to let every man, every house and every brick of the houses silently teach me, and, after having learned many fair and useful things, to return silently and thankfully home. Unfortunately I cannot now be a silent and contemplative pupil in this place, as I desired to be, but I must speak, forced by the time in which we are living and suffering. I will speak in order not to teach you, but to thank you. And I have to thank you much in the name of the Serbian nation and in my own name.

I thank you that you are so mindful of Serbia, of a poor and suffering country that failed so much in many respects, but never failed in admiration of the English character and civilisation. From central European civilisation we received a small light and a great shadow. From English civilisation we got—I dare say it—the light only. There is no doubt that English civilisation, being a great light, must have its shadow also, but our eyes, blinded by the great light, did not see the dark side of this light.

I thank you that you gave us Shakespeare, who is the second Bible for the world; and Milton the divine, and Newton and Herschel, the friends of the stars; and Wellington and Nelson, the fearless conquerors of the ambitious tyrant of the