24 MOSCOW. 
chap, consecrated in that edifice. It was built exactly 
- t — after the same model; and within it are ex- 
hibited, The tomb of Christ, The stone rolled from 
the sepulchre, The holes where the crosses of our 
Saviour and the two thieves crucified with him were 
placed, The prison where he was confined ; toge- 
ther with all the other absurdities fabricated 
by the Empress Helena and her ignorant priests 
at Jerusalem. Finding, however, some diffe- 
rence between the original building in the Holy 
Land, and its model here, we asked the reason 
of the alteration. The monks replied, “ Our 
building is executed with more taste, because 
it is more ornamental; and there are many 
good judges who prefer ours to the original thus 
most ignorantly implying, that the Church at 
Jerusalem, so long an object of adoration, had 
been so rather on account of its beauty, than 
any thing contained in it. But nothing can 
prove with more effect, to what an abject state 
the human mind may be degraded, than that 
the trumpery here, not having even the empty 
title to reverence which relics may claim, 
but confessedly imitations, should receive the 
veneration and the worship paid to their ori- 
ginals. A fat and filthy priest, pointing to some 
holes in a pavement in the midst ol Russia, ex- 
claims, “ Here stood the holy cross !" while boorish 
devotees shed over the spot tears of piety, as 
