and then banned by the Russian authorities, it became the first part of the trilogy The Kingdom of the Beast (Tsarstvo zverya). Dealing with the nature and history of the Russian monarchy, the trilogy had little in common with the author's earlier symbolism-influenced prose and, cast in the humanist tradition of the 19th-century Russian literature, was seen later as marking the peak of Merezhkovsky's literary career. The second and the third parts of the trilogy, the Decembrists novels Alexander the First and December 14 came out in 1913 and 1918 respectively. 1909–1913 In 1909 Merezhkovsky found himself in the center of another controversy after coming out with harsh criticism of Vekhi, the volume of political and philosophical essays written and compiled by the group of influential writers, mostly his former friends and allies, who promoted their work as a manifesto, aiming to incite the inert Russian intelligentsia into the spiritual revival. Arguing against vekhovtsys idea of bringing Orthodoxy and the Russian intellectual elite together, Merezhkovsky wrote in an open letter to Nikolay Berdyaev:Orthodoxy is the very soul of the Russian monarchy, and monarchy is the Orthodoxy's carcass. Among things they both hold sacred are political repressions, the [ultra-nationalist] Union of Russian People, the death penalty and meddling with other countries' international affairs. How can one entrust oneself to prayers of those whose actions one sees as God-less and demonic? Some argued Merezhkovsky's stance was inconsistent with his own ideas of some five years ago. After all, the Vekhi authors were trying to revitalize his own failed project of bringing the intellectual and the religious elites into collaboration. But the times have changed for Merezhkovsky and – following this (some argued, unacceptably scornful) anti-Vekhi tirade, his social status, too. Shunned by both former allies and the conservatives, he was hated by the Church: Saratov Bishop Dolganov even demanded his excommunication after the book Sick Russia was published in 1910. For the Social Democrats, conversely, Merezhkovsky, not a "decadent pariah" any-more, suddenly turned a "well-established Russian novelist" and the "pride of the European literature." Time has come for former friend Rozanov to write words that proved in the long run to be prophetic: "The thing is, Dmitry Sergeyevich, those whom you are with now, will never be with you. Never will you find it in yourself to wholly embrace this dumb, dull and horrible snout of the Russian revolution." In the early