Peter the Great was born in Moscow on Thursday 30 May 1672 on the feast of Saint Isaac of Dalmatia (Hugo 1). Pyotr Alexeevich, his formal name, was the fourteenth child born to Alexei I and his second wife Nataliya Kryillovna Naryshkina. Peter towered an astonishing six feet seven inches tall. He began to share power with his half-brother Ivan, who was an invalid, but gained sole power at the age of twenty-four, after Ivan's death in 1696 ("Peter I of Russia" 1). Through his internal, military, and governmental reforms, Peter the Great allowed Russia to be considered a leading state of Eastern Europe ("Peter the Great" 1). Peter the Great wanted to bring Russia into a new era. He achieved his goal of internal reform through the Russian economy, church, and education. By increasing the industrial, commercial, and agricultural aspects, Peter hoped that a richer Russia would invest in its own military to increase strength, and thus increase the amount of Peter's power. Unfortunately, it did not achieve the desired results, but it helped push Russia into a period of rapid economic growth (“Peter the Great – internal reforms” 2). Peter also saw the need for reform in the church. Not only did the church have a great source of wealth that Peter wanted to be a part of, but it also had land, power, and servants that challenged those of the Tsar. When the head of the church died in 1700, Peter did not replace him, but turned over ownership of the church to a branch of the government. In turn subjecting him to the command of Peter. In 1721, a regulation was issued on the church, which was entirely under state control. This regulation established everything the clergy could do and, in a sense, controlled their daily lives. The task of the clergy was to "make their congregations totally subservient to the state by convincing them that Peter was anything but God-like in order to guarantee the population of Russia total subordination to the crown" ("Peter the Great - internal reforms" 1) . If Russia had any hope of becoming a superpower, it could not have achieved it until the educational aspect of society was modernized. Peter knew that proper education for both soldiers and officers was vital to a successful army. For this purpose he established schools of navigation and mathematics, artillery and languages, medicine, engineering and science ("Peter the Great - internal reforms' 1).