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What does this census, that is about to be made, mean for us people of Moscow, who are not men of science? It means two things. In the first place, this, that we may learn with certainty, that among us tens of thousands who live in ease, there dwell tens of thousands of people who lack bread, clothing and shelter; in the second place, this, that our brothers and sons will go and view this and will calmly set down according to the schedules, how many have died of hunger and cold.

And both these things are very bad.

All cry out upon the instability of our social organization, about the exceptional situation, about revolutionary tendencies. Where lies the root of all this? To what do the revolutionists point? To poverty, to inequality in the distribution of wealth. To what do the conservatives point? To the decline in moral principle. If the opinion of the revolutionists is correct, what must be done? Poverty and the inequality of wealth must be lessened. How is this to be effected? The rich must share with the poor. If the opinion of the conservatives is correct, that the whole evil arises from the decline in moral principle, what can be more immoral and vicious than the consciously indifferent survey of popular sufferings, with the sole object of cataloguing them? What must be done? To the census we must add the work of affectionate intercourse of the idle and cultivated rich, with the oppressed and unenlightened poor.

Science will do its work, let us perform ours also. Let us do this. In the first place, let all of us who are occupied with the census, superintendents and census-takers, make it perfectly clear to ourselves what we are to investigate and why. It is the people, and the object is that they may be happy. Whatever may be one’s view of life, every one will agree that there is nothing more important than human life, and that there is no more weighty task than to remove the obstacles to the development of this life, and to assist it.

This idea, that the relations of men to poverty are at the foundation of all popular suffering, is expressed in the Gospels with striking harshness, but at the same time, with decision and clearness for all.

“He who has clothed the naked, fed the hungry, visited the prisoner, that man has clothed Me, fed Me, visited Me,” that is, has done the deed for that which is the most important thing in the world.

However a man may look upon things, every one knows that this is more important than all else on earth.

And this must not be forgotten, and we must not permit any other consideration to veil from us the most weighty fact of our existence. Let us inscribe, and reckon, but let us not forget that if we encounter a man who is hungry and without clothes, it is of more moment to succor him than to make all possible investigations, than to discover all possible sciences. Perish the whole census if we may but feed an old woman. The census will be longer and more difficult, but we cannot pass by people in the poorer quarters and merely note them down without taking any heed of them and without endeavoring, according to the measure of our strength and moral sensitiveness, to aid them. This in the first place. In the second, this is what must be done: All of us, who are to take part in the census, must refrain from irritation because we are annoyed; let us understand that this census is very useful for us; that if this is not cure, it is at least an effort to study the disease, for which we should be thankful; that we must seize this occasion, and, in connection with it, we must seek to recover our health, in some small degree. Let all of us, then, who are connected with the census, endeavor to take advantage of this solitary opportunity in ten years to purify ourselves somewhat; let us not strive against, but assist the census, and assist it especially in this sense, that it may not have merely the harsh character of the investigation of a hopelessly sick person, but may have the character of healing and restoration to health. For the occasion is unique: eighty energetic, cultivated men, having under their orders two thousand young men of the same stamp, are to make their way over the whole of Moscow, and not leave a single man in Moscow with whom they have not entered into personal relations. All the wounds of society, the wounds of poverty, of vice, of ignorance–all will be laid bare. Is there not something re-assuring in this? The census-takers will go about Moscow, they will set down in their lists, without distinction, those insolent with prosperity, the satisfied, the calm, those who are on the way to ruin, and those who are ruined, and the curtain will fall. The census-takers, our sons and brothers, these young men will behold all this. They will say: “Yes, our life is very terrible and incurable,” and with this admission they will live on like the rest of us, awaiting a remedy for the evil from this or that extraneous force. But those who are perishing will go on dying, in their ruin, and those on the road to ruin will continue in their course. No, let us rather grasp the idea that science has its task, and that we, on the occasion of this census, have our task, and let us not allow the curtain once lifted to be dropped, but let us profit by the opportunity in order to remove the immense evil of the separation existing between us and the poor, and to establish intercourse and the work of redressing the evil of unhappiness and ignorance, and our still greater misfortune,–the indifference and aimlessness of our life.