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.

I already hear the customary remark: “All this is very fine, these are sounding phrases; but do you tell us what to do and how to do it?”  Before I say what is to be done, it is indispensable that I should say what is not to be done.  It is indispensable, first of all, in my opinion, in order that something practical may come of this activity, that no society should be formed, that there should be no publicity, that there should be no collection of money by balls, bazaars or theatres; that there should be no announcement that Prince A. has contributed one thousand rubles, and the honorable citizen B. three thousand; that there shall be no collection, no calling to account, no writing up,—most of all, no writing up, so that there may not be the least shadow of any institution, either governmental or philanthropic.

But in my opinion, this is what should be done instantly: Firstly, All those who agree with me should go to the directors, and ask for their shares the poorest sections, the poorest dwellings; and in company with the census-takers, twenty-three, twenty-four or twenty-five in number, they should go to these quarters, enter into relations with the people who are in need of assistance, and labor for them.

Secondly: We should direct the attention of the superintendents and census-takers to the inhabitants in need of assistance, and work for them personally, and point them out to those who wish to work over them.  But I am asked: What do you mean by working over them?  I reply; Doing good to people.  The words “doing good” are usually understood to mean, giving money.  But, in my opinion, doing good and giving money are not only not the same thing, but two different and generally opposite things.  Money, in itself, is evil.  And therefore he who gives money gives evil.  This error of thinking that the giving of money means doing good, arose from the fact, that generally, when a man does good, he frees himself from evil, and from money among other evils.  And therefore, to give money is only a sign that a man is beginning to rid himself of evil.  To do good, signifies to do that which is good for man.  But, in order to know what is good for man, it is necessary to be on humane, i.e., on friendly terms with him.  And therefore, in