One of the most famous scandalous journalistic works in the entire history of Russia, the publication of only the first part of which caused a shock, infuriated those around Nicholas I, which led to the author being declared crazy, isolated in his own home and a ban on writing, while ensuring the widest popularity of the “Philosophical Letters” in educated circles of society, where they were distributed in handwritten form. What seditious thing did the “Nikolaev dissident” write? He stated that there is only one way of progressive development of humanity - Western European; that Russia’s “special path” is a lag behind this development; that the image of God in man lies in the desire for freedom, and love for the Motherland is not equal to love for its shortcomings and should consist in the desire to see them and eliminate them. The publishing design is preserved in PDF A4 format.