This book is written based on vigorous and prolonged debates between the Slavophils and proponents of Russian Slavophilism's principal ideological rival, Westernism, in the mid-nineteenth century. It presents the analysis and evaluation of Iu. F. Samarin's dissertation.

Introduction -- The Making of a Slavophil -- The 1820s: Family and Tutors -- The 1830s: Moscow University -- The Early 1840s: The Dissertation -- Early 1840s: The Struggle with Hegelianism -- Middle 1840s: In the Slavophil Camp -- Middle 1840s: In Government Service -- End of the 1840s: Reviews, Riga, and Prison -- The 1850s: The Slavophils on Science, Technology, and Farming—Koshelev -- The 1850s: Samarin’s Studies and Emancipation of the Serfs -- From Slavophil Orthodoxy to Reform -- Spirit and Meaning of Orthodoxy -- Rationalism, Materialism, and Slavophilism -- National Spirit (Culture): Russia and the West -- Memorandum (Zapiska) on the Emancipation of the Serfs -- The Drive for Emancipation -- Slavophil Collaborators and the Edict of 1861 -- Officiai Nationality -- The “Native Soil” Movement and Pan-Slavism -- Conclusion