The first volume presents essays and articles that reflect the author's struggle for an adequate image of the history of Russian philosophy. The main attention is paid to the practically unexplored direction of Russian philosophical thought, the heyday of which falls on the second half of the 19th century. The guiding ideas of this direction are considered, allowing us to see in it Russian classical philosophy, which is engaged not in the search for the "absolute," but in the problem of a person, his path to himself, to his personal and national essence.