"The last day of a death row is direct or indirect, consider it as you wish, a petition for the abolition of the death penalty, it is a general petition for all convicts present and future, for all time; This is a fundamental issue of human rights, raised and defended in full voice before society, as before the highest court of cassation ;. This is a terrible, fatal problem that is hidden in the bowels of every death sentence, ; This, I repeat, is a problem of life and death, open, naked, cleansed of the tinsel of ringing prosecutorial phrases, brought to the bright light, placed where it should be considered, in its true eerie environment - not in the courtroom, but on the scaffold, not at the judge, but at the executioner. This is the purpose of the author[edit] And if the future shows that he has achieved it, which he does not dare to hope for, then he does not need another crown, he does not need any other glory. (From the author's preface), Text is published by publication: Sovremennik magazine, No 11, 1865.