Most contemporary and latter-day readers saw Gogol as a satirist of the classical tinge, as a writer who aimed to expose social and human vices and simply as an author whose books are fun to read. Few took Gogol for a religious philosopher and publicist. But it is his focus on religious matters that reveals the ethical roots of the talent which shifted the course of Russian literature from aesthetics to religion, from the trail blazed by Alexander Pushkin to the soul-searching endeavors of Fyodor Dostoyevsky.

Since a certain moment, Gogol wrote, he had been concentrating quite heavily on man and man's soul. He could no longer do without church literature and books by the Fathers of the Orthodox Church and he had, without knowing how, come to Christ in whom he saw a key to man's soul. His seeing the light was not incidental: several generations of his forebears had church schooling. Long before he was born, his father, Vasily Gogol made a pilgrimage to the icon of the Virgin of Akhtyrskaya and saw, in a dream, the Virgin Mother pointing to a small girl who was sitting by her feet and telling him that he was to marry that girl. On return home, Vasily Gogol saw the baby girl of a neighboring family: she was the small girl of his wonderful dream. Thirteen years later he married that girl. Two of their children died in infancy and Vasily's wife vowed before the icon of Nicholas the Miracle-Maker that their next baby would also be named Nikolai. Nikolai Gogol was born on April 1, 1809. 

Established in the faith, Gogol took a much more critical view of himself and his writings. His famous comedy "The Inspector-General," first put on stage in St.Petersburg, was meant to exert good influence on the public. "The Inspector-General" took to the pillory the whole gamut of human vices rather than the corrupted civil servants. Gogol wanted the wrongdoers to see the sinfulness of their ways, to repent and to be saved. But few people, if any, got his message. And the ranks of his enemies had grown. He felt that everyone opposed his views. Elderly and respected government employees declared, he wrote in a letter of that period, that he held nothing sacred now that he dared speak that way about civil servants. Police officers, businessmen, writers - all opposed his views. But for His Majesty's protection, his play would have never been put on stage. 

The first volume of Gogol’s novel "The Dead Souls" came off print in Moscow in 1842. "The Dead Souls" depicts human vices. Its author shows the gradual death of a man's soul: the vulgar practices of society, its mannerisms and decorum ensnare one, grow a hard shell on one's soul. And, Gogol writes, an attempt to find a way to the soul of some horrible Plyushkin (one of the heroes of the novel), whose occasional display of emotions resembles the last effort of a drowning man, shows that the soul has disappeared; it has turned into some rock-hard substance. 

It took Gogol much time and effort to write the second volume of "The Dead Souls." Writing lay as a dreary load on his soul and he got tired of the hustle and bustle of this world. He was crying out for a different peace of mind, for a catharsis. He felt like becoming a monk but got no blessing for going to live in a monastery. He led, however, a monastic sort of life showing utmost humility and coveting neither women nor wealth. There was no place he could call his home because he distributed what he had inherited from his parents between his relatives and beggars. He had no wife and developed no serious relationships with women. He obeyed his pastor. 

The death of Alexei Khomyakov's wife fell as a heavy blow on him. Khomyakov was a friend of his, and the deceased was also dear to his heart. It was after her death that Gogol got a premonition of his own early end. He felt physically weak, with his doctors being unable to diagnose the disease. All the doctors could do was marvel at his condition. But he knew that God's measure for his wanderings on Earth had been fulfilled and he was not afraid to die. "How nice it is to be dying!" - was one of the last things he said in clear realization of what was happening, on his deathbed…