What To Do? - Lev Nikolayeviç Tolstoy - Platanus Publishing

The object o of a census is scientific. A census is a so­ciological investigation. And the object of the science of sociology is the happiness of the people. This science and its methods differ sharply from all other sciences.

Its peculiarity lies in this, that sociological in­vestigations are not conducted by learned men in their cabinets, observatories and laboratories, but by two thousand people from the community. A second peculiarity is this, that the investigati­ons of other sciences are not conducted on living people, but here living people are the subjects.