The article analyses the relations between Nikolay Chernyshevsky (1818-1889) and Vladimir Lamansky (1833-1914), who were students of professor N.N. Sreznevsky (1812-1880) of St. Petersburg University. The author observes that their mutual aversion was not only determined by their personal antipathy, but was also based on different worldviews and philosophical values (Westernism of Chernyshevsky and Slavophilism of Lamansky). The essential attention is paid to their polemics provoked by the publication of Chernyshevsky's article "National tactlessness" in Sovremennik in 1861. The article was an overview of the early issues of Slovo - a newspaper published in Lvov - which evoked Lamansky's reaction in a Slavophile newspaper Den'. The author notes that a special question about the language of the Galician Rusins put by Chernyshevsky gave Lamansky grounds for proposing his version of the origins of Russian literary language and for upholding Rusins' historical and cultural right to use Russian literary language instead of Ukrainian. The Slavophiles (I.S. Aksakov, V.I. Lamansky and P.A. Lavrovsky) accused Chernyshevsky of denying Rusins the right to use the Russian literary language, thus provoking the split in Russian ethnos and expressing the Polish viewpoint. In respond, Chernyshevsky pointed out that there were rather class then ethnic contradictions in Austria-Hungary. He also blamed Galician Rusins for political immaturity and refused to refer them to the Western line of the Russian nation, denying them of any national identity. The author concludes that the further polemics of the language led Lamansky to the civilization conception of "three worlds" with language as a main geopolitical force.