The end of the eighteenth century was an era of fulfilment in Russia even if the abuses of the regime were becoming as in grained as its habit of success. As much of the Petrine vision had been realised as was possible through the imitation of Europe's political and social superstructure rather than through the basic transformation of Russia. The richer nobility had been entirely westernised, the diplomatic and military tools of raison d'état had been acquired with the narrow industrial basis which contemporary warfare demanded and with effective if wasteful methods of conscripting man-power. Even some of the cultural insignia of national greatness were apparent. With the last two partitions of Poland in 1793 and 1795, the empire had reached territorial limits in the west that were hardly to be extended until the mid-twentieth century. In the south the Black Sea coast-line had been won from the Dniester to the sea of Azov and to the northern rivers of the Caucasus. Odessa was founded by 1796, and beyond the Caucasus the Christian kingdom of Georgia was becoming a voluntary protectorate. From the Caspian sea to the frontiers of Chinese administration the nomads of Central Asia were increasingly submitting to the political influence of Russian arms, trade and even culture.

As far as can be ascertained from the periodic and unreliable census of males for fiscal and military purposes, the population in 1800 within the new frontiers was probably nearer 35 than 40 million. This population seems to have begun to surge in time with the similar phenomenon in central and western Europe, although conditions were dissimilar.