Among local institutions, some were based upon common deliberation, and others upon hierarchical subordination; that is to say, some upon a principle of liberty, and others upon a principle of dependence. On one side, were the courts of hundred and the county-courts; on the other, the great landowners and their vassals: every man of fourteen years old and upwards was obliged to belong either to a hundred or to a lord, that is, to be free or vassal. {284} These two hostile systems, then, placed in presence of one another, conflicted as upon the Continent. There is some doubt about the question whether, before the Conquest, feudalism existed with regard to lands: that it existed with regard to persons there can be no doubt, for their hierarchical classification was real and progressive. In localities, although the system of free institutions subsisted, the system of feudal institutions was gaining ground; seignorial jurisdictions were encroaching upon free jurisdictions; and almost the same process, in fact, was going on as upon the Continent. If we look at central institutions, we observe the same phenomenon. On the Continent, feudalism was produced by the aggrandizement of the king's vassals, and by the dislocation of the sovereignty. The national unity, which resided in the assembly of the nation, became dissolved; the monarchical unity was unable to resist; and monarchy and liberty perished together. Events had taken the same course among the Anglo-Saxons. Under Edward the Confessor, the decay of the royal authority is evident. Earl Godwin, Siward, Duke of Northumberland, Leofric, Duke of Mercia, and many other great vassals, are rivals rather than subjects of the king; and Harold usurping the crown from Edgar Atheling, the legitimate heir, bears a strong resemblance to Hugh Capet. The sovereignty tends to dismemberment. Monarchical unity is in danger; national unity is in the same declining state, as is proved by the history of the Wittenagemot. This general assembly of the nation was at first the assembly of the warriors; afterwards the general assembly of the land-owners, both great and small; and at a later period, the assembly of the great land-owners alone, or of the king's thanes. Even these at last neglect to attend its meetings; and isolate themselves upon their estates, in which each of them exercises his share of the dismembered sovereignty. This is almost identical with the course of affairs on the Continent. Only, the system of free institutions still subsists in England with some energy in local institutions, and especially in the county-courts. The feudal system is in a less advanced state than on the Continent. {285} Norman Institutions.