To statesmen, whether of England or of the new Englands across the oceans, the importance can hardly be over-estimated of a sound appreciation of the nature of that remarkable economic evolution in the course of which the great English speaking nations have, so to speak, become charged in our time with the trial of the experiment--let us hope also with the solution of the problem--of _freedom_ and _democracy_, using the words in the highest political sense as the antipodes of _Paternal Government_ and _Communism_. Perhaps, without presumption, it may be said that the future happiness of the human race--the success or failure of the planet--is in no small degree dependent upon the ultimate course of what seems, to us at least, to be the main stream of human progress, upon whether it shall be guided by the foresight of statesmen into safe channels or misguided, diverted, or obstructed, till some great social or political convulsion proves that its force and its direction have been misunderstood. It may indeed be but too true that, in spite of the economic lessons of the past-- The weary Titan! with deaf Ears, and labour dimmed eyes, Regarding neither to right Nor left, goes passively by, Staggering on to her goal; Bearing on shoulders immense, Atlantëan, the load, Wellnigh not to be borne, Of the too vast orb of her fate. And she may continue to do so, however clearly and truthfully the economic lessons of the past may be dinned into her ear. But still the deep sense I have endeavoured to describe in these few sentences of the importance of a sound understanding of English Economic History as the true basis of much of the practical politics of the future will be accepted, I trust, as a sufficient reason why, ill-furnished as I have constantly found myself for the task, I should have ventured to devote some years of scant leisure to the production of this imperfect Essay. It is simply an attempt to set English Economic History upon right lines at its historical commencement by trying to solve the still open question whether it began with the _freedom_ or with the _serfdom_ of the masses of the people--whether the village communities living in the 'hams' and 'tons' of England were, at the outset of English history, _free_ village communities or communities in _serfdom_ under a manorial lordship; and further, what were their relations to the tribal communities of the Western and less easily conquered portions of the island.