The change of atmosphere from Adam Smith to Townsend was, indeed, striking. The former marked the close of an age which opened with the inventors of … - Karl Polanyi

How far the state was induced to interfere depended on the constitution of the political sphere and on the degree of economic distress. As long as the vote was restricted and only the few exerted political influence, interventionism was a much less urgent problem than it became after universal suffrage made the state the organ of the ruling million—the identical million who, in the economic realm, had often to carry in bitterness the burden of the ruled. And as long as employment was plentiful, incomes were secure, production was continuous, living standards were dependable, and prices were stable, interventionist pressure was naturally less than it became when protracted slumps made industry a wreckage of unused tools and frustrated effort.

We can know more than we can tell.

Enclosures have appropriately been called a revolution of the rich is against the poor. The lords and nobles were upsetting the social order, breaking down ancient law and custom, sometimes by means of vio¬lence, often by pressure and intimidation. They were literally robbing the poor of their share in the common, tearing down the houses which, by the hitherto unbreakable force of custom, the poor had long regarded as theirs and their heirs'. The fabric of society was being disrupted; desolate villages and the ruins of human dwellings testified to the fierce¬ness with which the revolution raged, endangering the defenses of the country, wasting its towns, decimating its population, turning its over¬burdened soil into dust, harassing its people and turning them from decent husbandmen into a mob of beggars and thieves.