"Not the least interesting of those who idealized the Middle Ages was William Cobbett. Although the supposed virtues of mediaeval barons and monks were certainly useful to hold up in comparison with the failings of later possessors of the soil—the Establishment and the squirearchy—his sincerity in this matter cannot be questioned. It would be a work of supererogation to elaborate on Cobbett's mediaevalism. His books are crowded with appeals to the good old days and denunciations of the new-rich of the Napoleonic wars. What have the people gained, he asks, by the fall of the feudal system? "Talk of vassals! Talk of villains! Talk of serfs! Are there any of these, or did feudal times ever see any of them, so debased, so absolutely slaves, as the poor creatures who, in the ‘enlightened’ north, are compelled to work fourteen hours in a day, in a heat of eighty-four degrees; and who are liable to punishment for looking out at a window of the factory!""