Sombart (Der moderne Kapitalismus, 2 vols., Leipzig, 1902), have propounded the doctrine of one gradual progression from an agricultural state to modern capitalistic conditions.
In politics nearly twelve years of Conservative government, or at least capitalistic predominance in public affairs, were succeeded by more than seventeen years of Radicalism.
As a matter of fact, as far as modern Europe is concerned, there has twice been a progression, separated by a period of retrogression, and it is to the latter that Bucher's picture of the agricultural and strictly protectionist town (the geschlossene Stadtwirtschaft) of the 14th and r 5th centuries belongs, while Sombart's notion of an entire absence of a spirit of capitalistic enterprise before the middle of the 15th century in Europe north of the Alps, or the 14th.