A political problem, namely the republican tradition, and a judicial and moral problem, the right to punish, have led us to a point where the path divides in a thousand ways, and we are led on to the Enlightenment in all its many aspects. Fortunately there is no lack of scholars ready to undertake such an enterprise. Our final task, however, must be to look at the Europe of the Enlightenment as a whole. We must try to feel its rhythm and define its extent. I attempted something similar in a report to the historians' Congress held at Stockholm in 1960. Perhaps it will be useful here to voice my doubts and second thoughts, the additions and corrections stimulated by the numerous studies of the last decade, and also my own researches, especially on eighteenth-century Italy.

The many essays on the economic history of the eighteenth century still provide a very uneven picture, which varies from region to region and country to country, in this period. We know about certain aspects very well, while many others remain obscure. But, even though our information is fragmentary, or even sometimes non-existent, I believe we can no longer avoid the question which every student of the eighteenth century must ask himself. How far is the general trend of the French economy described by Labrousse valid also for the rest of the continent? A period of expansion in the first quarter of the century is followed by the depression of the 1730s.