About the book: 2005 / This book, intended from its first edition for educational purposes, and in the current edition retains the same meaning. We would not want to confuse a textbook with a textbook: the first should only help the study of science, the second contains all the content of science that is mandatory for the student; there is no place for the latter in higher educational institutions. The educational nature of the book determines its concept. It contains many headings and divisions, not due to the author’s special predilection for them, but due to the need to focus the student’s attention on the essential shades of thought or phases of development of phenomena. These milestones, which show the way of thought for students, may seem like obstacles to a person who has already stopped learning. But, unfortunately, the book is not intended for these readers. Of course, it would be more pleasant for the author to paint complete pictures of the continuous movement of law in its mighty historical stream and float along this stream without barriers or dams; but in the educational book he is obliged to stop his impulse every minute and indicate to the student at every step the meaning of the phenomenon encountered. It goes without saying that when we talk about a different, freer presentation of science, we do not mean a presentation of it “from a bird’s eye view” (as they sometimes say), because a bird’s eye view is devoid of perspective, and in a historical perspective the whole meaning of history.