What was life like for ordinary people through most of human history?
Life for ordinary people through most of human history was mere existence, most under abject poverty, slavery, and oppression, unless they were fortunate enough to be among the very elite ruling class. Human rights were essentially nonexistent until the Magna Charta in about the 14th century began delineating some.
Les explains from Daniel's vision that all the way up through human history, unless someone lived among the very elite ruling class, life for the rest was just existence. Most people were under abject poverty, slavery, and oppression. He points out that human rights as such did not exist until the Magna Charta came out of England in about the fourteenth century and delineated some human rights. Since then, Western civilizations have had at least a semblance of human rights, but Les notes that even there many people remain downtrodden and groveling in poverty; it is not a utopia.