Goldsmith wrote The Deserted Village specifically to describe the results of: the Enclosure Acts.
The Enclosure Acts were passed between 1750 and 1860. They took away the rights peasants had to access and use fields and waste lands, such as swamps. The peasants were offered smaller, less productive pieces of land while the fertile fields and waste lands were taken by the government or by private owners with the purpose of enriching themselves.
As we can see in the following lines, Goldsmith is disgusted by what greed has done to rural areas:
... The man of wealth and pride
Takes up a space that many poor supplied;
Space for his lake, his park's extended bounds,
Space for his horses, equipage, and hounds:
The robe that wraps his limbs in silken sloth
Has robbed the neighbouring fields of half their growth