Thomas Aquinas. The use of a horse may be distinguished, at least by the intellect, from the horse itself. Men borrow a horse and afterwards restore it, but the usage of the horse has been a distinct advantage, for which they may lawfully pay; but in the case of money, which is consumed in the usage, the thing itself has no value distinct from its usage. When therefore a man restores the exact sum he has borrowed, he has done all that can be required of him, because to make him pay for the usage of this money is to make him pay for a thing that does not exist, or, perhaps more correctly, to make him pay twice for the same thing, and is therefore, said St. Thomas, dishonest.1

This was one branch of the argument; the other was derived from authority. The political economy of the Fathers was received with implicit faith, and a long series of passages of Scripture were cited which were universally regarded as condemnatory of usury.2

1 The views of St. Thomas (who was one of the chief authorities on the subject) are in the Summa, Pars ii. Quæst. 78. At the end of the eighteenth century they were drawn up with great elaboration by a writer named Pothier, and torn to pieces by Turgot (Mém. sur les Prêts d'Argent, § 26–27). The argument as I have stated it is, I know, very obscure, but I venture to think that is chiefly the fault of St. Thomas.

2 The chief passages cited were— —Lev. xxv. 36, Deut. xxiii. 19, Ps. xv. 5, Ezek. xviii., and (from the New Testament) Luke vi. 35. As Turgot notices, the popular interpretation of this last passage was peculiarly inexcusable in Catholics, who always interpret the injunctions that surround it as 'counsels of perfection,' not obligatory on every man. Yet Bossuet was able to say, 'La tradition constante des conciles, à commencer par les plus anciens, celle des Papes, des pères, des interprètes et de l'Eglise Romaine, est d'interpréter ce verset, Mutuum date nihil inde sperantes," comme prohibitif du

a horse borrowed is 5 years old & returned 6 years old.

As it is quite certain that commercial and industrial enterprise cannot be carried on on a large scale without borrowing, and as it is equally certain that these loans can only be effected by paying for them in the shape of interest, it is no exaggeration to say that the Church had cursed the material developement of civilisation. As long as her doctrine of usury was believed and acted on, the arm of industry was paralysed, the expansion of commerce was arrested, and all the countless blessings that have flowed from them were withheld.' As, however, it is impossible for a society that is even moderately civilised to continue without usury, we find, from a very early period, a certain antagonism existing on this subject between the civil law and the Church. The denunciations of the Fathers were soon succeeded by a long series

profit qu'on tire du prêt; "inde" c'est à dire de l'usure.' (2nde Pastorale, contre la Version de Richard Simon.)

1 Montesquieu, speaking of the scholastic writings on usury, says, with a little exaggeration, Ainsi nous devons aux spéculations des Scholastiques tous les malheurs qui ont accompagné la destruction du commerce' (Esprit des Lois, lib. xxi. c. 20); and Turgot, 'L'observation rigoureuse de ces lois serait destructive de tout commerce; aussi ne sont-elles pas observées rigoureusement. Elles interdisent toute stipulation d'intérêt sans aliénation du capital. . . . Et c'est une chose notoire qu'il n'y a pas sur la terre une place de commerce où la plus grande partie du commerce ne roule sur l'argent emprunté sans aliénation du capital' (Mém. sur les Prêts d'Argent,

xiv.). M. Sismondi has justly observed (Nouveaux Principes d'Economie Politique) that the prohibition of usury in Catholic countries has also done very much to promote a passion for luxury, and to discourage economy-the rich who were not engaged in business finding no easy way of employing their savings productively.

286

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of Councils which unanimously condemned usurers, and the canonical law is crowded with enactments against them; but at the same time kings found it constantly necessary to borrow for the equipment of their armies, and they very naturally shrank from suppressing a class to which they had recourse. Edward the Confessor indeed in England, St. Lewis in France,1 and a few other sovereigns of remarkable piety, took this extreme step; but generally usury, though not altogether recognised, was in some degree connived at. Besides, to lend was esteemed much more sinful than to borrow,2 and in the earlier part of the middle ages the usurers were almost exclusively Jews, who had no scruples on the subject, and who had adopted this profession partly because of the great profits they could derive from it, and partly because it was almost the only one open to them. It was not till the close of the eleventh century that Christian money-lenders became numerous, and the rise of

1 Confirming in this respect a French law of the eighth and ninth century which provided that 'Usuram non solum clerici, sed nec laici Christiani, exigere debent.' Some think Justinian prohibited usury, but there is a good deal of dispute about this. Richard I. of England Christianum fœneratorem fieri prohibuit aut quacunque conventionis occasione aliquid recipere ultra id quod mutuo concessit" (Bromton Chronicon). Some governors made it a law that the property of those who had been usurers might be confiscated by the crown after their death (Cibrario, Economia Politica del Medio Evo, vol. iii. p. 319). This arrangement had a double advantage: the government might borrow money from the usurer while he was living, and rob his children when he was dead.

2 According to the doctors of the Sorbonne it was sinful to borrow at usury except under extreme necessity, but the whole stress of the denunciations was directed against the lenders.