324 THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY. 



taking of interest ; the law of Moses, wliile it allowed usury in 

 dealing with strangers, forbade it in dealing with Jews. In the 

 New Testament stood the text in St. Luke, " Lend, hoping for 

 nothing again." These texts seemed to harmonize with the Ser- 

 mon on the Mount, and with the most beautiful characteristic of 

 primitive Christianity ; its tender care for the poor and oppressed : 

 hence we find, from the earliest period, the whole weight of the 

 Church brought to bear against the taking of interest for money.* 

 The great fathers of the Eastern Church, and among them 

 St. Basil, St. Chrysostom, and St. Gregory of Nyssa ; the fathers 

 of the Western Church, and among them TertuUian, St. Am- 

 brose, St. Augustine, and St. Jerome joined most earnestly in 

 this condemnation. St. Basil denounces money at interest as a 

 " fecund monster," and says, " The divine law declares expressly, 

 ' Thou shalt not lend on usury to thy brother or thy neighbor.' " 

 St. Gregory of Nyssa calls down on him who lends money at in- 

 terest the vengeance of the Almighty. St. Chrysostom says: 

 " What can be more unreasonable than to sow without land, 

 without rain, without plows ? All those who give themselves up 

 to this damnable culture shall reap only tares. Let us cut off 

 these monstrous births of gold and silver ; let us stop this execra- 

 ble fecundity." Lactantius called the taking of interest " rob- 

 bery." St. Ambrose declared it as bad as murder. St. Jerome 

 threw the argument into the form of a dilemma, which was used 

 as a weapon against money-lenders for centuries. St. Anselm 

 proved from the Scriptures that the taking of interest is a breach 

 of the Ten Commandments. Pope Leo the Great solemnly ad- 

 judged the same offense to be a sin worthy of severe punish- 

 ment, f 



* On the general allowance of interest for money in Greece, even at high rates, see 

 Bockh, Public Economy of the Athenians, translated by Lamb, Boston, 1857, especially 

 chaps, xxii, xxiii, and xxiv of Book I. For view of usury taken by Aristotle, see his 

 Politics and Economics, translated by Walford, p. 27 ; also Grote, History of Greece, vol. 

 iii, chap. xi. For summary of opinions in Greece and Rome, and their relation to Christian 

 thought, see Bohm-Bawerk, Capital and Interest, translated by Smart, London, 1890, chap, 

 i. For a very fuU list of Scripture texts against the taking of interest, see Pearson, The 

 Theories of Usury in Europe, 1100-1400, Cambridge (England), 1876, p. 6. The texts 

 most frequently cited were: Leviticus, xxv, 36, 37 ; Deuteronomy, xxiii, 19 and 26; Psalms, 

 XV, 5 ; Ezekiel, xviii, 8 and 17 ; St. Luke, vi, 35. For a curious modern use of them, see 

 D. S. Dickinson's speech in the Senate of New York in vol. i of his collected writings. 

 See also Lecky, History of Rationalism in Europe, vol. ii, chap, vi ; and, above all, as the 

 most recent historical summary by a leading historian of political economy, Bohm-Bawerk 

 as above. 



f For St. Basil and St. Gregory of Nyssa, see French translation of these diatribes in 

 Homelies contre les Usuriers, Paris, Hachette, 1861-'62, especially p. 30 of St. Basil. 

 For some doubtful reservations by St. Augustine, see Murray, History of Usury. For St. 

 Ambrose, see the De Officiis, lib. iii, cap. ii, in Migne, Patrologia, tome xvi ; also the 

 De Tobia, in Migne, tome xiv. For St. Augustine, see De Bapt. contra Donat, lib. iv, cap. 



