244 
whatever forloans; but the other, aspir- 
ing only to that degree of moral perfec- 
tion which is adequate to human powers, 
_ have permitted it in some cases, and pro- 
hibited it in others. Ambng political en- 
qu.rers, some have considered that- fixing 
the rate of interest was favourable to the 
well-being of man; while others have 
deemed this. regulation as hurttul to the 
free circulation of commercial capitals, 
and consequently to a greater develope- 
ment of national industry. [t is not our 
busivess to reconcile these opposite sys- 
tems, but merely to state the doctrine of 
our holy legislator. 
‘¢ The Israelites have been accused 
that their religion authorised them to 
take usury; accused by men of another 
religion, which religion is founded on the 
divinity of the revelation of Moses. They 
have said that Usury wasa precept of our 
Law! Wave they been aware of what 
they said? If we have received our law 
from God, as they agree we haye, God 
then would have commanded us to com- 
mit a crime! for usury is a kind of rob- 
bery. 
‘«‘ This error, you know, originates in a 
false interpretation of a single word, 
Neshech.” 
Here Mr. Furtado labours to prove that 
this word answers to the Latin word 
Fenus. To conclude that it means usury, 
another word should be found which 
means interest ; but as sucha word does 
not exist, it follows that all interest is 
usury, and all usury is interest. 
He then proceeds with great ingenuity. 
€ Moses declares, ‘ Thou shalt-not lend 
upon interest tothy brother,’ Deut.c 23, 
v.9. But how could a skilful legislator 
(some have said) forbid a legitimate and 
moderate interest between the Israelites ? 
Are we not rather to believe that he only 
interdicted usury from Hebrew to He- 
brew, while he allowed it to be practised 
on the stranger as an act of hostility ?” 
Thus, as if it were not enough to accuse 
the Divine Law of having given a power 
to the Israelite to vex the stranger by ex- 
acting a ruinous interest, they have even 
attributed to it the inculcating this infa- 
mous traffic. shy Le 
« Qn the other hand these reasoners 
eonfound the manners and habitudes of 
modern nations with those of the highest 
antiquity; and they falsely attribute to 
the infancy of society what only belongs 
to its maturity, and too often to its de- 
crepitude.” 
Here he refers to what he had deliver- 
ed in the meetings before the Sanhedrim 
Acts of the Great Sanhedrim at Paris. 
The first would not permit any interest. 
fOct. ty 
was formed, in which, with great ability,- 
he had sketched a picture of the civil and 
ceconomical staie of the Jews in the time 
ot Moses. Equality of property and me< 
aiocrity of private fortune were what they 
first amed to establish. Hence the in- 
stitution of the Sabbatical year, and the 
year of Jubilee; the first in every seventh 
year released ail debtors from their obli- 
gation, aud the second every fftieth year 
brought with it the restitution of all es- 
tates sold or mortgaged. It was easy to 
foresee that the greater or lesser industry, 
the different qualities of the soil, and 
many other similar causes, would compel 
the more unfortunate Israelite to have re= 
course to his prosperous brother. Moses 
foresaw that in urvent distress the former 
might become a slave to the latter. With — 
a view to this, he says, “ Thou‘shalt not 
lend upon interest to thy brother.” All 
assistance was tu be gratuitous; his peo= 
pie were a nation of agricuiturists. The 
Jews, though Idumea was not distant 
from the sea-cuasts, inhabit-d by the Ty- 
rians, the Sidonians and other nations 
possessing ships and commerce, were ne= 
ver themselves addicted to trade. 
all this it follows that the law of Moses 
respecting Interest among Jews, was no- 
thing more than a charitable precept, not 
a commercial regulation. 
He then exhibits a fine picture of the 
Jewish people in Palestine. 
“« Never were the manners of any an- 
clent nation, its government, its laws, its 
worship, more exactly described than: 
All the monimeats of history at- - 
ours. 
test the simplicity of our ancestors. A 
pastoral and agricultural life was their 
sole occupation; rustic games their only 
pleasures. They had neither manufac- 
tures, nor navigation; all their commerce 
with their neighbours was naturally li- 
mited. to barter, at a time when money 
was rare,-and its various uses so little 
known. ° They lived in a happy ignorance > 
of all those sumptuous embellishments 
which are known only to great and opu= 
lent nations; they enjoyed a happiness 
without splendour, and knew te practice 
virtues without celebrity. Moses would 
only make them a people of brothers ; he 
would only maintain a family equality ; 
he would not have in Israel the poor and 
the rich. Hence those laws which, after 
alimited time, re-established all property. 
What need had he to regulate commer- 
cial matters, since all his ordinances 
tended to remove them from that state, 
and attach them solely to agricultural 
industry? 
“ For this reason Moses prohibited the. 
Hebrew 
From. 
