We indicate here some of the statute provisions in relation to this matter, viz: “Permissible by agreement subjects the lender to a penalty of from three to six times the amount of usury taken; subject simply to have excess recovered; to lose the whole interest; an avoidance of whole contract; forfeiture of the whole debt,” etc.
These provisions are of little avail really, for they are continually in conflict with the law of supply and demand; and the ingenuity of man settles this conflict in individual cases by cunningly conceived and evasive conditions.
Where partial payments have been made, interest may be computed in the following manner, which has received the sanction of recognized authority: “Compute interest due on principal sum to the time when a payment, either alone or in conjunction with preceding payments, with interest cast on them, shall equal or exceed interest due on the principal. Deduct this sum, and upon the balance cast interest as before, until a payment or payments equal the interest due; then deduct again, and so on.”
SUNDAY READINGS.
SELECTED BY THE REV. J. H. VINCENT, D.D.
FROM GOULBURN’S “THOUGHTS ON PERSONAL RELIGION.”
[March 2.]
There is no interruption in the world, however futile and apparently perverse, which we may not address ourselves to meet with a spirit of patience and condescension borrowed from our Master; and to have made a step in advance in conforming to the mind of Christ will be quite as great a gain (probably a far greater) than if we had been engaged in our pursuit. For, after all, we may be too intent upon our business, or rather intent in a wrong way. The radical fault of our nature, be it remembered, is self-will; and we little suspect how largely self-will and self-pleasing may be at the bottom of plans and pursuits, which still have God’s glory and the furtherance of his service for their professed end.