So far the Law of Moses and the Gospel.
But our Lord, in the Parable of the Talents, appears to actually sanction the practice of loans upon interest: "Thou oughtest, therefore, to have put my money to the exchangers, and then at my coming I should have received mine own with usury" (Matt. xxv. 27). The preceding verse, the 26th, may well be understood to be a question—Didst thou indeed think so? It does not even indirectly attribute hardness and oppression to our Lord.[17] I am quite aware that it may be replied that this is an instance of those strong audacious metaphors, where the fact used by way of illustration is instinctively overleaped by the mind of the hearer to arrive at the lesson which it marks and emphasizes; as when the Lord is represented as an unjust judge, or Paul speaks of grafting the wild olive branch upon the good, or James refers to the rust and canker upon gold and silver, or Milton speaks of certain bishops as "blind mouths."[18] But in all these cases, the hyperbole is manifest; it is an untruth or a disguise, which not only does not deceive, but teaches a great truth. Our Lord's reference to money-lenders or exchangers appears to lend an indirect sanction to a familiar practice.
The Law of Moses, therefore, rebuking the practice of lending for increase among brethren and encouraging it in dealing with strangers, combined with the well-known avarice of the Jews to make them money-lenders on a large scale, and at high rates of interest, to the prodigals and spendthrifts, the bankrupt barons and needy sovereigns of the middle ages. Money was rarely lent for commercial purposes, and to advance the real prosperity of the borrower. It was generally to stave off want for the time; and principal and interest, when pay-day came, had generally to be found in the pastures or strongholds of the enemy. High interest was charged, on account of the extraordinary precariousness of what was called the security. Grinding and grasping undoubtedly the money-lenders would be, from the hardship of their case. Reckless extravagance and lavish profusion were, in those non-commercial ages, highly applauded. The spendthrift and the prodigal was the favourite of the multitude; the rich money-lender was hated and abused, while his money-bags were sought after with all the eagerness of hard-driving poverty. They reviled the careful and economical Israelite; they looked with horror upon his vast accumulations of capital, and never remembered to thank him for the safety they owed to him from the violent hands of their own soldiers and retainers.
All this went on until the sixteenth or seventeenth century. I have before me a very curious old book, lent to me by Mr. Ruskin, entitled, "The English Usurer: or, Usury Condemned by the most learned and famous Divines of the Church of England. Collected by John Blaxton, Preacher of God's Word at Osmington, in Dorsetshire, 1634."
The language throughout the book is of extreme violence against all manner of usury. The compiler gives a collection of the most emphatic testimonies of the greatest preachers of the day against this "detestable vice." Bishop Jewell calls it "a most filthy trade, a trade which God detesteth, a trade which is the very overthrow of all Christian love." There is, it must be admitted, no sort of argument attempted in the long extract from Bishop Jewell's sermon to demonstrate the wickedness of the practice against which he launches his fierce invectives, but he certainly brings his sermon to a conclusion with a threat of extreme measures "if they continue therein. I will open their shame and denounce excommunication against them, and publish their names in this place before you all, that you may know them, and abhor them as the plagues and monsters of this world; that if they be past all fear of God, they may yet repent and amend for worldly shame."
This was Bishop Jewell preaching in the middle of the 16th century; and such were the strong terms very generally employed by good and thoughtful men at that day. Bacon (Essay 41) says that one of the objections against usury is that "it is against nature for money to beget money!" Antonio, in "The Merchant of Venice," asks:
"When did friendship take
A breed of barren metal of his friend?"
And his practice was "neither to lend nor borrow by taking nor giving of excess," which brought upon him the malice and vindictiveness of the Jew—
"that in low simplicity
He lends out money gratis, and brings down
The rate of usance here with us in Venice."
Philip, in Tennyson's "Brook "—a simple man in later times—