Religion and the rise of capitalism

by R. H. Tawney

[56] Henry of Langenstein, Tractatus bipartitus de contractibus emptionis et venditionis, i, 11, 12 (quoted Schreiber, op. cit., pp. 198-200).

[57] For these examples see Cal. of Early Mayor’s Court Rolls of the City of London, ed. A. H. Thomas, pp. 259-60; Records of the City of Norwich, ed. W. Hudson and J. C. Tingey, vol. i, 1906, p. 227; Cal. of Early Mayor’s Court Rolls, p. 132; J. M. Wilson, The Worcester Liber Albus, 1920, pp. 199-200, 212-13. The question of the legitimacy of rent-charges and of the profits of partnership has been fully discussed by Max Neumann, Geschichte des Wuchers in Deutschland (1865), and by Ashley, Economic History. See also G. O’Brien, An Essay on Mediæval Economic Teaching (1920), and G. G. Coulton, An Episode in Canon Law (in History, July 1921), where the difficult question raised by the Decretal Naviganti is discussed.

[58] Bernardi Papiensis Summa Decretalium (ed. E. A. D. Laspeyres, 1860); lib. v, tit. xv.

[59] E.g., Ægidius Lessinus, De Usuris, cap. ix, pt. ii: “Etiam res futuræ per tempora non sunt tantæ estimationis, sicut eædem collectæ in instanti, nec tantam utilitatem inferunt possidentibus, propter quod oportet, quod sint minoris estimationis secundum justitiam.”

[60] O’Brien (op. cit.) appears, unless I misunderstand him, to take this view.

[61] Politics, I, iii, ad. fin. 1258^b. See Who said “Barren Metal”? by E. Cannan, W. D. Ross, etc., in Economica, June 1922, pp. 105-7.

[62] Innocent IV, Apparatus, lib. v, De Usuris.

[63] For Italy, see Arturo Segre, Storia del Commercio, vol. i, pp. 179-91, and for France, P. Boissonade, Le Travail dans l’Europe chrétienne au Moyen Age, 1921, pp. 206-9, 212-13. Both emphasize the financial relations of the Papacy.

[64] E.g., Council of Arles, 314; Nicæa, 325; Laodicea, 372; and many others.

[65] Corpus Juris Canonici, Decretal. Greg. IX, lib. v, tit. xix, cap. i.