A Christian Directory, Part 4: Christian Politics

by Richard Baxter

I will first lay you down the instances of such usury, and then prove it. There is a parcel of land to be sold for a thousand pounds, which is worth forty pounds per annum, and hath wood on it worth a thousand pounds (some such things we have known): John N. is willing to purchase it; but he hath a poor neighbour, T. S. that hath no money, but a great desire of the bargain. J. N. loving his neighbour as himself, and desiring his wealth, lendeth him the thousand pounds upon usury for one year. T. S. buyeth the land, and selleth the wood for the same money, and repayeth it in a year, and so hath all the land for almost nothing; as if J. N. had purchased the land and freely given it him, after a year or two; the gift had been the same.

Object. Here you suppose the seller wronged by selling his land almost for nothing.

Answ. 1. That is nothing at all to the present case, but a different case by itself. 2. I can put many cases in which such a sale may be made without any wrong to the seller: as when it is done by some prince, or state, or noble and liberal person, purposely designing the enriching of the subjects, or after a war, as lately in Ireland. So that the question is, whether J. N. may not give T. S. a thousand or eight hundred pounds' worth of land, taking a year's rent first out of the land, or a year's use for the money, which cometh to the same sum.

Another: a rich merchant trading into the East Indies, having five thousand pounds to lay out upon his commodities in traffic, when he hath laid out four thousand five hundred pounds, lendeth in charity the other five hundred pounds to one of his servants to lay out upon a commodity, which when it cometh home will be worth two thousand pounds; and offereth him to secure the carriage with his own; requiring only the use of his money at six per cent. Here the taking of thirty pounds' use, is but the giving him one thousand four hundred and seventy pounds, and is all one with deducting so much of the gift.

Another instance: certain orphans having nothing left them but so much money as will by the allowed use of it find them bread and poor clothing; the guardian cannot lay it out in lands for them; and if he maintain them upon the stock, it will be quickly spent, and he must answer for it: a rich man that is their neighbour tradeth in iron works, (furnaces or forges,) or lead works, or other such commodities, in which he constantly getteth the double of the stock which he employeth, or at least twenty pounds or forty pounds in the hundred; the guardian dare not lend the money to any poor man, lest he break and never be able to pay it; therefore he lendeth it this rich man. And if he have it without usury, the poor orphans give the rich man freely twenty pounds or forty pounds a year, supposing their stock to be a hundred; if he take usury, the rich man doth but give the poor orphans some part of his constant gain.

Another instance: in a city or corporation where there is a rich trade of clothing or making silks, there is a stock of money given by legacy for the poor, and intrusted into the hands of the richest of the city, to trade with and give the poor the use of it: and there is another stock left to set up young beginners, who have not a stock to set up themselves; on condition that they give the third part of their gain to the poor, and at seven years' end resign the stock: the question is, Whether the poor should be without this use of their money, and let the rich go away with it? or whether they may take it?

Now I prove that such usury is not forbidden by God.

1. It is not forbidden us by the law of Moses: (1.) Because Moses's law never did forbid it: for, 1. It is expressly forbidden as an act of unmercifulness; and therefore forbidden only to the poor and to brethren, Exod. xxii. 25; Lev. xxv. 36, 37. Yea, when the poor are not named, it is the poor that are meant; because in that country they did not keep up stocks for merchandise or trading, but lent usually to the needy only: at least the circumstances of the several texts show, that it is only lending to the needy, and not lending to drive on any enriching trades, which is meant where usury is forbidden.[157] 2. And it is expressly allowed to be used to strangers, Deut. xxiii. 19, 20, to whom nothing unjust or uncharitable might be done; only such a measure of charity was not required towards them as unto brethren. And there were more merchants of strangers that traded with them in foreign commodities, than of Jews that fetched them home: so that the prohibition of usury is in the law itself restrained only to their lending to the poor; but in the prophets who do but reprove the sin, it is expressed without that limitation, partly because it supposeth the meaning of the law to be known, which the prophets did but apply, and partly because there was little or no lending used among the Jews, but to the needy as an act of charity.

(2.) And if it had been forbidden in Moses's law only, it would not extend to christians now; because the law of Moses, as such, is not in force: the matter of it is much of the law of nature indeed; but as Mosaical, it was proper to the Jews and proselytes, or at least extended not to the christian gentiles; as is plain in 2 Cor. iii. 7; Gal. iii. 19, 24; v. 3; Ephes. ii. 15; 1 Tim. i. 7; Heb. vii. 12, 16, 19. Moses's law as such never bound any other nations, but the proselytes that joined themselves to the Jews (nor was all the world obliged so to be proselyted as to take up their laws): much less do they bind us that are the servants of Christ, so long after the dissolution of their commonwealth. So much of them as are part of the law of nature, or of any positive law of Christ, or of the civil law of any state, are binding as they are such natural, christian, or civil laws. But not one of them as Mosaical: though the Mosaical law is of great use to help us to understand the law of nature in many particular instances, in which it is somewhat difficult to us.

2. There is no positive law of Christ forbidding all usury: as for Luke vi. 32, 35, it is plainly nothing to the case; for he saith not, Lend, looking for no gain or increase, but looking for nothing again. And the context showeth that the meaning must be one of these two; either, q. d. Lend not only to them that will lend to you again when you are in want; but even to the poor, that you can never hope to borrow of; or else, Lend not only to them that are able to pay you, and where your stock is secured, but to the needy where your money is hazarded; and though they will pay you if they are able, yet you have little or no hope that ever they should be able to repay: lend so, as to be willing to make a gift of it in case the borrower never repay it. And there is no other text that can be pretended against it in the New Testament.