An Essay on Mediaeval Economic Teaching Part 2

[Footnote 5: Vol. iii. p. 138.]

[Footnote 6: _Ibid._]

[Footnote 7: See Laveleye, _Elements of Political Economy_ (Eng.

trans.), pp. 7-8. On the general conflict between the ethical and the non-ethical schools of economists see Keynes, _Scope and Method_, pp.

20 _et seq_.]

The other road to the establishment of a society based on justice is the way of Christianity, and, if we wish to attempt this path, it becomes vitally important to understand what was the economic teaching of the Church in the period when the Christian ethic was universally recognised. During the whole Middle Ages, as we have said above, the Canon Law was the test of right and wrong in the domain of economic activity; production, consumption, distribution, and exchange were all regulated by the universal system of law; once before economic life was considered within the scope of moral regulation. It cannot be denied that a study of the principles which were accepted during that period may be of great value to a generation which is striving to place its economic life once more upon an ethical foundation.

One error in particular we must be on our guard to avoid. We said above that both the socialists and the Christian economists are agreed in their desire to reintroduce justice into economic life. We must not conclude, however, that the aims of these two schools are identical.

One very frequently meets with the statement that the teachings of socialism are nothing more or less than the teachings of Christianity.

This contention is discussed in the following pages, where the conclusion will be reached that, far from being in agreement, socialism and Christian economics contradict each other on many fundamental points. It is, however, not the aim of the discussion to appraise the relative merits of either system, or to applaud one and disparage the other. All that it is sought to do is to distinguish between them; and to demonstrate that, whatever be the merits or demerits of the two philosophies, they are two, and not one.

SECTION 4.--DIVISION OF THE SUBJECT

The opinion is general that the distinctive doctrine of the mediaeval Church which permeated the whole of its economic thought was the doctrine of usury. The holders of this view may lay claim to very influential supporters among the students of the subject. Ashley says that 'the prohibition of usury was clearly the centre of the canonist doctrine.'[1] Roscher expresses the same opinion in practically the same words;[2] and Endemann sees the whole economic development of the Middle Ages and the Renaissance as the victorious destruction of the usury law by the exigencies of real life.[3] However impressed we may be by the opinions of such eminent authorities, we, nevertheless, cannot help feeling that on this point they are under a misconception.

There is no doubt that the doctrine of the canonists which impresses the modern mind most deeply is the usury prohibition, partly because it is not generally realised that the usury doctrine would not have forbidden the receipt of any of the commonest kinds of unearned revenue of the present day, and partly because the discussion of usury occupies such a very large part of the writings of the canonists. It may be quite true to say that the doctrine of usury was that which gave the greatest trouble to the mediaeval writers, on account of the nicety of the distinctions with which it abounded, and on account of the ingenuity of avaricious merchants, who continually sought to evade the usury laws by disguising illegal under the guise of legal transactions. In practice, therefore, the usury doctrine was undoubtedly the most prominent part of the canonist teaching, because it was the part which most tempted evasion; but to admit that is not to agree with the proposition that it was the centre of the canonist doctrine.

[Footnote: 1 _Op. cit._, vol. i. pt. ii. p. 399.]

[Footnote: 2 'Bekanntlich war das Wucherverbot der praktische Mittelpunkt der ganzen kanonischen Wirthschaftspolitik,' _Op. cit._, p. 8.]

[Footnote: 3 _Studien_, vol. i. p. 2 and _pa.s.sim_. At vol. ii. p. 31 it is stated that the teaching on just price is a corollary of the usury teaching. But Aquinas treats of usury in the article _following_ his treatment of just price.]

Our view is that the teaching on usury was simply one of the applications of the doctrine that all voluntary exchanges of property must be regulated by the precepts of commutative justice. In one sense it might be said to be a corollary of the doctrine of just price. This is apparently the suggestion of Dr. Cleary in his excellent book on usury: 'It seems to me that the so-called loan of money is really a sale, and that a loan of meal, wine, oil, gunpowder, and similar commodities--that is to say, commodities which are consumed in use--is also a sale. If this is so, as I believe it is, then loans of all these consumptible goods should be regulated by the principles which regulate sale contracts. A just price only may be taken, and the return must be truly equivalent.'[1] This statement of Dr. Cleary's seems well warranted, and finds support in the a.n.a.logy which was drawn between the legitimacy of interest--in the technical sense--and the legitimacy of a vendor's increasing the price of an article by reason of some special inconvenience which he would suffer by parting with it. Both these t.i.tles were justified on the same ground, namely, that they were in the nature of compensations, and arose independently of the main contract of loan or sale as the case might be. 'Le vendeur est en presence de l'acheteur. L'objet a pour lui une valeur particuliere: c'est un souvenir, par exemple. A-t-il le droit de majorer le prix de vente? de depa.s.ser le juste prix convenu? ... Avec l'unanimite des docteurs on peut trouver legitime la majoration du prix. L'evaluation commune distingue un double element dans l'objet: sa valeur ordinaire a laquelle repond le juste prix, et cette valeur extraordinaire qui appartient au vendeur, dont il se prive et qui merite une compensation: il le fait pour ainsi dire l'objet d'un second contrat qui se superpose au premier. Cela est si vrai que le supplement de prix n'est pas du au meme t.i.tre que le juste prix.'[2]

The importance of this a.n.a.logy will appear when we come to treat just price and usury in detail; it is simply referred to here in support of the proposition that, far from being a special doctrine _sui generis_, the usury doctrine of the Church was simply an application to the sale of consumptible things of the universal rules which applied to all sales. In other words, the doctrines of the just price and of usury were founded on the same fundamental precept of justice in exchange.

If we indicate what this precept was, we can claim to have indicated what was the true centre of the canonist doctrine.

[Footnote 1: _The Church and Usury_, p. 186.]

[Footnote 1: Desbuquois, 'La Justice dans l'Echange,' _Semaine Sociale de France_, 1911, p. 174.]

The scholastic teaching on the subject of the rules of justice in exchange was founded on the famous fifth book of Aristotle's _Ethics_, and is very clearly set forth by Aquinas. In the article of the _Summa_, where the question is discussed, 'Whether the mean is to be observed in the same way in distributive as in commutative justice?'

we find a clear exposition: 'In commutations something is delivered to an individual on account of something of his that has been received, as may be seen chiefly in selling and buying, where the notion of commutation is found primarily. Hence it is necessary to equalise thing with thing, so that the one person should pay back to the other just so much as he has become richer out of that which belonged to the other. The result of this will be equality according to the _arithmetical_ mean, which is gauged according to equal excess in quant.i.ty. Thus 5 is the mean between 6 and 4, since it exceeds the latter, and is exceeded by the former by 1. Accordingly, if at the start both persons have 5, and one of them receives 1 out of the other's belongings, the one that is the receiver will have 6, and the other will be left with 4: and so there will be justice if both are brought back to the mean, I being taken from him that has 6 and given to him that has 4, for then both will have 5, which is the mean.'[1]

In the following article the matter of each kind of justice is discussed. We are told that: 'Justice is about certain external operations, namely, distribution and commutation. These consist in the use of certain externals, whether things, persons, or even works: of things as when one man takes from or restores to another that which is his: of persons as when a man does an injury to the very person of another...: and of works as when a man justly enacts a work of another or does a work for him.... Commutative justice directs commutations that can take place between two persons. Of these some are involuntary, some voluntary.... Voluntary commutations are when a man voluntarily transfers his chattel to another person. And if he transfer it simply so that the recipient incurs no debt, as in the case of gifts, it is an act not of justice, but of liberality. A voluntary transfer belongs to justice in so far as it includes the notion of debt.' Aquinas then goes on to distinguish between the different kinds of contract, sale, usufruct, loan, letting and hiring, and deposit, and concludes, 'In all these actions the mean is taken in the same way according to the equality of repayment. Hence all these actions belong to the one species of justice, namely, commutative justice.'[2]

[Footnote 1: ii. ii. 61, 2.]

[Footnote 2: ii. ii. 61, 3. The reasoning of Aristotle is characteristically reinforced by the quotation of Matt. vii. 12; ii.

ii. 77,1.]

This is not the place to discuss the precise meaning of the equality upon which Aquinas insists, which will be more properly considered when we come to deal with the just price. What is to be noticed at present is that all the transactions which are properly comprised in a discussion of economic theory--sales, loans, etc.--are grouped together as being subject to the same regulative principle. It therefore appears more correct to approach the subject which we are attempting to treat by following that principle into its various applications, than by making one particular application of the principle the starting-point of the discussion.

It will be noticed, however, that the principles of commutative justice all treat of the commutations of external goods--in other words, they a.s.sume the existence of property of external goods in individuals. Commutations are but a result of private property; in a state of communism there could be no commutation. This is well pointed out by Gerson[1] and by Nider.[2] It consequently is important, before discussing exchange of owners.h.i.+p, to discuss the principle of owners.h.i.+p itself; or, in other words, to study the static before the dynamic state.[3]

[Footnote 1: _De Contractibus_, i. 4 'Inventa est autem commutatio civilis post peccatum quoniam status innocentias habuit omnia communia.']

[Footnote 2: _De Contractibus_, v. 1: 'Nunc videndum est breviter unde originaliter proveniat quod rerum dominia sunt distincta, sic quod hoc dicatur meum et illud tuum; quia illud est fundamentum omnis injust.i.tiae in contractando rem alienam, et post omnis injust.i.tia reddendo eam.']

[Footnote 3: See l'Abbe Desbuquois, _op. cit._, p. 168.]

We shall therefore deal in the first place with the right of private property, which we shall show to have been fully recognised by the mediaeval writers. We shall then point out the duties which this right entailed, and shall establish the position that the scholastic teaching was directed equally against modern socialistic principles and modern unregulated individualism. The next point with which we shall deal is the exchange of property between individuals, which is a necessary corollary of the right of property. We shall show that such exchanges were regulated by well-defined principles of commutative justice, which applied equally in the case of the sale of goods and in the case of the sale of the use of money. The last matter with which we shall deal is the machinery by which exchanges are conducted, namely, money. Many other subjects, such as slavery and the legitimacy of commerce, will be treated as they arise in the course of our treatment of these princ.i.p.al divisions.

In its ultimate a.n.a.lysis, the whole subject may be reduced to a cla.s.sification of the various duties which attached to the right of private property. The owner of property, as we shall see, was bound to observe certain duties in respect of its acquisition and its consumption, and certain other duties in respect of its exchange, whether it consisted of goods or of money. The whole fabric of mediaeval economics was based on the foundation of private property; and the elaborate and logical system of regulations to ensure justice in economic life would have had no purpose or no use if the subject matter of that justice were abolished.

It must not be understood that the mediaeval writers treated economic subjects in this order, or in any order at all. As we have already said, economic matters are simply referred to in connection with ethics, and were not detached and treated as making up a distinct body of teaching. Ashley says: 'The reader will guard himself against supposing that any mediaeval writer ever detached these ideas from the body of his teaching, and put them together as a modern text-book writer might do; or that they were ever presented in this particular order, and with the connecting argument definitely stated.'[1]

[Footnote 1: _Op. cit._, vol. i. pt. ii. p. 387.]

CHAPTER II

PROPERTY

SECTION 1.--THE RIGHT TO PROCURE AND DISPENSE PROPERTY

The teaching of the mediaeval Church on the subject of property was perfectly simple and clear. Aquinas devoted a section of the _Summa_ to it, and his opinion was accepted as final by all the later writers of the period, who usually repeat his very words. However, before coming to quote and explain Aquinas, it is necessary to deal with a difficulty that has occurred to several students of Christian economics, namely, that the teaching of the scholastics on the subject of property was in some way opposed to the teaching of the early Church and of Christ Himself. Thus Haney says: 'It is necessary to keep the ideas of Christianity and the Church separate, for few will deny that Christianity as a religion is quite distinct from the various inst.i.tutions or Churches which profess it....' And he goes on to point out that, whereas Christianity recommended community of property, the Church permitted private property and inequality.[1]

Strictly speaking, the reconciliation of the mediaeval teaching with that of the primitive Church might be said to be outside the scope of the present essay. In our opinion, however, it is important to insist upon the fundamental harmony of the teaching of the Church in the two periods, in the first place, because it is impossible to understand the later without an understanding of the earlier doctrine from which it developed, and secondly, because of the widespread prevalence, even among Catholics, of the erroneous idea that the scholastic teaching was opposed to the ethical principle laid down by the Founder of Christianity.

[Footnote 1: _Op. cit._, p. 73.]

Amongst the arguments which are advanced by socialists none is more often met than the alleged socialist teaching and practice of the early Christians. For instance, Cabet's _Voyage en Icarie_ contains the following pa.s.sage: 'Mais quand on s'enfonce serieus.e.m.e.nt et ardemment dans la question de savoir comment la societe pourrait etre organisee en Democratie, c'est-a-dire sur les bases de l'egalite et de la Fraternite, on arrive a reconnaitre que cette organisation exige et entraine necessairement la communaute de biens. Et nous hatons d'ajouter que cette communaute etait egalement proclamee par Jesus-Christ, par tous ses apotres et ses disciples, par tous les peres de l'eglise et tous les Chretiens des premiers siecles.' The fact that St. Thomas Aquinas, the great exponent of Catholic teaching in the Middle Ages, defends in unambiguous language the inst.i.tution of private property offers no difficulties to the socialist historian of Christianity. He replies simply that St. Thomas wrote in an age when the Church was the Church of the rich as well as of the poor; that it had to modify its doctrines to ease the consciences of its rich members; and that, ever since the conversion of Constantine, the primitive Christian teaching on property had been progressively corrupted by motives of expediency, until the time of the _Summa_, when it had ceased to resemble in any way the teaching of the Apostles.[1] We must therefore first of all demonstrate that there is no such contradiction between the teaching of the Apostles and that of the mediaeval Church on the subject of private property, but that, on the contrary, the necessity of private property was at all times recognised and insisted on by the Catholic Church. As it is put in an anonymous article in the _Dublin Review_: 'Among Christian nations we discover at a very early period a strong tendency towards a general and equitable distribution of wealth and property among the whole body politic. Grounded on an ever-increasing historical evidence, we might possibly affirm that the mediaeval Church brought her whole weight to bear incessantly upon this one singular and single point.'[2]

[Footnote 1: See, _e.g._, Nitti, _Catholic Socialism_, p. 71. 'Thus, then, according to Nitti, the Christian Church has been guilty of the meanest, most selfish, and most corrupt utilitarianism in her att.i.tude towards the question of wealth and property. She was communistic when she had nothing. She blessed poverty in order to fill her own coffers.

And when the coffers were full she took rank among the owners of land and houses, she became zealous in the interests of property, and proclaimed that its origin was divine' ('The Fathers of the Church and Socialism,' by Dr. Hogan, _Irish Ecclesiastical Record_, vol. xxv. p.

226).]

[Footnote 2: 'Christian Political Economy,' _Dublin Review_, N.S., vol. vi. p. 356]

The alleged communism of the first Christians is based on a few verses of the Acts of the Apostles describing the condition of the Church of Jerusalem. 'And they that believed were together and had all things common; And sold their possessions and goods, and parted them to all men, as every man had need.'[1] 'And the mult.i.tude of them that believed were of one heart and of one soul: neither said any of them that aught of the things which he possessed was his own; but they had all things common. Neither was there any amongst them that lacked: for as many as were possessors of land or houses sold them, and brought the price of the things that were sold, And laid them down at the apostles' feet: and distribution was made unto every man according as he had need.'[2]

[Footnote 1: ii. 44-45.]

[Footnote 2: iv. 32, 34, 35.]

It is by no means clear whether the state of things here depicted really amounted to communism in the strict sense. Several of the most enlightened students of the Bible have come to the conclusion that the verses quoted simply express in a striking way the great liberality and benevolence which prevailed among the Christian fraternity at Jerusalem. This view was strongly a.s.serted by Mosheim,[1] and is held by Dr. Carlyle. 'A more careful examination of the pa.s.sages in the Acts,' says the latter,[2] 'show clearly enough that this was no systematic division of property, but that the charitable instinct of the infant Church was so great that those who were in want were completely supported by those who were more prosperous.... Still there was no systematic communism, no theory of the necessity of it.' Colour is lent to this interpretation by the fact that similar words and phrases were used to emphasise the prevalence of charity and benevolence in later communities of Christians, amongst whom, as we know from other sources, the right of private property was fully admitted. Thus Tertullian wrote:[3] 'One in mind and soul, we do not hesitate to share our earthly goods with one another. All things are common among us but our wives.' This pa.s.sage, if it were taken alone, would be quite as strong and unambiguous as those from the Acts; but fortunately, a few lines higher up, Tertullian had described how the Church was supported, wherein he showed most clearly that private property was still recognised and practised: 'Though we have our treasure-chest, it is not made up of purchase-money, as of a religion that has its price. On the monthly collection day, if he likes, each puts in a small donation; but only if he has pleasure, and only if he be able; all is voluntary.' This point is well put by Bergier:[4]

'Towards the end of the first century St. Barnabas; in the second, St. Justin and St. Lucian; in the third, St. Clement of Alexandria, Tertullian, Origen, St. Cyprian; in the fourth, Arn.o.bius and Lactantius, say that among the Christians all goods are common; there was then certainly no question of a communism of goods taken in the strict sense.'

[Footnote 1: _Dissert. ad Hist. Eccles._, vol. ii. p. 1.]

[Footnote 2: 'The Political Theory of the Ante-Nicene Fathers,'