752 THE MIDDLE AGES. A.D. 1294-1517.
again, usury was practised by_„ Christians as well as by Jews. All the greater Schoolmen of the 13th century had discussed the subject of usury and pronounced it sin, on the ground of Luke 6 : 84, and other texts. They held that charges of interest offended against the law of love to our neighbor and the law of natural fairness, for money does not increase with use but rather is reduced in weight and value. It is a species of greed which is mortal sin.^ It was so treated by medifeval councils when practised by Christians and the contrary opinion was pronounced heretical by the oecumenical council of Vienne. Geiler of Strassburg expounded the official church view when he pronounced usury always wicked. It was wrong for a Christian to take back more than the original principal. And the substitution of a pig or some other gift in place of a money payment he also denounced.
The rates of the Jews were exorbitant. In Florence, they were 20 % in 1430 and, in 1488, 32 1 %.2 In Northern Europe they were much higher, from 43|- to 80 or even 100 %. Municipalities borrowed. Clerics, convents and churches mortgaged their sacred vessels. City after city in Germany and Switzerland expelled the Jews, — from Spires and Zurich, 1435, to Geneva, 1490, and Niirnberg, Ulm and Nordlingen, 1498-1500. The careers of the great banking-houses in the second half of the fifteenth century show the extensive demand for loans by popes and prelates, as well as secular princes.
To afford relief to the needy, whose necessities forced them to borrow, a measure of real philanthropy was conceived in the last century of the Middle Ages, the monies pietatis^ or charitable accuraulations.^ They were benevolent loaning fundj. The idea found widespread acceptance in Italy, where the first institutions were founded at Perugia, 1462, and Or-
1 Thos. Aquinas : Summa, II. 2, q. 78.
2 Pastor : Gesch. d. Pdpste, III. 83 sq. For Germany, see Janssen, 1.460 sqq. ^ Other names given to them were monies Christi, monte della carita, mare
di pieta. See Holzapfel, pp. 18, 20, for funds to provide for burial, monies mortuorum, made up from contributions, and funds to which mothere contributed at the birth of children, called inontes dotis. Holzapfel gives the primary authorities on the benevolent loaning funds, pp. 3-14.
§ 79. WORKS OF CHARITY. 753
vieto, 1463. City councils aided such funds by contributions, as at Perugia, when it gave 3,000 gulden. But in this case, finding itself unable to furnish the full amount, it mulcted the Jews for 1,200 gulden, Pius II. giving his sanction to the constraint. In cases, bishops furnished the capital, as at Pistoja, 1473, where Bishop Donato de' Medici gave 3,000 gulden. At Lucca, a merchant, who had grown rich through commercial affiliation with the Jews, donated the princely capital of 40,000 gold gulden. At Gubbio, a law taxed all inheritances one per cent in favor of the local fund, and neglect to pay was punished with an additional tax of one per cent.
The popes showed a warm interest in the new benevolence by granting to particular funds their sanction and offering indulgences to contributors^ From 1463 to 1515 we have records of 16 papal authorizations from such popes as Pius II., Sixtus IV., Innocent VIII., Alexander VI., Julius II. and Leo X. The sanction of Innocent VIII., given to the Mantua fund, 1486, called upon the preachers to summon the people to support the fund, promised 10 years full indulgence to donors, and excommunicated all who opposed the project. Sixtus IV., in commending the fund for his native town of Savona, 1479, pronounced its worthy object to be to aid not only the poor but also the rich who had pawned their goods. He offered a plenary indulgence on the collection of every 100 gulden. In 1490, the Savona fund had 22,000 gulden and the limit of loans was raised to 100 ducats.^
The administration of these bureaus of relief was in the hands of directors, usually a mixed body of clergymen and laymen, and often appointed by municipal councils. The accounts were balanced each month. In Perugia, the rate, which was 12 % in 1463, was reduced to 8 % a year later. In Milan it was reduced from 10% to 5%, in 1488. Five per cent was the appointed rate fixed at Padua, Vicenza and Pisa, and 4 % at Florence. The loans were made upon the basis of property put in pawn. The benevolent efficacy of these funds cannot be questioned and to them, in part, is due the
1 Holzapfel, pp. 10-12, 44, 64, 70. 3c