Lapas attēli
PDF
ePub

statutes forbade shoemakers, tanners, and curriers to infringe on each other's province. The general tendency was to keep trades, and more especially the allied trades, separate, in order presumably to avoid the growth of "combines" and monopolies. For this reason fishmongers and fishermen were forbidden to enter into partnership in London, because the dealers, knowing the needs of the city, would be able to manipulate supplies and keep up prices.

How far the desire to restrict output was at the bottom of regulations forbidding the employment of more than a strictly limited number of apprentices and journeymen, and how far such prohibitions were inspired by fear of the monopolization of labor by capitalists it is difficult to say. Probably the dread of the capitalist was the chief incentive for such regulations, which are very numerous. The same principle of fair play between employers led to the ordaining of heavy penalties for taking away another man's servant, or employing any journeyman who had not fulfilled his engagement with his previous master, and to the strict prohibition of paying more than the fixed maximum wages. This last provision was sometimes got over by the master's wife giving his servants extra gratuities and gifts. So also the use of the cheap labor of women was as a rule regarded with disfavor. The fullers of Lincoln were forbidden to work with any woman who was not the wife or maid of a master, and the "bracers" or makers of braces, of London, in 1355, laid down "that no one shall be so daring as to set any woman to work in his trade, other than his wedded wife or his daughter." Of child labor we hear very little, one of the few notices being an order on the children's behalf made, suitably enough, by Richard Whittington, in 1398, that whereas some "hurlers" (makers of fur caps) send their apprentices and journeymen and children of tender age down to the Thames and other exposed places, amid horrible tempests, frosts, and snows, to scour caps, to the very great scandal of this city, this practice is to cease at once.

Too much attention must not be given to the quarrelsome side of the gilds, for they were essentially friendly societies for mutual assistance. One of the rules of the London leather-dressers was that if a member should have more work than he could complete and the work was in danger of being lost, the other members should help him. A still more essential feature of the gilds was their grant of assistance to members who had fallen ill or become impoverished through no fault of their own. Nor did their benevolence end with the poor craftsman's death, for they made an allowance to his widow and celebrated masses for the repose of his soul.

E. MEDIEVAL ECONOMIC THEORY

16. The Gospel of Stewardship1

BY SAINT THOMAS AQUINAS

Exterior goods have the character of things useful to an end. Hence human goodness in the matter of these goods must consist in the observance of a certain measure as is done by a man seeking to have exterior riches in so far as they are necessary to his life according to his rank and condition. And, therefore, sin consists in exceeding this measure, and trying to acquire or retain riches beyond the due limit.

Covetousness may involve immoderation in two ways: in one way immediately as to the receiving or keeping of them, when one acquires or keeps beyond the due amount; and in this respect it is directly a sin against one's neighbor, because in exterior riches one cannot have superabundance without another being in want, since temporal goods cannot be simultaneously possessed by many. The other way is in interior affections, in immoderate love, or desire of, or delight in, riches. In this way it is a sin of man against himself by the disordering of his affection. It is also a sin against God by the despising of eternal good for temporal.

The Philosopher says: "It belongs to the magnanimous man to want nothing or hardly anything." This, however, must be understood in human measure, for it is beyond the condition of man to have no wants at all. For every man needs first of all the divine assistance, and secondly also human assistance, for man is naturally a social animal, not being self-sufficient for the purposes of life.

Magnanimity regards two objects, honor as its matter, and some good deed in view as its end. Goods of fortune co-operate to both these objects. For honor is paid to the virtuous, not by the wise only, but by the multitude. Now the multitude make most account of the external goods of fortune; consequently greatest honor is paid by them to those who have these things. In like manner goods of fortune serve as instruments to acts of virtue, because by riches there is opportunity for action. Clearly the goods of fortune contribute to magnanimity. Virtue is said to be self-sufficient, because it can exist even without these external goods; nevertheless, it needs these external goods to have more of a free hand in its working.

"Adapted from Summa Theologica, Quaest, CXVIII; LXXIX, art. 1, vi et viii (1265-1274).

Solicitude for temporal things is unlawful if we seek temporal things as our final goal. Temporal things are subject to man that he may use them for his necessity, not that he may set up his rest in them, or be idly solicitous about them.

17. The Usurer's Fate15

BY CAESARIUS OF HEISTERBACH

In the days when Oliver was Master of Schools at Cologne (as I was told by Brother Bernhard, who was then Oliver's colleague and fellow-preacher), there was a certain peasant named Gottschalk who busied himself with usury. As he slept one night beside his wife, he heard as it were the sound of a mill-wheel turning in his own mill; whereupon he cried for his servant, saying, "Who hath let the mill-wheel loose? Go and see who is there." The servant went and came back, for he was too sore afraid to go farther. "Who is there?" cried the master. "Such horror fell upon me at the milldoor," answered the fellow, "that I must perforce turn back.” "Well!" cried he, "even though it be the devil, I will go and see." So, naked as he was, but for a cloak which he threw over his shoulders, he opened the mill-door and looked in, when a sight of horror met his eyes. There stood t .vo coal-black horses, and by their side an illfavored man as black as they, who cried, "Quick! mount the horse, for he is brought for thee." When, pale and trembling, he hesitated to obey, the devil cried again, "Why tarriest thou? Cast aside thy cloak and come." No longer able to resist, he cast off his cloak, entered the mill, and mounted the horse-or rather the devil. The Fiend himself mounted another; and, side by side, they swept in breathless haste from one place of torture to another, wherein the wretched man saw his father and mother in miserable torments. There also he saw a certain knight lately died seated on a mad cow with his face toward her tail and his back to her horns; the beast rushed to and fro, goring his back every moment so that the blood gushed out. To him the usurer said, "Why suffer you this pain?" "This cow," replied the knight, "I tore mercilessly from a certain widow; wherefore, I must now endure this merciless punishment." Moreover, there he was shown a burning fiery chair, wherein could be no rest, but torment and interminable pain to him who sat there. And it was said, "Now shalt thou return to thy own house, and thou shalt have thy reward in this chair." The Fiend brought him back and laid him in the mill, half-dead. Here he was found by his wife Adapted from Dialogus Miraculorum, I, 70. Translation in Coulton A Mediaeval Garner, 212-215 (About 1250).

15

and family, who brought him to bed, and asked where he had been. "I have been to hell," he answered, "where I saw such and such tortures." The priest was called, who warned him to repent of his sins, saying that none should despair of God's mercy. He answered, “I cannot confess. My seat is made ready; after the third day I must come thither, and there must I receive the reward of my deeds." And thus unrepentant, unconfessed, and unanointed he died on the third day and found his grave in hell. It is scarce three years since these things came to pass. .

18. Usury Versus the Boycott16

If any of those who are setting out are bound by oath to pay interest, we command that their creditors shall be compelled by the same means to release them from their oaths and to desist from the exaction of interest. But if any creditor shall compel them to pay interest, we order that he shall be forced, by a similar punishment, to pay it back.

We command, however, that the Jews shall be compelled by the secular power to remit interest. Until they remit it, all faithful Christians shall, under penalty of excommunication, refrain from every species of intercourse with them. For those, moreover, who are unable at present to pay their debts to the Jews, the secular princes shall provide by a useful delay, so that after they begin their journey they shall suffer no inconvenience from interest. The Jews shall be compelled, after deducting the necessary expenses, to count the income which they receive in the meanwhile from the mortgaged property toward the payment of the principal; since a favor of this kind, which defers the payment and does not cancel the obligation, does not seem to cause great loss.

19. The Characteristics of Mercantilist Doctrine1

BY JOHN KELLS INGRAM

The Mercantile doctrine, stated in its most extreme form, makes wealth and money identical, and regards it therefore as the great object of the community so to conduct its dealings with other nations as to attract to itself the largest possible share of the precious. metals. Each country must seek to export the utmost possible quantity of its own manufactures, and to import as little as possible of

10 Adapted from Mansi, Conciliorum collectio, XXXII, 1057. This is an enumeration of the privileges granted the Crusaders by Innocent III (1215). "Adapted from A History of Political Economy, 37-40 (1887).

those of other countries, receiving the difference of the two values in gold and silver. This difference is called the balance of trade, and the balance is favorable when more money is received than is paid. Governments must resort to all available expedients for the purpose of securing such a balance.

But this statement of the doctrine does not represent correctly. the views of all belonging to the Mercantilist school. Many of that school were much too clear-sighted to entertain the belief that wealth consists exclusively in gold and silver.. The mercantilists may be best described by a set of theoretical tendencies, commonly found in combination, though severally prevailing in different degrees in different minds. These may be enumerated as follows:-(1) Towards over-estimating the importance of possessing a large amount of the precious metals; (2) towards an undue exaltation (a) of foreign trade over domestic, and (b) of the industry which works up materials over the industry which provides them; (3) towards attaching too high a value to a dense population as an element of national strength; and, (4) towards invoking the action of the state in furthering artificially the attainment of the several ends thus proposed.

If we consider the contemporary position of Western Europe, we shall have no difficulty in understanding how these tendencies would arise. The discoveries in the New World had led to a large development of the European currencies. A new "money economy" had arisen. The mercantilists saw that money was in universal demand, and that it put in the hands of its possessor the power of acquiring all other commodities. The period, again, was marked by the formation of great states, with powerful Governments at their head. These Governments required men and money for the maintenance of permanent armies and for court expenses. Taxation grew with the demands of the monarchies. Statesmen saw that for their own political ends industry must flourish. But manufactures, because they made possible a denser population and a larger total volume of exports than agriculture, became the object of special Governmental favor and patronage. The growth of manufactures reacted on commerce, to which a new and mighty arena had been opened by the establishment of colonies. The aim of statesmen was to make the colonial trade a new source of public revenue. Working for their own power, the nations entered into a competitive struggle in the economic field.

A national economic interest came to exist, of which the Government made itself the representative head. States became a sort of artificial hothouses for the rearing of urban industries.

« iepriekšējāTurpināt »