interest;
and that, if this interpretation is correct, the recommendation is
not a precept, but a counsel.[3] Aquinas thought that the verse was a
counsel as to the repayment of the principal, but a precept as to the
payment of interest, and this opinion is probably correct.[4] With the
exception of this verse, there is not a single passage in the Gospels
which prohibits the taking of usury.

[Footnote 1: Luke vi. 35.]

[Footnote 2: Cleary, _op. cit._, p. 33, following Knabenbaur.]

[Footnote 3: Cleary, _op. cit._, p. 34.]

[Footnote 4: _Ibid._, p. 35.]

We must now give some account of the teaching on usury which was laid
down by the Fathers and early councils of the Church; but at the same
time we shall not attempt to treat this in an exhaustive way, because,
although the early Christian teaching is of interest in itself,
it exercised little or no influence upon the great philosophical
treatment of the same subject by Aquinas and his followers, which is
the principal subject to be discussed in these pages. The first thing
we must remark is that the prohibition of usury was not included by
the Council of Jerusalem amongst the 'necessary things' imposed upon
converts from the Gentiles.[1] This would seem to show that the taking
of usury was not regarded as unlawful by the Apostles, who were at
pains expressly to forbid the commission of offences, the evil of
which must have appeared plainly from the natural law--for instance,
fornication. The _Didache_, which was used as a book of catechetical
instruction for catechumens, does not specifically mention usury; the
forcing of the repayment of loans from the poor who are unable to pay
is strongly reprobated; but this is not so in the case of the rich.[2]
Clement of Alexandria expressly limits his disapprobation of usury to
the case of loans between brothers, whom he defines as 'participators
in the same word,' _i.e._ fellow-Christians; and in any event it
is clear that he regards it as sin against charity, but not against
justice.[3]

[Footnote 1: Acts xv. 29.]

[Footnote 2: _Didache_, ch. i.; Cleary, _op. cit._, p. 39.]

[Footnote 3: _Stromata_, ii. 18.]

Tertullian is one of the first of the Fathers to lay down positively
that the taking of usury is sinful. He regards it as obviously wrong
for Christians to exact usury on their loans, and interprets the
passage of St. Luke, to which we have referred, as a precept against
looking for even the repayment of the