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treatises as those of Marcian Capella; but economics had no share in the heritage of the past. Not only had the writings of the ancients, who dealt to some extent with the theory of wealth, been destroyed, but the very traces of their teaching had been long forgotten. A good example of the state of thought in economic matters is furnished by the treatment which money receives in the Etymologies of Isidore of Seville, which was regarded in the early Middle Ages as a reliable encyclopædia. 'Money,' according to Isidore, 'is so called because it warns, monet, lest any fraud should enter into its composition or its weight. The piece of money is the coin of gold, silver, or bronze, which is called nomisma, because it bears the imprint of the name and likeness of the prince. … The pieces of money nummi have been so called from the King of Rome, Numa, who was the first among the Latins to mark them with the imprint of his image and name.'[1] Is it any wonder that the early Middle Ages were barren of economic doctrines, when this was the best instruction to which they had access?

      [Footnote 1: Etymol. xvi. 17.]

      In the course of the thirteenth century a great change occurred. The advance of civilisation, the increased organisation of feudalism, the development of industry, and the extension of commerce, largely under the influence of the Crusades, all created a condition of affairs in which economic questions could no longer be overlooked or neglected. At the same time the renewed study of the writings of Aristotle served to throw a flood of new light on the nature of wealth.

      The Ethics and Politics of Aristotle, although they are not principally devoted to a treatment of the theory of wealth, do in fact deal with that subject incidentally. Two points in particular are touched on, the utility of money and the injustice of usury. The passages of the philosopher dealing with these subjects are of particular interest, as they may be said, with a good deal of truth, to be the true starting point of mediæval economics.[1] The writings of Aristotle arrested the attention, and aroused the admiration of the theologians of the thirteenth century; and it would be quite impossible to exaggerate the influence which they exercised on the later development of mediæval thought. Albertus Magnus digested, interpreted, and systematised the whole of the works of the Stagyrite; and was so steeped in the lessons of his philosophic master as to be dubbed by some 'the ape of Aristotle.' Aquinas, who was a pupil of Albertus, also studied and commented on Aristotle, whose aid he was always ready to invoke in the solution of all his difficulties. With the single and strange exception of Vincent de Beauvais, Aristotle's teaching on money was accepted by all the writers of the thirteenth century, and was followed by later generations.[2] The influence of Aristotle is apparent in every article of the Summa, which was itself the starting point from which all discussion sprang for the following two centuries; and it is not too much to say that the Stagyrite had a decisive influence on the introduction of economic notions into the controversies of the Schools. 'We find in the writings of St. Thomas Aquinas,' says Ingram, 'the economic doctrines of Aristotle reproduced with a partial infusion of Christian elements.'[3]

      [Footnote 1: Jourdain, op. cit., p. 7.]

      [Footnote 2: Ibid., p. 12.]

      [Footnote 3: Op. cit., p. 27. Espinas thinks that the influence of Aristotle in this respect has been exaggerated. (Histoire des Doctrines Économiques, p. 80.)]

      In support of the account we have given of the development of economic thought in the thirteenth century, we may quote Cossa: 'The revival of economic studies in the Middle Ages only dates from the thirteenth century. It was due in a great measure to a study of the Ethics and Politics of Aristotle, whose theories on wealth were paraphrased by a considerable number of commentators. Before that period we can only find moral and religious dissertations on such topics as the proper use of material goods, the dangers of luxury, and undue desire for wealth. This is easily explained when we take into consideration (1) the prevalent influence of religious ideas at the time, (2) the strong reaction against the materialism of pagan antiquity, (3) the predominance of natural economy, (4) the small importance of international trade, and (5) the decay of the profane sciences, and the metaphysical tendencies of the more solid thinkers of the Middle Ages.'[1]

      [Footnote 1: Op. cit., p. 14; Espinas, op. cit., p. 80.]

      The teaching of Aquinas upon economic affairs remained the groundwork of all the later writers until the end of the fifteenth century. His opinions on various points were amplified and explained by later authors in more detail than he himself employed; monographs of considerable length were devoted to the treatment of questions which he dismissed in a single article; but the development which took place was essentially one of amplification rather than opposition. The monographists of the later fifteenth century treat usury and sale in considerable detail; many refinements are indicated which are not to be found in the Summa; but it is quite safe to say that none of these later writers ever pretended to supersede the teaching of Aquinas, who was always admitted to be the ultimate authority. 'During the fourteenth and fifteenth centuries, the general political doctrine of Aquinas was maintained with merely subordinate modifications.'[1] 'The canonist doctrine of the fifteenth century,' according to Sir William Ashley, 'was but a development of the principles to which the Church had already given its sanction in earlier centuries. It was the outcome of these same principles working in a modified environment. But it may more fairly be said to present a system of economic thought, because it was no longer a collection of unrelated opinions, but a connected whole. The tendency towards a separate department of study is shown by the ever-increasing space devoted to the discussion of general economic topics in general theological treatises, and more notably still in the manuals of casuistry for the use of the confessional, and handbooks of canon law for the use of ecclesiastical lawyers. It was shown even more distinctly by the appearance of a shoal of special treatises on such subjects as contracts, exchange, and money, not to mention those on usury.'[2] In all this development, however, the principles enunciated by Aquinas, and through him, by Aristotle, though they may have been illustrated and applied to new instances, were never rejected. The study of the writers of this period is therefore the study of an organic whole, the germ of which is to be found in the writings of Aquinas.[3]

      [Footnote 1: Ingram, op. cit., p. 35.]

      [Footnote 2: Op. cit., vol. i. pt. ii. p. 382.]

      [Footnote 3: The volume of literature which bears more or less on economic matters dating from the fourteenth and fifteenth centuries is colossal. By far the best account of it is to be found in Endemann's Studien in der Romanisch-canonistischen Wirthschafts- und Rechtslehre, vol. i. pp. 25 et seq. Many of the more important works written during the period are reprinted in the Tractatus Universi Juris, vols. vi. and vii. The appendix to the first chapter of Reseller's Geschichte also contains a valuable account of certain typical writers, especially of Langenstein and Henricus de Hoyta. Brants gives a useful bibliographical list of both mediæval and modern authorities in the second chapter of his Théories économiques aux xiii^{e} et xiv^{e} siècles. Those who desire further information about any particular writer of the period will find it in Stintzing, Literaturgeschichte des röm. Rechts, or in Chevallier's Répertoire historique des Sources du moyen âge; Bio-bibliographie. The authorship of the treatise De Regimine Principum, from which we shall frequently quote, often attributed to Aquinas, is very doubtful. The most probable opinion is that the first book and the first three chapters of the second are by Aquinas, and the remainder by another writer. (See Franck, Réformateurs et Publicistes, vol. i. p. 83.)]

      § 3. Teaching.

      We shall confine our attention in this essay to the economic teaching of the Middle Ages, and shall not deal with the actual practice of the period. It may be objected that a study of the former without a study of the latter is futile and useless; that the economic teaching of a period can only be satisfactorily learnt from a study of its actual economic institutions and customs; and that the scholastic teaching was nothing but a casuistical attempt to reconcile the early Christian dogmas with the ever-widening exigencies of real life. Endemann, for instance, devotes a great part of his invaluable books on the subject to demonstrating how impracticable the canonist teaching was when it was applied to real life, and recounting the casuistical devices that were resorted to in order to reconcile the teaching of the Church with

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