Page:Sarolea - Great Russia.djvu/183

ever. To lend money to the necessitous was a work of piety, hence the origin of the "Mont de Piété," or public gratuitous pawnshop, which even to-day still retains the spirit of the original institution, and which is peculiar to Roman Catholic countries. The Roman Catholic Church took the heroic and quixotic policy of branding all acceptance of interest as usury. It was a suicidal policy, for it paralyzed the trade of the Middle Ages. It proved an impossible policy, because the Catholic precept had to be constantly infringed, and it was violated even by Bishops and Popes. Popes were compelled to appeal to Jewish usurers in their financial need, as they were compelled to appeal to Jewish physicians in their physical need. Whole libraries of casuistical treatises were written trying to relax the original Catholic precept, and to reconcile it with the practical requirements of the day. The final result was that, first, the Jews and, later on, the Lombards and Cahorsins obtained the monopoly of European finance. The Mediæval Church reasoned with regard to the Jewish moneylender as the modern State reasons with regard to the prostitute. We are told that prostitution is an inevitable evil. Therefore some women must be set