altogether ignorant whether any one who continues in it is subject to the law concerning that winch is public.
M. In vain did I think to satisfy thee with short answers and commonplaces, since from such thou dost elicit a question, the explanation of which has hitherto been hidden from some of the skilled. But what thou sayest: "from thy words the condition of the clergy and of laymen who are thus delinquent seems to be unequal, when they are equal in crime," I do not approve of; for, as in their grades, so do they differ in their guilt; according to that saying: "the loftier the grade, the more grave the fall." Likewise, also, as it has seemed to some, they are unequal in good and meritorious works, for laymen, who are less bound by the restraint of a vow, seem to merit ampler grace; just as, in perverse acts, those who are under a vow of religion offend more gravely. But so much for these matters. Thou hast, indeed, from what precedes, a means of answering the first part of thy question. For inasmuch as a clerk practising usury deserves to lose the privilege of his dignity, he merits for himself a like punishment with a layman who is thus delinquent, namely, that, when he himself dies, all his movable goods are due to the fisc. In fact we have heard from prudent persons that it is so. Against a clerk or a lay Christian thus delinquent, the royal power has no claim so long as they are alive, for there remains time for repentance; but he is the rather reserved for an ecclesiastical tribunal, to be condemned according to the quality of his rank. When, moreover, he shall have fulfilled the decree of fate, all his goods, the church having no claim on them, go to the king: unless, as has been said, while life remained he have worthily repented and, his will being made, he have entirely alienated from himself what he shall have decided to will away. It remains now for us to explain what we call public usury, and what not public; then, whether those who err in either are within the scope of the same law. We call it, therefore, public and common usury when, after the manner of the Jews, one is about to receive in kind, by convention, more than one has lent,—as a pound for a mark, or, for a pound of silver two pence a week of gain, besides the principal:—not public, indeed, but none the less to be condemned, when one receives any
