II. USURY AND THE SOUTHERN SPIRIT OF CAPITALISM

The above quotation by Luigi Chiappelli is a good starting point for introducing the debate on usury. Throughout history, all merchants have known perfectly well that money-lenders did not work for free. So did the Church and the theologians, but they forbade the interest of money and imposed the free granting of credit. Money was in fact a commodity, and the price to be paid for it was called “interest,” which was generally accepted by all merchants and civil laws, especially if it was not excessive. However, canonical and ecclesiastical law prohibited usury, mainly because of the prohibition in the Bible, both in the Old Testament (e.g., Exodus 22:24) and the New Testament (Luke 6:35),Footnote ⁹ but also on the basis of an Aristotelian tradition (in Politics): “Following Aristotle’s statement that ‘money was intended to be used in exchange’ scholastic doctors held that the telos of money was to overcome the inconveniences of barter and to be a means of exchange” (Monsalve Reference Monsalve2014, p. 223).Footnote ¹⁰ Despite religious prohibitions, however, many Catholic moneylenders went on to brilliant political careers,Footnote ¹¹ in a European finance that was largely in Christian hands. Moneylenders were an essential part of the medieval civic and economic landscape. The bank was generally established by concession of the municipality—i.e., with a public contract between the city and the “usurer,” who had to have the reputation of a “public usurer.” They were Christians and Jews, easily recognizable by their feast and the carpet on which they sat in their tent, which was clearly visible in the central streets of the new commercial main cities of Europe.Footnote ¹² If, in fact, a merchant also had the function of a banker, this second moneylender activity was considered ancillary to the mercantile one. Its presence in the cities was the reason for the Jews’ bad reputation as usurai or strozzini, considered usurious lenders who took advantage of the common people. Interestingly, however, it was often the wealthy Christian merchant bankers (not the poor) who wanted to drive out the Jewish “usurers,” their competitors, and the people knew this and reacted against such moves.Footnote ¹³ Moreover, Jewish bankers were usually small agents, and they played an important role in the Italian cities of the late Middle Ages, where money was scarce and the new merchants were the emerging bourgeoisie, with little capital and in need of credit.Footnote ¹⁴ More generally, as Francesca Trivellato has shown, “in recent decades scholars have demonstrated that moneylending was not the predominant, let alone exclusive, economic activity in which Jews were involved in medieval France, and that where it existed, Jewish moneylending could unite Christians and Jews as much as it could set them against each other” (Trivellato Reference Trivellato2019, p. 76).Footnote ¹⁵ Not only in France;Footnote ¹⁶ from the early Trecento, Lombard became synonymous with moneylender, and Lombards were Christians. Interest was also paid on public debt in Christian cities, and the Bank of Genoa (Banco di San Giorgio) lent money at interest in the 1400s.Footnote ¹⁷

In the Italian city of Ascoli Piceno, for example, in 1297 the free community had signed a contract—condotta—allowing a company made up of Jews and Christians to operate as a moneylender:

The loan was clearly supplied at interest: “From the 1297 document on the società feneratizia between Jews and Tuscans, it appears that the loan on pledge was practiced at the rate of 20%.… Unredeemed pledges were auctioned off after one month, and whatever remained after the loan and interest were paid was to be returned to the debtor.”Footnote ²⁰ The Catholic Church watched these financial transactions, perhaps wrote a few documents against usury, and then let it go, partly because bishops and popes were the main beneficiaries of loans from Jewish and mainly Christian banks (especially the Chigi Senese family), and because, contrary to what they wrote, they knew very well that money was a commodity that no one would sell without payment of the appropriate price.Footnote ²¹

The Franciscan thinkers (for example, Peter John Olivi, Angelo Clareno, and Alexander Bonini) understood that trade was healthy for the whole city, including its poorest citizens. And if a merchant was able to lend money to other merchants, local or foreign, there was good reason to charge interest on this loan as the lucrum cessans, a category well known in ancient Roman civil and commercial law (lex mercatoria), known today as “opportunity cost.”Footnote ²² Therefore, this kind of interest was potentially morally good, provided that the interest rate was just and the lender was a merchant and thus the alternative use of money was effective and productive. Moreover, a second justification for interest was given by the Latin canonists as damnum emergens, that is, as compensation for the possible damage resulting from the total or partial non-payment of the risky loan. Thus, what had always seemed to the theologians (who were far removed from commercial life) to be usury was, in fact, just compensation for taking risks, for uncertainty, for inflation, for the volatility of the markets, and for giving up an alternative concrete business opportunity.Footnote ²³ All businessmen knew that, even theologians knew, but in the age of Catholic Controriforma when they wrote their manuals on moral theology or handbook for confessors (manuali per confessori), they almost always forgot reality and denied interest rate on money lending.

In the long Controriforma era,Footnote ²⁴ the proliferation in Catholic countries of conscientious controls and casuistry of economic and financial sins gave rise to phenomena that were all very relevant and, to my knowledge, not always analyzed carefully enough. The merchants, almost all of whom were Christians and even devout, continued to give alms to the Church to finance new churches, processions, patron saint days, and their fireworks. They confessed perhaps once a year (they, too, were afraid of Hell), but in the confessional they told the priest only what they could and wanted to say.Footnote ²⁵ Penitents thus had a strong incentive not to tell the truth to their confessors, not least because the confessional was the last effective offshoot of the Inquisition. Businessmen largely remained within the confines of the Church, but they sent their mothers, sisters, wives, and daughters to religious practice, confession, frequent communion, and worship.Footnote ²⁶ It was born in these long centuries, among the people and the priests, the idea, which soon became conviction, of the impossibility of respecting all the complex and infinite rules and legal norms of economic and social life. One therefore lived and worked in an ordinary state of imperfection and half-truths, of public principles and different private norms; one always felt at fault and indebted to the Church and God, and one asked for consolation and mercy, but then it was the same Church and the same religion of mercy that closed the system.

For not only did sinners always feel in a state of guilt and (if seen) shame; also the Catholic Church itself and its representatives were aware of the practical impossibility of implementing those control mechanisms. In fact, a double failure occurred. On the side of offering absolution, priests were not sufficiently prepared, especially in economic and financial matters, to be able to identify the various sins and then apply the corresponding punishment for each fault.Footnote ²⁷ On the demand side—i.e., that of the people—the faults confessed were never all the perceived faults.Footnote ²⁸ A necessary and structural debt of guilt was thus created, only a small part of which was redeemable on Earth; the rest was transferred to Purgatory. The part of the debt that was redeemable was managed by the Church itself with many instruments—ordinary and extraordinary plenary indulgences, jubilees, holy years, vows, pardons, and pilgrimages that cancelled unconfessed sins: “Me said that when you go before your confessor, you should only say what you want them to know and that you should then wait for a Jubilee because then sins are forgiven.”Footnote ²⁹ It is impossible to understand the current economic culture and ethics in Catholic Latin countries (certainly in Italy) without taking into account this interaction between religion and the economy.

III. DELL’IMPIEGO DEL DENARO

In 1744 Scipione Maffei wrote his treatise Dell’impiego del denaro,Footnote ³⁰ where, on the basis of Scripture, Roman and Greek philosophers, the Father of the Church, theologians, and Christian moral doctrine, he vindicated the legitimacy of a modest rate of interest on money—the adjective modest or moderate was the milestone of his rhetorical strategy. Maffei wrote his treatise after his long journey through northern Europe, where he witnessed first-hand the significant impact of a more liberal approach to usury. During the Middle Ages and the early modern period, German peoples upheld the principle that work is the source of property and that it must be regulated by principles of social morality. Without taking Roman law into account, they indirectly and unknowingly opposed its triumphant spread in northern countries—that is, the reception of Roman law in German territories. They did not recognize the unlimited extension of property rights in the Latin principle of individual freedom of interest, thus forming an unconscious reaction against the spread of Roman law in Germany. They therefore represented the conservative spirit of canon law, a centuries-old tradition among the Germans, and acted as a counter-current to the rapid spread of classical law.Footnote ³¹

Maffei traces the entire Christian and civil legal tradition to show that there are no real reasons, either theological or juridical, for declaring any rate of interest on money unlawful but only unjust, immoderate, excessively high rates. But as a general rule, the payment of interest on money is, to Maffei, not only lawful but necessary in order to modernize the economies of Catholic countries and bring them into line with those of Protestant countries. He also followed the Jansenist Nicolaus Broedersen (Leyden, Reference Broedersen1743), who wrote in Latin De usuris licitis et illicitis,Footnote ³² where he states that although the spirit of charity forbids usury to the detriment of the poor, it is neither a sin against charity nor a sin against justice to lend to the rich at a rate of interest fixed by law and custom. Maffei discovered Broedersen’s book in 1744 when Dell’impiego was already written, and he summarized the book in the Appendix of his treatise:

In fact, already in the introduction we find Maffei’s main thesis: “When it is a matter of yours and mine, it is not a matter of arcane, sublime and mysterious things…. [I]t is a matter of human affairs, and belongs to the commutative justice, about which we have not been told by the Lord any commandment that transcends the understanding, that is, that departs from our reasoning.” He then goes on to explain the theoretical vision that underpins all his reasoning, namely the golden law of “mutual advantage,” which is also the main tenet of Genovesi’s civil economy: “This is an honest and just contract, in which there is no injury, and from which one or the other of the contracting parties does not suffer but benefits…. How sinful can a contract be that does not harm either party, but on the contrary is beneficial to one and the other?” And then he becomes even more explicit and clear: “Joyful for the giver, because it is better to reap a meagre fruit of his money than to leave it idle: much more joyful for the receiver, because by willingly paying three, four or five per cent, benefit and profit are derived from it, and he discovers much more, whence he gives hearty thanks to him who gives the sum on such a condition. This consideration is in such a way most relevant” (Maffei Reference Maffei1744, pp. xiii–xiv).Footnote ³⁴ And in a private letter to the Venetian mathematician Giovanni Poleni, he wrote: “I am sending you a pamphlet that contradicts all those monks and priests who, with miraculous moral will, write that it is a sin to do good to one’s neighbour.”Footnote ³⁵

The treatise then examines the Scriptures in turn (first volume), with the intention of showing “that all the authorities of Scripture speak of the devouring of usuries [usure divoratrici] and of the imposition on the poor” (Maffei Reference Maffei1744, Tavola dei capitoli, p. xi). Most interestingly, he examines the Hebrew (Masoretic) text of the Bible, as well as the Greek, Syriac, Samaritan, and Arabic versions, and the Chaldean Targum, to show that the Old Testament does not condemn interest on money in general but only devouring usury, i.e., excessive interest rates (Maffei Reference Maffei1744, Tavola dei capitoli, pp. 32–37). The second volume then discusses the teaching on usury of the Fathers and Doctors of the Church, and then the third volume of the book discusses and compares the various theological arguments, pros and cons.

In order to write the book on such a complex and highly controversial subject, Maffei began to study seriously not only the history of theology and the medieval debates on the subject but also the Old and New Testaments, and thus biblical exegesis and theology: “It has occurred to me at the beginning of this treatise to make some use of the Hebrew letters, in which just last year, which is as much as to say in the sixty-eighth year of my age, by certain study again undertaken was Scripture (and I can now say almost by certain foreboding), I procured to inoltrate myself, not having before had but a very slight tincture of it” (Maffei Reference Maffei1744, Tavola dei capitoli, p. xx), Indeed, his detractors accused him of being an amateur when it came to theological and biblical matters—and they were wrong. It is enough to read the book to understand this, although the fact cannot be excluded that Maffei consulted a specialist for the most technical parts of his work.Footnote ³⁶

His exegesis of the Gospel of Luke 6:34 is important: “Lend without expecting anything in return” (nihil sperantes, in Latin). At the end of his lengthy study, Maffei asserts that this phrase in Luke is “a saying that means something quite different, that of something else, and … it really does not refer to the controversy [about usury]” (Maffei Reference Maffei1744, pp. 37–38). He then adds: ”How can anyone believe that if the Saviour had meant ’without demanding fruit’ he would have said nihil sperantes [nothing hoping/expecting]? Everyone sees that he would have said nihil exigentes [demanding nothing] or nihil lucrantes [gaining nothing], not nihil sperantes“ (Maffei Reference Maffei1744, p. 41), And here’s his key point:

Then, ironically, he concludes: “What a beautiful order would be introduced into civil life!” (Maffei Reference Maffei1744, p. 42).

Maffei thus asserts that “giving without expecting anything in return” is a gift, not a loan. For Maffei, the legitimation of interest was essentially a matter of reciprocity, of mutual benefit. Intentional mutual benefit is indeed the peculiarity of the Italian civil economy as compared with the political economy of Adam Smith and his associates, where mutual benefit is central, too, but, as discussed in the literature, extensional. Footnote ³⁷

Maffei’s treatise was published, inauspiciously, only a few months after the 1743 republication of Cardinal Robert Bellarmine’s Treatise on Christian Doctrine, a kind of short catechism that reiterated the classic and anachronistic thesis on interest, according to which every little thing that is taken in excess of the capital lent is usury. The archaic and conservative thesis of Bellarmine (a great theologian of the Counter-Reformation) and the Aggiunte of the Ballerini brothersFootnote ³⁸ caused a great uproar among the merchants and politicians (and even priests) of the Venetian state, also because Bellarmine’s thesis seemed to deny the legality of even the interest on public debt, established in Reference Maffei1742 by the City of Verona and some Genoese bankers.Footnote ³⁹ Maffei knew that after Bellarmine’s Treatise and the Ballerinis’ Aggiunte, his book was in danger of incurring the denunciation of the Inquisition. He published it anyway, however, and in sending a copy of the book, he wrote the following on March 8, 1744, to the Camaldolese father and writer Angelo Calogerà:

Maffei, in fact, had sent the book to Pope Lambertini (Benedict XIV), hoping for his approval. The first edition of his treatise, published in 1744, was indeed published with a letter from the Marquis Maffei to the Pope inserted at the beginning of the book (pp. iii–viii).

Pope Lambertini, already bound to Maffei by feelings of esteem and friendship,

This important confirmation, however, was not enough to protect Maffei from further serious attacks in the future.

IV. THE GREAT CONTROVERSY

At the beginning of February 1745, despite Maffei’s efforts to prevent it, a book by one of the two Ballerini brothers (Pietro) entitled La dottrina della Chiesa cattolica circa l’usura (The Catholic doctrine on usury) was published,Footnote ⁴² where he rebutted (and almost insulted) Maffei to argue once again the illegality of any interest-bearing loans, using the usual arguments of the old Catholic tradition.Footnote ⁴³ Pietro was an influential theologian and jurist who was involved in lively debates about the theology of usury. He supported the strict position of the Dominicans on this issue. To back up his claims in this controversy, he published a new edition of Antoninus of Florence’s Summa Theologica, to which he added the Praelectiones in secundam partem Summa Theologiae S. Antonini Prelection II: De usura (Ballerini, Reference Ballerini1740). In this text, he condemned any form of usury and restated the canonical Catholic doctrine on interest and loans.Footnote ⁴⁴

On the same topic, also the Dominican theologian Daniele Còncina,Footnote ⁴⁵ one of the most influential theologians of his generation, wrote a lengthy refutation of Maffei’s Dell’impiego, 274 pages in large folio (Còncina Reference Còncina1746).Footnote ⁴⁶ After stigmatizing the “indifferentism” of too many Catholic moralists towards those who, like Maffei, deny the dogmas of the Catholic Church, Còncina, following the classical rhetorical canon, begins his rebuttal by praising Maffei: “Such and so many are the reasons for the respect, the reverence and the esteem that I give to so illustrious a writer” (Còncina Reference Còncina1746, p. 2). And then, having paid his dues to Maffei’s fame, he continues:

He then goes on to stigmatize Maffei’s theses one by one, and so, after praising him, he insults and ridicules him by calling him “the Adversary,” an appellation usually reserved in the Christian tradition for Satana. To understand this, it is enough to read the summary of the various chapters that Còncina placed at the beginning of his treatise—“Index of Chapters and Paragraphs contained in this work.” For example, Book One, ch. VII, §III: “Strange and monstrous consequences which follow from the doctrine of the Adversary … ”; Book Two, ch. IV: “The author of Dell’impiego del denaro brings the most grievous disgrace upon the Christian republics, to whom he prescribes the sanction of exorbitant usury”; ch. V: “The greatest of all the paradoxes of the Adversary is that of proving that neither St. Thomas, nor St. Raymond, nor St. Bernardine, nor St. Antoninus … nor any of the most excellent scholastics, such as St. Bonaventure, Scotus …, Suárez, Vasquez, condemn any usury”; Book Three, ch. 1:“The reasons of the adversary against the sterility of the currency are frivolous and vain”; and so on. Còncina’s great authority is obviously Aquinas, and so he tries to show that Maffei’s reading of the legitimacy of some forms of interest on money is totally contrary to Aquinas, and thus to Scholasticism, the Fathers, and Scripture. And on this basis he calls Maffei’s teaching “heretical,” finally calling it “by its true name” (Còncina Reference Còncina1746, p. 4).

We find the gist of Còncina’s exposition already in the first pages, in his account of a hypothetical dispute with an imaginary Letterato opponent:

For Còncina, the cankerworm of Maffei’s argument is contained in the adjective indebitum, that is, excessive.

On the basis of this thesis, Còncina then sets out the “eight” propositions in which he articulates the refutation of Maffei in his quaestio disputata. The first contains almost the whole of his discourse: “It is a dogma of faith that God forbids in His Scriptures the sin of usury” (p. 7). Then, after his first three theological propositions, the fifth contains his own definition of usury, namely the mainstream in the Controriforma Catholic Church: “The idea which the Church gives us of usury is this: Usury is that profit which is received in excess of the lot by virtue of the contract called a mortgage.” From this follows the sixth: “This contract of mortgage consists in the handing over of a thing which is consumed by use, with the covenant that at the end of a given time as much of the same kind will be returned.” This is followed by the crucial seventh proposition: “If this contract be free, as it must be by its nature, it is a just and virtuous contract; if it be not free, it is usurious and unjust” (Còncina Reference Còncina1746, pp. 8–9).

We immediately understand where, for Còncina, the root of Maffei’s fatal error is: “If one reads the whole of Dell’impiego del Denaro, one will not find even a trace of the clear definition of usury given by the Church: on the contrary, one will find that the notion of usury given by the Church is openly refuted, ridiculed and scorned. It will be seen that the definition of usury places itself in the excess of interest” (p. 10). And so the category of “excess,” which the Controriforma Church had used to save many religious practices (from the veneration of saints to relics), no longer applies to money. Any amount charged for interest on money is usury and then a mortal sin, and those who defend it are defending “heretical” theses, just as heretical as “Calvin’s doctrine defending usury” (p. 11) that did not want to miss a chance to criticize the Protestants in the Controriforma Era!

The whole continuation of Còncina’s long book is an attempt to corroborate this thesis—any interest greater than zero on the loan is a sin. Moderate interest, or moderate usury, is only fraud, and therefore only free credit is lawful—on the basis of the Holy Scripture, the Fathers, above all Aquinas and many Catholic doctors. And at the end of his long journey through the Old and New Testament, theology, and philosophy, he concludes:

There is no reference to the Franciscan school of Olivi or Clareno, or to the Romanist categories of lucrum cessans and damnum emergens and similar concepts (except to ridicule them). Moderate interest remains usury and is therefore absolutely forbidden, without exceptions.

The other refuter, Pietro Ballerini, uses a similar method in his book La Dottrina cattolica. This text is much more modest, very short,Footnote ⁴⁷ but develops Maffei’s refutation along the same line of argument as Còncina’s—that is, the illegality of speaking of moderate interest or usury:

And again:

And so Ballerini goes on to show that, for theologians (from Bellarmine back to the Fathers), usury is any amount charged over and above the amount lent.

The controversy over Maffei’s book flared up to the point that “Pietro Perotti, parish priest of San Quirico and author of the additions to the Veronese Catechism, sharply criticized Maffei from the pulpit, crudely and ignorantly accusing his treatise of supporting the ’maxims of Luther and Calvin’. A great scandal arose and the Venetian government was forced to intervene” (Fallico Reference Fallico2016, p. clix). And so, shortly afterwards, the State Inquisitors ordered the Rectors of Verona to silence the three parties involved (Maffei, Ballerini, and Zeviani), and all three books were withdrawn from sale.

For Maffei it was a severe blow, as Antonio Fallico notes:

Pope Benedict XIV, seeing the growing controversy in the Serenissima and beyond, formed a commission of four cardinals and four theologians in October 1744, including also the Dominican Còncina, the great opponent of Maffei’s theses. Maffei, who was prevented from responding to the criticism by an order from Venice, had nevertheless begun to prepare material for this purpose and had collected many papers relating to the controversy. Among this material, currently housed in the Maffeian Collection of the Biblioteca Capitolare in Verona, is a small treatise on St Thomas’s thoughts on usury.Footnote ⁴⁸ In this text, Maffei simply reiterated the theses that were embodied in the Dell’impiego del denaro. Footnote ⁴⁹

It is interesting to note that some contemporary commentators seem to be closer to Maffei’s critics. Indeed, Giuseppe Silvestri writes:

The work of the eight members of the papal commission provided the material for Benedict XIV’s Vix Pervenit, probably the document itself, where Còncina’s hand was very visible. When Maffei read the encyclical, he was not at all enthusiastic because it “did not touch on any of the fundamental problems, deliberately refraining from formulating precise directives on the legality of the most widespread contracts of interest-bearing loans. The opinions of the Marquis Letterato were not criticised, let alone condemned, while those of the brothers Girolamo and Pietro Ballerini [and Còncina] were tacitly approved” (Fallico Reference Fallico2016, p. clxvi). In fact, the Vix Pervenit condemned the loan that was not free (where Maffei’s fight was focused). The interest “solius causa mutui” remained illegal (Vix Pervenit 3.II) but opened up to unspecified other “extrinsic” contracts (Vix Pervenit 3.III), where one could expect fruit instead. This was a clear compromise solution that, however, almost completely ignored Maffei’s reasons.

Indeed, in a letter (to an unidentified recipient) Maffei wrote: “The Pope says nihil statuimus of the issue that gave rise to the dispute; nihil decernimus of all those treaties for which there are theologians and canonists. Here the three contracts remain in force, the personal censo and the others made by brave men everywhere.” He reproaches the Pope who demands fruits solius causa mutui: “[T]his does not hurt me that I have not said it. The letter, in order to save the honour of casuistic language, wants to consecrate the point of reciprocity to a pure free loan…. But when one takes fruit, it is not mutual, it is a different contract” (Maffei Reference Maffei and Garibotto1955, II, pp. 1134–1135). The Vix Pervenit’s discourse on usury was then less courageous than those of Olivi, Clareno, and many Franciscan authors of the thirteenth and fourteenth centuries, but the reaction against Luther and Calvin had caused them to be forgotten in the Catholic world.

At this point, Maffei tried to obtain at least a new edition of his work, which was granted on condition that it included the Vix Pervenit at the beginning and a (second) letter from Maffei to Benedict XIV in which he declared his acceptance of the indications on usury contained in the encyclical.Footnote ⁵⁰ And so it was—a defeat for Maffei. Then, the following year Dell’impiego del denaro was reprinted by the Vatican press in Rome (Stamperia Vaticana) with his letter to the Pope, the encyclical, and also a document—Motu Proprio—by the same Pope on interest, foreign exchange, and censi attached (pp. xxi–xxiii, dated 7.10.1745).Footnote ⁵¹ In this second edition of 1746,Footnote ⁵² Maffei changed almost nothing in the body of the treatise, so much so that he continued to write that he was sixty-eight years old “the year before,”Footnote ⁵³ when at that point in time three years had passed (he was seventy-one). In the meantime, the Marquis Maffei had written two letters to Muratori (on the 8th and 17th of November 1745) in order to obtain his support, at least morally and culturally, which he had.Footnote ⁵⁴

V. FINAL REMARKS

It has already been noted that it would have been preferable for Maffei to have confined himself to a short, concise, polemical treatise that took into account the practical reasons for the existence of moderate interest-bearing loans, rather than resorting to biblical and theological analyses that could hardly serve his purpose.Footnote ⁵⁵ In fact, the first two books of the Dell’impiego del denaro, in which Maffei tries to show that the usury condemned by the Church was only excessive usury, are interesting, but he does not find any significant evidence to distinguish explicitly between licit and illicit usury in the sources he cites. The distinction between moderate and excessive usury was more Maffei’s idea than that of the Bible, the Gospel, or the Founder of the Church. Nevertheless, Maffei’s observation that the words of the Gospel were a precept of charity and not an economic rule is entirely convincing and correct. However, this does not detract from the fact that the rigorists had a good case for their thesis, especially since many decisions of popes and synods had reaffirmed these prohibitions, so that they had the right to say, certainly following the letter more than the spirit, that the doctrine of the Church was against any interest on money, moderate or excessive.

In fact, we showed that the same encyclical, Vix Pervenit, did not follow Maffei’s line, simply because Maffei’s distinction between moderate and immoderate usury cannot be found in Scripture or in the tradition of the Catholic Church, despite the thesis of Becker and Pascali (Reference Becker and Pascali2019). Maffei’s opponents had more historical, biblical, and theological ground to stand on, but Maffei was on the right side of modernity. This controversy is a paradigmatic case of the failure of strong practical reasons with weak theoretical justifications. Maffei—with Broedersen—was absolutely right to say that the condemnation of any interest on money was wrong because of its negative effects and because it was against any economic practice, but the ground of justification he chose in this polemic was not effective, because on that ground (Scripture, theology, and councils) his opponents were right, and won: “Great error of those who treat these subjects with the study of many subjects, but without that of the world” (Maffei Reference Maffei1744, p. 223). On this principle of reality rested the strength of Maffei’s argument, but perhaps he was optimistic or overconfident in his rhetorical ability when he thought that it would be possible to convince theologians on the basis of his free interpretation of the Scripture and the tradition of the Church.

However, the real paradox of the theses of Maffei’s detractors against interest in moneylending becomes apparent when we realize that the total prohibition of usury ended, in practice, by increasing usury in Catholic countries instead of reducing it. The reason for this is not difficult to understand. The mercantile community, but also many citizens and priests, demanded loans and mortgages, and everyone knew (perhaps even the theologians) that no one in the world lent money without asking the price for this convenience, which was called interest or usury (et similia). Since there were no transparent and public places (banks) where one could borrow money at fair and moderate rates, or since those that existed were strongly opposed by the Church, merchants and families in need of credit were forced to turn to the usurious market, almost always clandestine, where they paid rates that were not moderate at all. The more the rigorists fought and prohibited usury, the more it increased, with the poor as the main victims. That is why Maffei and later Genovesi and other Italian economists (e.g., Francesco Fuoco) continued to say that the condemnation of usury hurt everyone (except the usurers), and the poor more than the rich.Footnote ⁵⁶ Even today usury is much more widespread in countries with a Catholic culture than in Protestant ones, precisely in those countries where the Church had fought it so vigorously for centuries. In social facts, the most important effects are always the unintended ones.

This long period of lack of dialogue between the business community and the Catholic Church’s institutions reinforced and radicalized the mutual mistrust between the two groups, as well as the Catholic people’s dual economic and civil morality. The religious and moral authorities did not understand the lives of merchants and their problems, yet still delivered stern sermons and issued edicts and rules that served only to complicate the practical lives of entrepreneurs and businesspeople. These moral rules regarding profits, contracts, interest rates, and exchange rates were impossible to adhere to because they were based on a lack of expertise. Therefore, in order to live and work, it was necessary for businesspeople to learn how to circumvent them, to respect what it was impossible not to respect, and then to give a little alms so as not to sour relations with the Church, which they also loved like a senile old aunt. Something of their mercantile life remained under the Church’s control, that is, that part of the company’s and shop’s life that appeared in public, that was in everyone’s sight (how workers were treated, dismissals, donations …); but the most important and decisive things of the entrepreneur had to remain secret, and no one was to see or know about them. Then there were the deathbed bequests to the Catholic Church: total and tombstone pardons that would at least allow one to be saved in Purgatory.

And, coming back to Maffei’s book, as soon as the 1746 Roman edition of Maffei’s treatise appeared, forbidden by the Venetian government so as not to disturb public and commercial peace, the Venetian State Inquisitors, showing the great autonomy of the Serenissima from Rome, issued their condemnation of the book and its author on 23 July 1746. Maffei was confined to one of his country houses in Cadalora. “I find myself in a most strange ravine, exiled from the city by order of a tribunal that is always deadly to anyone, that gives no defense and hears no part,” as Maffei wrote to Cardinal Tamburini on 20 September 1746, asking him to erase the evidence of his repeated requests for the reprinting of the treatise in Rome.Footnote ⁵⁷ Benedict XIV himself came to his aid, and after four months of forced confinement, Maffei returned to Verona at the beginning of December 1746: “God forgive those who gave me this long holiday.”Footnote ⁵⁸ To conclude this paper on credit and debit, perhaps the best words are those.