[46] The Remains of Archbishop Grindal, ed. Wm. Nicholson (Parker Soc., 1843), p. 143.

[47] See, e.g., W. P. M. Kennedy, Elizabethan Episcopal Administration, 1924, vol. iii, p. 180 (Archdeacon Mullins’ Articles for the Archdeaconry of London (1585): “Item, whether you do know that within your parish there is (or are) any person or persons notoriously known or suspected by probable tokens or common fame to be an usurer; or doth offend by any colour or means directly or indirectly in the same”), and pp. 184, 233; Wilkins, Concilia, vol. iv, pp. 319, 337, 416.

[48] Cardwell, Synodalia, vol. i, pp. 144, 308; Wilkins, Concilia, vol. iv, p. 509.

[49] Ware, op. cit. (see note 29 above), quotes several examples. See also Archæologia Cantiana, vol. xxv, 1902, pp. 27, 48 (Visitations of the Archdeacon of Canterbury).

[50] Hist. MSS. Com., 13th Report, 1892, Appx., pt. iv, pp. 333-4 (MSS. of the Borough of Hereford).

[51] W. H. Hale, A Series of Precedents and Proceedings in Criminal Causes, 1847, p. 166.

[52] Yorkshire Arch. Journal, vol. xviii, 1895, p. 331.

[53] Commissary of London Correction Books, 1618-1625 (H. 184, pp. 164, 192). I am indebted to Mr. Fincham of Somerset House (where the books are kept) for kindly calling my attention to these cases. The shorter of them (p. 192) runs as follows:

9mo Maii 1620 coram domino officiali principali etc. et in eius camera etc. comparuit dictus Witham et ei objecto ut supra allegavit that he is seldom at home himselfe but leaves his man to deale in the business of his shop, and yf any fault be committed he saith the fault is in his man and not in himselfe, and he sayeth he will give charge and take care that no oppression shall be made nor offence committed this way hereafter, humbly praying the judge for favour to be dismissed, unde dominus monuit eum that thereafter neither by himselfe nor his servant he offende in the lyke nor suffer any such oppression to be committed, et cum hac monitione eum dimisit.

[54] S.P.D. Eliz., vol. lxxv, no. 54.

[55] For an account of these expedients see my introduction to Wilson’s Discourse upon Usury, 1925, pp. 123-8.

[56] Richard Hooker, The Laws of Ecclesiastical Policy, bk. viii, chap. i, par. 5.

[57] Acts of the Privy Council, vol. xxvii, 1597, p. 129.

[58] The Stiffkey Papers (ed. H. W. Saunders, Royal Historical Society, Camden Third Series, vol. xxvi, 1915), p. 140.

[59] Quoted by E. M. Leonard, The Early History of English Poor Relief, 1900, p. 148.

[60] For an account of the treatment of exchange business under Elizabeth, see Wilson, op. cit., Introduction, pp. 146-54.

[61] For references see ibid., pp. 164-5; and Les Reportes del Cases in Camera Stellata, 1593-1609, ed. W. P. Baildon, 1894, pp. 235-7. The latter book contains several instances of intervention by the Star Chamber in cases of engrossing of corn (pp. 71, 76-7, 78-9, 91) and of enclosure and depopulation (pp. 49-52, 164-5, 192-3, 247, 346-7).

[62] A Discourse of the Common Weal of this Realm of England, ed. E. Lamond, 1893, p. 14.

[63] The Works of William Laud, D.D., ed. Wm. Scott, vol. i, 1847, p. 6.

[64] Ibid., p. 64.

[65] Ibid., pp. 89, 138.

[66] Ibid., p. 167.

[67] Ibid., pp. 28-9.

[68] Gonner, Common Land and Enclosure, 1912, pp. 166-7. For the activity of the Government from 1629 to 1640, see Tawney, The Agrarian Problem in the Sixteenth Century, pp. 376, 391, and E. M. Leonard, The Inclosure of Common Fields in the Seventeenth Century, in Trans. Royal Hist. Soc., N.S., vol. xix, pp. 101 seqq.

[69] Letter to Dr. Gilbert Sheldon, Warden of All Souls (in Laud’s Works, vol. vi, pt. ii, p. 520): “One thing more I must tell you, that, though I did you this favour, to make stay of the hearing till your return, yet for the business itself, I can show you none; partly because I am a great hater of depopulations in any kind, as being one of the greatest mischiefs in this kingdom, and of very ill example from a college, or college tenant”; Clarendon, History of the Rebellion, bk. i, par. 204.

[70] S.P.D. Chas. I, vol. ccccxcix, no. 10 (printed in Tawney, The Agrarian Problem in the Sixteenth Century, pp. 420-1); and Lords’ Journals, vol. vi, p. 468b (March 13, 1643-4), Articles against Laud: “Then Mr. Talbot upon oath deposed how the Archbishop did oppose the law in the business of inclosures and depopulations; how, when the law was desired to be pleaded for the right of land, he bid them ‘Go plead law in inferior Courts, they should not plead it before him’; and that the Archbishop did fine him for that business two hundred pounds for using the property of his freehold, and would not suffer the law to be pleaded.”

[71] Leonard, The Early History of English Poor Relief, pp. 150-64; Unwin, Industrial Organization in the Sixteenth and Seventeenth Centuries, 1904, pp. 142-7.

[72] R. R. Reid, The King’s Council in the North, 1921, pp. 412, 413 n.

[73] Camden Soc., N.S., vol. xxxix, 1886, Cases in the Courts of Star Chamber and High Commission, ed. S. R. Gardiner, p. 46. For another case of engrossing of corn, see ibid., pp. 82-9.

[74] Tawney, The Assessment of Wages in England by the Justices of the Peace, in Vierteljahrschrift für Sozial- und Wirthschaftsgeschichte, Bd. xi, 1913, pp. 551-4; Leonard, op. cit., p. 157.

[75] The Works of William Laud, ed. Wm. Scott, vol. vi, 1857, pt. i, p. 191. (Answer to Lord Saye and Sele’s speech upon the Bill about Bishops’ Powers in Civil Affairs and Courts of Judicature.)

[76] Ibid., vol. i, pp. 5-6.

[77] Harrington, Works, 1700 ed., pp. 69 (Oceana) and 388-9 (The Art of Law-giving).

[78] G. Malynes, Lex Mercatoria, 1622. The same simile had been used much earlier in A Discourse of the Common Weal of this Realm of England, ed. E. Lamond, p. 98.

[79] D’Ewes, Journals, p. 674; and 39 Eliz., c. 2.

[80] For criticisms of price control see Tawney and Power, Tudor Economic Documents, vol. iii, pp. 339-41, and vol. ii, p. 188, and Stiffkey Papers (see note 58 above), pp. 130-40.

[81] H. Ellis, Original Letters, 2nd series, vol. ii, 1827, letter clxxxii, and J. W. Burgon, The Life and Times of Sir Thomas Gresham, 1839, vol. ii, p. 343.

[82] Wilson, op. cit. (see note 55 above), p. 249.

[83] Commons’ Journals, May 21, 1604, vol. i, p. 218.

[84] 13 Eliz., c. 8, repealing 5 and 6 Ed. VI, c. 20; D’Ewes, Journals, pp. 171-4.

[85] Owen and Blakeway, History of Shrewsbury, 1825, vol. ii, pp. 364 n., 412.

[86] Hist. MSS. Com., Report on MSS. in various Collections, vol. i, 1901, p. 46 (MSS. of Corporation of Burford).

[87] Wilson, op. cit. (see note 55 above), p. 233.

[88] Coke, Institutes, pt. ii, 1797, pp. 601 seqq. (Certain articles of abuses which are desired to be reformed in granting of prohibitions, exhibited by Richard Bancroft, Archbishop of Canterbury.)

[89] Thomas Ridley, A View of the Civile and Ecclesiastical Law, and wherein the Practice of them is streitened and may be relieved within this Land, 1607, Dedication, p. 3.

[90] W. Huntley, A Breviate of the Prelates’ intolerable Usurpation, 1637, pp. 183-4. The case referred to is that of Hinde, alleged to have been heard Mich. 18 and 19 Eliz. For the controversy over prohibitions, see R. G. Usher, The Rise and Fall of the High Commission, 1913, pp. 180 seqq.

[91] D’Ewes, Journals, pp. 171, 173.

[92] See, e.g., Surtees Society, vol. xxxiv, 1858, The Acts of the High Commission Court within the Diocese of Durham, Preface, which shows that between 1626 and 1639 cases of contempt of the ordinary ecclesiastical jurisdiction ran into hundreds.

[93] Penn, No Cross, No Crown, pt. i, ch. xii, par. 8.

[94] Sanderson, De Obligatione Conscientiæ, 1666; Taylor, The Rule and Exercises of Holy Living, 1650, chap. iii, sect. iii (Of Negotiation or Civil Contracts, Rules and Measures of Justice in Bargaining).

[95] Mandeville, The Fable of the Bees, ed. F. B. Kaye, 1924, pp. 193, 194. Similar sentiments with regard to the necessity of poverty were expressed later by the Rev. J. Townsend, in his Dissertation on the Poor Laws (1785), and by Patrick Colquhoun in his Treatise on the Wealth and Resources of the British Empire (1814). Like Mandeville, both these writers argue that poverty is essential to the prosperity, and, indeed, to the very existence, of civilization. For a full collection of citations to the same effect from eighteenth-century writers, see E. S. Furniss, The Position of the Laborer in a System of Nationalism, 1920, chaps. iv-vi.

[96] The Whole Duty of Man, laid down in a plain and familiar Way for the Use of All, 1658.

[1] Tucker, A Brief Essay on the Advantages and Disadvantages which respectively attend France and Great Britain with regard to Trade, 1750, p. 33. The best account of Tucker, most of whose works are scarce, is given by W. E. Clark, Josiah Tucker, Economist (Studies in History, Economics and Public Law, Columbia University, vol. xix, 1903-5).

[2] Reliquiæ Baxterianæ: or Mr. Richard Baxter’s Narrative of the most memorable Passages of his Life and Times, 1696, p. 5.

[3] Bunyan, The Pilgrim’s Progress.

[4] The Life of the Duke of Newcastle, by Margaret, Duchess of Newcastle (Everyman ed., 1915, p. 153).

[5] Baxter, op. cit., p. 31.

[6] Bunyan, Pilgrim’s Progress.

[7] Baxter, op. cit., p. 89.

[8] Thomas Fuller, The Holy and Profane States, 1884 ed., p. 122.

[9] Quoted S. Seyer, Memoirs of Bristol, vol. ii, 1823, p. 314.

[10] R. G. Usher, The Reconstruction of the English Church, vol. i, 1910, pp. 249-50.

[11] Baxter, op. cit., p. 30.

[12] An orderly and plaine Narration of the Beginnings and Causes of this Warre, 1644, p. 4 (Brit. Mus., Thomason Tracts, E. 54 [3]). I owe this reference to the kindness of Father Paschal Larkin.

[13] Clarendon, History of the Rebellion, bk. vi, par. 271.

[14] Parker, Discourse of Ecclesiastical Politie, 1670, Preface, p. xxxix.

[15] The Life of Edward, Earl of Clarendon, written by himself, 1827 ed., vol. iii, p. 101.

[16] D. C. A. Agnew, Protestant Exiles from France, 1886, vol. i, pp. 20-1. In 1640 the Root and Branch Petition included, among the evils due to the Bishops, “the discouragement and destruction of all good subjects, of whom are multitudes, both clothiers, merchants and others, who, being deprived of their ministers, and overburthened with these pressures, have departed the kingdom to Holland and other parts, and have drawn with them a great manufacture of cloth and trading out of the land into other places where they reside, whereby wool, the great staple of the kingdom, is become of small value, and vends not, trading is decayed, many poor people want work, seamen lose employment, and the whole land is much impoverished” (S. R. Gardiner, Constitutional Documents of the Puritan Revolution, 1628-60 [1889], p. 73). For instances of the comparatively liberal treatment of alien immigrants under Elizabeth, see Tawney and Power, Tudor Economic Documents, vol. i, section vi, nos. 3, 4, 11 (2), 15, and Cunningham, Growth of English Industry and Commerce, Modern Times, 1921, pt. i, pp. 79-84.

[17] Toryism and Trade can never agree, 1713, p. 12. The tract is wrongly ascribed to Davenant by H. Levy, Economic Liberalism, 1913, p. 12.

[18] See, e.g., G. Martin, La Grande Industrie sous le règne de Louis XIV, 1899, chap. xvii, where the reports of several intendants are quoted; and Levasseur, Histoire du commerce de la France, 1911, vol. i, p. 421.

[19] A Letter from a Gentleman in the City to a Gentleman in the Country about the Odiousness of Persecution, 1677, p. 29.

[20] Sir Wm. Temple, Observations upon the United Provinces of the Netherlands, chap. v, vi.

[21] The True Interest and Political Maxims of the Republick of Holland and West-Friesland, 1702, pt. i, chap. xiv.

[22] Petty, Political Arithmetic, 1690, pp. 25-6.

[23] The Present Interest of England stated, by a Lover of his King and Country, 1671. I am indebted to Mr. A. P. Wadsworth for calling my attention to the passage quoted in the text. The same point is put more specifically by Lawrence Braddon: “The superstition of their religion obligeth France to keep (at least) fifty Holy days more than we are obliged to keep; and every such day wherein no work is done is one hundred and twenty thousand pounds loss to the deluded people” (Abstract of the Draft of a Bill for relieving, reforming and employing the Poor, 1717). See also Defoe, in his Enquiry into Occasional Conformity, 1702, pp. 18-19: “We wonder, gentlemen, you will accept our money on your deficient funds, our stocks to help carry on your wars, our loans and credits to your victualling office and navy office. If you would go on to distinguish us, get a law made we shall buy no lands, that we may not be freeholders; and see if you could find money to buy us out. Transplant us into towns and bodies, and let us trade by our selves; let us card, spin, knit, weave and work with and for one another, and see how you’ll maintain your own poor without us. Let us fraight our ships apart, keep our money out of your Bank, accept none of our bills, and separate your selves as absolutely from us in civil matters, as we do from you in religious, and see how you can go on without us.”

[24] Swift, Examiner.

[25] Bolingbroke, Letter to Sir Wm. Windham, 1753, p. 21.

[26] Reliquiæ Baxterianæ (see note 2), p. 94. He goes on: “The generality of the Master Workmen [i.e., employers] lived but a little better than their journeymen (from hand to mouth), but only that they laboured not altogether so hard.”

[27] Voltaire, Lettres Philosophiques, no. x, and Montesquieu, Esprit des Lois, xix, 27, and xx, 22. See also the remarks to the same effect in D’Argenson, Considérations sur le Gouvernement de la France, 1765.

[28] Brief Survey of the Growth of Usury in England, 1673.

[29] Marston, Eastward Ho!, act I, sc. i.

[30] Clarendon, History of the Rebellion, bk. i, par. 163.

[31] Petty, Political Arithmetic, 1690, p. 23.

[32] Max Weber, Die protestantische Ethik und der Geist des Kapitalismus, first published in the Archiv für Sozialwissenschaft und Sozialpolitik Statistik, vols. xx, xxi, and since reprinted in vol. i of his Gesammelte Aufsätze zur Religionssoziologie, 1920; Troeltsch, Die Soziallehren der Christlichen Kirchen and Protestantism and Progress, 1912; Schulze-Gaevernitz, Britischer Imperialismus und Englischer Freihandel, 1906; Cunningham, Christianity and Economic Science, 1914, chap. v.

Weber’s essay gave rise to much discussion in Germany. Its main thesis—that Calvinism, and in particular English Puritanism, from which nearly all his illustrations are drawn, played a part of preponderant importance in creating moral and political conditions favorable to the growth of capitalist enterprise—appears to be accepted by Troeltsch, Die Soziallehren der Christlichen Kirchen, pp. 704 seqq. It is submitted to a critical analysis by Brentano (Die Anfänge des modernen Kapitalismus, 1916, pp. 117-57), who dissents from many of Weber’s conclusions. Weber’s essay is certainly one of the most fruitful examinations of the relations between religion and social theory which has appeared, and I desire to acknowledge my indebtedness to it, in particular with reference to its discussion of the economic application given by some Puritan writers to the idea expressed by the word “calling.” At the same time, there are several points on which Weber’s arguments appear to me to be one-sided and overstrained, and on which Brentano’s criticisms of it seem to me to be sound.

Thus (i), as was perhaps inevitable in an essay dealing with economic and social thought, as distinct from changes in economic and social organization, Weber seems to me to explain by reference to moral and intellectual influences developments which have their principal explanation in another region altogether. There was plenty of the “capitalist spirit” in fifteenth-century Venice and Florence, or in south Germany and Flanders, for the simple reason that these areas were the greatest commercial and financial centers of the age, though all were, at least nominally, Catholic. The development of capitalism in Holland and England in the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries was due, not to the fact that they were Protestant powers, but to large economic movements, in particular the Discoveries and the results which flowed from them. Of course material and psychological changes went together, and of course the second reacted on the first. But it seems a little artificial to talk as though capitalist enterprise could not appear till religious changes had produced a capitalist spirit. It would be equally true, and equally one-sided, to say that the religious changes were purely the result of economic movements.

(ii) Weber ignores, or at least touches too lightly on, intellectual movements, which were favorable to the growth of business enterprise and to an individualist attitude towards economic relations, but which had little to do with religion. The political thought of the Renaissance was one; as Brentano points out, Machiavelli was at least as powerful a solvent of traditional ethical restraints as Calvin. The speculations of business men and economists on money, prices and the foreign exchanges were a second. Both contributed to the temper of single-minded concentration on pecuniary gain, which Weber understands by the capitalist spirit.

(iii) He appears greatly to over-simplify Calvinism itself. In the first place, he apparently ascribes to the English Puritans of the seventeenth century the conception of social ethics held by Calvin and his immediate followers. In the second place, he speaks as though all English Puritans in the seventeenth century held much the same view of social duties and expediency. Both suggestions are misleading. On the one hand, the Calvinists of the sixteenth century (including English Puritans) were believers in a rigorous discipline, and the individualism ascribed not unjustly to the Puritan movement in its later phases would have horrified them. The really significant question is that of the causes of the change from the one standpoint to the other, a question which Weber appears to ignore. On the other hand, there were within seventeenth-century Puritanism a variety of elements, which held widely different views as to social policy. As Cromwell discovered, there was no formula which would gather Puritan aristocrats and Levellers, landowners and Diggers, merchants and artisans, buff-coat and his general, into the fold of a single social theory. The issue between divergent doctrines was fought out within the Puritan movement itself. Some won; others lost.

Both “the capitalist spirit” and “Protestant ethics,” therefore, were a good deal more complex than Weber seems to imply. What is true and valuable in his essay is his insistence that the commercial classes in seventeenth-century England were the standard-bearers of a particular conception of social expediency, which was markedly different from that of the more conservative elements in society—the peasants, the craftsmen, and many landed gentry—and that that conception found expression in religion, in politics, and, not least, in social and economic conduct and policy.