Distinction XLVII

GRATIAN. The reason usurers are prohibited from being ordained at the end of this chapter is that those who practice usury are proved to serve cupidity; but the covetous are prohibited by the Apostle from being ordained, because such persons would easily deviate from what is just. Hence it is read in the Canons of the Apostles [c. 44]:

Let a bishop, priest, or deacon exacting usury from debtors either cease or certainly be deposed.

Likewise from the Council of Nicaea [c. 17]. Since many established under a rule pursue avarice and shameful profits and, forgetful of divine Scripture, which says, “He has not given his money at usury,” exact hundredths when making a loan, the holy and great synod justly decreed that, if anyone after this definition is found receiving usury, or pursuing some invention or transacting business in any manner whatsoever, or exacting hemiolia, that is, sesquiples, or devising absolutely any such thing for the sake of shameful profit, he is to be cast down from the clergy and held alien to the rule. Hence Gregory also writes concerning lovers of the world in Book XIX of the Moralia, part IV, chapter 35, saying:

All lovers of this world are strong in earthly matters, weak in heavenly ones. For temporal glory they desire to labor even unto death, and for perpetual hope they do not persist even a little in labor. For earthly profits they tolerate any injuries, and for a heavenly reward they refuse to bear the insults of even the slightest word. They are strong enough to stand before an earthly judge even for the whole day, but in prayer before the Lord they grow weary in the space of even one hour. Often they tolerate nakedness, abasement, and hunger to acquire riches and honors, and through abstinence they torment themselves for those things they hasten to attain; but they conceal themselves from laboriously seeking heavenly things all the more, the more slowly they think those things will be repaid. §1. Therefore, after the manner of other trees, they are broad below and narrow above, because they remain strong in lower things but fail in higher ones. On the contrary, by the quality of palms is designated the advancing life of the just, who are by no means strong in earthly desires and weak in heavenly ones, but show themselves zealous for God by a longer and more extended measure than they remember having been for the world. §2. For when it is said to certain persons through our preacher, “I speak in human terms because of the weakness of your flesh. For just as you presented your members to serve uncleanness and iniquity unto iniquity, so now present your members to serve justice unto sanctification,” he undoubtedly condescends to their weakness, as if it were said to them more openly: If you can do no more, at least be such in the fruit of good works as you formerly were in the practice of vices, lest the holy freedom of charity hold you weaker than the practice of earthly pleasure held you strong in the flesh.

Likewise Gregory to the citizens of Naples [Book VIII, epistle 40]. Know, moreover, that it has reached us concerning Peter that he gave solidi at usury. You ought to investigate this with all subtlety; and if it is established thus, elect another and withdraw yourselves from a person of this kind without delay. For we impose hands upon lovers of usury for no reason. But if, after a subtle investigation has been held, you judge this to be false—because his person is unknown to us, and we do not know whether what has been reported to us concerning his simplicity is so—it is necessary for him to come to us with a decree made by you, so that, examining his life and morals more solicitously, we may also learn his understanding, and so that, if he proves suitable for this judgment, with the Lord’s help we may fulfill your desires concerning him.

Likewise from the Council of Elvira [c. 20]. If any cleric has been discovered receiving usury, it was resolved that he be degraded and made to abstain.

Likewise Bishop Leo [to Anatolius, Bishop of Constantinople, epistle LI]. Part II. Just as a catholic man, and especially a priest of the Lord, ought to be entangled in no error, so he ought to be violated by no cupidity, holy Scripture saying: “Do not go after your desires.” A mind greedy for power knows neither how to abstain from prohibited things, nor to rejoice in things conceded, nor to grant consent to piety.

Likewise Gregory [Book VII, epistle 100]. We cannot adhere to the author of goods in any other way unless we cut away from ourselves cupidity, which is the root of all evils.

Likewise Ambrose [Sermon LXXXI] concerning what is written in the Gospel: “The field of a certain rich man brought forth abundant fruits.” Just as those who through madness have been transported in mind no longer see the things themselves but the phantasms of their passion, so also the mind of the avaricious person, once bound by the chains of cupidity, always sees gold, always silver, always calculates revenues, gazes upon gold more gladly than upon the sun; his very prayer and supplication to the Lord seeks gold. And a little later: §1. Sometimes also, by the most wicked art of usury, gold is born from gold itself. But neither satiety nor an end will ever come to cupidity. And below: §2. But he says: What injustice is there if, while I do not invade another’s possessions, I preserve my own more diligently? O shameless thing to say! You call them your own? Which things? From what stores did you bring them into this world? When you entered this light, when you came forth from your mother’s womb, with what resources, I ask, and with what assistance did you enter, provided? And a little later: §3. Let no one call his own what is common, when more than would suffice has been taken and violently obtained. And below: §4. Is God unjust, so that he does not distribute the supports of life equally to us, so that you indeed should be affluent and abounding while others should lack and be in need? Or is it rather for this reason: because he wished both to confer upon you proofs of his kindness and to crown another through the virtue of patience? But you, having received the gifts of God and gathered them into your bosom, think you do nothing unjust if you alone possess the supports of the lives of so many? For who is so unjust, so avaricious, as one who makes the nourishment of many not his use but his abundance and luxuries? For it is no less a crime to take from one who has than, when you can and abound, to deny the needy. The bread you retain belongs to the hungry; the garment you shut away belongs to the naked; the money you bury in the earth is the redemption and release of the wretched. Therefore, know that you invade the goods of as many persons as you could furnish with what you wish. Part III. GRATIAN. It is also necessary that one who is to be ordained “preside well over his own house”; that is, if in the lay habit he has had a wife or children, let him provoke them from vices toward the pursuit of virtues both by word and example, so that he may first exact from his household what he will afterward command the peoples. Hence the Apostle writes to the Ephesians that they should love their wives as their own bodies and not provoke their children to wrath, but nourish them in every discipline and correction of the Lord. Hence when, writing to Timothy, he had said, “one presiding well over his own house,” he immediately added: “having children subject to him in all chastity, not under an accusation of luxury.” For one who dwells together with such persons does not have the boldness to reprove others. Hence it is read concerning blessed Job that he offered daily sacrifices to God for his children, offering holocausts for each of them; he bound them together into one by so great a perfection of charity that each of them on his own day prepared a banquet for his brethren and equally invited his three sisters to feast with him. Because Eli neglected to do this and, overcome by false piety, was unwilling to strike his delinquent sons, as is read in the Book of Kings, before the strict judge he struck himself together with his sons by a cruel condemnation; hence it is said to him by the divine voice: “You honored your sons more than me.” Hence David also, exercising kindness and not the severity of discipline toward his sons, learned by experience that the youth of those whose boyhood he had permitted to be wanton through wandering license was destructive. For one of them, corrupting his sister by rape, was slain by her brother, namely Absalom, amid the feast that he had deceitfully prepared for his brethren. But Absalom, after he obtained pardon from his father, expelled him from the kingdom, went in to his concubines, and finally, pursuing his father through the pathless places of the wilderness, became caught in an oak and thus perished suspended. Hence Paul also writes to Timothy, saying: “One who has no care for his own and especially those of his household has denied the faith and is worse than an unbeliever.” Rightly, therefore, one who does not know how to preside over his own house is prohibited from being ordained bishop, because if he is not faithful in the least matter, concerning which a more familiar care ought to be in him, how will he display solicitous diligence in the Church of God, where there are so many persons and strangers? Hence Jerome says: “For the just person is not polluted by the vices of his children; rather, freedom is reserved by the Apostle for the ruler of the Church, so that he may be such a person as does not fear to reprove outsiders on account of the vices of his children.” Part IV. §1. This will happen when there is nothing imputed to him. For since the steps of a person are directed by the Lord and his ways are not in the person, he can indeed reprove, but he cannot correct; he can knock, but not open; restrain the hands, but not change the mind. Hence Augustine to Vincentius the Donatist [epistle CXXXVII]:

However much the discipline of my house may keep watch, I am a human being and live among human beings; nor do I dare arrogate to myself that my house is better than Noah’s ark, where nevertheless among eight human beings one reprobate was found, or better than the house of Abraham, where it was said: “Cast out the bondwoman and her son,” or better than the house of Isaac, to whom it was said concerning the two twins: “I loved Jacob, but Esau I hated.” §1. But I confess simply to your charity before the Lord our God, who is witness over my soul, that since I began to serve God, just as I have with difficulty experienced persons better than those who advanced in monasteries, so I have not experienced persons worse than those who fell away in monasteries.

Likewise Pope Cornelius to Cyprian. As far as pertains to us, it befits our conscience, brother, to take care lest anyone perish from the Church through our fault. But if anyone has perished voluntarily and by his own crime, and has been unwilling to do penance and return to the Church, we believe that we, who counsel their health, will be blameless on the day of judgment, and that those alone will remain in punishments who were unwilling to be healed by the healthfulness of our counsel. Nor ought the insults of the lost to move us to depart from the right way and the certain rule, as the Apostle also instructs, saying: “If I pleased human beings, I would not be Christ’s servant.”