' " Yea! with the thunderbolt of excommunication." — (Roa. on Us.) ^ ^ ■ * Hume's Hist, of Eng., 5 vol., p. 484.
THE LAST SPARK OF PEEJUDICB. 4a before England in commerce, at this period, that Henry IV. had reduced the rate of interest in that country to six and one-half per cent. ; and another change presently took place in the English statutes on the subject of interest.
In the following reign,^ the Statute of James I. re- duced the rate of interest to eight per cent.j and the Bishops refused to agree to it unless usury was therein degraded as in former statutes. It was therefore provided that " nothing in this law contained shall be construed or expounded to allow the practice of usury in point of religion or conscience."^ And Ser- geant KoUe, in speaking of this clause, says, " Usury hath been holden infamous by all statutes as horrible and damnable ; and when the last statute of eight per cent, was made, the Bishops would not consent to it, because there was no clause in it, as Judge Doderidge said, to disgrace usury, as in former statutes, and for this, as the judges were sitting upon it, a clause was added, for this purpose for their satisfaction, as may be seen at the end of the statute."^ And this is the last spark of prejudice discoverable in any of the public acts, though it was not so soon extinguished in other countries in Europe.
But the distinction between interest and usury, properly so called, was rapidly becoming better un- derstood ; and Lord Chief Justice Lea'' expressed an '21JamesJ. A. D. 1624. ^Pal. Moi: Phil, 3d book, p. 1, c. 10. 8 2 Roll. Eep., 469. Oliver and Oliver, 22 Jac. Mich. B. R. * Sanderson v. Warner, Palm. 291. Temp., James I. 4 So HISTORY OF USURY.
opinion that it was not toothless usury, but only hiting usury ,^ such as was practised by the Jews, that was illegal ; but that usury, such as ten per cent., was not condemned, but tolerated, if a man chose to en- danger his