e University of Bologna, but no
formal decision was pronounced, and, had it not been for the reaction
following the Reformation, the _trinus contractus_ would probably have
gained general acceptance. As it was, it was condemned by a provincial
synod at Milan in 1565, and by Sixtus V. in 1585.[2]

[Footnote 1: _Op. cit._, IV. xv. 11. Lecky attributed the invention of
the _trinus contractus_ to the Jesuits--who were only founded in 1534
(_History of Rationalism_, vol. ii. p. 267).]

[Footnote 2: Ashley, _op. cit._, vol. i. pt. ii. pp. 439 _et seqq._;
Cleary, _op. cit._, pp. 126 _et seqq._]

We should also refer to the contract of bottomry, which consisted of a
loan made to the owner--or in some cases the master--of a ship, on
the security of the ship, to be repaid with interest upon the safe
conclusion of a voyage. This contract could not be considered a
partnership, inasmuch as the property in the money passed to the
borrower; but it probably escaped condemnation as usurious on the
ground that the lender shared in the risk of the enterprise. The
payment of some additional sum over and above the money lent might
thus be justified on the ground of _periculum sortis_. The contract,
moreover, was really one of insurance for the shipowner, and contracts
of insurance were clearly legitimate. In any event the legitimacy of
loans on bottomry was not questioned before the sixteenth century.[1]

[Footnote 1: Ashley, _op. cit._, vol. i. pt. ii. pp. 421-3; Palgrave,
_Dictionary of Political Economy_, art. 'Bottomry'; Cunningham,
_Growth of English Industry and Commerce_, vol i. p. 257.]

Sec. 10. _Concluding Remarks on Usury_.

It is to be hoped that the above exposition of the mediaeval doctrine
on usury will dispel the idea that the doctrine was founded upon the
injustice of unearned income. Far from the receipt of an unearned
income from money or other capital being in all cases condemned, it
was unanimously recognised, provided that the income accrued to the
owner of the capital, and not to somebody else, and that the rate
of remuneration was just. The teaching on partnership rested on the
fundamental assumption that a man might trade with his money, either
by using it himself, or by allowing other people to use it on his
behalf. In the latter case, the person making use of the money might
be either assured of being paid a fixed remuneration for his services,
in which case the contract was one of _locatio operarum_, or h