mall, it will no whit discourage the lender. For he, for example,
that took before ten or nine in the hundred, will sooner descend to
eight in the hundred than give over his trade in usury, and go from
certain gains to gains of hazard. Let these licensed lenders be in
number indefinite, but restrained to certain principal cities and
towns of merchandising; for then they will be hardly able to color
other men's monies in the country. So as the license of nine will not
suck away the current rate of five; for no man will lend his monies
far off, nor put them into unknown hands.

"If it be objected that this doth in a sort authorize usury, which
before was in some places but permissive; the answer is, that it is
better to mitigate usury by declaration, than to suffer it to rage by
connivance."

(Works of Francis Bacon, Vol. 12, Page 218.)

CHAPTER XXXVIII.

WHY THIS TRUTH WAS NEGLECTED.

That we may find the way of return, we must consider the reasons of
our wandering. We must reverse our direction and retrace our steps.
These reasons are not occult or hard to find.

1. The departure had its root in man's depraved nature. The natural
tendency is evil, while the graces must be cultivated with great
diligence. Evils grow as weeds grow in the garden, as thorns and
thistles and briers cover the untended fields. This evil has not been
disturbed by any book exposing its harm for a hundred years, and it
has been two hundred since it was treated as a violation of the Eighth
Commandment. This evil, thus left undisturbed, has flourished and
spread over all the world.

2. Two and three hundred years ago the great doctrines were occupying
the thought of Christendom. The doctrines of free grace, by repentance
and an exercise of faith, were receiving close attention. The creeds
of the denominations were being unfolded, and their defense and proof
absorbed the thought of the wise and good. What shall we believe was
the question?

3. Other great evils stood before the faces of those who labored for
the uplifting of the race. Practices attached to the ecclesiastics,
and degrading the organized church, were flaunted before the eyes of
those who stood for true faith and pure living. These were attacked
with vigor, while this evil, which had been especially the sin of the
Jew, crept in and entrenched itself.

4. Covetousness is one of those secret sins that may lurk in the heart
while there is maintained a fair outward life