THE PROTESTANT ETHIC AND
THE SPIRIT OF CAPITALISM

by the same author

GENERAL ECONOMIC HISTORY

by Ernst Troehsch

THE SOCIAL TEACHING OF THE
CHRISTIAN CHURCHES

I

MAX WEBER

THE PROTESTANT ETHIC

AND THE
SPIRIT OF CAPITALISM

TRANSLATED BY

TALCOTT PARSONS

Tutor in Economics, Harvard University

WITH A FOREWORD BY

R. H. TAWNEY

NEW YORK:

CHARLES SCRIBNER'S SONS

LONDON:

GEORGE ALLEN & UNWIN LTD

FIRST PUBLISHED IN GREAT BRITAIN IN I93O
SECOND IMPRESSION 1 948
THIRD IMPRESSION I95O

This book is copyright under the Berne Convention

No portion of it may be reprodttced by
any process without written permission.
Inquiries to be addressed to the publisher

PRINTED IN GREAT BRITAIN BY
BUTLER AND TANNER LTD., FROME AND LONDON

CONTENTS ^^c,

Translator's Preface jl. j \N 3 L. j^

Foreword C C P , ^ i

Author's Introduction 13

PART I

THE PROBLEM

CHAPTER

I. Religious Affiliation and Social Stratification 35

II. The Spirit of Capitalism 47

III. Luther's Conception of the Calling. Task of the

Investigation 79

PART II

THE PRACTICAL ETHICS OF THE ASCETIC
BRANCHES OF PROTESTANTISM

IV. The Religious Foundations of Worldly Asceticism 95

A. Calvinism 98

B. Pietism 128

C. Methodism 139

D. The Baptist Sects 144

V. Asceticism and the Spirit of Capitalism 155

Notes 185

Index 285

Vll

TRANSLATOR'S PREFACE

Max Weber's essay, Die protestantische Ethik und der
Geist des Kapitalismus, which is here translated, was
first pubHshed in the Archil für Sozialwissenschaft und
Sozialpolitik^ Volumes XX and XXI, for 1904-5. It
was reprinted in 1920 as the first study in the ambitious
series Gesammelte Aufsätze zur Religionssoziologie,
which was left unfinished by Weber's untimely death
in that same year. For the new printing he made
considerable changes, and appended both new material
and replies to criticism in footnotes. The translation
has, however, been made directly from this last edition.
Though the volume of footnotes is excessively large,
so as to form a serious detriment to the reader's
enjoyment, it has not seemed advisable either to omit
any of them or to attempt to incorporate them into
the text. As it stands it shows most plainly how the
problem has grown in Weber's own mind, and it
would be a pity to destroy that for the sake of artistic
perfection. A careful perusal of the notes is, however,
especially recommended to the reader, since a great
deal of important material is contained in them. The
fact that they are printed separately from the main text
should not be allowed to hinder their use. The
translation is, as far as is possible, faithful to the text,
rather than attempting to achieve any more than
ordinary, clear EngHsh style. Nothing has been altered,
and only a few comments to clarify obscure points and
to refer the reader to related parts of Weber's work
have been added.
The Introduction, which is placed before the main

R ix

The Protestant Ethic and the Spirit of Capitalism

essay, was written by Weber in 1920 for the whole series
on the Sociology of Religion. It has been included in
this translation because it gives some of the general
background of ideas and problems into which Weber
himself meant this particular study to fit. That has
seemed particularly desirable since, in the voluminous
discussion w4iich has grown up in Germany around
Weber's essay, a great deal of misplaced criticism has
been due to the failure properly to appreciate the scope
and limitations of the study. While it is impossible
to appreciate that fully without a thorough study of
Weber's sociological work as a whole, this brief intro-
duction should suffice to prevent a great deal of
misunderstanding.

The series of which this essay forms a part was, as
has been said, left unfinished at Weber's death. The
first volume only had been prepared for the press by
his own hand. Besides the parts translated here, it
contains a short, closely related study, Die pro-
testantischen Sekten und der Geist des Kapitalismus', a
general introduction to the further studies of particular
religions which as a whole he called Die Wirtschafts-
ethik der Weltreligionen ; and a long study of Confucian-
ism and Taoism. The second and third volumes, which
were published after his death, without the thorough
revision which he had contemplated, contain studies
of Hinduism and Buddhism and Ancient Judaism.
In addition he had done work on other studies, notably
of Islam, Early Christianity, and Talmudic Judaism,
which were not yet in a condition fit for publication
in any form. Nevertheless, enough of the whole series
has been preserved to show something of the extra-

Translator's Preface

ordinary breadth and depth of Weber's grasp of
cultural problems. What is here presented to English-
speaking readers is only a fragment, but it is a fragment
which is in many ways of central significance for
Weber's philosophy of history, as well as being of very
great and very general interest for the thesis it advances
to explain some of the most important aspects of
modern culture.

TALCOTT PARSONS

Cambridge, Mass., U.S.A.
January 1930

XJ

FOREWORD

Max Weber, the author of the work translated in the
following pages, was a scholar whose intellectual
range was unusually wide, and whose personality made
an even deeper impression than his learning on those
privileged to know him. He had been trained as a
jurist, and, in addition to teaching as a professor
at Freiburg, Heidelberg, and Munich, he wrote on
subjects so various as ancient agrarian history, the
conditions of the rural population of Prussia, the
methodology of the social sciences, and the sociology
of religion. Nor were his activities exclusively those
of the teacher and the student. He travelled widely,
was keenly interested in contemporary political and
social movements, played a vigorous and disinterested
part in the crisis which confronted Germany at the
close of the War, and accompanied the German
delegation to Versailles in May 1919. He died in
Munich in the following year, at the age of fifty-six.
Partly as a result of prolonged ill-health, which com-
pelled him for several years to lead the life of an invalid,
partly because of his premature death, partly, perhaps,
because of the very grandeur of the scale on which he
worked, he was unable to give the final revision to
many of his writings. His collected works have been
published posthumously. The last of them, based on
notes taken by his students from lectures given at
Munich, has appeared in English under the title of
General Economic History}

' Max Weber, General Economic History, trans. Frank H. Knight,
Ph.D. (George Allen & Unwin). A bibliography of Weber's writings is

1(a)

The Protestant Ethic and the Spirit of Capitalism

f The Protestant Ethic and the Spirit of Capitalism was
published in the form of two articles in the Archiv für
Sozialwissenschaft und Sozialpolitik in 1904 and 1905.)
Together with a subsequent article, which appeared
in 1906, on The Protestant Sects and the Spirit of
Capitalism^ they form the first of the studies contained
in Weber's Gesammelte Aufsätze zur Religionssoziologie.
On their first appearance they aroused an interest which
extended beyond the ranks of historical specialists, and
which caused the numbers of the Archiv in which they
were published to be sold out with a rapidity not very
usual in the case of learned publications. The discussion
which they provoked has continued since then with
undiminished vigour. For the questions raised by
Weber possess a universal significance, and the method
of his essay was as important as its conclusions. It not
only threw a brilliant light on the particular field which
it explored, but suggested a new avenue of approach to
a range of problems of permanent interest, which
concern, not merely the historian and the economist,
but all who reflect on the deeper issues of modern
society.

The question which Weber attempts to answer is
simple and fundamental. It is that of the psychological
conditions which made possible the development of
capitalist civilization. Capitalism, in the sense of great
individual undertakings, involving the control of large
financial resources, and yielding riches to their masters

printed at the end of the charming and instructive account of him
by his widow, Max Weber, Ein Lebensbild, von Marianna Weber
(J. C. B. Mohr, Tübingen, 1926), See also tlconomistes et Historiens:
Max Weber, un komme, une ceuvre, pqr Maurice Halbwachs, in
Annales d'Histoire ^conomique et Sociale, No. i, January, 1929.

i(b)

Foreword

as a result of speculation, money-lending, commercial
enterprise, buccaneering and war, is as old as history.
Capitalism, as an economic system, resting on the V^cxUr
organisation of legally free wage-earners, for the purpose
of pecuniary profit, by the owner of capital or his agents,
and setting its stamp on every aspect of society, is a
modern phenomenon.

All revolutions are declared to be natural and
inevitable, once they are successful, and capitalism, as
the type of economic system prevailing in Western
Europe and America, is clothed to-day with the
unquestioned respectability of the triumphant fact.
But in its youth it was a pretender, and it was only
after centuries of struggle that its title was established-»
For it involved a code of economic conduct and
a system of human relations which were sharply
at variance with venerable conventions, with the
accepted scheme of social ethics, and with the law,
both of the church and of most European states. So
questionable an innovation demanded of the pioneers
who first experimented with it as much originality,
self-confidence, and tenacity of purpose as is required
to-day of those who would break from the net that it
has woven. What influence nerved them to defy
tradition? From what source did they derive the
-^principles to repKce it ? " '^ i

The conventional answer to these questions is to
deny their premises. The rise of new forms of economic
enterprise was the result, it is argued, of changes in
• the character of the economic environment. It was due
to the influx of the precious metals from America in
the sixteenth century, to the capital accumulated in

* 1(C)

The Protestant Ethic and the Spirit of Capitalism

extra-European commerce, to the reaction of expanding
markets on industrial organisation, to the growth of
population, to technological improvements made pos-
sible by the progress of natural science, Weber's reply,
which is developed at greater length in his General
Economic History than in the present essay, is that such
explanations confuse causes and occasions. Granted
that the economic conditions of the sixteenth and
seventeenth centuries were, in some respects, though by
no means in all, unusually favourable to an advance in
economic technique, such conditions had existed from
time to time in the past without giving birth to the
development of capitalist industry. In many of the
regions affected by them no such development took
place, nor were those which enjoyed the highest
economic civilization necessarily those in which the
new order found its most congenial environment. The
France of Louis XIV commanded resources which,
judged by the standards of the age, were immense, but
they were largely dissipated in luxury and war^The
"America of theeTghteertth CiJfltUty was economically
primitive, but it is in the maxims of Franklin that the
spirit of bourgeois capitalism, which, rather than the
grandiose schemes of mercantilist statesmen, was to
dominate the future, finds, Weber argues, its naivest
and most lucid expression.

To appeal, as an explanation, to the acquisitive
nstincts, is even less pertinent, for there is little reason
to suppose that they have been more powerful during
'?!k.the last fe\y centuries than in earlier ages. "The notion
that our rationalistic and capitalistic age is characterised
by a stronger economic interest than other periods is

i(d)

Foreword

childish. The moving spirits of modern capitaUsm are
not possessed of a stronger economic impulse than, for
example, an Oriental trader. The unchaining of the
economic interest, merely as such, has produced only
irrational results: such men as Cortes and Pizarro,
who were, perhaps, its strongest embodiment, were far
from having an idea of a rationalistic economic life." '
The word "rationalism" is used by Weber as a term
of art, to describe an economic system based, not on
custom or tradition, but on the deliberate and systematic
adjustment of economic means to the attainment of the
objective of pecuniary profit. The question is why this
temper triiimphed^ver the conventional attitude which
had regarded the appetitus divitiarum infijiitus — ^the
unlimited lust for gain — as anti-social and immoral.^
His answer is that it was the result of movements
which had their source in the religious revolution of
the sixteenth century.

Weber wrote as a scholar, not as a propagandist,
and there is no trace in his work of the historical ani-
mosities which still warp discussions of the effects of
the Reformation J Professor Pirenne,^ in an illuminating ^
essay, has argued that social progress springs from
below, and that each new phase of economic develop-
ment is the creation, not of strata long in possession of
wealth and power, but of classes which rise from
humble origins to build a new structure on obscure
foundations. The thesis of Weber is somewhat similar.

' Weber, General Economic History, trans. Frank H. Knight,
PP- 355-6.

* Henri Pirenne, Les P^riodes de VHistoire Sociale du Capitalisme
(Hayez, Brussels, 1914).

1(e)

The Protestant Ethic and the Spirit of Capitalism

The pioneers of the modern economic order were, he

,] argues, parvenus y who elbowed their way to success in

the teeth of the established aristocracy of land and

commerce. The tonic that braced them for the conflict

was a new copcf^pti^^" ^f rpliginn^ wKi^ih taught them

to rpgrard the_purs,ijjt^ pf wealth as, not merely an

.^acLvantage^ but a_ duty. This conception welded into

a disciplined force the still feeble bourgeoisie ^ heightened

its energies, and cast a halo of sanctification round its

LjConvenient vices. What is significant, in short, is not

T^ the strength of the motive of economic self-interest,

^ which is the commonplace of all ages and demands no]

1! explanation. It is the change of moral standards which

converted a natural frailty into an ornament of the

spirit, and canonized as the economic virtues habits

which in earlier ages had been ^

1 The force which produced it was the creed associated
V \s^ith the name of Calvin. Capitalism was the social
{^ .counterpart of Calvinist theology.

"X The central idea to which Weber appeals in con-
firmation of his theory is expressed in the characteristic
phrase **a calling." For Luther, as for most mediaeval
theologians, it had normally meant the state of life in
which the individual had been set bv Heaven, and

(

against which it was impious to rebel. 'l"o the Calvinist,
Weber argues, the calling is not a condition in which
the individual is born, but a strenuous and exacting
enterprise to be chosen bj^himself , and to be pursued
with a sense of rehgimis responsihihty. Baptized in the
bracing, if icy, waters of Calvinist theology, the life
of business, once regarded as perilous to the soul —
summe periculosa est emptionis et venditionis negotiatio —
2

Foreword

acquires a new sanctity. Labout-js_-QüL.03erely an
economic means : it is a spiritual end. Covetousness^ if '>^
2l danger to the^oul, is a less formidable menace than
sloth. So far from poverty being melito^rious, it is a
duty to choose the more profitable occupation. So far "/
Ifoift-there^beingan inevitableconflict between money-
making_and43iety Tthey^are^ natural^ alJl^ for the virtues
incumbent on the elect — diligence, thriit^ sobriety,
prudence — are the_jnost reliable passporL to com-
mercial_2ros2erity. Thus the pursuit of riches, which ^
once had been fe3red^;aSLllit:_iUieiy]f;;;5|HP&l4gion , was I
now_3:dcmn£d.-_.as_Jts__ally--^The habits "and^insti-
tutions in which that philosophy found expression
survived long after the creed which was their parent
had expired, or had withdrawn from Europe to more
congenial cn^es.' If capitalism begins as the practical
idealism of the aspiring bourgeoisie , it ends, Weber
suggests in his concluding pages, as an orgy of
materialism.

Un England the great industry grew by gradual ^
increments over a period of centuries, and, since the
English class system had long been based on differences
of wealth, not of juristic status, there was no violent
contrast between the legal foundations of the old order /)
and the new. Hence in England the conception of ^, <^
capitalism as a distinct and peculiar phase of social *^%i, '
development has not readily been accepted. It is still ^^ -^
possible for writers, who in their youth have borne
^ with equanimity instruction on the meaning of feudal- ^ -
ism, to dismiss capitalism as an abstraction of theorists
or a catchword of politicians.

The Protestant Ethic and the Spirit of Capitalism

The economic history of the Continent has moved
by different stages from that of England, and the
categories employed by Continental thinkers have
accordingly been different. In France, where the
•site on which the modern economic system was to
be erected was levelled by a cataclysm, and in
Germany, which passed in the fifty years between
1850 and 1900 through a development that in England
had occupied two hundred, there has been little
temptation to question that capitalist civilization is a
phenomenon differing, not merely in degree, but in
kind, from the social order preceding it. It is not
surprising, therefore, that its causes and characteristics
should have been one of the central themes of historical
study in both. The discussion began with the epoch-
making work of Marx, who was greater as a sociologist
than as an economic theorist, and continues unabated.
Its most elaborate monument is Sombart's Der Modertie
Kapitalismus.

The first edition of Sombart's book appeared in 1902.
Weber's articles, of which the first was published two
years later, were a study of a single aspect of the same
problem. A whole literature ^ has arisen on the subject

* See, in particular, the following: E. Troeltsch, Die Sozialen Lehren
der christlichen Kirchen und Gruppen (1912); F. Rachfahl, Kalvinismus
und Kapitalismus {Internationale Wochenschrift, 1909, i. III); B. L.
Brentano, Die Anfänge des Modernen Kapitalismus (1916) and Der
Wirthschaftende Mensch in der Geschichte (191 1); W. Sombart, Die
Juden und das Wirthschaftslehen (191 1 . Eng. trans. The Jews and Modern
Capitalism, 1913), and Der Bourgeois (1913. Eng. trans. The Quint-
essence of Modern Capitalism, 1915); G. v. Schulze-Gaevernitz,
" Die Geistesgeschichtlichen Grundlagen der Anglo- Amerikanischen
Weltsuprematie. III. Die Wirthschaftsethik des Kapitalismus"
{Archiv für Sozialwissenschaft und Sozialpolitik, Bd. 61, Heft 2);
H. S^e, *' Dans quelle mesure Puritains et Juifs ont-ils contribuö au
Progres du Capitalisme Moderne?" {Revue Historique, t. CLV, 1927)

.11

I Foreword

discussed in them. How does Weber's thesis stand
to-day, after a quarter of a century of research and
criticism ?

The interpretation of rehgious beHefs and social
institutions as different expressions of a common
psychological attitude, which Weber elaborated in his
Aufsätze zur Religionssociologie^ is no longer so novel
as when he advanced it. Once stated, indeed, it has the
air of a platitude. The capacity of human beings to
departmentalize themselves is surprising, but it is not
unlimited. It is obvious that, in so far as doctrines as
to man's place in the universe are held with conviction,
they will be reflected in the opinions formed of the
nature of the social order most conducive to well-being,
and that the habits moulded by the pressure of the
economic environment' will in turn set their stamp on
religion . Nor can Weber's contention be disputed that
Calvinism, at least in certain phases of its history, was
associated with an attitude to questions of social
ethics which contemporaries regarded as peculiarly its
own. Its critics attacked it as the sanctimonious ally of
commercial sharp practice. Its admirers applauded it

and Les Origines du Capitalisme Moderne (igzb) ; M. Halbwachs, " Les
Origines Puritaines du Capitalisme Moderne " (Revue d'histoire et
Philosophie religieuses, March-April 1925) and "ficonomistes et His-
toriens : Max Weber, une vie, un ceuvre " (Annales d'Histoire Eco-
nomique et Sociale, No. i, 1929); H, Häuser, Les Debuts du Capitalisme
Moderne (igzj); H. G. Wood, "The Influence of the Reformation
on ideas concerning Wealth and Property," in Property, its Rights
and Duties (1913); Talcott Parsons, " Capitalism in Recent German
Literature" (Journal of Political Economy, December 1928 and
February 1929); Frank H. Knight, "Historical and Theoretical
Issues in the Problem of Modern Capitalism" (Journal of Economic
and Business History, November 1928); Kemper Fulberton, "Cal-
vinism and Capitalism" (Harvard Theological Reviezv, July, 1928).

5

The Protestant Ethic and the Spirit of Capitalism

as the school of the economic virtues. By the middle of
the seventeenth century the contrast between the social
conservatism of Catholic Europe and the strenuous
enterprise of Calvinist communities had become a
commonplace. "There is a kind of natural inaptness,"
wrote a pamphleteer in 1671, "in the Popish religion
to business, whereas, on the contrary, among the
Reformed, the greater their zeal, the greater their
inclination to trade and industry, as holding idleness
unlawful." The influence of Calvinism was frequently
adduced as one explanation of the economic prosperity
of Holland. The fact that in England the stronghold
of Nonconformity was the commercial classes was an
argument repeatedly advanced for tolerating Non-
conformists. .

/ In cmphasTzingrtherefore, the connection betwee^

religious radicalism and economic progress, Webei
called attention to an interesting phenomenon, atP
which previous writers had hinted, but which none,
had yet examined with the same wealth of learning and|-
philosophical insight. (The significance"to~be'äscnbedto
it, and, in particulaf;ihe relation of Calvinist influences
to the other forces making for economic innovation,
is a different and more difficult question. His essay
was confined to the part played by religious movements
in creating conditions favourable to the growth of a
new type of economic civilization, and he is careful to
guard himself against the criticism that* he under-
estimates the importance of the parallel developments
in the world of commerce, finance, and industry.
It is obvious, however, that, until the latter have been
examined, it is not possible to determine the weight to
6

1

Foreword

be assigned to the former. It is arguable, at least, that,
instead of Calvinism producing the spirit of Capitalism, ,/
both would with equal plausibility be regarded as
different effects of changes in economic organisation
and social structure.

It is the temptation of one who expounds a new and
fruitful idea to use it as a key to unlock all doors,
and to explain by reference to a single principle
phenomena which are, in reality, the result of several
converging causes ."^~Weber's essay is not altogether
free, perhaps, from the defects of its qualities. It
appears occasionally to be somewhat over-subtle in'
ascribing to intellectual and moral influences develop-
ments which were the result of more prosaic and
mundane forces, and which appeared, irrespective of
the character of religious creeds, wherever external
conditions offered them a congenial environment. /
"Capitalism" itself is an ambiguous, if indispensable,
word, and Weber's interpretation of it seems sometimes
to be open to the criticism of Professor See,^ that he
simplifies and limits its meaning to suit the exigencies
of his argument. There was no lack of the "capitalist
spirit" in the Venice and Florence of the fourteenth
century, or in the Antwerp of the fifteenth. Its develop-
ment in Holland and England, it might not unreason-
ably be argued, had less to do with the fact that they,
or certain social strata in them, accepted the Calvinist
version of the Reformation, than with large economic
movements and the social changes produced by them.

t ' H. S^e, " Dans quelle mesure Puritains et Juifs ont-ils contribu^
|au Progrfes Capitalisme Moderne?" {Revue Historique, t. CLV,
ii927).

' 7

The Protestant Ethic and the Spirit of Capitalism

**Ce que MM. Weber et Troeltsch," writes Professor
Pirenne,» "prennent pour I'esprit Calviniste, c'est
precisement I'esprit des hommes nouveaux que la
revolution economique du temps introduit dans la
vie des affaires, et qui s'y opposent aux traditionalistes
auxquels ils se substituent." Why insist that causation
can work in only one direction ? Is it not a little artificial
to suggest that capitalist enterprise had to wait, as
Weber appears to imply, till religious changes had
produced a capitalist spirit? Would it not be equally
plausible, and equally one-sided, to argue that the
religious changes were themselves merely the result of
economic movements ?

If Weber, as was natural in view of his approach to
the problem, seems to lay in the present essay some-
what too exclusive an emphasis upon intellectual and
ethical forces, his analysis of those forces themselves
requires, perhaps, to be supplemented. Brentano 's
criticism, that the political thought of the Renaissance
was as powerful a solvent of conventional restraints as
the teaching of Calvin, is not without weight. In
England, at any rate, the speculations of business men
and economists as to money, prices, and the foreign
exchanges, which were occasioned by the recurrent
financial crises of the sixteenth century and by the
change in the price level, were equally effective in
undermining the attitude which Weber called tradi-
tionalism. Recent studies of the development of
economic thought suggest that the change of opinion
on economic ethics ascribed to Calvinism was by no

' H. Pirenne, Les Periodes de VHistoire Sociale du Capitalisme
(1914). 2

8

Foreword

means confined to it, but was part of a general intel-
lectual movement, which was reflected in the outlook
of Catholic, as well as of Protestant, writers. Nor was
the influence of Calvinist teaching itself so uniform in
character, or so undeviating in tendency, as might be
inferred by the reader of Weber's essay. On the
contrary, it varied widely from period to period and
coimtry to country, with differences of economic
conditions, social tradition, and political environment.
It looked to the past as well as to the future. If in
some of its phases it was on the side of change, in
others it was conservative.

Most of Weber's illustrations of his thesis are drawn
from the writings of English Puritans of the latter
part of the seventeenth century. It is their teaching
which supplies him with the materials for his picture of
the pious bourgeois conducting his business as a calling
to which Providence has summoned the elect. Whether
the idea conveyed by the word "calling" is so peculiar
to Calvinism as Weber implies is a question for
theologians; but the problem, it may be suggested,
is considerably more complex than his treatment of it
suggests. For three generations of economic develop-
ment and political agitation lay between these writers
and the author of the Institutes. The Calvinism which
fought the English Civil War, still more the Calvinism
which won an uneasy toleration at the Revolution, was
not that of its founder.

Calvin's own ideal of social organization Is revealed
by the system which he erected at Geneva. It had been

/heocracy administered by a dictatorship of ministers.

I "the most perfect school of Christ ever seen on

c 9

4

The Protestant Ethic and the Spirit of Capitalism

earth since the day of the Apostles", the rule of life
had been an iron collectivism. A godly discipline had
been the aim of Knox, of the Reformed Churches in
France, and of the fathers of the English Presbyterian
Movement; while a strict control of economic enter-
prise had been the policy first pursued by the saints
in New England. The Calvinism, both of England
and Holland, in the seventeenth century, had found its
way to a different position. It had discovered a com-
promise in which a juster balance was struck between
prosperity and salvation, and, while retaining the
theology of the master, it repudiated his scheme of
social ethics. Persuaded that "godliness hath the
promise of this life, as well as of the life to come," it
resisted, with sober intransigeance, the interference in
matters of business both of the state and of divines.
It is this second, individualistic phase of Calvinism,
rather than the remorseless rigours of Calvin himself,
which may plausibly be held to have affinities with the
temper called by Weber "the spirit of Capitalism."
The question which needs investigation is that of the
causes which produced a change of attitude so con-
venient to its votaries and so embarrassing to their
pastors.

It is a question which raises issues that are not
discussed at length in Weber's essay, though, doubtless,
he was aware of them. Taking as his theme, not the
conduct of Puritan capitalists, but the doctrines of
Puritan divines, he pursues a single line of inquiry
with masterly ingenuity. His conclusions are illuminat-
ing; but they are susceptible, it may perhaps be heid,
of more than one interpretation. There was action j^nd

10

)

Foreword

reaction, and, while Puritanism helped to mould the
social order, it was, inits turn» jnoulded_by it. It is
instructive to "'fFaCeT'with Weber, the influence of
religious ideas on economic development. It is not less
important to grasp the effect of the economic arrange-
ments accepted by an age on the opinion which it holds
of the province of religion.

R. H. TAWNEY

74.

^

///

II

AUTHOR'S INTRODUCTION

A PRODUCT of modern European civilization, studying
any problem of universal history, is bound to ask him-
self to ^hat ^combination of circumstances the fact
should be attributed that in Western civilization, and in
Western civilization only, cultural phenomena have
appeared which(äs we like to think) lie in a line~of
development having^ universal significance and value.

Only in the West does science exist at a stage of
development which we recognize to-day as valid.
Knrpiriral knowledge, reflection on problems of the
cosmos and of life, philosophical and theological
wisdom of the most profound sort, are not confined to
it. thougiTm the case of Ihe last the full development of
a_§ystematic theology must be credited to Christianity
under the influence of Hellenism, since there were
only fragments m Islam and in a few Indian sects. In
short, knowledge and observation of great refinement
have existed elsewhere, above all in India, China,
Babylonia, Egypt. But in Babylonia and elsewhere
astronomy lacked — ^which makes its development all
the more astounding — ^the mathematical foundation
which it first received from the Greeks. The Indian
geometry had no rational proof; that was another
product of the Greek intellect, also the creator of
mechanics and physics. The Indian natural sciences,
though well developed in observation, lacked the
method of experiment, which was, apart from begin-
nings in antiquity, essentially a product of the
Renaissance, as was the modern laboratory. Hence
medicine, especially in India, though highly developed

13

The Protestant Ethic and the Spirit of Capitalism

in empirical technique, lacked a biological and par-
ticularly a biochemical foundation. A rational chemistry
has been absent from all areas of culture except the
West.

The highly developed historical scholarship of China
did not have the method of Thucydides. Machiavelli,
it is true, had predecessors in India; but all Indian
political thought was lacking in a systematic method
comparable to that of Aristotle, and, indeed, in the
possession of rational concepts. Not all the anticipa-
tions in India (School of Mimamsa), nor the extensive
codification especially in the Near East, nor all the
Indian and other books of law, had the strictly syste-
matic forms of thought, so essential to a rational juris-
prudence, of the Roman law and of the Western law
under its influence. A structure like the canon law is
known only to the West.

A similar statement is true of art. The musical ear
of other peoples has probably been even more sensi-
tively developed than our own, certainly not less so.
Polyphonic music of various kinds has been widely
distributed over the earth. The co-operation of a
number of instruments and also the singing of parts
have existed elsewhere. All our rational tone intervals
have been known and calculated. But rational har-
monious music, both counterpoint and harmony,
formation of the tone material on the basis of three
triads with the harmonic third; our chromatics and
enharmonics, not interpreted in terms of space, but,
since the Renaissance, of harmony; our orchestra, with
its string quartet as a nucleus, and the organization of
ensembles of wind instruments; our bass accompani-

14

Author's Introduction

ment; our system of notation, which has made possible
the composition and production of modem musical
works, and thus their very survival; our sonatas,
symphonies, operas; and finally, as means to all these,
our fundamental instruments, the organ, piano, violin,
etc.; all these things are known only in the Occident,
although programme music, tone poetry, alteration of
tones and chromatics, have existed in various musical
traditions as means of expression.

In architecture, pointed arches have been used else-
where as a means of decoration, in antiquity and in
Asia ; presumably the combination of pointed arch and
cross-arched vault was not unknown in the Orient.
But the rational use of the Gothic vault as a means of
distributing pressure and of roofing spaces of all
forms, and above all as the constructive principle of
great monumental buildings and the foundation of a
style extending to sculpture and painting, such as that
created by our Middle Ages, does not occur elsewhere.
The technical basis of our architecture came from the
Orient. But the Orient lacked that solution of the
problem of the dome and that type of classic rational-
ization of all art — in painting by the rational utilization
of lines and spatial perspective — which the Renaissance
created for us. There was printing in China. But a
printed literature, designed only for print and only
possible through it, and, above all, the Press and
periodicals, have appeared only in the Occident.
Institutions of higher education of all possible types,,
even some superficially similar to our universities, or
at least academies, have existed (China, Islam). But a
rational, systematic, and specialized pursuit of science,

^ IS

The Protestant Ethic and the Spirit of Capitalism

with trained and specialized personnel, has^ only
existed in the West in a sense at all approaching its
present dominant place in our culture. Above all is
this true of the trained official, the pillar of both the
modern State and of the economic life- of the West.
He forms a type of which there have heretofore only
been suggestions, which have never remotely ap-
proached its present importance for the social order.
Of course the official, even the specialized official, is a
very old constituent of the most various societies. But
no country and no age has ever experienced, in the
same sense as the modern Occident, the absolute and
complete dependence of its whole existence, of the
political, technical, and economic conditions of its life,
on a specially trained organization of officials. The
most important functions of the everyday life of
society have come to be in the hands of technically,
commercially, and above all legally trained govern-
ment officials.

Organization of political and social groups in feudal
classes has been common. But even the feudal^ state
of rex et regnum in the Western sense has only been
known to our culture. Even more are parliaments of
periodically elected representatives, with government
by demagogues and party leaders as ministers respon-
sible to the parliaments, peculiar to us, although there
have, of course, been parties, in the sense of organiza-
tions for exerting influence and gaining control of
political power, all over the world. In fact, the State
itself, in the sense of a political association with a
ra tional, written constitution, rationally ordained law,
anvd an administration bound to rational rules or laws,
i6'

Introduction

administered by trained officials, is known, in this
combination of characteristics, only in the Occident,
despite all other approaches to it.

^And the same is true of the most fateful force in our
nioaern life, capitalism. The impulse to arqnisitinn, ,
pursuit_of gain, of money, of the, grpatpst pngsjhlp
amount "f money^ has in itself nothing to do with
capitalismj^his impulse exists and has existed among
waiters, physicians, coachmen, artists, prostitutes, dis-
honest officials, soldiers, nobles, crusaders, gamblers, ^
and beggars. One may say that it has been common to ■^'
all sorts and conditions of men at all times f^pH \n nÜ '^^
cniintries nf the f^arth, whprf^vpr thf^ nKj^Ptlye possi-
bility ^f it jp or has b^^n givfn It^should be taught in
the kindergarten of cultural history that this naive id^a
oTcäpitalism must be given up once and for all. Un-
limited jgreed for gain is not in the least identical with
capitalismj ?inH i« still less its spirit- Papitplism mny
even be identical with thp r^Qt-ramtj nr at |pQgt ^ rM\^^?\

tempering^ of this irrational impulse. \But capitalism i^ /^
identical with the pursuit of profit, and forever renewed\
profit, by means of continuous, rational, capitalistic
eaterprisei-For it must be so: in a wholly capitalistic
order of society, an individual capitalistic enterprise
which did not take advantage of its opportunities for
profit-making would be doomed to extinction.
( Let us now define our terms sornewhat_more care.-
fully than is generally done. We will define a capitalistic
economic flrtinn~äR~nnp"whirh rests on the expectation
of profit by the utilization of opportunities for exchange,
that is on (formally) peaceful chances of profit. Acqui-
sition by force (formally and actually) follows its own

17

The Protestant Ethic and the Spirit of Capitalism

particular laws, and it is not expedient, however little
one can forbid this, to place it in the same category
with action which is, in the last analysis, oriented to
profits from exchange. ^ Where capitalistic acquisition
is rationally pursued, the corresponding action is
adjusted to calculations in terms of capital. This means
that the action is adapted to a systematic utilization of
goods or personal services as means of acquisition in
such a way that, at the close of a business period, the
balance of the enterprise in money assets (or, in
the case of a continuous enterprise, the periodically
estimated money value of assets) exceeds the capital,
i.e. the estimated value of the material "^eans
of production used for acquisition in exchange. It
makes no difference whether it involves a quantity
of goods entrusted in natura to a travelling merchant,
the proceeds of which may consist in other goods in
natura acquired by trade, or whether it involves a
manufacturing enterprise, the assets of which consist
of buildings, machinery, cash, raw materials, partly
and wholly manufactured goods, which are balanced
against liabilities. The important fact is always that a
calculation of capital in terms of money is made,
whether by modern book-keeping methods or in any
other way, however primitive and crude. Everything
is done in terms of balances : at the beginning of the
enterprise an initial balance, before every individual
decision a calculation to ascertain its probable profit-
ableness, and at the end a final balance to ascertain
how much profit has been made. For instance, the
initial balances of a commenda ^ transaction would
determine an agreed money value of the assets put into
i8

Introduction

it (so far as they were not in money form already), and
a final balance would form the estimate on which
to base the distribution of profit and loss at the end.
So far as the transactions are rational, calculation under-
lies every smgle action oi the partners. 1 hat a really
accurate calculation or estimate may not exist, that the
procedure is pure guess-work, or simply traditional and
conventional, happens even to-day in every form of
capitalistic enterprise where the circumstances do
not demand strict accuracy. But these are points
affecting only the degree of rationality of capitalistic
acquisition.

For the purpose of this conception all that matters is
that an actual adaptation of economic action to a com-
parison of money income with money expenses takes
place, no matter how primitive the form. Now in this
sense capitalism^ and capitalistic enterprises, even
with a considerable rationalization of capitalistic calcu-
lation, have existed in all civilized countries of the
earth, so far as economic documents permit us to
judge. In China, India, Babylon, Egypt, Mediterranean
antiquity, and the Middle Ages, as well as in modem
times. These were not merely isolated ventures, but
economic enterprises which were entirely dependent
on the continual renewal of capitalistic undertakings,
and even continuous operations. However, trade espe-
cially was for a long time not continuous like our
own, but consisted essentially in a series of individual
undertakings. Only gradually did the activities of even
the large merchants acquire an inner cohesion (with
branch organizations, etc.). In any case, the capitalistic
enterprise and the capitalistic entrepreneur, not only

19

The Protestant Ethic and the Spirit of Capitalism

as occasional but as regular entrepreneurs, are very old
and were very widespread.

Now, however, the Occident has developed capital-
ism both to a quantitative extent, and (carrying this
quantitative development) in types, forms, and direc-
tions which have never existed elsewhere. All over the
world there have been merchants, wholesale and retail,
local and engaged in foreign trade. Loans of all kinds
have been made, and there have been banks with the
most various functions, at least comparable to ours of,
say, the sixteenth century. Sea loans,* commenda^ and
transactions and associations similar to the Kom-
manditgesellschaft y^ have all been widespread, even as
continuous businesses. Whenever money finances of
public bodies have existed, money- lenders have ap-
peared, as in Babylon, Hellas, India, China, Rome.
They have financed wars and piracy, contracts and
building operations of all sorts. In overseas policy they
have functioned as colonial entrepreneurs, as planters
with slaves, or directly or indirectly forced labour, and
have farmed domains, offices, and, above all, taxes.
They have financed party leaders in elections and
condottieri in civil wars. And, finally, they have been
speculators in chances for pecuniary gain of all kinds.
This kind of entrepreneur, the capitalistic adventurer,
has existed everywhere. Withjthejexception of trade
and credit and banking transactions, their activities'
were predominantly of an irrational and speculative
character, or directed to acquisition by force, above all
the acquisition of booty, whether directly in war or in
the form of continuous fiscal booty by exploitation of
subjects.

20

Introduction

The capitalism of promoters, large-scale speculators,
concession hunters, and much modern financial capital-
ism even in peace time, but, above all, the capitalism
especially concerned with exploiting wars, bears this
stamp even in modern Western countries, and some, /
but only some, parts of large-scale international trade ^ ^
are closely related to it, to-day as alwa^» '■c^/ö/w j^

But in modem times the Occident^nas developed, in U>
addition to this, a very different form of capitalism /-/e^'^
which has appeared nowhere else : the rational capital-
istic organization of (formally) free labour. Only
suggestions of it are found elsewhere. Even the organ-
ization of unfree labour reached a considerable degree
of rationality only on plantations and to a very limited
extent in the Ergasteria of antiquity. In the manors,
manorial workshops, and domestic industries on estates
with serf labour it was probably somewhat less devel-
oped. Even real domestic industries with free labour
have definitely been proved to have existed in only a
few isolated cases outside the Occident. The frequent
use of day labourers led in a very few cases — especially
State monopolies, which are, however, very different from
modern industrial organization — to manufacturing organ-
izations, but never to a rational organization of apprentice-
ship in the handicrafts like that of our Middle Ages.

^Rational industrial organization, attuned to a regular
market7^nd neither to political nor irrationally specu-
lative opportunities for profit, is not, however, the only
peculiarity of Western capitalism. The modern rational
organization of the capitalistic enterprise would not
have been possible without two other important factors
in its development: tJie separation of business from ^'^

21

The Protestant Ethic and the Spirit of Capitalism

the household, which completely dominates modem
economic life, and closely connected with it, rational
book-keeping. A spatial separation of places of work
from those of residence exists elsewhere, as in the
Oriental bazaar and in the ergasteria of other cultures.
The development of capitalistic associations with their
own accounts is also found in the Far East, the Near
East, and in antiquity. But compared to the modern
independence of business enterprises, those are only
small beginnings. The reason for this was particularly
that the indispensable requisites for this independence,
our rational business book-keeping and our legal
separation of corporate from personal property, were
entirely lacking, or had only begun to develop.^ The
tendency everywhere else was for acquisitive enterprises
to arise as parts of a royal or manorial household (of
the oikos), which is, as Rodbertus has perceived, with
all its superficial similarity, a fundamentally different,
even opposite, development.

However, all these peculiarities of Western capitalism
have derived their significance in the last analysis only
from their association with the capitalistic organization
of labour. Even what is generally called commercializa-
tion, the development of negotiable securities and the
rationalization of speculation, the exchanges, etc., is
connected with it. For without the rational capitalistic
organization of labour,, all this, so far as it was possible
at all, would have nothing like the same significance,
above all for the social structure and all the specific
problems of the modem Occident connected with it.
Exact calculation — the basis of everything else — is only
possible on a basis of free labour.'

22

Introduction

And just as, or rather because, the world has known
no rational organization of labour outside the modern
Occident, it has known no rational socialism. Of course,
there has been civic economy, a civic food-supply
policy, mercantilism and welfare policies of princes,
rationing, regulation of economic life, protectionism,
and laissez-faire theories (as in China). The world has
also known socialistic and communistic experiments of
various sorts : family, religious, or military communism,
State socialism (in Egypt), monopolistic cartels, and
consumers' organizations. But although there have
everywhere been civic market privileges, companies,
guilds, and all sorts of legal differences between town
and country, the concept of the citizen has not existed
outside the Occident, and that of the bourgeoisie
outside the modern Occident. Similarly, the proletariat
as a class could not exist, because there was no rational
organization of free labour under regular discipline.
Qlass_struggles between creditor and debtor classes;
landowners and the landless, serfs, or tenants; trading
interests and consumers or landlords, have existed
everywhere in various combinations. But even the
Western mediaeval struggles between putters-out and
their workers exist elsewhere only in beginnings. The
modern conflict of the large-scale industrial entre-
preneur and free-wage labourers was entirely lacking.
And thus there could be no such problems as those
of socialism.

Hence in a universal history of culture the central
problem for us is not, in the last analysis, even from a
purely economic view-point, the development of capital-
istic activity as such, differing in different cultures only

23

The Protestant Ethic and the Spirit of Capitalism

in form: the adventurer type, or capitalism in trade,
war, politics, or administration as sources of gain. It is

(rather the origin of this sober bourgeois capitalism with
its rational organization of free labour. Or in terms of
/cultural history, the problem is that of the origin of

/ the Western bourgeois class and of its peculiarities, a

\ problem which is certainly closely connected with that
of the origin of the capitalistic organization of labour,
but is not quite the same thing. For the bourgeois as a
class existed prior to the development of the peculiar
modern form of capitalism, though, it is true, only in
the Western hemisphere.

Now the peculiar modern Western form of capitalism
has been, at first sight, strongly influenced by the
development of technical possibilities. Its rationality is
to-day essentially dependent on the calculability of the
most important technical factors. But this means
fundamentally that it is dependent on the peculiarities
of modern science, especially the natural sciences based
on mathematics and exact and rational experiment. On
the other hand, the development of these sciences and
of the technique resting upon them now receives
important stimulation from these capitalistic interests
in its practical economic application. It is true that the
origin of Western science cannot be attributed to such
interests. Calculation, even with decimals, and algebra
have been carried on in India, where the decimal

/ system was invented. But it was only made use of by
developing capitalism in the West, while in India it

, led to no modern arithmetic or book-keeping. Neither
was the origin of mathematics and mechanics deter-
mined by capitalistic interests. But the technical utilizsL' )f
24 —

Introduction

tion of scientific knowledge, so important for the living
conditions of the mass of people, was certainly encour- I
aged by economic considerations, which were extremely '
favourable to it in the Occident. Bui this encourage-
ment was derived from the peculiarities of the social
structure of the Occident. We must hence ask, from
what parts of that structure was it derived, since not
all of them have been of equal importance ?

Among those of undoubted importance are the
rational structures of law and of administration. Fori-
modern rational capitalism has need, not only of the
technical means of production, but of a calculable legal
system and of administration in terms of formal rules.
Without it adventurous and speculative trading capital-
ism and all sorts of politically determined capitalisms
are possible, but no rational enterprise under individual
initiative, with fixed capital and certainty of calculations.
Such a legal system and such administration have been
available for economic activity in a comparative state of
legal and formalistic perfection only in the Occident.
We must hence inquire where that law came from.
Among other circumstances, capitalistic interests häve|
in turn undoubtedly also helped, but by no means alone |
nor even principally, to prepare the way for the pre-
dominance in law and administration of a class of jurists
specially trained in rational law. But these interests
did not themselves create that law. Quite different forces
were at work in this development. And why did not the
capitalistic interests do the same in China or India?
Why- did not the scientific, the artistic, the political, or
the economic development there enter upon that path ,
of rationalization which is peculiar to the Occident? y

25'

The Protestant Ethic and the Spirit of Capitalism

For in all the above cases it is a question of the
specific and peculiar rationalism of Western culture.
Now by this term very different things may be under-
stood, as the following discussion will repeatedly show.
There is, for example, rationalization' of mystical
contemplation, that is of an attitude which, viewed
from other departments of life, is specifically irrational,
just as much as there are rationalizations of economic
life, of technique, of scientific research, of military
training, of law and administration. Furthermore, each
one of these fields may be rationalized in terms of very
different ultimate values and ends, and what is rational
from one point of view may well be irrational from
another. Hence rationalizations of the most varied
character have existed in various departments of life
and in all areas of culture. To characterize their
differences from the view-point of cultural history it is
necessary to know what departments are rationalized,
and in what direction. It is hence our first concern
to work out and to explain genetically the special
peculiarity of Occidental rationalism, and within this
field that of the modern Occidental form. Every such
attempt at explanation must, recognizing the funda-
mental importance of the economic factor, above all
take account of the economic conditions. But at the
same time the opposite correlation must not be left
out of consideration. For though the development of
economic rationalism is partly dependent on rational
technique and law, it is at the same time determined
by the ability and disposition of men to adopt certain
types of practical rational condudt. When these types
have been obstructed by spiritual obstacles, the
26

Introduction

development of rational economic conduct has also
met serious inner resistance. The magical and religious
forces, and the ethical ideas of duty based upon them,
have in the past always been among the most important
formative influences on conduct. In the studies collected
here we shall be concerned with these forces.^

Two older essays have been placed at the beginning
whicE attempt, at one important point, to approach the
side of the problem which is generally most difficult to
grasp: the influence of certain religious ideas on the
development of aneconomic spirit ,_or the eitte of an
economic_system. In this case we are dealing with the
connection of the spirit of modern economic life with
the rational ethics of ascetic Protestantism. Thus we
treat here only one side of the causal chain. The later
studies on the Economic Ethics of the World Religions
attempt, in the form of a survey of the relations of the
most important religions to economic life and to the
social stratification of their environment, to follow out
both causal relationships, so far as it is necessary in
order to find points of comparison with the Occidental
development. For only in this way is it possible to
attempt a causal evaluation of those elements of the
economic ethics of the Western religions which differ-
entiate them from others, with a hope of attaining
even a tolerable degree of approximation. Hence these
' studies do not claim to be complete analyses of cultures,
however brief. On the contrary, in every culture they
quite deliberately emphasize the elements in which it
differs from Western civilization. They are, hence,
definitely oriented to the problems which seem im-
portant for the understanding of Western culture from

27

The Protestant Ethic and the Spirit of Capitalism

this view-point. With our object in view, any other
procedure did not seem possible. But to avoid mis-
understanding we must here lay special emphasis on
the limitation of our purpose.

In another respect the uninitiated at least must be
warned against exaggerating the importance of these
investigations. The Sinologist, the Indologist, the
Semitist, or the Egyptologist, will of course find no.
facts unknown to him. We only hope that he will find
nothing definitely wrong in points that are essential.
How far it has been possible to come as near this ideal
as a non-specialist is able to do, the author cannot know.
It is quite evident that anyone who is forced to rely on
translations, and furthermore on the use and evaluation
of monumental, documentary, or literary sources, has
to rely himself on a specialist literature which is often
highly controversial, and the merits of which he is
unable to judge accurately. Such a writer must make
modest claims for the value of his work. All the more
so since the number of available translations of relal
sources (that is, inscriptions and documents) is,
especially for China, still very small in comparison
with what exists and is important. From all this follows
the definitely provisional character of these studies,
and especially of the parts dealing with Asia.^ Only the
specialist is entitled to a final judgment. And, naturally,
it is only because expert studies with this special
purpose and from this particular view-point have not
hitherto been made, that the present ones have been
written at all. They are destined to be superseded in a
much more important sense than this can be said, as
it can be, of all scientific work. But however objection-
28

Introduction

able it may be, such trespassing on other special fields
cannot be avoided in comparative work. But one must
take the consequences by resigning oneself to con-
siderable doubts regarding the degree of one's success.

Fashion and the zeal of the literati would have
us think that the specialist can to-day be spared, or
degraded to a position subordinate to that of the seer.
Almost all sciences owe something to dilettantes, often
very valuable view-points. But dilettantism as a leading
principle would be the end of science. He who yearns
for seeing should go to the cinema, though it will be
offered to him copiously to-day in literary form in the
present field of investigation also.^® Nothing is farther
from the intent of these thoroughly serious studies than
such an attitude. And, I might add, whoever wants a
sermon should go to a conventicle. The question of the ,^
elative value of the cultures which are compared herg/

not receive a single word. It is true that the path
of human destiny cannot but appall him who surveys a
section of it. But he will do well to keep his small
personal commentaries to himself, as one does at the
sight of the sea or of majestic mountains, unless he
knows himself to be called and gifted to give them
expression in artistic or prophetic form. In most other
cases the voluminous talk about intuition does nothing
but conceal a lack of perspective toward the ob'ect,
which merits the same judgment as a similar lack of
perspective toward men.

Some justification is needed for the fact that ethno-
graphical material has not been utilized to anything
like the extent which the value of its contributions
naturally demands in any really thorough investigation,

29

•xelati
ywillj

The Protestant Ethic and the Spirit of Capitalism

especially of Asiatic religions. This limitation has not
only been imposed because human powers of work are
restricted. This omission has also seemed to be per-
missible because we are here necessarily dealing with
the religious ethics of the classes which were the culture-
bearers of their respective countries. We are concerned
with the influence which their conduct has had. Now it
is quite true that this can only be completely known in
all its details when the facts from ethnography and
folk-lore have been compared with it. Hence we must
expressly admit and emphasize that this is a gap to
which the ethnographer will legitimately object. I
hope to contribute something to the closing of this
gap in a systematic study of the Sociology of Religion .^^
But such an undertaking would have transcended the
limits of this investigation with its closely circumscribed
purpose. It has been necessary to be content with
bringing out the points of comparison with our Occi-
dental religions as well as possible.

Finally, we may make a reference to the anthropo-
logical side of the problem. When we find again and
again that, even in departments of life apparently
mutually independent, certain types of rationalization
have developed in the Occident, and only there, it
would be natural to suspect that the most important
reason lay in differences of heredity. The author admits
that he is inclined to think the importance of biological
heredity very great. But in spite of the notable achieve-
ments of anthropological research, I see up to the
present no way of exactly or even approximately
measuring either the extent or, above all, the form
of its influence on the development investigated here.
30

Introduction

It must be one of the tasks of sociological and historical
investigation first to analyse all the influences and
causal relationships which can satisfactorily be ex-
plained in terms of reactions to environmental condi-
tions. Only then, and when comparative racial
neurology and psychology shall have progressed beyond
their present and in many ways very promising
beginnings, can we hope for even the probability of a
satisfactory answer to that problem .^^ In the mean-
time that condition seems to me not to exist, and an
appeal to heredity would therefore involve a premature
renunciation of the possibility of knowledge attainable
now, and would shift the problem to factors (at present)
still unknown.

31

PART I
THE PROBLEM

^>J CHAPTERI

^ RELIGIOUS AFFILIATION AND SOCIAL
STRATIFICATION!

A GLANCE at the occupational statistics of any country
bf mixed religious composition brings to light with
remarkable frequency^ a situation which has several
times provoked discussion in the Catholic press and
literature,^ and in Catholic congresses in Germany,
namely, the fact that business leaders and owners of
capital, as well as the higher grades of skilled labour,
and even more the higher technically and commercially
trained personnel of modem enterprises, are over-
whelmingly Protestant."* This is true not only in cases
where the difference in religion coincides with one of
nationality, and thus of cultural development, as in
Eastern Germany between Germans and Poles. The
same thing is shown in the figures of religious affiliation
almost wherever capitalism, at the time of its great
expansion, has had a free hand to alter the social
distribution of the population in accordance with its
needs, and to determine its occupational structure.
The more freedom it has had, the more clearly is the
effect shown. It is true that the greater relative par-
ticipation of Protestants in the ownership of capital,^
in management, and the upper ranks of labour in great
modem industrial and commercial enterprises,® may in
part he explained in terms of historical circumstances'
which extend far back into the past, and in which
religious affiliation is not a cause of the economicV
conditions, but to a certain extent appears to be a result/

The Protestant Ethic and the Spirit of Capita^ m

^ of them. Participation in the above economic funr in
^\ usually involves some previous ownership of c.'- m
and generally an expensive education ; often both. T. nesv.
are to-day largely dependent on the possession of in-
herited wealth, or at least on a certain degree of material
well-being. A number of those sections of the old
Empire which were most highly developed economic-
ally and most favoured by natural resources and
situation, in particular a majority of the wealthy towns,
went over to Protestantism in the sixteenth century.
The results of that circumstance favour the Protestants
even to-day in their struggle for economic existence.
There arises thus the historical question : why were the
districts of highest economic development at the same
tnpe particulprly favniirablp tn a rpvf>]i^finn in the

Church ? The answer is by no means so simple as one
might think.

The emancipation from economic traditionalism

appears, no doubt, to be a factor which would greatly

gfrfpg^^^" ^hp tpnHpncy to doubt the sanctity ofthe

religious traditinn, as of all traditional authoritiesQBut

it is necessary to note, what has often been forgotten,

Ahat the Reformation meant not the elimination of

j the Churches control over everyday life, but ratherthe

-J substitution of a new form of control for the previous

' one. It meant the repudiation of a control which was

Wery lax, at that time scarcely perceptible in practice,

/ and hardly more than formal, in favour of a regulation

^\ of the whole of conduct which, penetrating to all

>^ departments of private and public life, was infinitely

y/\ burdensome and earnestly enforced]) The rule of the

I Catholic Church, "punishing the heretic, but indulgent

^36

Religious Affiliation and Social Stratification

^ the sinner", as it was in the past even more than
0-day, is now tolerated by peoples of thoroughly modem
economic character, and was borne by the richest and
economically most advanced peoples on earth at about
the turn of the fifteenth century., The^rule of Calvinism,
on the other hand, as it was enforced in the sixteenth
century in Geneva and in Scotland, at the turn of the
sixteenth and seventeenth centuries in large parts of
the Netherlands, in the seventeenth in New England,
and for a time in England itself, wouldbe^or u&_the
most absolutely unbearable form of eccfcsiastical con-
trol of the individual which could possibly exist. That
was^xactly what largeliumberi~oF the old commercial
aristocracy of those times, in Geneva as well as in
Holland and England, felt about it. And what the
reformers complained of in those areas of high eco-
nomic development was not too much supervision of
life on the part of the Church, but too little fNow how
does it happen that at that time those countries which
were most advanced economically, and within them
the rising bourgeois middle classes, not only failed to
resist this imexampled tyranny of Puritanism, but even
developed a heroism in its defence.'' For bourgeois
classes as such have seldom before and never since
displayed heroism. It was "the last of our heroisms", as
Carlyle, not without reason, has said.

But further, and especially important: it may be, as
has been claimed, that the greater partiripatinn _q£
Protestants injhe^positions of ownership andLmanag&r
ment in modern economic^jife^may to-day be under-
stood, in part at least, simply as a^e^lt of thegreater
matemTwealth^J^yllE^fc inherited,. But there are

37/

The Protestant Ethic and the Spirit of Capitalism

certain other phenomena which cannot be explained in
the same way. Thus, to mention only a few facts:
there is a great difference discoverable in Baden, in
Bavaria, in Hungary,, in the type of higher education
which Catholic parents, as opposed to Protestant, give
their children. That the percentage of Catholics among
the students and graduates of higher educational
institutions in general lags behind their proportion of
the total population,^ .may, to be sure, be largely
explicable in terms o^ inherited differences of wealth.
But among the Catholic graduates themselves the per-
centage of those graduating from the institutions pre-
paring, in particular, for technical studies and industrial
and commercial occupations, but in general from those
preparing for middle-class business life, lags still
farther behind the percentage of Protestants.^ On the
other hand. Catholics prefer the sort of training which
the humanistic Gymnasium affords. That is a circum-
stance to which the above explanation does not apply,
but which, on the contrary, is one reason why so few
Catholics are engaged in capitalistic enterprise.

Even more striking is a fact which partly explains
the smaller proportion of Catholics among the skilled
labourers of modern industry. It is well known that-
the factory has taken its skilled labour to a large extent
from young men in the handicrafts ; but this is much
more true of Protestant than of Catholic journeymen.
Among journeymen, in other words, the Catholics
show a stronger propensity to remain in their crafts,
that is they more often become master craftsmen,
whereas the Protestants are attracted to a larger extent
into the factories in order to fill the upper ranjcs of

38

Religious Affiliation and Social Stratification

skilled labour and administrative positions.^® The
explanation of these cases is undoubtedly that the
mental and spiritual peculiarities acquired from the
environment, here the type of education favoured by
the religious atmosphefe^Tlhe^ome community and
the_girehtal home, have determined the choice of
occupation, and through i^he protessional career.

The smaller participation of Catholics in the modern
business life of Germany is all the more striking because
it runs counter to a tendency which has been observed
at all times ^^ including the present. National or
religious minorities which are in a position of sub-
ordination to a group of rulers are likely, through their
voluntary or involuntary exclusion from positions of
political influence, to be driven with peculiar force into
economic activity. Their ablest members seek to satisfy
the desire for recognition of their abilities in this field,
since there is no opportunity in the service of the 'State.
This has undoubtedly been true of the Poles in Russia
and Eastern Prussia, who have without question been
undergoing a more rapid economic advance than in
Galicia, where they have been in the ascendant. It has
in earlier times been true of the Huguenots in France
under Louis XIV, the Nonconformists and Quakers in
England, and, last but not least, the Jew for two
thousand years. But the Catholics in Germany have
shown no striking evidence of such a result of their
position. In the past they have, unlike the Protestants,
undergone no particularly prominent economic devel-
opment in the times when they were persecuted or
only tolerated, either in Holland or in England. On
the other hand, it is a fact that the Protestants (especi-

39

The Protestant Ethic and the Spirit of Capitalism

ally certain branches of the movement to be fully
discussed later) both as ruling classes and sis ruled,
both as majority and as minority, have shown a spc^idi

<.^^tendency to develop economic rationalism v^hich
cannot be observed to the same extent among Catholics
either in the one situation or in the other .^^ Thus the
principal explanation of this difference must be sought
in the permanent intrinsic character of their religious
beliefs, and not only in their temporary external

xl j historico-political situations.^*

It will be our task to investigate these religions with
a view to finding out what peculiarities they have or
have had which might have resulted in the behaviour
we have described. On superficial analysis, and on the
basis of certain current impressions, one might be
tempted to express the diflference by saying that the
greater other- worldliness of Catholicism, the ascetic
character of its highest ideals, must have brought up
its adherents to a greater indifference toward the good
things of this world. Such an explanation fits the
popular tendency in the judgment of both religions.
On the Protestant side it is used as a basis of criticism
of those (real or imagined) ascetic ideals of the Catholic
way of life, while the Catholics answer with the
accusation that materialism results from the seculariza-
tion of all ideals through Protestantism. One recent
writer has attempted to formulate the difference of
their attitudes toward economic life in the following
manner: "The Catholic is quieter, having less of the
acquisitive impulse; he prefers a life of the greatest
possible security, even with a smaller income, to a life
of risk and excitement, even though it may bring the
40

Religions Affiliation and Social Stratification

chance of gaining honour and riches. The proverb says
jokingly, ^either eat well or sleep wellLJn the present
case the Protestant prefers to eat well, the Catholic to
sleep undisturbed.**^^ — ►

In fact, this desire to eat,^^! may_J]>e-^ correct
though incomplete characterization of the motives of
many nominal Protestants in Germany at the present
time.. But things were very different in the past: the
English, Dutch, and American Puritans were charac-
terized by the exact opposite of the joy of living, a
fact which is indeed, as we shall see, most im-
portant for our present study. Moreover, the French
Protestants, among others, long retained, and retain to
a certain extent up to the present, the characteristics
which were impressed upon the Calvinistic Churches
everywhere, especially under the cros« in the time of
the religious struggles. Nevertheless (or was it, perhaps,
as we shall ask later, precisely on that account?) it is
well known th^t these characteristics were one of the
most important factors in the industrial and capital-
istic development of France, and on the small scale
permitted them by their persecution remained so. If
we may call this seriousness and the strong predomi-
nance of religious interests in the whole conduct of life
otherworldliness, then the French Calvinists were and
still are at least as otherworldly as, for instance, the
North German Catholics, to whom their Catholicism is
undoubtedly as vital a matter as religion is to any other
people in the world. Both differ from the predominant
religious trends in their respective countries in much
the same way. The Catholics of France are, in their
lower ranks, greatly interested in the enjoyment of life,

41

The Protestant Ethic and the Spirit of Capitalism

in the upper directly hostile to religion. Similarly, the |
Protestants of Germany are to-day absorbed in worldly
economic lif^, and their upper ranks are most indifferent
to religion. ^^j)Hardly anything shows so clearly as this
parallel that, with such vague ideas as that of the
alleged other\vorldliness of Catholicism, and the alleged
materialistic joy of living of Protestantism, and others
like them, nothing can be accomplished for our pur-
pose. In such general terms the distinction does not
even adequately fit the facts of to-day, and certainly not
of the past. If, however, one wishes to make use of it
at all, several other observations present themselves at
once which, combined with the above remarks, suggest
that the supposed conflict between other- worldliness,
asceticism, and ecclesiastical piety on the one side, and
participation in capitalistic acquisition on the other,
might actually turn out to be an intimate relationship.

As a matter of fact it is surely remarkable, to begin
with quite a superficial observation, how large is the
number of representatives ojfjhejnost^jpiritual forms
pf Christian _pifiJty-whQ Jiaye s^rung^rom comme^jal
jcircles^. In particular, very many of the most zealous
adherents of Pietism are of this origin. It might be
explained as a sort of reaction against mammonism on
the part of sensitive natures not adapted to commercial
life, and, as in the case of Francis of Assisi. many
Pietists have themselves interpreted the process of
their conversion in these terms. Similarly, the remark-
able circumstance that so many of the greatest capital-
istic entrepreneurs — down to Cecil Rhodes — have come
from clergymen's families might be explained as a
reaction against their ascetic upbringing. But this
42

Religious Affiliation and Social Stratification

form of explanation fails where an extraordinary
capitalistic business sense is combined in the same
persons and groups with the most intensive forms of a
piety which penetrates and dominates their whole lives.
Such cases are not isolated, but these traits are charac-
teristic of many of the most important Churches and
sects in the history of Protestantism. Especially
Calvinism, wherever it has appeared,^® has shown
;:his combination. However little, in the time of the
expansion of the Reformation, it (or any other Protest-
ant belief) was bound up with any particular social
class, it is characteristic and in a certain sense typical
that in French Huguenot Churches monks and business
men (merchants, craftsmen) were particularly numer-
ous among the proselytes, especially at the time of the
persecution.^'^ Even the Spaniards knew that heresy
(i.e. the Calvinism of the Dutch) promoted trade, and
this coincides with the opinions which Sir William
Petty expressed in his discussion of the reasons for the
capitalistic development of the Netherlands. Gothein ^^
rightly calls the Calvinistic diaspora the seed-bed of
capitalistic economy .^^ Even in this case one might''
consider the decisive factor to be the superiority of the
French and Dutch economic cultures from which these
communities sprang, or perhaps the immense influence
of exile in the breakdown of traditional relationships .^^^
But in France the situation was, as we know from
Colbert's struggles, the same even in the seventeenth
century. Even Austria, not to speak of other countries,
directly imported Protestant craftsmen.
I But not all the Protestant denominations seem to
have had an equally strong influence in this direction. /

43

The Protestant Ethic and the Spirit of Capitalism

That of Calvinism, even in Germany, was among the
strongest, it seems, and the reformed faith ^^ more
than the others seems to have promoted the develop-
ment of the spirit of capitalism, in the Wupperthal as
well as elsewhere. Much more so than Lutheranism,
as comparison both in general and in particular
instances, especially in the Wupperthal, seems to
prove .22 por Scotland, Buckle, and among English
poets, Keats, have emphasized these same relation-
ships.^^ Even more striking, as it is only necessary to
mention, is the connection of a religious way of life with
the most intensive development of business acumen
among those sects whose otherworldliness is as
proverbial as their wealth, especially the Quakers and
the Mennonites. The part which the former have
played in England and North America fell to the latter
in Germany and the Netherlands. That in East Prussia
Frederick William I tolerated the Mennonites as in-
dispensable to industry, in spite of their absolute
refusal to perform military service, is only one of the
numerous well-known cases which illustrates the fact,
though, considering the character of that monarch,
it is one of the most striking. Finally, that this com-
bination of intense piety with just as strong a develop-
ment of business acumen, was also characteristic of
the Pietists, is common knowledge .^^

It is only necessary to think of the Rhine country
and of Calw. In this purely introductory discussion
it is unnecessary to pile up more examples. For these
few already all show one thing:, 'that the spirit of hard
work, of progress, or whatever else it may be called,
the awakening of which one is inclined to ascribe to

44

Religious Affiliation and Social Stratification

Protestantism, must not be understood, as there is a
tendency to do, as joy of living nor in any other sense <
as connected with the EnHghtenment. The_old_Protest-!
antismof^Luther, Calvin, Knox, Voet, had _Brecious
ligipjn^ with what fo-day is called progress. To whole
agpprfgnf nnndern life which the most extreme re-
ligionist^ would not wish to suppress to-day^ it was
directly hostile. If any innerrelationship between certain
expressions of the old Protestant spirit and modern
capitalistic culture is to be found, we must attempt to
find it, for better or worse, not in its alleged more or
less materialistic or at least anti-ascetic joy of living.
but in its purely religious characteristics. Montesquieu
says {Esprit des Lois, Book XX, chap. 7) of the English
that they "had progressed the farthest of all peoples
of the world in three important things: in piety, in
commerce, and in freedom". Is it not possible »that their
commercial superiority and their adaptation to free
political institutions are connected in someway with that
record of piety which Montesquieu ascribes to them ?

A large number of possible relationships, vaguely
perceived, occur to us when we put the question in
this way. It will now be our task to formulate what
•occurs to us confusedly as clearly as is possible, con-
•sidering the inexhaustible diversity to be found in all
historical material. But in order to do this it is necessary'
to leave behind the vague and general concepts with
which we have dealt up to this point, and attempt to
penetrate into the peculiar characteristics of and the
differences between those great worlds of religious
thought which have existed historically in the various
branches of Christianity.

45

The Protestant Ethic and the Spirit of Capitalism

Before we can proceed to that, however, a few
remarks are necessary, first on the pecuHarities of the
phenomenon of which we are seeking an historical
explanation, then concerning the sense in which such
an explanation is possible at all within 'the limits of
these investigations.

46

CHAPTER II

THE SPIRIT OF CAPITALISM

/
In the title of this study is used the somewhat pre-
tentious phrase, the spirit of capitaHsm. ^vVhat is to be
understood by it? The attempt to give, anything Hke
a definition of it brings out certain difficulties which
are in the very nature of this type of investigation.

If any object can be found to which this term can
be applied with any understandable meaning, it can
only be an historical individual, i.e. a complex of
elements associated in historical reality which we unite
into a conceptual whole from the standpoint of their
cultural significance.

Such an historical concept, however, since it refers
in its content to a phenomenon significant for its unique
individuality, cannot be defined according to the
formula genus proximum, differentia specifica, but it
must be gradually put together out of the individual
parts which are taken from historical reality to make it
up. Thus the final and defimitive concept cannot stand
at the beginning of the investigation, but must come at
the end. We must, in other words, work out in the
course of the discussion, as its most important result,
the best conceptual formulation of what we here under-
stand by the spirit of capitalism, that is the best from
the point of view which interests us here. This point of
view (the one of which we shall speak later) is, further,
by no means the only possible one from which the
historical phenomena we are investigating can be
analysed. Other standpoints would, for this as for every

47

The Protestant Ethic and the Spirit of Capitalism

historical phenomenon, yield other characteristics as
the essential ones. The result is that it is by no means
, necessary to understand by the spirit of capitalism only
what it will come to mean to us for the purposes of our
analysis. This is a necessary result of the nature of
historical com'::epts which attempt for their methodo-
logical purposves not to grasp historical reality in
abstract general formulae, but in concrete genetic sets
of relations whicli are inevitably of a specifically unique
and individual character.^

Thus, if we try to determine the object, the analysis
and historical explanation of which we are attempting,
it cannot be in the form of a conceptual definition, but
at least in the beginning only^ provisional description
of what is here meant by the spirit of capitalism. Such
a description is, however, indispensable in order clearly
to understand the object of the investigation. For this
purpose we turn to a d'ocument of that s^irit^which
contains__what we are looking for in almost classical
purity, and at the^ämeTir/n^^Käs" theliH^^tag of being
free from all direct relationship to religion, being thus,
for our purposesyfree of pf^cönceptions7~^

I "Remember, that time is money. He that can earn

' ten shillings a day by his labour, and goes abroad, or

/ sits idle, one half of that day, though he spends but

I sixpence during his diversion or idleness, ought not to

\ reckon that the only expense; he has really spent, or

\ rather thrown away, five shillings besides.

"Remember, that credit is money. If a man lets his
money lie in my hands after it is due, he gives me the
interest, or so much as I can n:\ake of it during that

48

The Spirit of Capitalism

time. This amounts to a considerable sum where a man
has good and large credit, and makes good use of it.
"Remember, that money is of the prolific, generating

nature. Money can beget rrioney, and its offspring can

beget more, and so on. Five shillings turned is six,
turned again it is seven and threepence, and so on, till
it becomes a hundred pounds. The more there is of it,
the more it produces every turning, so that the profits
rise quicker and quicker. He that kills a breeding-sow,
destroys all her offspring to the thousandth generation.
He that murders a crown, destroys all that it might/
have produced, even scores of pounds."

"Remember this saying. The good paymaster is lord^JL\
^lanother mail's purse. He that is known to pay punctu-
ally and exactly to the time he promises, may at any
time, and on any occasion, raise all the money his
friends can spare. This is sometimes of great use.
After industry and frugality, nothing contributes more
to the raising of a young man in the world than punctu-
ality and justice in all his dealings; therefore never
keep borrowed money an hour beyond the time you
promised, lest a_disappointment shut up youtiriend!s^ |
purse for ever.

"The most trifling actions that affect a man's credit
are to be regarded. The sound of your hammer at five
in the morning, or eight at night, heard by a creditor,
makes him easy six months longer; but if he sees you
at a billiard-table, or hears your voice at a tavern, when
you should be at work, he sends for his money the next
day; demands it, before he can receive it, in a lump.

"It shows, besides, that you are mindful of what you |

49 ~

The Protestant Ethic and the Spirit of Capitalism

owe ; it makes you appear a careful as well as an honest
man, and that still increases your credit.

"Beware of thinking all your own that you possess,
and of living accordingly. It is a mistake that many
people who have credit fall into. To prevent this, keep
an exact account for some time both of your expenses
and your income. If you take the pains at first to
mention particulars, it will have this good effect: you
will discover how wonderfully small, trifling expenses
mount up to large sums, and will discern what might
have been, and may for the future be saved, without
occasioning any great inconvenience."

"For six pounds a year you may have the use of one

hundred pounds, provided you are a man of known

prudence and honesty.

"He that spends a groat a day idly, spends idly above

S six pounds a year, which is the price for the use of one

J hundred pounds.

4 "He that wastes idly a groat's worth of his time

?r per day, one day with another, wastes the privilege of

^ using one hundred pounds each day.

"^ "He that idly loses five shillings' worth of time,

^ loses five shillings, and might as prudently throw five

J shillings into the sea.
"He that loses five shillings, not only loses that sum,
but all the advantage that might be made by turning it
in dealing, which by the time that a young man becomes
old, will amount to a considerable sum of money." ^

It is Benjamin Ferdinand who preaches to us in these
sentences, the same which Ferdinand Kiirnberger

SO

The Spirit of Capitalism

satirizes in his clever and malicious Picture of American
Culture^ as the supposed confession of faith of the
Yankee. That it is the spirit of capitaHsm which here
speaks in characteristic fashion, no one will doubt,
however little we may wish to claim that everything
which could be understood as pertaining to that
spirit is contained in it. Let us pause a moment to
consider this passage, the philosophy of which Kürn-
berger sums up in the words, "They make tallow out
of cattle and money out of men". The peculiarity of
this philosophy of.^l^variCe appears to be the ideal of
the honest man of recognized credit, and above all the
idea of a duty of the individual toward the increase of
_his capital, which is assumed as an end in itself. Truly
what is here preached is not simply a means of making
one*s way in the world, but a peculiar ethic. The
infraction of its rules is treated not äs foolishness but
as forgetfulness of duty. That is the essence of the
matter. It is not mere business astuteness, that sort of
thing is common enough, it is an ethos. This is the
quality which interests us.

When Jacob Fugger, in speaking to a business
associate who had retired and who wanted to persuade
him to do the same, since he had made enough money
and should let others have a chance, rejected that as
pusillanimity and answered that "he (Fugger) thought
otherwise, he wanted to make money as long as he
could ",^ the spirit of his statement is evidently quite
different from that of Franklin. What in the former
case was an expression of commercial daring and a
personal inclination morally neutral,^ in the latter
takes on the character of anr ethically coloured maxim

51

The 'Protestant Ethic and the Spirit of Capitalism

for the conduct of life. The concept spirit of capitaHsm
is here used in this specific sense,^ it is the spirit
of modern capitaHsm. For that we are here deahng
only with Western European and American capitalism
is obvious from the way in which the problem was
stated. Capitalism existed in China, India, Babylon, in
the classic world, and in the Middle Ages. But in all these
cases, as we shall see, this particular ethos was lacking.
Now, all Franklin's moral attitudes are coloured
with utilitarianism. Honesty is useful, because it
assures credit; so are punctuality, industry, frugality,
and that is the reason they are virtues. A logical
deduction from this would be that where, for instance,
the appearance of honesty serves the same purpose,
that would suffice, and an unnecessary surplus of this
virtue would evidently appear to Franklin's eyes as
unproductive waste. And as a matter of fact, the story
in his autobiography of his conversion to those
virtues,' or the discussion of the value of a strict
maintenance of the appearance of modesty, the assidu-
ous belittlement of one's own deserts in order to gain
general recognition later ,^ confirms this impression.
According to Franklin, those virtues, like all others, are
only in so far virtues as they are actuallv useful to the
individual, and the surrogate of mere appearance is
always gnfpjfiVnf when it accomplishes ^e end in

view. It ij, a rnnrlnrinn tt liii 1i ij. iiiHl'ilnhlH far «Irirt

Utilitarianism. The impression of many Oemaans that
the virtues professed by Americanism are pureJ^ypo-
crisy seems to have been confirmed by this striking case.
But in fact the matter is not by any means so simple.
Benjamin Franklin's own character, as it appears in
52

The Spirit of Capitalism

the really unusual candidness of his autobiography,
belies that suspicion. The circumstance that he ascribes
his recognition of the utility of virtue to a divine
revelation which was intended to lead him in the path
of righteousness, shows that something more than mere
garnishing for purely egocentric motives is involved.

vjn fact, the summum bonum of this ethic, the earning
of more and more money, combined with the strict
avoidance of all spontaneous enjoyment of life, is
above all completely devoid of any eudasmonistic, not
to say hedonistic, admixture. It is thought of so purely ^^>t^
as an end in itself, that from the point of view of the
happiness of, or utility to, the single individual, it
appears entirely transcendental and absolutely irra-
tional.^Man is dominated by the making of money,
by acquisition as the ultimate purpose of his life.
"T)conomic acquisition is no longer subordinated to^:^,;^
man as the means for the satisfaction of his material f;i
needs. This reversal of what we should call the natural
relationship, so irrational from a naive point of view, is
evidently as definitely a leading principle of capitalism
as it is foreign to all peoples not under capitalistic
influence. At the same time it expresses a type of
feeling which is closely connected with certain religious
ideas. If we thus ask, why should ''money be made out
of men", Benjamin Franklin himself, although he was
a colourless deist, answers in his autobiography with a
quotation from the Bible, which his strict Calvinistic
father drummed into him again and again in his youth :
'*Seest thou a man diligent in his busjiiess.'* He shall
stand before kings" (Prov. xxii. 29). |The earning of
money within the modern economic order is, so long

53

r.

The Protestant Ethic and the Spirit of Capitalism

; ,as it is done legally, the result and the expression of
( virtu^andproficiencYJn a calling J and this virtue and
proficiency are, as it is now not difficult to see, the
real Alpha and Omega of Franklin's ethic, as expressed
in the passages we have quoted, as well as in all his
works without exception .^^

And in truth this peculiar idea, so familiar to us
to-day, but in reality so little a matter of course, of
one's duty in a calling, is what is most characteristic
of the[ßocial ethic of capitalistic culture/ and is in a
sense the fundamental basis of it. It is an obligation
which the individual is supposed to feel and does feel
towards the content of his professional^^ activity, no
matter in what it consists, in particular no matter
whether it appears on the surface as a utilization of
his personal powers, or only of his material possessions
(as capital).

Of course, this conception has not appeared only
under capitalistic conditions. On the contrary, we shall
later trace its origins back to a time previous to the ad-
vent of capitalism. Still less, naturally, do we maintain
that a conscious acceptance of these ethical maxims on
the part of the individuals, entrepreneurs oj labourers,
in modern capitalistic enterprises, is a condition of
the further existence of present-day capitalisnaJwThe
^ I capitalistic economy of the present day is an immense
\ cosmos into which the individual is born, and which
presents itself to him, at least as an individual, as an
unalterable order of things in which he must live. It
forces the individual, in so far as he is involved in the
system of market relationships, to conform to capital-
istic rules of action. The manufacturer who in the long

54

The Spirit of Capitalism

run acts counter to these norms, will just as inevit
be eliminated from the economic scene as the woi
who cannot or will not adapt himself to them will be
thrown into the streets without a job. — ^

Thus the capitalism of to-day, which has come to
dominate economic life, educates and selects the
economic subjects which it needs through a process of
economic survival of the fittest. But here one can easily^
see the limits of the concept of selection as a means of
historical explanation^Aln order that a manner of life so
well adapted to the peculiarities of capitalism could be
selected at all, i.e. should come to dominate others, it
had to originate somewhere, and not in isolated indi-
viduals alone, but as a way of life common to whole
groups of men.lThisorigin is what really needs explana-
tion. Concerning the doctrine of the more naive his-
torical materialism, that such ideas originate as a \
reflection or superstructure of economic situations, we \
shall speak more in detail below. At this point it will
suffice for our purpose to call attention to the fact that
without doubt, in the country of Benjamin Franklin's
birth (Massachusetts), the spirit of capitalism (in the
sense we have attached to it) was present before the
capitalistic order. There were complaints of a peculiarly
calculating sort of profit-seeking in New England, as
distinguished from other parts of America, as early as
1632. It is further undoubted that capitalism remained
far less developed in some of the neighbouring colonies,
the later Southern States of the United States of

America, in spite of the fact that_,these latter were ' ^^

founded by large capitalists for business motives, while '^ ^
the New England colonies^ereTounded by preachers/ _

SS

^(

The Protestant Ethic and the Spirit of Capitalism

and seminary graduates with the help of small bour-
geois, craftsmen and yoemen, for religious reasons. In
this case the causal relation is certainly the reverse of
t^at suggested by the materialistic standpointj
^!5ut the origin and history of such ideas is. «lucli
more complex than the theorists of the supeßflWfcture
suppose. The spirit of capitalism, in the sense in which
we are using the term, had to fight its way to supremacy
against a whole world of hostile forces. A state of mind
such as that expressed in the passages we have quoted
from Franklin, and which called forth the applause of
a whole people, would both in ancient times and in the
Middle Ages ^^ have been proscribed as the lowest sort
of avarice and as an attitude entirely lacking in self-
respect. It is, in fact, still regularly thus looked upon
by all those social groups which are least involved in
or adapted to modern capitalistic conditions. This is
not wholly because the instinct of acquisition was in
those times unknown or undeveloped, as has often
been said. Nor because the auri sacra fames, the greed
for gold, was then, or now, less powerful outside of
bourgeois capitalism than within its peculiar sphere, as
the illusions of modern romanticists are wont to believe.
The difference between the capitalistic and pre-
capitalistic spirits is not to be found at this point. The
greed of the Chinese Mandarin, the old Roman aristo-
crat, or the modern peasant, can stand up to any
comparison. And the auri sacra fames of a Neapolitan
cab-driver or barcaiuolo, and certainly of Asiatic
representatives of similar trades, as well as of the
craftsmen of southern European or Asiatic countries,
is, as anyone can find out for himself, very much more

56

The Spirit of Capitalism

intense, and especially more unscrupulous than that
of^ay, an Englishman in similar circumstances.^^
tChe universal reign of absolute unscrupulousness in
■ the pursuit of selfish interests by the making of money f
, has been a specific characteristic of precisely those
countries whose bourgeois-capitalistic development,
measured according to Occidental standards, has re-
mained backward^ As every employer knows, the lack
of coscienziosita 6i the labourers ^^ of such countries, ';
for instance Italy as compared with Germany, has
been, and to a certain extent still is, one of the principal \.
_Qbstai::les,to their capitalistic development. [Capitalism /\
cannot make use of the labour of those who practise
the doctrine of undisciplined liberum arbitrium, any
more than it can make use of the business man who
seems absolutely unscrupulous in his dealings with
others, as we can learn from Franklin. Hence the
difference does not lie in the degree of development of
any impulse to make money QPhe atiri sacra fames is as
old as the history of man. Out we shall see that those
who submitted to it without reserve as an uncontrolled
impulse, such as the Dutch sea-captain who "would
go through hell for gain, even though he scorched his
sails", were by no means the representatives of that
attitude of mind from which the specifically modern
capitalistic spirit as a mass phenomenon is derived, and
that is what matters. At all periods of history, wherever it
was possible, there has been ruthless acquisition, bound
to no ethical norms whatever] Like war and piracy, trade
has often been unrestrained in its relations with foreigners
J^and those outside the group . The double ethic has permit-
^ted here what was forbidden in dealings among brothers. I

57

The Protestant Ethic and the Spirit of Capitalism

Capitalistic acquisition as an adventure has been at
home in all types of economic society which have known
trade with the use of money and which have offered it
opportunities, through commenda^ farming of taxes,
State loans, financing of wars, ducal courts and office-
holders. Likewise the inner attitude of the adventurer,
which laughs at all ethical limitations, has been'^uni-
versal. Absolute and conscious ruthlessness in acqui-
sition has often stood in the closest connection with the
strictest conformity to tradition. Moreover, with the
breakdown of tradition and the more or less complete
extension of free economic enterprise, even to within
the social group, the new thing has not generally been
ethically justified and encouraged, but only tolerated
as a fact. And this fact has been treated either as
ethically indiflferent or as reprehensible, but unfortu-
nately unavoidable. This has not only been the normal
attitude of all ethical teachings, but, what is more
important, also that expressed m the practical action of
the average man of pre-capitalistic times, pre-capi tal-
is tic in the sense that the rational utilization of capital
in a permanent enterprise and the rational capitalistic
organization of labour had not yet become dominant
forces in the determination of economic activity. Now
just this attitude was one of the strongest inner obstacles
which the adaptation of men to the conditions of an
ordered bourgeois- capitalistic economy has encoun-
tered . everywhere .

CThe most important opponent with which the spirit

of capitalism, in the sense of a definite standard of life

claiming ethical sanction, has had to struggle, was that

type of attitude and reaction to new situations which

S8

Vi The Spirit of Capitalism

we may designate as traditionalism.^ In this case also
every attempt at a final definition must be held in
abeyance. On the other hand, we must try to make the
provisional meaning clear by citing a few cases. We
will begin from below, with the labourers.

One of the technical means which the modern
employer uses in order to secure the greatest possible
amount of work from his men is the device of piece-
rates Jin agriculture, for instance, the gathering of the
harvest is a case where the greatest possible intensity
of labour is called for, since, the weather being un-
certain, the difference between high profit and heavy
loss may depend on the speed with which the harvesting
can be done. Hence a system of piece-rates is almost
universal in this case. And since the interest of the
employer in a speeding- up of harvesting increases with
the increase of the results and the intensity of the work,
the attempt has again and again been made, by in-
creasing the piece-rates of the workmen, thereby giving
them an opportunity to earn what is for them a very
high wage, to interest them in increasing their own
efficiency. But a peculiar difficulty has been met with
surprising frequency: raising the piece-rates has often
had the result that not more but less has been accom-
plished in the same time, because the worker reacted
to the increase not by increasing but by decreasing the
amount of his work. A man, for instance, who at the
rate of i mark per acre mowed 2\ acres per day
and earned 2 J marks, when the rate was raised to 1*25
marks per acre mowed, not 3 acres, as he might
easily have done, thus earning 3*75 marks, but only
2 acres, so that he could still earn the 2\ marks to

59

The Protestant Ethic and the Spirit of Capitalisn^f-

which he was accustomed . The opportunity of earninvä^
more was less attractive than that of working less. He
did not ask: how much can I earn in a day if I do as
much work as possible ? but : how much must I work
in order to earn the wage, 2\ marks, which. I earned
before and which takes care of my traditional needs?
This is an example of what is here meant bytradition-
jlisin. A man does not "by nature" wish to earn more
and more rnoney^ut_simply to live as he is accustomed"*
to live and to earn as much as is necessary for that
purpose. Wherever modern capitalism has begun its

^ork of increasing the productivity of human labour
by increasing its intensity, it has encountered the
immensely stubborn resistance of this leading trait of
pre-capitalistic labour. And to-day it encounters it
the more, the more backward (from a capitalistic point
of view) the labouring forces are with which it has
to deal.

Another obvious possibility, to return to our example,
since the appeal to the acquisitive instinct through
higher wage-rates failed, would have been to try the
opposite policy, to force the worker by reduction of
his wage-rates to work harder to earn the same amount
than he did before. Low wages and high profits seem
even to-day to a superficial observer tp stand in corre-
lation ; everything which is paid out in wages seems to
involve a corresponding reduction of profits. That road
capitalism has taken again and again since its beginning.
For centuries it was an article of faith, that low wages
were productive, i.e. that they increased the material
results of labour so that, as Pieter de la Cour, on this
point, as we shall see, quite in the spirit of the old

60

The Spirit of Capitalism

Calvinism, said long ago, the people only work because
and so long as they are poor.

But the effectiveness of this apparently so efficient
method has its limits. ^^ Of course the presence of a
surplus population which it can hire cheaply in the
labour _market is a necessity for the development of
capitalism. But though too large a reserve army may
in certain cases favour its quantitative expansion, it
checks its qualitative developrhent, especially the
transition, to types of enterprise which make more
intensive use of labour. Low wages are by no means
identical with cheap labour. ^^ From a purely quantita-;
tive point of view the efficiency of labour decreases!
with a wage which is physiologically insufficient, whichj
may in the long run even mean a survival of the unfit.
The present-day average Silesian mows, when he
exerts himself to the full, little more than two-thirds as
much land as the better paid and nourished Pomeranian
or Mecklenburger, and the Pole, the further East he
comes from, accomplishes progressively less than the
German. Low wages fail even from a purely business
point of view wherever it is a question of producing
goods which require any sort o'f skilled labouf, or the
use of expensive machinery which is easily damaged,
or in general wherever any great amount of sharp
attention or of initiative is required. Here low wages do
not pay, and their effect is the opposite of what was
intended .(For not only is a developed sense of responsi-
bility absolutely indispensable, but in general also an
attitude which, at least during working hours, is freed
from continual calculations of how the customary wage
may be earned with a maximum of comfort and a

"^The Protestant Ethic and the Spirit of Capitalism

minimum of exertion. Labour must, on the contrary^
be performed as if it were an absolute end in itselL_A
calling. But such an attitude is by no means a product
of nature. It cannot be evoked by low wages or high
ones alone, but can only be the product of a long and
arduous process of education. To-day, capitalism, once
in the .saddle, can recruit its labouring force in all
A I industrial countries with comparative ease. In the past
this was in every case an extremely difficult^roblem.^'
d even to-day it could probably not get along~with-
out the support of a powerful ally along the way, which,
as we shall see below, was at hand at the time of its
development.

What is meant can again best be explained by means
of an example. The type of backward traditional form
of labour is to-day very often exemplified by women
workers, especially unmarried ones. An almost universal
complaint of employers of girls, for instance German
girls, is that they are almost entirely unable and un-
willing to give up methods of work inherited or once
learned in favour of more efficient ones, to adapt
themselves to new methods, to learn and to concentrate
their intelligence, or even to use it at all. Explanations
of the possibility of making work easier, above all more
profitable to themselves, generally encounter a com-
plete lack of understanding. Increases of piece-rates are
without avail against the stone wall of habit. In general
it is otherwise, and that is a point of no little importance
from our view-point, only with girls having a specifically
religious, especially a Pietistic, background. One often
hears, and statistical investigation confirms it,^® that by
far the best chances of economic education are found
62

The Spirit of Capitalism

among this group. The ability of mental concentration,
as well as the absolutely essentiajjFeeling of obligation
tojone's job, are here most often combined with a
strict economy which calculates the possibility of high
earnings, and a cool self-control and frugality which
enormously increase performance. This provides the
most favourable foundation for the conception of
lalwmrasjLnjendjn itself , as a calling which is necessary
to capitalism : the chances of overcoming traditionalism
are greatest oiT account of the religious upbringing.
This observation of present-day capitalism ^^ in itself
suggests that it is worth while to ask how this connec-
tion of adaptability to capitalism with religious factors
may have come about in the days of the early develop-
ment of capitalism. For that they were even then
present in much the same form can be inferred from
numerous facts. For instance, the dislike and the per-
secution which Methodist workmen in the eighteenth
century met at the hands of their comrades were
not solely nor even principally the result of their
religious eccentricities, England had seen many of
those and more striking ones. It rested rather, as the
destruction of their tools, repeatedly mentioned in the
reports, suggests, upon their specific willingness to
work as we should say to-day.

However, let us again return to the present, and this
time to the entrepreneur, in order to clarify the meaning
of traditionalism in his case.

Sombart, in his discussions of the genesis of capital-
ism ,20 has distinguished between the satisfaction of
needs and acquisition as the two great leading prin-
ciples in economic history. In the former case the

63

The Protestant Ethic and the Spirit of Capitalism

attainment of the goods necessary to meet personal
needs, in the latter a struggle for profit free from the
limits set by needs, have been the ends controlling the
form and direction of economic activity. What he calls
the economy of needs seems at first glance to be
identical with what is here described as economic
traditionalism. That may be the case if the concept of
needs is limited to traditional needs. But if that is not
done, a number of economic types which must be
considered capitalistic according to the definition of
capital which Sombart gives in another part of his
work, 2^ would be excluded from the category of
acquisitive economy and put into that of needs
economy. Enterprises, namely, which are carried on
by private entrepreneurs by utilizing capital (money or
goods with a money value) to make a profit, purchasing
the means of production and selling the product,
i.e. undoubted capitalistic enterprises, may at the same
time have a traditionalistic character. This has, in the
course even of modem economic history, not been
merely an occasional case, but rather the rule, with
continual interruptions from repeated and increasingly
powerful conquests of the capitalistic spirit. To be sure
the capitalistic form of an enterprise and the spirit in
which it is run generally stand in some sort of adequate
relationship to each other, but not in one of necessary
interdependence. Nevertheless, we provisionally use
the expression spirit of (modern) capitalism ^^ to
describe that attitude which seeks profit rationally and
systematically in the manner which we have illustrated
by the example of Benjamin Franklin. This, however,
is justified by the historical fact that that attitude of

64

The Spirit of Capitalism

mind has on the one hand found its most suitable
expression in capitahstic enterprise, while on the
other the enterprise has derived its most suitable
motive force from the spirit of capitalism.

But the two may very well occur separately. Benjamin
Franklin was filled with the spirit of capitalism at a time
when his printing business did not' differ in form from
any handicraft enterprise. And we shall see that at the
beginning of modern times it was by no means the
capitalistic entrepreneurs of the commercial aristocracy,
who were either the sole or the predominant bearers
of the attitude we have here called the spirit of capital-
ism.2^ It was much more the rising strata of the lower
industrial middle classes. Even in the nineteenth
century its classical representatives were not the
elegant gentlemen of Liverpool and Hamburg, with
their commercial fortunes handed down for genera-
tions, but the self-made parvenus of Manchester and
Westphalia, who often rose from very modest circum-
stances. As early as the sixteenth century the situation
was similar; the industries which arose at that time
were mostly created by parvenus .^^

The management, for instance, of a bank, a wholesale
export business, a large retail establishment, or of a
large putting-out enterprise dealing with goods pro-
duced in homes, is certainly only possible in the form
of a capitalistic enterprise. Nevertheless, they may all
be carried on in a traditionalistic spirit. In fact, the
business of a large bank of issue cannot be carried on
in any other way. The foreign trade of whole epochs
has rested on the basis of monopolies and legal privileges
of strictly traditional character. In retail trade — and we

6s

The Protestant Ethic and the Spirit of Capitalism

are not here talking of the small men without capital
who are continually crying out for Government aid —
the revolution which is making an end of the old
traditionalism is still in full swing. It is the same
development which broke up the old putting-out
system, to which modern domestic labour is related
only in form. How this revolution takes place and
what is its significance may, in spite of the fact these
things are so familiar, be again brought out by a
concrete example.

Until about the middle of the past century the life
of a putter-out was, at least in many of the branches of
the Continental textile industry ,2^ what we should
to-day consider very comfortable. We may imagine its
routine somewhat as follows : The peasants came with
their cloth, often (in the case of linen) principally or
entirely made from raw material which the peasant
himself had produced, to the town in which the
putter-out lived, and after a careful, often official,
appraisal of the quality, received the customary price
for it. The putter-out's customers, for markets any
appreciable distance away, were middlemen, who also
came to him, generally not yet following samples, but
seeking traditional qualities, and bought from his
warehouse, or, long before delivery, placed orders
which were probably in turn passed on to the peasants.
Personal canvassing of customers took place, if at all,
only at long intervals. Otherwise correspondence
sufficed, though the sending of samples slowly gained
ground. The number of business hours was very
moderate, perhaps five to six a day, sometimes con-
siderably less; in the rush season, where there was one,
66

The Spirit of Capitalism

more. Earnings were moderate; enough to lead a
respectable life and in good times to put away a little.
On the whole, relations among competitors were rela-
tively good, with a large degree of agreement on the
fundamentals of business. A long daily visit to the
tavern, with often plenty to drink, and a congenial circle
of friends, made life comfortable and leisurely.

The form of organization was in every respect
capitalistic ; the entrepreneur's activity was of a purely
business character; the use of capital, turned over in
the business, was indispensable ; and finally, the objec-
tive aspect of the economic process, the book-keeping,
was rational. But.it was traditionalistic business, if one_'
considers the spirit which animated the entrepreneur:
the traditional manner of life, the traditional rate of
profit, the traditional amount of work, the traditional
manner of regulating the relationships with labour, and
the^ssentially traditional circle of customers and the
manner of attracting new ones. All these dominated
the conduct of the business, were at the basis, one may
say, of the ethosoi this group of business men.

Now at some time this leisureliness was suddenly
destroyed, and often entirely without any essential
change in the form of organization, such as the transi-
tion to a unified factory, to mechanical weaving, etc.
What happened was, on the contrary, often no more than
this: some young man from one of the putting-out
families went out into the country, carefully chose
weavers for his employ, greatly increased the rigour of
his supervision of their work, and thus turned them
from peasants into labourers. On the other hand, he
would begin to change his marketing methods by so

67

The Protestant Ethic and the Spirit of Capitalism

far as possible going directly to the final consumer,
would take the details into his own hands, would
personally solicit customers, visiting them every year,
and above all would adapt the quality of the product
directly to their needs and wishes. At the same time
he began to introduce the principle of low prices and
large turnover. There was repeated what everywhere
and always is the result of such a process of rationali-
zation: those who would not follow suit had to go
out of business .\The idyllic state collapsed under the
pressure of a bitter competitive struggle, respectable
fortunes were made,- and not lent out at interest, but
always reinvested in the business. The old leisurely and
comfortable attitude toward life gave way to a hard
frugality in which some participated and came to the
top, because they did not wish to consume but to earn,
while others who wished to keep on with the old ways
were forced to curtail their consumption .^^

And, what is most important in this connection, it
was not generally in such cases a stream of new money
invested in the industry which brought about this
revolution — in several cases known to me the whole
revolutionary process was set in motion with a few
thousands of capital borrowed from relations — but the
,new spirit, the spirit of modem capitalism, had set to
work. The question of the motive forces in the expan-
sion of modem capitalism is not in the first instance a
question of the origin of the capital sums which were
available for capitalistic uses, but, above all, of the
development of the spirit of capitalism. Where it
appears and is able to work itself out, it produces its
own capital and monetary supplies as the means to its
68

The Spirit of Capitalism

ends, but the reverse is not true.^'^ Its entry on the
scene was not generally peaceful. A flood of mistrust,
sometimes of hatred, above all of moral indignation,
regularly opposed itself to the first innovator. Often — I
know of several cases of the sort — regular legends of
mysterious shady spots in his previous life have been
produced. jit is very easy not to recognize that only an
unusually strong character could save an entrepreneur
of this new type from the loss of his temperate self-
control and from both moral and economic shipwreckj^
Furthermore, along with clarity of vision and ability to
act, it is only by virtue of very definite and highly
developed ethical qualities that it has been possible for
him to command the absolutely indispensable confi-
dence of his customers and workmen. Nothing else
could have given him the strength to overcome the
innumerable obstacles, above all the infinitely more
intensive work which is demanded of the modern
entrepreneur. But these are ethical qualities of quite
a diff^erent sort from those adapted to the traditionalism
of the past.

And, as a rule, it has been neither dare-devil and
unscrupulous speculators, economic adventurers such as
we meet at all periods of economic history, nor simply
great financiers who have carried through this change,
outwardly so inconspicuous, but nevertheless so de-
cisive for the penetration of economic life with the new
spirit. ^n the contrary, they were men who had grown
up in the hard school of life, calculating and daring at
the same time, above all temperate and reliable, shrewd
and completely devoted to their business, with strictly
bourgeois opinions and principlesJ

69

The Protestant Ethic and the Spirit of Capitalism

One is tempted to think that these personal moral
qualities have not the slightest relation to any ethical
maxims, to say nothing of religious ideas, but that the
essential relation between them is negative. The ability
to free oneself from the common tradition, a sort of
liberal enlightenment, seems likely to be the most
suitable basis for such a business man's success. And
to-day that is generally precisely the case. Any relation-
ship between religious beliefs and conduct is generally
absent, and where any exists, at least in Germany, it
tends to be of the negative sort. The people filled with
the spirit of capitali&m to-day tend to be indifferent, if
not hostile, to the Church. The thought of the pious
boredom of paradise has little attraction for their
active natures; religion appears to them as a means of
drawing people away from labour in this world. If you
ask them what is the meaning of their restless activity,
why they are never satisfied with what they have, thus
appearing so senseless to any purely worldly view of
life, they would perhaps give the answer, if they know
any at ail: "to provide for my children and grand-
children". But more often and, since that motive is
not peculiar to them, but was just as effective for the
traditionalist, more correctly, simply: that business
with its continuous work has become a necessary part
of their lives. That is in fact the only possible motivä^
tion, but it at the same time expresses what is, seen
from the view-point of personal happiness, so irrational
about this sort of life, where a man exists for the sake
of his business, instead of the reverse."^ ""

Of course, the desire for the power and recognition
which the mere fact of wealth brings plays its part.
70

The Spirit of Capitalistn

When the imagination of a whole people has once been
turned toward purely quantitative bigness, as in the
United States, this romanticism of numbers exercises
an irresistible appeal to the poets among business men.
Otherwise it is in general not the real leaders, ^nd
especially not the permanently successful entrepreneurs,
who are taken in by it. In particular, the resort to en-
tailed estates and the nobility, with sons whose conduct
at the university and in the officers' corps tries to cover
up their social origin, as has been the typical history of
German capitalistic parvenu families, is a product of
later decadence. The ideal type ^® of the capitalistic
entrepreneur, as. it has been represented even in
Germany by occasional outstanding examples, has no
relation to such more or less refined climbers. He
avoids ostentation and unnecessary expenditure^ as
weir~ äs conscious enjoyment of hTs power, and is
emEarrassed^y the outward signs of the^cial recogni-
HoiTwHich he receives. His manner oFlife is, in other
words, often, and we shall have to investigate the
historical significance of just this important fact,
distinguished by a certain ascetic tendency, as appears
clearly enough in the sermon of Franklin which we
have quoted. It is, namely, by no means exceptional,
but rather the rule, for him to have a_s^t_üfjQaodesty
which is essentially more honest than the reserve which
Franklin so shrewdly recommends. He gets nothing
out of his wealth for himself, except the irrational sense^
ofjiaving done his job well.

But it is just that which seems to the pre-capitalistic
man so incomprehensible and mysterious, so unworthy
and contemptible. That anyone should be able to make

71

The Protestant Ethic and the Spirit of Capitalism

it the sole purpose of his Hfe-work, to sink into the
grave weigiied down with a great material load of
money a.*id goods, seems to him explicable only as the
prod'-^ct of a pf fvprsf^ instinrt, the auri sacra fames.

.^.c present under our individualistic political, legal,
and economic institutions, with the forms of organiza-
tion and general structure which are peculiar to our
economic order, this spirit of capitalism might be
understandable, as has been said, purely as a result
of adaptation. The capitalistic system so needs this
devotion to the calling of making money, it is an
attitude toward material goods which is so well suited
to that system, so intimately bound up with the condi-
tions of survival in the economic struggle for existence,
that there can to-day no longer be any question of a
necessary connection of that acquisitive manner of life
with any single Weltanschauung. In fact, it no longer
needs the support of any religious forces, and feels the

si attempts of religion to influence economic life, in so
far as they can still be felt at all, to be as much an
unjustified interference as its regulation by the State.
In such circumstances men's commercial and social
interests do tend to determine their opinions and
attitudes. Whoever does not adapt his manner of life
to the conditions of capitalistic success must go under,

■iz^ br at least cannot rise. But these are phenomena of a
time in which modern capitalism has become dominant
and has become emancipated from its old supports.
But as it could at one time destroy the old forms of
mediaeval regulation of economic life only in alliance
with the growing power of the modern State, the same,
we may say provisionally, may have been the case in
72

II

The Spirit of Capitalism

its relations with religious forces. Whether and in what
sense that was the case, it is our task to investisrate.
ror that the conception or money-making as an end in
itself to which people were bound, as a calling, was
contrary to the ethical feelings of whole epochs, it is
hardly necessary to prove. The dogma Deo placer e vix
potest which was incorporated into the canon law and
applied to the activities of the merchant, and which
at that time (like the passage in the gospel about
interest) ^^ was considered genuine, as well as St.
Thomas's characterization of the desire for gain as
turpitudo (which term even included unavoidable and
hence ethically justified profit-making), already con-
tained a high degree of concession on the part of the ^
Catholic doctrine to the financial powers with which ^
the Church had such intimate political relations in 1^9
the Italian cities, ^^ as compared with the much more
radically anti-chrematistic views of comparatively wide
circles. But even where the doctrine was still better
accommodated to the facts, as for instance with
Anthony of Florence, jhe feeling was never quite
overcome, that activity directed to acquisition for its
own sake was at bottom a pudendum which was to be
tolerated only because of the unalterable necessities of
life in this worldj

Some moralists of that time, especially of the
nominalistic school, accepted developed capitalistic
business forms as inevitable, and attempted to justify
them, especially commerce, as necessary. The iudustria
developed in it they were able to regard, though not
without contradictions, as a legitimate source of profit,
and hence ethically unobjectionable. But the dominant

^ 73

The Protestant Ethic and the Spirit of Capitalism

doctrine rejected the spirit of capitalistic acquisition
as turpitudo, or at least could not give it a positive
ethical sanction. An ethical attitude like that of Ben-
jamin Franklin would have been simply unthinkable.
This was, above all, the attitude of capitalistic circles
themselves. Their life-work was, so long as they clung
to the tradition of the Church, at best something
morally indifferent. It was tolerated, but was still, even
if only on account of the continual danger of collision
with the Church's doctrine on usury, somewhat
dangerous to salvation. Quite considerable sums, as
the sources show, went at the death of rich people to
religious institutions as conscience money, at times
even back to former debtors as usiira which had been
unjustly taken from them. It was otherwise, along with
heretical and other tendencies looked upon with dis-
approval, only in those parts of the commercial aris-
tocracy which were already emancipated from the
tradition. But even sceptics and people indifferent to
the Church often reconciled themselves with it by
gifts, because it was a sort of insurance against the
uncertainties of what might come after death, or
because (at least according to the very widely held
latter view) an external obedience to the commands of
the Church was sufficient to insure salvation. ^^ Here
the either non-moral or immoral character of their
action in the opinion of the participants themselves
comes clearly to light.

Now, how could activity, which was at best ethically
tolerated, turn into a calling in the sense of Benjamin
Franklin.'' The fact to be explained historically is that
in the most highly capitalistic centre of that time, in

74

The Spirit of Capitalism

Florence of the fourteenth and fifteenth centuries, the
money ;md capital market of all the great political
Powers,, this attitude was considered ethically un-
justifiable, or at best to be tolerated. But in the back-
woods small bourgeois circumstances of Pennsylvania
in the eighteenth century, where business threatened
for simple lack of money to fall back into barter, where
there was hardly a sign of large enterprise, where only
the earliest beginnings of banking were to be found,
the same thing was considered the essence of moral
conduct, even commanded in the name of duty. To
speak here of aj;eflection of material conditions in the
ideal^ superstructure would be patent nonsense. WhaP
was the background of ideas which couFd account for
the sort of activity apparently directed toward profit
alone as a calling toward which the individual feels
himself to have an ethical obligation? For it was this
idea which gave the way of life of the new entrepreneur
its ethical foundation and justification. ^

The attempt has been made, particularly by Sombart,
in what are often judicious and eflfective observations,
to depict economic rationalism as the salient feature of
modern economic life as a whole. Undoubtedly with
justification, if by that is meant the extensipn of the
productivity of labour which has, through the " sub-
ordination of the process of production to scientific
points of view, relieved it from its dependence upon
the natural organic limitations of the hun>an individual.
Now this process of rationalization i^ the field of
technique and economic organization undoubtedly
determines an important part of the ideals of life of
modern bourgeois society. Labour in the service of a

75

S^

The Protestant Ethic and the Spirit of Capialism

rational organization for the provision of humanity with
material goods has without doubt always appeared to
representatives of the capitalistic spirit as one of the
most important purposes of their life-work. It is only
necessary, for instance, to read Franklin's account of
his efforts in the service of civic improvements in
Philadelphia clearly to apprehend this obvious trutl .
And the joy and pride of having given employment to
numerous people, of having had a part in the economic
progress of his home town in the sense referring to
figures of population and volume of trade which
capitalism associated with the word, all these things
obviously are part .of the specific and undoubtedly
idealistic satisfactions in life to modern men of busi-
ness. Similarly it is one of the fundamental character-
istics of an individualistic capitalistic economy that it
is rationalized on the basis of rigorous calculation,
directed with foresight and caution toward the economic
success which is sought in sharp contrast to the hand-
to-mouth existence of the peasant, and to the privileged
traditionalism of the guild craftsman and of the
adventurers' capitalism, oriented to the exploitation of
political opportunities and irrational speculation.

It might thus seem that the development of the
spirit of capitalism is best understood as part of the
development of rationalism as a whole, and could be
deduced from the fundamental position of rationalism
on the basic problems of life. In the process Protestant-
ism would only have to be considered in so far as it
had formed a stage prior to the development of a purely
rationalistic philosophy. But any serious attempt to
carry this thesis through makes it evident that such a

76

/ The Spirit of Capitalism

simple way of putting the question will not work,
simply becaus'e of the fact that the history of rationalism
shows 3 development which by no means follows
parallel lines in the various departments of life. The
rationalization of private law, for instance, if it is
thought of as a logical simplification and rearrange-
ment of the content of the law, was achieved in the
highest hitherto known degree in the Roman law of
late antiquity. But it remained most backward in some
of the countries with the highest degree of economic
rationalization, notably in England, where the Renais-
sance of Roman Law was overcome by the power of'
the great legal corporations, while it has always retained
its supremacy in the Catholic countries of Southern
Europe. The worldly rational philosophy of the
eighteenth century did not find favour alone or even
principally in the countries of highest capitalistic
development. The doctrines of Voltaire are even to-day
the common property of broad upper, and what is
practically more important, middle-class groups in
the Romance Catholic countries. Finally, if under
practical rationalism is understood the type of attitude
which sees and judges the world consciously in terms
of the worldly interests of the individual ego, then this
view of life was and is the special peculiarity of the
peoples of the libenim arbitrium, such as the Italians
and the French are in very flesh and blood. But we
have already convinced ourselves that this is by no
means the soil in which that relationship of a man to
his calling as a task, which is necessary' to capitalism,
has pre-eminently grown. In fact, one may — this simple
proposition, which is often forgotten, should be placed

77

The Protestant Ethic and the Spirit of Capuutism

at the beginning of every study which essays to deal
with rationalism — rationalize life from fundamentally
different basic points of view and in very different
directions. Rationalism is an historical concept which
covers a j^JKile-WQrici of different Üiings. It will be our
task to find out whose intellectual child The particular
concrete form of rational thought ~was, from which
theidea of a calling and the devotion to labour in_the
calling lias grown, which is, as we haye seen^ so irra-
tional from the standpoint of purely eudaemoni^tic_
self-interest, but which has been and still is one of the
most characteristic elements of our capitalistic culture..
We are here particularly interested in the origin of
precisely the irrational element which lies in this, as
in every conception of a calling.

78

CHAPTER III

LUTHER'S CONCEPTION OF THE CALLING
Task of the Investigation

Now it is unmistakable that even in the German word
Bert^, and perhaps still more clearly in the English
calling, a religious conception, that of a task set by
God7^~at~least suggested. The more emphasis is pur
upon the word in a concrete case, the more evident is
the connotation. And if we trace the history of the
word through the civilized languages, it appears that
neither the predominantly Catholic peoples nor those
of classical antiquity^ have possessed any expression
of similar connotation for what we know as a calling
(in the sense of a life-task, a definite field in which to
work), while pne has existed for all predominantly
Protestantpeo^les^ It may be further shown that this
IS not due to any ethnical peculiarity of the languages
concerned. It is not, for instance, the product of a
Germanic spirit, but in its modern meaning the word
comes from the Bible translations, through the spirit
of the translator, not that of the original.- In Luther's
translation of the Bible it appears to have first been
used at a point in Jesus Sirach(xi. 20 and 21) precisely
in our modern sense. ^ After that it speedily took on its
present meaning in the everyday speech of all Pro-
testant peoples, while earlier not even a suggestion of
such a meaning could be found in the secular literature
of any of them, and even, in religious writings, so far
as I can ascertain, it is only found in one of the German

79

The Protestant Ethic and the Spirit of Capitalism

mystics whose influence on Luther is well known.

Like the meaning of the word, the idea is new, a

product of the Reformation. This may be assumed as

generally known. It is true that certain suggestions of

the positive valuation of routine activity in the world,

which is contained in this conception of the calling, had

already existed in the Middle Ages, and even in late

Hellenistic antiquity. We shall speak of that later.

But at least one thing was unquestionably new: the

valuation of the fulfilment of duty in worldly affairs as

the highest form which the moral activity of the

individual could assiime. This it was which inevitably

gave every-day worldly activity a religious significance,

and which first created the conception of a calling in

this sense. The conception of the calling thus brings

out that central dogma of all Protestant denominations

which the Catholic division of ethical precepts into

prcecepta and consilia discards. The only way of living

acceptably to God was not to surpass worldly morality

in monastic asceticism, but solely through the fulfilment

of the obligations imposed upon the individual by his

!^ position in the worjd. That was his calling.

Luther* developed the concept ion~m'The course of
the first decade of his activity as a reformer. At first,
quite in harmony with the prevailing tradition of the
Middle Ages, as represented, for example, by Thomas
Aquinas,^ he thought of activity in the world as a thing
of the flesh, even though willed by God. I,t is the
indispensable natural condition of a life of faith, but
in itself, like eating and drinkjng, morally ijieutral.^ But
with the development of the conception of sola fide in
all its consequences, and its logical result, the increas-
80

Luther's Conception of the Calling

ingly sharp emphasis against the Catholic cons.;^^
evangelica of the monks as dictates of the devil, tL, '
calling grew in importance. [The monastic life is not
.only quite devoid of value as a means of justification
before God, but he also looks upon its renunciation of y
the. duties of this world as the product of selfishness, yN-
withdrawing from temporal obligations. In contrast,
labour in a calling appears to him as the outward
expression of brotherly love]] This he proves by the
observation that the division of labour forces every
individual to work for others, but his view-point is
highly naive, forming an almost grotesque contrast to J
Adam Smith's well-known statements on the same
subject.' However, this justification, which is evidently
essentially scholastic, soon disappears again, and there
remains, more and more strongly emphasized, the state-
ment that the fulfilment of worldly duties is under all
circumstances the only way to live acceptably to God. It
and it alone is the will of God , and hence every legitimate /C
calling has exactly the same worth in the sight of God.®

[That this moral justification of worldly activity was "^ —
one of the most important results of the Reformation,
especially of Luther's part in it, is beyond doubt, and
may even be considered a platitude.^ This attitude is
worlds removed from the deep hatred of Pascal, in his
contemplative moods, for all worldly activity, which
he was deeply convinced could only be understood in
terms of vanity or low cunning.^^ And it differs even
more from the Hberal utilitarian compromise with the
world at which the Jesuits arrived] But just what the prac-
tical significance of this achievement of Protestantism
was in detail is dimly felt rather than clearly perceived.

8i

jy^g r'rotestant Ethic and the Spirit of Capitalism

j^^.n the first place it is hardly necessary to point out
lat Luther cannot be claimed for the spirit of capital-
ism in the sense in which we have used that term
above, or for that matter in any sense whatever. The
religious circles which to-day most enthusiastically
celebrate that great achievement of the Reformation
are by no means friendly to capitalism in any sense.
And Luther himself would, without doubt, have
sharply repudiated any connection with a point of
view like that of Franklin. Of course, one cannot con-
sider his complaints against the great merchants of his
time, such as the Fuggers,^^ as evidence in this case.
For the struggle against the privileged position, legal
or actual, of single great trading companies in the six-
teenth and seventeenth centuries may best be compared
with the modern campaign against the trusts, and can
no more justly be considered in itself an expression of
a traditionalistic point of view. Against these people,
against the Lombards, the monopolists, speculators,
and bankers patronized by the Anglican Church and
the kings and parliaments of England and France, both
the Puritans and the Huguenots carried on a bitter
struggle. ^2 Cromwell, after the battle of Dunbar
(September 1650), wrote to the Long Parliament:
"Be pleased to reform the abuses of all professions:
and if there be any one that makes many poor to make
a few rich, that suits not a Commonwealth." But,
nevertheless, we will find Cromwell following a quite
specifically capitalistic line of thought. ^^ On the other
hand, Luther's numerous statements against usury or
interest in any form reveal a conception of the nature
of capitalistic acquisition which, compared with that of
82

Luther's Conception of the Calling

late Scholasticism, is, from a capitalistic view-point,
definitely backward .^^ Especially, of course, the doctrine
of the sterility of money which Anthony of Florence
had already refuted.

But it is unnecessary to go into detail. For, above all,
the consequences of the conception of the calling in the
religious sense for worldly conduct were susceptible
to quite different interpretations. The effect of the
Reformation as such was only that, as compared with
tKe~~Cäthölic attitude, the moral emphasis on and the '
religious sanction of, organized worldly labour in a
calling was mightily increased. The way in which the
concept of the calling, which expressed this change,
should develop further depended upon the religious
evolution which now took place in the different Pro-
testant Churches. The authority of the Bible, from
which Luther thought he had derived his idea of the
calling, on the whole favoured a traditionalistic inter-
pretation. The old Testament, in particular, though in
the genuine prophets it showed no sign of a tendency
to excel worldly morality, and elsewhere only in quite
isolated rudiments and suggestions, contained a similar
religious idea entirely in this traditionalistic sense.
Everyone should abide by his living and let the godless
mn after gain. That is the sense of all the statements
which bear directly on worldly activities. Not until the
Talmud is a partially, but not even then fundamentally,
different attitude to be found. The personal attitude
of Jesus is characterized in classical purity by the
typical antique-Oriental plea: "Give us this day our
daily bread." The element of radical repudiation
of the world, as expressed in the fiafiajvas rrjs dBiKlas,

83

^

The Protestant Ethic and the Spirit of Capitalism

excluded the possibility that the modern idea of a
calling should be based on his personal authority .^^ In
the apostolic era as expressed in the New Testament,
especially in St. Paul, the Christian looked upon
worldly activity either with indifference, or at least
essentially traditionalistically ; for those first generations
were filled with eschato logical hopes. Since everyone
was simply waiting for the coming of the Lord, there
was nothing to do but remain in the station and in
the worldly occupation in which the call of the Lord
had found him, and labour as before. Thus he would
not burden his brothers as an object of charity, and it
would only be for a little while. Luther read the Bible
through the spectacles of his whole attitude; at the time
and in the course of his development from- about 1518
to 1530 this not only remained traditionalistic but
became ever more so.^^

In the first years of his activity as a reformer he was,
since he thought of the calling as primarily of the flesh,
dominated by an attitude closely related, in so far as the
form of world ^^ activity was concerned, to the Pauline
eschatological indifference as expressed in i Cor. vii.^'
One may attain salvation in any walk of life; on the
short pilgrimage of life there is no use in laying weight
on the form of occupation. The pursuit of material gain
beyond personal needs must thus appear as a symptom
of lack of grace, and since it can apparently only be
attained at the expense of others, directly reprehen-
sible.^® As he became increasingly involved in the affairs
/ of the world, he came to value work in the world more

(highly. But in the concrete calling an individual pursued
he saw more and more a special command of God to
84

Luther's Conception of the Calling

fulfil these particular duties which the Divine Will had
imposed upon him. And after the conflict with the
Fanatics and the peasant disturbances, the objective
historical order of things in which the individual has (v
been placed by God becomes for Luther more and \\\
more a direct manifestation of divine will.^^ The
stronger and stronger emphasis on the providential
element, even in particular events of life, led more and
more to a traditionalistic interpretation based on the
idea of Providence. The individual should remain once -)
and for all in the station and calling in which God had
placed him, and should restrain his worldly activity
within the limits imposed by his established station in
life. While his economic traditionalism was originally
the result of Pauline indifference, it later became that
of a more and more intense belief in divine provi-
dence,^^ which identified absolute obedience to God's
will, 2^ with absolute acceptance of things as they were.
Starting from this background, it was impossible for
Luther to establish a new or in any way fundamental
connection between worldly activity and religious
principles .22 His acceptance of purity of doctrine as the
one infallible criterion of the Church, which became
more and more irrevocable after the struggles of the
'twenties, was in itself sufficient to check the develop-
ment of new points of view in ethical matters.

Thus jo^J^^utheiLihe concept of the calling remained
traditionalisticu-^^ His callmg is something which man'j
has to accept as a divine ordinance, to which he must I
adapt himself. This aspect outweighed the other idea V;
which was also present, that work in the calling was a,
or gather the, task set by God.^^ And in its further j

8s 1

The Protestant Ethic and the Spirit of Capitalism

development, orthodox Lutheranism emphasized this
aspect still more. Thus, for the time being, the only
ethical result was negative; worldly duties were no
longer subordinated to ascetic ones; obedience to
authority and the acceptance of things as they were,
were preached .^^ In this Lutheran form the idea of a
calling had, as will be shown in our discussion of
mediaeval religious ethics, to a considerable extent
been anticipated by the German mystics. Especially
in Tauler's equalization of the values of religious and
worldly occupations, and the decline in valuation of
the traditional forms of ascetic practices ^® on account
of the decisive significance of the ecstatic-contemplative
absorption of the divine spirit by the soul. To a certain
extent Lutheranism means a step backward from the
mystics, in so far as Luther, and still more his Church,
had, as compared with the mystics, partly undermined
the psychological foundations for a rational ethics. (The
mystic attitude on this point is reminiscent partly of the
Pietest and partly of the Quaker psychology of faith .2')
That was precisely because he could not but suspect the
tendency to ascetic self-discipline of leading to salvation
by works, and hence he and his Church were forced to
keep it more and more in the background.

Thus the mere idea of the calling in the Lutheran
sense is at best of questionable importance for the
problems in which we are interested. This was all that
was nieant to be determined here.^^ But this is not in
the least to say that even the Lutheran form of the
renewal of the religious life may not have had some
practical significance for the objects of our investiga-
tion ; quite the contrary. Only that significance evidently
86

Luther's Conception of the Calling

cannot be derived directly from the attitude of Luther
and his Church to worldly activity, and is perhaps not
altogether so easily grasped as the connection with
other branches of Protestantism. It is thus well for us

I; next to look into those forms in which a relation
between practical life and a religious motivation can

1 be more easily perceived than in Lutheranism. We
have already called attention to the conspicuous part
played by Calvinism and the Protestant sects in the
history of capitalistic development. As Luther found
a different spirit at work in Zwingli than in himself,
so did his spiritual successors in Calvinism. And
Catholicism has to the present day looked upon
Calvinism as its real opponent.

I Now that may be partly explained on purely political
grounds. Although the Reformation is unthinkable
without Luther's own personal religious development,
and was spiritually long influenced by his personality,
I without Calvinism his work could not have had per-
manent concrete success. Nevertheless, the reason for
this common repugnance of Catholics and Lutherans
lies, at least partly, in the ethical peculiarities of
Calvinism. A purely superficial glance shows that there
is here quite a different relationship between the
religious life and earthly activity than in either Catholi-
cism or Lutheranism. Even in literature motivated
purely by religious factors that is evident. Take for
instance the end of the Divine Comedy y where the poet
in Paradise stands speechless in his passive contempla-
tion of the secrets of God, and compare it with the
poem which has come to be called the Divine Comedy
of Puritanism. Milton closes the last song of Paradise

87

The Protestant Ethic and the Spirit of Capitalism

Lost after describing the expulsion from paradise as
follows: —

"They, looking back, all the eastern side beheld
Of paradise, so late their happy seat,
Waved over by that flaming brand ; the gate
With dreadful faces thronged and fiery arms.
Some natural tears they dropped, but wiped them soon:
The world was all before them, there to choose
Their place of rest, and Providence their guide."

And only a little before Michael had said to Adam:

. . . "Only add
Deeds to thy knowledge answerable ; add faith ;
Add virtue, patience, temperance; add love,
By name to come called Charity, the soul
Of all the rest : then wilt thou not be loth
To leave this Paradise, but shall possess
A Paradise within thee, happier far."

One feels at once that this powerful expression of the
Puritan's serious attention to this world, his acceptance
of his life in the world as a task, could not possibly have
come from the pen of a mediaeval writer. But it is
just as uncongenial to Lutheranism, as expressed for
instance in Luther's and Paul Gerhard's chorales.
It is now our task to replace this vague feeling by a
somewhat more precise logical formulation, and to
investigate the fundamental basis of these differences.
The appeal to national character is generally a mere
confession of ignorance, and in this case it is entirely
untenable. To ascribe a unified national character to
the Englishmen of the seventeenth century would be
simply to falsify history. Cavaliers and Roundheads did
88

Luther^s Conception of the Calling

ncct appeal to each other simply as two parties, but as
radically distinct species of men, and whoever looks
into the matter carefully must agree with them.^^ On
the other hand, a difference of character between the
English merchant adventurers and the old Hanseatic
merchants is not to be found; nor can any other
fundamental difference between the English and
German characters at the end of the Middle Ages,
which cannot easily be explained by the differences of
their political history. ^° It was the power of religious
influence, not alone, but more than anything else,
which created the differences of which we are conscious
to-day. 3^

We thus take as our starting-point in the investiga-
tion of the jrelatkmship between the old PrptestanL.
ethic and the spirit of capitalism the works of Calvin,

nfTalvin jt^rn , and the nther Puritan SectS. But it is not

to be understood that we expect to find any of the
founders or representatives of these religious move-
ments considering the promotion of what we have
called the spirit of capitalism as in any sense the end of
his life-work. We cannot well maintain that the pursuit
of worldly goods, conceived as an end in itself, was to
any of them of positive ethical value. Once and for all
it must be remembered that programmes of ethical
reform never were at the centre of interest for any of
the religious reformers (among whom, for our purposes,
we must include men like Menno, George Fox, and
Wesley). They were not the founders of societies for
ethical culture nor the proponents of humanitarian
projects for social reform or cultural ideals. The salva-
tion of the soul and that alone was the centre of their

' H 89

The Protestant Ethic and the Spirit of Capii '^a

j life and work «^ Their ethical ideals and the pracoft'al
( results of their doctrines were all based on that alone,
^ and were the consequences of purely religious motives.
We shall thus have to admit that the cultural conse-
quences of the Reformation were to a great extent,
perhaps in the particular aspects with which we are-
dealing predominantly, unforeseen and even unwished-
for results of the labours of the reformers. They were
often far removed from or even in contradiction to all
t^t they themselves thought to attain.
^1 The following study may thus perhaps in a modest
/way form a contribution to the understanding of the
manner in which ideas become effective forces in
history. In order, however, to avoid any misunder-
standing of the sense in which any such effectiveness
of purely ideal motives is claimed at all, I may perhaps
be permitted a few remarks in conclusion to this intro-
ductory discussion.

In such a study, it may at once be definitely stated,
no attempt is made to evaluate the ideas of the Reforma-
tion in any sense, whether it concern their social or their
religious worth. We have continually to deal with
aspects of the Reformation which must appear to the
, truly religious consciousness as incidental and even
)/^ /■ superficial. For we are merely attempting to clarify the
/ part which religi^ous forces have played in forming the
I developing web of our specifically worldly modern
\ culture, in the complex interaction of innumerable
\ different historical factors. We are thus inquiring only
to what extent certain characteristic features of this
culture can be imputed to the influence of the Reforma-
tion. At the same time we must free ourselves from the
90

Luther* s Conception of the Calling

idea that it is possible to deduce the Reformation, as
a historically necessary result, from certain economic
changes. Countless historical circumstances, which
cannot be reduced to any economic law, and are not
susceptible of economic explanation of any sort,
especially purely political processes, had to concur in
order that the newly created Churches should survive
at all.

On the other hand, however, we have no intention
whatever of mauitaining such a foolish and doctrinaire
thesis^^ as that'^the spirit of capitalism (in the pro-
visional sense of the term explained above) could only
have arisen as ^e result of certain effects of the Refor-
mation, or even that capitalism as an economic system
is a creation of the Reformation. In itself, the fact that
certain important forms of capitalistic business organi-
zation are known to be considerably older than the
Reformation is a sufficient refutation of such a claim.
On the contrary, we only wish to ascertain whether and
to what extent religious forces have taken part in the
qualitative formation and the quantitative expansion of
that spirit over the world. Furthermore, what concrete
aspects of our capitalistic culture can be traced to them.
In view of the tremendous confusion of interdependent
influences between the material basis, the forms of
social and political organization, and the ideas current
in the time of the Reformation, we can only proceed
by investigating whether and at what points certain
correlations between forms of religious belief and
practical ethics can be worked out. At the same time
we shall as far as possible clarify the manner and the
general direction in which, by virtue of those relation-

91

The Protestant Ethic and the Spirit of Capitalism

ships, the religious movements have influenced the
development of material culture. Only when thisKas
been determined with reasonable accuracy can the
attempt be made to estimate to what extent the his-
torical development of modern culture can be attributed
to those religious forces and to what extent to others.

92

II

PART II

THE PRACTICAL ETHICS OF THE ASCETIC
BRANCHES OF PROTESTANTISM

CHAPTER IV

THE RELIGIOUS FOUNDATIONS OF
WORLDLY ASCETICISM

In history there have been four principal fornas_of
ascetic Protestantism (in the sense of word here used) :
(i) Calvinism in the form which it assumed in the •
main area of its influence in Western Europe, especially
in the seventeenth century ; (2) Pietism ; (3) Methodism ;
(4) the sects growing out of the Baptist movement.^
None of these movements was completely separated
from the others, and even the distinction from the
non-ascetic Churches of the Reformation is never
perfectly clear. Methodism. which_first arnsp in the
middle of the eightfifirillLceiituiY within the Established

Church of England, was not^in the minds of its
founders, intended to form a new^^Hnlr^^^JÜLÖnly
a new^waRening of the ascetic .spirit v^itWn_jhe^jold^_
OnTy in tEe"coiirse oHts .develQpm£iit,..£Sfi£dallyJn its
extension to Americav.didiLJbecome separate from the

Anglican Church.

Pietism first split off from the Calvinistic movement
in England, and especially in Holland. It remained
loosely connected with orthodoxy, shading off from it
by imperceptible gradations, until at the end of the
seventeenth century it was absorbed into Lutheranism
under Spener's leadership. Though the dogmatic
adjustment was not entirely satisfactory, it remained a
movement within the Lutheran Church. Only the
faction dominated by Zinzendorf, and affected by
lingering Hussite and Calvinistic influences within the

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The Protestant Ethic and the Spirit of Capitalism

Moravian brotherhood, was forced, like Methodism
against its will, to form a peculiar sort of sect. Calvinism
and Baptism were at the beginning of thek develop-
ment~^Karply opposed to each other. .But in the Baptism
"tJf'fhe litter part of the seventeenth century they were
in close contact. And even in the Independent sects of
England and Holland at the beginning of the seven-
teenth century the transition w^s not abrupt. As
Pietism shows, the transition to Lutheranism is also
gradual, and the same is true of Calvinism and the
Anglican Church, though both in external character
and in the spirit of its most logical adherents the latter
is more closely related to Catholicism. It is true that
both the mass of the adherents and especially the
staunchest champions ofthat ascetic movement which,
in the broadest sense of a highly ambiguous word, has
been called Puritanism,^ did attack the foundations of
Anglicanism; but even here the differences were only
gradually worked out in the course of the struggle.
Even if for the present we quite ignore the questions
of government and organization which do not interest
us here, the facts are just the same. The dogmatic
differences, even the most important, such as those over
the doctrines of predestination and justification, were
combined in the most complex ways, and even at the
beginning of the seventeenth century regularly, though
not without exception, prevented the maintenance of
unity in the Church. Above all, the types of moral
conduct in which we are interested may be found in a
similar manner among the adherents of the most various
denominations, derived from any one of the four
sources mentioned above, or a combination of several

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The Religious Foundations of Worldly Asceticism

of them. We shall see that similar ethical maxims may
be correlated with very different dogmatic foundations .
Also the important literary tools for the saving of
souls, above all the casuistic compendia of the various
denominations, influenced each other in the course of
time ; one finds great similarities in them, in spite of
very great differences in actual conduct.

It would almost seem as though we had best com-
pletely ignore both the dogmatic foundations and the
ethical theory and confine our attention to the moral
practice so far as it can be determined. That, however,
is not true. The various different dogmatic roots of
ascetic morality did no doubt die out after terrible
struggles. But the original connection with those
dogmas has left behind important traces in the later
undogmatic ethics ; moreover, only the knowledge of the
original body of ideas can help us to understand the
connection of that morality with the idea of the after-
life which absolutely dominated the most spiritual
men of that time. Without its power, overshadowing
everything else, no moral awakening which seriously
influenced practical life came into being in that period.

We are naturally not concerned with the question of
what was theoretically and officially taught in the
ethical compendia of the time, however much practical
significance this may have had through the influence
of Church discipline, pastoral work, and preaching.^

^e are interested rather in something entirely different^
jhe influence of those psychological sanctions which,
originating in religious belief and the practice of re-
ligion, gave a direction to practical conduct and held
3ie individual to it. Now these sanctions were to a larg^

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Tlie Protestant Ethic and the Spirit of Capitalism

extent derived from the peculiarities of the rehgious
ideas behind them. The men of that day were occupied
with abstract dogmas to an extent which itself can only
be understood when we perceive the connection of
these dogmas with practical religious interests. A few
observations on dogma, ^ which will seem to the non-
theological reader as dull as they will hasty and super-
ficial to the theologian, are indispensable. We can of
Icourse only proceed by presenting these religious
[ideas in the artificial simplicity of ideal types, as they
[I could at best but seldom be found in history. For just
because of the impossibility of drawing sharp boun-
daries in historical reality we can only hope to under-
stand their specific importance from an investigation of
them in their most consistent and logical forms.

A. Calvinism

Now Calvinism^ was the faith ^ over which the
i great political and cultural struggles of the sixteenth
I and seventeenth centuries were fought in the most
- highly developed countries, the Netherlands, England,
and France. To it we shall hence turn first. At that
time, and in general even to-day, the doctrine of
predestination was considered its most characteristic
dogma. It is true that there has been controversy as to
whether it is the most essential dogma of the Reformed
Church or only an appendage. Judgments of the im-
portance of a historical phenomenon may be judgments
of value or faith, namely, when they refer to what is
alone interesting, or alone in the long run valuable
in it. Or, on the other hand, they may refer to its

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The Religious Foundations of Worldly Asceticism

influence on ether historical processes as a causal
factor. Then we are concerned with judgments of
historical imputation. If now we start, as we must
do here, from the latter standpoint and inquire into
the significance which is to be attributed to that
dogma by virtue of its cultural and historical con-
sequences, it must certainly be rated very highly.' The
movement which Oldenbarneveld led was shattered
by it. The schism in the English Church became
irrevocable under James I after the Crown and the
Puritans came to differ dogmatically over just this
doctrine. Again and again it was looked upon as the
real element of political danger in Calvinism and
attacked as such by those in authority.^ The great
synods of the seventeenth century, above all those of
Dordrecht and Westminster, besides numerous smaller
ones, made its elevation to canonical authority the
central purpose of their work. It served as a rallying-
point to countless heroes of the Church militant, and in
both the eighteenth and the nineteenth centuries it
caused schisms in the Church and formed the battle-
cry of great new awakenings. We cannot pass it by,
and since to-day it can no longer be assumed as known
to all educated men, we can best learn its content from
the authoritative words of the Westminster Confession
of 1647, which in this regard is simply repeated by
both Independent and Baptist creeds.

"Chapter IX (of Free Will), No. 3. Man, by his
fall into a state of sin, hath wholly lost all ability
of will to any spiritual good accompanying salvation.
So that a natural man, being altogether averse from
that Good, and dead in sin, is not able, by his own

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The Protestant Ethic and the Spirit of Capitalism

strength, to convert himself, or to prepare himself

thereunto.

' "Chapter III (of God's Eternal Decree), No. 3.

By the decree of God, for the manifestation of His

I glory, some men and angels are predestinated unto ever-

VJasting life, and others foreordained to everlasting death.

**No. 5. Those of mankind that are predestinated unto

life, God before the foundation of the world was laid,

according to His eternal and immutable purpose, and

the secret counsel and good pleasure of His will, hath

chosen in Christ unto everlasting glory, out of His mere

free grace and love, without any foresight of faith or

good works, or perseverance in either of them, or any

other thing in the creature as conditions, or causes

moving Him thereunto, and all to the praise of His

glorious grace.

''No. 7. The rest of mankind God was pleased,
according to the unsearchable counsel of His own will,
whereby He extendeth, or with-holdeth mercy, as He
pleaseth, for the glory of His sovereign power over His
creatures, to pass by, and to ordain them to dishonour
and wrath for their sin, to the praise of His glorious
justice.

' "Chapter X (of Effectual Calling), No. i. All those
whom God hath predestinated unto life, and those only.
He is pleased in His appointed and accepted time effec-
tually to call, by His word and spirit (out of that state
of sin and death, in which they are by nature) . . .
taking away their heart of stone, and giving unto them
an heart of flesh; renewing their wills, and by His
almighty power determining them to that which is
good. . . i
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The Religious Foundations of Worldly Asceticism

' ' Chapter V (of Providence) , No . 6 . As for those wicked
and ungodly men, whom God as a righteous judge, for
former sins doth blind and harden, from them He not
only with-holdeth His grace, whereby they might have
been enlightened in their understandings and wrought
upon in their hearts, but sometimes also withdraweth
the gifts which they had and exposeth them to such
objects as their corruption makes occasion of sin : and
withal, gives them over to their own lusts, the tempta-
tions of the world, and the power of Satan: whereby it
comes to pass that they harden themselves, even under
those means, which God useth for the softening of
others."»

"Though_l_niay^ be sent to Hell for it, such 4 God
all never command my respect", was Milton's well-

lown opinion of the doctrine. ^^ But we are here
concerned not with the evaluation, but the historical
significance of the dogma. We can only JbrieflV-sketch
the question of how the do^rine originated and how it
^fitted into the framework of Calvinist ic theology.

Two paths leading to it were possible. The pheno-
menonof the religious sense jof grace is combined^^Jn.
the mostactiye and passionate of those great worship-
^ers_which Christianity has produced again and jgain
since Augustine, with the feeling of certainty that that
grace is the sole product of an objective power, and not
in the least to be^ttributed to personal worthTThe
powerful feeling of light-hearted assurance, in which
the tremendous pressure of their sense of sin is released,
apparently breaks over them with elemental force and
destroys every possibility of the belief that this over-
powering gift of grace could owe anything to their own

lOI

The Protestant Ethic and the Spirit of Capitalism

/co-operation or could be connected with achievements
/or quahties of their own faith and will. At the time of
I Luther's greatest religious creativeness, when he was
/ capable of writing his Freiheit eines Christenmenschen,
I God's secret decree was also to him most definitely
I the sole and ultimate source of his state of religious
V-grace.^^ Even later he did not formally abandon it.
But not only did the idea not assume a central position
for him, but it receded more and more into the back-
ground, the more his position as responsible head
of his Church forced him into practical politics.
Melancthon quite deliberately avoided adopting the
dark and dangerous teaching in the Augsburg
Confession, and for the Church fathers of Lutheranism
it was an article of faith that grace was revocable
(amissibilis) , and could be won again by penitent
humility and faithful trust in the word of God and in
the sacraments.
f With Calvin the process was just the opposite; the
' significance of the doctrine for him increased,^- per-
ceptibly in the course of his polemical controversies
with theological opponents. It is not fully developed
until the third edition of his Institutes, and only gained
""its position of central prominence after his death in
the great struggles which the Synods of Dordrecht and
Westminster sought to put an end to. With Calvin the
decretum horribile is derived not, as with Luther, from
religious experience, but from the logical necessity of
his thought; therefore its importance increases with
every increase in the logical consistency of that religious
Ir thought. The interest of it is solely in God, not in man ;
God does not exist for men, but men for the sake of

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\

The Religious Foundations of Worldly Asceticism

\God.^^i/All creation, including of course the fact, as
irUhdoubtedly was for Calvin, that only a small pro-i
portion of men are chosen for eternal grace, can have i/
any meaning only as means to the glory and majesty;
3f God. To apply earthly standards of justice to His,
sovereign decrees is meaningless and an insult to His
Majesty,^* since He and He alone is free, i.e. is subject
to no law. His decrees can only be understood by or
even known to us in so far as it has been His pleasure to
reveal them. We can only hold to these fragments of
eternal truth. Everything else, including the meaning
of our individual destiny, is hidden in dark mystery
which it would be both impossible to pierce and pre-
sumptuous to question.

For the damned to complain of their lot would be.,
much the same as for animals to bemoan the fact they
were not born as men. For everything of the flesh i^
separated from God by an unbridgeable gulf and
deserves of Him only eternal death, in so far as He
has not decreed otherwise for the glorification of His
Majesty jjWe know only that a part of humanity is saved,
the rest damned. To assume that human merit or guilt
play a part in determining this destiny would be to
think of God's absolutely free decrees, which have been
settled from eternity, as subject to change by human
influence, an impossible contradiction. The Father in
heaven of the New Testament, so human and under-
standing, who rejoices over the repentance of a sinner
as a woman over the lost piece of silver she has found,
is gone. His place has been taken by a transcendental
being, beyond the reach of human understanding, who
with His quite incomprehensible decrees has decided

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The Protestant Ethic and the Spirit of Capitalism

'1
the fate of every individual and regulated the tiniest .^^<

details of the cosmos from eternity .^^ God's grace is, "^
-since His decrees cannot change, as impossible for those ^1
to whom He has granted it to lose as it is unattainable , ri
for those to whom He has denied it. ^

In its extreme inhumanity this doctrine must above
all have had one consequence for the life of a generation
which surrendered to its magnificent consistency. That
was a feeling of unprecedented inner loneliness of the
single individual. ^^ In what was for the man of the age
of the Reformation the most important thing in life,
his eternal salvation, he was forced to follow his path
alone to meet a destiny which had been decreed for him
from eternity. No one could help him. No priest, for
the chosen one can understand the word of God only
in his own heart. No sacraments, for though the sacra-
ments had been ordained by God for the increase of
His glory, and must hence be scrupulously observed,
they are not a means to the attainment of grace, but
only the subjective externa subsidia of faith. No Church,
for though it was held that extra ecclesiam nulla
salus in the sense that whoever kept away from the
true Church could never belong to God's chosen
band,^'^ nevertheless the membership of the external
Church included the doomed. They should belong to
it and be subjected to its discipline, not in order thus
to attain salvation, that is impossible, but because, for
the glory of God, they too must be forced to obey His
commandments. Finally, even no God. For even
Christ had died only for the elect ,^^ for whose benefit
God had decreed His martyrdom from eternity. This,
the complete elimination of salvation through the
104

The Religious Foundations of Worldly Asceticism

Church and the sacraments (which was in Lutheranism
by~ no" means developed to its final conclusions), was
what formed the absolutely decisive difference from \\
Catholicism.

That great historic process in the development of
religions, the elimination of magic from the world^^
which had begun with the old Hebrew prophets and,
in conjunction with Hellenistic scientific thought, had
repudiated all magical means to salvation as superstition
and sin, came here to its logical conclusion. The genuine
Puritan even rejected all signs of religious ceremony at
the grave and buried his nearest and dearest without
song or ritual in order that no superstition, no trust in
the effects of magical and sacramental forces on
salvation, should creep in.^^

There was not only no magical means of attaining
the grace of God for those to whom God had decided
to deny it, but no means whatever. Combined with the
harsh doctrines of the absolute transcendentality of God
and the corruption of everything pertaining to the flesh,
this inner isolation of th^Jndividual contains, on the
one hand, the reason for [the entirely negative attitude^
of Puritanism,. tQ_, all the sensuous and emotional»
elements in culture and in religion, because they are
of no use toward salvation and promote sentimental
illusions and idolatrous superstitions. (Thus it provides
a basis for a fundamental antagonism to sensuous
culture of all kinds. ^^ On the other hand, it forms one
of the roots of that disillusioned and pessimistically
inclined individualism^^ which can even to-day be
identiHed^ih'the national characters and the institutions
of the peoples with a Puritan past, in such a striking

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1/

The Protestant Ethic and the Spirit of Capitalism

contrast to the quite different spectacles through which
the EnHghtenment later looked upon men.^^ We can
clearly identify the traces of the influence of the
doctrine of predestination in the elementary forms of
conduct and attitude toward life in the era with which
we are concerned, even where its authority as a dogma
was on the decline. It was in fact only the most extreme
form of that exclusive trust in God in which we are
here interested. It comes out for instance in the
strikingly frequent repetition, especially in the English
Puritan literature, of warnings against any trust in
the aid of friendship of men .2'* Even the amiable
Baxter counsels deep distrust of even one's closest
friend, and Bailey directly exhorts to trust no one
and to say nothing compromising to anyone. Only
God should be your confidant .^^ In striking con-
trast to Lutheranism, this attitude toward life was
also connected with the quiet disappearance of the
private confession, of which Calvin was suspicious only
on account of its possible sacramental misinterpreta-
tion, from all the regions of fully developed Calvinism.
That was an occurrence of the greatest importance. In
the first place it is a symptom of the type of influence
this religion exercised. Further, however, it was a
psychological stimulus to the development of their
ethical attitude. The means to a periodical discharge of
the emotional sense of sin ^^ was done away with.

Of the consequences for the ethical conduct of
everyday life we speak later. But for the general
religious situation of a man the consequences are
evident. In spite of the necessity of membership in the
true Church ^'^ for salvation, the Calvinist's intercourse
1 06

i

The Religious Foundations of Worldly Asceticism

with his God was carried on in deep spiritual isolation.
To see the specific results ^^ of this peculiar atmosphere,
it is only necessary to read Bunyan's Pilgrim's Progress,^^
by far the most widely read book of the whole Puritan
literature. In the description of Christian's attitude after
he had realized that he was living in thft City of Destruc-
tion and he had received the call to take .up his pilgrim-
age to the celestial city, wife and childreh cling to him,
but stopping his ears with his fingers and crying, "life,
eternal life", he staggers forth across the fields. No
refinement could surpass the naive feeling of the tinker
who, writing in his prison cell, earned the applause of
a believing world, in expressing the emotions of the
faithful Puritan, thinking only of his own salvation. It
is expressed in the unctuous conversations which he
holds with fellow-seekers on the way, in a manner
somewhat reminiscent of Gottfried Keller's Gerechte
Kammacher. Only when he himself is safe does it
occur to him that it would be nice to have his family
with him. It is the same anxious fear of death and the
beyond which we feel so vividly in Alfonso of Liguori,
as Döllinger has described him to us. It is worlds
removed from that spirit of proud worldliness which
Machiavelli expresses in relating the fame of those
Florentine citizens who, in their struggle against the
Pope and his excommunication, had held "Love of
their native city higher than the fear for the salvation
of their souls". And it is of course even farther from
the feelings which Richard Wagner puts into the
mouth of Siegmund before his fatal combat, "Grüsse
mir Wotan, grüsse mir Wallhall — Doch von Wallhall's
spröden Wonnen sprich du wahrlich mir nicht". But

107

The Protestant Ethic and the Spirit of Capitalism

the effects of this fear on Bunyan and Liguori are
characteristically different. The same fear which drives
the latter to every conceivable self-humiliation spurs
the former on to a restless and systematic struggle
with life. Whence comes this difference?
/ It seems at ßrst a mystery how the undoubted
/ superiority of Calvinism in social organization can be
/ connected witn this tendency to tear the individual
I away from the closed ties with which he is bound to
\this world. ^^. But, however strange it may seem, it
Ifollows fron\ the peculiar form which the Christian
brotherly love was forced to take under the pressure of
the inner isolation of the individual through the
Calvinistic faith. In the first place it follows dogmatic-
ally.^^ The world exists to serve the glorification of God
and for chat purpose alone. The elected Christian is in
the world o^Jy to increase this glory of God by fulfilling
His commandments to the best of his ability. But God
requires social achievement of the Christian because
j He wills that social life shall be organized according to
I His commandments, in accordance with that purpose.
The social ^2 activity of the Christian in the world is
solely activity in majorem gloriam Dei. This character is
hence shared by labour in a calling which serves the
mundane life of the community. Even in Luther we
found specialized labour in callings justified in terms
of brotherly love. But what for him remained an un-
certain, purely intellectual suggestion became for the
Calvinists a characteristic element in their ethical
system. Brotherly love, since it may only be practised
for the glory of God^^ and not in the service of the
flesh, ^^ is expressed in the first place in the fulfilment
io8

The Religious Fowtdatiom of Worldly Asceticism

of the daily tasks given by the lex naturce\ and in the
process this fulfilment assumes a peculiarly objective
and impersonal character, that_of service in thejnterest _

^ of the rational organization of our social environmej:^'
For the wonderfully purposeful organizatior.-^ and
arrangement of this cosmos is, according botj-'i to the
revelation of the Bible and to natural intuitior^» evidently
designed by God to serve the utility of the V"^^'^ race.

- This makes labour in the service of imperso/?al social

I usefulness appear to promote the glory of <^»^od and
hence to be willed by Him. The complete elimifiation
of the theodicy problem and of all those questions about
the meaning of the world and of life, which have tof*^
tured others, was as self-evident to the Puritan as, for
quite diflferent reasons, to the Jew, and even in a certain
sense to all the non-mystical types of Christian religion.
^To this-£CQnomy of forces Calvinism added another
tendency which worked in the same direction. The
conflict betw€€ft-^he Jftdi^ddual and the ethic (in
Sören Kierkegaard's sense) didJiot^exist fqr^jyinisjn,
although it placed the individual entirely on his own
responsibility in religious matters. This is not the
place to analyse the reasons for this fact, or its signifi-
cance for the political and economic rationalism of
Calvinism. The source of the utilitarian character of
fcalvinistic ethics lies here, and important peculiarities
[of the Calvinistic idea of the calling were derived from
; the same source as well.^^ But for the moment we must
1 return to the special consideration of the doctrine of
Wedestination.

f For us the decisive problem is : How was this doctrine
borne^^ in an age to which the after-life was not only

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The Protestant Ethic and the Spirit of Capitalism

more important, but in many ways also more certain,
[than all the interests of life in this world ?^^ The
question, Am I one of the elect? must sooner or later
ha«.ve arisen for every believer and have forced all other
interc^^ßts into the background. And how j:an I be sure
of this :?^tate of grace P^^ For Calvin himself this was
not a proLS>|em. He felt himself to be a chosen agent of
the Lord, " -id was certain of his own salvation. Accord-
ingly, t^)', the question of how the individual can be
certain :of his own election, he has at bottom only the
answe'r that we should be content with the knowledge
that '^Jod has chosen and depend further only on that
'implicit trust in Christ which is the result of true faith.
He rejects in principle the assumption that one can
learn from the conduct of others whether they are
chosen or damned. It is an unjustifiable attempt to
;force God's secrets. Tlie._elect differ externally in
this^iife in no way from the damned^® ; and even
all the subjective experiences of the chosen are, as
liidihria Spiritus sancti, possible for the damned Y^ith.
the_single_exception of^hat finaliter expectant, trusting
faith. The elecTlKus are and remain God's invisible
Church.

Quite naturally this attitude was impossible for his
followers as early as Beza, and, above all, for the broad
mass of ordinary men. For them the certitudo salutis in
the sense of the recognizability of the state of grace
necessarily became of absolutely dominant impor-
tance.*^ So, wherever the doctrine of predestination was
held, the question could not be suppressed whether
there were any infallible criteria by which membership
in the electi could be known. Not only has this question
no

The Religious Foundations of' Worldly Asceticism

continually had a central importance in the develop-
ment of the Pietism which first arose on the basis of
the Reformed Church ; it has in fact in a certain sense
at times been fundamental to it. But when we con-
sider the great political and social importance of the
Reformed doctrine and practice of the Communion,
we shall see how great a part was played during
the whole seventeenth century outside of Pietism by
the possibility of ascertaining the state of grace
of~ the individual. On it depended, for instance, his
admission to Communion, i.e. to the central religious
ceremony which determined the social standing of the
participants.

It was impossible, at least so far as the question of a
man's own state of grace arose, to be satisfied ^^ with
Calvin's trust in the testimony of the expectant faith
resulting from grace, even though the orthodox doctrine
had never formally abandoned that criterion. '^^ Above
all, practical pastoral work, which had immediately to
deal with afl the suffering caused by the doctrine,
could not be satisfied. It met these difficulties in various
ways.*^ So far as predestination was not reinterpreted,
toned down, or fundamentally abandoned,** two prin-
cipal, mutually connected, types of pastoral advice
appear. On the one hand it is held to be an absolute j/
duty to consider oneself chosen, and to combat all
doubts as temptations of the devil, *^ since lack of self-
confidence is the result of insufficient faith, hence of
imperfect grace. The exhortation of the apostle to
make fast one's own call is here interpreted as a duty
to attain certainty of one's own election and justifica-
tion in the daily struggle of life. In the place of the

III

The Protestant Ethic and the Spirit of Capitalism

humble sinners to whom Luther promises grace if
they trust themselves to God in penitent faith are bred
those self-confident saints ^^ whom we can rediscover
in the hard Puritan merchants of the heroic age of
capitalism and in isolated instances down to the present.
On the other hand, in j^ldei^o attain that self-con-
fidence intense worldly^activity is recommended as tue
most suitable means. ^^ It and it alone dispersesTeligious
I doubts and gives the certainty of grace.

That worldly activity should be considered capable
of this achievement, that it could, so to speak, be
considered the most suitable means of counteracting
feelings of religious anxiety, finds its explanation m
the fundamental peculiarities of religious feeling in the
Reformed Church, which come most clearly to light
in its differences from Lutheranism in the doctrine of
justification by faith. These differences are analysed so
subtly and with such objectivity and avoidance of value-
judgments in Schneckenburger's excellent lectures, ^^
that the following brief observations can for the most
part simply rest upon his discussion.
^ The highest religious experience which the Lutheran
faith strives to attain, especially as it developed in the
course of the seventeenth century, is the unio mystica
\with the deity. ^^ As the name itself, which is unknown
to the Reformed faith in this form, suggests, it is a
feeling of actual absorption in the deity, that of a real
entrance of the divine into the soul of the believer. It
is qualitatively similar to the aim of the contemplation
of the German mystics and is characterized by its
passive search for the fulfilment of the yearning' for
rest in God.

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The Religious Foundations of Worldly Asceticism

Now the history of philosophy shows that rehgious
behef which is primarily mystical may very well be
compatible with a pronounced sense of reality in the
field of empirical fact ; it may even support it directly
i on account of the repudiation of dialectic doctrines.
Furthermore, mysticism may indirectly even further
the interests of rational conduct. Nevertheless, the
positive valuation of external activity is lacking in its
relation to the world. In addition to this, Lutheranism
combines the unio mystica with that deep feeling of
sin-stained unworthiness which is essential to preserve
the poenitentia qiiotidiana of the faithful Lutheran,
thereby maintaining the humility and simplicity in-
dispensable for the forgiveness of sins. The typical
religion of the Reformed Church, on the other hand,
has from the beginning repudiated both this purely
inward emotional piety of Lutheranism and the
Quietist escape from everything of Pascal. A real'pene-
tration of the human soul by the divine was made
impossible by the absolute transcendentality of God
compared to the flesh : finitum non est capax infiniti.
The community of the elect with their God could only
take place and be perceptible to them in that God ^
worked (operatur) through them and that they were u/
conscious of it. That is, their action originated from
the faith caused by God's grace, and this faith in turn
justified itself by the quality of that action. Deep-lying
differences of the most important conditions of salva-
tion^o which apply to the classification of all practical
religious activity appear here. The religious believer,'
can make himself sur^ of his state of grace either in
that he feels himself to be the vessel of the Holy Spirit

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The Protestant Ethic and the Spirit of Capitalism

or the tool of the divine will. In the former case his
religious life tends to mysticism and emotionalism, in
the latter to ascetic action; Luther stood close to the
former type, Calvinism belonged definitely to the
latter. The Calvinist also wanted to be saved sola fide,
^nt since Calvin viewed all pure feelings and emotions,
no matter how exalted they might seem to be, with
suspicion ,^1 faith had to be proved by its objective
results in order to provide a firm foundation for the
certitudo salutis. It must be a fides efficax,^^ the call to
salvation an effectual calling (expression used in Savoy
Declaration).

If we now ask further, by what fruits the Calvinist
/thought himself able to identify true faith? the answer
[is: by a type of Christian conduct which served to
j increase the glory of God . Just what does so serve is to
be seen in his own will as revealed either directly
through the Bible or indirectly through the purposeful
order of the world which he has created {lex natura). ^^
Especially by comparing the condition of one's own
soul with that of the elect, for instance the patriarchs,
according to the Bible, could the state of one's own
grace be known .^* Only one of the elect really has the
fides efficaXy^^ only he is able by virtue of his rebirth
(regeneratio) and the resulting sanctification {sanctifi-
catio) of his whole life, to augment the glory of God by
real, and not merely apparent, good works. It was
through the consciousness that his conduct, at least in
its fundamental character and constant ideal (propositum
oboedientice) y rested on a power ^^ within himself
working for the glory of God ; that it is not only willed
of God but rather done by God'^^ that he attained the
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The Religions Foundations of Worldly Asceticism

highest good towards which this reHgion strove, the
certainty of salvation.^® That it was attainable was
proved by 2 Cor. xiii. 5.^® Thus, however useless goo^
works might be as a means of attaining salvation, for
even the elect remain beings of the flesh, and everything
they do falls infinitely short of divine standards,
nevertheless, they are indispensable as a sign of elec-
tion.^^ They are the technical means, not of purchasing ,
salvation, but of getting rid of the fear of damnationj
In this sense they are occasionally referred to as directly
necessary for salvation^^ or the possessio salutis is made
conditional on them.^^

Injpra^ice this means that God helps those who
help themselves .^^ Thus the Calvinist, as it is some-
times put, himself creates®* his own salvation, or, as
Nvould be more correct, the conviction of it. But this
creation cannot, as in Catholicism, consist in a gradual
accumulation of individual good works to one's credit,
but rather in a systematic self-control which at every
moment stands before the inexorable alternative, chosen
or damned. This brings us to a very important point
in our investigation.

It is common knowledge that Lutherans have again
and again accused this line of thought, which was
worked out in the Reformed Churches and sects with
increasing clarity,®^ of reversion to the doctrine of
salvation by works.®® And however justified the. protest
of the accused against identification of their dogmatic
position with the Catholic doctrine, this accusation has
surely been made with reason if by it is meant the
practical consequences for the everyday life of the
average Christian of the Reformed Church.®^ For a

115

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The Protestant Ethic and the Spirit of Capitalism

more intensive form of the religious valuation of moral
action than that to which Calvinism led its adherents
has perhaps never existed. But what is important for
the practical significance of this sort of salvation by
works must be sought in a knowledge of the particular
qualities which characterized their type of ethical con-
duct and distinguished it from the everyday life of an
average Christian of the Middle Ages. The difference
, .Pf may well be formulated as follows : the normal mediaeval
v/ Catholic layman^® lived ethically, so to speak, from
^ pJjiand to mouth. In the first place he conscientiously
^ ^ ^fulfilled his traditional duties. But beyond that mini-
'/U^mum his good works did not necessarily form a con-
^'m^nected, or at least not a rationalized, system of life,
0;] T)ut rather remained a succession of individual acts.
•^'^' He could use them as occasion demanded, to atone for
^ {3 particular sins, to better his chances for salvation, or,
>^ toward the end of his life, as a sort of insurance
premium. Of course the Catholic ethic was an ethic of
intentions. But the concrete intentio of the single act
/ determined its value. And the single good or bad
/ action was credited to the doer determining his tem-
L^ poral and eternal fate. Quite realistically the Church
recognized that man was not an absolutely clearly defined
unity to be judged one way or the other, but that his
moral life was normally subject to conflicting motives
and his action contradictory. Of course, it required as an
ideal a change of life in principle. But it weakened just
this requirement (for the average) by one of its most
important means of power and education, the sacrament
of absolution, the function of which was connected with
the deepest roots of the peculiarly Catholic religion.
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The Religions Foundations of Worldly Asceticism

~^j The rationalization of the world, the eHmination of
Änagic as a means to salvation ,^^ the Catholics had not
carried nearly so far as the Puritans (and before them
the Jews) had done. To the -Catholic^^ the absolution of
his Church was a compensation for his own imperfec-
tion. The priest was a magician who performed the
miracle of transubstantiation, and who held the key
to eternal life in his hand. One could turn to him in
grief and penitence. He dispensed atonement, hppe of
grace, certainty of forgiveness, and thereby granted
release from that tremendous tension to which the
Calvinist was doomed by an inexorable fate, admitting
of no mitigation. For him such friendly and human
comforts did not exist. He could not hope to atone for
hours of weakness or of thoughtlessness by increased
good will at other times, as the Catholic or even the\
Lutheran could. The God of Calvinism demanded of
his believers not single good works, but a life of good Ij
works combined into a unified system.'^ There was no /
place for the very human Catholic cycle of sin, repent-/
ance, atonement, release, followed by renewed _sin .'
Nor was there any balance of merit for a life as a whole
which could be adjusted by temporal punishments or
the Churches' means of grace.

' The moral conduct of the average man was thus
deprived of its planless and unsystematic character and
subjected to a consistent method for conduct as a
whole. It is no accident that the name of Methodists
stuck to the participants in the last great revival of
Puritan ideas in the eighteenth century just as the term
Precisians, which has the same meaning, was applied
to their spiritual ancestors in the seventeenth century. "^

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The Protestant Ethic and the Spirit of Capitalism

For only by a fundamental change in the whole meaning
of life at every moment and in every action '^^ could the
effects of grace transforming a man from the status
naturce to the status gratice be proved.

The life of the saint was directed solely toward a
transcendental end, salvation. But precisely for that
reason it was thoroughly rationalized in this world and
dominated entirely by the aim to add to the glory of
God on earth. Never has the precept omnia in majorem
dei gloriam been taken with more bitter seriousness.'^
Only a life guided by constant thought could achieve
conquest over the state of nature. Descartes 's cogito
ergo sum was taken over by the contemporary Puritans
with this ethical reinterpretation.'^ It was this rational-
ization which gave the Reformed faith its peculiar
ascetic tendency, and is the basis both of its relation-
ship'^^ to and its conflict with Catholicism. For naturally
similar things were not unknown to Catholicism.

Without doubt Christian asceticism, both outwardly
and in its inner meaning, contains many different
things. But it has had a definitely rational character in
its highest Occidental forms as early as the Middle
Ages, and in several forms even in antiquity. The great
historical significance of Western monasticism, as
contrasted with that of the Orient, is based on this
fact, not in all cases, but in its general type. In the
rules of St. Benedict, still more with the monks of
Cluny, again with the Cistercians, and most strongly
the Jesuits, it has become emancipated from planless
otherworldliness and irrational self-torture. It had
developed a systematic method of rational conduct with
the purpose of overcoming the status natura, to free
ii8

The Religions Foundations of Worldly Asceticism

man from the power of irrational impulses and his
dependence on the world and on nature. It attempted
to subject man to the supremacy of a purposeful will/'
to bring his actions under constant self-control with
a careful consideration of their ethical consequences.
Thus it trained the monk, objectively, as a worker in
the service of the kingdom of God, and thereby further,
subjectively, assured the salvation of his soul. This
active__sei£=control, which formed the end of the
exercitia of St. Ignatius and of the rational monastic
virtues everywhere,''^ was also the most important
practical ideaLüf Puritanism. "^^ In the deep contempt
with which the cool reserve of its adherents is con-
trasted, in the reports of the trials of its martyrs, with
the undisciplined blustering of the noble prelates and
officials ^^ can be seen that respect for quiet self-con-
trol which still distinguishes the best type of English
or American gentleman to-day .^^ To put it in our
terms ^^ : , The Puritan, like every rational type of j
asceticism, tried to enable a man to maintain and act ''
upon his constant motives, especially those which it
taught him itself, against the emotions. In this formal
psychological sense of the term it tried to make him
into a personality. Contrary to many popular ideas, the
end of this asceticism was to be able to lead an alert, /
intelligent life: Jthe most urgent task the destruction 6TN
spontaneous, impulsive enjoyment, the most important /
means was to bring order into the conduct of its '
adherents. All these important points are emphasized
' , in the rules of Catholic monasticism as strongly ^^ as in
the principles of conduct of the Calvinists.^* On this
methodical control over the whole man rests the

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The Protestant Ethic and the Spirit of Capitalism

enormous expansive power of both, especially the
ability of Calvinism as against Lutheranism to defend
the cause of Protestantism as the Church militant.
^^n the other hand, the difference of the Calvinistic
/from the mediaeval asceticism is evident. It consisted in
I the disappearance of the consilia evaiigelica and the
accompanying transformation of asceticism to activity
within the world. Ims not as though Catholicism had
TCsTficted the methodical life to monastic cells. This
was by no means the case either in theory or in practice.
On the contrary, it has already been pointed out that,
in spite of the greater ethical moderation of Catholicism,
an ethically unsystematic life did not satisfy the highest
ideals which it had set up even for the life of the
layman .^^ The tertiary order of St. Francis was, for
instance, a powerful attempt in the direction of an
ascetic penetration of everyday life, and, as we know,
by no means the only one. But, in fact, works like the
Nachfolge Christi show, through the manner in which
their strong influence was exerted, that the way of life
preached in them was felt to be something higher than
the everyday morality which sufficed as a minimum,
and that this latter was not measured by such standards
as Puritanism demanded. Moreover, the practical use
made of certain institutions of the Church, above all
of indulgences inevitably counteracted the tendencies,
toward systematic worldly asceticism. For that reason
it was not felt at the time of the Reformation to be
merely an unessential abuse, but one of the most
fundamental evils of the Church.

But the most important thing was the fact that the
man who, par excellence , lived a rational life in the
1 20

\

The Keligioiis Foundations of Worldly Asceticism

religious sense was, and remained, alone the monk,
'hus asceticism, the more strongly it gripped an
individual, simply served to drive him farther away
ifrom everyday life, because the holiest task was defin-
itely to surpass all worldly morality.®^ Luther, who was
not in any sense fulfilling any law of development, but
acting upon his quite personal experience, which was,
though at first somewhat uncertain in its practical
consequences, later pushed farther by the political
situation, had repudiated that tendency, and Calvinism
simply took this over from him.^' Sebastian FranckA
struck the central characteristic of this type of religion
when he saw the signifix^ncfi-DfLhe^ Reformation in the
fact that now every_Chnstian had to be a monk all his--
lifg^ The drain of asceticism from everyday worldly
life had been stopped by a dam, and those passionately
spiritual natures which had formerly supplied the
highest type of monk were now forced to pursue their

ascetic iHealg wjthin mnnHanp n^-nipptinn«^

But in the course of its development Calvinisi
added something positive-to thisT— the- idea of- the \
necessity__o£4inmng— one's faitk-in worldly activity.^ l
Therein it gave the broader ' groups of religiously /
inclined people a positive incentive to asceticism. By^
founding its ethic in the doctrine of predestination, it
substituted for the spiritual aristocracy of monks out-L_
side of and above the world the spiritual aristocracy of
the predestined saints of God within the world .^^ It
was an aristocracy which, with its character indelebilis, V^
was divided from the eternally damned remainder of
humanity by a more impassable and in its invisibility
niore terrifying gulf,^^ than separated the monk of the

K 121

The Protestant Ethic and the Spirit of Capitalism

Middle Ages from the rest of the world about him, a
gulf which penetrated all social relations with its sharp
brutality. This consciousness of divine grace of the
elect and holy was accompanied by an attitude toward
the sin of one's neighbour, not of sympathetic under-
standing based on consciousness of one's own weakness,
but of hatred and contempt for him as an enemy of
God bearing the .signs of eternal damnation. ^^ This
sort of feeling was capable of such intensity that it
sometimes resulted in the formation of sects. This was
the case when, as in the Independent movement of the
seventeenth century, the genuine Calvinist doctrine
that the glory of God required the Church to bring the
damned under the law, was outweighed by the con-
viction that it was an insult to God if an unregenerate
soul should be admitted to His house and partake in
the sacraments, or even, as a minister, administer
them.®^ Thus, as a consequence of the doctrine of
proof, the Donatist idea of the Church appeared, as
in the case of the Calvinistic Baptists. The full logical
consequence of the demand for a pure Church, a
community of those proved to be in a state of grace,
was not often drawn by forming sects. Modifications
in the constitution of the Church resulted from the
attempt to separate regenerate from unregenerate
Christians, those who were from those who were not
prepared for the sacrament, to keep the government of
the Church or some other privilege in the hands of the
former, and only to ordain ministers of whom there
was no question. ^^

The norm by which it could always measure itself,
of which it was evidently in need, this asceticism
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The Religions Foundations of Worldly Asceticism

naturally found in the Bible. It is important to note
that the well-known bibliocracy of the Calvinists held
the moral precepts of the Old Testament, since it
was fully as authentically revealed, on the same level
of esteem as those of the New. It was only neces-
sary that they should not obviously be applicable only
to the historical circumstances of the Hebrews, or have
been specifically denied by Christ. For the believer,
the law was an ideal though never quite attainable
norm^* while Luther, on the other hand, originally
had prized freedom from subjugation to the law as a
divine privilege of the believer. ^^ The influence of the
God-fearing but perfectly unemotional wisdom of the
Hebrews, which is expressed in the books most read
by the Puritans, the Proverbs and the Psalms, can be j
felt in their whole attitude toward life. In particular, /
its rational suppression of the mystical, in fact the
whole emotional side of religion, has rightly been
attributed by Sanford^® to the influence of the Old
Testament. But this Old Testament rationalism was
as such essentially of a small bourgeois, traditionalistic
type, and was mixed not only with the powerful pathos
of the prophets, but also with elements which encour-
aged the development of a peculiarly emotional type of
religion even in the Middle Ages.^' It was thus in the
last analysis the peculiar, fundamentally ascetic, char-
acter of Calvinism itself which made it select and
assimilate those elements of Old Testament religion
which suited it best.

Now that systematization of ethical conduct which
the asceticism of Calvinistic Protestantism had in
common with the rational forms of life in the Catholic

123

The Protestant Ethic and the Spirit of Capitalism

orders is expressed quite superficially in the way in
which the conscientious Puritan continually super-
vised^^ his own state of grace. To be sure, the religious
account-books in which sins, temptations, and progress
made in grace were entered or tabulated were common
to both the most enthusiastic Reformed circles^^ and
some parts of modern Catholicism (especially in
France), above aU under the influence of the Jesuits.
But in Catholicism it served the purpose of complete-
ness of the confession, or gave the directeur de Vame a
basis for his authoritarian guidance of the Christian
(mostly female). The Reformed Christian, however,
felt his own pulse with its aid. It is mentioned by all
the moralists and theologians, while Benjamin Frank-
lin's tabulated statistical book-keeping on 'his progress
in the different virtues is a classic example. ^^^ On the
other hand, the old mediaeval (even ancient) idea of
God's book-keeping is carried by Bunyan to the
characteristically tasteless extreme of comparing the
relation of a sinner to his God with that of customer
and shopkeeper. One who has once got into debt may
well, by the product of all his virtuous acts, succeed
in paying off the accumulated interest but never the
principal. ^^^

As he observed his own conduct, the later Puritan
also observed that of God and saw His finger in all the
details of life. And, contrary to the strict doctrine of
Calvin, he always knew why God took this or that
measure. The process of sanctifying life could thus
almost take on the character of a business enterp rise. ^^^
A thoroughgoing Christianization of the whole of life
was the consequence of this methodical quality of
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The Religious Foundations of Worldly Asceticism

ethical conduct into which Calvinism as distinct from
Lutheranism forced men. That this rationajitx__a[as-^
decisive in its influence on practical life must always
be borne in mind in order rightly to understand the
influence of Calvinism. On the one hand we can see
that it took this element to exercise such an influence
at all. But other faiths as well necessarily had a similar
influence when their ethical motives were the same in
this decisive point, the doctrine of proof.
K-So-iar we haveconsidered only Calyinismj^ and have
thus flSRumed therfnrtnne of nredestinatinn as the

dogmatic background of the Puritan morality in the
sense of melTiodically rationaliyH pthjc^WvynHiirt This
could be done because the influence of thaTHogma in
fact extended far beyond the single religious group
which held in all respects strictly to Calvinistic prin-
ciples, the Presbyterians. Not only the Independent
Savoy Declaration of 1658, but also the Baptist Con-
fession of Hanserd Knollyof 1689 contained it, and it
had a place within Methodism. Although John Wesley,
the great organizing genius of the movement, was a
believer in the universality of Grace, one of the great
agitators of the first generation of Methodists and their
most consistent thinker, Whitefield, was an adherent of
the doctrine. The same was true of the circle around
Lady Huntingdon, which for a time had considerable
influence. It was this doctrine in its magnificent con-
sistency which, in the fateful epoch of the seventeenth
century, upheld the belief of the militant defenders of
the holy life that they were weapons in the hand of
God, and executors of His providential will.^^^ More-
over, it prevented a premature collapse into a purely

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The Protestant Ethic and the Spirit of Capitalism

utilitarian doctrine of good works in this world which
would never have been capable of motivating such
tremendous sacrifices for non-rational ideal ends.

The combination of faith in absolutely valid norms
with absolute determinism and the complete trans-
cendentality of God was in its way a product of great
genius. At the same time it was, in principle, very
much more modern than the milder doctrine, making
greater concessions to the feelings which subjected
God to the moral law. Above all, we shall see again
and again how fundamental is the idea of proof for our
problem, Since its practical significance as a psycho-
logical basis for rational morality could be studied in
such purity in the doctrine of predestination, it was
best to start there with the doctrine in its most con-
sistent form. But it forms a recurring framework for
the connection between faith and conduct in the
denominations to be studied below. Within the Pro-
testant movement the consequences which it inevitably
had for the ascetic tendencies of the conduct of its first
adherents form in principle the strongest antithesis to
the relative moral helplessness of Lutheranism. The
Lutheran gratia amissibilis, which could always be
regained through penitent contrition evidently, in itself,
contained no sanction for what is for us the most
important result of ascetic Protestantism, a systematic
rational ordering of the moral life as a whole .1^* The
Lutheran faith thus left the spontaneous vitality of
impulsive action and naive emotion more nearly un-
changed. The motive to constant self-control and thus
to a deliberate regulation of one's own life, which the
gloomy doctrine of Calvinism gave, was lacking. A

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The Religions Foundations of Worldly Asceticism

religious genius like Luther could live in this atmo-
sphere of openness and freedom without difficulty and,
so long as his enthusiasm was powerful enough, without
danger of falling back into the status naturalis. That
1^ simple, sensitive, and peculiarly emotional form of
piety, which is the ornament of many of the highest
types of Lutherans, like their free and spontaneous
morality, finds few parallels in genuine Puritanism, but
many more in the mild Anglicanism of such men as
Hooker, Chillingsworth, etc. But for the everyday
Lutheran, even the able one, nothing was more certain
than that he was only temporarily, as long as the single
confession or sermon affected him, raised above the
status naturalis.

There was a great difference which was very striking
to contemporaries between the moral standards of the
courts of Reformed and of Lutheran princes, the latter
often being degraded by drunkenness and vulgarity .^^^
Moreover, the helplessness of the Lutheran clergy,
with their emphasis on faith alone, against the ascetic
Baptist movement, is well known. The typical German
quality often called good nature (Gemütlichkeit) or
naturalness contrasts strongly', even in the facial
expressions of people, with the effects of that thorough
destruction of the spontaneity of the status naturalis
in the Anglo-American atmosphere, which Germans
are accustomed to judge unfavourably as narrowness,
unfreeness, and inner constraint. But the differences of
conduct, which are very striking, have clearly originated
in the lesser degree of ascetic penetration of life in
Lutheranism as distinguished from Calvinism. The
antipathy of every spontaneous child of nature to

127

The Protestant Ethic and the Spirit of Capitalism

everything ascetic is expressed in those feeHngs. The

fact is that Lutheranism, on account of its doctrine of

gracejä-cked a psychological sanction of systematic con-

luct to compel the methodical rationalization of life.

This sanction, which conditions the ascetic character
of religion, could doubtless in itself have been furnished
by various different religious motives, as we shall soon
see. The Calvinistic doctrine of predestination was
only one of several possibilities. But nevertheless we
have become convinced that in its way it had not only
a quite unique consistency, but that its psychological
effect was extraordinarily powerful. ^^^ In comparison
with it the non-Calvinistic ascetic movements, con-
sidered purely from the view-point of the religious
motivation of asceticism, form an attenuation of the
inner consistency and power of Calvinism.

But even in the actual historical development the
situation was, for the most part, such that the Calvinistic
form of asceticism was either imitated by the other
ascetic movements or used as a source of inspiration or
of CQmparison in the development of their divergent
principles. Where, in spite of a different doctrinal basis,
similar ascetic features have appeared, this has gener-
ally been the result of Church organization. Of this we
shall come to speak in another connection.^^^

B. Pietism

Historically the doctrine of predestination is also the
starting-point of the ascetic movement usually known
as Pietism. In so far as the movement remained within
the Reformed Church, it is almost impossible to draw
128

The Religious Foundations of Worldly Asceticism

the line between Pietistic and non-Pietistic Calvinists.^^®
Almost all the leading representatives of Puritanism are
sometimes classed among the Pietists. It is even quite
legitimate to look upon the whole connection between
predestination and the doctrine of proof, with its
fundamental interest in the attainment of the certitudo
salutis as discussed above, as in itself a Pietistic develop-
ment of Calvin's original doctrines. The occurrence
of ascetic revivals within the Reformed Church was,
especially in Holland, regularly accompanied by a
regeneration of the doctrine of predestination which
had been temporarily forgotten or not strictly held to.
Hence for England it is not customary to use the term
Pietism at alL^^^

But even the Continental (Dutch and Lower Rhenish)
Pietism in the Reformed Church was, at least funda-
mentally, just as much a simple intensification of the
Reformed asceticism as, for instance, the doctrines of
Bailey. The emphasis was placed so strongly on the
praxis pietatis that doctrinal orthodoxy was pushed into
the background; at times, in fact, it seemed quite a
matter of indifference. Those predestined for grace
could occasionally be subject to dogmatic error as well
as to other sins and experience showed that often those
Christians who were quite uninstructed in the theology
of the schools exhibited the fruits of faith most clearly,
while on the other hand it became evident that mere
knowledge of theology by no means guaranteed the
proof of faith through conduct .^^^

Thus election could not be proved by theological
learning at all.^^^ Hence Pietism, with a deep distrust
of the Church of the theologians, ^i- to which — this is

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The Protestant Ethic and the Spirit of Capitalism

characteristic of it — it still belonged officially, began to
gather the adherents oi the praxis pietatis in conventicles
removed from the world .^^^ It wished to make the in-
visible Church of the elect visible on this earth. Without
going so far as to form a separate sect, its members
attempted to live, in this community, a life freed from
all the temptations of the world and in all its details
dictated by God's will, and thus to be made certain of
their own rebirth by external signs manifested in their
daily conduct. Thus the ecclesiola of the true converts —
this was common to all genuinely Pietistic groups —
wished, by means of intensified asceticism, to enjoy the
blissfulness of community with God in this life.

Now this latter tendency had something closely
related to the Lutheran unio mystica, and very often
led to a greater emphasis on the emotional side of
religion than was acceptable to orthodox Calvinism. In
fact this may, from our view-point, be said to be the
decisive characteristic of the Pietism which developed
within the Reformed Church. For this element of
emotion, which was originally quite foreign to Calvin-
ism, but on the other hand related to certain mediaeval
forms of religion, led religion in practice to strive for
the enjoyment of salvation in this world rather than to
engage in the ascetic struggle for certainty about the
future world. Moreover, the emotion was capable of
such intensity, that religion took on a positively hys-
terical character, resulting in the alternation which is
familiar from examples without number and neuro-
pathologically understandable, of half-conscious states
of religious ecstasy with periods of nervous exhaustion,
which were felt as abandonment by God. The effect
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The Religions Foundations of Worldly Asceticism

was the direct opposite of the strict and temperate
discipHne under which men were placed by the syste-
matic life of hoHness of the Puritan. It meant a weaken-
ing of the inhibitions which protected the rational
personality of the Calvinist from his passions .^^*
Similarly it was possible For the Calyinistic idea of the^
depravity oF the fleih, taken emotionally, for instance in
the form of the so-called womT^feeling, to lead to a
deadening oF enterprise in worldly activity .^^^ Even the
doctrine of predestination could lead to fatalism if,
contrary to the predominant tendencies of rational
Calvinism, it were made the object of emotional con-
templation .^^^ Finally, the desire to separate the elect
from the world could, with a strong emotional intensity,
lead to a sort of monastic community life of half-
communistic character, as the history of Pietism, even
within the Reformed Church, has shown again and
again .^^^

But so long as this extreme effect, conditioned by
this emphasis on emotion, did not appear, as long as
Reformed Pietism strove to make sure of salvation
within the everyday routine of life in a worldly calling,
the practical effect of Pietistic principles was an even
stricter ascetic control of conduct in the calling, which
provided a still more solid religious basis for the ethic
of the calling, than the mere worldly respectability of
the normal Reformed Christian, which was felt by the
superior Pietist to be a second-rate Christianity. The
religious aristocracy of the elect, which developed in
every form of Calvinistic asceticism, the more seriously
it was taken, the more surely, was then organized, in
Holland, on a voluntary basis in the form of conven-

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The Protestant Ethic and the Spirit of Capitalism

tides within the Church. In EngHsh Puritanism, on the
other hand, it led partly to a virtual differentiation
between active and passive Christians within the
Church organization, and partly, as has been shown
above, to the formation of sects.

On the other hand, the development of German
Pietism from a Lutheran basis, with which the names
of Spener, Francke, and Zinzendorf are connected,
led away from the doctrine of predestination. But at
the same time it was by no means outside the body
of ideas of which that dogma formed the logical
climax, as is especially attested by Spener's own
account of the influence which English and Dutch
Pietism had upon him, and is shown by the fact that
Bailey was read in his first conventicles.^^®

From our special point of view, at any rate. Pietism
meant simply the penetration of methodically controlled
and supervised, thus of ascetic, conduct into the non-
^alvinistic denominations .^^^ But Lutheranism neces-
sarily felt this rational asceticism to be a foreign element,
and the lack of consistency in German Pietistic doc-
trines was the result of the difficulties growing out of
that fact. As a dogmatic basis of systematic religious
conduct Spener combines Lutheran ideas with the
specifically Calvinistic doctrine of good works as such
which are undertaken with the "intention of doing
honour to God".^^^ He also has a faith, suggestive of
Calvinism, in the possibility of the elect attaining a
relative degree of Christian perfection .^^^ But the
theory lacked consistency. Spener, who was strongly
influenced by the mystics ,^^2 attempted, in a rather
uncertain but essentially Lutheran manner, rather to
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The Religious Foundations of Worldly Asceticism

describe the systematic type of Christian conduct
which was essential to even his form of Pietism than
to justify it. He did not derive the certitudo saliitishom.
sanctification ; instead of the idea of proof, he adopted
Luther's somewhat loose connection between faith and
works, which has been discussed above. ^^^

But again and again, in so far as the rational and
ascetic element of Pietism outweighed the emotional,
the ideas essential to our thesis maintained their place.
These were: (i) that the methodical development of /
one's own state of grace to a higher and higher degree
of certainty and perfection in terms of the law was a
sign of grace ^2*; and (3) that "God's Providence works
through those in such a state of perfection", i.e. in that
He gives them His signs if they wait patiently and
deliberate methodically .^^^ Labour in a calling was also
the ascetic activity /»ar excellence for A. H. Francke ^2^;
that God Himself blessed His chosen ones through the
success of their labours was as undeniable to him as we
shall find it to have been to the Puritans.

And as a substitute for the double decree Pietism
worked out ideas which, in a way essentially similar to
Calvinism, though milder, established an aristocracy of
the elect^^' resting on God's especial grace, with all
the psychological results pointed out above. Among
them belongs, for instance, the so-called doctrine of
Terminism,^28 ^hich was generally (though unjustly)
attributed to Pietism by its opponents. It assumes
that grace is offered to all men, but for everyone
either once at a definite moment in his life or at
some moment for the last time.i^» Anyone who let
that moment pass was beyond the help of the

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universality of grace ; he was in the same situation as
those neglected by God in the Calvinistic doctrine.
Quite close to this theory was the idea which Francke
took from his personal experience, and which was very
widespread in Pietism, one may even say predomi-
nant, that grace could only become effective under
certain unique and peculiar circumstances, namely,
after previous repentance .^^^ Since, according to Pietist
doctrine, not everyone was capable of such experiences,
those who, in spite of the use of the ascetic methods
recommended by the Pietists to bring it about, did not
attain it, remained in the eyes-t)f the regenerate a sort
of passive Christian. On the other hand, by the creation
of a rnethodjto_induce repentance even the attainment
of divine grace became in effect an object of rational
human activity.

Moreover, the antagonism to the private confessional,
which, though not shared by all — ^for instance, not by
Francke — ^was characteristic of many Pietists, especially,
as the repeated questions in Spener show, of Pietist
pastors, resulted from this aristocracy of grace. This
antagonism helped to weaken its ties with Lutheranism.
The visible effects on conduct of grace gained through
repentance formed a necessary criterion for admission
to absolution; hence it was impossible to let contritio
alone suffice .^^^

Zinzendorf's conception of his own religious posi-
tion, even though it vacillated in the face of attacks
from orthodoxy, tended generally toward the instru-
mental idea. Beyond that, however, the doctrinal
standpoint of this remarkable religious dilettante, as
Ritschl calls him, is scarcely capable of clear formula-

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The Religions Foundations of Worldly Asceticism

tion in the points of importance for us.^^^ He repeatedly
designated himself a representative of Pauline-Lutheran
Christianity; hence he opposed the Pietistic type
associated with Jansen with its adherence to the law.
But the Brotherhood itself in practice upheld, as early
as its Protocol of August 12, 1729, a standpoint which
in many respects closely resembled that of the Gal-
vinistic aristocracy of the elect.^^^ And in spite of his
repeated avowals of Lutheranism/^* he permitted and
encouraged it. The famous stand of attributing the Old
Testament to Christ, taken on November 12, 1741, was
the outward expression of somewhat the same attitude.
However, of the. three branches of the Brotherhood,
both the Calvinistic and the Moravian accepted the
Reformed ethics in essentials from the beginning.
And even Zinzendorf followed the Puritans in ex-
pressing to John Wesley the opinion that even though
a man himself could not, others could know his state
of grace by his conduct .^^^

But on the other hand, in the peculiar piety of
Hermhut, the emotional element held a very prominent
place. In particular Zinzendorf himself continually
attempted to counteract the tendency to ascetic
sanctification in the Puritan sense ^^® and to turn the
interpretation of good works in a Lutheran direction.^^'
Also under the influence of the repudiation of con-
venticles and the retention of the confession, there
developed an essentially Lutheran dependence on the
sacraments. Moreover, Zinzendorf 's peculiar principle
that the childlikeness of religious feeling was a sign of
its genuineness, as well as the use of the lot as a means
of revealing God's will, strongly counteracted the

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The Protestant Ethic and the Spirit of Capitalism

influence of rationality in conduct. On the whole,
within the sphere of influence of the Count,^^® the
anti-rational, emotional elements predominated much
more in the religion of the Herrnhuters than elsewhere
in Pietism. ^^^ The connection between morality and
the forgiveness of sins in Spangenberg's Idea fides
fratrum is as loose ^^^ as in Lutheranism generally.
Zinzendorf's repudiation of the Methodist pursuit of
perfection is part, here as everywhere, of his funda-
mentally eudasmonistic ideal of having men experience
eternal bliss (he calls it happiness) emotionally in the
present, ^^^ instead of encouraging them by rational
labour to make sure of it in the next, world .^'^^

Nevertheless, the idea that the most important value
of the Brotherhood as contrasted with other Churches
lay in an active Christian life, in missionary, and, which
was brought into connection with it, in professional
■ work in a calling,^ ^^ remained a vital force with them.
In addition, the practical rationalization of life from
the standpoint of utility was very essential to Zinzen-
dorf's philosophy.^** It was derived for him, as for
other Pietists, on the one hand from his decided dislike
of philosophical speculation as dangerous to faith,
and his corresponding preference for empirical know-
ledge ^*^; on the other hand, from the shrewd common
sense of the professional missionary. The Brotherhood
was, as a great mission centre, at the same time a
business enterprise. Thus it led its members into the
paths of worldly asceticism, which everywhere first
seeks for tasks and then carries them out carefully and
systematically. However, the glorification of the apos-
tolic poverty, of the disciples ^*^ chosen by God
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II

The Religious Foundations of Worldly Asceticism

through predestination, which was derived from the
example of the apostles as missionaries, formed another
obstacle. It meant in effect a partial revival of the
consilia evangelica. The development of a rational
economic ethic similar to the Calvinistic was certainly
retarded by these factors, even though, as the develop-
ment of the Baptist movement shows, it was not
impossible, but on the contrary subjectively strongly
encouraged by the idea of work solely for the sake
of the calling.

All in all, when we consider German Pietism from
the point of view important for us, we must admit a
vacillation and uncertainty in the religious basis of its
asceticism which makes it definitely weaker than the
iron consistency of Calvinism, and which is partly the
result of Lutheran influences and partly of its emotional
character. To be sure, it is very one-sided to make this
emotional element the distinguishing characteristic of
Pietism as opposed to Lutheranism.^^' But compared
to Calvinism, the rationalization of life was necessarily
less intense because the pressure of occupation with a
state of grace which had continually to be proved, and
which was concerned for the future in eternity, was
diverted to the present emotional state. The place of
the self-confidence which the elect sought to attain, and
continually to renew in restless and successful work at
his calling, was taken by an attitude of humility and
abnegation .1^^ This in turn was partly the result of
emotional stimulus directed solely toward spiritual
experience; partly of the Lutheran institution of the
confession, which, though it was often looked upon
with serious doubts by Pietism, was still generally

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The Protestant Ethic and the Spirit of Capitalism

tolerated .^*^ All this shows the influence of the pecu-
liarly Lutheran conception of salvation by the forgive-
ness of sins and not by practical sanctification.(l[n place
^of the systematic rational struggle to attain ana retain
certain knowledge of future (otherworldly) salvation
comes here the need to feel reconciliation and com-
munity with God now. Thus the tendency of the pursuit
of present enjoyment to hinder the rational organization
of economic life, depending as it does on provision for
the future, has in a certain sense a parallel in the field
of religious life.

Evidently, then, thie orientation of religious needs to
present emotional satisfaction could not develop so
powerful a motive to rationalize worldly activity, as
J:he need of the Calvinistic elect for proof with their
exclusive preoccupation with the beyond. On the
other hand, it was considerably more favourable to the
methodical penetration of conduct with religion__than
the traditionalistic faith of the orthodox Lutheran,
bound as it was to the Word and the sacraments. On
the whole Pietism from Francke and Spener to Zinzen-
dorf tended toward increasing emphasis on the
emotional side. But this was not in any sense the
expression of an immanent law of development. The
differences resulted from differences of the religious
(and social) environments from which the leaders
came. We cannot enter into that here, nor can we
discuss how the peculiarities of German Pietism have
affected its social and geographical extension .^^^ We
must again remind ourselves that this emotional
Pietism of course shades off into the way of life of
the Puritan elect by quite gradual stages. If we can, at

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The Religions Foundations of Worldly Asceticism

least provisionally, point out any practical consequence
of the difference, we may say that the virtues favoured
by Pietism were more those on the one hand of the
I* faithful official, clerk, labourer, or domestic worker.^^i
and on the other of the predominantly patriarchal
employer with a pious condescension (in Zinzendorf 's
manner). Calvinism, in comparison, appears to be more

I closely related to the hard legalism and the active
;^ enterprise of bourgeois-capitalistic entrepreneurs. ^^^
finally, the purely emotional form of Pietism is, as
Ritschl 1^^ has pointed out, a religious dilettantism for
the leisure classes. However far this characterization
falls short of being exhaustive, it helps to explain certain
differences in the character (including the economic
character) of peoples which have been under the
influence of one or the other of these two ascetic
movements.

C. IVIethodism

The combination of an emotional 'but still ascetic
type of religion with increasing indifference to or
repudiation of the dogmatic basis of Calvinistic
asceticism is characteristic also of the Anglo-American
movement corresponding to Continental Pietism,
namely Methodism. ^^^ The name in itself shows what
impressed contemporaries as characteristic of its ad-
herents : the methodical, systematic nature of conduct
for the purpose of attaining the certitudo salutis. This
was from the beginning the centre of religious aspiration
for this movement also, and remamed so. In spite of
all the differences, the undoubted relationship to

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The Protestant Ethic and the Spirit of Capitalism

certain branches of German Pietism^^^ is shown above
all by the fact that the method was used primarily to
bring about the emotional act of conversion. And the
emphasis on feeling, in John Wesley awakened by
Moravian and Lutheran influences, led Methodism,
which from the beginning saw its mission among the
masses, to take on a strongly emotional character,
especially in America. The attainment of repentance
under certain circumstances involved an emotional
struggle of such intensity as to lead to the most terrible
ecstasies, which in America often took place in a public
meeting. This formed the basis of a belief in the
undeserved possession of divine grace and at the same
time of an immediate consciousness of justification and
forgiveness.

Now this emotional religion entered into a peculiar
alliance, containing no small inherent difficulties, with
the ascetic ethics which had for good and all been
stamped with rationality by Puritanism. For one thing,
unlike Calvinism, which held everything emotional
to be illusory, the only sure basis for the certitude
salutis was in principle held to be a pure feeling of
absolute certainty of forgiveness, derived immediately
from the testimony of the spirit, the coming of which
could be definitely placed to the hour. Added to this
is Wesley's doctrine of sanctification which, though a
decided departure from the orthodox doctrine, is a
logical development of it. According to it, one reborn
in this manner can, by virtue of the divine grace
already working in him, even in this life attain sanctifi-
cation, the consciousness of perfection in the sense of
freedom from sin, by a second, generally separate and

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The Religious Foundations of Worldly Asceticism

often sudden spiritual transformation. However difficult
of attainment this end is, generally not till toward the
end of one's life, it must inevitably be sought, because
it finally guarantees the certitudo salutis and substitutes
a serene confidence for the sullen worry of the Calvin-
ist .^^® And it distinguishes the true convert in his own
eyes and those of others by the fact that sin at least no
longer has power over him.

In spite of the great significance of self-evident feeling,
righteous conduct according to the law was thus natur-
ally also adhered to. Whenever Wesley attacked the
emphasis on works of his time, it was only to revive the
old Puritan doctrine that works are not the cause,
but only the means of knowing one's st' *f of grace,
and even this only when they are performed Jiely for
the glory of God. Righteous conduct alone did not
suffice, as he had found out for himself. The feeling of
grace was necessary in addition. He himself sometimes
described works as a condition of grace, and in the
Declaration of August 9, 1771,^^' he emphasized that
he who performed no good works was not a true
believer. In fact, the Methodists have always main-
tained that they did not differ from the Established
Church in doctrine, but only in religious practice. This
emphasis on the fruits of belief was mostly justified by
J John iii, 9; conduct is taken as a clear sign of rebirth.

But in spite of all that there were difficulties.^^ For
those Methodists who were adherents of the doctrine
of predestination, to think of the certitudo salutis as
appearing in the immediate feeling ^^^ of grace and
perfection instead of the consciousness of grace which
grew out of ascetic conduct in continual proof of faith —

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TJie Protestant Ethic and the Spirit of Capitalism

since then the certainty of the perservantia depended
only on the single act of repentance — meant one of two
things. For weak natures there was a fatalistic inter-
pretation of Christian freedom, and with it the break-
down of methodical conduct; or, where this path was
rejected, the self-confidence of the righteous man^^^
reached untold heights, an emotional intensification of
the Puritan type. In the face of the attacks of opponents,
the attempt was made to meet these consequences. On
the one hand by increased emphasis on the normative
authority of the Bible and the indispensability of
proof ^^^; on the other by, in effect, strengthening
Wesley's anti-Calvin istic faction within the movement
with its doctrine that grace could be lost. The strong
Lutheran influences to which Wesley was exposed^^^
through the Moravians strengthened this tendency and
increased the uncertainty of the religious basis of the
Methodist ethics .^^^ In the end only the concept of
regeneration, an emotional certainty of salvation as the
immediate result of faith, was definitely maintained as
the indispensable foundation of grace; and with it
sanctification, resulting in (at least virtual) freedom
from the power of sin, as the consequent proof of grace.
The significance of external means of grace, especially
the sacraments, was correspondingly diminished. In
any case, the general awakening which followed
Methodism everywhere> for example in New England,
meant a victory for the doctrine of grace and election. ^^*
Thus from our view-point the Methodist ethic appears
to rest on a foundation of uncertainty similar to Pietism.
But the aspiration to the higher life, the second blessed-
ness, served it as a sort of makeshift for the doctrine
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The Religions Foundations of Worldly Asceticism

of predestination. Moreover, being English in origin,
its ethical practice was closely related to that of English
Puritanism, the revival of which it aspired to be.

The emotional act of conversion was methodically
induced. And after it was attained there did not follow
a pious enjoyment of community with God, after the
manner of the emotional Pietism 'of Zinzendorf, but
the emotion, once awakened, was directed into a
rational struggle for perfection. Hence the emotional
character of its faith did not lead to a spiritualized
religion of feeling like German Pietism. It has already
been. shown by Schneckenburger that this fact was
connected with the less intensive development of the
sense of sin (partly directly on account of the emotional
experience of conversion), and this has remained an
accepted point in the discussion of Methodism. The
fundamentally Calvinistic character of its religious
feeling here remained decisive. The emotional excite-
ment took the form of enthusiasm which was only
occasionally, but then powerfully stirred, but which
by no means destroyed the otherwise rational character
of conduct .^^^ The regeneration of Methodism thus
created only a supplement to the pure ^ctrine of
works, a religious basis for ascetic conduct after the
doctrine of predestination had been given up. The
signs given by conduct which formed an indispensable
means of ascertaining true conversion, even its con-
dition as Wesley occasionally says, were in fact just the
same as those of Calvinism. As a late product ^^^ we
can, in the following discussion, generally neglect
Methodism, as it added nothing new to the develop-
ment ^^' of the idea of calling.

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The Protestant Ethic and the Spirit of Capitalism

D. The Baptist Sects

The Pietism of the Continent of Europe and the
Methodism of the Anglo-Saxon peoples are, considered
both in their content of ideas and their historical
significance, . secondary movements.^®^ On the other
hand, we find a second independent source of Protest-
ant asceticism besides Calvinism in the Baptist move-
ment and the sects ^^^ which, in the course of the
sixteenth and seventeenth centuries, came directly
from it or adopted its forms of religious thought, the
Baptists, Mennonites, and, above all, the Quakers.^ '^
With them we approach religious groups whose ethics
rest upon_a_basis differing inprinciple from theCal-
vinistic doctrine. The followIng~^etch, "which only
emphasizes what is important for us, can give no true
impression of the diversity of this movement. Again
we lay the principal emphasis on the development in
the older capitalistic countries.

The feature of all these communities, which is both
historically and in principle most important, but whose
influence on the development of culture can only be
made quite clear in a somewhat different connection, is
something with which we are already familiar, the
believer's Church .^^^ This means that the religious
community, the visible Church in the language of the
Reformation Churches ,^'2 was no longer looked upon
as a sort of trust foundation for supernatural ends, an
institution, necessarily including both the just and the
unjust, whether for increasing the glory of God
(Calvinistic) or as a mediurh for bringing the means
of salvation to men (Catholic and Lutheran), but
144

i

The Religious Foundations of Worldly Asceticism

solely as a communityof personal believers of the
.Vrbr^rnj ^pH onlynRFv^s^ Tn other words, not as a
/Church but as a sect.^"^ This is all that the principle,
in itself purely external, that only adults who have
personally gained their own faith should be baptized,
is meant to symbolize.^'* The justification through
this faith was for the Baptists, as they have insistently
repeated in all religious discussions, radically different
from the idea of work in the world in the service of
Christ, such as dominated the orthodox dogma of the
older Protestantism.^'^ It consisted rather in taking
spiritual possession of His gift of salvation. But this
occurred through individual revelation, by the working
of the Divine Spirit in the individual, and only in that
way. It was offered to everyone, and it sufficed to wait
for the Spirit, and not- to resist its coming by a sinful
attachment to the world. The significance of faith in
the sense of knowledge of the doctrines of the Church,
but also in that of a repentant search for divine grace,
was consequently quite minimized, and there took
place, naturally with great modifications, a renais-
sance of Early Christian pneumatic doctrines. For
instance, the sect to which Menno Simons in his
Fondamentboek (1539) gave the first reasonably con-
sistent doctrine, wished, like the other Baptist sects,
to be the true blameless Church of Christ; like the
apostolic community, consisting entirely of those per-
sonally awakened and called by God. JThose whohave
been born again, and they alone, are brethren of Christ.
.because they, like Him, have been created in spirit
.directlyby God.^'^ A strict avoidance of the world, in
the sense of air not strictly necessary intercourse with

145

The Protestant Ethic and the Spirit of Capitalism

worldly people, together with the strictest bibliocracy
in the sense of taking the life of the first generations
of Christians as a model, were the results for the first
Baptist communities, and this principle of avoidance of
the world never quite disappeared so long as the old
spirit remained alive .^'^

As a permanent possession, the Baptist sects retained
from these dominating motives of their early period a
principle with which, on a somewhat different founda-
tion, we have already become acquainted in Calvinism,
and the fundamental importance of which will again
and again come out. They absolutely repudiated all
idolatryofthejlesh, as a detractionfrom the reverence
due to God alone .^'® The Biblical way of life was
conceived by the first Swiss and South German
Baptists with a radicalism similar to that of the young
St. Francis, as a sharp break with all the enjoyment of
life, a life modelled directly on that of the Apostles.
And, in truth, the life of many of the earlier Baptists
is reminiscent of that of St. Giles. But this strict
observation of Biblical precepts^^^ was not on very
secure foundations in its connection with the pneu-
matic character of the faith. What God had revealed
to the prophets and apostles was not all that He could
and would reveal. On the contrary, the continued life
of the Word, not as a written document, but as the
force of the Holy Spirit working in daily life, which
speaks directly to any individual who is willing to hear,
was the sole characteristic of the true Church. That, as
Schwenkfeld taught as against Luther and later Fox
a^inst_the_Presbyterians, was the testimony oF the
early Christian communities. From this idea oF^the
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The Religious Foundations of Worldly Asceticism

continuance of revelation developed the well-known
doctrine, later consistently worked out by the Quakers,
of the (in the last analysis decisive) significance of the
inner testimony of the Spirit in reason and conscience.
I This did away, not with the authority, but with the
' sole authority, of the Bible, and started a development
which in the end radically eliminated all that remained
of the doctrine of salvation through the Church; for
the Quakers even with Baptism and the Communion .^®^
The Baptist denominations along with the pre-
destinationists, especially the strict Calvinists, carried
out the most radical devaluation of all sacraments as
means to salvation, and thus accomplished the religious
rationalization of the world in its most extreme form.
Only the inner light of continual reyelafion could
enable one truly to Understand__even the _jBiblical
revelations of God.^®^ On the other hand, at least
according to the Quaker doctrine which here drew the
logical conclusion, its effects could be extended to
people who had never known revelation in its Biblical
form. The proposition extra ecclesiam nulla salus held
only for this /«visible Church of those illuminated by
the Spirit. Without the inner light, the natural man,
even the man guided by natural reason, ^^^ remained
purely a creature of the flesh, whose godlessness was
condemned by the Baptists, including the Quakers,
almost even more harshly than by the Calvinists. On
the other hand, the new birth caused by the Spirit, if
we wait for it and open our hearts to it, may, since it is
divinely caused, lead to a state of such complete
conquest of the power of sin,^^^ that relapses, to say
nothing of the loss of the state of grace, become

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The Protestant Ethic and the Spirit of Capitalism

practically impossible. However, as in Methodism at
a later time, the attainment of that state was not
thought of as the rule, but rather the degree of perfec-
tion of the individual was subject to development.
But all Baptist communities desired to be pure
^. Churches in the sense of the blameless conduct of their
members. A sincere repudiation of the world and its
interests, and unconditional submission to God as
speaking through the conscience, were the only un-
challengeable signs of true rebirth, and a corresponding
type of conduct was thus indispensable to salvation.
And hence the gift of God's grace could not be earned,
i but only one who followed the dictates of his conscience
1 could be justified in considering himself reborn. Good
1 works in this sense were a causa sine qua non. As we
s^e, this last reasoning of Barclay, to whose exposition
-' \^e have adhered, was again the equivalent in practice
cjf the Calvinistic doctrine, and was certainly developed
linder the influence of the Calvinistic asceticism,
which surrounded the Baptist sects in Englandand the
Netherlands. George Fox devoted the whole of his
early missionary activity to the preaching of its earnest
and sincere adoption.

^ut \sinc£^Bredestination wasjrejected , the peculiarly
Tational character of Baptist morality rested psycho-
logically above all on the idea of expectant waiting for
the Spirit to descend, which even to-day is character-
istic of the Quaker meeting, and is well analysed by
Barclay, ^he purpose of this silent waiting is to over-
come everything impulsive and irrational, the passions
and subjective interests of the natural man. He must
be stilled in order to create that deep repose of the
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The Religious Foundations of Worldly Asceticism

soul in which alone the word of God can be heard.
Of course, this waiting might result in hysterical con-
ditions, prophecy, and, as long as eschato logical hopes
survived, under certain circumstances even in an
outbreak of chiliastic enthusiasm, as is possible in all
similar types of religion. That actually happened in the
movement which went to pieces in Münster.

But in so far as Baptism affected the normal worka-
day world, the idea that God only speaks when the
flesh is silent evidently meant an incentive to the
deliberate weighing of courses of action and their
careful justification in terms of the individual con-
science.^^* The later Baptist communities, most par-
ticularly the Quakers, adopted this quiet, moderate,
eminently conscientious character of conduct. The
radical elimination of magic from the world allowed
no other psychological course than the practice of
worldly asceticism. Since these communities would
Kave nothing to do with the political powers and their
doings, the external result also was the penetration of
life in the calling with these ascetic virtues. The leaders
of the earliest Baptist movement were ruthlessly
radical in their rejection of worldliness. But naturally,
even in the first generation, the strictly apostolic way
of life was not maintained as absolutely essential to
the proof of rebirth for everyone. Well-to-do bourgeois
there were, even in this generation and even before
Menno, who definitely defended the practical worldly
virtues and the system of private property; the strict
morality of the Baptists had turned in practice into
the path prepared by the Calvinistic ethic .^^^ This was
simply because the road to the otherworldly monastic

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The Protestant Ethic and the Spirit of Capitalism

form of asceticism had been closed as unbiblical and
savouring of salvation by works since Luther, whom,
the Baptists also followed in this respect. 1

Nevertheless, apart from the half-communistic com-
munities of the early period, one Baptist sect, the so-
called Dunckards (Tunker, dompelaers)^ has to this day
maintained its condemnation of education and of eveiy
form of possession beyond that indispensable to life.
And even Barclay looks upon the obligation to one's
calling not in Calvinistic or even Lutheran terms, but
rather Thomistically, as naturali ratione, the necessary
consequence of the believers having to live in the
world. ^^^

This attitude meant a weakening of the Calvinistic
conception of the calling similar to those of Spener and
the German Pietists. But, on the other hand, the
intensity of interest in economic occupations was
considerably increased by various factors at work in
the Baptist sects. In the first place, by the refusal to
accept office in the service of the State, which origin-
ated as a religious duty following from the repudiation
of everything worldly. After its abandonment in
principle it still remained, at least for the Mennonites
and Quakers, effective in practice, because the strict
refusal to bear arms or to take oaths formed a sufficient
disqualification for office. Hand in hand with it in all
Baptists' denominations went an invincible antagonism
to any sort of aristocratic way of life. Partly, as with
the Calvinists, it was a consequence of the prohibition
of all idolatry of the flesh, partly a result of the afore-
mentioned unpolitical or even anti-political principles.
The whole shrewd and conscientious rationality of

150

The Religious Foundations of Worldly Asceticism

Baptist conduct was thus forced into non-political
callings.

A^t the same time, the immense importance which was
attributed by the Baptist doctrine of salvation^ to the
role of the ronsrience as the revelation oj^Qodi^ the
individual gave their conduct in worldly callings a
Character which was of the greatest significance for the
development of the spirit of capitalism. We shall have
to postpone its consideration until later, and it can then
be studied only in so far as this is possible without
entering into the whole political and social ethics of
Protestant asceticism. But, to anticipate this much, we
have already called attention to that most important
principle of the capitalistic ethic which is generally
formulated *' honesty is the_best policy ".^^' Its classical
document is the tract of Franklin quoted above. And
even in the judgment of the seventeenth century the
specific form of the worldly asceticism of the Baptists,
especially the Quakers, lay in the practical adoption of
this maxim .^^ On the other hand, we shall expect to
find that the influence of Calvinisnrwn5~exened more
in the direction of the liberation of energy for private
acquisition. For in spiteof all the tormanegä!ismrüf~~
the elect, Goethe's remark in fact applied often enough
to the Calvinist: ''The man of action is always ruthless;
no one has a conscience but an observer."^^®

A further important element which promoted the
intensity of the worldly asceticism of the Baptist
denominations can in its full significance also be
considered only in another connection. Nevertheless, .
we may anticipate a few remarks on it to justify the
order of presentation we have chosen. We have quite

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The Protestant Ethic and the Spirit of Capitalism

deliberately not taken as a starting-point the objective
social institutions of the older Protestant Churches,
and their ethical influences, especially not the very
important Church discipline. We have preferred rather
to take the results which subjective adoption of an
ascetic faith might have had in the conduct of the
individual. This was not only because this side of the
thing has previously received far less attention than
the other, but also because the effect of Church disci-
pline was by no means always a similar one. On the
contrary, the ecclesiastical supervision of the life of the
individual, which, as it was practised in thie Calvinistic
State Churches, almost amounted to an inquisition,
might even retard that liberation of individual powers
which was conditioned by the rational ascetic pursuit of
salvation, and in some cases actually did so.

The mercantilistic regulations of the State might
develop industries, but not, or certainly not alone, the
spirit of capitalism; where they assumed a despotic,
authoritarian character, they to a large extent directly
hindered it. Thus a similar eff"ect might well have
resulted from ecclesiastical regimentation when it
became excessively despotic. It enforced a particular
type of external conformity, but in some cases weakened
the subjective motives of rational conduct. Any dis-
cussion of this point^^^ must take account of the great
difference between the results of the authoritarian
moral discipline of the Established Churches and the
corresponding discipline in the sects which rested on
voluntary submission. That the Baptist movement
everywhere and in principle founded sects and not
Churches was certainly as favourable to the intensity
152

The Religious Foundations of Worldly Asceticism

of their asceticism as was the case, to differing degrees,
with those Calvinistic, Methodist, and Pietist com-
munities which were driven by their situations into the
formation of voluntary groups. ^^^

It is our next task to follow out the results of the
Puritan Idea of the calling in the business world, now
that the above sketch has attempted to show its religious
foundations. With all the differences of detail and

emphasis which these different ascetic movements
show in the aspects with which we have been concerned,
much the same characteristics are present and impor-
tant in all of them.^^2 But for our purposes the decisive
point jw^^to recapitulate, the conception of the state
Q£xeligiQus_grace, common to all the denominations, as
a status which marks off its possessor from the degrada-

tionji£lhe_flesh,Jrom the worM.l-^

On the other hand, though the means by which it
was attained differed for different doctrines, it could ~
not be guaranteed by any magical sacraments, by relief /
in the confession, nor by individual good works .^That
was only possible by proof in a specific type of conduct
unmistakably different from the way of life of the
natural man. FronL-thajLJollQwed^for the individual
an incentive methodically to supervise his own s^e
of^grace in his own conductTandT thus IfTpenetratfi-it
with asceticism. But, as we have seen, this ascetic
conduct meant a rational planning of the whole of one's
life in accordance with God's will. And this asceticism
was no longer an opus supererogationis , but something
which could be required of everyone who would be
certain of salvation. The religious life of the saints, as
distinguished from the natural life, was — the most

M 153

The Protestant Ethic and the Spirit of Capitalism

important point — no longer lived outside the world in
monastic communities, but within the world and its
institutions. This rationalization of conduct within
this world, but for the sake of the world beyond, was
the consequence of the concept of calling of ascetic
Protestantism, ,. '

iristian asceticism, at first fleeing from the world
into solitude, had already ruled the. world which it had
renounced from the monastery and through the
Church. But it had, on the whole, left the naturally
spontaneous character of daily life in the world un-
touched. Now it strode into the market-place of life,
slammed the door of the monastery behind it, and
undertook to penetrate just that daily routine of life
with its methodicalness, to fashion it into a life in the
world, but neither of nor for this world. With what
result, we shall try to make clear in the following
discussion.

154

CHAPTER V

ASCETICISM AND THE SPIRIT OF
CAPITALISM

In order to understand the connection between the
fundamental religious ideas of ascetic Protestantism
and its maxims for everyday economic conduct, it is
necessary to examine with especial care such writings
as have evidently been derived from ministerial prac-
tice. For in a time in which the beyond meant every-
thing, when the social position of the Christian
depended upon his admission to the communion, the
clergyman, through his ministry. Church discipline,
and preaching, exercised an influence (as a glance at
collections of consilia, casus conscientice, etc., shows)
which we modern men are entirely unable to picture.
In such a time the religious forces which express
themselves through such channels are the decisive
influences in the formation of national character.

For the purposes of this chapter, though by no
means for all purposes, we can treat ascetic Protestant-
ism as a single whole. But since that side of English
Puritanism which was derived from Calvinism gives
the most consistent religious basis for the idea of the
calling, we shall, following our previous method,
place one of its representatives at the centre of the
discussion. Richard Baxter stands out above many
other writers on Puritan ethics, both because of his
eminently practical and realistic attitude, and, at the
same time, because of the universal recognition
accorded to his works, which have gone through many

155

The Protestant Ethic and the Spirit of Capitalism

new editions and translations. He was a Presbyterian
and an apologist of the Westminster Synod, but at the
same time, like so many of the best spirits of his time,
gradually grew away from the dogmas of pure Calvin-
ism. At heart he opposed Cromwell's usurpation as he
would any revolution. He was unfavourable to the
sects and the fanatical enthusiasm of the saints,
but was very broad-minded about external peculiarities
and objective towards his opponents. He sought his
field of labour most especially in the practical promo-
tion of the moral life through the Church. In the
pursuit of this end, as one of the most successful
ministers known to history, he placed his services at
the disposal of the Parliamentary Government, of
Cromwell, and of the Restoration,^ until he retired
from office under the last, before St. Bartholomew's
day. His Christian Directory is the most complete
compendium of Puritan ethics, and is continually
adjusted to the practical experiences of his own minis-
terial activity. In comparison we shall make use of
Spener's Theologische Bedenken^ as representative of
German Pietism, Barclay's Apology for the Quakers,
and some other representatives of ascetic ethics,^
which, however, in the interest of space, will be
limited as far as possible.^

Now, in glancing at Baxter's Saints^ Everlasting Rest,
or his Christian Directory^ or similar works of others,*
one is struck at first glance by the emphasis placed, in
the discussion of wealth^ and its acquisition, on the
ebionitic elements of the New Testament.^ Wealth
as such is a great danger; its temptations never end,
and its pursuit'^ is not only senseless as compared with

156

Asceticism and the Spirit of Capitalism

the dominating importance of the Kingdom of God,
but it is morally suspect. Here asceticism seems to have
turned much more sharply against the acquisition of
earthly goods than it did in Calvin, who saw no hin-
drance to the effectiveness of the clergy in their wealth,
but rather a thoroughly desirable enhancement of their
prestige. Hence he permitted them to employ their
means profitably. Examples of the condemnation ^f
the pursuit of money and goods may be gathered
without end from Puritan writings, and may be
contrasted with the late mediaeval ethical literature,
which was much more open-minded on this point.

Moreover, these doubts were meant with perfect
seriousness; only it is necessary to examine them
somewhat more closely in order to understand their
true ethical significance and implications. The real
moral objection is ^o_rela3^tipn in the security of
possession,^ the enjoyment of wealth with the conse-
quence of idleness and the temptations of the flesh,
above all of distraction from the pursuit of a righteous
life. Iß fact, itjs_only because possession_invq]yes_this
danger of relaxation that it is objectionable at all. For
the Saints' everlasting rest is in the next world; on
earth man must, to be certain of his state of grace,
"do the works of him who sent him, as long as it is
yet day". NaL leisure and enjoyment^ but only activity
serves to increase the glory of God, according to the
definite manifestations of His will.^ y

Wi\^te, nf time is thus tji^ first and in principle the A
deadliest of sins. The span of human life is infinitely
short and precious to make sure of one's own election.
Loss of time through sociability, idle talk,^" luxur^^^^

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The Protestant Ethic and the Spirit of Capitalism

even more sleep than is necessary for health,^^ six to at
most eight hours, is worthy of absolute moral con-
demnation .^^ It does not yet hold, with Franklin, that
time is money, but the proposition is true in a certain
spiritual sense. It is infinitely valuable because every
y hour lost is lost to labour for the glory of God.^*
Thus inactive contemplation is also valueless, or even
directly reprehensible if it is at the expense of one's
daily work.^^ For it is less pleasing to God than the
active performance of His will in a calling .^^ Besides,
Sunday is provided for that, and, according to Baxter,
it is always those who are not diligent in their callings who
have no time for God when the occasion demands it.^'^
Accordingly, Baxter's principal work is dominated
yby the continually repeated, often almost passionate
^ preaching of hard, continuous bodily or mental labour. ^^
[t is due to a combination of two different motives .^^
'Labour is, on the one hand, an approved ascetic
technique, as it always has been^^ in the Western
Church, in sharp contrast not only to the Orient but
to almost all monastic rules the world over.^^ It is in
particular the specific defence against all those tempta-
tions which Puritanism united under the name of the
unclean life, whose role for it was by no means small.
The sexual asceticism of Puritanism differs only in
degree, not in fundamental principle, from that of
monasticism ; and on account of the Puritan conception
of marriage, its practical influence is more far-reaching
than that of the latter. For sexual intercourse is per-
mitted, even within marriage, only as the means willed
by God for the increase of His glory according to the
commandment, "Be fruitful and multiply." ^^ Along

158

Asceticism and the Spirit of Capitalism

with a moderate vegetable diet and cold baths, the
same prescription is given for all sexual temptations as
is used against religious doubts and a sense of moral
unworthiness : "Work hard in your calling." ^3 But
the most important thing was that even beyond that
labour came to be considered in itself ^^ the end of life,
ordained as such by God. St. Paul's "He who will not
work shall not eat" holds unconditionally for every-
one .^^ Unwillingness to work is symptomatic of the
lack of grace .^^

Here the difference from the mediaeval view-point
becomes quite evident. Thomas Aquinas also gave an
interpretation of that statement of St. Paul. But for
him^' labour is only necessary naturali ratione for the
maintenance of individual and community. Where this
end is achieved, the precept ceases to have any meaning..
Moreover, it holds only for the race, not for every
individual. It does not apply to anyone who can live
without labour on his possessions, and of course
contemplation, as a spiritual form of action in the
Kingdom of God, takes precedence over the command-
ment in its literal sense. Moreover, for the popular
theology of the time, the highest form of monastic
productivity lay in the increase of the Thesaurus
ecclesice through prayer and chant.

Now only do these exceptions to the duty to labour
naturally no longer hold for Baxter, but he holds most
emphatically that wealth does not exempt anyone from
the unconditional command .^^ Even the wealthy shall
not eat without working, for even though they do not
need to labour to support their own needs, there is
God's commandment which they, like the poor, must

159

\

The Protestant Ethic and the Spirit of Capitalism

obey .2® For everyone without exception God's Provi-
dence has prepared a calHng, which he should profess
and in which he should labour. And this calling is not,
as it was for the Lutheran, ^^ a fate to which he must
submit and which he must make the best of, but God's
commandment to the individual to work for the divine
glory. This seemingly subtle difference had far^reacEing
psychological consequences, and became connected with
a further development of the providential interpretation
of the economic order which had begun in scholasticism.
The phenomenon— of _the_ division of jabour and
/occupations in society had, among others, been inter-
/preted by Thomas Aquinas, to whom we may most
' conveniently refer, as a direct consequence of the
divine scheme of things. But the places assigned to
each man in this cosmos follow ex causis naturalibus and
are fortuitous (contingent in the Scholastic termin-
ology). The differentiation of men into the classes and
occupations established through historical development
became for Luther, as we have seen, a direct result of
the divine will. The perseverance of the individual in
the place and within the limits which God had assigned
to him was a religious duty.^^ This was the more
certainly the consequence since the relations of Luther-
anism to the world were in general uncertain from the
beginning and remained so. Ethical principles for the
reform of the world could not be found in Luther's
realm of ideas ; in fact it never quite freed itself from
Pauline indifference. Hence the world had to be accepted
as it was, and this alone could be made a religious duty.
But Jn_the-Puritan view, the providential character
or the play of private economic interests takes on a
1 60

Asceticism and the Spirit of Capitalism

somewhat different emphasis. True to the Puritan
tendency to pragmatic interpretations, the providential
purpos£-Q£-tbe^diyision of labour is to be known by its
fruits. On this point Baxter expressesTiimself in terms
which more than once directly recall Adam Smith's
well-known apotheosis of the division of labour. ^^ The '
specialization of occupations lead^, since it makes the
development of skill possible, to a quantitative and
qualitative improvement in production, and thus serves
the common good, which is identical with the good
of the greatest possible number. So far, the motivation is
purely utilitarian, and is closely related to the customary
view-point of much of the secular literature of the time.^^

But the characteristic Puritan element appears when
Baxter sets at the head of his discussion the statement
that *'outside of a well-marked calling the accomplish-
ments of a man are only casual and irregular, and he
spends more time in idleness than at work", and when he
concludes it as follows : "and he [the specialized worker]
will carry out his work in order while another remains in
constant confusion, and his business knows neither time
nor place ^* . . . therefore is a certain calling the best for
everyone". Irregular work, which the ordinary labourer is
often forced to accept, is often unavoidable, but always an
unwelcome state of transition. A man without a calling
thus lacks the systematic, methodical character which is,
as we have seen, demanded by worldly asceticism.

The Quaker ethic also holds that a man's life in his
calling is an exercise in ascetic virtue, a proof of his
state, of grace through his conscientiousness, which is
expressed in the care ^^ and method with which he
pursues his calling. What God demands is not labour
i6i

The Protestant Ethic and the Spirit of Capitalism

in itself, but rational labour in a calling. In the Puritan
concept of the calling the emphasis is always placed on
this methodical character of worldly asceticism, not, as
with Luther, on the acceptance of the lot which God
has irretrievably assigned to man.^^

Hence the question whether anyone may combine
several callings is answered in the affirmative, if it is
useful for the common good or one's own,^' and not
injurious to anyone, and if it does not lead to un-
faithfulness in one of the callings. Even a change of
calling is by no means regarded as objectionable, if it
is not thoughtless and is made for the purpose of
pursuing a calling more pleasing to God,^^ which
means, on general principles, one more useful.

It is true that the usefulness of a calling, and thus its

I favour in the sight of God, is measured primarily in

moral terms, and thus in terms of the importance of

the goods produced in it for the community. But a

further, and, above all, in practice the most important,

criterion is found in private profitableness.^^ For if

that God, whose hand the Puritan sees in all the

occurrences of life, shows one of His elect a chance of

profit, he must do it with a purpose. Hence the faithful

(christian must follow the call by taking advantage of

Hhe opportunity.^^ *'If God show you a way in which

you may lawfully get more than in another way (without

wrong to your soul or to any other), if you refuse this,

and choose the less gainful way, you crass one of the

ends of your calling, and you refuse to be God's

steward, and to accept His gifts and use them for Him

when He requireth it: you may labour to be rich for

God, though not for the flesh and sin."*^

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Asceticism and the Spirit of Capitalism

Wealth is thus bad ethically only in so far as it is a
temptation to idleness and sinful enjoyment of life^ and
ita-acquiaition is bad only when it is with the purpose
of _lat£L living merrily and without care. But as a ,
performance of duty in a calling it is not only morally '
permissible, but actually enjoined. ^^ The parable of the
servant who was rejected because he did not increase
the talent which was entrusted to him seemed to say
so directly.^^ To wish to be poor was, it was often
argued, the same as wishing to be unhealthy **; if is
objectionable as a glorification of works and derogatory
to the glory of God. Especially begging, on the part of
one able to work, is not only the sin of slothfulness,
but a violation of the duty of brotherly love according
to the Apostle's own wordJL,^^

The emphasis on tK^asceti^ importance of a fixed
calling provided an ethical justification of the modern
specialized division of labour. In a similar way the
providential interpretation ot profit-making justified
the activities of the business man.*^ The superior in-
dulgence of the seigneur and the parvenu ostentation
of the nouveau riche are equally detestable to asceticism.
But, on the other hand, it has the highest ethical
appreciation of the sober, middle-class, self-made
man.*' "God blesseth His trade" is a stock remark
about those good men*^ who had successfully followed
the divine hints. The whole power of the God of the
Old Testament, who rewards His people for their
obedience in this life,*^ necessarily exercised a similar
influence on the Puritan who, following Baxter's
advice, compared his own state of grace with that of
the heroes of the Bible,^^ and in the process interpreted

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The Protestant Ethic and the Spirit of Capitalism

the statements of the Scriptures as the articles of a book
of statutes.

Of course, the words of the Old Testament were not
entirely without ambiguity. We have seen that Luther
first used the concept of the calling in the secular sense
in translating a passage from Jesus Sirach. But the
book of Jesus Sirach belongs, with the whole atmo-
sphere expressed in it, to those parts of the broadened
Old Testament with a distinctly traditionalistic ten-
dency, in spite of Hellenistic influences. It is charac-
teristic that down to the present day this book seems
to enjoy a special favour among Lutheran German
peasants, ^^ just as the Lutheran influence in large
sections of German Pietism has been expressed by a
preference for Jesus Sirach .^^

The Puritans repudiated the Apocrypha as not
inspired, consistently with their sharp distinction
between things divine and things of the flesh. ^^ But
among the canonical books tliat of Job had all the
more influence. On the one hand it contained a grand
conception of the absolute sovereign majesty of God,
beyond all human comprehension, which was closely
related to that of Calvinism. With that, on the other
hand, it combined the certainty which, though inci-
dental for Calvin, came to be of great importance for
Puritanism, that God would bless His own in this life —
in the book of Job only — and also in the material
sense.^* The Oriental quietism, which appears in several
of the finest verses of the Psalms and in the Proverbs,
was interpreted away, just as Baxter did with the
traditionalistic tinge of the passage in the ist Epistle to
the Corinthians, so important for the idea of the calling.
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Asceticism and the Spirit of Capitalism

But all the more emphasis was placed on those parts
of the Old Testament which praise formal legality as
a- sign of conduct pleasing to God. They held the
theory that the Mosaic Law had only lost its validity
through Christ in so far as it contained ceremonial or
purely historical precepts applying only to the Jewish
people, but that otherwise it had always been valid
as an expression of the natural law, and must hence be
retained. ^^ This made it possible, on the one hand, to
eliminate elements which could not be reconciled with
modern life. But still, through its numerous related
features, Old Testament morality was able to give a
powerful impetus to that spirit of self-righteous and
sober legality which was so characteristic of the worldly
asceticism of this form of Protestantism.^^

Thus when authors, as was the case with several
contemporaries as well as later writers, characterize the
basic ethical tendency of Puritanism, especially in
England, as English Hebraism^ ^ they are, correctly
understood, not wrong. It is necessary, however, not
to think of Palestinian Judaism at the time of the
writing of the Scriptures, but of Judaism as it became
under the influence of many centuries of formalistic,
legalistic, and Talmudic education. Even then one must
be very careful in drawing parallels. The general
I tendency of the older Judaism toward a naive accept-
ance of life as such was far removed from the special
characteristics of Puritanism. It was, however, just as
far — and this ought not to be overlooked — from the
economic ethics of mediaeval and modern Judaism, in
the traits which determined the positions of both in
the development of the capitalistic ethos. The Jews

165

The Protestant Ethic and the Spirit of Capitalism

stood on the side of the politically and speculatively
oriented adventurous capitalism; their ethos was, in a
word, that of pariah-capitalism. But Puritanism carried
the ethos of the rational organization of capital and
labour. It took over from the Jewish ethic only what
was adapted to this purpose.

To analyse the effects on the character of peoples of
the penetration of life with Old Testament norms — a
tempting task which, however, has not yet satisfactorily
been done even for Judaism^® — would be impossible
within the limits of this sketch. In addition to the
relationships already pointed out,* it is important for the
general inner attitude of the Puritans, above all, that
the belief that they were God's chosen people saw in
them a great renaissance.^^ Even the kindly Baxter
thanked God that he was born in England, and thus in
the true Church, and nowhere else. This thankfulness
for one's own perfection by the grace of God penetrated
the attitude toward life ^^ of the Puritan middle class,
and played its part in developing that formalistic, hard,
correct character which was peculiar to the men of that
heroic age of capitalism.

Let us now try to clarify the points in which the
Puritan idea of the calling and the premium it placed
upon ascetic conduct was bound directly to influence

^ the development of a capitalistic way of life. As we have
seen, this asceticism turned with all its force against

\ one_tliingiJjbL^_5pQntaneous enjoyment of life and all

7it Jiad_to_offer. This is perhaps most charä^cteristically

brought out in the struggle over the Book of Sports ^^

which James I and Charles I made into law expressly

as a means of counteracting Puritanism, and which

i66

Asceticism and the Spirit of Capitalism

the latter ordered to be read from all the pulpits. The
fanatical opposition of the Puritans to the ordinances
of the King, permitting certain popular amusements on
Sunday outside of Church hours by law, was not only
explained by the disturbance of the Sabbath rest, but
also by resentment against the intentional diversion
from the ordered life of the saint, which it caused.
And, on his side, the King's threats of severe punish-
ment for every attack on the legality of those sports
were motivated by his purpose of breaking the anti-
authoritarian ascetic tendency of Puritanism, which was
so dangerous to the State. The feudal and monarchical
forces protected the pleasure seekers against the
rising middle-class morality and the anti-authoritarian
ascetic conventicles, just as to-day capitalistic society
tends to protect those willing to work against the class
morality of the proletariat and the anti-authoritarian
trade union.

As against this the Puritans upheld their decisive
characteristic, the principle of ascetic conduct. For
otherwise the Puritan aversion to sport, even for the
Quakers, was by no means simply one of principle.
Sport was accepted if it served a rational purpose, that
of recreation necessary for physical efficiency. But as a
means for the spontaneous expression of undisciplined
impulses, it was under suspicion; and in so far as it
became purely a means of enjoyment, or awakened
pride, raw instincts or the irrational gambling instinct,
it was of course strictly condemned. Impulsive enjoy-
ment of life, which leads away both from work in a
calling and from religion, was as such the enemy of
rational asceticism, whether in the form of seigneurial

167

The Protestant Ethic and the Spirit of Capitalism

sports, or the enjoyment of the dance-hall or the public-
house of the common man.^^

Its attitude was thus suspicious and often hostile to
the aspects of culture without any immediate religious
value. It is not, however, true that the ideals of Puritan-
ism implied a solemn, narrow-minded contempt of
culture. Quite the contrary is the case at least for
science, with the exception of the hatred of Scholasti-
cism. Moreover, the great men of the Puritan movement
were thoroughly steeped in the culture of the Renais-
sance. The sermons of the Presbyterian divines abound
with classical allusions, ^^ and even the Radicals, although
they objected to it, were not ashamed to display that
kind of learning in theological polemics. Perhaps no
country was ever so full of graduates as New England
in the first generation of its existence. The satire of
their opponents, such as, for instance, Butler's Hudibras,
also attacks primarily the pedantry and highly trained
dialectics of the Puritans. This is partially due to the
religious valuation of knowledge which followed from
their attitude to the Catholic fides implicita.

But the situation is quite different when one looks
at non-scientific literature,^* and especially the fine
arts. Here asceticism descended like a frost on the life
of "Merrie old England." And not only worldly merri-
ment felt its effect. The Puritan's ferocious hatred of
everything which smacked of superstition, of all
survivals of magical or sacramental salvation, applied
to the Christmas festivities and the May Pole ^^ and
all spontaneous religious art. That there was room in
Holland for a great, often uncouthly realistic art^^
proves only how far from completely the authoritarian
1 68

I

Asceticism and the Spirit of Capitalism

moral discipline of that country was able to counteract
the influence of the court and the regents (a class of
rentiers), and also the joy in life of the parvenu bour-
geoisie, after the short supremacy of the Calvinistic
theocracy had been transformed into a moderate
national Church, and with it Calvinism had perceptibly
lost in its power of ascetic influence.^'

The theatre was obnoxious to the Puritans,^^ and
with the strict exclusion of the erotic and of nudity
from the realm of toleration, a radical view of either
literature or art could not exist. The conceptions of
idle talk, of superfluities,^^ and of vain ostentation, all
designations of an irrational attitude without objective
purpose, thus not ascetic, and especially not serving the
glory of God, but of man, were always at hand to serve
in deciding in favour of sober utility as against any
artistic tendencies. This was especially true in the
case of decoration of the person, for instance clothing."^
That powerful tendency toward uniformity of life, which
to-day so immensely aids the capitalistic interest in the
standardization of production, '^ had its ideal founda-
tions in the repudiation of all idolatry of the flesh. ""^

Of course we must not forget that Puritanism in-
cluded a world of contradictions, and that the instinc-
tive sense of eternal greatness in art was certainly
stronger among its leaders than in the atmosphere
of the Cavaliers."^ Moreover, a unique genius like
Rembrandt, however little his conduct may have been
acceptable to God in the eyes of the Puritans, was very
strongly influenced in the character of his work by his
religious environment.''* But that does not alter the
picture as a whole. In so far as the development of

N 169

The Protesta?it Ethic and the Spirit of Capitalism

the Puritan tradition could, and in part did, lead to
a powerful spiritual ization of personality, it was a
decided benefit to literature. But for the most part
that benefit only accrued to later generations.

Although we cannot here enter upon a- discussion of
the influence of Puritanism in all these directions, we
should call attention to the fact that /the toleration of
pleasure in cultural goods, which contributed to purely
aesthetic or athletic enjoyment, certainly always ran up
against one characteristic limitation: they must not
cost anything. Man is only a trustee of the goods which
have come to him through God's grace. He must, like
the servant in the parable, give an account of every
penny entrusted to him,"*^ and it is at least hazardous
to spend any of it for a purpose which does not serve
the glory of God but only one's own enjoyment.''^
What person, who keeps his eyes open, has not met
representatives of this view-point even in the present P"^^
^The_jdeajiJLa_man's duty to his possessions, to which
Ihe subordinates himself as an obedient steward, or even
las an acquisitive machine, bears with chilling weight
on his life. The greater the possessions the heavier,
if the ascetic attitude toward life stands the test, the
feeling of responsibility for them, for holding them
undiminished for the glory of God and increasing them
Jby restless eftbrt. The origin of this type of life also
extends in certain roots, like so many aspects of the
spirit of capitalism, back into the Middle Ages.'^ But
it was in the ethic of ascetic Protestantism that it first
found a consistent ethical foundation. Its significance
for the development of capitalisrn is obvious . ' ^

This worldly Protestant asceticism, as we may
170

Asceticism and the Spirit of Capitalism

r£capitulatejipJojthjs_point, acted powerfully against
the spontaneous enjoyment of possessions ; it restricted

^nsumption, especially^nuxuries. On the other hand,
it had the psychological effect of freeing the acquisition
of goods from the inhibitions of traditionalistic ethics-
It broke the bonds of the impulse of acquisition in that
it not only legalized it, but (in the sense discussed)
looked upon it as directly willed by God. The campaign
against the temptations of the flesh, and the depend-'
ence on external things, was, as besides the Puritans
the great Quaker apologist Barclay expressly says, not
a struggle against the rational acquisition, but against

.the irratiTm2ri~use"ofwealth .

Butlhis irrational usFwas exemplified in the outward
forms of luxury which their code condemned as idolatry
of the flesh ,^^ however natural they had appeared to
the feudal mind. On the other hand, they approved the
rational and utilitarian uses of wealth which were willed
by God for the needs of the individual and the com-
munity. They did not wish to impose mortification^^
on the man of wealth, but the use of his means for
necessary and practical things. The idea of comfort \y^
characteristically limits the extent of ethically permis-
sil)le expenditures. It is naturally no accident that

'the development of a manner of living consistent with
that idea may be observed earliest and most clearly
among the most consistent representatives of this
whole attitude toward life. Over against the glitter and
ostentation of feudal magnificence which, resting on
an unsound economic basis, prefers a sordid elegance
to a sober simplicity, they set the clean and solid
comfort of the middle-class home as an ideal. ^'-^

171

The Protestant Ethic and the Spirit of Capitalism

On the side of the production of private wealth,
asceticism condemned both dishonesty and impulsive
avarice. What was condemned as covetousness, Mam-
monism, etc., was the pursuit of riches for their own
sake. For wealth in itself was a temptation. But here
asceticism was the power * 'which ever seeks the good
but ever creates evil" ^^; what was evil in its sense was
possession and its temptations. For, in conformity with
the Old Testament and in analogy to the ethical
valuation of good works, asceticism looked upon the
pursuit of wealth as an end in itself as highly repre-
hensible ; but the attainment of it as a fruit of labour
\ in a calling was a sign of God's blessing. And even
jjinore important: the religious valuation of restless,
'7 continuous, systematic work in a worldly calling, as
the highest means to asceticism, and at the same time
. the surest and most evident proof of rebirth and
! genuine faith, must have been the most powerful con-
1 ceivable lever for the expansion of that attitude toward
r life which we have here called the spirit of capitalism.^*
,|**2^When the limitation of consumption is combined
( \ with this release of acquisitive activity, the inevitable
' practical result is obvious: accumulation of capital
through ascetic compulsion to save.®^ The restraints
which were imposed upon the consumption of wealth
naturally served to increase it by making possible the
productive investment of capital. How strong th|s
influence was is not, unfortunately, susceptible of
pvart statistical demonstration. In New England the
connection is so evident that ft did not escape the eye
of so discerning a historian as Doyle .^^ But also in
Holland, which was really only dominated by strict
172

i

Asceticism and the Spirit of Capitalism

Calvinism for seven years, the greater simplicity of
life in the more seriously religious circles, in combina-
tion with great wealth, led to an excessive propensity
to accumulation.®^

That, furthermore, the tendency which has existed
everywhere and at all times, being quite strong in
Germany to-day, for middle-class fortunes to be
absorbed into the nobility, was necessarily checked by
the Puritan antipathy to the feudal way of life, is
evident. English Mercantilist writers of the seventeenth
century attributed the superiority of Dutch capital to
English to the circumstance that newly acquired wealth
there did not regularly seek investment in land. Also,
since it is not simply a question of the purchase of
land, it did not there seek to transfer itself to feudal
habits of life, and thereby to remove itself from the
possibility of capitalistic investment .^^ The high esteem
for agriculture as a peculiarly important branch of
activity, also especially consistent with piety, which the
Puritans shared, applied (for instance in Baxter) not to
the landlord, but to the yeoman and farmer, in the
eighteenth century not to the squire, but the rational
cultivator.®^ Through the whole of English society in
the time since the seventeenth century goes the conflict
between the squirearchy, the representatives of "merrie
old England", and the Puritan circles of widely varying
social influence. ^^ Both elements, that of an unspoiled
naive joy of life, and of a strictly regulated, reserved
self-control, and conventional ethical conduct are even
to-day combined to form the English national charac-
ter.^^ Similarly, the early history of the North American"
Colonies is dominated by the sharp cöntrast~oFlEe

173

The Protestant Ethic and the Spirit of Capitalism

adventurers, who wanted to set up plantations with the
labour of indentured servants, and live as feudal lords,
and the specifically middle-class outlook of the Puritans. ^^
As far as the influence of the Puritan outlook ex-
tended, under all circumstances — and this is, of course,
much more important than the mere encouragement of
capital accumulation — it favoured the development of
a rational bourgeois economic life; it was the most
important, and above all the only consistent influence
in the development of that life. It stood at the cradle of
the modern economic man.

To be sure, these Puritanical ideals tended to give
way under excessive pressure from the temptations of
wealth, as the Puritans themselves knew very well.
With great regularity we find the most genuine adher-
ents of Puritanism among the classes which were rising
from a lowly status, ^^ the small bourgeois and farmers,
while~the beati possidentes, even among Quakers, are
often found tending to repudiate the old ideals.^* It
was the same fate which again and again befell the
predecessor of this worldly asceticism, the monastic
asceticism of the Middle Ages. In the latter case, when
/rational economic activity had worked out its full effects
by strict regulation of conduct and limitation of con-
sumption, the wealth accumulated either succumbed
directly to the nobility, as in the time before the Reforma-
tion, or monastic discipline threatened to break down,
and one of the numerous reformations became necessary.

In fact the wlible history of monasticTsm is in a

certain sense the history of a continual struggle with

the problem of the secularizing influence of wealth.

The same is true on a grand scale of the worldly

174

Asceticism and the Spirit of Capitalism

asceticism of Puritanism. The great revival of Method-
ism, which preceded the expansion of EngHsh industry
toward the end of the eighteenth century, may well be
compared with such a monastic reform. We may hence
quote here a passage^^ from John Wesley himself which
might well serve as a motto for everything which has been
said above. For it shows that the leaders of these ascetic
movements understood the seemingly paradoxical rela-
tionships which we have here analysed perfectly well, and
in the same sense that we have given them.^^ He wrote :

"I fear, wherever riches have increased, the essence'
of religion has decreased in the same proportion/
Therefore I do not see how it is possible, in the nature
of things, for any revival of true religion to continue
long. For religion must necessarily produce both
industry and frugality, and these cannot but produce
riches. But as riches increase, so will pride, anger, and
love of the world in all its branches. How then is it
possible that Methodism, that is, a religion of the heart,
though it flourishes now as a green bay tree, should
continue in this state? For the Methodists in every
place grow diligent and frugal; consequently they
increase in goods. Hence they proportionately increase
in pride, in anger, in the desire of the flesh, the desire
of the eyes, and the pride of life. So, although the form
of religion remains, the spirit is swiftly vanishing away.
Is there no way to prevent this — this continual decay
of pure religion ? We_9ught^not to prevent people from^
being diligent and frugal; we must exhort all Christians
togain all they can, and to save all they can', that isy inj
effect f to grow rich.'' ^'

175

The Protestant Ethic and the Spirit of Capitalism

There follows the advice that those who gain all they
can and save all they can should also give all they can,
so that they will grow in grace and lay up a treasure in
heaven. It is clear that Wesley here expresses^ even in
detail, just what we have been trying to-point^ut . ^^

As Wesley here says, the full economic effect of those
great religious movements, whose significance for
economic development lay above ail in their ascetic
educative influence, generally came only after the peak
of the purely religious enthusiasm was past. Then the
intensity of the search for the Kingdom of God com-
menced gradually to pass over into sober economic
virtue ; the religious roots died out slowly, giving way
to utilitarian worldliness. Then, as Dowden puts it, as in
Robinson Crusoe, the isolated economic man who carries
on missionary activities on the side ^^ takes the place
of the lonely spiritual search for the Kingdom of
Heaven of Bunyan's pilgrim, hurrying through the
market-place of Vanity.

When later the principle **to make the most of both
worlds" became dominant in the end, as Dowden has
remarked, a good conscience simply became one of the
means of enjoying a comfortable bourgeois life, as is
well expressed in the German proverb about the soft
pillow. What the great religious epoch of the seven-
teenth century bequeathed to its utilitarian successor
was, however, above all an amazingly good, we may
even say a pharisaically good, conscience in the acqui-
sition of money, so long as it took place legally. Every
trace of the deplacere vix potest has disappeared. ^^^
[ " A specifically bourgeois economic ethic had grown
up. With the conscio.usness of standing in the fullness
~ "176

k

Asceticism and the Spirit of Capitalism

/of God's grace and being visibly blessed by Him, the
'bourgeois business man, as long as he remained within
the bounds of formal correctness, as long as his moral
conduct was spotless and the use to which he put his
wealth was not objectionable, could follow his pecuniary
interests as he would and feel that he was fulfilling ai
luty in doing so. The power of religious asceticisnr
provided Tum in addition with sober, conscientious, and
unusually industrious workmen, who clung to their
work as to a life purpose willed by God.^^^

Finally, it gave him the comforting assurance that
the unequal distribution of the goods of this world was
a special dispensation of Divine Providence, which in
these differences, as in particular grace, pursued secret
ends unknown to men.^^^ Calvin himself had made the
much-quoted statement that only when the people, i.e.
the mass of labourers and craftsmen, were poor did
they remain obedient to God.^^^ In the Netherlands
(Pieter de la Court and others), that had been secularized
to the effect that the mass of men only labour when
necessity forces them to do so. This formulation of aj
leading idea of capitalistic economy later entered into!
the current theories of the productivity of low wages.
Here also, with the dying out of the religious root, th^
utilitarian interpretation crept in unnoticed, in the line
of development which we have again and again observed^

Mediaeval ethics not only tolerated begging but
actually glorified it in the mendicant orders. Even
secular beggars, since they gave the person of means
opportunity for good works through giving alms, were
sometimes considered an estate and treated as such.
Even the Anglican social ethic of the Stuarts was very

177

The Protestant Ethic and the Spirit of Capitalism

close to this attitude. It remained for Puritan Ascetic-
ism to take part in the severe EngHsh Poor ReHef
Legislation which fundamentally changed the situation.
And it could do that, because the Protestant sects and
the strict Puritan communities actually did not know
any. begging in their own midst. ^^^

On the other hand, seen from the side of the workers,
the Zinzendorf branch of Pietism, for instance, glorified
the loyal worker who did not seek acquisition, but lived
according to the apostolic model, and was thus en-
dowed with the charisma^^^ of the disciples. ^^^ Similar
ideas had originally been prevalent among the Baptists
in an even more radical form.

Now naturally the whole ascetic literature of almost

all denominations is saturated with the idea that faithful

labour, even at low wages, on the part of those whom

life offers no other opportunities, is highly pleasing to

God. In this respect Protestant Asceticism added in

pitselF nothing new. But it not only deepened this idea

most powerfully, it also created the force which was

alone decisive for its effectiveness: the psychological

sanction of it through the conception of this labour as

a calling, as the best, often in the last analysis the only

means of attaining certainty of grace. ^^^ And on the

oth^ hamülLlegalizedthe exploitation of this specific

willingness to work, ip^jthat it also interpreted the

j employer's business activity as a calling.^^^ It is obvious

""how powerfully the exclusive search for the Kingdom

,,of God only through the fulfilment of duty in the

/ calling, and the strict asceticism which Church disci-

l pline naturally imposed, especially on the propertyless

\ classes, was bound to affect the productivity of labour

178

Asceticism and the Spirit of Capitalism

in the capitalistic sense of the word. The treatment
of labour' as a calHng became as characteristic of the
modern worker as the corresponding attitude toward
acquisition of the business man. It was a perception of
this situation, new at his time, which caused so able an
observer as Sir William Petty to attribute the economic
power of Holland in the seventeenth century to the
fact that the very numerous dissenters in that country
(Calvinists and Baptists) "are for the most part thinking,
sober men, and such as believe that Labour and In-
dustry is their duty towards God".^^^

Calvinism opposed organic social organization in the
fiscal-monopolistic form which it assumed in Anglican-
ism under the Stuarts, especially in the conceptions of
Laud, this alliance of Church and State with the
monopolists on the basis of a Christian-social ethical
foundation. Its leaders were universally among the
most passionate opponents of this type of politically
privileged commercial, putting-out, and colonial
capitalism. Over against it they placed the individual-
istic motives of rational legal acquisition by virtue of
one's own ability and initiative. And, while the politic-
ally privileged monopoly industries in England all
disappeared in short order, this attitude played a large
and decisive part in the development of the industries
which grew up in spite of and against the authority
of the State. 1^^ The Puritans (Prynne, Parker) repudi-
ated all connection with the large-scale capitalistic
courtiers and projectors as an ethically suspicious class.
On the other hand, they took pride in their own
superior middle-class business morality, which formed
the true reason for the persecutions to which they were

179

The Protestafit Ethic and the Spirit of Capitalism

subjected on the part of those circles. Defoe proposed
to win the battle against dissent by boycotting bank
credit and withdrawing deposits. The difference of the
two types of capitalistic attitude went to a very large
extent hand in hand with religious differences. The
opponents of the Nonconformists, even in the eight-
eenth century, again and again ridiculed them for
personifying the spirit of shopkeepers, and for having
ruined the ideals of old England. Here also lay the
difference of the Puritan economic ethic from the
Jewish; and contemporaries (Prynne) knew well that
the former and not the latter was the bourgeois capital-
istic ethic. 11^

^ One of the fundamental elements of the spirit of
[modern capitalism, and not only of that but of all
I modern culture: rational conduct on the basis of the
idea of the calling, was born — ^that is what this dis-
cussion has sT5trght^o demonstrate — ^from the spirit
jof Christian asceticism. One has only to re-read the
passage from Franklin, quoted at the beginning of this
essay, in order to see that the essential elements of the
attitude which was there called the spirit of capitalism
are the same as what we have just shown to be the
content of the Puritan worldly asceticism,^^^ only
without the religious basis, ^^hichby Franklin's time
had died awav. The idea that modern "Tabour^iras an

ascetic character is of course not new. Limitation to
specialized work, with a renunciation of the Faustian
universality of man which it involves, is a condition of
any valuable work in the modern world; hence deeds
and renunciation inevitably condition each other to-
day. This fundamentally ascetic trait of middle-class
i8o

Asceticism and the Spirit of Capitalism

life, if it attempts to be a way of life at all, and not
simply the absence of any, was what Goethe wanted
to teach, at the height of his wisdom, in the Wander-
jähren, and in the end which he gave to the life of his
' Fatist}^^ For him the realization meant a renunciation,
' a departure from an age of full and beautiful humanity,
which can no more be repeated in the course of our
cultural development than can the flower of the
Athenian culture of antiquity.
[ The Puritan wanted to work in a calling; :a[£_are
' _fo£C£djo_do_sa^For when asceticism was carried out of
monastic cells into everyday life, and began to dominate
worldly morality, it did its part in building the tremen-
dous cosmos of the modern economic order. This order
is now bound to the technical and economic conditions
of machine production which to-day determine the
lives of all^ the individuals who are born into this
mechanism, not only those directly concerned with
economic acquisition, with irresistible force. Perhaps
it will so determine them until the last ton of fossilized
coal is burnt. In Baxter's view the care for external
^oods should only lie on the shoulders^oFlhe *jäjnt
like a light cloak, which can be thrownaside at any
^_nioment'\^^^ But fate decreed that the cloak should
_become an iron cage.

Since asceticism undertook to remodel the world and
to work out its ideals in the world, material goods havi
gained an increasing and finally an inexorable power\
over the lives of men as at no previous period in his-
tory. To-day the spirit of religious asceticism — whether
.finally, who knows? — has escaped from the cage. But
victorious capitalism, since it rests on mechanical

i8i

The Protestant Ethic and the Spirit of Capitalism

foundations, needs its support no longer. The rosy
blush of its laughing heir, the Enlightenment, seems
also to be irretrievably fading, and the idea_of_duty in
one's calling prowls about in our lives likejiie- ghost
ofHdead religious beliefs. Where the_ fulfilment of the
calling cannot directly be related to the highest spiritual
and cultural values7~br when, on the other hand, it
need not be felt simpfy as economic compulsion, the
individual generally abandons the attempt to justify it
at all. In the field of its highest development, in the
United States, the pursuit of wealth, stripped of its
religious and ethical meaning, tends to become asso-
ciated with purely mundane passions, which often
actually give it the character of sport .^^^

^ No one knows who will live in this cage in the future,
or whether at the end of this tremendous development
entirely new prophets will arise, or there will be a
great rebirth of old ideas and ideals, or, if neither,
mechanized petrification, embellished with a sort of
convulsive self-importance. For of the last stage of
s cultural development, it might well be truly said :

Specialists without spirit, sensualists without heart ;
this nullity imagines that it has attained a level of
civilization never before achieved."

But this brings us to the world of judgments of
value and of faith, with which this purely historical
discussion need not be burdened. The next task would
be rather to show the significance of ascetic rationalism,
which has only been touched in the foregoing sketch,
for the content of practical social ethics, thus for
the types of organization and the functions of social ^
groups from the conventicle to the State. Then its

182

Asceticism and the Spirit of Capitalism

relations to humanistic rationalism/^^ its ideals of life
and cultural influence; further to the development of
philosophical and scientific empiricism, to technical
development and to spiritual ideals would have to be
analysed. Then__its historical development from the
mediaeval beginnings of worldl)^ asceticism to its
dissolution into pure utilitarianism would have to be
traced out through all the areas of ascetic religion. Only
then could the quantitative cultural significance of
ascetic Protestantism in its relation to the other plastic
elements of modern culture be estimated.

Here we have only attempted to trace the fact and
the direction of its influence to their motives in one,
though a very important point. But it would also
Turther be necessary to investigate how Protestant
Asceticism was in turn influenced in its development
and its character by the totality of social conditions,
especially economic.^^'^ The modern man is in general,
even with the best will, unable to give religious ideas
a significance for culture and national character which
they deserve. But it is, of course, not my aim to sub-
stitute for a one-sided materialistic an equally one-
sided spiritualistic causal interpretation of culture and
of history. Each is equally possible,^i^ but each, if it
does not serve as the preparation, but as the conclusion
of an investigation, accomplishes equally little in the
interest of historical truth .^^^

i«3

NOTES

INTRODUCTION

1. Ständestaat. The term refers to the late form taken by feudalism
in Europe in its transition to absolute monarchy. — ^Translator's Note.

2. Here, as on some other points, I differ from our honoured
master, Lujo Brentano (in his work to be cited later). Chiefly in
regard to terminology, but also on questions of fact. It does not seem
to me expedient to bring such different things as acquisition of booty
and acquisition by management of a factory together under the same
category; still less to designate every tendency to the acquisition of
money as the spirit of capitalism as against other types of acquisition.
The second sacrifices all precision of concepts, and the first the
possibility of clarifying the specific difference between Occidental
capitalism and other forms. Also in Simmel's Philosophie des Geldes
money economy and capitalism are too closely identified, to the
detriment of his concrete analysis. In the writings of Werner Sombart,
above all in the second edition of his most important work. Der
moderne Kapitalismus, the differentia specifica of Occidental capitalism
— at least from the view -point of my problem — the rational organiza-
tion of labour, is strongly overshadowed by genetic factors which
have been operative everywhere in the world.

3. Commenda was a form of mediaeval trading association, entered
into ad hoc for carrying out one sea voyage. A producer or exporter
of goods turned them over to another who took them abroad (on a
ship provided sometimes by one party, sometimes by the other) and
sold them, receiving a share in the profits. The expenses of the
voyage were divided between the two in agreed proportion, while
the original shipper bore the risk. See Weber, "Handelsgesellschaften
im Mittelalter", Gesammelte Aufsätze zur Sozial- und Wirtschafts-
geschichte, pp. 323-8. — ^Translator's Note.

4. The sea loan, used in maritime commerce in the Middle Ages,
was "a method of insuring against the risks of the sea without violating
the prohibitions against usury. . . . When certain risky maritime
ventures were to be undertaken, a certain sum . . . was obtained for
the cargo belonging to such and such a person or capitalist. If the
ship was lost, no repayment was exacted by the lender ; if it reached
port safely, the borrower paid a considerable premium, sometimes 50 per
cent." Henri See, Modern Capitalism, p. 189. — Translator's Note.

5. A form of company between the partnership and the limited
liability corporation. At lea.st one of the participants is made liable
without limit, while the others enjoy limitation of liability to the
amount of their investment. — Translator's Note.

o 185

The Protestant Ethic and the Spirit of Capitalism

6. Naturally the difference cannot be conceived in absolute terms.
The politically oriented capitalism (above all tax-farming) of Mediter-
ranean and Oriental antiquity, and even of China and India, gave
rise to rational, continuous enterprises whose book-keeping — though
known to us only in pitiful fragments — probably had a rational
character. Furthermore, the politically oriented adventurers 'capitalism
has been closely associated with rational bourgeois capitalism in the
development of modern banks, which, including the Bank of England,
have tor the most part originated in transactions of a political nature,
often connected with war. The difference between the characters of
Paterson, for instance — a typical promoter — and of the members of
the directorate of the Bank who gave the keynote to its permanent
policy, and very soon came to be known as the "Puritan usurers of
Grocers' Hall", is characteristic of it. Similarly, we have the aberra-
tion of the policy of this most solid bank at the time of the South
Sea Bubble. Thus the two naturally shade off into each other. But
the difference is there. The great promoters and financiers have no
more created the rational organization of labour than — again in
general and with individual exceptions — those other typical repre-
sentatives of financial and political capitalism, the Jews. That was
done, typically, by quite a different set of people.

7. For Weber's discussion of the ineffectiveness of slave labour,
especially so far as calculation is concerned, see his essay, "Agrar-
verhältnisse im Altertum", in the volume Gesammelte Aufsätze zur
Sozial- und Wirtschaftsgeschichte . — Translator's Note.

8. That is, in the whole series of Aufsätze zur Religionssoziologie ,
not only in the essay here translated. See translator's preface. —
Translator's Note.

9 . The remains of my knowledge of Hebrew are also quite inadequate.

10. I need hardly point out that this does not apply to attempts
like that of Karl Jasper's (in his hook Psychologie der Weltanschauungen,
1919), nor to Klages's Charakterologie, and similar studies which
differ from our own in their point of departure. There is no space
here for a criticism of them.

11. The only thing of this kind which Weber ever wrote is the
section on "Religionssoziologie" in his large work Wirtschaft und
Gesellschaft. It was left unfinished by him and does not really close
the gap satisfactorily. — Translator's Note.

12. Some years ago an eminent psychiatrist expressed the same
opinion to me.

CHAPTER I

I. From the voluminous literature which has grown up around
this essay I cite only the most comprehensive criticisms, (i) F.
Rachfahl, "Kalvinismus und Kapitalismus", biternationale Wochen-
schrift für Wissenschaft, Kunst und Technik (1909), Nos. 39-43. In

186

Notes

reply, my article: "Antikritisches zum Geist des Kapitalismus,"
Archiv für Sozialwissenschaft und Sozialpolitik (Tübingen), XX,
1910. Then Rachfahl's reply to that: "Nochmals Kalvinismus und
Kapitalismus", 1910, Nos. 22-25, of the Internationale Wochenschrift.
Finally my "Antikritisches Schlusswort", Archiv, XXXI. (Brentano,
in the criticism presently to be referred to, evidently did not know
of this last phase of the discussion, as he does not refer to it.) I have
not incorporated anything in this edition from the somewhat un-
fruitful polemics against Rachfahl . He is an author whom I otherwise
admire, but who has in this instance ventured into a field which he
has not thoroughly mastered . I have only added a few supplementary
references from my anti -critique, and have attempted, in new passages
and footnotes, to make impossible any future misunderstanding.
(2) W. Sombart, in his book Der Bourgeois (Munich and Leipzig,
191 3, also translated into English under the title The Quintessence of
Capitalism, London, 1915), to which I shall return in footnotes below.
Finally (3) Lujo Brentano in Part II of the Appendix to his Munich
address (in the Academy of Sciences, 191 3) on Die Anfänge des
modernen Kapitalismus, which was published in 191 6. (Since Weber's
death Brentano has somewhat expanded these essays and incorporated
them into his recent book Der wirtschaftende Mensch in der Geschichte.
— Translator's Note.) I shall also refer to this criticism in special
footnotes in the proper places. I invite anyone who may be interested
to convince himself by comparison that I have not in revision left
out, changed the meaning of, weakened, or added materially different
statements to, a single sentence of my essay which contained any
essential point. There was no occasion to do so, and the development
of my exposition will convince anyone who still doubts. The two
latter writers engaged in a more bitter quarrel with each other than
with me. Brentano's criticism of Sombart 's book, Die Juden und das
Wirtschaftsleben, I consider in many points well founded, but often
very unjust, even apart from the fact that Brentano does not himself
seem to understand the real essence of the problem of the Jews
(which is entirely omitted from this essay, but will be dealt with later
[in a later section of the Religionssoziologie. — Translator's Note]).

From theologians I have received numerous valuable suggestions
in connection with this study. Its reception on their part has been
in general friendly and impersonal, in spite of wide differences of
opinion on particular points. This is the more welcome to me since
I should not have wondered at a certain antipathy to the manner in
which these matters must necessarily be treated here. "What to a
theologian is valuable in his religion cannot play a very large part
in this study. We are concerned with what, from a religious point
of view, are often quite superficial and unrefined aspects of relligious
life, but which, and precisely because they were superficial and
unrefined, have often influenced outward behaviour most profoundy.

187

The Protestant Ethic and the Spirit of Capitalism

Another book which, besides containing many other things, is a
very welcome confirmation of and supplement to this essay in so far
as it deals with our problem, is the important work of E. Troeltsch,
Die Soziallehren der christlichen Kirchen und Gruppen (Tübingen,
1912). It deals with the history of the ethics of Western Christianity
from a very comprehensive point of view of its own, I here refer the
reader toitfor general comparison instead of makingrepeated references
to special points . The author is principally concerned with the doctrines
of religion, while I am interested rather in their practical results.

2. The exceptions are explained, not always, but frequently, by
the fact that the religious leanings of the labouring force of an industry
are naturally, in the first instance, determined by those of the locality
in which che industry is situated, or from which its labour is drawn.
This circumstance often alters the impression given at first glance
by some statistics of religious adherence, for instance in the Rhine
provinces. Furthermore, figures can naturally only be conclusive if
individual specialized occupations are carefully distinguished in them.
Otherwise very large employers may sometimes be grouped together
with master craftsmen who work alone, under the category of "pro-
prietors of enterprises". Above all, the fully developed capitalism of
the present day, especially so far as the great unskilted lower strata
of labour are concerned, has become independent of any influence
which religion may have had in the past. I shall return to this point.

3. Compare, for instance. Schell, Der Katholizismus als Prinzip
des Fortschrittes (Würzburg, 1897), p. 31, and V. Hertling, Das
Prinzip des Katholizismus und die Wissenschaft (Freiburg, 1899), p. 58.

4. One of my pupils has gone through what is at this time the
most complete statistical material we possess on this subject : the
religious statistics of Baden. See Martin Offenbacher, "Konfession
und soziale Schichtung", Eine Studie über die wirtschaftliche Lage
der Katholiken und Protestanten i?i Baden (Tübingen und Leipzig,
1901), Vol. IV, part V, of the Volkswirtschaftliche Abhandlungen der
badischen Hochschulen. The facts and figures which are used for
illustration below are all drawn from this study.

5. For instance, in 1895 in Baden there was taxable capital available
for the tax on returns from capital :

Per 1,000 Protestants . . . . . . 954,000 marks

Per 1,000 Catholics '. . . . . . 589,000 marks

It is true that the Jews, with over four millions per 1,000, were far
ahead of the rest. (For details see Offenbacher, op. cit., p. 21.)

6. On this point compare the whole discussion in Offenbacher's
study.

7. On this point also Offenbacher brings forward more detailed
evidence for Baden in his first two chapters.

8. The population of Baden was composed in 1895 as follows :
188

Notes

Protestants, 37*0 per cent.; Catholics, 61*3 per cent.; Jewish, 1*5 per
cent. The students of schools beyond the compulsory public school
stage were, however, divided as follows (OfFenbacher, p. 16):

Protestant.

Catholic.

Jews.

Gymnasien . .

Realgymnasien . .

Oberrealschulen . .

Realschulen

Höhere Bürgerschulen . .

Per Cent.

43
69
52
49
51

Per Cent.
46

31
41
40

37

Per Cent.
9.5

9

7
II
12

Average

48

42

10

(In the Gymnasium the main emphasis is on the classics. In the
Realgymnasium Greek is dropped and Latin reduced in favour of
modern languages, mathematics and science. The Realschule and Ober-
realschule are similar to the latter except that Latin is dropped entirely
in favour of modern languages. See G. E. Bolton, The Secondary
School System in Germany, New York, 1900. — Translator's Note.)

The same thing may be observed in Prussia, Bavaria, Würtemberg,
Alsace-Lorraine, and Hungary (see figures in Offenbacher, pp. 16 ff.).

9. See the figures in the preceding note, which show that the
Catholic attendance at secondary schools, which is regularly less
than the Catholic share of the total population by a third, only exceeds
this by a few per cent, in the case of the grammar schools (mainly
in preparation for theological studies). With reference to the subse-
quent discussion it may further be noted as characteristic that in
Hungary those affiliated with the Reformed Church exceed even the
average Protestant record of attendance at secondary schools. (See
Offenbacher, p. 19, note.)

10. For the proofs see Offenbacher, p. 54, and the tables at the end
of his study.

11. Especially well illustrated by passages in the works of Sir
William Petty, to be referred to later.

12. Petty 's reference to the case of Ireland is very simply explained
by the fact that the Protestants were only involved in the capacity
of absentee landlords. If he had meant to maintain more he would
have been wrong, as the situation of the Scotch-Irish shows. The
typical relationship between Protestantism and capitalism existed in
Ireland as well as elsewhere. (On the Scotch-Irish see C. A. Hanna,
The Scotch-Irish, two vols.; Putnam, New York.)

13. This is not, of course, to deny that the latter facts have had
exceedingly important consequences. As I shall show later, the fact

189

The Protestant Ethic and the Spirit of Capitalism

that many Protestant sects were small and hence homogeneous
minorities, as were all the strict Calvinists outside of Geneva and
New England, even where they were in possession of political power,
was of fundamental significance for the development of their whole
character, including their manner of participation in economic life.
The migration of exiles of all the religions of the earth, Indian,
Arabian, Chinese, Syrian, Phoenician, Greek, Lombard, to other
countries as bearers of the commercial lore of highly developed
areas, has been of universal occurrence and has nothing to do with
our problem. Brentano, in the essay to which I shall often refer, Die
Anfänge des modernen Kapitalismus, calls to witness his own family.
But bankers of foreign extraction have existed at all times and in all
countries as the representatives of commercial experience and con-
nections. They are not peculiar to modem capitalism, and were looked
upon with ethical mistrust by the Protestants (see below). The case
of the Protestant families, such as the Muralts, Pestalozzi, etc., who
migrated to Zurich from Locarno, was different. They very soon
became identified with a specifically modern (industrial) type of
capitalistic development.

14. Offenbacher, op. cit., p. 58.

15. Unusually good observations on the characteris'tic peculiarities
of the different religions in Germany and France, and the relation of
these differences to other cultural elements in the conflict of nation-
alities in Alsace are to be found in the fine study of W. Wittich,
"Deutsche und französische Kultur im Elsass", Illustrierte Elsässische
Rundschau (1900, also published separately).

16. This, of course, was true only when some possibility of
capitalistic development in the area in question was present.

17. On this point see, for instance, Dupin de St. Andr6, "L'ancienne
^glise röform^e de Tours. Les membres de I'^glise", Bull, de la soc.
de I' hist, du Protest., 4, p. 10. Here again one might, especially from
the Catholic point of view, look upon the desire for emancipation
from monastic or ecclesiastical control as the dominant motive. But
against that view stands not only the judgment of contemporaries
(including Rabelais),* but also, for instance, the qualms of conscience
of the first national synods of the Huguenots (for instance ist Synod,
C. partic. qu. 10 in Aymon, Synod. Nat., p. 10), as to whether a
banker might become an elder of the Church; and in spite of Calvin's
own definite stand, the repeated discussions in the same bodies of
the permissibility of taking interest occasioned by the questions
of ultra-scrupulous members. It is partly explained by the number of
persons having a direct interest in the question, but at the same time
the wish to practise usuraria pravitas without the necessity of con-
fession could not have been alone decisive. The same, see below, is
true of Holland. Let it be said explicitly that the prohibition of
interest in the canon law will play no part in this investigation.

190

Notes

i8. Gothein, Wirtschaftsgeschichte des Schwarzwaldes, I, p. 67.

19. In connection with this see Sonabart's brief comments {Der
moderne Kapitalismus, first edition, p. 380). Later, under the influence
of a study of F. Keller {Unternehmung und Mehrwert, Publications
of the Goerres-Gesellschaft, XII), which, in spite of many good
observations (which in this connection, however, are not new), falls
below the standard of other recent works of Catholic apologetics,
Sombart, in what is in these parts in my opinion by far the weakest
of his larger works {Der Bourgeois), has unfortunately maintained a
completely untenable thesis, to which I shall refer in the proper place.

20. That the- simple fact of a change of residence is among the
most effective means of intensifying labour is thoroughly established
(compare note 13 above). The same Polish girl who at home was not
to be shaken loose from her traditional laziness by any chance of
earning money, however tempting, seems to change her entire nature
and become capable of unlimited accomplishment when she is a
migratory worker in a foreign country. The same is true of migratory
Italian labourers. That this is by no means entirely explicable in
terms of the educative influence of the entrance into a higher cultural
environment, although this naturally plays a part, is shown by the
fact that the same thing happens where the type of occupation, as
in agricultural labour, is exactly the same as at home. Furthermore,
accommodation in labour barracks, etc., may involve a degradation
to a standard of living which would never be tolerated at home. The
simple fact of working in quite different surroundings from those to
which one is accustomed breaks through the tradition and is the
educative force. It is hardly necessary to remark how much of
American economic development is the result of such factors. In
ancient times the similar significance of the Babylonian exile for the
Jews is very striking, and the same is true of the Parsees. But for
the Protestants, as is indicated by the undeniable difference in the
economic characteristics of the Puritan New England colonies from
Catholic Maryland, the Episcopal South, and mixed Rhode Island,
the influence of their religious belief quite evidently plays a part as
an independent factor. Similarly in India, for instance, with the Jains,

21. It is well known in most of its forms to be a more or less
moderated Calvinism or Zwinglianism.

22. In Hamburg, which is almost entirely Lutheran, the only
fortune going back to the seventeenth century is that of a well-known
Reformed family (kindly called to my attention by Professor A. Wahl).

23. It is thus not new that the existence of this relationship is
maintained here. Lavelye, Matthew Arnold, and others already per-
ceived it. What is new, on the contrary, is the quite vmfounded
denial of it. Our task here is to explain the relation.

24. Naturally this does not mean that official Pietism, like other
religious tendencies, did not at a later date, from a patriarchal point

191

The Protestant Ethic and the Spirit of Capitalism

of view, oppose certain progressive features of capitalistic develop-
ment, for instance, the transition from domestic industry to the
factory system. What a religion has sought after as an ideal, and
what the actual result of its influence on the lives of its adherents
has been, must be sharply distinguished, as we shall often see in the
course of our discussion. On the specific adaptation of Pietists to
industrial labour, I have given examples from a Westphalian factory
in my article, "Zur Psychophysik der gewerblichen Arbeit", Archiv
für Sozialwissenschaft und Sozialpolitik, XXVIII, and at various other
times.

CHAPTER II

1 . These passages represent a very brief summary of some aspects
of Weber's methodological views. At about the same time that he
wrote this essay he was engaged in a thorough criticism and re-
valuation of the methods of the Social Sciences, the result of which
was a point of view in many ways different from the prevailing one,
especially outside of Germany. In order thoroughly to understand
the significance of this essay in its wider bearings on Weber's socio-
logical work as a whole it is necessary to know what his methodological
aims were. Most of his writings on this subject have been assembled
since his death (in 1920) in the volume Gesammelte Aufsätze zur
Wissenschaftslehre . A shorter exposition of the main position is con-
tained in the opening chapters of Wirtschaft und Gesellschaft, Grundriss
der Sozialökonomik, III. — Translator's Note.

2. The final passage is from Necessary Hints to Those That Would
Be Rich (written 1736, W^orks, Sparks edition, II, p. 80), the rest
from Advice to a Young Tradesman (written 1748, Sparks edition, II,
pp. 87 ff.). The italics in the text are Franklin's.

3. Der Amerikamüde (Frankfurt, 1855), well knov^n to be an
imaginative paraphrase of Lenau's impressions of America. As a
work of art the book would to-day be somewhat diflBcult to enjoy,
but it is incomparable as a document of the (now long since blurred-
over) differences between the German and the American outlook,
one may even say of the type of spiritual life which, in spite of
everything, has remained common to all Germans, Catholic and
Protestant alike, since the German mysticism of the Middle Ages,
as against the Puritan capitalistic valuation of action.

4. Sombart has used this quotation as a motto for his section
dealing with the genesis of capitalism (Der moderne Kapitalismus,
first edition, I, p. 193. See also p. 390).

5 . Which quite obviously does not mean either that Jacob Fugger
was a morally indifferent or an irreligious man, or that Benjamin
Franklin's ethic is completely covered by the above quotations. It
scarcely required Brentano's quotations (Die Anfänge des modernen
Kapitalismus, pp. 150 flF.) to protect this well-known philanthropist

192

Notes

from the misunderstanding which Brentano seems to attribute to
me. The problem is just the reverse : how could such a philanthropist
come to write these particular sentences (the especially characteristic
form of which Brentano has neglected to reproduce) in the manner of
a moralist ?

6. This is the basis of our difference from Sombart in stating the
problem. Its very considerable practical significance will become clear
later. In anticipation, however, let it be remarked that Sombart has
by no means neglected this ethical aspect of the capitalistic entre-
preneur. But in his view of the problem it appears as a result of
capitalism, whereas for our purposes we must assume the opposite
as an hypothesis. A final position can only be taken up at the end
of the investigation. For Sombart's view see op. cit., pp. 357, 380,
etc. His reasoning here connects with the brilliant analysis given in
Simmel's Philosophie des Geldes (final chapter). Of the polemics
which he has brought forward against me in his Bourgeois I shall come
to speak later. At this point any thorough discussion must be postponed .

7. "I grew convinced that truth, sincerity, and integrity in dealings
between man and man were of the utmost importance to the felicity
of life; and I formed written resolutions, which still remain in my
journal book to practise them ever while I lived. Revelation had
indeed no weight with me as such; but I entertained an opinion that,
though certain actions might not be bad because they were forbidden
by it, or good because it commanded them, yet probably these
actions might be forbidden because they were bad for us, or com-
manded because they were beneficial to us in their own nature, all
the circumstances of things considered." Autobiography (ed. F. W.
Pine, Henry Holt, New York, 1916), p. 112.

8. "I therefore put myself as much as I could out of sight and
started it" — that is the project of a library which he had initiated —
"as a scheme of a number of friends, who had requested me to go
about and propose it to such as they thought lovers of reading. In
this way my affair went on smoothly, and I ever after practised it
on such occasions; and from my frequent successes, can heartily
recommend it. The present little sacrifice of your vanity will after-
wards be amply repaid. If it remains awhile uncertain to whom the
merit belongs, someone more vain than yourself will be encouraged
to claim it, and then even envy will be disposed to do you justice by
plucking those assumed feathers and restoring them to their right
owner." Autobiography, p. 140.

9. Brentano {op. cit., pp. 125, 127, note i) takes this remark as
an occasion to criticize the later discussion of "that rationalization and
discipline" to which worldly asceticism^ has subjected men. That,

^ This seemingly paradoxical term has been the best translation
I could find for Weber's innerweltliche Askese, which means asceticism

The Protestant Ethic and the Spirit of Capitalism

he says, is a rationalization toward an irrational mode of life. He is,
in fact, quite correct. A thing is never irrational in itself, but only
from a particular rational point of view. For the unbeliever every
religious way of life is irrational, for the hedonist every ascetic
standard, no matter whether, measured with respect to its particular
basic values, that opposing asceticism is a rationalization. If this essay
makes any contribution at all, may it be to bring out the complexity
of the only superficially simple concept of the rational.

10. In reply to Brentano 's {Die Anfäfige des modernen Kapitalismus,
pp. 150 ff.) long and somewhat inaccurate apologia for Franklin,
whose ethical qualities I am supposed to have misunderstood, I refer
only to this statement, which should, in my opinion, have been
sufficient to make that apologia superfluous.

11. The two terms profession and calling I have used in trans-
lation of the German Beruf, whichever seemed best to fit the particular
context. Vocation does npt carry the ethical connotation in which
Weber is interested. It is especially to be remembered that profession
in this sense is not contrasted with business, but it refers to a par-
ticular attitude toward one's occupation, no matter what that occupa-
tion may be. This should become abundantly clear from the whole
of Weber's argument. — Translator's Note.

12. I make use of this opportunity to insert a few anti-critical
remarks in advance of the main argument. Sombart (Bourgeois)
makes the untenable statement that this ethic of Franklin is a word-
for-word repetition of some writings of that great and versatile genius
of the Renaissance, Leon Battista Alberti, who besides theoretical
treatises on Mathematics, Sculpture, Painting, Architecture, and
Love (he was personally a woman-hater), wrote a work in four books
on household management (Delia Famiglia). (Unfortunately, I have
not at the time of writing been able to procure the edition of Mancini,
but only the older one of Bonucci.) The passage from Franklin is
printed above word for word. Where then are corresponding passages
to be found in Alberti 's work, especially the maxim "time is money",
which stands at the head, and the exhortations which follow it? The
only passage which, so far as I know, bears the slightest resemblance
to it is found towards the end of the first book of Delia Famiglia
(ed. Bonucci, II, p. 353), where Alberti speaks in very general terms
of money as the nervus rerum of the household, which must hence

practised within the world as contrasted with ausserweltliche Askese,
which withdraws from the world (for instance into a monastery). Their
precise meaning will appear in the course of Weber's discussion. It
is one of the prime points of his essay that asceticism does not need
to flee from the world to be ascetic. I shall consistently employ the
terms worldly and otherworldly to denote the contrast between the
two kinds of asceticism. — Translator's Note.
194

Notes

be handled with special care, just as Cato spoke in De Re Rustica.
To treat Alberti, who was very proud of his descent from one of
the most distinguished cavalier families of Florence (Nobilissimi
Cavalieri,- op. cit., pp. 213, 228, 247, etc.), as a man of mongrel blood
who was filled with envy for the noble families because his illegitimate
birth, which was not in the least socially disqualifying, excluded
him as a bourgeois from association with the nobility, is quite in-
correct. It is true that the recommendation of large enterprises as
alone worthy of a nobile e onesta famiglia and a libero e nobile animo,
and as costing less labour is characteristic of Alberti (p. 209 ; compare
Del governo della Famiglia, IV, p. 55, as well as p. 116 in the edition
for the Pandolfini). Hence the best thing is a putting-out business
for wool and silk. Also an ordered and painstaking regulation of his
household, i.e. the limiting of expenditure to income. This is the
santa masserizia, which is thus primarily a principle of maintenance,
a given standard of life, and not of acquisition (as no one should have
understood better than Sombart). Similarly, in the discussion of the
nature of money, his concern is with the management of consumption
funds (money or /)055e55Jom'), not with that of capital ; all that is clear
from the expression of it which is put into the mouth of Gianozzo.
He recommends, as protection against the uncertainty of for tuna,
early habituation to continuous activity, which is also (pp. 73-4)
alone healthy in the long run, in cose niagnifiche e ample, and avoidance
of laziness, which always endangers the maintenance of one's position
in the world. Hence a careful study of a suitable trade in case of a
change of fortune, but every opera mercenaria is unsuitable {op. cit.,
I, p. 209). His idea of tranquillita dell' animo and his strong tendency
toward the Epicurean Xdds ßiiboa; (vivere a shstesso, p. 262) ; especially
his dislike of any office (p. 258) as a source of unrest, of making
enemies, and of becoming involved in dishonourable dealings; the
ideal of life in a country villa; his nourishment of vanity through
the thought of his ancestors ; and his treatment of the honour of the
family (which on that account should keep its fortune together in the
Florentine manner and not divide it up) as a decisive standard and
ideal — all these things would in the eyes of every Puritan have been
sinful idolatry of the flesh, and in those of Benjamin Franklin the
expression of incomprehensible aristocratic nonsense. Note, further,
the very high opinion of literary things (for the industria is applied
principally to literary and scientific work), which is really most
worthy of a man's efforts. And the expression of the masserizia, in
the sense of "rational conduct of the household" as the means of
living independently of others and avoiding destitution, is in general
put only in the mouth of the illiterate Gianozzo as of equal value.
Thus the origin of this concept, which comes (see below) from monastic
ethics, is traced back to an old priest (p. 249).

Now compare all this with the ethic and manner of life of Benjamin

The Protestant Ethic and the Spirit of Capitalism

Franklin, and especially of his Puritan ancestors; the works of the
Renaissance litterateur addressing himself to the humanistic aris-
tocracy, with Franklin's works addressed to the masses of the lower
middle class (he especially mentions clerks) and with the tracts and
sermons of the Puritans, in order to comprehend the depth of the
difference . The economic rationalism of Alberti , everywhere supported
by references to ancient authors, is most clearly related to the treat-
ment of economic problems in the works of Xenophon (whom he
did not know), of Cato, Varro, and Columella (all of whom he quotes),
except that especially in Cato and Varro, acquisition as such stands
in the foreground in a different way from that to be found in Alberti.
Furthermore, the very occasional comments of Alberti on the use of
t\\e. fattori, their division of labour and discipline, on the unreliability
of the peasants, etc., really sound as if Cato's homely wisdom were
taken from the field of the ancient slave-using household and applied
to that of free labour in domestic industry and the metayer system.
When Sombart (whose reference to the Stoic ethic is quite mis-
leading) sees economic rationalism as "developed to its farthest
conclusions" as early as Cato, he is, with a correct interpretation, not
entirely wrong. It is possible to unite the diligens pater familias of
the Romans with the ideal of the massajo of Alberti under the same
category. It is above all characteristic for Cato that a landed estate
is valued and judged as an object for the investment of consumption
funds. The concept of industria, on the other hand, is differently
coloured on account of Christian influence. And there is just the
difference. In the conception of industria, which comes from monastic
asceticism and which was developed by monastic writers, lies the
seed of an ethos which was fully developed later in the Protestant
worldly asceticism. Hence, as we shall often point out, the relationship
of the two, which, however, is less close to the official Church doctrine
of St. Thomas than to the Florentire and Siennese mendicant-
moralists. In Cato and also in Alberti 's own writings this ethos is
lacking; for both it is a matter of worldly wisdom, not of ethic. In
Franklin there is also a utilitarian strain. But the ethical quality of
the sermon to young business men is impossible to mistake, and
that is the characteristic thing. A lack of care in the handling of
money means to him that one so to speak murders capital embryos,
and hence it is an ethical defect.

An inner relationship of the two (Alberti and Franklin) exists in
fact only in so far as Alberti, whom Sombart calls pious, but who
actually, although he took the sacraments and held a Roman benefice,
like so many humanists, did not himself (except for two quite colourless
passages) in any way make use of religious motives as a justification
of the manner of life he recommended, had not yet, Franklin on the
other hand no longer, related his recommendation of economy to
religious conceptions. Utilitarianism, in Alberti's preference for

196

I

Notes

wool and silk manufacture, also the mercantilist social utilitarianism
"that many people should be given employment" (see Alberti, op.
cit., p. 292), is in this field at least formally the sole justification for
the one as for the other. Alberti 's discussions of this subject form an
excellent example of the sort of economic rationalism which really
existed as a reflection of economic conditions, in the work of authors
interested purely in "the thing for its own sake" everywhere and at
all times ; in the Chinese classicism and in Greece and Rome no less
than in the Renaissance and the age of the-.Enlightenment. There is
no doubt that just as in ancient times with Cato, Varro, and Columella,
also here with Alberti and others of the same type, especially in the
doctrine of industria, a sort of economic rationality is highly developed.
But how can anyone believe that such a literary theory could develop
into a revolutionary force at all comparable to the way in which a
religious belief was able to set the sanctions of salvation and damnation
on the fulfillment of a particular (in this case methodically rationalized)
manner of life? What, as compared with it, a really religiously
oriented rationalization of conduct looks like, may be seen, outside
of the Puritans of all denominations, in the cases of the Jains, the
Jews, certain ascetic sects of the Middle Ages, the Bohemian Brothers
(an offshoot of the Hussite movement), the Skoptsi and Stundists in
Russia, and numerous monastic orders, however much all these may
differ from each other.

The essential point of the difference is (to anticipate) that an ethic
based on religion places certain psychological sanctions (not of an
economic character) on the maintenance of the attitude prescribed
by it, sanctions which, so long as the religious belief remains alive,
are highly effective, and which mere worldly wisdom like that of
Alberti does not have at its disposal. Only in so far as these sanctions
work, and, above all, in the direction in which they work, which is
often very different from the doctrine of the theologians, does such
an ethic gain an independent influence on the conduct of life and
thus on the economic order. This is, to speak frankly, the point of this
whole essay, which I had not expected to find so completely overlooked.

Later on I shall come to speak of the theological moralists of the
late Middle Ages, who were relatively friendly to capital (especially
Anthony of Florence and Bernhard of Siena), and whom Sombart
has also seriously misinterpreted. In any case Alberti did not belong
to that group. Only the concept of industria did he take from monastic
lines of thought, no matter through what intermediate links. Alberti,
Pandolfini, and their kind are representatives of that attitude which,
in spite of all its outward obedience, was inwardly already enianci-
pated from the tradition of the Church. With all its resemblance to
the current Christian ethic, it was to a large extent of the antique
pagan character, which Brentano thinks I have ignored in its
significance for the development of modern economic thought (and

197

The Protestant Ethic and the Spirit of Capitalism

also modern economic policy). That I do not deal with its influence
here is quite true. It would be out of place in a study of the Protestant
ethic and the spirit of capitalism. But, as will appear in a different
connection, far from denying its significance, I have been and am
for good reasons of the opinion that its sphere and direction of
influence were entirely different from those of the Protestant ethic
(of which the spiritual ancestry, of no small practical importance, lies
in the sects and in the ethics of Wyclif and Hus). It was not the mode
of life of the rising bourgeoisie which was influenced by this other
attitude, but the policy of statesmen and princes; and these two
partly, but by no means always, convergent lines of development
should for purposes of analysis be kept perfectly distinct. So far as
Franklin is concerned, his tracts of advice to business men, at present
used for school reading in America, belong in fact to a category of
works which have influenced practical life, far more than Alberti's
large book, which hardly became known outside of learned circles.
But I have expressly denoted him as a man who stood beyond the
direct influence of the Puritan view of life, which had paled con-
siderably in the meantime, just as the whole English enlightenment,
the relations of which to Puritanism have often been set forth.

13. Unfortunately Brentano {op. cit.) has throvvn every kind of
struggle for gain, whether peaceful or warlike, into one pot, and has
then set up as the specific criterion of capitalistic (as contrasted, for
instance, with feudal) profit-seeking, its acquisitiveness of money
(instead of land). Any further differentiation, which alone could lead
to a clear conception, he has not only refused to make, but has made
against the concept of the spirit of (modern) capitalism which we have
formed for our purposes, the (to me) incomprehensible objection that
it already includes in its assumptions what is supposed to be proved.

14. Compare the, in every respect, excellent observations of Som-
bart, Die deutsche Volkswirtschaft im igten Jahrhundert, p. 123. In
general I do not need specially to point out, although the following
studies go back in their most important points of view to much older
work, how much they owe in their development to the mere existence
of Sombart's important works, with their pointed formulations
and this even, perhaps especially, where they take a different road.
Even those who feel themselves continually and decisively disagreeing
with Sombart's views, and who reject many of his theses, have the
duty to do so only after a thorough study of his work.

15. Of course we cannot here enter into the question of where these
limits lie, nor can we evaluate the familiar theory of the relation
between high wages and the high productivity of labour which was
first suggested by Brassey, formulated and maintained theoretically
by Brentano, and both historically and theoretically by Schulze-
Gaevemitz. The discussion was again opened by Hasbach's pene-
trating studies {Schmollers Jahrbuch, 1903, pp. 385-91 and 417 ff.),

198

Notes

and is not yet finally settled. For us it is here sufficient to assent to
the fact which is not, and cannot be, doubted by anyone, that low
wages and high profits, low wages and favourable opportunities for
industrial.development, are at least not simply identical, that generally
speaking training for capitalistic culture, and with it the possibility of
capitalism as an economic system, are not brought about simply through
mechanical financial operations. All examples are purely illustrative,

1 6. It must be remembered that this was written twenty-five
years ago, when the above statement was by no means the common-
place that it is now, even among economists, to say nothing of
business men. — Translator's Note.

17. The establishment even of capitalistic industries has hence
often not been possible without large migratory movements from
areas of older culture. However correct Sombart's remarks on the
difference between the personal skill and trade secrets of the handi-
craftsman and the scientific, objective modern technique may be, at
the time of the rise of capitalism the difference hardly existed. In
fact the, so to speak, ethical qualities of the capitalistic workman (and
to a certain extent also of the entrepreneur) often had a higher scarcity
value than the skill of the craftsman, crystallized in traditions hundreds
of years old. And even present-day industry is not yet by any means
entirely independent in its choice of location of such qualities of
the population, acquired by long-standing tradition and education in
intensive labour. It is congenial to the scientific prejudices of to-day,
when such a dependence is observed to ascribe it to congenital racial
qualities rather than to tradition and education, in my opinion with
very doubtful validity.

18. See my "Zur Psychophysik der gewerblichen Arbeit", Archiv
für Sozialwissenschaft und Sozialpolitik, XXVIII.

19. The foregoing observations might be misunderstood. The
tendency of a well-known type of business man to use the belief
that "religion must be maintained for the people" for his own
purpose, and the earlier not uncommon willingness of large numbers,
especially of the Lutheran clergy, from a general sympathy with
authority, to offer themselves as black police when they wished to
brand the strike as sin and trade unions as furtherers of cupidity, all
these are things with which our present problem has nothing to do.
The factors discussed in the text do not concern occasional but
very common facts, which, as we shall see, continually recur in a
typical manner.

20. Der moderne Kapitalismus, first edition, I, p. 62.

21. Ibid., p. 195.

22. Naturally that of the modern rational enterprise peculiar to
the Occident, not of the sort of capitalism spread over the world for
three thousand years, from China, India, Babylon, Greece, Rome,
Florence, to the present, carried on by usurers, military contractors

199

The Protestant Ethic and the Spirit of Capitalism

traders in offices, tax-farmers, large merchants, and financial mag-
nates. See the Introduction.

23. The assumption is thus by no means justified a priori, that is
all I wish to bring out here, that on the one hand the technique of
the capitalistic enterprise, and on the other the spirit of professional
work which gives to capitalism its expansive energy, must have had
their original roots in the same social classes. Similarly with the social
relationships of religious beliefs. Calvinism was historically one of
the agents of education in the spirit of capitalism. But in the Nether-
lands, the large moneyed interests were, for reasons which will be
discussed later, not predominately adherents of strict Calvinism, but
Arminians. The rising middle and small bourgeoisie, from which
entrepreneurs were principally recruited, were for the most part
here and elsewhere typical representatives both of capitalistic ethics
and of Calvinistic religion. But that fits in very well with our present
thesis: there were at all times large bankers and merchants. But a
rational capitalistic organization of industrial labour was never known
until the transition from the Middle Ages to modern times took place.

24. On this point see the good Zurich dissertation of J. Maliniak

(1913)-

25. The following picture has been put together as an ideal type
from conditions found in different industrial branches and at different
places. For the purposes of illustration which it here serves, it is of
course of no consequence that the process has not in any one of the
examples we have in mind taken place in precisely the manner we
have described.

26. For this reason, among others, it is not by chance that this
first period of incipient (economic) rationalism in German industry
was accompanied by certain other phenomena, for instance the
catastrophic degradation of taste in the style of articles of everyday use .

27. This is not to be understood as a claim that changes in the
supply of the precious metals are of no economic importance.

28. This is only meant to refer to the type of entrepreneur (busmess
man) whom we are making the object of our study, not any empirical
average type. On the concept of the ideal type see my discussion in
the Archiv für Sozialwissenschaft und Sozialpolitik, XIX, No. i.
(Republished since Weber's death in the Gesammelte Aufsätze zur
Wissenschaftslehre . The concept was first thoroughly developed by
Weber himself in these essays, and is likely to be unfamiliar to non-
German reader-;. It is one of the most important aspects of Weber's
methodological work, referred toin a noteabove. — Translator's Note.)

29. This is perhaps the most appropriate place to make a few
remarks concerning the essay of F. Keller, already referred to
(volume 12 of the publications of the Görres-Gesellschaft), and
Sombart's observations {Der Bourgeois) in following it up, so far as
they are relevant in the present context. That an author should

200

Notes

criticize a study in which the canonical prohibition of interest (except
in one incidental remark which has no connection with the general
argument) is not even mentioned, on the assumption that this pro-
hibition of interest, which has a parallel in almost every religious
ethic in the world, is taken to be the decisive criterion of the difference
between the Catholic and Protestant ethics, is almost inconceivable.
One should really only criticize things which one has read, or the argu-
ment of which, if read, one has not already forgotten. The campaign
against usurarta pravitas runs through both the Huguenot and the
Dutch Church history of the sixteenth century; Lombards, i.e.
bankers, were by virtue of that fact alone often excluded from com-
munion fsee Chap. I, note 17). The more liberal attitude of Calvin
(which did not, however, prevent the inclusion of regulations against
usury in the first plan of the ordinances) did not gain a definite
victory until Salmasius. Hence the difference did not lie at this
point ; quite the contrary. But still worse are the author's own argu-
ments on this point. Compared to the works of Funck and other
Catholic scholars (whjch he has not, in my opinion, taken as fully
into consideration as they desers'e), and the investigations of Ende-
mann, which, however obsolete in certain points to-day, are still
fundamental, they make a painful impression of superficiality. To be
sure , Keller has abstained from such excesses as the remarks of Som-
bart (Der Bourgeois, p. 321) that one noticed how the "pious gentle-
men" (Bernard of Siena and Anthony of Florence) "wished to excite
the spirit of enterprise by every possible means", that is, since they,
just like nearly everyone else concerned with the prohibition of
interest, interpreted it in such a way as to exempt what we should
call the productive investment of capital. That Sombart, on the one
hand, places the Romans among the heroic peoples, and on the
other, what is for his work as a whole an impossible contradiction,
considers economic rationalism to have been developed to its final
consequences in Cato (p. 267), may be mentioned by the way as a
symptom that this is a book with a thesis in the worst sense.

He has also completely misrepresented the significance of the
prohibition of interest. This cannot be set forth here in detail. At
one time it was often exaggerated, then strongly underestimated, and
now, in an era which produces Catholic millionaires as well as
Protestant, has been turned upside down for apologetic purposes.
As is well known, it was not, in spite of Biblical authority, abolished
until the last century by order of the Congregatio S. Officii, and then
only temporum ratione habita and indirectly, namely, by forbidding
confessors to worry their charges by questions about usur aria pravitas,
even though no claim to obedience was given up in case it should
be restored. Anyone who has made a thorough study of the extremely
complicated history of the doctrine cannot claim, considering the
endless controversies over, for instance, the justification of the

p 201

The Protestafit Ethic and the Spirit of Capitalism

purchase of bonds, the discounting of notes and various other contracts
(and above all considering the order of the Congregatio S. Officii^
mentioned above, concerning a municipal loan), that the prohibition
of interest was only intended to apply to emergency loans, nor that
it had the intention of preserving capital, or that it was even an aid
to capitalistic enterprise (p. 25). The truth is that the Church came
to reconsider the prohibition of interest comparatively late. At the
time when this happened the forms of purely business investment
were not loans at fixed interest rate, but th&fcenus nauticum, commenda,
societas maris, and the dare ad proficuum de mart (a loan in which the
shares of gain and loss were adjusted according to degrees of risk),
and were, considering the character of the return on loans to pro-
ductive enterprise, necessarily of that sort. These were not (or only
according to a few rigorous canonists) held to fall under the ban,
but when investment at a definite rate of interest and discounting
became possible and customary, the first sort of loans also encountered
very troublesome difficulties from the prohibition, which led to various
drastic measures of the merchant guilds (black lists). But the treat-
ment of usury on the pari of the canonists was generally purely legal
and formal, and was certainly free from any such tendency to protect
capital as Keller ascribes to it. Finally, in so far as any attitude towards
capitalism as such can be ascertained, the decisive factors were: on
the one hand, a traditional, mostly inarticulate hostility towards the
growing power of capital which was impersonal, and hence not
readily amenable to ethical control (as it is still reflected in Luther's
pronouncements about the Fuggers and about the banking business) ;
on the other hand, the necessity of accommodation to practical needs.
But we cannot discuss this, for, as has been said, the prohibition of
usury and its fate can have at most a symptomatic significance for
us, and that only to a limited degree.

The economic ethic of the Scotists, and especially of certain
mendicant theologians of the fourteenth century, above all Bernhard
of Siena and Anthony of Florence, that is monks with a specifically
rational type of asceticism, undoubtedly deserves a separate treatment,
and cannot be disposed of incidentally in our discussion. Otherwise
I should be forced here, in reply to criticism, to anticipate what I
have to say in my discussion of the economic ethics of Catholicism
in its positive relations to capitalism. These authors attempt, and in
that anticipate some of the Jesuits, to present the profit of the
merchant as a reward for his indiistria, and thus ethically to justify it.
(Of course, even Keller cannot claim more.)

The concept and the approval of industria come, of course, in the
last analysis from monastic asceticism, probably also from the idea
of masserizia, which Alberti, as he himself says through the mouth
of Gianozzo, takes over from clerical sources. We shall later speak
more fully of the sense in which the monastic ethics is a forerunner

202

Notes

of the worldly ascetic denominations of Protestantism. In Greece,
among the Cynics, as shown by late-Hellenic tombstone inscriptions,
and, with an entirely different background, in Egypt, there were
suggestions of similar ideas. But what is for us the most important
thing is entirely lacking both here and in the case of Alberti. As we
shall see later, the characteristic Protestant conception of the proof
of one's own salvation, the certitudo salutis in a calling, provided the
psychological sanctions which this religious belief put behind the
industria. But that Catholicism could not supply, because its means
to salvation were different. In effect these authors are concerned
with an ethical doctrine, not with motives to practical action, de-
pendent on the desire for salvation. Furthermore, they are, as is very
easy to see, concerned with concessions to practical necessity, not, as
was worldly asceticism, with deductions from fundamental religious
postulates. (Incidentally, Anthony and Bernhard have long ago been
better dealt with than by Keller.) And even these concessions have
remained an object of controversy down to the present. Nevertheless
the significance of these monastic ethical conceptions as symptoms
is by no means small.

But the real roots of the religious ethics which led the way to the
modern conception of a calling lay in the sects and the heterodox
movements, above all in Wyclif; although Brodnitz (Etiglische Wirt-
schaftsgeschichte), who thinks his influence was so great that Puritanism
found nothing left for it to do, greatly overestimates his significance.
All that cannot be gone into here. For here we can only discuss in-
cidentally whether and to what extent the Christian ethic of the Middle
Ages had in fact already prepared the way for the spirit of capitalism.

30. The words /DjOev äTTeXviQovTeg (Luke vi. 35) and the translation
of the Vulgate, nihil inde sperantes, are thought (according to A.
Merx) to be a corruption of nr]6eva dTTeATTL^ovTsg (or meminem des-
perantes), and thus to command the granting of loans to all brothers,
including the poor, without saying anything at all about interest.
The passage Deo placere vix potest is now thought to be of Arian
origin (which, if true, makes no difference to our contentions).

3 1 . How a compromise with the prohibition of usury was achieved
is shown, for example, in Book I, chapter 65, of the statutes of the
Arte di Calimala (at present I have only the Italian edition in Emiliani-
Guidici, Stor. dei Com. Ital., Ill, p. 246). "Procurino i consoli
con quelli frate, che parrä loro, che perdono si faccia e come fare
si possa il meglio per I'amore di ciascuno, del dono, merito o guider-
dono, ovvero Interesse per I'anno presente e secondo che altra volta
fatto fue." It is thus a way for the guild to secure exemption for its
members on account of their official positions, without defiance of
authority. The suggestions immediately following, as well as the
immediately preceding idea to book all interest and profits as gifts,
are very characteristic of the amoral attitude towards profits on

203

The Protjstant Ethic and the Spirit of Capitalism

capital. To the present stock exchange black list against brokers
who hold back the difference between top price and actual selling
price, often corresponded the outcry against those who pleaded
before the ecclesiastical court with the exceptio usiirarice pravitatis.

CHAPTER III

I. Of the ancient languages only Hebrew has any similar concept.
Most of all in the word '"'?'*f9' It is used for sacerdotal funntions
(Exod. XXXV. 2t; Neh. xi. 22; i Chron. ix. 13; xxiii. 4; xxvi. 30),
for business in the service of the king (especially i Sam. viii. 16;
I Chron. iv. 23; xxix. 6), for the service of a royal official (Esther iii.
9; ix. 3), of a superintendant of labour (2 Kings xii. 12), of a slave
(Gen. xxxix. 1 1), of labour in the fields (i Chron. xxvii. 26), of crafts-
men (Exod. xxxi. 5; XXXV. 21; Kings vii. 14), for traders (Psa. cvii.
23), and for worldly activity of any kind in the passage, Sirach xi. 20,
to be discussed later. The word is derived from the root "^X?, to
send, thus meaning originally a task. That it originated in the ideas
current in Solomon's bureaucratic kingdom of serfs (Fronstaat),
built up as it was according to the Egyptian model, seems evident
from the above references. In meaning, however, as I learn from
A. Merx, this root concept had become lost even in antiquity. The
word came to be used for any sort of labour, and in fact became fully
as colourless as the German Beruf, with which it shared the fate
of being used primarily for mental and not manual functions.
The expression (pn), assignment, task, lesson, which also occurs in
Sirach xi. 20, and is translated in the Septuagint with öiaOi^Krj, is
also derived from the terminology of the servile bureaucratic regime
of the time, as is Ql^""*?"! (Exod. v. 13, cf. Exod. v. 14), where the
Septuagint also uses öiaOi^Krj for task. In Sirach xliii. 10 it is rendered
in the Septuagint with Kpi/na. In Sirach xi. 20 it is evidently used to
signify the fulfillment of God's commandments, being thus related
to our calling. On this passage in Jesus Sirach reference may here
be made to Smend's well-known book on Jesus Sirach, and for the
words öiaOi'jKi], epyov, v6i>og, to his Index zur Weisheit des Jesus
Sirach (Berlin, 1907). As is well known, the Hebrew text of the
Book of. Sirach was lost, but has been rediscovered by Schechter,
and in part supplemented by quotations from the Talmud. Luther
did not possess it, and these two Hebrew concepts could not have
had any influence on his use of language. (See below on Prov. xxii. 29.)

In Greek there is no term corresponding in ethical connotation to
the German or English words at all. Where Luther, quite in the
spirit of the modern usage (see below), translates Jesus Sirach xi. 20
and 21, bleibe in deinem Beruf, the Septuagint has at one point epyov,
at the other, which however seems to be an entirely corrupt passage,
204

Notes

vovoQ (the Hebrew original speaks of the shining of divine help!).
Otherwise in antiquity to Ttpoai^Kox-xo is used in the general sense of
duties. In the works of the Stoics Kafiarog occasionally carries similar
connotations, though its linguistic source is indifferent (called to my
attention by A. Dieterich). All other expressions (such as rd^ic,
etc.) have no ethical implications.

In Latin what we translate as calling, a man's sustained activity
under the division of labour, which is thus (normally) his source of
income and in the long run the economic basis of his existence, is,
aside from the colourless opus, expressed with an ethical content, at
least similar to that of the German word, either by officium (from
opificium, which was originally ethically colourless, but later, as
especially in Seneca de benef, IV, p. i8, came to mean Beruf); or by
munus, derived from the compulsory obligations of the old civic
community; or finally by professio. This last word was also charac-
teristically used in this sense for public obligations, probably being
derived from the old tax declarations of the citizens. But later it
came to be applied in the special modem sense of the liberal pro-
fessions (as in professio bene dicendi), and in this narrower meaning
had a significance in every way similar to the German Beruf, even in
the more spiritual sense of the word, as when Cicero says of someone
"non intelligit quid profiteatur", in the sense of "he does not know
his real profession". The only difference is that it is, of course,
definitely secular without any religious connotation. That is even
more true of ars, which in Imperial times was used for handicraft.
The Vulgate translates the above passages from Jesus Sirach, at one
point with opus, the other (verse 21) with locus, which in this case
means something like social station. The addition of mandaturatn
tuorum comes from the ascetic Jerome, as Brentano quite rightly
remarks, without, however, here or elsewhere, calling attention to the
fact that this was characteristic of precisely the ascetic use of the
term, before the Reformation in an otherworldly, afterwards in a
worldly, sense. It is furthermore uncertain from what text Jerome's
translation was made. An influence of the old liturgical meaning of
'^S**^^ does not seem to be impossible.

In the Romance languages only the Spanish t^ocaaon in the sense
of an inner call to something, from the analogy of a derical oflSce,
has a connotation partly corresponding to that of the German word,
but it is never used to mean calling in the external sense. In the
Romance Bible translations the Spanish vocacion, the Italian vocazione
and chiamatnento, which, otherwise have a meaning partly correspond-
ing to the Lutheran and Calvinistic usage to be discussed presently,
are used only to translate the kXtjok; of the New Testament, the call
of the Gospel to eternal salvation, which in the Vulgate is vocatio.
Strange to say, Brentano, op. cit., maintains that this fact, which I
have myself adduced to defend my view, is evidenced for the existence

205

The Protestant Ethic and the Spirit of Capitalism

of the concept of the calling in the sense which it had later, before
the Reformation. But it is nothing of the kind. /cAj/atg had to be
translated by vocatio. But where and when in the Middle Ages was
it used in our sense? The fact of this translation, and in spite of it,
the lack of any application of the word to worldly callings is what is
decisive. Chiamamento is used in this manner along with vocazione in
the Italian Bible translation of the fifteenth century, which is printed
in the Collezione di opere inedite e rare (Bologna, 1887), while the
modern Italian translations use the latter alone. On the other hand,
the words used in the Romance languages for calling in the external
worldly sense of regular acquisitive activity carry, as appears from
all the dictionaries and from a report of my friend Professor Baist
(of Freiburg), no religious connotation whatever. This is so no
matter whether they are derived from ministerium or officium, which
originally had a certain religious colouring, or from ars, professio, and
implicare (impeigo), from which it has been entirely absent from the
beginning. The passages in Jesus Sirach mentioned above, where
Luther used Beruf, are .translated: in French, v. 20, office; v. 21,
labeur (Calvinistic translation); Spanish, v. 20, obra; v. 21, lugar
(following the Vulgate); recent translations, posto (Protestant). The
Protestants of the Latin countries, since they were minorities, did not
exercise, possibly without even making the attempt, such a creative
influence over their respective languages as Luther did over the still
less highly rationalized (in an academic sense) German official language.

2. On the other hand, the Augsburg Confession only contains the
idea implicitly and but partially developed. Article XVI (ed. by
Kolde, p. 43) teaches: "Meanwhile it (the Gospel) does not dissolve
the ties of civil or domestic economy, but strongly enjoins us to
maintain them as ordinances of God and in such ordinances {ein
jeder nach seinem Beruf) to exercise charity." (Translated by Rev.
W. H. Teale, Leeds, 1842.)

(In Latin it is only "et in talibus ordinationibus exercere cari-
tatem". The English is evidently translated directly from the Latin,
and does not contain the idea which came into the German version. —
Translator's Note.)

The conclusion drawn, that one must obey authority, shows that
here Beruf is thought of, at least primarily, as an objective order in
the sense of the passage in i Cor. vii. 20.

And Article XXVII (Kolde, p. 83) speaks of Beruf (Latin in voca-
tione sua) only in connection with estates ordained by God: clergy,
magistrates, princes, lords, etc. But even this is true only of the
German version of the Konkor dienbuch, while in the German Ed.
princeps the sentence is left out.

Only in Article XXVI (Kolde, p. 81) is the word used in a sense
^yhich at least includes our present meaning: "that he did chastise
his body, not to deserve by that discipline remission of sin, but to
206

Notes

have his body in bondage and apt to spiritual things, and to do his
calling". Translated by Richard Taverner, Philadelphia Publications
Society, 1888. (Latin jMA-fa vocationem suam.)

3. According to the lexicons, kindly confirmed by my colleagues
Professors Braune and Hoops, the word Beruf {Dutch beroep, English
calling, Danish kald, Swedish kallelse) does not occur in any of the
languages which now contain it in its present worldly (secular) sense
before Luther's translation of the Bible. The Middle High German,
Middle Low German, and Middle Dutch words, which sound like it,
all mean the same as Ruf in modern German, especially inclusive, in
late mediaeval times, of the calling (vocation) of a candidate to a
clerical benefice by those with the power of appointment. It is a
special case which is also often mentioned in the dictionaries of the
Scandinavian languages. The word is also occasionally used by
Luther in the same sense. However, even though this special use of
the word may have promoted its change of meaning, the modern
conception of Beruf undoubtedly goes linguistically back to the Bible
translations by Protestants, and any anticipation of it is only to be
found, as we shall see later, inTauler (died 1361). All the languages
which were fundamentally influenced by the Protestant Bible trans-
lations have the word, all of which this was not true (like the Romance
languages) do not, or at least not in its modern meaning.

Luther renders two quite diflferent concepts with Beruf. First the
Pauline KXfjaig in the sense of the call to eternal salvation through
Qod.Thus: i Cor. i. 26; Eph.i. 18; iv. 1,4; 2 Thess.i. 11 ; Heb.iii. i ;
2 Peter i. 10. All these cases concern the purely religious idea of the
call through the Gospel taught by the apostle; the word KAfjaig has
nothing to do with worldly callings in the modern sense. The German
Bibles before Luther use in this case ritffunge (so in all those in the
Heidelberg Library), and sometimes instead of "von Gott geruffet"
say "von Gott gefordert". Secondly, however, he, as we have already
seen, translates the words in Jesus Sirach discussed in the previous
note (in the Septuagint £v reo epyco aov T:a\aiwOi)Ti and Kai e/x/xeve
TO) novo) aov), with "beharre in deinem Beruf" and "bliebe in deinem
Beruf", instead of "bliebe bei deiner Arbeit". The later (authorized)
Catholic translations (for instance that of Fleischütz, Fulda, 1781)
have (as in the New Testament passages) simply followed him.
Luther's translation of the passage in the Book of Sirach is, so far
as I know, the first case in which the German word Beruf appears
in its present purely secular sense.The preceding exhortation, verse 20,
axTJdi ev diaOriKj) aov, he translates "bliebe in Gottes Wort", although
Sirach xiv. i and xliii. 10 show that, corresponding to the Hebrew
pr\, which (according to quotations in the Talmud) Sirach used,
öiadi]Kr] really did mean something similar to our calling, namely
one's fate or assigned task. In its later and present sense the word
Beruf did not exist in the German language, nor, so far as I can learn,

207

The Protestant Ethic and the Spirit of Capitalism

in the works of the older Bible translators or preachers. The German
Bibles before Luther rendered the passage from Sirach with Werk.
Berthold of Regensburg, at the points in his sermons where the
modern would say Beruf, uses the word Arbeit. The usage was thus
the same as in antiquity. The first passage I know, in which not
Beruf but Ruf (as a translation of KXfjaio) is applied to purely worldly
labour, is in the fine sermon of Tauler on Ephesians iv (Works, Basle edi-
tion, f. 117. v), of peasants who misten go : they often fare better "so sie
folgen einfeltiglich irem Ruff denn die geistlichen Menschen, die auf
ihren Ruf nicht Acht haben". The word in this sense did not find
its way into everyday speech. Although Luther's usage at first
vacillates between Ruf and Beruf (see Werke, Erlangen edition,
p. 51.), that he was directly influenced by Tauler is by no means
certain, although the Freiheit eines Christenmenschen is in miany
respects similar to this sermon of Tauler. But in the purely worldly
sense of Tauler, Luther did not use the word Ruf. (This against
Denifle, Luther, p. 163.)

Now evidently Sirach 's advice in the version cf the Septuagint
contains, apart from the general exhortation to trust in God, no
suggestion of a specifically religious valuation of secular labour in a
calling. The term tiovoz, toil, in the corrupt second passage would
be rather the opposite, if it were not corrupted. What Jesus Sirach
says simply corresponds to the exhortation of the psalmist (Psa. xxxvii.
3), "Dwell in the land, and feed on his faithfulness", as also comes
out clearly in the connection with the warning not to let oneself be
blinded with the works of the godless, since it is easy for God to
make a poor man rich. Only the opening exhortation to remain in
the p\\ (verse 20) has a certain resemblance to the KAfjai; of the Gospel,
but here Luther did not use the word Beruf for the Greek Öiadi)Kq.
The connection between Luther's two seemingly quite unrelated
uses of the word Beruf is found in the first letter to the Corinthians
and its translation.

In the usual modern editions, the whole context in which
the passage stands is as follows, i Cor, vii. 17 (English, King
James version [American revision, iqoi]): "(17) Only as the Lord
hath distributed to each man, as God hath called each, so let him
walk. And so ordain I in all churches. (18) Was any man called being
circumcised? let him not become uncircumcised. Hath any man been
called in uncircumcision ? let him not be circumcised. (19) Circum-
cision is nothing and uncircumcision is nothing; but the keeping of
the commandments of God. (20) Let each man abide in that calling
wherein he was called (t'f rn KAr'jaei rj ekA/jOi] ; an undoubted Hebraism,
as Professor Merx tells me). (21) Wast thou called being a bond-
servant? care not for it; nay even if thou canst become free use it
rather. (22) For he that was called in the Lord being a bondservant
is the Lord's freedman; likewise he that was called being free is

208

Notes

Christ's bondservant. (23) Ye were bought with a price; become not
bondservants of men. (24) Brethren, let each man, wherein he was
called, therein abide with God."

In verse 29 follows the remark that time is shortened, followed by
the well-known commandments motivated by eschatological expecta-
tions: (31) to possess women as though one did not have them, to
buy as though one did not have what one had bought, etc. In verse 20
Luther, following the older German translations, even in 1523 in his
exigesis of this chapter, renders KXfjaiQ with Beruf, and interprets it with
Stand. (Erlangen ed., LI, p. 51.)

In fact it is evident that the word KXfjan; at this point, and only
at this, corresponds approximately to the Latin status and the German
Stand (status of marriage, status of a servant, etc.). But of course
not as Brentano, op. cit., p. 137, assumes, in the modern sense of
Beruf. Brentano can hardly have read this passage, or what I have
said about it, very carefully. In a sense at least suggesting it this
word, which is etymologically related to sKKArjaia, an assembly which
has been called, occurs in Greek literature, so far as the lexicons tell,
only once in a passage from Dionysius of Halicarnassus, where
it corresponds to the Latin classis, a word borrowed from the
Greek, meaning that part of the citizenry which has been called to
the colours. Theophylaktos (eleventh-twelfth century) interprets
I Cor. vii. 20: iv oio) ßio) Kai ev olq) Tay/naTi Kai TToAirev/iazi wv
evlarevaev. (My colleague Professor Deissmann called my attention
to this passage.) Now, even in our passage, KXf^aiz does not correspond
to the modern Beruf. But having translated KAfjaig with Beruf in the
eschatologically motivated exhortation, that everyone should remain
in his present status, Luther, when he later came to translate the
Apocrypha, would naturally, on account of the similar content of the
exhortations alone, also use Beruf for novog in the traditionalistic and
anti-chrematistic commandment of Jesus Sirach, that everyone
should remain in the same business. This is what is important and
characteristic. The passage in i Cor. vii. 17 does not, as has been pointed
out, use KAfjaiQ at all in the sense of Beruf, a definite field of activity.
In the meantime (or about the same time), in the Augsburg Con-
fession, the Protestant dogma of the uselessness of the Catholic
attempt to excel worldly morality was established, and in it the
expression "einem jeglichen nach seinem Beruf" was used (see
previous note). In Luther's translation, both this and the positive
valuation of the order in which the individual was placed, as holy,
which was gaining ground just about the beginning of the 1530's,
stand out. It was a result of his more and more sharply defined
belief in special Divine Providence, even in the details of life, and
at the same time of his increasing inclination to accept the existing
order of things in the world as immutably willed by God. Vocatio,
in the traditional Latin, meant the divine call to a life of holiness,

209

The Protestant Ethic and the Spirit of Capitalism

especially in a monastery or as a priest. But now, under the influence
of this dogma, life in a worldly calling came for Luther to have the
same connotation. For he now translated novoc, and epyov in Jesus
Sirach with Beruf, for which, up to that time, there had been only
the (Latin) analogy, coming from the monastic translation. But a
few. years earlier, in Prov. xxii. 29, he had still translated the Hebrew
n3X?9> which was the original of epyov in the Greek text of Jesus
Sirach, and which, like the German Beruf and the Scandinavian
kald, kallelse, originally related to a spiritual call {Beruf), as in other
passages (Gen. xxxix. 11), with Geschäft (Septuagint epyov, Vulgate
opus, English Bibles business, and correspondingly in the Scandinavian
and all the other translations before me).

The word Beruf, in the modern sense which he had finally created,
remained for the time being entirely Lutheran. To the Calvinists
the Apocrypha are entirely uncanonical. It was only as a result of the
development which brought the interest in proof of salvation to the
fore that Luther's concept was taken over, and then strongly empha-
sized by them. But in their first (Romance) translations they had no
such word available, and no power to create one in the usage of a
language already so stereotyped.

As early as the sixteenth century the concept of Beruf in its present
sense became established in secular literature. The Bible translators
before Luther had used the word Berufung for KXfjaig (as for instance
in the Heidelberg versions of 1462-66 and 1485), and the Eck trans-
lation of 1537 says "in dem Ruf, worin er beruft ist". Most of the
later Catholic translators directly follow Luther. In England, the first
of all, Wyclif's translation (1382), used cleping (the Old English
word which was later replaced by the borrowed calling). It is quite
characteristic of the Lollard ethics to use a word which already
corresponded to the later usage of the Reformation. Tyndale's transla-
tion of 1534, on the other hand, interprets the idea in terms of status:
"in the same state wherein he was called", as also does the Geneva
Bible of 1557. Cranmer's oflScial translation of 1539 substituted
calling for state, whil^ the (Catholic) Bible of Rheims (1582), as well
as the Anglican Court Bibles of the Elizabethan era, characteristically
return to vocation, following the Vulgate.

That for England, Cranmer's Bible translation is the source of the
Puritan conception of calling in the sense of Beruf, trade, has already,
quite correctly, been pointed out by Murray. As early as the middle
of the sixteenth century calling is used in that sense. In 1588 unlawful
callings are referred to, and in 1603 greater callings in the sense of
higher occupations, etc. (see Murray). Quite remarkable is Bren-
tano's idea {op. cit., p. 139), that in the Middle Ages vocatio was
not translated with Beruf, and that this concept was not knowTi,
because only a free man could engage in a Beruf, and freemen, in
the middle-class professions, did not exist at that time. Since the
210

4

Notes

whole social structure of the mediaeval crafts, as opposed to those of
antiquity, rested upon free labour, and, above all, almost all the
merchants were freemen, I do not clearly understand this thesis.

4. Compare with the following the instructive discussion in K.
Eger, Die Anschauung Luthers vom Beruf (Giessen, 1900). Perhaps
its only serious fault, which is shared by almost all other theological
writers, is his insufficiently clear analysis of the concept of lex naturce.
On this see E. Troeltsch in his review of Seeberg's Dogmengeschichte,
and now above all in the relevant parts of his Soziallehren der christ-
lichen Kirchen.

5. For when Thomas Aquinas represents the division of men into
estates and occupational groups as the work of divine providence,
by that he means the objective cosmos of society. But that the
individual should take up a particular calling (as we should say;
Thomas, however, says ministerium or officium) is due to causce
naturales. Qucest. quodlibetal, VII, Art. 17c: "Haec autem diversi-
ficatio hominum in diversis officiis contingit primo ex divina Pro-
videntia, quae ita hominum status distribuit . . . secundo etiam ex
causis naturalibus', ex quibus contingit, quod in diversis hominibus
sunt diversae inclinationes ad diversa officia. . . ."

Quite similar is Pascal's view when he says that it is chance which
determines the choice of a calling. See on Pascal, A. Koester, Die
Ethik Pascals (1907). Of the organic systems of religious ethics,
only the most complete of them, the Indian, is different in this
respect. The difference between the Thomistic and the Protestant
ideas of the calling is so evident that we may dismiss it for the present
with the above quotation. This is true even as between the Thomistic
and the later Lutheran ethics, which are very similar in many other
respects, especially in their emphasis on Providence. We shall return
later to a discussion of the Catholic view-point. On Thomas Aquinas,
see Maurenbrecher, Thomas von Aquino's Stellung zum Wirtschafts-
leben seiner Zeit, 1888. Otherwise, where Luther agrees with Thomas
in details, he has probably been influenced rather by the general
doctrines of Scholasticism than by Thomas in particular. For, accord-
ing to Denifle's investigations, he seems really not to have known
Thomas very well. See Denifle, Luther und Luthertum (1903), p. 501,
and on it, Koehler, Ein Wort zu Denifles Luther (1904), p. 25.

6. In Von der Freiheit eines Christenmenschen, (i) the double nature
of man is used for the justification of worldly duties in the sense of
the lex natures (here the natural order of the world). From that it
follows (Erlangen edition, 27, p. 188) that man is inevitably bound to
his body and to the social community. (2) In this situation he will
(p. 196: this is a second justification), if he is a believing Christian,
decide to repay God's act X)f grace, which was done for pure love,
by love of his neighbour. With this very loose connection between
faith and love is combined (3) (p. 190) the old ascetic justification

211

The Protestant Ethic and the Spirit of Capitalism

of labour as a means of securing to the inner man mastery over the
body. (4) Labour is hence, as the reasoning is continued with another
appearance of the idea of lex natures in another sense (here, natural
morality), an original instinct given by God to Adam (before the fall),
which he has obeyed "solely to please God". Finally (5) (pp. 161
and 199), there appears, in connection with Matt. vii. 18 f., the idea
that good work in one's ordinary calling is and must be the result of
the renewal of life, caused by faith, without, however, developing the
most important Calvinistic idea of proof. The powerful emotion which
dominates the work explains the presence of such contradictory ideas.

(^y. "It is not from the benevolence of the butcher, the brewer, or
the baker, that we expect our dinner, but from their regard to their
own interest. We address ourselves, not to their humanity, but to
their self-love; and never talk to them of our own necessities, but of
their advantages" {Wealth of Nations, Book I, chap. ii).
~ 8. "Omnia enim per te operabitur (Deus), mulgebit per te vaccam
et servilissima quaeque opera faciet, ac maxima pariter et minima
ipsi grata erunt" (Exigesis of Genesis, Opera lat. exeget., ed. Elsperger,
VII, p. 213). The idea is found before Luther in Tauler, who holds
the spiritual and the worldly Ruf to be in principle of equal value.
The difference from the Thomistic view is common to the German
mystics and Luther. It may be said that Thomas, principally to
retain the moral value of contemplation, but also from the view-point
of the mendicant friar, is forced to interpret Paul's doctrine that "if
a man will not work he shall not eat" in the sense that labour, which
is of course necessary lege natura, is imposed upon the human race
as a whole, but not on all individuals. The gradation in the value of
forms of labour, from the opera servilia of the peasants upwards, is
connected with the specific character of the mendicant friars, who
were for material reasons bound to the town as a place of domicile.
It was equally foreign to the German mystics and to Luther, the
peasant's son; both of them, while valuing all occupations equally,
looked upon their order of rank as willed by God. For the relevant
passages in Thomas see Maurenbrecher, op. cit., pp. 65 ff.

9. It is astonishirtg that some investigators can maintain that
such a change could have been without effect upon the actions of
men. I confess my inability to understand such a view.

10. "Vanity is so firmly imbedded in the human heart that a camp-
follower, a kitchen -helper, or a porter, boast and seek admirers. ..."
(Faugeres edition, I, p. 208. Compare Koester, o/).aV.,pp. 17, 136 ff.).
On the attitude of Port Royal and the Jansenists to the calling, to
which we shall return, see now the excellent study of Dr. Paul
Honigsheim, Die Staats- und Soziallehren der französischen Jansenisten
im lyten Jahrhundert (Heidelberg Historical Dissertation, 1914. It is
a separately printed part of a more comprehensive work on the Vorge-
schichte der französischen Aufklärung. Compare especially pp. 138 ff.).

212

Notes

II. Apropos of the Fuggers, he thinks that it "cannot be right and
godly for such a great and regal fortune to be piled up in the lifetime
of one man". That is evidently the peasant's mistrust of capital.
Similarly {Grosser Sermon vom Wucher, Erlangen edition, XX, p. 109)
investment in securities he considers ethically undesirable, because
it is "ein neues behendes erfunden Ding" — i.e. because it is to him
economically incomprehensible ; somewhat like margin trading to the
modern clergyman.

It. The difference is well worked out by H. Levy (in his study,
Die Grundlagen des ökonomischen Liberalismus in der Geschichte der
englischen Volkswirtschaft, Jena, 1912). Compare also, for instance,
the petition of the Levellers in Cromwell's army of 1653 against
monopolies and companies, given in Gardiner, Commonwealth, II,
p. 179. Laud's regime, on the other hand, worked for a Christian,
social, economic organization under the joint leadership of Crown
and Church, from which the King hoped for political and fiscal-
monopolistic advantages. It was against just this that the Puritans
were struggling.

13. What I understand by this may be shown by the example of
the proclamation addressed by Cromwell to the Irish in 1650, with
which he opened his war against them and which formed his reply
to the manifestos of the Irish (Catholic) clergy of Clonmacnoise of
December 4 and 13, 1649. The most important sentences follow:
"Englishmen had good inheritances (namely in Ireland) which many
of them purchased with their money . . . they had good leases from
Irishmen for long time to come, great stocks thereupon, houses and
plantations erected at their cost and charge. . . . You broke the
union ... at a time when Ireland was in perfect peace and when,
through the example of English industry, through commerce and
traffic, that which was in the nation's hands was better to them than
if all Ireland had been in their possession. ... Is God, will God
be with you? I am confident He will no't."

This proclamation, which is suggestive of articles in the English
Press at the time of the Boer War, is not characteristic, because the
capitalistic interests of Englishmen are held to be the justification of
the war. That argument could, of course, have just as well been
made use of, for instance, in a quarrel between Venice and Genoa
over their respective spheres of influence in the Orient (which, in
spite of my pointing it out here, Brentano, op. cit., p. 142, strangely
enough holds against me). On the contrary, what is interesting in
the document is that Cromwell, with the deepest personal conviction,
as everyone who knows his character will agree, bases the moral
justification of the subjection of the Irish, in calling God to witness,
on the fact that English capital has taught the Irish to work. (The
proclamation is in Carlyle, and is also reprinted and analysed in
Gardiner, History of the Comynonu'ealth, I, pp. 163 f.)

213

The Protestant Ethic and the Spirit of Capitalism

14. This is not the place to follow the subject farther. Gampare
the authors cited in Note 16 below.

15. Compare the remarks in Jiiiicher's fine book, Die Gleichnisreden
Jesu, II, pp. 108, 636 f.

16. With what follows, compare above all the discussion in Eger,
op. cit. Also Schneckenburger's fine work, which is even to-day not
yet out of date {Vergleichende Darstellung der lutherischeji und refor-
mierten Lehrhegriffe, Grüder, Stuttgart, 1855). Luthardt's Ethik
Luthers, p. 84 of the first edition, the only one to which I have had
access, gives no real picture of the development. Further compare
Seeberg, Dogmengeschichte, II, pp. 262 ff. The article on Beruf in the
Realenzyklopädie für protestantische Theologie und Kirche is valueless.
Instead of a scientific analysis of the conception and its origin, it
contains all sorts of rather sentimental observations on all possible
subjects, such as the position of women, etc. Of the economic
literature on Luther, I refer here only to Schmoller's studies
("Geschichte der Nationalökönomischen Ansichten in Deutschland
während der Reformationszeit", Zeitschrift f. Staatswiss., XVI, i860);
Wiskemann's prize essay (1861); and the study of Frank G. Ward
("Darstellung und Würdigung von Luthers Ansichten vom Staat und
seinen wirtschaftlichen Aufgaben", Conrads Abhandlimgai, XXI,
Jena, 1898). The literature on Luther in commemoration of the
anniversary of the Reformation, part of which is excellent, has, so
far as I can see, made no definite contribution to this particular
problem. On the social ethics of Luther (and the Lutherans) compare,
of course, the relevant parts of Troeltsch's Soziallehren.

17. Analysis of the Seventh Chapter of the First Epistle to the Corin-
thians, 1523, Erlangen edition, LI, p. i. Here Luther still interprets
the idea of the freedom of every calling before God in the sense of
this passage, so as to emphasize (i) that certain human institutions
should be repudiated (monastic vows, the prohibition of mixed
marriages, etc.), (2) that the fulfillment of traditional worldly duties
to one's neighbour (in itself indifferent before God) is turned into a
commandment of brotherly love. In fact this characteristic reasoning
(for instance pp. 55,. 56) fundamentally concerns the question of the
dualism of the lex natura in its relations vi^ith divine justice.

18. Compare the passage from Von Kaufhandlung und Wucher,
which Sombart rightly use? as a motto for his treatment of the
handicraft -spirit (= traditionalism): "Darum musst du dir fürsetzen,
nichts denn deine ziemliche Nahrung zu suchen in solchem Handel,
danach Kost, Mühe, Arbeit und Gefahr rechnen und überschlagen
und also dann die Ware selbst setzen, steigern oder niedern, dass du
solcher Arbeit und Mühe Lohn davon hasst." The principle is for-
mulated in a thoroughly Thomistic spirit.

19. As early as the letter to H. von Sternberg of 1530, in which
he dedicates the Exigesis of the 117th Psalm to him, the estate of the

214

Notes

lower nobility appears to him, in spite of its moral degradation, as
ordained of God (Erlangen edition, XL, pp. 282 ff.)- The decisive
influence of the Münzer disturbances in developing this view-point can
clearly be seen in the letter (p. 282). Compare also Eger, op. cit., p. 150.

20. Also in the analysis of the 1 1 ith Psalm, verses 5 and 6 (Erlangen
edition, XL, pp. 215-16), written in 1530, the starting-point is the
polemics against withdrawal from the world into monasteries. But in this
case the lex naturce (as distinct from positive law made by the Emperor
and the Jurists) is directly identical with divine justice. It is God's
ordinance, and includes especially the division of the people into
classes (p. 215). The equal value of the classes is emphasized, but
only in the sight of God.

21. As taught especially in the works Von Konzilien und Kirchen
(1539) and Kurzer Bekenntnis vom heiligen Sakrament (1545).

22. How far in the background of Luther's thought was the most
important idea of proof of the Christian in his calling and his worldly
conduct, which dominated Calvinism, is shown by this passage from
Von Konzilien und Kirchen (1539, Erlangen edition, XXV, p. 376):
"Besides these seven principal signs there are more superficial ones
by which the holy Christian Church can be known. If we are not
unchaste nor drunkards, proud, insolent, nor extravagant, but chaste,
modest, and temperate." According to Luther these signs are not so
infallible as the others (purity of doctrine, prayer, etc.). "Because
certain of the heathen have borne themselves so and sometimes even
appeared holier than Christians." Calvin's personal position was, as
we shall see, not very different, but that was not true of Puritanism.
In any case, for Luther the Christian serves God only in vocatione,
not per vocationem (Eger, pp. 117 ff.). Of the idea of proof, on the
other hand (more, however, in its Pietistic than its Calvinistic form),
there are at least isolated suggestions in the German mystics (see
for instance in Seeberg, Dogmengeschichte, p. 195, the passage from
Suso, as well as those from Tauler quoted above), even though it
was understood only in a psychological sense.

23. His final position is well expressed in some parts of the
exegesis of Genesis (in the op. lat. exeget. edited by Elsperger).

Vol. IV, p. 109: "Neque haec fuit levis tentatio, intentum esse
suae vocationi et de aliis non esse curiosum. . . . Paucissimi sunt,
qui sua sorte vivant contenti ... (p. iii). Nostrum autem est,
ut vocanti Deo pareamus ... (p. 112). Regula igitur haec servanda
est, ut unusquisque maneat in sua vocatione et suo dono contentus
vivat, de aliis autem non sit curiosus." In effect that is thoroughly
in accordance with Thomas Aquinas 's formulation of traditionalism
(Secunda secundce, Quest. 118, Art. i) : "Unde necesse est, quod bonum
hominis circa ea consistat in quadam mensura, dum scilicet homo . . .
quaerit habere exteriores divitas, prout sunt necessariae ad vitam
ejus secundum suam conditionem. Et ideo in excessu hujus mensurae

The Protestant Ethic and the Spirit of Capitalism

consistit peccatum, dum scilicet aliquis oupra debitum modum vult
eas vel acquirere vel retinere, quod pertinet ad avaritiam." The
sinfulness of the pursuit of acquisition beyond the point set by the
needs of one's station in life is based by Thomas on the lex natura
as revealed by the purpose (ratio) of external goods ; by Luther, on
the other hand, on God's will. On the relation of faith and the calling
in Luther see also Vol. VII, p. 225: "... quando es fidelis, turn
placent Deo etiam physica, carnalia, animalia, officia, sive edas, sive
bibas, sive vigiles, sive dormias, quae mere corporalia et animalia
sunt. Tanta res est fides. . . . Verum est quidem, placere Deo
etiam in impiis sedulitatem et industriam in officio [This activity in
practical life is a virtue lege natura] sed obstat incredulitas et vana
gloria, ne possint opera sua referre ad gloriam Dei [reminiscent of
Calvinistic w^ays of speaking]. . . . Merentur igitur etiam impiorum
bona opera in hac quidem vita praemia sua [as distinct from Augus-
tine's 'vitia specie virtutum palliata'] sed non numerantur, non
coUiguntur in altero."

24. In the Kirchenpostille it runs (Erlangen edition, X, pp. 233,
235-6): "Everyone is called to some calling." He should wait for
this call (on p. 236 it even becomes command) and serve God in it.
God takes pleasure not in man's achievements but in his obedience
in this respect.

25. This explains why, in contrast to what has been said above
about the effects of Pietism on women workers, modern business
men sometimes maintain that strict Lutheran domestic workers
to-day often, for instance in Westphalia, think very largely in tradi-
tional terms. Even without going over to the factory system, and in
spite of the temptation of higher earnings, they resist changes in
methods of work, and in explanation maintain that in the next world
such trifles won't matter anyway. It is evident that the mere fact of
Church membership and belief is not in itself of essential significance
for conduct as a whole. It has been much more concrete religious
values and ideals which have influenced the development of capitalism
in its early stages and, to a lesser extent, still do.

26. Compare Tauler, Basle edition, BL, pp. 161 fif.

27. Compare the peculiarly emotional sermon of Tauler referred
to above, and the following one, 17, 18, verse 20.

28. Since this is the sole purpose of these present remarks on
Luther, I have limited them to a brief preliminary sketch, which
would, of course, be wholly inadequate as an appraisal of Luther's
influence as a whole.

29. One who shared the philosophy of history of the Levellers
would be in the fortunate position of being able to attribute this in
turn to racial differences. They believed themselves to be the defenders
of the Anglo-Saxon birthright, against the descendants of William
the Conqueror and the Normans. It is astonishing enough that it

216

Notes

has not yet occurred to anyone to maintain that the plebeian Round-
heads were round-headed in the anthropometric sense !

30. Especially the English national pride, a result of Magna
Charta and the great wars. The saying, so typical to-day, "She looks
like an English girl" on seeing any pretty foreign girl, is reported as
early as the fifteenth century.

31. These differences have, of course, persisted in England as
well. Especially the Squirearchy has remained the centre of "merrie
old England" down to the present day, and the whole period since
the Reformation may be looked upon as a struggle of the two elements
in English society. In this point I agree with M. J. Bonn's remarks
(in the Frankfurter Zeitung) on the excellent study of v. Schulze-
Gaevernitz on British Imperialism. Compare H. Levy in the Archiv
für Sozialwissenschaft und Sozialpolitik, 46, 3.

32. In spite of this and the following remarks, which in my opinion
are clear enough, and have never been changed, I have again and
again been accused of this.

CHAPTER IV

1. Zwinglianism we do not discuss separately, since after a short
lease of power it rapidly lost in importance. Arminianism, the dog-
matic peculiarity of which consisted in the repudiation of the doctrine
of predestination in its strict form, and which also repudiated worldly
asceticism, was organized as a sect only in Holland (and the United
States). In this chapter it is without interest to us, or has only the
negative interest of having been the religion of the merchant patricians
in Holland (see below). In dogma it resembled the Anglican Church
and most of the Methodist denominations. Its Erastian position (i.e.
upholding the sovereignty of the State even in Church matters) was,
however, common to all the authorities with purely political interests :
the Long Parliament in England, Elizabeth, the Dutch States-General,
and, above all, Oldenbamereldt.

2. On the development of the concept of Puritanism see, above all,
Sanford, Studies and Reflections of the Great Rebellion, p. 65 f. When
we use the expression it is always in the sense which it took on in
the popular speech of the seventeenth century, to mean the ascetically
inclined religious movements in Holland and England without
distinction of Church organization or dogma, thus including Inde-
pendents, Congregationalists, Baptists, Mennonites, and Quakers.

3. This has been badly misunderstood in the discussion of these
questions. Especially Sombart, but also Brentano, continually cite the
ethical writers (mostly those of whom they have heard through me)
as codifications of rules of conduct without ever asking which of
them were supported by psychologically effective religious sanctions.

Q 2^7

The Protestant Ethic and the Spirit of Capitalism

4. I hardly need to emphasize that this sketch, so far as it is con-
cerned solely with the field of dogma, falls back everywhere on the
formulations of the literature of the history of the Church and of
doctrine. It makes no claim whatever to originality. Naturally I have
attempted, so far as possible, to acquaint myself with the sources for
the history of the Reformation. But to ignore in the process the
intensive and acute theological research of many decades, instead of,
as is quite indispensable, allowing oneself to be led from it to the
sources, would have been presumption indeed. I must hope that the
necessary brevity of the sketch has not led to incorrect formulations,
and that I have at least avoided important misunderstandings of fact.
The discussion contributes something new. for those familiar with
theological literature only in the sense that the whole is, of course,
considered from the point of view of our problem. For that reason
many of the most important points, for instance the rational character
of this asceticism and its significance for modern life, have naturally
not been emphasized by theological writers.

This aspect, and in general the sociological side, has, since the
appearance of this study, been systematically studied in the work of
E. Troeltsch, mentioned above, whose Gerhard und Mclancthon, as
well as numerous reviews in the Gott. Gel. Anz., contained several
preliminary studies to his great work. For reasons of space the
references have not included everything which has been used, but
for the most part only those works which that part of the text follows,
or which are directly relevant to it. These are often older authors,
where our problems have seemed closer to them. The insufficient
pecuniary resources of German libraries have meant that in the
provinces the most important source materials or studies could only
be had from Berlin or other large libraries on loan for very short
periods. This is the case with Voet, Baxter, Tyermans, Wesley, all
the Methodist, Baptist, and Quaker authors, and many others of the
earlier writers not contained in the Corpus Reformatorum . For any
thorough study the use of English and American libraries is almost
indispensable. But for the following sketch it was necessary (and
possible) to be content with material available in Germany. In
America recently the characteristic tendency to deny their own
sectarian origins has led many university libraries to provide little
or nothing new of that sort of literature. It is an aspect of the general
tendency to the secularization of American life which will in a short
time have dissolved the traditional national character and changed
the significance of many of the fundamental institutions of the
country completely and finally. It is now necessary to fall back on
the small orthodox sectarian colleges.

5. On Calvin and Calvinism, besides the fundamental work of
Kampschulte, the best source of information is the discussion of
Erick Marcks (in his Coligny). Campbell, The Puritans in Holland,

21S

Notes

England, and America (2 vols.), is not always critical and unprejudiced.
A strongly partisan anti-Calvinistic study is Pierson, Studien over
Johan Calvijn. For the development in Holland compare, besides
Motley, the Dutch classics, especially Groen van Prinsterer, Geschie-
denis v.h. Vaderland; La Hollande et Vinfluence de Calvin (1864); Le
parti anti-rdvoliitionnaire et confessionnel dans I'dglise des P.B. (i860)
(for modern Holland); further, above all, Fruin's Tien jar en mit den
tachtigjarigen oorlog, and especially Naber, Calvinist of Libertijnsch.
Also W. J. F. Nuyens, Gesch. der kerkel. an pol. geschillen in de Rep.
d. Ver. Prov. (Amsterdam, 1886); A. Köhler, Die Niederl. ref. Kirche
(Erlangen, 1856), for the nineteenth century. For France, besides
Polenz, now Baird, Rise of the Huguenots. For England, besides
Carlyle, Macaulay, Masson, and, last but not least, Ranke, above all,
now the various works of Gardiner and Firth. Further, Taylor,
A Retrospect of the Religious Life in England (1854), and the excellent
book of Weingarten, Die englischen Revolutionskirchen. Then the
article on the English Moralists by E. Troeltsch in the Realetizy-
klopädie für protestantische Theologie und Kirche, third edition, and
of course his Soziallehren. Also E. Bernstein's excellent essay in
the Geschichte des Sozialismus (Stuttgart, 1895, I, p. 50 ff.). The best
bibliography (over seven thousand titles) is in Dexter, Congregational-
ism of the Last Three Hundred Years (principally, though not exclu-
sively, questions of Church organization). The book is very much
better than Price {History of Nonconformism) , Skeats, and others.
For Scotland see, among others. Sack, Die Kirche von Schottland
(1844), and the literature on John Knox. For the American colonies
the outstanding work is Doyle, The English in America. Further,
Daniel Wait Howe, The Puritan Republic; J. Brown, The Pilgrim
Fathers of New England and their Puritan Successors (third edition,
Revell). Further references will be given later.

For the differences of doctrine the following presentation is
especially indebted to Schneckenburger's lectures cited above. Ritschl's
fundamental work. Die christliche Lehre von der Rechtfertigung und
Versöhnung (references to Vol. HI of third edition), in its mixture of
historical method with judgments of value, shows the marked pecu-
liarities of the author, who with all his fine acuteness of logic does
not always give the reader the certainty of objectivity. Where, for
instance, he differs from Schneckenburger's interpretation I am often
doubtful of his correctness, however little I presume to have an
opinion of my own. Further, what he selects out of the great variety
of religious ideas and feelings as the Lutheran doctrine often seems
to be determined by his own preconceptions. It is what Ritschl
himself conceives to be of permanent value in Lutheranism. It is
Lutheranism as Ritschl would have had it, not always as it was.
That the works of Karl Müller, Seeberg, and others have ever>'^vhere
been made use of it is unnecessary to mention particularly. If in

219

The Protestant Ethic and the Spirit of Capitalism

the following I have condemned the reader as well as myself to the
penitence of a malignant growth of footnotes, it has been done in
order to give especially the non-theological reader an opportunity to
check up the validity of this sketch by the suggestion of related lines
of thought.

6. In the following discussion we are not primarily interested in
the origin, antecedents, or history of these ascetic movements, but
take their doctrines as given in a state of full development.

7. For the following discussion I may here say definitely that we
are not studying the personal views of Calvin, but Calvinism, and
that in the form to which it had evolved by the end of the sixteenth
and in the seventeenth centuries in the great areas where it had a
decisive influence and which were at the same time the home of
capitalistic culture. For the present, Germany is neglected entirely,
since pure Calvinism never dominated large areas here. Reformed is,
of course, by no means identical with Calvinistic.

8. Even the Declaration agreed upon between the University of
Cambridge and the Archbishop of Canterbury on the 17th Article
of the Anglican Confession, the so-called Lambeth Article of 1595,
which (contrary to the official version) expressly held that there was
also predestination to eternal death, was not ratified by the Queen.
The Radicals (as in Hanserd Ktiolly's Cotifesston) laid special emphasis
on the express predestination to death (not only the admission of
damnation, as the milder doctrine would have it).

9. Westminster Confession, fifth official edition, London, 1717.
Compare the Savoy and the (American) Hanserd KnoUy's Declarations.
On predestination and the Huguenots see, among others, Polenz,

I. pp. 545 ff-

10. On Milton's theology see the essay of Eibach in the Theol.
Studieti und Kritiken, 1879. Macaulay's essay on it, on the occasion
of Sumner's translation of the Doctrina Christiana, rediscovered in
1823 (Tauchnitz edition, 185, pp. i ff.), is superficial. For more
detail see the somewhat too schematic six-volume English work of
Masson, and the German biography of Milton by Stern which rests
upon it. Milton early began to grow away from the doctrine of pre-
destination in the form of the double decree, and reached a wholly
free Christianity in his old age. In his freedom from the tendencies
of his own time he may in a certain sense be compared to Sebastian
Franck. Only Milton was a practical and positive person, Franck
predominantly critical. Milton is a Puritan only in the broader sense
of the rational organization of his life in the world in accordance
with the divine will, which formed the permanent inheritance of later
times from Calvinism. Franck could be called a Puritan in much the
same sense. Both, as isolated figures, must remain outside our
investigation.

11. "Hie est fides summus gradus; credere Deum esse clementum,
220

Notes

qui tarn paucos salvat, justum, qui sua voluntate nos damnabiles
facit", is the. text of the famous passage in De servo arbitrio.

12. The truth is that both Luther and Calvin believed funda-
mentally in a double God (see Ritschl's remarks in Geschichte des
Pietismus and Kostlin, Gott in Realenzyklopädie für protestantische
Theologie und Kirche, third edition), the gracious and kindly Father
of the New Testament, who dominates the first books of the Institutio
Christiana, and behind him the Deus absconditus as an arbitrary
despot. For Luther, the God of the New Testament kept the upper
hand, because he avoided reflection on metaphysical questions as
useless and dangerous, while for Calvin the idea of a transcendental
God won out. In the popular development of Calvinism, it is true,
this idea could not be maintained, but what took his place was not the
Heavenly Father of the New Testament but the Jehovah of the Old.

13. Compare on the following: Scheibe, Calvins Prädestinations-
lehre (Halle, 1897). On Calvinistic theology in general, Heppe,
Dogmatik der evangelisch-reformierten Kirche (Elberfeld, 1861).

14. Corpus Reformator urn, LXXVH, pp. 186 ff.

15. The preceding exposition of the Calvinistic doctrine can be
found in much the same form as here given, for instance in Hoorn-
beek's Theologia practica (Utrecht, 1663), L. H, c. i ; de predesti-
natione, the section stands characteristically directly under the
heading De Deo. The Biblical foundation for it is principally the
first chapter of the Epistle to the Ephesians. It is unnecessary for
us here to analyse the various inconsistent attempts to combine with
the predestination and providence of God the responsibility and free
will of the individual. They began as early as in Augustine's first
attempt to develop the doctrine.

16. "The deepest community (with God) is found not in institu-
tions or corporations or churches, but in the secrets of a solitary
heart", as Dowden puts the essential point in his fine book Puritan and
Anglican(p. 234). This deep spiritual loneliness of the individual applied
as well to the Jansenists of Port Royal, who were also predestinationists.

17. "Contra qui huiusmodi ccetum [namely a Church which main-
tains a pure doctrine, sacraments, and Church discipline] contemnunt
. . . salutis suae certi esse non possunt; et qui in illo contemtu
perseverat electus non est." Olevian, De subst. feed., p. 222.

18. "It is said that God sent His Son to save the human race,
but that was not His purpose. He only wished to help a few out of
their degradation — and I say unto you that God died only for the
elect" (sermon held in 1609 at Broek, near Rogge, Wtenbogaert,
II, p. 9. Compare Nuyens, op. cit., II, p. 232). The explanation of
the role of Christ is also confused in Hanserd Knolly's Confession.
It is everywhere assumed that God did not need His instrumentality.

19. Entzauberung der Welt. On this process see the other essays
in my Wirtschaftsethik der Weltreligionen. The peculiar position of

221

The Protestant Ethic and the Spirit of Capitalism

the old Hebrew ethic, as compared with the closely related ethics of
Egypt and Babylon, and its development after the time of the prophets,
rested, as is shown there, entirely on this fundamental fact, the
rejection of sacramental magic as a road to salvation. (This process
is for Weber one of the most important aspects of the broader process
of rationalization, in which he sums up his philosophy of history.
See various parts of Wirtschaft und Gesellschaft and H. Grab, Der
Begriff des Rationalen hei Max Weber. — Translator's Note.)

20. Similarly the most consistent doctrine held that baptism was
required by positive ordinance, but was not necessary to salvation.
For that reason the strictly Puritan Scotch and English Independents
were able to maintain the principle that children of obvious reprobates
should not be baptized (for instance, children of drunkards). An
adult who desired to be baptized, but was not yet ripe for the com-
munion, the Synod of Edam of 1586 (Art. 32, i) recommended
should be baptized only if his conduct were blameless, and he should
have placed his desires sonder superstitie.

21. This negative attitude toward all sensuous culture is, as Dow-
den, op. cit., shows, a very fundamental element of Puritanism.

22. The expression individualism includes the most heterogeneous
things imaginable. What is here understood by it will, I hope, be
clear from the following discussion. In another sense of the word,
Lutheranism has been called individualistic, because it does not
attempt any ascetic regulation of life. In yet another quite different
sense the word is used, for example, by Dietrich Schäfer when in
his study, "Zvir Beurteilung des Wormser Konkordats", Abh. d.
Berl. Akad. (1905), he calls the Middle Ages the era of pronounced
individuality because, for the events relevant for the historian,
irrational factors then had a significance which they do not possess
to-day. He is right, but so perhaps are also those whom he attacks
in his remarks, for they mean something quite different, when they
speak of individuality and individualism. Jacob Burchhardt's brilliant
ideas are to-day at least partly out of date, and a thorough analysis
of these concepts in historical terms would at the present time be highly
valuable to science. Quite the opposite is, of course, true when the play
impulse causes certain historians to define the concept in such a way
as to enable them to use it as a label for any epoch of history they please.

23. And in a similar, though naturally less sharp, contrast to the
later Catholic doctrine. The deep pessimism of Pascal, which also
rests on the doctrine of predestination, is, on the other hand, of
Jansenist origin, and the resulting individualism of renunciation by
no means agrees with the official Catholic position. See the study by
Honigsheim on the French Jansenists, referred to in Chap. III. note 10.

24. The same holds for the Jansenists.

25. Bailey, Praxis pietatis (German edition, Leipzig, 1724), p. 187.
Also P. J. Spener in his Theologische Bedenken (according to third

222

Notes

edition, Halle, 1712) adopts a similar standpoint. A friend seldom
gives advice for the glory of God, but generally for mundane (though
not necessarily egotistical) reasons. "He [the knowing man] is blind
in no man's cause, but best sighted in his own. He confines himself
to the circle of his own affairs and thrusts not his fingers into needless
fires. He sees the falseness of it [the world] and therefore learns to
trust himself ever, others so far as not to be damaged by their dis-
appointment", is the philosophy of Thomas Adams {Works of the
Puritan Divines, p. 11). Bailey {Praxis pietatis, p. 176) further recom-
mends every morning before going out among people to imagine
oneself going into a wild forest full of dangers, and to pray God
for the "cloak of foresight and righteousness". This feeling is charac-
teristic of all the ascetic denominations without exception, and in
the case of many Pietists led directly to a sort of hermit's life within
the world. Even Spangenberg in the (Moravian) Idea fides fratum,
p. 382, calls attention with emphasis to Jer. xvii. 5: "Cursed is the
man who trusteth in man." To grasp the peculiar misanthropy of
this attitude, note also Hoombeek's remarks {Theologia practica, I,
p. 882) on the duty to love one's enemy: "Denique hoc magis nos
ulcisimur, quo proximum, inultum nobis, tradimus ultori Deo — Quo
quis plus se ulscitur, eo minus id pro ipso agit Deus." It is the same
transfer of vengeance that is found in the parts of the Old Testament
written after the exile ; a subtle intensification and refinement of the
spirit of revenge compared to the older "eye for an eye". On brotherly
love, see below, note 34.

26. Of course the confessional did not have only that effect. The
explanations, for instance, of Muthmann, Z. f. Rel. Psych., I, Heft 2,
p. 65, are too simple for such a highly complex psychological problem
as the confessional.

27. This is a fact which is of especial importance for the inter-
pretation of the psychological basis of Calvinistic social organizations.
They all rest on spiritually individualistic, rational motives. The
individual never enters emotionally into them. The glory of God and
one's own salvation always remain above the threshold of conscious-
ness. This accounts for certain characteristic features of the social
organization of peoples with a Puritan past even to-day.

28. The fundamentally anti-authoritarian tendency of the doctrine,
which at bottom undermined every responsibility for ethical conduct
or spiritual salvation on the part of Church or State as useless, led
again and again to its proscription, as, for instance, by the States-
General of the Netherlands. The result was always the formation of
conventicles (as after 16 14).

29. On Bunyan compare the biography of Froude in the English
Men of Letters series, also Macaulay's superficial sketch {Miscel.
Works, n, p. 227). Bunyan was indifferent to the denominational dis-
tinctions within Calvinism, but was himself a strict Calvinistic Baptist.

223

The Protestant Ethic and the Spirit of Capitalism

30. It is tempting to refer to the undoubted importance for the
social character of Reformed Christianity of the necessity for salva-
tion, following from the Calvinistic idea of -'incorporation into the
body of Christ" (Calvin, Instit. Christ, III, 11, 10), of reception into a
community conforming to the divine prescriptions. From our point
of view, however, the centre of the problem is somewhat different.
That doctrinal tenet could have been developed in a Church of
purely institutional character {anstaltsmässig), and, as is well known,
this did happen. But in itself it did not possess the psychological
force to awaken the initiative to form such communities nor to imbue
them with the power which Calvinism possessed. Its tendency to
form a community worked itself out very largely in the world outside
the Church organizations ordained by God. Here the belief that the
Christian proved (see below) his state of grace by action in majorem
Dei gloriam was decisive; and the sharp condemnation of idolatry of
the flesh and of all dependence on personal relations to other men
was bound unperceived to direct this energy into the field of objective
(impersonal) activity. The Christian who took the proof of his state
of grace seriously acted in the service of God's ends, and these could
only be impersonal. Every purely emotional, that is not rationally
motivated, personal relation of man to man easily fell in the Puritan,
as in every ascetic ethic, under the suspicion of idolatry of the flesh.
In addition to what has already been said, this is clearly enough shown
for the case of friendship by the following warning: "It is an
irrational act and not fit for a rational creature to love any one farther
than reason will allow us. ... It very often taketh up men's minds
so as to hinder their love of God" (Baxter, Christian Directory, IV,
p. 253). We shall meet such arguments again and again.

The Calvinist was fascinated by the idea that God in creating the
world, including the order of society, must have willed things to be
objectively purposeful as a means of adding to His glory ; not the
flesh for its own sake, but the organization of the things of the flesh
under His will. The active energies of the elect, liberated by the
doctrine of predestination, thus flowed into the struggle to rationalize
the world. Especially the idea that the public welfare, or as Baxter
(Christian Directory, IV, p. 262) puts it, quite in the sense of later
liberal rationalism, "The good of the many" (with a somewhat
forced reference to Rom. ix. 3), was to be preferred to any personal
or private good of the individual, followed, although not in itself
new, for Puritanism from tne repudiation of idolatry of the flesh.
The traditional American objection to performing personal service
is probably connected, besides the other important causes resulting
from democratic feelings, at least indirectly with that tradition.
Similarly, the relative immunity of formerly Puritan peoples to
Caesarism, and, in general, the subjectively free attitude of the English
to their great statesmen as compared with liftany things which we

224

Notes

have experienced since 1878 in Germany positively and negatively.
On the one hand, there is a greater w^illingness to give the great man
his due, but, on the other, a repudiation of all hysterical idolization
of him and of the naive idea that political obedience could be due
anyone from thankfulness. On the sinfulness of the belief in authority,
which is only permissible in the form of an impersonal authority, the
Scriptures, as well as of an excessive devotion to even the most holy
and virtuous of men, since that might interfere with obedience to
God, see Baxter, Christian Directory (second edition, 1678), I, p. 56.
The political consequences of the renunciation of idolatry of the
flesh and the principle which was first applied only to the Church
but later to life in general, that God alone should rule, do not belong
in this investigation.

31. Of the relation between dogmatic and practical psychological
consequence we shall often have to speak. That the two are not
identical it is hardly necessary to remark.

'^2. Social, used of course without any of the implications attached
to the modem sense of the word, meaning simply activity within the
Church, politics, or any other social organization.

33. "Good works performed for any other purpose than the glory
of God are sinful" {Hanserd Knolly's Confession, chap. xvi).

34. What such an impersonality of brotherly love, resulting from
the orientation of life solely to God's will, means in the field of
religious group life itself may be well illustrated by the attitude of
the China Inland Mission and the International Missionaries Alliance
(see Wameck, Gesch. d. prot. Missionären, pp. 99, 1 1 1). At tremendous
expense an army of missionaries was fitted out, -for instance one
thousand for China alone, in order by itinerant preaching to ofifer
the Gospel to all the heathen in a strictly literal sense, since Christ
had commanded it and made His second coming dependent on it.
Whether these heathen should be converted to Christianity and
thus attain salvation, even whether they could understand the
language in which the missionary preached, was a matter of small
importance and could be left to God, Who alone could control such
things. According to Hudson Taylor (see Wameck, op. cit.), China
has about fifty million families; one thousand missionaries could
each reach fifty families per day (!) or the Gospel could be presented
to all the Chinese in less than three years. It is precisely the same
manner in which, for instance, Calvinism carried out its Church
discipline. The end was not the salvation of those subject to it,
which was the affair of God alone (in practice their own) and could
not be in any way influenced by the means at the disposal of the
Church, but simply the increase of God's glory. Calvinism as such
is not responsible for those feats of missionary zeal, since they rest
on an interdenominational basis. Calvin himself denied the duty of
sending missions to the heathen since a further expansion of the

225

The Protestafit Ethic afid the Spirit of Capitalism

Church is wiiits Dei opus. Nevertheless, they obviously originate
in the ideas, running through the whole Puritan ethic, according to
which the duty to love one's neighbour is satisfied by fulfilling God's
commandments to increase His glory. The neighbour thereby receives
all that is due him, and anything further is God's affair. Humanity
in relation to one's neighbour has, so to speak, died out. That is
indicated by the most various circumstances.

Thus, to mention a remnant of that atmosphere, in the field of
charity of the Reformed Church, which in certain respects is justly
famous, the Amsterdam orphans, with (in the twentieth century!)
their coats and trousers divided vertically into a black and a red, or
a red and a green half, a sort of fool's costume, and brought in
parade formation to church, formed, for the feelings of the past, a
highly uplifting spectacle. It served the glory of God precisely to
the extent that all personal and human feelings were necessarily
insulted by it. And so, as we shall see later, even in all the details
of private life. Naturally all that signified only a tendency and we
shall later ourselves have to make certain qualifications. But as one
very important tendency of this ascetic faith, it was necessary to
point it out here.

35. In all these respects the ethic of Port Royal, although pre-
destinationist, takes quite a different standpoint on account of its
mystical and otherworldly orientation, which is in so far Catholic
(see Honigsheim, op. cit.).

36. Hundeshagen (Beitr. z. Kirchenverfassungsgesch. u. Kirchen-
politik, 1864, I, p. 37) takes the view, since often repeated, that
predestination was a dogma of the theologians, not a popular doctrine.
But that is only true if the people is identified with the mass of the
uneducated lower classes. Even then it has only limited validity.
Köhler {op. cit) found that in the forties of the nineteenth century
just those masses (meaning the petite bourgeoisie of Holland) were
thoroughly imbued with predestination. Anyone who denied the
double decree was to them a heretic and a condemned soul. He
himself was asked about the time of his rebirth (in the sense of pre-
destination). Da Costa and the separation of de Kock were greatly
influenced by it. Not only Croniwell, in whose case Zeller {Das
Theologische System Zwinglis, p. 17) has already shown the effects of
the dogma most effectively, but also his army knew very well what
it was about. Moreover, the canons of the synods of Dordrecht and
Westminster- were national questions of the first importance. Crom-
well's tryers and ejectors admitted only believers in predestination,
and Baxter {Life, I, p. 72), although he was otherwise its opponent,
considers its effect on the quality of the clergy to be important. That
the Reformed Pietists, the- members of the English and Dutch con-
venticles, should not have imderstood the doctrine is quite impossible.
It was precisely what drove them together to seek the certitudo salutis.

226

Notes

What significance the doctrine of predestination does or does not
have when it remains a dogma of the theologians is shown by perfectly
orthodox Catholicism, to which it was by no means strange as an
esoteric doctrine under various forms. What is important is that the
idea of the individual's obligation to consider himself of the elect
and prove it to himself was always denied. Compare for the Catholic
doctrine, for instance, A. Van Wyck, Tract, de prcedestinatione
(Cologne, 1708). To what extent Pascal's doctrine of predestination
was correct, we cannot inquire here.

Hundeshagen, who dislikes the doctrine, evidently gets his im-
pressions primarily from German sources. His antipathy is based on
the purely deductive opinion that it necessarily leads to moral
fatalism and antinomianism. This opinion has already been refuted
by Zeller, op. cit. That such a result was possible cannot, of course,
be denied. Both Melanchthon and Wesley speak of it. But it is charac-
teristic that in both cases it is combined with an emotional religion
of faith. For them, lacking the rational idea of proof, this consequence
was in fact not unnatural.

The same consequences appeared in Islam. But why? Because the
Mohammedan idea was that of predetermination, not predestination,
and was applied to fate in this world, not in the next. In consequence
the most important thing, the proof of the believer in predestination,
played no part in Islam. Thus only the fearlessness of the warrior
(as in the case of moira) could result, but there were no consequences
for rationalization of life; there was no religious sanction for them.
See the (Heidelberg) theological dissertation of F. Ullrich, Die
Vorherhestimmungslehre itn Islam u. Christenheit, 1900. The modifi-
cations of the doctrine which came in practice, for instance Baxter,
did not disturb it in essence so long as the idea that the election of
God, and its proof, fell upon the concrete individual, was not shaken.
Finally, and above all, all the great men of Puritanism (in the broadest
sense) took their departure from this doctrine, whose terrible serious-
ness deeply influenced their youthful development. Milton like, in
declining order it is true, Baxter, and, still later, the free-thinker
Franklin. Their later emancipation from its strict interpretation is
directly parallel to the development which the religious movement
as a whole underwent in the same direction. And all the great religious
revivals, at least in Holland, and most of those in England, took it
ua^again.

37. As is true in such a striking way of the basic atmosphere of
Bunyan's Pilgrim's Progress.

38. This question meant less to the later Lutheran, even apart
from the doctrine of predestination, than to the Calvinist. Not because
he was less interested in the salvation of his soul, but because, in the
form which the Lutheran Church had taken, its character as an
institution for salvation (Heilsanstalt) came to the fore. The individual

227

The Protestant Ethic and the Spirit of Capitalism

thus felt himself to be an object of its care and dependent on it.
The problem was first raised within Lutheranism characteristically
enough through the Pietist movement. The question of certitudo
salutis itself has, however, for every non -sacramental religion of
salvation, whether Buddhism, Jainism, or anything else, been abso-
lutely fundamental; that must not be forgotten. It has been the
origin of all psychological drives of a purely religious character.

39. Thus expressly in the letter to Bucer, Corp. Ref. 29, p. 883 f.
Compare with that again Scheibe, op. cit., p. 30.

40. The Westminster Confession (XVIII, p. 2) also assures the
elect of indubitable certainty of grace, although with all our activity
we remain useless servants and the struggle against evil lasts one's
whole life long. But even the chosen one often has to struggle long
and hard to attain the certitudo which the consciousness of having
done his duty gives him and of which a true believer will never
entirely be deprived.

41. The orthodox Calvinistic doctrine referred to faith and the
consciousness of community with God in the sacraments, and men-
tioned the "other fruits of the Spirit" only incidentally. See the
passages in Heppe, op. cit., p. 425. Calvin himself most emphatically
denied that works were indications of favour before God, although
he, like the Lutherans, considered them the fruits of belief {Instit.
Christ, 111,2, 37, 38). The actual evolution to the proof of faith through
works, which is characteristic of asceticism, is parallel to a gradual
modification of the doctrines of Calvin. As with Luther, the true
Church was first marked off primarily by purity of doctrine and
sacraments, but later the disciplina came to be placed on an equal
footing with the other two. This evolution may be followed in the
passages given by Heppe, op. cit., pp. 194-5, as well as in the manner
in which Church members were acquired in the Netherlands by the
end of the sixteenth century (express subjection by agreement to
Church discipline as the principal prerequisite).

42. For example, Olevian, De substantia fcederis gratuiti inter
Deum et electos (1585), p. 257; Heidegger, Corpus Theologice, XXIV,
p. 87; and other passages in Heppe, Dogmatik der ev. ref. Kirche
(1861), p. 425-

43. On this point see the remarks of Schneckenburger, op. cit., p. 48.

44. Thus, for example, in Baxter the distinction between mortal
and venial sin reappears in a truly Catholic sense. The former is a
sign of the lack of grace which can only be attained by the conversion
of one's whole life. The latter is not incompatible with grace.

45. As held in many difTerent shades by Baxter, Bailey, Sedgwick,
Hoombeek. Further see examples given by Schneckenburger, op.
cit., p. 262.

46. The conception of the state of grace as a sort of social estate
(somewhat like that of the ascetics of the early Church) is very common.

228

Notes

See for instance Schortinghuis, Het innige Christendom U740
proscribed by the States-General) !

47. Thus, as we shall see later, in countless passages, especially
the conclusion, of Baxter's Christian Directory. This recommendation
of worldly activity as a means of overcoming one's own feeling of
moral inferiority is reminiscent of Pascal's psychological interpretation
of the impulse of acquisition and ascetic activity as means to deceive
oneself about one's own moral worthlessness. For him the belief in
predestination and the conviction of the original sinfulness of every-
thing pertaining to the flesh resulted only in renunciation of the
world and the recommendation of contemplation as the sole means
of lightening the burden of sin and attaining certainty of salvation.
Of the orthodox Catholic and the Jansenist versions of the idea of
calling an acute analysis has been made by Dr. Paul Honigsheim in
the dissertation cited above (part of a larger study, which it is hoped
will be continued). The Jansenists lacked every trace of a connection
between certainty of salvation and worldly activity. Their concept of
calling has, even more strongly than the Lutheran or even the orthodox
Catholic, the sense of acceptance of the situation in life in which one
finds oneself, sanctioned not only, as in Catholicism by the social
order, but also by the voice of one's own conscience (Honigsheim,
op. cit., pp. 139 ff.).

48. The very lucidly written sketch of Lobstein in the Festgabe
für H. Holtzmann, which starts from his view-point, may also be
compared with the following. It has been criticized for too sharp an
emphasis on the certitudo salutis. But just at this point Calvin's
theology must be distinguished from Calvinism, the theological
system from the needs of religious practice. All the religious move-
ments which have affected large masses have started from the
question, "How can I become certain of my salvation?" As we have
said, it not only plays a central part in this case but in the history of
all religions, even in India. And could it well be otherwise?

49. Of course it cannot be denied that the full development of
this conception did not take place until late Lutheran times (Prastorius,
Nicolai, Meisner). It is present, however, even in Johannes Gerhard,
quite in the sense meant here. Hence Ritschl in Book IV of his
Geschichte des Pietismus (II, pp. 3 ff.) interprets the introduction of
this concept into Lutheranism as a Renaissance or an adoption of
Catholic elements. He does not deny (p. 10) that the problem of
individual salvation was the same for Luther as for the Catholic
Mystics, but he believes that the solution was precisely opposite in
the t\Vo cases. I can, of course, have no competent opinion of my
own. That the atmosphere of Die Freiheit eines Christenmenschen is
different, on the one hand, from the sweet flirtation with the liebem
Jesulein of the later writers, and on the other from Tauler's religious
feeling, is naturally obvious to anyone. Similarly the retention of

229

The Protestant Ethic and the Spirit of Capitalism

the mystic-magical element in Luther's doctrines of the Communion
certainly has different religious motives from the Bemhardine piety,
the "Song of Songs feeling" to wliich Ritschl again and again returns
as the source of the bridal relations with Christ. But might not, among
other things, that doctrine of the Communion have favoured the
revival of mystical religious emotions? Further, it is by no means
accurate to say that (p. 1 1, op. cit.) the freedom of the mystic consisted
entirely in isolation from the world. Especially Tauler has, in passages
which from the point of view of the psychology of religion are very
interesting, maintained that the order which is thereby brought
into thoughts concerning worldly activities is one practical result of
the nocturnal contemplation which he recommends, for instance, in
case of insomnia. "Only thereby [the mystical union with God at
night before going to sleep] is reason clarified and the brain
strengthened, and man is the whole day the more peacefully and
divinely guided by virtue of the inner discipline of having truly
united himself with God : then all his works shall be set in order.
And thus when a man has forewarned (= prepared) himself of his
work, and has placed his trust in virtue; then if he comes into the
world, his works shall be virtuous and divine" {Predigten, fol. 318).
Thus we see, and we shall return to the point, that mystic con-
templation and a rational attitude toward the calling are not in them-
selves mutually contradictory. The opposite is only true when the
religion takes on a directly hysterical character, which has not been
the case with all mystics nor even all Pietists.

50. On this see the introduction to the following essays on the Wirt-
schaftsethik der Weltreligionen (not included in this translation : German
in Gesammelte Aufsätze zur Religionssoi^iologie. — Translator's Note).

51". In this assumption Calvinism has a point of contact with
official Catholicism. But for the Catholics there resulted the necessity
of the sacrament of repentance; for the Reformed Church that of
practical proof through activity in the world.

52. See, for instance, Beza {De prcedestinat doct. ex preelect. in
Rom 9a, Raph. Eglino exc. 1584), p. 133: "Sicut ex operibus vere
bonis ad sanctificationis donum, a sanctificatione ad fidem — ascendi-
mus: ita ex certis illis effectis non quamvis vocationem, sed efficacem
illam et ex hac vocatione electionem et ex electione donum prae-
destinationis in Christo tarn firmam quam immotus est Dei thronus
certissima connexione effectorum et causarum colligimus. . . ," Only
with regard to the signs of damnation is it necessary to be careful,
since it is a matter of final judgment. On this point the Puritans first
differed. See further the thorough discussion of Schneckenburger,
op. cit., who to be sure only cites a limited category of literature. In
the whole Puritan literature this aspect comes out. "It will not be
said, did you believe? — but: were you Doers or Talkers only?" says
Bunyan. According to Baxter {The Saints' Everlasting Rest, chap, xii),
230

Notes

who teaches the mildest form of predestination, faith means sub-
jection to Christ in heart and in deed, "Do what you are able first,
and then complain of God for denying you grace if you have cause",
was his answer to the objection that the will was not free and God
alone was able to insure salvation {Works of the Puritan Divines, IV,
p. 155). The investigation of Fuller (the Church historian) was
limited to the one question of practical proof and the indications of
his state of grace in his conduct. The same with Howe in the passage
referred to elsewhere. Any examination of the Works of the Puritan
Divines gives ample proofs.

Not seldom the conversion to Puritanism was due to Catholic
ascetic writings, thus, with Baxter, a Jesuit tract. These conceptions
were not wholly new compared with Calvin's own doctrine {Instit.
Christ, chap, i, original edition of 1536, pp. 97, 113). Only for Calvin
himself the certainty of salvation could not be attained in this manner
(p. 147). Generally one referred to i John iii. 5 and similar passages.
The demand for fides efficax is not — to anticipate — limited to the
Calvinists. Baptist confessions of faith deal, in the article on pre-
destination, similarly with the fruits of faith ("and that its — of re-
generation— proper evidence appears in the holy fruits of repentance
and faith and newness of life" — Article 7 of the Confession printed in
the Baptist Church Manual by J. N. Brown, D.D., Philadelphia,
Am. Bapt. Pub. Soc). In the same way the tract (under Alennonite
influence), Oliif-Tacxken, which the Harlem Synod adopted in 1649,
begins on page i with the question of how the children of God are to be
known, and answers (p. 10) : "Nu al is't dat dasdanigh vruchtbare ghe-
love alleene zii het seker fondamentale kennteeken — om de conscientien
der gelovigen in het nieuwe verbondt der genade Gods te versekeren."

53. Of the significance of this for the material content of social
ethics some hint has been given above. Here we are interested not in
the content, but in the motives of moral action.

54. How this idea must have promoted the penetration of Puritan-
ism with the Old Testament Hebrew spirit is evident.

55. Thus the Savoy Declaration says of the members of the ecclesia
piira that they are "saints by effectual calling, visibly manifested by
their profession and walking".

56. "A Principle of Goodness", Charnock in the Works nf the
Puritan Divines, p. 175.

57. Conversion is, as Sedgwick puts it, an "exact copy of the
decree of predestination". And whoever is chosen is also called to
obedience and made capable of it, teaches Bailey. Only those whom
God calls to His faith (which is expressed in their conduct) are true
believers, not merely temporary believers, according to the (Baptist)
Confession of Hanserd KnoUy.

58. Compare, for instance, the conclusion to Baxter's Christian
Directory.

The Protestant Ethic and the Spirit of Capitalism

59. Thus, for instance, Chamock, Self -Examination, p. 183, in
refutation of the Catholic doctrine of dubitatio.

60. This argument recurs again and again in Hoornbeek, Theo-
logia practica. For instance, I, p. 160; II, pp. 70, 72, 182.

61. For instance, the Conf. Helvet, 16, says "et improprie his
[the works] salus adtribuitur" .

62. With all the above compare Schneckenburger, pp. 80 ff.

63. Augustine is supposed to have said "si non es praedestinatus,
fac ut praedestineris".

64. One is reminded of a saying of Goethe with essentially the
same meaning: "How can a man know himself? Never by observation,
but through action. Try to do your duty and you will know what is in
you. And what is your duty? Your daily task."

65. For though Calvin himself held that saintliness must appear
on the surface {Instit. Christ, IV, pp. i, 2, 7, 9), the dividing-line
between saints and sinners must ever remain hidden from human
knowledge. We must believe that where God's pure word is alive in
a Church, organized and administered according to His law, some
of the elect, even though we do not know them, are present.

66. The Calvinistic faith is one of the many examples in the
history of religions of the relation between the logical and the psycho-
logical consequences for the practical religious attitude to be derived
from certain religious ideas. Fatalism is, of course, the only logical
consequence of predestination. But on account of the idea of proof
the psychological result was precisely the opposite. For essentially
similar reasons the followers of Nietzsche claim a positive ethical
significance for the idea of eternal recurrence. This case, however,
is concerned with responsibility for a future life which is connected
with the active individual by no conscious thread of continuity,
while for the Puritan it was tua res agitur. Even Hoornbeek {Theologia
practica, I, p. 159) analyses the relation between predestination and
action well in the language of the times. The electi are, on account of
their election, proof against fatalism because in their rejection of it
they prove themselves "quos ipsa electio sollicitos reddit et diligentes
officiorum". The practical interests cut off the fatalistic consequences
of logic (which, however, in spite of everything occasionally did
break through).

But, on the other hand, the content of ideas of a religion is, as
Calvinism shows, far more important than William James {Varieties
of Religious Experience, 1902, p. 444 f.) is inclined to admit. The
significance of the rational element in religious metaphysics is shown
in classical form by the tremendous influence which especially the
logical structure of the Calvinistic concept of God exercised on' life.
If the God of the Puritans has influenced history as hardly another
before or since, it is principally due to the attributes which the power
of thought had given him. James's pragmatic valuation of the signi-
ficance of religious ideas according to their influence on life is inci-
2^2

I

Notes

dentally a true child of the world of ideas of the Puritan home of that
eminent scholar. The religious experience as such is of course irrational,
like every experience. In its highest, mystical form it is even the
experience Kax' i^oxv^, and, as James has w^cll shown, is distinguished
by its absolute inconununicability. It has a specific character and
appears as knowledge, but cannot be adequately reproduced by means
of our lingual and conceptual apparatus. It is further true that every
religious experience loses some of its content in the attempt of rational
formulation, the further the conceptual formulation goes, the more
so. That is the reason for many of the tragic conflicts of all rational
theology, as the Baptist sects of the seventeenth century already
knew. But that irrational element, which is by no means peculiar to
religious experience, but applies (in different senses and to different
degrees) lo every experience, does not prevent its being of the greatest
practical importance, of what particular type the system of ideas is,
that captures and moulds the immediate experience of religion in its
own way. For from this source develop, in times of great influence
of the Church on life and of strong interest in dogmatic considerations
within it, most of those differences between the various religions in
their ethical consequences which are of such great practical importance.
How unbelievably intense, measured by present standards, the dog-
matic interests even of the layman were, everyone knows who is
familiar with the historical sources. We can find a parallel to-day
only in the at bottom equally superstitious belief of the modern
proletariat in what can be accomplished and proved by science.

67. Baxter, The Saints' Everlasting Rest, I, p. 6, answers to the
question: "Whether to make salvation our end be not mercenary
or legal? It is properly mercenary when we expect it as wages for
work done. . . . Otherwise it is only such a mercenarism as Christ
commandeth . . . and if seeking Christ be mercenary, I desire to be
so mercenary." Nevertheless, many Calvinists who are considered
orthodox do not escape falling into a very crass sort of mercenariness.
According to Bailey, Praxis pietatis, p. 262, alms are a means of
escaping temporal punishment. Other theologians urged the damned
to perform good works, since their damnation might thereby become
somewhat more bearable, but the elect because God will then not
only love them without cause but ob causam, which shall certainly
sometime have its reward. The apologists have also made certain
small concessions concerning the significance of good works for the
degree of salvation (Schneckenburger, op. cit., p. loi).

68. Here also it is absolutely necessary, in order to bring out the
characteristic differences, to speak in terms of ideal types, thus in a
certain sense doing violence to historical reality. But without this a
clear formulation would be quite impossible considering the com-
plexity of the material. In how far the differences which we here
draw as sharply as possible were merely relative, would have to be
discussed separately. It is, of course, true that the official Catholic

R 233

The Protestant Ethic and the Spirit of Capitalism

doctrine, even in the Middle Ages, itself set up the ideal of a systematic
sanctification of life as a whole. But it is just as certain (i) that the
normal practice of the Church, directly on account of its most effective
means of discipline, the confession, promoted the unsystematic way
of life discussed in the text, and further (2) that the fundamentally
rigorous and cold atmosphere in which he lived and the absolute
isolation of the Calvinst were utterly foreign te mediaeval lay-
Catholicism.

69. The absolutely fundamental importance of this factor will, as
has already once been pointed out, gradually become clear in the
essays on the Wirtschaftsethik der Weltreligionen.

70. And to a certain extent also to the Lutheran. Luther did not
wish to eliminate this last vestige of sacramental magic.

"^i. Compare, for instance, Sedg%vick, Buss- und Gnadenlehre
(German by Roscher, 1689). The repentant man has a fast rule to
which he holds himself exactly, ordering thereby his whole life and
conduct (p. 591). He lives according to the law, shrewdly, wakefully,
and carefully (p. 596). Only a permanent change in the whole man
can, since it is a result of predestination, cause this (p. 852). True
repentance is always expressed in conduct (p. 361). The difference
between only morally good work and opera spiritualia lies, as Hoorn-
beek {op. cit., I, IX, chap, ii) explains, in the fact that the latter are
the results of a regenerate life {op. cit., I, p. 160). A continuous
progress in them is discernible which cap only be achieved by the
supernatural influence of God's grace (p. 150). Salvation results from
the transformation of the whole man through the grace of God
(p. 190 f.). These ideas are common to all Protestantism, and are of
course found in the highest ideals of Catholicism as well. But their
consequences could only appear in the Puritan movements of worldly
asceticism, and above all only in those cases did they have adequate
psychological sanctions .

72. The latter name is, especially in Holland, derived from those
who modelled their lives precisely on the example of the Bible (thus
with Voet). Moreover, the name Methodists occurs occasionally
among the Puritans in the seventeenth century.

,.^73. For, as the Puritan preachers emphasize (for instance Banyan
in the Pharisee and the Publican, Works of the Puritan Divines, p. 126),
every single sin would destroy everything which might have been
accumulated in the way of merit by good works in a lifetime, if,
which is unthinkable, man were alone able to accomplish anything
which God should necessarily recognize as meritorious, or even
could live in perfection for any length of time. Thus Puritanism did
not think as did Catholicism in terms of a sort of account with calcu-
lation of the balance, a simile which was common even in antiquity,
but of the definite alternative of grace or damnation held for a life as
a whole. For suggestions of the banlt account idea see note 102 below.

Notes

74. Therein lies the distinction from the mere Legality and Civility
which Bunyan has living as associates of Mr. Worldly-Wiseman in
the City called Morality.

75. Chamock, Self -Examination {Works of the Puritan Divines,
p. 172): "Reflection and knowledge of self is a prerogative of a
rational nature." Also the footnote: "Cogito, ergo sum, is the first
principle of the new philosophy."

76. This is not yet the place to discuss the relationship of the^
theology of Duns Scotus to certain ideas of ascetic Protestantism. It
never gained official recognition, but was at best tolerated and at
times proscribed. The later specific repugnance of the Pietists to
Aristotelean philosophy was shared by Luther, in a somewhat different
sense, and also by Calvin in conscious antagonism to Catholicism
(cf. Instit. Christ, II, chap, xii, p. 4 ; IV, chap, xvii, p. 24). The "primacy
of the will", as Kahl has put it, is common to all these movements.

77. Thus, for instance, the article on "Asceticism" in the Catholic
Church Lexicon defines its meaning entirely in harmony with its
highest historical manifestations. Similarly Seeberg in the Realenzy-
klopädie für protestantische Theologie und Kirche. For the purpose of
this study we must be allowed to use the concept as we have done.
That it can be defined in other ways, more broadly as well as more
narrowly, and is generally so defined, I am well aware.

78. In Hudibras {ist Song, 18, 19) the Puritans are compare(P
with the bare-foot Franciscans. A report of the Genoese Ambassador,
Fieschi, calls Cromwell's army an assembly of monks.

79. In view of the close relationship between otherworldly monastic '
asceticism and active worldly asceticism, which I here expressly
maintain, I am surprised to find Brentano {op. cit., p. 134 and else-
where) citing the ascetic labour of the monks and its recommendation
against me. His whole "Exkurs" against me culminates in that. But
that continuity is, as anyone can see, a fundamental postulate of
my whole thesis : the Reformation took rational Christian asceticism
and its methodical habits out of the monasteries and placed them in
the service of active life in the world. Compare the following dis-
cussion, which has not been altered.

80. So in the many reports of the trials of Puritan heretics cited
in Neal's History of the Puritans and Crosby's English Baptists.

81. Sanford, op. cit. (and both before and after him many others),
has found the origin of the ideal of reserve in Puritanism. Compare
on that ideal also the remarks of James Bryce on the American college
in Vol. II of his American Commotizvealth. The ascetic principle of
self-control also riiade Puritanism one of the fathers of modern
military discipline. (On Maurice of Orange as a founder of modern
army organization, see Roloff, Preuss. Jahrb., 1903, III, p. 255.) Crom-
well's Ironsides, with cocked pistols in their hands, and approaching
the enemy at a brisk trot without shooting, were not the superiors of

The Protestant Ethic and the Spirit of Capitalism

the Cavaliers by virtue of their fierce passion, but, on the contrary,
through their cool self-control, which enabled their leaders always
to keep them well in hand. The knightly storm-attack of the Cavaliers,
on the other hand, always resulted in dissolving their troops into
atoms. See Firth, Cromwell's Army.

82. See especially Windelband, Ueber Willensfreiheit, pp. 77 ff,

83. Only not so unmixed. Contemplation, sometimes combined
with emotionalism, is often combined with these rational elements.
But again contemplation itself is methodically regulated.

84. According to Richard Baxter everything is sinful which is
contrary to the reason given by God as a norm of action. Not only
passions which have a sinful content, but all feelings which are
senseless and intemperate as such. They destroy the countenance
and, as things of the flesh, prevent us from rationally directing all
action and feeling to God, and thus insult Him. Compare what is
said of the sinfulness of anger {Christian Directory, second edition,
1698, p. 285. Tauler is öited on p. 287). On the sinfulness of anxiety,
Ebenda, I, p. 287. That it is idolatry if our appetite is made the "rule
or measure of eating" is maintained very emphatically (op. cit., I,
pp. 310, 316, and elsewhere). In such discussions reference is made
everywhere to the Proverbs and also to Plutarch's De tranquilitate
Animi, afid not seldom to ascetic writings of the Middle Ages: St.
Bernard, Bonaventura, and others. The contrast to "who does not
love wine, women, and song . . ." could hardly be more sharply
drawn than by the extension of '' ''^a of idolatry to all sensuous
pleasures, so far as they are rf vy hygienic considerations,
in which case they (like . .ihese limits, but also other
recreations) are permissible. L "^^ Thapter V) for further dis-
cussion. Please note that the' > i<.:d to here and elsewhere
are neither dogmatic nor edfi} \ .iKS, but grew out of practical
ministry, and thus give a good picture of the direction which its
influence took.

85. I should regret it if any evaluation of one or the other form
of religion should be read into this discussion. We are not concerned
with that here. It is only a question of the influence of certain things
which, from a purely religious point of view, are perhaps incidental,
but important for practical conduct.

86. On this, see especially the article "Moralisten, englische", by
E. Troeltsch, in the Realenzyklopädie für protestantische Theologie
und Kirche, third edition.

87. How much influence quite definite religious ideas and situations,
which seem to be historical accidents, have had is shown unusually
clearly by the fact that in the circles of Pietism of a Reformed origin
the lack of monasteries was occasionally directly regretted, and that
the communistic experiments of Labadie and others were simply a
substitute for monastic life.

236

Notes

88. As early even as several confessions of the time of the Refor-
mation. Even Ritschl {Pietismus, I, p. 258 f.) does not deny, although
he looks upon the later development as a deterioration of the ideas
of the Reformation, that, for instance, in Conf. Gall. 25, 26, Conf.
Belg. 29, Conf. Helv. post, 17, the true Reformed Church was defined
by definitely empirical attributes, and that to this true Church
believers were not accounted without the attribute of moral activity.
(See above, note 42.)

89. "Bless God that we are not of the many" (Thomas Adams.
Works of the Puritan Divines, p. 138).

90. The idea of the birthright, so important in history, thus
received an important confiimation in England. "The firstborn
which are written in heaven. ... As the firstborn is not to be
defeated in his inheritance, and the enrolled names are never to be
obliterated, so certainly they shall inherit eternal life" (Thomas Adams,
Works of the Puritan Divines, p. xiv).

91. The Lutheran emphasis on penitent grief is foreign to the spirit
of ascetic Calvinism, not in theory, but definitely in practice. For it
is of no ethical value to the Calvinist; it does not help the damned,
while for those certain of their election, their own sin, so far as they
admit it to themselves, is a symiptom of backwardness in development.
Instead of repenting of it they hate it and attempt to overcome it by
activity for the glory of God. Compare the explanation of Howe
(Cromwell's chaplain 1656-58) in Of Men's Enmity against God and
of Reconciliation between G ^ Man {Works of English Puritan
Divines, p. 237): "The cr ..ejimity against God. It is the
mind, therefore, not as spec. / .^ ,y, but as practical and active
thatmust be renewed", an ' econciliation . . . must begin in
(i) a deep conviction . . ,. ' . ner enmity. ... I have been
alienated from God. ... (2) (p,. ,. . ,iear and lively apprehension of
the monstrous iniquity and wickedness thereof." The hatred here is
that of sin, not of the sinner. But as early as the famous letter of the
Duchess Renata d'Este (Leonore's mother) to Calvin, in which she
speaks of the hatred which she would feel toward her father and
husband if she became convinced they belonged to the damned, is
shown the transfer to the person. At the same time it is an example
of what was said above [pp. 104-6] of how the individual became
loosed from the ties resting on his natural feelings, for which the doc-
trine of predestination was responsible.

92. "None but those who give evidence of being regenerate or
holy persons ought to be received or counted fit members of visible
Churches. Where this is wanting, the very essence of a Church is lost",
as the principle is put by Owen, the Independent-Calvinistic Vice-
Chancellor of Oxford under Cromwell {Inv. into the Origin of Ev. Ch.).
Further, see the following essay (not translated here. — Trans l.'VTOR) .

93. See following essay.

The Protestant Ethic and the Spirit of Capitalism

94. Cat. Genev., p. 149. Bailey, Praxis pietatis, p. 125: "In life we
should act as though no one but Moses had authority over us."

95. "The law appears to the Calvinist as an ideal norm of action.
It oppresses the Lutheran because it is for him unattainable." In the
Lutheran catechism it stands at the beginning in order to arouse the
necessary humility, in the Reformed catechism it generally stands after
the Gospel. The Calvinists accused the Lutherans of having a "virtual
reluctance to becoming holy" (Möhler), while the Lutherans accused
the Calvinists of an "unfree servitude to the law", and of arrogance.

96. Studies and Reflections of the Great Rebellion, pp. 79 f.

97. Among them the Song of Songs is especially noteworthy.
It was for the most part simply ignored by the Puritans. Its Oriental
eroticism has influenced the development of certain types of religion,
such as that of St. Bernard.

98. On the necessity of this self-observation, see the sermon of
Charnock, already referred to, on 2 Cor. xiii. 5, Works of the Puritan
Divines, pp. 161 ff.

99. Most of the theological moralists recommended it. Thus
Baxter, Christian Directory, II, pp. 77 ff., who, however, does not
gloss over its dangers.

100. Moral book-keeping has, of course, been widespread elsewhere.
But the emphasis which was placed upon it as the sole means of
knowledge of the eternal decree of salvation or damnation was lacking,
and with it the most important psychological sanction for care and
exactitude in this calculation.

xoi. This was the significant difference from other attitudes which
were superficially similar.

102. Baxter {Saints' Everlasting Rest, chap, xii) explains God's
invisibility with the remark that just as one can carry on profitable
trade with an invisible foreigner through correspondence, so is it
possible by means of holy commerce with an invisible God to get
possession of the one priceless pearl. These commercial similes
rather than the forensic ones customary with the older moralists and
the Lutherans are thoroughly characteristic of Puritanism, which in
effect makes man buy his own salvation. Compare further the follow-
ing passage from a sermon: "We reckon the value of a thirtg by that
which a wise man will give for it, who is not ignorant of it nor under
necessity. Christ, the Wisdom of God, gave Himself, His own precious
blood, to redeem souls, and He knew what they were and had no
need of them" (Matthew Henry, The Worth of the Soul, Works of
the Puritan Divines, p. 313).

103. In contrast to that, Luther himself said: "Weeping goes
before action and suffering excells all accomplishment" (Weinen geht
vor Wirken und Leiden übertrifft alles tun).

104. This is also shown most clearly in the development of the
ethical theory of Lutheranism. On this see Hoennicke, Studien zur

238

Notes

altprotestantischen Ethik (Berlin, 1902), and the instructive review of
it by E. Troeltsch, Gott. Gel. Anz., 1902, No, 8. The approach of
the Lutheran doctrine, especially to the older orthodox Calvinistic,
was in form often very close. But the difference of religious back-
ground was always apparent. In order to establish a connection
between morality and faith, Melanchthon had placed the idea of
repentance in the foreground. Repentance through the law must
precede faith, but good works must follow it, otherwise it cannot
be the truly justifying faith — almost a Puritan formula. Melanchthon
admitted a certain degree of perfection to be attainable on earth. He
had, in fact, originally taught that justification was given in order to
make men capable of good works, and in increasing perfection lay
at least the relative degree of blessedness which faith could give in
this world. Also later Lutheran theologians held that good works are
the necessary fruits of faith, that faith results in a new external life,
just as the Reformed preachers did. The question in what good works
consist Melanchthon, and especially the later Lutherans, answered
more and more by reference to the law. There remained of Luther's
original doctrines only the lesser degree of seriousness with which
the Bible, especially the particular norms of the Old Testament, was
taken. The decalogue remained, as a codification of the most im-
portant ideas of the natural moral law, the essential norm of human
action. But there was no firm link connecting its legal validity with
the more and more strongly emphasized importance of faith for
justification, because this faith (see above) had a fundamentally
different psychological character from the Calvinistic.

The true Lutheran standpoint of the early period had to be
abandoned by a Church which looked upon itself as an institution
for salvation. But another had not been found. Especially was it
impossible, for fear of losing their dogmatic foundation (sola fide!),
to accept the ascetic rationalization of conduct as the moral task of
the individual. For there was no motive to give the idea of proof
such a significance as it attained in Calvinism through the doctrine
of predestination. Moreover, the magical interpretation of the sacra-
ments, combined with the lack of this doctrine, especially the asso-
ciation of the regeneratio, or at least its beginning with baptism,
necessarily, assuming as it did the universality of grace, hindered
the development of methodical morality. For it weakened the contrast
between the state of nature and the state of grace, especially when
combined with the strong Lutheran emphasis on original sin. No less
important was the entirely forensic interpretation of the act of justi-
fication which assumed that God's decrees might be changed through
the influence of particular acts of repentance of the converted sinner.
And that was just the element to which Melanchthon gave increasing
emphasis. The whole development of his doctrine, which gave
increasing weight to repentance, was intimately connected with his

239

The ProteMant Ethic and the Spirit of Capitalism

profession of the freedom of the will. That was what primarily
determined the- uwrnethodical character of Lutheran conduct.

Particular ac ts of grace for particular sins, not the development
of an aristoci'ac"./ of saints creating the certainty of their own salvation,
was the nece^ssary form salvation took for the average Lutheran, as
the retention c^f the confession proves. Thus it could develop neither
a morality free from the law nor a rational asceticism in terms of the
law. Rather the law remained in an unorganic proximity to faith as
an ideal, and, moreover, since the strict dependence on the Bible
was avoided as sui?gesting salvation by works, it remained uncertain,
vague, and, above all, unsystematic in its content. Their conduct
remained, as Troelitsch has said of their ethical theory, a "sum of
mere beginnings wh,*^ch never quite materialized"; which, "taught in
particular, uncertain, and unrelated maxims", did not succeed in
"working out an articulate system of conduct", but formed essentially,
following the development through which Luther himself (see above)
had gone, a resignation to things as they were in matters both small
and great. The resignation of the Germans to foreign cultures, their
rapid change of nationality, of which there is so much complaint, is
clearly to be attributed, along with certain political circumstances in
the history of the nation, in part to the results of this influence,
which still affects all aspects of our life. The subjective assimilation
of culture remained weak because it took place primarily by means
of a passive absorption of what was authoritatively presented.

105. On these points, see the gossipy book of Tholuck, Vorgeschichte
des Rationalismus.

106. On the quite different results of the Mohammedan doctrine
of predestination (or rather predetermination) and the reasons for
it, see the theological disyertation (Heidelberg) of F. Ullrich, Die
Vor herb estimmungslehre im Islam u. Ch., 19 12. On that of the Jan-
senists, see P. Honigsheim, op. cit.

107. See the following essay in this collection (not translated here).

108. Ritschl, Geschichte des Pietismus, I, p. 152, attempts to dis-
tinguish them for the time before Labadie (only on the basis of
examples from the Netherlands) (i) in that the Pietists formed
conventicles; (2) they held the doctrine of the "worthlessness of
existence in the flesh" in a "manner contrary to the Protestant
interests in salvation"; (3) "the assurance of grace in the tender
relationship with the Lord Jesus" was sought in an un-Calvinistic
manner. The last criterion applies for this early period only to one
of the cases with which he deals. The idea of worthlessness of the
flesh was in itself a true child of the Calvinistic spirit, and only
where it led to practical renunciation of the world was it antagonistic
to normal Protestantism. The conventicles, finally, had been estab-
lished to a certain extent (especially for catechistic purposes) by
the Synod of Dordrecht itself. Of the criteria of Pietism analysed

240

Notes

in Ritschl's previous discussion, those worth considering are (i) the
greater precision with which the letter of the Bible was followed in
all external affairs of life, as Gisbert Voet for a time urged; (2) the
treatment of justification and reconciliation with God, not as ends
in themselves, but simply as means toward a holy ascetic life as can
be seen perhaps in Lodensteyn,but as is also suggested by Melanch-
thon [see above, note 104] ; (3) the high value placed on repentance
as a sign of true regeneration, as was first taught by W. Teellinck;
(4) abstention from communion when unregenerate persons partake
of it (of which we shall speak in another connection). Connected with
that was the formation of conventicles with a revival of prophecy,
i.e. interpretation of the Scriptures by laymen, even women. That
went beyond the limits set by the canons of Dordrecht.

Those are all things forming departures, sometimes considerable,
from both the doctrine and practice of the Reformers. But compared
with the movements which Ritschl does not include in his treatment,
especially the English Puritans, they form, except for No. 3, only a
continuation of tendencies which lay in the whole line of development
of this religion. The objectivity of Ritschl's treatment suffers from
the fact that the great scholar allows his personal attitude towards
the Church or, perhaps better, religious policy, to enter in, and, in
his antipathy to all peculiarly ascetic forms of religion, interprets
any development in that direction as a step back into Catholicism.
But, like Catholicism, the older Protestantism included all sorts and
conditions of men. But that did not prevent the Catholic Church
from repudiating rigorous worldly asceticism in the form of Jansenism ;
just as Pietism repudiated the peculiar Catholic Quietism of the
seventeenth century. From our special view-point Pietism differs not
in degree, but in kind from Calvinism only when the increasing fear
of the world leads to flight from ordinary economic life and the
formation of monastic-communistic conventicles (Labadie). Or,
which has been attributed to certain extreme Pietists by their con-
temporaries, they were led deliberately to neglect worldly duties in
favour of contemplation. This naturally happened with particular
frequency when contemplation began to assume the character which
Ritschl calls Bemardism, because it suggests St. Bernard's interpre-
tation of the Song of Songs: a mystical, emotional form of religion
seeking the unio mystica with an esoteric sexual tinge. Even from the
view-point of religious psychology alone this is undoubtedly some-
thing quite different from Calvinism, including its ascetic form
exemplified by men like Voet. Ritschl, however, everywhere attempts
to connect this quietism with the Pietist asceticism and thus to bring
the latter under the same indictment; in doing so he puts his finger
on every quotation from Catholic mysticism or asceticism which he
can find in Pietist literature. But English and Dutch moralists and
theologians who are quite beyond suspicion cite Bernard, Bona-

241

The Protesia7jt Ethic and the - Spirit of Capitalism

Ventura, and Thomas ä Kempis. The relationship of all the Refor-
mation Churches to the Catholic past was very complex and, according
to the point of view which is emphasized, one or another appears
most closely related to Catholicism or certain sides of it.

109. The illuminating article on "Pietism" by Mirbt in the third
edition of the Realenzyklopädie für protestantische Theologie und
Kirche, treats the origin of Pietism, leaving its Protestant antecedents
entirely on one side, as a purely personal religious experience of
Spener, which is somewhat improbable. As an introduction to Pietism,
Gustav Freytag's description in Bilder der deutschen Vergangenheit
is still worth reading. For the beginnings of English Pietism in the
contemporary literature, compare W. Whitaker, Prima Institutio
disciplinaque pietatis (1570).

no. It is well known that this attitude made it possible for Pietism
to be one of the main forces behind the idea of toleration. At this
point we may insert a few remarks on that subject. In the West its
historical origin, if we omit the humanistic indifference of the En-
lightenment, which in itself has never had great practical influence,
is to be found in the following principal sources: (i) Purely political
expediency (type: William of Orange). (2) Mercantilism (especially
clear for the City of Amsterdam, but also typical of numerous cities,
landlords, and rulers who received the members of sects as valuable
for economic progress). (3) The radical wing of Calvinism. Pre-
destination made it fundamentally impossible for the State really to
promote religion by intolerance. It could not thereby save a single
soul. Only the idea of the glory of God gave the Church occasion to
claim its help in the suppression of heresy. Now the greater the
emphasis on the membership of the preacher, and all those that
partook of the communion, in the elect, the more intolerable became
the interference of the State in the appointment of the clergy. For
clerical positions were often granted as benefices to men from the
universities only because of their theological training, though they
might be personally unregener^te. In general, any interference in the
affairs of the religious community by those in political power, whose
conduct might often be unsatisfactory, was resented. Reformed
Pietism strengthened this tendency by weakening the emphasis on
doctrinal orthodoxy and by gradually undermining the principle of
extra ecclesiam nulla salus.

Calvin had regarded the subjection of the damned to the divine
supervision of the Church as alone consistent with the glory of
God ; in New England the attempt was made to constitute the Church
as an aristocracy of proved saints. Even the radical Independents,
however, repudiated every interference of temporal or any sort of
hierarchical powers with the proof of salvation which was only
possible within the individual community. The idea that the glory
of God requii'es the subjection of the damned to the discipline of

242

Notes

the Church was gradually superseded by the other idea, which was
present from, the beginning apd became gradually more prominent,
that it was an insult to His glory to partake of the Communion with
one rejected by God. That necessarily led to voluntarism, for it led
to the believers' Church the religious community which included
only the twice-born. Calvinistic Baptism, to which, for instance, the
leader of the Parliament of Saints Praisegod Barebones belonged,
drew the consequences of this line of thought with great emphasis.
Cromwell's army upheld the liberty of conscience and the parliament
of saints even advocated the separation of Church and State, because
its members were good Pietists, thus on positive religious grounds.
(4) The Baptist sects, which we shall discuss later, have from the
beginning of their history most strongly and consistently maintained
the principle that only those personally regenerated could be admitted
to the Church. Hence they repudiated every conception of the Church
as an institution {Anstalt) and every interference of the temporal
power. Here also it was for positive religious reasons that uncondi-
tional toleration was advocated.

The first man who stood out for absolute toleration and the separa-
tion of Church and State, almost a generation before the Baptists
and two before Roger Williams, was probably John Browne. The
first declaration of a Church group in this sense appears to be the
resolution of the English Baptists in Amsterdam of 1612 or 1613:
"The magistrate is not to middle with religion or matters ,of con-
science . . . because Christ is the King and Law-giver of the Church
and conscience." The first official document of a Church which
claimed the positive protection of liberty of conscience by the State
as a right was probably Article 44 of the Confession of the Particular
Baptists of 1644.

Let it be emphatically stated again that the idea sometimes brought
forward, that toleration as such was favourable to capitalism, is
naturally quite wrong. Religious toleration is neither peculiar to
modern times nor to the West. It has ruled in China, in India, in
the great empires of the Near East in Hellenistic times, in the Roman
Empire and the Mohammedan Empires for long periods to a degree
only limited by reasons of political expediency (which form its limits
to-day also !) which was attained nowhere in the world in the sixteenth
and seventeenth centuries. Moreover, it was least strong in those
areas which were dominated by Puritanism, as, for instance, Holland
and Zeeland in their period of political and economic expansion or
in Puritan old or New England. Both before and after the Reformation,
religious intolerance was peculiarly characteristic of the Occident as
of the Sassanian Empire. Similarly, it has prevailed in China, Japan,
and India at certain particular times, though mostly for political
reasons. Thus toleration as such certainly has nothing whatever to
do with capitalism. The real question is, Who benefited by it? Of the

The Protestant Ethic and the Spirit of Capitalism

consequences of the believers' Church we shall speak further in the
following article.

111. This idea is illustrated in its practical application by Crom-
well's tryers, the examiners of candidates for the position of preacher.
They attempted to ascertain not only the knowledge of theology, but
also the subjective state of grace of the candidate. See also the
following article.

112. The characteristic Pietistic distrust of Aristotle and classical
philosophy in general is suggested in Calvin himself (compare Instit.
Christ, II, chap, ii, p. 4; III, chap, xxiii, p. 5; IV, chap, xvii, p. 24).
Luther in his early days distrusted it no less, l?ut that was later changed
by the humanistic influence (especially of Melanchthon) and the urgent
need of ammunition for apologetic purposes. That everything neces-
sary for salvation was contained in the Scriptures plainly enough for
even the untutored was, of course, taught by the Westminster Confes-
sion (chap.i, No. 7.), in conformity with the whole Protestant tradition.

113. The official Churches protested against this, as, for example,
in the shorter catechism of the Scotch Presbyterian Church of 1648,
sec. vii. Participation of those not members of the same family in
family devotions was forbidden as interference with the prerogatives
of the office. Pietism, like every ascetic community-forming move-
ment, tended to loosen the ties of the individual with domestic
patriarchalism, with its interest in the prestige of office.

114. We are here for good reasons intentionally neglecting dis-
cussion of the psychological, in the technical sense of the word,
aspect of these religious phenomena, and even its terminology has
been as far as possible avoided. The firmly established results of
psychology, including psychiatry, do not as present go far enough
to make them of use for the purposes of the historical investigation
of our problems without prejudicing historical judgments. The use of
its terminology would only form a temptation to hide phenomena
which were immediately understandable, or even sometimes trivial,
behind a veil of foreign words, and thus give a false impression of
scientific exactitude, such as is unfortunately typical of Lamprecht.
For a more serious attempt to make use of psychological concepts
in the interpretation of certain historical mass phenomena, see W.
Hellpach, Grundlinien zu einer Psychologie der Hysterie, chap, xii, as
well as his Nervosität und Kultur. I cannot here attempt to explain
that in my opinion even this many-sided writer has been harmfully
influenced by certain of Lamprecht's theories. How completely worth-
less, as compared with the older literature, Lamprecht's schematic
treatment of Pietism is (in Vol. VII of the Deutsche Geschichte)
everyone knows who has the slightest acquaintance with the literature.

115. Thus with the adherents of Schortinghuis's Innige Christen-
dorn. In the history of religion it goes back to the verse about the
servant of God in Isaiah and the 22nd Psalm.

244

Notes

ii6. This appeared occasionally in Dutch Pietism and then under
the influence of Spinoza.

117. Labadie, Teersteegen, etc.

118. Perhaps this appears most clearly when he (Spener !) disputes
the authority of the Government to control the conventicles except
in cases of disorder and abuses, because it concerns a fundamental
right of Christians guaranteed by apostolic authority {Theologische
Bedenken, II, pp. 81 f.). That is, in principle, exactly the Puritan stand-
point regarding the relations of the individual to authority and the
extent to which individual rights, which follow ex jure divino and
are therefore inalienable, are valid. Neither this heresy, nor the one
mentioned farther on in the text, has escaped Ritschl (Pietismus,

II, pp. 115, 157). However unhistorical the positivistic (not to say
philistine) criticism to which he has subjected the idea of natural
rights to which we are nevertheless indebted for not much less than
everything which even the most extreme reactionary prizes as his
sphere of individual freedom, we naturally agree entirely with him
that in both cases an organic relationship to Spener's Lutheran
standpoint is lacking.

The conventicles (collegia pietitatis) themselves, to which Spener's
famous pia desideria gave the theoretical basis, and which he founded
in practice, corresponded closely in essentials to the English pro-
phesyings which were first practised in John of Lasco's London
Bible Classes (1547), and after that were a regular feature of all
forms of Puritanism which revolted against the authority ' of the
Church. Finally, he bases his well-known repudiation of the Church
discipline of Geneva on the fact that its natural executors, the third
estate (status oeconomicus : the Christian laity), were not even a part
of the organization of the Lutheran Church. On the other hand, in
the discussion of excommunication the lay members' recognition of
the Consistorium appointed by the prince as representatives of the
third estate is weakly Lutheran.

119. The name Pietism in itself, which first occurs in Lutheran
territory, indicates that in the opinion of contemporaries it was
characteristic of it that a methodical business was made out of pietas.

120. It is, of course, granted that though this type of motivation
was primarily Calvinistic it is not exclusively such. It is also found
with special frequency in some of the oldest Lutheran Church
constitutions.

121. In the sense of Heb. v. 13, 14. Compare Spener, Theologische
Bedenken, I, p. 306.

122. Besides Bailey and Baxter (see Consilia theologtca, III, 6, i ;
I, 47; 3, 6), Spener was especially fond of Thomas ä Kempis, and
even more of Tauler — whom he did not entirely understand (op. cit.,

III, 61, I, No. i). For detailed discussion of the latter, see op. cit.,
I, I, I No. 7. For him Luther is derived directly from Tauler.

The Protestant Ethic and the Spirit of Capitalism

123. See in Ritschl, op. cit., II, p. 113. He did not accept the
repentance of the later Pietists (and of Luther) as the sole trust-
worthy indication of true conversion (Theologische Bedenken, III,
p. 476). On sanctification as the fruit of thankfulness in the belief of
forgiveness, a typically Lutheran idea, see passages cited by Ritschl,
op. cit., p. 115, note 2. On the certitudo salutis see, on the one hand,
Theologische Bedenken, I, p. 324: "true belief is not so much felt
emotionally as known by its fruits" (love and obedience to God); on
the other. Theologische Bedenken, I, p. 335 f.: "As far as anxiety that
they should be assured of salvation and grace is concerned, it is better
to trust to our books, the Lutheran, than to the English writings." But on
the nature of sanctification he was at one with the English view-point.

124. Of this the religious account books which A. H. Francke
recommended were external symptoms. The methodical practice and
habit of virtue was supposed to cause its growth and the separation
of good from evil. This is the principal theme of Francke 's book.
Von des Christen Vollkommenheit.

125. The difference between this rational Pietist belief in Pro-
vidence and its orthodox interpretation is shown characteristically
in the famous controversy between the Pietists of Halle and the
orthodox Lutheran Löscher. Löscher in his Timotheus Verinus goes
so far as to contrast everything that is attained by human action
with the decrees of Providence. On the other hand, Francke 's con-
sistent view was that the sudden flash of clarity over what is to happen,
which comes as a result of quiet waiting for decision, is to be con-
sidered as "God's hint", quite analogous to the Quaker psychology,
and corresponding to the general ascetic idea that rational methods
are the way to approach nearer to God. It is true that Zinzendorf,
who in one most vital decision entrusted the fate of his community
to lot, was far from Francke 's form of the belief in Providence.
Spener, Theologische Bedenken, I, p. 314, referred to Tauler for a
description of the Christian resignation in which one should bow to
the divine will, and not cross it by hasty action on one's own respon-
sibility, essentially the position of Francke. Its effectiveness as com-
pared to Puritanism is essentially weakened by the tendency of
Pietism to seek peace in this world, as can everywhere be clearly
seen. "First righteousness, then peace", as was said in opposition to
it in 1904 by a leading Baptist (G. White in an address to be referred
to later) in formulating the ethical programme of his denomination
(Baptist Handbook, 1904, p. 107).

126. Lect. paraenet., IV, p. 271.

127. Ritschl's criticism is directed especially against this continually
recurrent idea. See the work of Francke containing the doctrine
which has already been referred to. (See note 124 above.)

128. It occurs also among English Pietists who were not adherents
of predestination, for instance Goodwin. On him and others compare

246

Notes

Heppe, Geschichte des Pietistniis in der reformierten Kirche (Leiden,
1879), a book which even with Ritschl's standard work cannot yet
be dispensed with for England, and here and there also for the
Netherlands. Even in the nineteenth century in the Netherlands Köhler,
Die Niederl. ref. Kirche, was asked about the exact time of his rebirth.

129. They attempted thus to counteract the lax results of the
Lutheran doctrine of the recoverability of grace (especially the very
frequent conversion in extremis).

130. Against the corresponding necessity of knowing the day and
hour of conversion as an indispensable sign of its genuineness. See
Spener, Theologische Bedenken, II, 6, i, p. 197. Repentance was as
little known to him as Luther's terror es conscientice to Melanchthon.

131. At the same time, of course, the anti-authoritarian interpre-
tation of the universal priesthood, typical of all asceticism, played a
part. Occasionally the minister was advised to delay absolution until
proof was given of genuine repentance which, as Ritschl rightly says,
was in principle Calvinistic.

132. The essential points for our purposes are most easily found
in Plitt, Zinzendorf's Theologie (3 vols., Gotha, 1869), I, pp. 325,
345, 381, 412. 429. 433 f-, 444. 448; II, pp. 372, 381, 385, 409 f.;
Ill, pp. 131, 167, 176. Compare also Bernh. Becker, Zinzendorf und
sein Christentum (Leipzig, 1900), Book III, chap. iii.

133. "In no religion do we recognize as brothers those who have
not been washed in the blood of Christ and continue thoroughly
changed in the sanctity of the Spirit. We recognize no ■evident
( = visible) Church of Christ except where the Word of God is
taught in purity and where the members live in holiness as children
of God following its precepts." The last sentence, it is true, is taken
from Luther's smaller catechism but, as Ritschl points out, there it
serves to answer the question how the Name of God shall be made
holy, while here it serves to delimit the Church of the saints.

134. It is true that he only considered the Augsburg Confession
f^ be a suitable document of the Lutheran Christian faith if, as he
expressed it in his disgusting terminology, a Wundbriihe had been
poured upon it. To read him is an act of penitence because his
language, in its insipid melting quality, is even worse than the
frightful Christo-turpentine of F. T. Vischer (in his polemics
with the Munich christoterpe) .

135. See Plitt, op. cit.,l,p. 346. Even more decisive is the answer,
quoted in Plitt, op. cit., I, p. 381, to the question whether good works
are necessary to salvation. "Unnecessary and harmful to the attain-
ment of salvation, but after salvation is attained so necessary that he
who does not perform them is not really saved." Thus here also they
are not the cause of salvation, but the sole means of recognizing it.

136. For instance, through those caricatures of Christian freedom
which Ritschl, op. cit., Ill, p. 381, so severely criticizes.

247

The Protestant Ethic and the Spirit of Capitalism

137. Above all in the greater emphasis on the idea of retributive
punishment in the doctrine of salvation, which, after the repudiation
of his missionary attempts by the American sects, he made the basis
of his method of sanctification. After that he places the retention of
childlikeness and the virtues of humble resignation in the foreground
as the end of Hermhut asceticism, in sharp contrast to the inclination
of his own community to an asceticism closely analogous to the
Puritan.

138. Which, however, had its limits. For this reason alone it is
wrong to attempt to place Zinzendorf's religion 'in. a scheme of social
psychological evolutionary stages, as Lamprecht does. Furthermore,
however, his whole religious attitude is influenced by nothing more
strongly than the fact that he was a Count with an outlook funda-
mentally feudal. Further, the emotional side of it would, from the
point of view of social psychology, fit just as well into the period of
the sentimental decadence of chivalry as in that of sensitiveness. If
social psychology gives any clue to its difference from West European
rationalism, it is most likely to be found in the patriarchal tradi-
tionalism of Eastern Germany.

139. This is evident from Zinzendorf's controversy with Dippel
just as, after his death, the doctrines of the Synod of 1764 bring out
the character of the Hermhut community as an institution for salva-
tion. See Ritschl's criticism, op. cit., Ill, p. 443 f.

140. Compare, for instance, §§151, 153, 160. That sanctification
may not take place in spite of true penitence and the forgiveness of
sins is evident, especially from the remarks on p. 311, and agrees
with the Lutheran doctrine of salvation just as it is in disagreement
with that of Calvinism (and Methodism).

141. Compare Zinzendorf's opinion, cited in Plitt, op. cit., II,
p. 345. Similarly Spangenberg, Idea Fidei, p. 325.

142. Compare, for instance, Zinzendorf's remark on Matt. xx. 28,
cited by Plitt, op. cit., Ill, p. 131 : "When I see a man to whom God
has given a great gift, I rejoice and gladly avail myself of the gift.
But when I note that he is not content with his own, but wishes to
increase it further, I consider it the beginning of that person's ruin."
In other words, Zinzendorf denied, especially in his conversation
with John Wesley in 1743, that there could be progress in holiness,
because he identified it with justification and found it only in the
emotional relationship to Christ (Plitt, I, p. 413). In place of the
sense of being the instrument of God comes the possession of the
divine; mysticism, not asceticism (in the sense to be discussed in
the introduction to the following essays) (not here translated. —
Translator's Note). As is pointed out there, a present, worldly
state of mind is naturally what the Puritan really seeks for also. But
for him the state which he interprets as the certitudo salutis is the
feeling of being an active instrument,

248

Notes

143. But which, precisely on account of this mystical tendency,
did not receive a consistent ethical justification. Zinzendorf rejects
Luther's idea of divine worship in the calling as the decisive reason
for performing one's duty in it. It is rather a return for the "Saviour's
loyal services" (Pütt, II, p. 411).

144. His saying that "a reasonable man should not be without
faith and a believer should not be unreasonable" is well known. See
his Sokrates, d. i. Aufrichtige Anzeige verschiedener nicht sowohl
unbekannter als vielmehr in Abfall geratener Hauptwahrheiten (i'jz'^).
Further, his fondness for such authors as Bayle.

145. The decided propensity of Protestant asceticism for em-
piricism, rationalized on a mathematical basis, is well known, but
cannot be further analysed here. On the development of the sciences
in the direction of mathematically rationalized exact investigation,
the philosophical motives of it and their contrast to Bacon's view-
point, see Windelband, Geschichte der Philosophie, pp. 305-7, especially
the remark on p. 305, which rightly denies that modern natural
science can be understood as the product of material and technical
interests. Highly important relationships exist, of course, but they
are much more complex. See further Windelband, Neuere Phil.,
I, pp. 40 IT. For the attitude of Protestant asceticism the decisive
point was, as may perhaps be most clearly seen in Spener's Theolo-
gische Bedenken, I, p. 232; III, p. 260, that just as the Christian is
known by the fruits of his belief, the knowledge of God and His
designs can only be attained through a knowledge of His works.
The favourite science of all Puritan, Baptist, or Pietist Christianity
was thus physics, and next to it all those other natural sciences which
used a similar method, especially mathematics. It was hoped from
the empirical knowledge of the divine laws of nature to ascend to a
grasp of the essence of the world, which on account of the frag-
mentary nature of the divine revelation, a Calvinistic idea, could
never be attained by the method of metaphysical speculation. The
empiricism of the seventeenth century was the means for asceticism
to seek God in nature. It seemed to lead to God, philosophical
speculation away from Him. In particular Spener considers the
Aristotelean philosophy to have been the most harmful element in
Christian tradition. Every other is better, especially the Platonic:
Cons. TheoL, III, 6, i, Dist. 2, No. 13. Compare further the following
characteristic passage: "Unde pro Cartesio quid dicam non habeo
[he had not read him], semper tamen optavi et opto, ut Deus viros
excitet, qui veram philosophiam vel tandem oculis sisterent in qua
nullius hominis attenderetur auctoritas, sed sana tantum magistri
nescia ratio", Spener, Com. TheoL, II, 5, No. 2. The significance
of this attitude of ascetic Protestantism for the development of
education, especially technical education, is well known. Combined with
the attitude to fides implicita they furnished a pedagogical programme.

249

The Protestant Ethic and the Spirit of Capitalism

146. "That is a type of men who seek their happiness in four main
ways: (i) to be insignificant, despised, and abased; (2) to neglect all
things they do not need for the service of their Lord; (3) either to
possess nothing or to give away again what they receive ; (4) to work
as wage labourers, not for the sake of the wage, but of the calling in
the service of the Lord and their neighbour" {Rel. Reden, II, p. 180;
Plitt, op. cit., I, p. 445). Not everyone can or may become a disciple,
but only those who receive the call of the Lord. But according to
Zinzendorf's own confession (Plitt, op. cit., 1, ■p. 449) there still remain
difficulties, for the Sermon on the Mount applies formally to all. The
resemblance of this free universality of love to the old Baptist ideals
is evident.

147. An emotional intensification of religion was by no means
entirely unknown to Lutheranism even in its later period. Rather
the ascetic element, the way of life which the Lutheran suspected of
being salvation by works, was the fundamental difference in this case.

148. A healthy fear is a better sign of grace than certainty, says
Spener, Theologische Bedenken, I, p. 324. In the Puritan writers we,
of course, also find emphatic warnings against false certainty; but at
least the doctrine of predestination, so far as its influence determined
religious practice, always worked in the opposite direction

149. The psychological effect of the confessional was everywhere
to relieve the individual of responsibility for his own conduct, that
is why it was' sought, and that weakened the rigorous consistency of
the demands of asceticism.

150. How important at the same time, even for the form of the
Pietist faith, was the part played by purely political factors, has been
indicated by Ritschl in his study of Württemberg Pietism.

151. See Zinzendorf's statement [quoted above, note 146].

152. Of course Calvinism, in so far as it is genuine, is also patri-
archal. The connection, for instance, of the success of Baxter's
activities with the domestic character of industry in Kidderminster
is evident from his autobiography. See the passage quoted in the
Works of the Puritan Divines, p. 38: "The town liveth upon the
weaving of Kidderminster stuffs, and as they stand in their loom,
they can set a book before them, or edify each other. . . ." Never-
theless, there is a difference between patriarchalism based on Pietism
and on the Calvinistic and especially the Baptist ethics. This problem
can only be discussed in another connection.

153. Lehre von der Rechtfertigung und Versöhnung, third edition,
I, p. 598. That Frederick William I called Pietism a religion for the
leisure class is more indicative of his owti Pietism than that of Spener
and Francke. Even this king knew very well why he had opened his
realm to the Pietists by his declaration of toleration.

154. As an introduction to Methodism the excellent article Metho-
dismus by Loofs in the Realenzyklopädie für protestantische Theo-

250

Notes

logie und Kirche is particularly good. Also the works of Jacoby
(especially the Handbuch des Methodismus), Kolde, Jüngst, and
Southey are useful. On Wesley: Tyerman, Life and Times of John
Wesley is popular. One of the best libraries on the history of Methodism
is that of Northwestern University, Evanston, 111. A sort of link
between classical Puritanism and Methodism was formed by the
religious poet Isaac Watts, a friend of the chaplain of Oliver Cromwell
(Howe) and then of Richard Cromwell. Whitefield is said to have
sought his advice (cf. Skeats, op. cit., pp. 254 f.).

155. Apart from the personal influence of the Wesleys the similarity
is historically determined, on the one hand, by the decline of the
dogma of predestination, on the other by the powerful revival of
the sola fide in the founders of Methodism, especially motivated by
its specific missionary character. This brought forth a modified
rejuvenation of certain mediaeval methods of revival preaching and
combined them with Pietistic forms. It certainly does not belong in
a general line of development toward subjectivism, since in this
respect it stood behind not only Pietism, but also the Bernardino
religion of the Middle Ages.

156. In this manner Wesley himself occasionally characterized
the effect of the Methodist faith. The relationship to Zinzendorf's
Glückseligkeit is evident.

157. Given in Watson's Life of Wesley, p. 331 (German edition).

158. J. Schneckenburger, Vorlesungen über die Lehrbegriffe der
kleinen protestantischen Kirchenparteien, edited by Hundeshagen
(Frankfurt, 1863), p. 147.

159. Whitefield, the leader of the predestinationist group which
after his death dissolved for lack of organization, rejected Wesley's
doctrine of perfection in its essentials. In fact, it is only a makeshift
for the real Calvinistic idea of proof.

160. Schneckenburger, op. cit., p. 145. Somewhat different in Loofs,
op. cit. Both results are typical of all similar religious phenomena.

161. Thus in the conference of 1 770 . The first conference of 1 744 had
already recognized that the Biblical words came "within a hair" of Cal-
vinism on the one hand and Antinomianism on the other. But since
they were so obscure it was not well to be separated by doctrinal differ-
ences so long as the validity of the Bible as a practical norm was upheld.

162. The Methodists were separated from the Herrnhuters by
their doctrine of the possibility of sinless perfection, which Zin-
zendorf, in particular, rejected. On the other hand, Wesley felt the
emotional element in the Hermhut religion to be mysticism and
branded Luther's interpretation of the law as blasphemous. This
shows the barrier which existed between Lutheranism and every
kind of rational religious conduct.

163. John Wesley emphasizes the fact that everywhere, among
Quakers, Presbyterians, and High Churchmen, one must believe in

251

The Protestant Ethic and the Spirit of Capitalism

dogmas, except in Methodism. With the above, compare the rather
summary discussion in Skeats, History of the Free Churches of
England, 1688-1851.

164. Compare Dexter, Congregationalism, pp. 455 ff.

165. Though naturally it might interfere with it, as is to-day the
case among the American negroes. Furthermore, the often definitely
pathological character of Methodist emotionalism as compared to
the relatively mild type of Pietism may possibly, along with purely
historical reasons and the publicity of the process, be connected
with the greater ascetic penetration of life in the areas where Method-
ism is widespread. Only a neurologist could decide that.

166. Loofs, op. cit., p. 750, strongly emphasizes the fact that
Methodism is distinguished from other ascetic movements in that it
came after the English Enlightenment, and compares it with the
(surely much less pronounced) German Renaissance of Pietism in
the first third of the nineteenth century. Nevertheless, it is permissible,
following Ritschl, Lehre von der Rechtfertigung und Versöhnung, I,
pp. 568 f., to retain the parallel with the Zinzendorf form of Pietism,
which, unlike that of Spener and Francke, was already itself a reaction
against the Enlightenment. However, this reaction takes a very
different course in Methodism from that of the Hermhuters, at
least so far as they were influenced by Zinzendorf.

167. But which, as is shown by the passage from John Wesley
(below, p. 175), it developed in the same way and with the same
effect as the other ascetic denominations.

168. And, as we have seen, milder forms of the consistent ascetic
ethics of Puritanism; while if, in the popular manner, one wished to
interpret these religious conceptions as only exponents or reflections
of capitalistic institutions, just the opposite would have to be the case.

169. Of the Baptists only the so-called General Baptists go back
to the older movement. The Particular Baptists were, as we have
pointed out already, Calvinists, who in principle limited Church
membership to the regenerate, or at least personal believers, and
hence remained in principle voluntarists and opponents of any State
Church. Under Cromwell, no doubt, they were not always consistent
in practice. Neither they nor the General Baptists, however important
they are as the bearers of the Baptist tradition, give us any occasion
for an especial dogmatic analysis here. That the Quakers, though
formally a new foundation of George Fox and his associates, were
fundamentally a continuation of the Baptist tradition, is beyond
question. The best introduction to their history, including their
relations to Baptists and Mennonites, is Robert Barclay, The Inner
Life of the Religious Societies of the Commonwealth, 1876. On the
history of the Baptists, compare, among others, H. M. Dexter, The
True Story of John Smyth, the Se-Baptist, as told by himself and his
contemporaries, Boston, i88i (also J. C. Lang in The Baptist Quarterly

252

Notes

Review, 1883, p. i); J. Murch, A History of the Presb. and Gen.
Bapt. Church in the West of England, London, 1835; A. H. Newman,
History of the Baptist Church in the U.S., New York, 1894 (Am.
Church Hist. Series, vol. 2) ; Vedder, A Short History of the Baptists,
London, 1897 ; E. B. Bax, Rise and Fall of the Anabaptists, New York,
1902; G. Lorimer, The Baptists in History, 1902; J. A, Seiss, The
Baptist System Examined, Lutheran Publication Society, 1902;
furthermaterial in the Baptist Handbook, London, 1896 ff.; Baptist
Manuals, Paris, 1891-93; The Baptist Quarterly Review; and the
Bibliotheca Sacra, Oberlin, 1900.

The best Baptist library seems to be that of Colgate College in
the State of New York. For the history of the Quakers the collection
in Devonshire House in London is considered the best (not available
to me). The official modern organ of orthodoxy is the American
Friend, edited by Professor Jones; the best Quaker history that of
Rowntree. In addition: Rufus B. Jones, George Fox, an Autobiography,
Phila., 1903; Alton C. Thomas, A History of the Society of Friends
in America, Phila., 1895 ; Edward Grubbe, Social Aspects of the Quaker
Faith, London, 1899. Also the copious and excellent biographical
literature.

170. It is one of the many merits of Karl MüUer's Kirchengeschichte
to have given the Baptist movement, great in its way, even though
outwardly unassuming, the place it deserved in his work. It has
suffered more than any other from the pitiless persecution of all
the Churches, because it wished to be a sect in the specific sense of
that word. Even after five generations it was discredited before the
eyes of all the world by the debacle of the related eschatological
experiment in Münster. And, continually oppressed and driven
underground, it was long after its origin before it attained a consistent
formulation of its religious doctrines. Thus it produced even less
theology than would have been consistent with its principles, which
were themselves hostile to a specializea development of its faith in
God as a science. That was not very pleasing to the older professional
theologians, even in its own time, and it made little impression on
them. But many more recent ones have taken the same attitude. In
Ritschl, Pietismus, I, pp. 22 f., the rebaptizers are not very adequately,
in fact, rather contemptuously, treated. One is tempted to speak of
a theological bourgeois standpoint. That, in spite of the fact that
Cornelius's fine work {Geschichte des Münsterschen Aufruhrs) had
been available for decades.

Here also Ritschl everywhere sees a retrogression from his stand-
point toward Catholicism, and suspects direct influences of the
radical wing of the Franciscan tradition. Even if such could be
proved in a few cases, these threads would be very thin. Above all,
the historical fact was probably that the official Catholic Church,
wherever the worldly asceticism of the laity went as far as the

The Protestant Ethic and the Spirit of Capitalism

formation of conventicles, regarded it with the utmost suspicion and
attempted to encourage the formation of orders, thus outside the
world, or to attach it as asceticism of the second grade to the existing
orders and bring it under control. Where this did not succeed, it
felt the danger that the practice of subjectivist ascetic morality might
lead to the denial of authority and to heresy, just as, and with the
same justification, the Elizabethan Church felt toward the half-
Pietistic prophesying Bible conventicles, even when their conformism
was undoubted; a feeling which was expressed by the Stuarts in
their Book of Sports, of which later. The history of numerous heretical
movements, including,, for instance, the Humiliati and the Beguins,
as well as the fate of St. Francis, are the proofs of it. The preaching
of the mendicant friars, especially the Franciscans, probably did
much to prepare the way for the ascetic lay morality of Calvinist-
Baptist Protestantism, But the numerous close relationships between
the asceticism of Western monasticism and the ascetic conduct of
Protestantism, the importance of which must continually be stressed
for our particular problems, are based in the last analysis on the fact
that important factors are necessarily common to every asceticism
on the basis of Biblical Christianity. Furthermore, every asceticism,
no matter what its faith, has need of certain tried methods of subduing
the flesh.

Of the following sketch it may further be remarked that its brevity
is due to the fact that the Baptist ethic is of only very limited
importance for the problem considered primarily in this study, the
development of the religious background of the bourgeois idea of
the calling. It contributed nothing new whatever to it. The much
more important social aspect of the movement must for the present
remain untouched. Of the history of the older Baptist movement,
we can, from the view-point of our problem, present here only what
was later important for the development of the sects in which we
are interested: Baptists, Quakers, and, more incidentally, Mennonites.

171. See above [note 92].

172. On their origin and changes, see A. Ritschl in his Gesammelte
Aufsätze, pp. 69 f. *

173. Naturally the Baptists have always repudiated the designation
of a sect. They form the Church in the sense of the Epistle to the
Ephesians v. 27. But in our terminology they form a sect not only
because they lack all relation to the State. The relation between Church
and State of early Christianity was even for the Quakers (Barclay) their
ideal; for to them, as to many Pietists, only a Church under the
Cross was beyond suspicion of its purity. But the Calvinists as well,
faute de mieux, similarly even the Catholic Church in the same
circumstances, were forced to favour the separation of Church and
State under an unbelieving State or under the Cross. Neither were
they a sect, because induction to membership in the Church took

Notes

place de facto through a contract between the congregation and the
candidates. For that was formally the case in the Dutch Reformed
communities (as a result of the original political situation) in accord-
ance with the old Church constitution (see v. Hoffmann, Kirchen-
verfassungsrecht der nieder!. Reformierten, Leipzig, 1902).

On the contrary, it was because such a religious community could
only be voluntarily organized as a sect, not compulsorily as a Church,
if it did not wish to include the unregenerate and thus depart from
the Early Christian ideal. For the Baptist communities it was an
essential of the very idea of their Church, while for the Calvinists
it was an historical accident. To be sure, that the latter were also
urged by very definite religious motives in the direction of the
believers' Church has already been indicated. On the distinction
between Church and sect, see the following essay. The concept of
sect which I have adopted here has been used at about the same
time and, I assume, independently from me, by Kattenbusch in the
Realenzyklopädie für protestantische Theologie und Kirche (Article
Sekte). Troeltsch in his Die Soziallehren der christlichen Kirchen und
Gruppen accepts it and discusses it more in detail. See also below,
the introduction to the essays on the Wirtschaftsethik der Weltreligionen.

174. How important this symbol was, historically, for the conser-
vation of the Church commünty, since it was an unambiguous and
unmistakable sign, has been very clearly shown by Cornelius, op. cit.

175. Certain approaches to it in the Mennonites' doctrine of justi-
fication need not concern us here.

176. This idea is perhaps the basis of the religious interest in the
discussion of questions like the incarnation of Christ and his relation-
ship to the Virgin Mary, which, often as the sole purely dogmatic
part, stands out so strangely in the oldest documents of Baptism (for
instance the confessions printed in Cornelius, op. cit., Appendix to
Vol, n. On this question, see K. Müller, Kirchengeschichte, II, i,
p. 330). The difference between the christology of the Reformed
Church and the Lutheran (in the doctrine of the so-called communicatio
idiomatum) seems to have been based on similar religious interests.

177. It was expressed especially in the original strict avoidance
even of everyday intercourse with the excommunicated, a point at
which even the Calvinists, who in principle held the opinion that
worldly affairs were not affected by spiritual censure, made large
concessions. See the following essay.

178. How this principle was applied by the Quakers to seemingly
trivial externals (refusal to remove the hat, to kneel, bow, or use
formal address) is well known. The basic idea is to a certain extent
characteristic of all asceticism. Hence the fact that true asceticism is
always hostile to authority." In Calvinism it appeared in the principle
that only Christ should rule, in the Church. In the case of Pietism'
one may think of Spener's attempts to find a Biblical justification of

The Protestant Ethic and the Spirit of Capitalism

titles. Catholic asceticism, so far as ecclesiastical authority was con-
cerned, broke through this tendency in its oath of obedience, by
interpreting obedience itself in ascetic terms. The overturning of
this principle in Protestant asceticism is the historical basis of the
peculiarities of even the contemporary democracy of the peoples
influenced by Puritanism as distinct from that of the Latin spirit.
It is also part of the historical background of that lack of respect of
the American which is, as the case may be, so irritating or so
refreshing.

179. No doubt this was true from the beginning for the Baptists
essentially only of the New Testament, not to the same extent of
the Old. Especially the Sermon on the Mount enjoyed a peculiar
prestige as a programme of social ethic in all denominations.

180. Even Schwenkfeld had considered the outward performance
of the sacraments an adiaphoron, while the General Baptists and the
Mennonites held strictly to Baptism and the Communion, the Men-
nonites to the washing of feet in addition. On the other hand, for
the predestinationists the depreciation, in fact for all except the com-
munion— one may even say the suspicion — in which the sacraments
were held, went very far. See the following essay.

181. On this point the Baptist denominations, ' especially the
Quakers (Barclay, Apology for the True Christian Divinity, fourth
edition, London, 1701, kindly placed at my disposal by Eduard
Bernstein), referred to Calvin's statements in the Instit. Christ, III,
p. 2, where in fact quite unmistakable suggestions of Baptist doctrine
are to be found. Also the older distinction between the Word of God
as that which God had revealed to the patriarchs, the prophets, and
the apostles, and the Holy Scriptures as that part of it which they
had written down, was, even though there was no historical con-
nection, intimately related to the Baptist conception of revelation.
The mechanical idea of inspiration, and with it the strict bibliocracy
of the Calvinists, was just as much the product of their development
in one direction in the course of the sixteenth century as the doctrine
of the inner light of the Quakers, derived from Baptist sources, was
the result of a directly opposite development. The sharp differen-
tiation was also in this case partly a result of continual disputes.

182. That was emphasized strongly against certain tendencies of
the Socinians. The natural .reason knows nothing whatever of God
(Barclay, op. cit., p. 102). That meant that the part played by the
lex natures elsewhere in Protestantism was altered. In principle
there could be no general rules, no moral code, for the calling which
everyone had, and which is different for every individual, is revealed
to him by God through his conscience. We should do, not the good
in the general sense of natural reason, but God's will as it is written
in our hearts and known through the conscience (Barclay, pp. 73,
76). This irrationality of morality, derived from the exaggerated

256

Notes

contrast between the divine and the flesh, is expressed in these
fundamental tenets of Quaker ethics: "What a man does contrary to
his faith, though his faith may be wrong, is in no way acceptable
to God — though the thing might have been lawful to another"
(Barclay, p. 487). Of course that could not be upheld in practice.
The "moral and perpetual statutes acknowledged by all Christians"
are, for instance, for Barclay the limit of toleration. In practice the
contemporaries felt their ethic, with certain peculiarities of its own,
to be similar to that of the Reformed Pietists. "Everything good in
the Church is suspected of being Quakerism", as Spener repeatedly
points out. It thus seems that Spener envied the Quakers this reputa-
tion. Cons. Theol., Ill, 6, i, Dist. 2, No. 64. The repudiation of oaths
on the basis of a passage in the Bible shows that the real emancipation
from the Scriptures had not gone far. The significance for social
ethics of the principle, "Do unto others as you would that they
should do unto you", which many Quakers regarded as the essence
of the whole Christian ethics, need not concern us here.

183. The necessity of assuming this possibility Barclay justifies
because without it "there should never be a place known by the
Saints wherein they might be free of doubting and despair, which —
is most absurd". It is evident that the certitudo salutis depends upon
it. Thus Barclay, op. cit., p. 20.

184. There thus remains a difference in type between the Cal-
vinistic and the Quaker rationalization of life. But when Baxter
formulates it by saying that the spirit is supposed by the Quakers
to act upon the soul as on a corpse, while the characteristically
formulated Calvinistic principle is "reason and spirit are conjunct
principles" {Christian Directory, II, p. 76), the distinction was no
longer valid for his time in this form.

185. Thus in the very careful articles "Menno" and "Men-
noniten" by Cramer in the Realenzyklopädie für protestantische
Theologie und Kirche, especially p. 604. However excellent these
articles are, the article "Baptisten" in the same encyclopedia is not
very penetrating and in part simply incorrect. Its author does not
know, for instance, the Publications of the Hanserd Knolly's Society,
which are indispensable for the history of Baptism.

186. Thus Barclay, op. cit., p. 404, explains that eatmg, drinking,
and acquisition are natural, not spiritual acts, which may be per-
formed without the special sanction of God. The explanation is in
reply to the characteristic objection that if, as the Quakers teach,
one cannot pray without a special motion of the Spirit, the same
should apply to ploughing. It is, of course, significant that even in the
modem resolutions of Quaker Synods the advice is sometimes given
to retire from business after acquiring a sufficient fortune, in order,
withdrawn from the bustle of the world, to be able to live in devotion
to the Kingdom of God alone. But the same idea certainly occurs

The Protestant Ethic and the Spirit of Capitalism

occasionally in other denominations, including Calvinism. That
betrays the fact that the acceptance of the bourgeois practical ethics
by these movements w^as the worldly application of an asceticism
which had originally fled from the world.

187. Veblen in his suggestive book The Theory of Business
Enterprise is of the opinion that this motto belongs only to early
capitalism. But economic supermen, who, like the present captains
of industry, have stood beyond good and evil, have always existed,
and the statement is still true of the broad underlying strata of
business men.

188. We may here again expressly call attention to the excellent
remarks of Eduard Bernstein, op. cit. To Kautsky's highly schematic
treatment of the Baptist movement and his theory of heretical com-
munism in general (in the first volume of the same work) we shall
return on another occasion.

189. "In civil actions it is good to be as the many, in religious
to be as the best", says, for example, Thomas Adams {Works of the
Puritan Divines, p. 138).. That sounds somewhat more drastic than
it is meant to be. It means that the Puritan honesty is formalistic
legality, just as the uprightness which the sometime Puritan people
like to claim as a national virtue is something specifically different
from the German Ehrlichkeit. Some good remarks on the subject
from the educational standpoint may be found in the Preuss. Jahrb.,
CXI I (1903), p. 226. The formalism of the Puritan ethic is in turn
the natural consequence of its relation to the law.

190. Something is said on this in the following essay.

191. This is the reason for the economic importance of the ascetic
Protestant, but not Catholic, minorities.

192. That the difference of dogmatic basis was not inconsistent
with the adoption of the most important interest in proof is to be
explained in the last analysis by the historical peculiarities of Christi-
anity in general which cannot be discussed here.

193. "Since God hath gathered us to be a people", says Barclay, op.
cit., p. 357. 1 myself heard a Quaker sermon at Haverford College which
laid great emphasis on the interpretation of saints as meaning separate.

CHAPTER V

I. See the excellent sketch of his character in Dowden, op. cit.
A passable introduction to Baxter's theology, after he had abandoned
a strict belief in the double decree, is given in the introduction to
the various extracts from his works printed in the Works of the
Puritan Divines (by Jenkyn). His attempt to combine universal
redemption and personal election satisfied no one. For us it is
important only that he even then held to personal election, i.e. to

258

Notes

the most important point for ethics in the doctrine of predestination.
On the other hand, his weakening of the forensic view of redemption
is important as being suggestive of baptism.

2. Tracts and sermons by Thomas Adams, John Howe, Matthew
Henry, J. Janeway, Stuart Charnock, Baxter, Bunyan, have been
collected in the ten volumes of the Works of the Puritan Divines
(London, 1845-8), though the choice is often somewhat arbitrary.
Editions of the works of Bailey, Sedgwick, and Hoombeek have
already been referred to.

3. We could just as well have included Voet and other continental
representatives of worldly asceticism. Brentano's view that the whole
development was purely Anglo-Saxon is quite wrong. My choice is
motivated mainly (though not exclusively) by the wish to present
the ascetic naovement as much as possible in the second half of the
seventeenth century, immediately before the change to utilitarianism.
It has unfortunately been impossible, within the limits of this sketch,
to enter upon the fascinating task of presenting the characteristics
of ascetic Protestantism through the medium of the biographical
literature ; the Quakers would in this connection be particularly
important, since they are relatively little known in Germany.

4. For one might just as well take the writings of Gisbert Voet,
the proceedings of the Huguenot Synods, or the Dutch Baptist
literature. Sombart and Brentano have unfortunately taken just the
ebionitic parts of Baxter, which I myself have strongly emphasized,
to confront me with the undoubted capitalistic backwardness of his
doctrines. But (i) one must know this whole literature thoroughly
in order to use it correctly, and (2) not overlook the fact that I have
attempted to show how, in spite of its anti-mammonistic doctrines,
the spirit of this ascetic religion nevertheless, just as in the monastic
communities, gave birth to economic rationalism because it placed
a premium on what was most important for it: the fundamentally
ascetic rational motives. That fact alone is under discussion and is
the point of this whole essay.

5. Similarly in Calvin, -who was certainly no champion of bour-
geois wealth (see the sharp attacks on Venice and Antwerp in Jes.
Opp., ni, 140a, 308a).

6. Saints' Everlasting Rest, chaps, x, xii. Compare Bailey {Prax-
is Pietatis, p. 182) or Matthew Henry {The Worth of the Soul, Works
of the Puritan Divines, p. 319). "Those that are eager in pursuit of
worldly wealth despise their Soul, not only because the Soul is
neglected and the body preferred before it, but because it is employed
in these pursuits" (Psa. cxxvii. 2). On the same page, however, is
the remark to be cited below about the sinfulness of all waste of
time, especially in recreations. Similarly in almost the whole religious
literature of English-Dutch Puritanism. See, for instance, Hoombeek's
(op. cit., L, X,ch, 18, i8) Phillipics against avaritia. This writer is also

The Protestant Ethic ayid the Spirit of Capitalism

affected by sentimental pietistic influences. See the praise of tran-
quillitas animi which is much more pleasing to God than the sollicitudo
of this world. Also Bailey, referring to the well-known passage in
Scripture, is of the opinion that "A rich man is not easily saved"
{op. cit., p. 182). The Methodist catechisms also warn against
"gathering treasure on this earth". For Pietism this is quite obvious,
as also for the Quakers. Compare Barclay {op. cit., p. 517), "... and
therefore beware of such temptations as to use their callings as an
engine to be richer".

7. For not wealth alone, but also the impulsive pursuit of it (or
what passed as such) was condemned with similar severity. In the
Netherlands the South Holland Synod of 1574 declared, in reply to
a question, that nioney-lenders should not be admitted to communion
even though the business was permitted by law; and the Deventer
Provincial Synod of 1598 (Art. 24) extended this to the employees
of nioney-lenders. The Synod of Gorichem in 1606 prescribed severe
and humiliating conditions under which the wives of usurers might
be admitted, and the question was discussed as late as 1644 and 1657
whether Lombards should be admitted to communion (this against
Brentano, who cites his own Catholic ancestors, although foreign
traders and bankers have existed in the whole European and Asiatic
world for thousands of years). Gisbert Voet (Disp. Theol., IV,
1667, cie usiiris, p. 665) still wanted to exclude the Trapezites
(Lombards, Piedmontese). The same was true of the Huguenot
Synods. This type of capitalistic classes were not the typical
representatives of the philosophy or the type of conduct with which
we are concerned. They were also not new as compared with
antiquity or the Middle Ages.

8. Developed in detail in the tenth chapter of the Saints' Ever-
lasting Rest. He who should seek to rest in the shelter of possessions
which God gives, God strikes even in this life. A self-satisfied enjoy-
ment of wealth already gained is almost always a symptom of moral
degradation. If we had everything which we could have in this world,
would that be all we hoped for? Complete satisfaction of desires is
not attainable on earth because God's will has decreed it should
not be so.

9. Christian Directory, I, pp. 375-6. "It is for action that God
maintaineth us and our activities; work is the moral as well as the
natural end of power. ... It is action that God is most served and
honoured by. . . . The public welfare or the good of the many is
to be valued above our own." Here is the connecting-point for the
transition from the will of God to the purely utilitarian view-point of
the later liberal theory. On the religious sources of Utilitarianism,
see below in the text and above, chap, iv, note 145.

10. The commandment of silence has been, starting from the
Biblical threat of punishment for every useless word, especially since

260

Notes

the Cluny monks, a favourite ascetic means of education in self-
control, Baxter also speaks in detail of the sinfulness of unnecessary
words. Its place in his character has been pointed out by Sanford,
op. cit., pp. 90 ff.

What contemporaries felt as the deep melancholy and moroseness
of the Puritans was the result of breaking down the spontaneity of
the status naturalis, and the condemnation of thoughtless speech was
in the service of this end. When Washington Irving {Bracebridge
Hall, chap, xxx) seeks the reason for it partly in the calculating
spirit of capitalism and partly in the effect of political freedom,
which promotes a sense of responsibility, it may be remarked that
it does not apply to the Latin peoples. For England the situation
was probably that: (i) Puritanism enabled its adherents to create
free institutions and still become a world power ; and (2) it trans-
formed that calculating spirit (what Sombart calls Rechenhaftigkeit),
which is in truth essential to capitalism, from a mere means to
economy into a principle of general conduct.

11. Op. cit., I, p. III.

12. Op. cit., I, p. 383 f.

13. Similarly on the preciousness of time, see Barclay, op. cit., p. 14.

14. Baxter, op. cit., I, p. 79. "Keep up a high esteem of time and
be every day more careful that you lose none of your time, than
you are that you lose none of your gold and silver. And if vain
recreation, dressings, feastings, idle talk, unprofitable company, or
sleep be any of them temptations to rob you of any of your time,
accordingly heighten your watchfulness." "Those that are prodigal
of their time despise their own souls", says Matthew Henry {Worth
of the Soul, Works of the Puritan Divines, p. 315). Here also Protestant
asceticism follows a well-beaten track. We are accustomed to think it
characteristic of the modern man that he has no time, and for instance,
like Goethe in the Wanderjahren, to measure the degree of capitalistic
development by the fact that the clocks strike every quarter-hour.
So also Sombart in his Kapitalismus. We ought not, however, to
forget that the first people to live (in the Middle Ages) with careful
measurement of time were the monks, and that the church bells
were meant above all to meet their needs.

15. Compare Baxter's discussion of the calling, op. cit., I, pp. 108 ti.
Especially the following passage: "Question: But may I not cast off
the world that I may only think of my salvation ? Answer : You may
cast off all such excess of worldly cares or business as unnecessarily
hinder you in spiritual things. But you may not cast off all bodily
employment and mental labour in which you may serve the common
good. Everyone as a member of Church or Commonwealth must
employ their parts to the utmost for the good of the Church and the
Commonwealth. To neglect this and say: I will pray and meditate,
is as if your servant should refuse his greatest work and tie himself

261

The Protestant Ethic and the Spirit of Capitalism

to some lesser, easier part. And God hath commanded you some
way or other to labour for your daily bread and not to live as drones
of the sweat of others only." God's commandment to Adam, "In
the sweat of thy brow", and Paul's declaration, "He who will not
work shall not eat", are also quoted. It has always been known of
the Quakers that even the most well-to-do of them have had their
sons learn a calling, for ethical and not, as Alberti recommends, for
utilitarian reasons.

i6. Here are points where Pietism, on account of its emotional
character, takes a different view. Spener, although he emphasizes in
characteristic Lutheran fashion that labour in a calling is worship
of God {Theologische Bedenken, III, p. 445), nevertheless holds that
the restlessness of business affairs distracts one from God, a most
characteristic difference from Puritanism.

17. I, op. cit., p. 242 ."It's they that are lazy in their callings that
can find no time for holy duties." Hence the idea that the cities, the
seat of the middle class with its rational business activities, are the
seats of ascetic virtue. Thus Baxter says of his hand-loom weavers
in Kidderminster: "And their constant converse and traffic with
London doth much to promote civility and piety among trades-
men . . ." in his autobiography {Works of the Puritan Divines,
p. 38). That the proximity of the capital should promote virtue
would astonish modem clergymen, at least in Germany. But Pietism
also inclined to similar views. Thus Spener, speaking of a young
colleague, writes : "At least it appears that among the great multitudes
in the cities, though the majority is quite depraved, there are never-
theless a number of good people who can accomplish much, while
in villages often hardly anything good can be found in a whole
community" {Theologische Bedenken, I, 66, p. 303). In other words,
the peasant is little suited to rational ascetic conduct. Its ethical
glorification is very modem. We cannot here enter into the significance
of this and similar statements for the question of the relation of
asceticism to social classes.

18. Take, for instance, the following passages {op. cit., p. 336 f.):
"Be wholly taken up in diligent business of your lawful callings
when you are not exercised in the more immediate service of God."
"Labour hard in your callings." "See that you have a calling which
will find, you employment for all the time which God's immediate
service spareth."

19. That the peculiar ethical valuation of labour and its dignity
was not originally a Christian idea nor even peculiar to Christianity
has recently again been strongly emphasized by Harnack {Mitt, des
Ev.-Soz. Kongr., 14. Folge, 1905, Nos. 3,4, p. 48).

20. Similarly in Pietism (Spener, op. cit.. Ill, pp. 429-30). The
characteristic Pietist version is that loyalty to a calling which is
imposed upon us by the fall serves to annihilate one's own selfish

262

Notes

will. Labour in the calling is, as a service of love to one's neighbour,
a duty of gratitude for God's grace (a Lutheran idea), and hence it
is not pleasing to God that it should be performed reluctantly
{pp. cit.,\\\, p. 272). The Christian should thus "prove himself as
industrious in his labour as a worldly man" (III, p. 278). That is
obviously less drastic than the Puritan version .

21. The significance of this important difference, which has been
evident ever since the Benedictine rules, can only be shown by a
much wider investigation.

22. "A sober procreation of children" is its purpose according
to Baxter. Similarly Spener, at the same time with concessions to
the coarse Lutheran attitude, which makes the avoidance of im-
morality, which is otherwise unavoidable, an accessory aim. Con-
cupiscence as an accompaniment of sexual intercourse is sinful even
in marriage. For instance, in Spener 's view it is a result of the fall
which transformed such a natural, divinely ordained process into
something inevitably accompanied by sinful sensations, which is
hence shameful. Also in the opinion of various Pietistic groups the
highest form of Christian marriage is that with the preservation of
virginity, the next highest that in which sexual intercourse is only
indulged in for the procreation of children, and so on down to those
which are contracted for purely erotic or external reasons and which
are, from an ethical standpoint, concubinage. On these lower levels
a marriage entered into for purely economic reasons is preferred
(because after all it is inspired by rational motives) to one with erotic
foundations. We may here neglect the Herrnhut theory and practice
of marriage. Rationalistic philosophy (Christian Wolff) adopted the
ascetic theory in the form that what was designed as a means to an
end, concupiscence and its satisfaction, should not be made an end
in itself.

The transition to a pure, hygienically oriented utilitarianism had
already taken place in Franklin, who took approximately the ethical
standpoint of modern physicians, who understand by chastity the
restriction of sexual intercourse to the amount desirable for health,
and who have, as is well known, even given theoretical advice as to
how that should be accomplished. As soon as these matters have
become the object of purely rational consideration the same develop-
ment has everywhere taken place. The Puritan and the hygienic
sex-rationalist generally tread very different paths, but here they
understand each other perfectly. In a lecture, a zealous adherent of
hygienic prostitution — it was a question of the regulation of brothels
and prostitutes — defended the moral legitimacy of extra-marital
intercourse (which was looked upon as hygienically useful) by referring
to its poetic justification in the case of Faust and Margaret. To treat
Margaret as a prostitute and to fail to distinguish the powerful sway
of human passions from sexual intercourse for hygienic reasons,

263

The Protestant Ethic and the Spirit of Capitalism

both are thoroughly congenial to the Puritan standpoint. Similar,
for instance, is the typical specialist's view, occasionally put forward
by very distinguished physicians, that a question which extends so
far into the subtlest problems of personality and of culture as that
of sexual abstinence should be dealt with exclusively in the forum
of the physician (as an expert). For the Puritan the expert was the
moral theorist, now he is the medical man ; but the claim of com-
petence to dispose of the questions which seem to us somewhat
narrow-minded is, with opposite signs of course, the same in both
cases.

But with all its prudery, the powerful idealism of the Puritan
attitude can show positive accomplishments, even from the point of
view of race conservation in a purely hygienic sense, while modern
sex hygiene, on account of the appeal to unprejudicedness which it
is forced to make, is in danger of destroying the basis of all its success.
How, with the rationalistic interpretation of sexual relations among
peoples influenced by Puritanism, a certain refinement and spiritual
and ethical penetration of marital relationships, with a blossoming
of matrimonial chivalry, has grown up, in contrast to the patriarchal
sentimentality (Brodeni), which is typical of Germany even in the
circles of the intellectual aristocracy, must necessarily remain outside
this discussion. Baptist influences have played a part in the emancipa-
tion of woman ; the protection of her freedom of conscience, and
the extension of the idea of the universal priesthood to her were
here also the first breaches in patriarchal ideas.

23. This recurs again and again in Baxter. The Biblical basis is
regularly either the passages in Proverbs, which we already know
from Franklin (xxii. 29), or those in praise of labour (xxxi. 16). Cf.
op. cit., I, pp. 377, 382, etc.

24. Even Zinzendorf says at one point: "One does not only work
in order to live, but one lives for the sake of one's work, and if
there is no more work to do one suffers or goes to sleep" (Plitt,
op. cit., I, p. 428).

25. Also a symbol of the Mormons closes (after quotations) with
the words: "But a lazy or indolent man cannot be a Christian and
be saved. He is destined to be struck down and cast from the hive."
But in this case it was primarily the grandiose discipline, half-way
between monastery and factory, which placed the individual before
the dilemma of labour or annihilation and, of course in connection
with religious enthusiasm and only possible through it, brought
forth the astonishing economic achievements of this sect.

26. Hence (op. cit., I, p. 380) its symptoms are carefully analysed.
Sloth and idleness are such deadly sins because they have a cumu-
lative character. They are even regarded by Baxter as "destroyers of
grace" (op. cit., I, pp. 279-80), That is, they are the antitheses of the
methodical life.

264

Notes

27. See above, chap, iii, note 5.

28. Baxter, op. cit., I, pp. 108 ff. Especially striking are the follow-
ing passages: "Question: But will not wealth excuse us? Answer:
It may excuse you from some sordid sort of work by making you
more serviceable to another, but you are no more excused from
service of work . . . than the poorest man." Also, p. 376: ''Though
they [the rich] have no outward want to urge them, they have as

' great a necessity to obey God , . . God hath strictly commanded
it [labour] to all." Chap, iv, note 47.

29. Similarly Spener (op. cit., Ill, pp. 338, 425), who for this
reason opposes the tendency to early retirement as morally objec-
tionable, and, in refuting an objection to the taking of interest, that
the enjoyment of interest leads to laziness, emphasizes that anyone
who was in a position to live upon interest would still be obligated
to work by God's commandment.

30. Including Pietism. Whenever a question of change of calling
arises, Spener takes the attitude that after a certain calling has once
been entered upon, it is a duty of obedience to Providence to remain
and acquiesce in it.

31. The tremendous force, dominating the whole of conduct,
with which the Indian religious teaching sanctions economic tradi-
tionalism in terms of chances of favourable rebirth, I have shown in
the essays on the Wirtschaftsethik der Weltreligionen. It is an excellent
example by which to show the difference between mere ethical
theories and the creation of psychological sanctions with a religious
background for certain types of conduct. The pious Hindu could
advance in the scale of transmigration only by the strictly traditional
fulfilment of the duties of the caste of his birth. It was the strongest
conceivable religious basis for traditionalism. In fact, the Indian
ethic is in this respect the most completely consistent antithesis of
the Puritan, as in another respect (traditionalism of the caste structure)
it is opposed to the Hebrew,

32. Baxter, op. cit., I, p. 377.

33. But this does not mean that the Puritan view-point was his-
torically derived from the latter. On the contrary, it is an expression
of the genuinely Calvinistic idea that the cosmos of the world serves
the glory of God. The utilitarian turn, that the economic cosmos
should serve the good of the many, the common good, etc., was a
consequence of the idea that any other interpretation of it would
lead to aristocratic idolatry of the flesh, or at least did not serve the
glory of God, but only fleshly cultural ends. But God's will, as it is
expressed (chap iv, note 34) in the purposeful arrangements of the
economic cosmos, can, so far as secular ends are in question at all,
only be embodied in the good of the community, in imF>ersonal
usefulness. Utilitarianism is thus, as has already been pointed out,
the result of the impersonal character of brotherly love and the

26;;

The Protestant Ethic and the Spirit of Capitalism

repudiation of all glorification of this world by the exclusiveness of
the Puritan in majorem Dei gloriam.

How completely this idea, that all idolatry of the flesh is incon-
sistent with the glory of God and hence unconditionally bad,
dominated ascetic Protestantism is clearly shown by the doubts and
hesitation which it cost even Spener, who certainly was not infected
with democracy, to maintain the use of titles as äöidi])opov against
numerous objections. He finally comforted himself with the reflection
that even in the Bible the Praetor Festus was given the title of
KpdriajoQ by the Apostles. The political side of the question does
not arise in this connection.

34. "The inconstant man is a stranger in his own house", says
Thomas Adams {Works of the Puritan Divines, p. 77).

35. On this, see especially George Fox's remarks in the Friends'
Library (ed. W. & T. Evans, Philadelphia, 1837), I, p. 130.

36. Above all, this sort .of religious ethic cannot be regarded as a
reflex of economic conditions. The specialization of occupations had,
if anything, gone further. in mediaeval Italy than in the England of
that period.

37. For, as is often pointed out in the Puritan literature, God
never commanded "love thy neighbour more than thyself", but only
as thyself. Hence self-regard is also a duty. For instance, a man who
can make better use of his possessions, to the greater glory of God,
than his neighbour, is not obliged by the duty of brotherly love to
part with them.

38. Spener is also close to this view-point. But even in the case
of transfer from commercial occupations (regarded as especially
dangerous to virtue) to theology, he remains hesitaiit and on the
wholeopposed to it (o/). a7., HI, pp. 435, 443; I, p. 524). The frequent
occurrence of the reply to just this question (of the permissibility of
changing a calling) in Spener's naturally biassed opinion shows,
incidentally, how eminently practical the different ways of inter-
preting I Corinthians vii were.

39. Such ideas are not to be found, at least in the writings, of the
leading Continental Pietists. Spener's attitude vacillates between the
Lutheran (that of satisfaction of needs) and Mercantilist arguments
for the usefulness of the prosperity of commerce, etc. {op. cit., HI,
PP- 330i'332; I, p. 418: "the cultivation of tobacco brings money
into the country and is thus useful, hence not sinful". Compare
also HI, pp. 426-7, 429, 434). But he does not neglect to point out
that, as the example of the Quakers and the Mennonites shows,
one can make profit and yet remain pious ; in fact, that even especially
high profits, as we shall point out later, may be the direct result of
pious uprightness {op. cit., p. 435).

. 40. These views of Baxter are not a reflection of the economic
environment in which he lived. On the contrary, his autobiography

266

Notes

shows that the success of his home missionary work was partly due
to the fact that the Kidderminster tradesmen were not rich, but
only earned food and raiment, and that the master craftsmen had
to live from hand to mouth just as their employees did. "It is the
poor who receive the glad tidings of the Gospel." Thomas Adams
remarks on the pursuit of gain: "He [the knowing man] knows . . .
that money may make a man richer, not better, and thereupon
chooseth rather to sleep with a good conscience than a full purse . . .
therefore desires no more wealth than an honest man may bear
away" {Works of the Puritan Divines, LI). But he does want that
much, and that means that every formally honest gain is legitimate.

41. Thus Baxter, op. cit., I, chap, x, i, 9 (par. 24) ; I, p. 378, 2.
In Prov. xxiii. 4: "Weary thyself not to be rich" nKeans only "riches
for our fleshly ends must not ultimately be intended". Possession in
the feudal-seigneurial form of its use is what is odious (cf . the remark,
op. cit., I, p. 380, on the "debauched part of the gentry"), not posses-
sion in itself. Milton, in the first Defensio pro populo Anglicano, held
the well-known theory that only the middle class can maintain
virtue. That middle class here means bourgeoisie as against the
aristocracy is shown by the statement that both luxury and necessity
are unfavourable to virtue.

42. This is most important. We may again add the general remark:
we are here naturally not so much concerned with what concepts
the theological moralists developed in their ethical theories, but,
rather, what was the effective morality in the life of believers — that
is, how the religious background of economic ethics affected practice.
In the casuistic literature of Catholicism, especially the Jesuit, one
can occasionally read discussions which — for instance on the question
of the justification of interest, into which we do not enter here — sound
like those of many Protestant casuists, or even seem to go farther in
permitting or tolerating things. The Puritans have since often
enough been reproached that their ethic is at bottom the same as
that of the Jesuits. Just as the Calvinists often cite Catholic moralists,
not only Thomas Aquinas, Bernhard of Clairvaux, Bonaventura,
etc., but also contemporaries, the Catholic casuists also took notice
of heretical ethics. We cannot discuss all that here.

But quite apart from the decisive fact of the religious sanction of
the ascetic life for the layman, there is the fundamental difference,
even in theory, that these latitudinarian ideas within Catholicism
were the products of peculiarly lax ethical theories, not sanctioned
by the authority of the Church, but opposed by the most serious
and strictest disciples of it. On the other hand, the Protestant idea
of the calling in effect placed the most serious enthusiasts for
asceticism in the service of capitalistic acquisition. What in the one
case might under certain conditions be allowed, appeared in the
other as a positive moral good. The fundamental differences of the

267

f — The Protestant Ethic and the Spirit of Capitalism

two ethics, very important in practice, have been finally crystallized,
even for modern times, by the Jansenist controversy and the Bull
Unigenittis.

43. "You may labour in that manner as tendeth most to your
success and lawful gain. You are bound to improve all your talents."
There follows the passage cited above in the text. A direct parallel
between the pursuit of wealth in the Kingdom of Heaven and the
pursuit of success in an earthly calling is found in Janeway, Heaven
upon Earth {Works of the Puritan Divines, p, 275).

44. Even in the Lutheran Confession of Duke Christopher of
/ Württemberg, which was submitted to the Council of Trent, objection
J is made to the oath of poverty. He who is poor in his station should

bear it, but if he swore to remain so it would be the same as if he
swore to remain sick or to maintain a bad reputation.

45. Thus in Baxter and also in Duke Christopher's confession.
Compare further pasages like: "... the vagrant rogues whose lives
are nothing but an exorbitant course; the main begging", etc.
(Thomas Adams, Works of the Puritan Divines; p. 259). Even Calvin
had strictly forbidden begging, and the Dutch Synods campaigned
against licences to beg. During the epoch of the Stuarts, especially
Laud's regime under Charles I, which had systematically developed
the principle of public poor relief and provision of work for the un-
employed, the Puritan battle-cry was: "Giving alms is no charity"
(title of Defoe's later well-known work). Towards the end of the
seventeenth century they began the deterrent system of workhouses
for the unemployed (compare Leonard, Early History of English Poor
Relief, Cambridge, 1900, and H. Levy, Die Grundlagen des ökono-
mischen Liberalismus in der Geschichte der englischen Volkswirtschaft,
Jena, 1912, pp. 69 ff.).

46. The President of the Baptist Union of Great Britain and
Ireland, G. White, said emphatically in his inaugural address before
the assembly in London in 1903 (Baptist Handbook, 1904, p. 104):
"The best men on the roll of our Puritan Churches were men of

y_affairs, who believed that religion should permeate the whole of life.*

47. Here also lies the characteristic difference from all feudal
view -points. For the latter only the descendants of the parvenu
(political or social) can reap the benefit of his success in a recognized
station (characteristically expressed in the Spanish Hidalgo = hijo
d'algo =filius de aliquo where the aliquid means an inherited properly)
However rapidly these differences are to-day fading out in the rapid
change and Europeanization of the American national character,
nevertheless the precisely opposite bourgeois attitude which glorifies
business success and earnings as a symptom of mental achievement,
but has no respect for mere inherited wealth, is still sometimes
represented there. On the other hand, in Europe (as James Bryce
once remarked) in effect almost every social honour is now purchasable

268

JSotes

for money, so long as the buyer has not himself stood behind the
counter, and carries out the necessary metamorphosis of his property
(formation of trusts, etc.). Against the aristocracy of blood, see for
instance Thomas Adams, Works of the Puritan Divines, p. 216.

48. That was, for instance, already true of the founder of the
Familist sect, Hendrik Nicklaes, who was a merchant (Barclay,

^Jnner Life of the Religious Societies of the Commonwealth, p. 34).

49. This is, for instance, definitely true for Hoornbeek, since
Matt. V. 5 and i Tim. iv. 8 also made purely worldly promises to
the saints {op. cit., I, p. 193). Everything is the work of God's Pro-
vidence, but in particular He takes care of His own. Op. cit., p. 192:
"Super alios autem summa cura et modis singularissimis versatur
Dei Providentia circa fideles." There follows a discussion of how
one can know that a stroke of luck comes not from the communis
Providentia, but from that special care. Bailey also {op. cit., p. igi)
explains success in worldly labours by reference to Providence. That
prosperity is often the reward of a godly life is a common expression
in Quaker writings (for example see such an expression as late as
1848 in Selection from the Christian Advices, issued by the General
Meeting of the Society of Friends, London, sixth edition, 1851,
p. 209). We shall return to the connection with the Quaker ethics.

50. Thomas Adams's analysis of the quarrel of Jacob and Esau
may serve as an example of this attention to the patriarchs, which is
equally characteristic of the Puritan view of life {Works of the Puritan
Divines, p. 235): "His [Esau's] folly may be argued from the base
estimation of the birthright" [the passage is also important for the
development of the idea of the birthright, of which more later] "that
he would so lightly pass from it and on so easy condition as a pottage."
But then it was perfidious that he would not recognize the sale,
charging he had been cheated. He is, in other words, "a cunning
hunter, a man of the fields"; a man of irrational, barbarous life;
while Jacob, "a plain man, dwelling in tents", represents the "man
of grace".

The sense of an inner relationship to Judaism, which is expressed
even in the well-known work of Roosevelt, Köhler {op. cit.) found
widespread among the peasants in Holland. But, on the other hand,
Puritanism was fully conscious of its differences from Hebrew ethics
in practical affairs, as Prynne's attack on the Jews (apropos of Cromwell's
proposals for toleration) plainly shows. See below, note 58.

5 1 . Zur bäuerlichen Glaubens- und Sittenlehre. Von einem thüring-
ischen Landpfarrer, second edition, Gotha, 1890, p. 16. The peasants
who are here described are characteristic products of the Lutheran
Church. Again and again I wrote Lutheran in the margin when the
excellent author spoke of peasant religion in general.

52. Compare for instance the passage cited in Ritschl, Pietismus
n, p. 158. Spener also bases his objections to change of calling and

26f

The Protestant Ethic and the Spirit of Capitalism

pursuit of gain partly on passages in Jesus Sirach. Theologische
Bedenken, III, p. 426.

53. It is true that Bailey, nevertheless, recommends reading them,
and references to the Apocrypha occur now and then, though naturally
not often. I can remember none to Jesus Sirach just now (though
perhaps by chance).

54. Where outward success comes to persons evidently damned,
the Calvinist (as for instance Hoombeek) comforts himself with the
reflection, following the theory of stubbornness, that God allows it
to them in order to harden them and make their doom the more
certain.

55. We cannot go farther into this point in this connection. We
are here interested only in the formalistic character of Puritan
righteousness. On the significance of Old Testament ethics for the
lex natures there is much in Troeltsch's Soziallehren.

56. The binding character of the ethical norms of the Scriptures
goes for Baxter (Christian Directory, III, p. 173 f.) so far that they
are (i) only a transcript of the law of nature, or (2) bear the "express
character of universality and perpetuity".

57. For instance Dowden (with reference to Bunyan), op. cit.,

P- 39-

58. More on this point in the essays on the Wirtschaftsethik der
Weltreligionen. The enormous influence which, for instance, the
second commandment ("thou shalt not make unto thee a graven
image") has had on the development of the Jewish character, its
rationality and abhorrence of sensuous culture, cannot be analysed
here. However, it may perhaps be noted as characteristic that one
of the leaders of the Educational Alliance in the United States, an
organization which carries on the Americanization of Jewish immi-
grants on a grand scale and with astonishing success, told me that
one of the first purposes aimed at in all forms of artistic and social
educational work was emancipation from the second commandment.
To the Israelite's prohibition of any anthropomorphic representation
of God corresponds in Puritanism the somewhat different but in
effect similar prohibition of idolatry of the flesh.

As far as Talmudic Judaism is concerned, some fundamental
traits of Puritan morality are certainly related to it. For instance, it
is stated in the Talmud (in Wünsche, Bdbyl. Talmud, II, p. 34)
that it is better and will be more richly rewarded by God if one
does a good deed for duty's sake than one which is not commanded
by the law. In other words, loveless fulfillment of duty stands higher
ethically than sentimental philanthropy. The Puritan ethics would
accept that in essentials. Kant in effect also comes close to it, being
partly of Scotch ancestry and strongly influenced by Pietism in his
bringing up. Though we cannot discuss the subject here, many of
his formulations are closely related to ideas of ascetic Protestantism.

270

Notes

But nevertheless the Talmudic ethic is deeply saturated with Oriental
traditionalism. "R. Tanchum said to Ben Chanilai, 'Never alter a
custom'" (Gemara to Mischna. VII, i, 86b, No. 93, in Wünsche. It
is a question of the standard of living of day labourers). The only
exception to this conformity is relation to strangers.

Moreover, the Puritan conception of lawfulness as proof evidently
provided a much stronger motive to positive action than the Jewish
unquestioned fulfillment of all commandments. The idea that success
reveals the blessing of God is of course not unknown to Judaism.
But the fundamental difference in religious and ethical significance
which it took on for Judaism on account of the double ethic pre-
vented the appearance of similar results at just the most important
point. Acts toward a stranger were allowed which were forbidden
toward a brother. For that reason alone it was impossible for success
in this field of what was not commanded but only allowed to be a
sign of religious worth and a motive to methodical conduct in the
way in which it was for the Puritan. On this whole problem, which
Sombart, in his book Die Juden und das Wirtschaftsleben, has often
dealt with incorrectly, see the essays referred to above. The details
have no place here.

The Jewish ethics, however strange that may at first sound,
remained very strongly traditionalistic. We can likewise not enter
into the tremendous change which the inner attitude toward the
world underwent with the Christian form of the ideas of grace and
salvation which contained in a peculiar way the seeds of new possi-
bilities of development. On Old Testament lawfulness compare
for example Ritschl, Die christliche Lehre von der Rechtfertigung und
Versöhnung, II, p. 265.

To the English Puritans, the Jews of their time were representatives
of that type of capitalism which was involved in war, Government
contracts. State monopolies, speculative promotions, and the con-
struction and financial projects of princes, which they themselves
condemned. In fact the difference may, in general, with the necessary
qualifications, be formulated: that Jewish capitalism was speculative
pariah-capitalism, while the Puritan was bourgeois organization of
labour.

59. The truth of the Holy Scriptures follows for JBaxter in the
last analysis from the "wonderful difference of the godly and ungodly",
the absolute diflFerence of the renewed man from others, and God's
evident quite special care for His chosen people (which may of
course be expressed in temptations). Christian Directory, I, p. 165.

60. As a characterization of this, it is only necessary to read
how tortuously even Bunyan, who still occasionally approaches the
atmosphere of Luther's Freiheit eines Christenmenschen (for example
in Of the Law and a Christian, Works of the Puritan Divines, p. 254),
reconciles himself with the parable of the Pharisee and the Publican

271

The Protestant Ethic and the Spirit of Capitalism

(see the sermon The Pharisee and the Publican, op. cit., p. loo).
Why is the Pharisee condemned? He does not truly keep God's
commandments, for he is evidently a sectarian who is only concerned
with external details and ceremonies (p. 107), but above all because
he ascribes merit to himself , and at the same time, like the Quakers,
thanks God for virtue by misuse of His name. In a sinful manner
he exalts this virtue (p. 126), and thus implicitly contests God's
predestination (p. 139). His prayer is thus idolatry of the flesh, and
that is the reason it is sinful. On the other hand, the publican is, as
the honesty of his confession shows, spiritually reborn, for, as it is
put with a characteristic Puritan mitigation of the Lutheran sense oi
sin, "to a right and sincere conviction of sin there must be a con-
viction of the probability of mercy" (p. 209).

'61. Printed in Gardiner's Constitutional Documents. One may
compare this struggle against anti-authoritarian asceticism with
Louis XIV's persecution of Port Royal and the Jansenists.

62. Calvin's own standpoint was in this respect distinctly less
drastic, at least in so far as the finer aristocratic forms of the enjoy-
ment of life were concerned. The only limitation is the Bible. Whoever
adheres to it and has a good conscience, need not observe his every
impulse to enjoy life with anxiety. The discussion in Chapter X of
the Instit. Christ (for instance, "nee fugere ea quoque possumus
quae videntur oblectatione magis quam necessitate inservire") might
in itself have opened the way to a very lax practice. Along with
increasing anxiety over the certitudo salutis the most important
circumstance for the later disciples was, however, as we shall point
out in another place, that in the era of the ecclesia militans it was
the small bourgeoisie who were the principal representatives of
Calvinistic ethics.

63. Thomas Adams {Works of the Puritan Divines, p. 3) begins a
sermon on the "three divine sisters" ("but love is the greatest of
these") with the remark that even Paris gave the golden apple to
Aphrodite !

64. Novels and the like should not be read; they are "wastetimes"
(Baxter, Christian Directory, I, p. 51). The decline of lyric poetry
and folk-music, as well as the drama, after the Elizabethan age in
England is well known. In the pictorial arts Puritanism perhaps did
not find very much to suppress. But very striking is the decline
from what seemed to be a promising musical beginning (England's
part in the history of music was by no means unimportant) to that
absolute musical vacuum which we find typical of the Anglo-Saxon
peoples later, and even to-day. Except for the negro churches, and
the professional singers whom the Churches now engage as attractions
(Trinity Church in Boston in 1904 for $8,000 annually), in America
one also hears as community singing in general only a noise which
is intolerable to German ears (partly analogous things in Holland also).

272

Notes

65. Just the same in Holland, as the reports of the Synods show.
(See the resolutions on the Maypole in the Reitmaas Collection,
VI, 78, 139.)

66. That the "Renaissance of the Old Testament" and the Pietistic
orientation to certain Christian attitudes hostile to beauty in art,
which in the last analysis go back to Isaiah and the 22nd Psalm,
must have contributed to making ugliness more of a possible object
for art, and that the Puritan repudiation of idolatry of the flesh
played a part, seems likely. But in detail everything seems uncertain.
In the Roman Church quite different demagogic motives led to
outwardly similar effects, but, however, with quite different artistic
results. Standing before Rembrandt's Saul and David (in the
Mauritshuis), one seems directly to feel the powerful influence of
Puritan emotions. The excellent analysis of Dutch cultural influences
in Carl Neumann's Rembra7tdt probably gives everything that for
the time being we can know about how far ascetic Protestantism may
be credited with a positive fructifying influence on art.

67. The most complex causes, into which we cannot go here, wei:e
responsible for the relatively smaller extent to which the Calvinistic
ethic penetrated practical life there. The ascetic spirit began to
wealcen in Holland as early as the beginning of the seventeenth
century (the English Congregationalists who fled to Holland in 1608
were disturbed by the lack of respect for the Sabbath there), but
especially under the Stadtholder Frederick Henry. Moreover, Dutch
Puritanism had in general much less expansive power than English.
The reasons for it lay in part in the political constitution (par-
ticularistic confederation of towns and provinces) and in the far
smaller degree of military force (the War of Independence was soon
fought principally with the money of Amsterdam and mercenary
armies. English preachers illustrated the Babylonian confusion of
tongues by reference to the Dutch Arrny). Thus the burden of the
war of religion was to a large extent passed on to others, but at the
same time a part of their political power was lost. On the other hand,
Cromwell's army, even though it was partly conscripted, felt that it
was an army of citizens. It was, to be sure, all the more characteristic
that just this army adopted the abolition of conscription in its pro-
gramme, because one could fight justly only for the glory of God
in a cause hallowed by conscience, but not at the whim of a sovereign.
The constitution of the British Army, so immoral to traditional
German ideas, had its historical origin in very moral motives, and
was an attainment of soldiers who had never been beaten. Only after
the Restoration was it placed in the service of the interests of the
Crown .

The Dutch schutterijen, the champions of Calvinism in the period
of the Great War, only half a generation after the Synod of Dordrecht,
do not look in the least ascetic in the pictures of Hals. Protests of

The Protestant Ethic and the Spirit of Capitalism

the Synods against their conduct occur frequently. The Dutch
concept of Deftigkeit is a mixture of bourgeois-rational honesty and
patrician consciousness of status. The division of church pews
according to classes in the Dutch churches shows the aristocratic
character of this religion even to-day. The continuance of the town
economy hampered industry. It prospered almost alone through
refugees, and hence only sporadically. Nevertheless, the worldly
asceticism of Calvinism and Pietism was an important influence in
Holland in the same direction as elsewhere. Also in the sense to be
referred to presently of ascetic compulsion to save, as Groen van
Prinsterer shows in the passage cited below, note 87.

Moreover, the almost complete lack of belles lettres in Calvinistic
Holland is of course no accident (see for instance Busken-Huet,
Het Land van Rembrandt). The significance of Dutch religion as
ascetic compulsion to save appears clearly even in the eighteenth
century in the writings of Albertus Haller. For the characteristic
peculiarities of the Dutch attitude toward art and its motives, compare
for example the autobiographical remarks of Constantine Huyghens
(written in 1629-31) in Oud Holland, 1891. The work of Groen van
Prinsterer, La Hollande et Vinfluence de Calvin, 1864, already referred
to, offers nothing important for our problems. The Ntew Netherlands
colony in America was socially a half-feudal settlement of patroons,
merchants who advanced capital, and, unlike New England, it was
difficult to persuade small people to settle there.

68. We may recall that the Puritan town government closed the
theatre at Stratford-on-Avon while Shakespeare was still alive and
residing there in his last years, Shakespeare's hatred and contempt
of the Puritans appear on every occasion. As late as 1777 the City
of Birmingham refused to license a theatre because it was conducive
to slothfulness, and hence unfavourable to trade (Ashley, Birmingham
Trade and Commerce, 191 3).

69. Here also it was of decisive importance that for the Puritan
there was only the alternative of divine will or earthly vanity. Hence
for him there could be no adiaphora. As we have already pointed
out, Calvin's own view was different in this respect. What one eats,
wears, etc., as long as there is no enslavement of the soul to earthly
desire as a result, is indifferent. Freedom from the world should be
expressed, as for the Jesuits, in indifference, which for Calvin meant
an indifferent, un covetous use of whatever goods the earth offered
(pp. 409 ff. of the original edition of the Jnstit. Christ).

70. The Quaker attitude in this respect is well known. But as
early as the beginning of the seventeenth century the heaviest storms
shook the pious congregation of exiles in Amsterdam for a decade
over the fashionable hats and dresses of a preacher's wife (charmingly
described in Dexter's Congregationalism of the Last Three Hundred
Years). Sanford (op. cit.) has pointed out that the present-day male

274

Notes

hair-cut is that of the ridiculous Roundheads, and the equally ridiculous
(for the time) male clothing of the Puritans is at least in principle
fundamentally the same as that of to-day.

71. On this point again see Veblen's Theory of Business Enterprise.

yz. Again and again we come back to this attitude. It explains
statements like the following: "Every penny which is paid upon
yourselves and children and friends must be done as by God's own
appointment and to serve and please Him. Watch narrowly, or else
that thievish, carnal self will leave God nothing" (Baxter, op. cit., I,
p. 108). This is decisive; what is expended for personal ends is
withdrawn from' the service of God's glory.

73. Quite rightly it is customary to recall (Dowden, op. cit.) that
Cromwell saved Raphael's drawings and Mantegna's Triumph of
Ctssar from destruction, while Charles II tried to sell them. More-
over, the society of the Restoration was distinctly cool or even hostile
to English national literature. In fact the influence of Versailles was
all-powerful at courts everywhere. A detailed analysis of the influence
of the unfavourable atmosphere for the spontaneous enjoyment of
everyday life on the spirit of the higher types of Puritan, and the
men who went through the schooling of Puritanism, is a task which
cannot be undertaken within the limits of this sketch. Washington
Irving {Bracebridge Hall) forniulates it in the usual English terms
thus: "It [he says political freedom, we should say Puritanism]
evinces less play of the fancy, but more power of the imagination."
It is only necessary to think of the place of the Scotch in science,
literature, and technical invention, as well as in the business life of
Great Britain, to be convinced that this remark approaches the truth,
even though put somewhat too narrowly. We cannot speak here of
its significance for the development of technique and the empirical
sciences. The relation itself is always appearing in everyday life. For
the Quakers, for instance, the recreatjons which are permissible
(according to Barclay) are: visiting of friends, reading of historical
works, mathematical and physical experiments, gardening, discussion
of business and other occurrences in the world, etc. The reason is
that pointed out above.

74. Already very finely analysed in Carl Neumann's Rembrandt,
which should be compared with the above remarks in general.

75. Thus Baxter in the passage cited above, I, p. 108, and
below.

76. Compare the well-known description of Colonel Hutchinson
(often quoted, for instance, in Sanford, op. cit., p. 57) in the biography
written by his widow. After describing all his chivalrous virtues and
his cheerful, joyous nature, it goes on: "He was wonderfully neat,
cleanly, and genteel in his habit, and had a very good fancy in it ;
but he left off very early the wearing of anything that was costly."
Quite similar is the ideal of the educated and highly civilized Puritan

The Protestant Ethic and the Spirit of Capitalism

woman who, however, is penurious of two things: (i) time, and
(2) expenditure for pomp and pleasure, as drawn in Baxter's funeral
oration for Mary Hammer {Works of the Puritan Divines, p. 533).

77. I think, among many other examples, especially of a manu-
facturer unusually successful in his business ventures, and in his
later years very wealthy, who, when for the treatment of a trouble-
some digestive disorder the doctor prescribed a few oysters a day,
could only be brought to comply with difficulty. Very considerable
gifts for philanthropic purposes which he made during his lifetime
and a certain openhandedness showed, on the other hand, that it
was simply a survival of that ascetic feeling which looks upon enjoy-
ment of wealth for oneself as morally reprehensible, but has nothing
whatever to do with avarice.

78. The separation of workshop, office, of business in general and
the private dwelling, of firm and name, of business capital and private
wealth, the tendency to make of the business a corpus mysticum (at
least in the case of corporate property) all lay in this direction. On
this, see my Handelsgesellschaften im Mittelalter {Gesammelte Aufsätze
zur Sozial- und Wirtschaftsgeschichte, pp. 312 ff.).

79. Sombart in his Kapitalismus (first edition) has already well
pointed out this characteristic phenomenon. It must, however, be noted
that the accumulation of wealth springs from two quite distinct psycho-
logical sources. One reaches into the dimmest antiquity and is expressed
in foundations, family fortunes, and trusts, as well as much more purely
and clearly in the desire to die weighted down with a great burden
of material goods ; above all to insure the continuation of a business
even at the cost of the personal interests of the majority of one's
children. In such cases it is, besides the desire to give one's own
creation an ideal life beyond one's death, and thus to maintain the
splendor familiee and extend the personality of the founder, a question
of, so to speak, fundamentally egocentric motives. That is not the
case with that bourgeois motive with which we are here dealing.
There the motto of asceticism is "Entsagen sollst du, sollst entsagen"
in the positive capitalistic sense of "Erwerben sollst du, sollst
erwerben". In its pure and simple non -rationality it is a sort of
categorical imperative. Only the glory of God and one's own duty,
not human vanity, is the motive for the Puritans; and to-day only
the duty to one's calling. If.it pleases anyone to illustrate an idea by
its extreme consequences, we may recall the theory of certain American
millionaires, that their millions should not be left to their children,
so that they will not be deprived of the good moral effects of the
necessity of working and earning for themselves. To-day that idea is
certainly no more than a theoretical soap-bubble.

80. This is, as must continually be emphasized, the final decisive
religious motive (along with the purely ascetic desire to mortify the
flesh). It is especially clear in the Quakers.

276

Notes

8i. Baxter {Saints' Everlasting Rest, p. 12) repudiates this with
precisely the same reasoning as the Jesuits: the body must have
what it needs, otherwise one becomes a slave to it.

82. This ideal is clearly present, especially for Quakerism, in the
first period of its development, as has already been shown in im-
portant points by Weingarten in his Englische Revolutionskirchen.
Also Barclay's thorough discussion {op. cit., pp. 519 ff., 533) shows
it very clearly. To be avoided are: (i) Worldly vanity ; thus all osten-
tation, frivolity, and use of things having no practical purpose, or
which are valuable only for their scarcity (i.e. for vanity's sake).
(2) Any unconscientious use of wealth, such as excessive expenditure
for not very urgent needs above necessary provision for the real needs
of life and for the future. The Quaker was, so to speak, a living law
of marginal utility. "Moderate use of the creature" is definitely per-
missible, but in particular one might pay attention to the quality
and durability of materials so long as it did not lead to vanity. On
all this compare Morgenblatt für gebildete Leser, 1846, pp. 216 ff.
Especially on comfort and solidity among the Quakers, compare
Schneckenburger, Vorlesungen, pp. 96 f.

83. Adapted by Weber from Faust, Act I. Goethe there depicts
Mephistopheles as "Die Kraft, die stets das Böse will, und stets das
Gute schafft". — Translator's Note.

84. It has already been remarked that we cannot here enter into
the question of the class relations of these religious movements (see
the essays on the Wirtschaftsethik der Weltreligionen). In order to
see, however, that for example Baxter, of whom we make so much
use in this study, did not see things solely as a bourgeois of his time,
it will suflSce to recall that even for him in the order of the religious
value of callings, after the learned professions comes the husband-
man, and only then mariners, clothiers, booksellers, tailors, etc.
Also, under mariners (characteristically, enough) he probably thinks
at least as often of fishermen as of shipowners. In this regard several
things in the Talmud are in a different class. Compare, for instance,
in Wünsche, Babyl. Talmud, II, pp. 20, 21, the sayings of Rabbi
Eleasar, which though not unchallenged, all contend in effect that
business is better than agriculture. In between see II, 2, p. 68, on
the wise investment of capital: one-third in land, one-third in
merchandise, and one-third in cash.

For those to whom no causal explanation is adequate without an
economic (or materialistic as it is unfortunately still called) inter-
pretation, it may be remarked that I consider the influence of
economic development on the fate of religious ideas to be very
important and shall later attempt to show how in our case the process
of mutual adaptation of the "two took place. On the other haiid, those
religious ideas themselves simply cannot be deduced from economic
circumstances. They are in themselves, that is beyond doubt, the

277

The Protestant Ethic and the Spirit of Capitalism

most powerful plastic elements of national character, and contain a
law of development and a compelling force entirely their own.
Moreover, the most important differences, so far as non-religious
factors play a part, are, as with Lutheranism and Calvinism, the
result of political circumstances, not economic.

85. That is what Eduard Bernstein means to express when he
says, in the essay referred to above (pp. 625, 681), "Asceticism is a
bourgeois virtue." His discussion is the first which has suggested
these important relationships. But the connection is a much wider
one than he suspected. For not only the accumulation of capital, but
the ascetic rationalization of the whole of economic life was involved.

For the American Colonies, the difference between the Puritan
North, where, on account of the ascetic compulsion to save, capital
in search of investment was always available, from the conditions
in the South has already been clearly brought out by Doyle.

86. Doyle, The English in America, II, chap. i. The existence
of iron -works (1643), weaving for the market (1659), and also the
high development of the handicrafts in New England in the first
generation after the foundation of the colonies are, from a purely
economic view-point, astounding. They are in striking contrast to
the conditions in the South, as well as the non-Cälvinistic Rhode
Island with its complete freedom of conscience. There, in spite of
the excellent harbour, the report of the Governor and Council of
1686 said: "The great obstruction concerning trade is the want
of merchants and men of considerable estates amongst us" (Arnold,
History of the State of Rhode Island, p. 490). It can in fact hardly be
doubted that the compulsion continually to reinvest savings, which
the Puritan curtailment of consumption exercised, played a part. In
addition there was the part of Church discipline which cannot be
discussed here.

87. That, however, these circles rapidly diminished in the Nether-
lands is shown by Busken-Huet's discussion {op. cit., II, chaps, iii
and iv). Nevertheless, Groen van Prinsterer says {Handb. der Gesch.
van het Vaderland, third edition, par. 303, note, p. 254), "De Neder-
landers verkoopen vtel en verbruiken wenig", even of the time after
the Peace of Westphalia.

88. For England, for instance, a petition of an aristocratic Royalist
(quoted in Ranke, Engl. Geschichte, IV, p. 197) presented after the
entry of Charles II into London, advocated a legal prohibition of
the acquisition of landed estates by bourgeois capital, which should
thereby be forced to find employment in trade. The class of Dutch
regents was distinguished as an estate from the bourgeois patricians
of the cities by the purchase of landed estates. See the complaints,
cited by Fruin, Tien jaren uit den tachtigjarigen oorlog, of the year
1652, that the regents have become landlords and are no longer
merchants. To be sure these circles had never been at bottom strictly

278

Notes

Calvinistic. And the notorious scramble for membership in the
nobility and titles in large parts of the Dutch middle class in the
second half of the seventeenth century in itself shows that at least
for this period the contrast between English and Dutch conditions
must be accepted with caution. In this case the power of hereditary
moneyed property broke through the ascetic spirit.

89. Upon the strong movement for bourgeois capital to buy
English landed estates followed the great period of prosperity of
English agriculture.

90. Even down into this century Anglican landlords have often
refused to accept Nonconformists as tenants. At the present time
the two parties of the Church are of approximately equal numbers,
while in earlier times the Nonconformists were always in the
minority.

91. H. Levy (article in Archiv für Sozialwissenschaft und Sozial-
politik, XLVI, p. 605) rightly notes that according to the native
character of the English people, as seen from numerous of its traits,
they were, if anything, less disposed to welcome an ascetic ethic
and the middle-class virtues than other peoples. A hearty and un-
restrained enjoyment of life was, and is, one of their fundamental
traits. The power of Puritan asceticism at the time of its predominance
is shown most strikingly in the astonishing degree to which this trait
of character was brought under discipline among its adherents.

92. This contrast recurs continually in Doyle's presentation. In
the attitude of the Puritan to everything the religious motive always
played an important part (not always, of course, the sole important
one). The colony (under Winthrop's leadership) was inclined to
permit the settlement of gentlemen in Massachusetts, even an upper
house with a hereditary nobility, if only the gentlemen would adhere
to the Church. The colony remained closed for the sake of Church
discipline. The colonization of New Hampshire and Maine was
carried out by large Anglican merchants, who laid out large stock-
raising plantations. Between them and the Puritans there was very
little social connection. There were complaints over the strong greed
for profits of the New Englanders as early as 1632 (see Weeden's
Economic and Social History of New England, I, p. 125).

93. This is noted by Petty {Pol. Arith.), and all the contemporary
sources without exception speak in particular of the Puritan sectarians,
Baptists, Quakers, Mennonites, etc., as belonging partly to a property-
less class, partly to one of small capitalists, and contrast them both
with the great merchant aristocracy and the financial adventurers.
But it was from just this small capitalist class, and not from the
great financial magnates, monopolists, Government contractors,
lenders to the King, colonial entrepreneurs, promoters, etc., that
there originated what was characteristic of Occidental capitalism : the
middle-class organization of industrial labour on the basis of private

279

The Protestant Ethic and the Spirit of Capitalism

property (see Unwin, Industrial Organization in the Sixteenth and
Seventeenth Centuries, London, 1914, pp. 196 ff.)» To see that this
difference was fully known even to contemporaries, compare Parker's
Discourse Concerning Puritans of 164 1, where the contrast to promoters
and courtiers is also emphasized.

94. On the way in which this was expressed in the politics of
Pennsylvania in the eighteenth century, especially during the War
of Independence, see Sharpless, A Quaker Experiment in Government,
Philadelphia, 1902.

95. Quoted in Southey, Life of Wesley, chap, xxix (second American
edition, II, p. 308). For the reference, which I did not know, I am
indebted to a letter from Professor Ashley (191 3). Ernst Troeltsch, to
whom I communicated it for the purpose, has already made use of it.

96. The reading of this passage may be recommended to all those
who consider themselves to-day better informed on these matters
than the leaders and contemporaries of the movements themselves.
As we see, they knew very well what they were doing and what
dangers they faced. It is really inexcusable to contest so lightly, as
some of my critics have done, facts which are quite beyond dispute,
and have hitherto never been disputed by anyone. All I have done
is to investigate their underlying motives somewhat 'more carefully.
No one in the seventeenth century doubted the existence of these
relationships (compare Manley, Usury of 6 per Cent. Examined, 1669,
p. 137). Besides the modern writers already noted, poets like Heine
and Keats, as well as historians like Macaulay, Cunningham, Rogers,
or an essayist such as Matthew Arnold, have assumed them as
obvious. From the most recent literature see Ashley, Birmingham
Industry and Commerce (191 3). He has also expressed his complete
agreement with me in correspondence. On the whole problem now
compare the study by H. Levy referred to above, note 91.

97. Weber's italics.

98. That exactly the same things were obvious to the Puritans of
the classical era cannot perhaps be more clearly shown than by the
fact that in Bunyan Mr. Money-Love argues that one may become
religious in order to' get rich, for instance to attract customers. For
why one has become religious makes no difference (see p. 114,
Tauchnitz edition).

99. Defoe was a zealous Nonconformist.

100. Spener also {Theologische Bedenken, pp. 426, 429, 432 ff.),
although he holds that the merchant's calling is full of temptations
and pitfalls, nevertheless declares in answer to a question: "I am
glad to see, so far as trade is concerned, that my dear friend knows
no scruples, but takes it as an art of life, which it is, in which much
good may be done for the human race, and God's will may be carried
out through love." This is more fully justified in other passages by
mercantilist arguments. Spener, at times in a purely Lutheran strain,

280

Notes

designates the desire to become rich as the main pitfall, following
I Tim. vi, viii, and ix, and referring to Jesus Sirach (see above),
and hence rigidly to be condemned. But, on the other hand, he
takes some of it back by referring to the prosperous sectarians who
yet live righteously (see above, note 39). As the result of industrious
work wealth is not objectionable to him either. But on account of
the Lutheran influence his standpoint is less consistent than that of
Baxter.

loi. Baxter, op. cit., II, p. 16, warns against the employment of
"heavy, flegmatic, sluggish, fleshly, slothful persons" as servants,
and recommends preference for godly servants, not only because
ungodly servants would be mere eye-servants, but above all because
"a truly godly servant will do all your service in obedience to God,
as if God Himself had bid him do it". Others, on the other hand,
are inclined "to make no great matter of conscience of it". However,
the criterion of saintliness of the workman is not for him the external
confession of faith, but the "conscience to do their duty". It appears
here that the interests of God and of the employers are curiously
harmonious. Spener also (Theologische Bedenken, III, p. 272), who
otherwise strongly urges taking time to think of God, assumes it to
be obvious that workers must be satisfied with the extreme minimum
of leisure time (even on Sundays). English writers have rightly
called the Protestant immigrants the pioneers of skilled labour. See
also proofs in H. Levy, Die Grundlagen des ökonomischen Liberalismus
in der Geschichte der englischen Volkswirtschaft, p. 53.

102. The analogy between the unjust (according to human
standards) predestination of only a few and the equally unjust, but
equally divinely ordained, distribution of wealth, was too obvious to
be escaped. See for example Hoornbeek, op. cit., I, p. 153. Further-
more, as for Baxter, op. cit., I, p. 380, poverty is very often a symptom
of sinful slothfulness.

103. Thomas Adams {Works of the Puritan Divines, p. 158) thinks
that God probably allows so many people to remain poor because
He knows that they would not be able to withstand the temptations
that go with w^ealth. For wealth all too often draws men away from
religion.

104. See above, note 45, and the study of H. Levy referred to there.
The same is noted in all the discussions (thus by Manley for the
Huguenots).

105. Charisma is a sociological term coined by Weber himself. It
refers to the quality of leadership which appeals to non-rational
motives. See Wirtschaft und Gesellschaft, pp. 140 ff. — Translator's
Note.

106. Similar things were not lacking in England. There was, for
example, that Pietism which, starting from Law's Serious Call (172S),
preached poverty, chastity, and, originally, isolation from the world.

u 281

The Protestant Ethic and the Spirit of Capitalism

107. Baxter's activity in Kidderminster, a community absolutely
debauched when he arrived, which was almost unique in the history
of the ministry for its success, is at the same time a typical example
of how asceticism educated the masses to labour, or, in Marxian
terms, to the production of surplus value, and thereby for the first
time made their employment in the capitalistic labour relation
(putting-out industry, weaving, etc.) possible at all. That is very
generally the causal relationship. From Baxter's own view-point he
accepted the employment of his charges in capitalistic production
for the sake of his religious and ethical interests. From the standpoint
of the development of capitalism these latter were brought into the
service of the development of the spirit of capitalism.

108. Furthermore, one may well doubt to what extent the joy of
the mediaeval craftsman in his creation, which is so commonly
appealed to, was effective as a psychological motive force. Never-
theless, there is undoubtedly something in that thesis. But in any case
asceticism certainly deprived all labour of this worldly attractiveness,
to-day for ever destroyed by capitalism, and oriented it to the
beyond. Labour in a calling as such is willed by God. The im-
personality of present-day labour, what, from the standpoint of the
individual, is its joyless lack of meaning, still has a religious justifi-
cation here. Capitalism at the time of its development needed
labourers who were available for economic exploitation for conscience'
sake. To-day it is in the saddle, and hence able to force people to
labour without transcendental sanctions.

109. Petty, Political Arithmetick, Works, edited by Hull, I, p. 262.
no. On these conflicts and developments see H. Levy in the book

cited above. The very powerful hostility of public opinion to
monopolies, which is characteristic of England, originated historically
in a combination of the political struggle for power against the
Crown — the Long Parliament excluded monopolists from its member-
ship— with the ethical motives of Puritanism; and the economic
interests of the small bourgeois and moderate -scale capitalists against
the financial magnates in the seventeenth century. The Declaration
of the Army of August 2, 1652, as well as the Petition of the Levellers
of January 28, 1653, demand, besides the abolition of excises, tariffs,
and indirect taxes, and the introduction of a single tax on estates,
above all free trade, i.e. the abolition of the monopolistic barriers to
trade at home and abroad, as a violation of the natural rights of man.

111. Compare H. Levy, Die Grundlagen des ökonomischen Liberal-
ismus in der Geschichte der englischen Volkswirtschaft, pp. 5 1 f .

112. That those other elements, which have here not yet been
traced to their religious roots, especially the idea that honesty is the
best policy (Franklin's discussion of credit), are also of Puritan
origin, must be proved in a somewhat different connection (see the
following essay [not translated here]). Here I shall limit myself to

282

Notes

repeating the following remark of J. A. Rowntree {Quakerism, Past
and Present, pp. 95-6), to which E. Bernstein has called my atten-
tion: "Is it merely a coincidence, or is it a conseqtience, that the
lofty profession of spirituality made by the Friends has gone hand
in hand with shrewdness and tact in the transaction of mundane
affairs? Real piety favours the success of a trader by insuring his
integrity and fostering habits of prudence and forethought, im-
portant items in obtaining that standing and credit in the commercial
world, which are requisites for the steady accumulation of wealth"
(see the following essay). "Honest as a Huguenot" was as proverbial
in the seventeenth century as the respect for law of the Dutch which
Sir W. Temple admired, and, a century later, that of the English as
compared with those Continental peoples that had not been through
this ethical schooling.

113. Well analysed in Bielschowsky's Goethe, \l, chap, xviii. For
the development of the scientific cosmos Windelband, at the end of
his Blütezeit der deutschen Philosophie (Vol. H of the Gesch. d. Neueren
Philosophie), has expressed a similar idea.

114. Saints' Everlasting Rest, chap. xii.

115. "Couldn't the old man be satisfied with his $75,000 a year
and rest? No! The frontage of the store must be widened to 400 feet.
Why? That beats everything, he says. In the evening when his wife
and daughter read together, he wants to go to bed. Sundays he looks
at the clock every five minutes to see when the day will be over —
what a futile life!" In these terms the son-in-law (who had emigrated
from Germany) of the leading dry-goods man of an Ohio city
expressed his judgment of the latter, a judgment which would un-
doubtedly have seemed simply incomprehensible to the old man. A
symptom of German lack of energy.

116. This remark alone (unchanged since his criticism) might
have shown Brentano {op. cit.) that I have never doubted its inde-
pendent significance. That humanism was also not pure rationalism
has lately again been strongly emphasized by Borinski in the Abfiandl.
der Münchener Akad. der Wiss., 191 9.

117. The academic oration of v. Below, Die Ursachen der Refor-
mation (Freiburg, 1916), is not concerned with this problem, but
with that of the Reformation in general, especially Luther. For the
question dealt with here, especially the controversies which have
grown out of this study, I may refer finally to the work of Hermelink,
Reformation und Gegenreformation, which, however, is also primarily
concerned with other problems.

118. For the above sketch has deHberately taken up only the
relations in which an influence of religious ideas on the material
culture is really beyond doubt. It would have been easy to proceed
beyond that to a regular construction which logically deduced
everything characteristic of modern culture from Protestant rational-

283

The Protesta?jt Ethic afid the Spirit of Capitalism

ism. But that sort of thing may be left to the type of dilettante who
believes in the unity of the group mind and its reducibility to a
single formula. Let it be remarked only that the period of capitalistic
development lying before that which we have studied was every-
where in part determined by religious influences, both hindering and
helping. Of what sort these were belongs in another chapter. Further-
more, whether, of the broader problems sketched above, one or
another can be dealt with in the limits of this Journal [the essay first
appeared in the Archiv für Sozialwissenschaft und Sozialpolitik —
Translator's Note] is not certain in view of the problems to which
it is devoted. On the other hand, to write heavy tomes, as thick as
they would have to be in this case, and dependent on the work of
others (theologians and historians), I have no great inclination (I
have left these sentences unchanged).

For the tension between ideals and reality in early capitalistic
times before the Reformation, see now Strieder, Studien zur Ges-
chichte der kapit. Organizationsformen, 1914, Book II. (Also as against
the work of Keller, cited above, which was utilized by Sombart.)

119. I should have thought that this sentence and the remarks and
notes immediately preceding it would have sufficed to prevent any
misunderstanding of what this study was meant to accomplish, and
I find no occasion for adding anything. Instead of following up with
an immediate continuation in terms of the above programme, I
have, partly for fortuitous reasons, especially the appearance of
Troeltsch's Die Soziallehren der christlichen Kirchen und Gruppen,
which disposed of many things I should have had to investigate in
a way in which I, not being a theologian, could not have done it;
but partly also in order to correct the isolation of this study and to
place it in relation to the whole of cultural development, determined,
first, to write down some comparative studies of the general historical
relationship of religion and society. These follow. Before them is
placed only a short essay in order to clear up the concept of sect
used above, and at the same time to show the significance of the
Puritan conception of the Church for the capitalistic spirit of modern
times.

284

INDEX

absolution, sacrament of, 1 16, 134
acquisition, as principle of econo-
mic action, 63
acquisition, impulse to, 16, 56
Adams, Thomas, 223, 237, 258,
259, 266, 267, 269, 272, 281
adaptation, 72

(see selection)
adiaphora, 256, 274
administration, 25
adventurers, capitalistic, 20, 24,
58, 69, 76, 166, 174, 186,
199, 279
after-life, idea of, 97, 109
Alberti, Leon Battista, 194, 202,

262
Anglican Church, 82, 99, 179
Anthony of Florence, 73, 83, 197,

201, 202
anthropology, 30
Anti-authoritarianism, 167

{see also asceticism)
architecture, in West, 15
aristocracy, antagonism to, 150
aristocracy, commerical, 37, 65, 74
Aristotle, 14, 235, 244, 249
Arminians, 200, 217
Arnold, Matthew, 191, 280
Arnold, Samuel G., 278
art in West, 14
Arte di Calimala, 203
arts, Puritan attitude to, 168, 272
asceticism, an ti -authoritarian, ten-
dency of, 167, 255
asceticism, definition of, 193-4
asceticism, monastic, 80, 121,

253-4
asceticism, sexual, 158
asceticism, tendency of capitalism

to, 71
asceticism, types of, 118
asceticism, worldly, 149, 154
Ashley, W. J., 280

Augsburg Confession, 102, 206,

209
Augustine, St., loi
Aymon, Jean, 190

Bailey, R., 106, 129, 132, 222,

228, 231, 233, 238, 245,

259
Baird, Henry M., 219
Bank of England, 186
baptism, 145, 222
Barclay, Robert, 148, 156, 171,

252, 257, 269
Barebones, Praisegod, 243
Bartholomew's day, St., 156
Bax, E. Belfort, 253
Baxter, Richard, 106, 155, 181,

218, 224, 226 flf., 245, 259 flF.
Becker, Bernhard, 247
begging, 177, 268
believers' church, 122, 144

{see also sect)
Below, Georg von, 283
Benedict, St., 118
Bernhard, St., 230, 236, 238, 241,

267
Bernhard of Siena, 197, 201, 202
Bernstein, Eduard, 219, 256, 258,

278, 283
Berthold of Regensburg, 208
Beruf, 79, 204 ff.
Beruf, translation of, 194
Beza, Theodore, iio, 230
bibliocracy, 123, 146
Bielschowsky, Albert, 283
Bohemian Brothers, 197
Bonaventura, St., 236, 242, 267
Bonn, M. J., 217
book-keeping, 22, 67
book-keeping, moral, 124, 238
Borinski, Karl, 283
bourgeoisie, 23, 24, 176
Brassey, Thomas, 198

285

The Protestant Ethic and the Spirit of Capitalism

Braune, Wilhelm, 207
Brentano, Lujo, 185, 187, 190,

192, 193, 194, 198, 205, 209,

210, 217, 259, 283
Brodnitz, Georg, 203
brotherly love, 81, 108, 163, 226
Brown, John, 219
Browne, John, 243
Bryce, James, 235, 268
Bucer, letter to, 228
Buckle, Henry Thomas, 44
Buddhism, 228
Bunyan, John, 107, 124, 176, 223,

227, 230, 234, 259, 271, 280
Busken-Huet, 274, 278
Butler, Samuel, 168

Caesarism, Puritan immunity to,
224

calling, duty in a, 54, 62

calling, idea of, 79 ff.

Calvin, John, 45, 89
and predestination, 102
attitude to certitudo salutis, no
attitude toward wealth, 157

Calvinism, social organization of,
224

Calw, 44

Campbell, Douglas, 218

Carlyle, Thomas, 37, 214, 219

capital, definition of, 17

capital, origin of, 68

capital, ownership of, 36

capitalism, concept of, 16

Cato, 19s, 201

Cavaliers, 88, 169

certitudo salutis, no, 114-15, 129,
r33, 139-40, 203. 226, 229,
272

charisma, 178, 281

Charles I, 166

Charnock, Stuart, 231, 232, 235,
238, 259

Chillingworth, William, 127

chosen people, belief in, 166
(see also elect)

286

Christopher, Duke of Würtem-

berg, 268
Cicero, 205
Cistercians, 118
Cluny, Monks of, 118
Colbert, Jean Baptiste, 43
Columella, 196
comfort, idea of, 171
commenda, 17, 20, 58
Communion, admission to, in,

155 .
confession, 106, 124, 134, 137,

153
confessions, Baptist, 231

(see also Dordrecht, West-

munster, Augsburg, Han-

serd Knolly)
Congregationalists, 217
consilia evangelica, 80, 120, 137
contemplation, 26, H2, 158, 159,

212
conventicles, 130, 131, 167, 245
conversion, 140
Corinthians, ist Epistle to the,

84, 164, 206, 208, 214
Cornelius, Carl Adolf, 253, 255
counterpoint, 14
Court, Peter de la, 177
Cramer, S., 257
Cranmer, Thomas, 210
creation, joy of, 282
Cromwell, Oliver, 82, 156, 213,

226, 275
Cromwell, Richard, 251
Crosby, Thomas, 235
Cunningham, William, 280

Da Costa, 226

Defoe, Daniel, 180, ä8o

Deissmann, Adolf, 209

democracy, 224

Denifle, Heinrich, 211

Deventer, Provincial Synod of,

260
Dexter, H. M., 219, 252, 274
Dieterich, A., 205

Index

dilettantes, 29

Dionysius of Halicarnassus, 209
Dippel, Johann Conrad, 248
discipline. Church, 97, 152, 155,

178
« discipline, monastic, 174

distribution of goods, unequal,

177
Divine Comedy, 87
DöUinger, Johann Joseph Iquaz

von, 107
domestic industry, 21, 192
'if Dordrecht, Synod of, 99, 102,

226, 240
Dowden, Edward, 176, 221, 222,

258, 270, 275
Doyle, John Andrew, 172, 219,

278
Dunckards, 150

Eck Bible translation, 10

Economic interpretation of His-
tory {see Materialism, his-
torical)

education and capitalism, 38

Eger, Karl, 211

elect, aristocracy of, 104, 121,
122, 131-8, 151, 242

elect, membership in, no

emotion, emphasis on, 131, 135
138-40

Enlightenment, The, 45, 70, 106
182

Entzauberung der Welt, 221
{see also magic, elimination of)

Erastianism, 2x7

d'Este, Renata, 237

Ethnography, 29

experiment, method of, 1 3

faith, justification by, 112, 114
faith, results of, 114

{see also proof)
fatalism, 131, 232
feudal state, 16
feudalism, 185

Fieschi, 235

Firth, Charles Harding, 219, 236
Fleischiitz, Bible translator, 207
formalism, as characteristic of

Puritanism, 166
Fox, George, 89, 146, 148, 253,

266
Francis of Assissi, 120, 146, 254
Franciscans, 253
Franck, Sebastian, 121, 220
Francke, August Hermann, 132-

3, 138, 246
Franklin, Benjamin, 48, 50, 64,

71, 82, 124, 151, 158, .i8o,

192, 19s, 263
Frederick, Henry, Stadholder,

273
Frederick William I, 44, 250
Freytag, Gustav, 242
Froude, James Anthony, 223
Fruin, Robert, 219, 278
Fugger, Jacob, 51, 192
Fuggers, 82, 202, 213
Fuller, Thomas, 231
Funck, 201

Gardiner, Samuel Rawson, 213,

219, 272
Gerhard, Johannes, 229
Gerhard, Paul, 88
Giles, St., 146
God, Calvinistic conception of,

103
Goethe, Wolfgang, 151, 181, 261,

277
Goodwin, John, 246
Gorichem, Synod of, 260
Gothein, Eberhard, 43
Grab, Hermann von, 222
Grubbe, Edward, 253

Haller, Albertus, 274
Hals, Frans, 273
handicrafts, 21, 38, 65
Hanna, C. A., 189

287

The Protestant Ethic and the Spirit of Capitalism

Hanserd Knolly, Confession of,
125, 220, 221, 225, 231, 257

harmony, 14

Harnack, Adolf, 262

Hasbach, Wilhelm, 198

Hebrews, 265
{see Jews)

Heidegger, Johann Heinrich, 228

Heine, Heinrich, 280

Hellpach, W., 244

Henry, Matthew, 238, 259, 261

Heppe, Heinrich Ludwig, 221,
228, 247

heredity, influence of, 30, 279

Hermelink, Heinrich, 283

Hermhut, 135, 248

Hertling, Georg von, 188

historical individual, 47

Hoenicke, 238

Hoffmann, 255

honesty, best policy, 282

Honigsheim, Paul, 212, 222, 226,
229

Hooker, Richard, 127

Hoops, Johannes, 207

Hoornbeek, J., 221, 223, 228, 232,

234,259
Howe, Daniel Wait, 219
Howe, John, 237, 251, 259
Hudibras, 235

{see also Bulter)
Hugenots, 39, 43, 201
Humiliati, 254

Hundeshagen, Carl Bernhard, 226
Huntingdon, Lady, 125
Huss, John, 95, 198
Hutchinson, Colonel John, 275
Huyghens, Constantine, 274

ideal type, 71, 98, 200

idolatry of the flesh, 105, 146,

150, 169, 171, 224, 266, 270,

272-3
Ignatius, St., 119
Independents, 99, 122, 217, 242
India, religious teaching of, 265

288

individualism, 105, 222
indulgence, 120
industria, 73, 196, 197
inner light, doctrine of, 147
institution for salvation, church

as, 227
interest, prohibition of, 73, 201
interests, capitalistic, influence of,

24
Irving, Washington, 261, 275
isolation ,of individual, 108

Jacoby, Ludwig S., 250

Jains, 191, 197, 228

James I, 99, 166

James, William, 232

Janeway, James, 259, 268

Jansenists, 221, 222, 229

Jaspers, Karl, 186

Jerome, St., 205

Jesuits, 81, 118, 124, 267, 274,
277

Jesus , Jx. —N

/Jews as minorities, 39, 191
news as representing adven-
I turer's capitalism, 186, 271

Jews, problem of, 187, 197

Jews, Puritans' relation to, 165,
180

Jews, rationalization of, 117, 222 /
ob. Book of, 164

Jones, Ruf us B., 253

joy of living, 41, 42, 45

joy of living, relation of Puri-
tanism to, 163, 166-7, 173

Judaism {see Jews)

Jülicher, A., 214

Jüngst, Johannes, 251

Kampschulte, F. Wilhelm, 218
Kant, Immanuel, 270
Kattenbusch, Ferdinand, 255
Kautsky, Karl, 258
Keats, John, 44, 270
Keller, F., 191, 200, 284
Keller, Gottfried, 107

Index

Kierkegaard, Soren, 109

Klages, Ludwig, 186

de Kock, 226

Knolley, Hanserd {see Hanserd

Knolley)
» Knox, John, 45, 219
Koehler, Walther, 211
Koester, A., 211
Köhler, August, 219, 226, 247,

269
Kolde, Theodor, 251
Kommanditgesellschaft, 20
Köstlin, Julius, 221
Kürnberger, Ferdinand, 50

Labadie, Jean de, 240, 241, 245

laboratory, modern, 13

labour, division of^_8i^6o, 161
/labour, rational, capitälTstic'^r-
*• — ^-^^amzation of, 21, 22, 24, 166

labour, valuation of, 158

Lambeth Article, 220

Lamprecht, Karl, 244, 248

Lang, J. C, 252

Laud, Bishop William, 179, 213

Lavelye, ßmile, 191

law, canon, 14, 73

law, mosaic, 123, 165, 2 j i.

law, natural {see lex natures)

law, rational structure of, 25

law, Roman, 14, 77

Lenau, Nicolaus, 192

Leonard, Ellen M., 268

Levy, Hermann, 213, 217, 268,
279, 281, 282

lex naturce, 109, 114, 211, 256,
270

liberum arbitrium, 57, 77

Liguori, Alfonso of, 107

literature, Puritan attitude to, 168

Lobstein, Paul, 229

Lodensteyn, Jodocus van, 241

Loofs, Friedrich, 250, 252

Lorimer, G., 253

Löscher, Valentine Ernest, 246

Luthardt, Christoph Ernst, 214

Luther, use of "calling," 164,

204 ff.
Lutheranism, ethical theory of,

238
Lutheranism, moral helplessness

of, 126
Lutheranism, relation to Pietism,

95

Lutheranism, relation to world,
87, 160

Lutheranism, traditionalistic ten-
dency of, 86

Lutheranism and Predestination,

IÜ2

Macaulay, Thomas Babington,

219, 220, 223, 280
Machiavelli, Nicolo, 14, 107
magic, elimination of, 105, 117,

149
Magna Charta, 217
Maliniak, J., 200
Manley, Thomas, 280
manors, 21
Marcks, Erich, 218
marriage, Puritan conception of,

158, 263
masserizia, 195
Masson, David, 219, 220
materialism, historical, 24, 55,

75, 90-2, 183, 266, 277
Maurenbrecher, Max, 211
Maurice of Orange, 235
Meissner, Balthasar, 229
Melancthon, Philip, 102, 227,

239, 244
Menno, Simons, 89, 145
Mennonites, 44, 144, 149, 150,

217, 255, 256, 257
mercantilism, 23, 152, 197, 242
Merx, Albrecht, 203, 204, 208
Milton, John, 87, loi, 220, 267
minorities, 39, 190
Mirbt, Carl, 242
missionary, 136, 225
monasti ism, 118, 119, 158, 174

289

The Protestant Ethic and the Spirit of Capitalism

money-lenders, 20
monopolies, 65, 82, 179, 271
Montesquieu, Charles Louis de,

45
Moravians, 96, 135
Mormons, 264
Motley, John Lothrop, 219
Müller, Karl, 219, 253, 255
Münster, 149, 253
Murch, J., 253
music, 14
Muthmann, 223
mystics, German, 79, 86, 112, 132

Naber, 219
Neal, David, 235
needs, satisfaction of, 63
Neumann, Carl, 273, 275
Newman, A. H., 253
Nicklaes, Hendrik, 269
Nicolai, Philip, 229
Nietzsche, Friedrich, 232
Nuyens, W. J. F., 219, 221

official, 16

OflFenbacher, Martin, 188

oikos, 22

Old Testament, 123

Oldenbarneveld, Joan van, 99

Olevianus, J<aspar, 221, 228

organization, capitalistic forms of,

64,67
organization. Church, 128
organization, social, superiority of

Calvinism in, 108
orphans, Amsterdam, 226
ostentation, avoidance of, 71
otherworldliness, 40, 41, 42, 118,

14s
Owen, John, 237

Parker, 179

Parsees, 191

parvenus, 65, 71, 163, 268

Pascal, Blaise, 81, 113, 211 222,

227, 229
Paterson, William, i86 /

290

Paul, St., 84, 159, 160, 212
Petty, Sir William, 43, 179, 189,

279, 282
piece-rates, 59
Pierson, Allard, 219
Pietism, 42
Plitt, Hermann, "247
Plutarch, 236
Polenz, Gottlob van, 219
Poor relief, English, 178
poverty, glorification of, 136
Praetorius, Abdias, 229
Praxis pietatis, 129, 130
precisians, 117
predestination, doctrine of, 98 fF.,

i09iT., 121, 125, 128, 131,
\^ 143,148,226,227,232
Presbyterians, 125, 146
Price, Thomas, 219
Prinsterer, Groen van, 219, 274,

278
printing, 15
privileges, 65
profitableness, as sign of grace,

162
proletariat, 25
proof, doctrine of, 112, 115, 126,

129, 133, 137, 141, 142,

153,203
Prynne, William, 179, 269
psychology, in sociological in-
vestigation, 31, 244
Puritanism, attitude to sensuous

culture, 105
Puritanism, definition of, 96
putting-out system, 23, 66, 179

Quakers, 39, 44, 86, 144 ff., 150,
217,276,283
{see also Barclay, Robert)

Rabelais, Frangois, 190
Rachfel, Felix, i86
Ranke, Leopold von, 210
nraribnalism, 2^740, 75 \
(see also rationalization)^

Index

rationalization, 25, 68, 136, 147
{see also rationalism ; rn^gic,

elimination of ) -"""
" Rembrandt7i69, 273
Rer»aissance, Puritan relation to,

168
Rhodes, Cecil, 42
Ritschl, Albrecht, 134, 139, 219,

221, 229, 237, 240, 245, 247,

253.254,271
Rogers, Thorold, 280
Roloff, Gustav, 235
romanticism, 71
romanticists, 65
Roosevelt, Theodore, 269
Roundheads, 88
Rowntree, J. A., 283

Sack, Carl Heinrich, 219
sacraments, 104
Salmasius, Claudius, 201
salvation, conditions of, 113
sanctification, 138, 140
sanctions, psychological, 97, 128,

178, 197, 267
Sanford, John Langton, 123, 217,

274
saving, ascetic compulsion to,

172, 276
Savoy Declaration, 114, 125, 231
Schäfer, Dietrich, 222
Schechter, Solomon, 204
Scheibe, Max, 221
Schell, Hermann, 188
SchmoUer, Gustav, 214
Schneckenburger, Matthias, 112,

143, 214, 219, 228, 230, 232,

251.277
Scholasticism, 83, 168

{see also Thomas Aquinas)
Schortinghuis, Wilhelmus, 229,

244
Schulze-Gaevemitz, G. von, 198
Schwenkfeld, Caspar, 146, 256
science, Puritan attitude to, 168,

249

science. Western characteristics

of, 13, 15, 24
Scotists, 202
Scotus, Duns, 235
sea loans, 20

sect, distinguished from church,
145, 152,254
{see also believers' church)
Sedgwick, Obadiah, 228, 231,

234.259
Söe, Henri, 185

Seeberg, 211, 214, 215, 219, 235
Seiss, J. A., 253
selection, concept of, 55, 72
Seneca, 205
Septuagint, 204
Sermon on the Mount, 250
Shakespeare, William, 274
Simmel, Georg, 185, 193
Sirach, Jesus, 79, 164, 204 ff,
Skeats, Herbert S., 252
Skoptsi, 197
Sloth, 264
Smend, Rudolf, 204
Smith, Adam, 81, 161
socialism, 23
Sombart, Werner, 63, 75, 185,

187, 191, 192, 193-8, 200 ff.,

214, 217, 259, 261, 271, 276
South Sea Bubble, 186
Southey, Robert, 251, 280
Spangenberg, A. G., 136,223,248
Spener, Philip Jacob, 95, 132-5,

138, 150, 156,222,245, 247,

257, 262, 266
Spinoza, Baruch de, 245
Sports, Book of, 166
St. Andre, Dupin de, 190
State, characteristics of, 179
State, modern, 16, 72
Sternberg, H. von, 214
Strieder, Jacob, 284
Stundists, 197

talents, parable of the, 163
Talmud, 83, 165, 207, 270, 277

291

The Protestant Ethic and the Spirit of Capitalism

Tauler, Johannes, 86, 208, 212,

216, 229, 236, 24s
Taylor, Hudson, 225
Taylor, J. J., 219
Teellinck, W., 241
Teersteegen, 245
Terminism, doctrine of, 133
theodicy problem, 109
Theophylaktos, 209
Tholuck, A., 240
Thomas, Alton C, 253
Thomas Aquinas, St., 80, 150,

159, 160, 196, 211, 215,

267
Thomas ä Kempis, St., 242, 245
Thucydides, 14
time is money, 48, 158
Time, waste of, 157
toleration, idea of, 242
traditionalism, 36, 59 ff., 65 fr.,

76, 84, 164, 191, 215, 265,

271
Troeltsch, Ernst, i88, 211, 214,

218,219,236,239,255,270,

284
Tyerman, Luke, 251
Tyermans, 218
Tyndale, William, 210

Ullrich, F., 227, 240
uniformity, tendency toward, 169
unio mysHca, 112, 113, 130
Unwin, George, 280
utilitarianism, 52, 81, 109, 126,

161,176, 183, 196,265
utilitarianism, hygienic, 263

Van Wyck, A., 227

value, judgments of, 29, 98, 112,

182, 236
Varro, 196

Veblen, Thorstein, 258, 275
Vedder, Henry C, 253
Vischer, F. T., 247
Voet, Gisbert, 45, 218, 234, 241,
259

292

Voltaire, 77
Vol gate, 205

wages and productivity, 60, 198

Wagner, Richard, 107

Wahl, Adalbert, 191

waiting for Spirit, 148

Ward, Frank G., 214

Warneck, Johannes, 225

Watson, Richard, 251

Watts, Isaac, 251

wealth, temptations of, 156, 172,

174
wealth, uses approved by Puri-
tans, 171
Weingarten, H., 219, 277
Wesley, John, 89, 125, 135, 140,

142, 175,218,227,251
Westminster Confession, 99, 220,

228, 244
Westminster, Synod of, 99, 102,

156, 226
Whitaker, W., 242
White, G., 246, 268
Whitefield, George, 125, 251
William of Orange, 242
Williams, Roger, 243
Windelband, Wilhelm, 236, 249,

283
Wiskemann, Heinrich, 214
Wittich, W., 190
Wolff, Christian, 263
workers, women, 62
workSj.^odj^£iS, 117, 148
workSjSaivatiorrEy . 1 1 ■; . 1 1 6 . 141,

143, 150
Wupperthal, 44
Wyclif, John, 198, 203, 210

Xenophon, 196

Zeller, 226

Zinzendorf, Count Nicolaus, 95,

132, 134, 138, 143, 178.248,

264
Zwingli, Ullrich, 87
Zwinglianism, 217

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