Weber’s italics. ↩
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). ↩
Defoe was a zealous Nonconformist. ↩
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, designates the desire to become rich as the main pitfall, following 1 Timothy 6, 8, and 9, 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 337). 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. ↩
Baxter, Saints’ Everlasting Rest, II, p. 16, warns against the employment of “heavy, phlegmatic, 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. ↩
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, Theologia practica, I, p. 153. Furthermore, as for Baxter, Saints’ Everlasting Rest, I, p. 380, poverty is very often a symptom of sinful slothfulness. ↩
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 wealth. For wealth all too often draws men away from religion. ↩
See above, note 343, and the study of H. Levy referred to there. The same is noted in all the discussions (thus by Manley for the Huguenots). ↩
“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 ↩
Similar things were not lacking in England. There was, for example, that Pietism which, starting from Law’s Serious Call (1728), preached poverty, chastity, and, originally, isolation from the world. ↩
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 viewpoint 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. ↩
Furthermore, one may well doubt to what extent the joy of the medieval craftsman in his creation, which is so commonly appealed to, was effective as a psychological motive force. Nevertheless, there is undoubtedly something in that thesis. But in any case asceticism certainly deprived all labour of this worldly attractiveness, today forever destroyed by capitalism, and oriented it to the beyond. Labour in a calling as such is willed by God. The impersonality of present-day labour, what, from the standpoint of the individual, is its joyless lack of meaning, still has a religious justification here. Capitalism at the time of its development needed labourers who were available for economic exploitation for conscience’ sake. Today it is in the saddle, and hence able to force people to labour without transcendental sanctions. ↩
