Page:Catholic Encyclopedia, volume 15.djvu/271

USILLA , Ushaw College, A Centenary Memorial (Newcastle, 1894); axLER. Records and Recollections of Ushaw (Preston. 1889); GlLLOn-. Chapels al Ushaw (Durham, 1885); J. GlLLOW, aydock Papers (Ivondon, 1888); Oakley, Introduction to, Hidden Gem (London, 18!i9); Wilbekfobcb, Ushciw College in Dublin Review. XLV (1858); Bonney, Life and Letters of Lingard (London. 1911); Wabd. Life and Times of ird. Wiseman (London. 1899); Gillow. Bibl. Dict. Eng. Cath. London, 1885); Ushaw Magazine, I-XXI (1891). sq. Catholic Who's Who (1911); Catholic Magazine, I. II (1831-2); Taf*. Miscelany. III (18241; Catholic University Bulletin (1908).

E. Bonney.

Usilla, a titular see of Byzacena in Africa. Nothing is known of the history of this city; it is mentioned by Ptolemy (IV, .3, 10) and with variations in the spelling the name by the Peutinger Tables (ii) which call it a municipality, and by other ancient geographical documents according to which it was thirty-two miles 3m Thysdrus (to-day El Djem) and twentj'-eight miles from Thipna; (Bcnshir Tina). The ruins are known as Inshilki. among them being the remains of a Byzantine basilica. We have the names of six shops of Usilla: Felix, present at the Council of irthage (256) ; Cassianus, at the Council of Carthage 49); Theodore, one of the Donatist partisans of aximianus, who at the Council of Cabarsussi (393) ndemned Primianus, and in turn at the Council of igai (394) was condemned by the partisans of the tter, as one of the consecrators of Maximianus; ivatus, present at the Conference of Carthage (411); ctorinus, e.xiled by Huneric (484); Laurentius, a ner of the letter addressed by the Council of Byzantine ((541), to the Byzantine emperor again.st the onothelites.

SM1TH, Dict, of Greek and Roman Geogr., s. v. Usilla; Muller, it<^^ on Ptolemy, ed. Didot, I. 623; Todlotte, Glog. de IWfrique etienne, Byzaclne el Tripolitaine (Montreuil. 1894). 227-29. S. P^TRIofes.

Usingen, Arnoldi von. See Arnoldi, BarIOLO.\I.«iuS.

Uskup. See ScopiA, Archdiocese of.

Usuard, MARTYROLOGY of. — Usuard was a Benedictine monk of the Abbey of St-Germain-des-Prc5s, iris. He seems to have died about the year 87.5, d the prologue in which he offers to Charles the lid his most important work, the "Martyrology", lich he had undertaken at that monarch's instiga- >n, was apparently written very shortly before the thor's death. Usuard wa.s a prominent member of 3 order and he had been sent on a mission to Spain 8.58 to procure certain imjiortant relics, of which jrney an account is stiU preserved (sec Acta SS., ly, VI, 4.59). The "Martyrologium" which bears i name, a compilation upon which the existing jman Martyrology depends very closely, remained roughout the Middle .^ges the most famous docu- ?nt of its kind, and is preserved to us in innumerable S.S., of which Dom Quentin gives a partial hst lartyrologes historiques, 1908, pp. (37.5-7). The ther complicated history of the evolution of the rly medieval martyrologia culminating in Usuard's )rk has for the fir.st time been accurately told by )m (Quentin in the Ijook just cited. It has, however, ig brcti known that U.^iuard jjrovided what was sub- intially ,an abridgement of .\do's "MartjTology " 'C .\do of ViENNE) in a form hotter adapted for actical liturgical use. In cert:iin points, however, mard reverted to a Lyonese recension of Bede's gmented "M.artjTology ", which was attributed to e famous archdeacon Florus. But the storj' of the lation of these texts, unravelled for the first time by am Quentin, is too complicated to be detailed here, iclext of Usuard's "Martyrologium" was carefully itcd by Dom Bouillant (Paris, 1718) from M.S. itisi 1374.5 at Paris, which, if not the autograph of e author, dates at any rate from his time. A still are elaborate edition waa brought out by the Bollandist Du Solher in Acta SS., June, VI. It has been reprinted in P. L., CXXIII–CXXIV.

, Les martyrologes historiques (Paris, 1908), a work of supreme import, |,m - ,i.,r\ manor of tho editions of Bonili ,, ,;, , I .. ,., nvcd in tho light of what is there demonstrated, so also must the accounts given by .^HELIS. Die MarlurolugtuH ihn. Geschichte und ihr Werth (Berlin. 1900); see also de Smedt. Introd. ad hist, eccles. (Ghent, 1870). 127-55; Veith in Kirchenlexikon. s. v.

Herbert Thurston.

Usury.—In the article we have reserved the question of the lawfulness of taking interest on money lent ; we have here to consider first, usury as a. subject of controversy; and, secondly, usury as con- denmed by all honest men.

Plato (L.aws, v. 742) and Aristotle (Pohtics, I, X, xi) considered interest aa contrary to the nature of things; Aristophanes expressed his disapproval of it, in the "Clouds" (1283 sqq.); Cato condemned it (see Cicero, "De officiis", II, xxv), comparing it to homi- cide, as also did Seneca (De beneficiis, VII, x) and Plutarcli in his treatise against incurring debts. So much for Greek and Roman writers, who, it is true, knew Utile of economic science. Aristotle disapproved of the money trader's profit; and the ruinous rales at which money was lent explain his severity. On the other hand, the Roman and Greek laws, while considering the mutuum, or loan for consumption, as a contract gratuitous in principle, allowed a clause, stipulating for the payment of interest, to be added to the bond. The Law of the Twelve Tables allowed only unciarium fenus, probably of the capital, or 8.33 per cent. A plebiscitum, lex Ganucia, 412 went so far as to forbid all interest whatever, but, at a later period, the Roman Law allowed interest at 1 percent monthly, or 12 per cent per annum. Justinian laid down as a general rule that this maximum should be reduced by half (L. 26, § 1, c. De usuris, IV, 32). Chaldea allowed interest on loans (cf. Law of Hammurabi, 48 sqq.). No absolute prohibition can be found in the Old Testament; at most, Exod., .xxii, 25, and Deut., xxiii, 19, 20, forbifl the taking of interest by one Jew from another (cf. Schwalm, "La vie privée du peuple juif à l'époque de J. C.", III, col. 7, Paris, 1910).

In the Christian era, the New Testament is silent on the subject; the passage in St. Luke (vi, 34, 35), which some persons interpret as a condemnation of interest, is only an exhortation to general and disinterested benevolence. A certain number of authors, among them Benedict XIV (De synodo diocesana, X, iv, n. 6), believed in the existence of a Patristic tradition which regardetl the prohibitory passages of Holy Scripture a-s of universal application. Exami- nation of (he texts, however, leads us to the following conclusions: until the fourth century all that can be inferred from the Fathers and ecclesiastical writers is that it is contrary to mercy and humanity to demand interest from a poor and needy man. The vehement denunciations of the Fathers of the fourth and fifth centuries were called forth by the moral decadence and avarice of the time, and we cannot find in them any expression of a general doctrine on this point ; nor do the Fathers of the following centuries say anything remarkable on usury; they simply protest again.st the exploitation of misfortune, and .such transactions as, under pretence of rendering service to the borrower, really threw him into great distress. The question of moderate rates of interest seems scarcely to have presented itself to their minds as a matter for discussion. The texts bearing on the question are collected in Vermeersch, "Quæstiones morales de justitia", II, n. 3.59.—The councils condemned in the first place clerics who lent money at interest. This is the purpose of the 44th of the Apostolic Canons; of the Council of Arles (314), and of the 17th canon of the First Council of Nica-a (325). It is true that a text of the Council of Elvira (305 or