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 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 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).