by Max Weber
The form and configuration [Zusammenhang] of these pastoral works are sufficient (not always, of course, but, fortunately, often enough) to make it clear where they have drawn from life. And where they have done so, there is no source, other than correspondence and perhaps autobiographies, that is anywhere near as authentic or true to life. Unsatisfactory, too, are popular pamphlets and little tracts, or sermons, although one has every right to make the fullest use of these in addition, to complement the above sources. Even less helpful are the products of contemporary literature (however important they may become as a secondary source), nor, finally, the denominational statements by individual groups of capitalists which fail to penetrate beneath the surface, especially since they are often influenced by the “atmosphere” created by Protestant asceticism. Rarely are we in the fortunate position of being able to see so precisely the interlocking of religious and capitalist interests in work as, for example, in the case of the weavers of Kidderminster (quoted by me).
This is not in the least to diminish the importance of the sort of academic work that Rachfahl wishes to see. But, the specific direction in which a particular variety of religiosity was able to have its effect could, in my view, only be discovered along the path which I chose—and this was the point I especially wanted to establish. This direction was not, however, a mere “encouragement” of a psychological disposition which was present anyway. It meant, at least within the secular sphere, a new “spirit.” Out of their own religious life, out of their religiously determined family tradition, out of the religiously influenced style of life of their environment, there grew within people a disposition [Habitus] that suited them in a quite specific way to meet the specific demands of early modern capitalism. To express it schematically, instead of the entrepreneur, who in his “chrematism” [moneymaking] was able to feel at best “tolerated” by God, and who, in common with, for example, the Native Indian trader today, had to atone for or make up for his “usuraria pravitas,” the entrepreneur emerged with an utterly clear conscience, filled with the consciousness (1) that Providence was showing him the path to profit, so that he might tread it to God’s glory, (2) that God was visibly blessing him in the increase of his profit and possessions, (3) that he could measure his worth, not only before men, but before God, above all by success in his calling, provided this was achieved by legal means, and (4) that God had a purpose in selecting precisely him for economic advancement and had equipped him with the means to achieve it—in contrast to others, whom for good, if imponderable, reasons he had destined to suffer poverty and hard toil. With the certainty of the “Pharisee,” this man treads his path in strict formal legality, which to him is the supreme virtue and, since there is no “sufficiency” before God, indeed the only virtue to have any tangible significance.
On the other hand, in the home-based craftsman or the worker, we have the man with a specific “willingness to work,” whose conscientiousness in the God-given “calling” gives him the consciousness of his religious state of grace. And his abhorrence of the particular crime of idolatry of the flesh, that is, relaxing with one’s possessions, enjoying oneself, or wasting time and money on matters unconnected with the calling, forces him (in the case of the entrepreneur) again and again along the path of the investment of capital (as required by the calling), or of “saving,” and thereby toward the greatest possible advancement (for the “ethically” qualified poor [Besitzlosen]). The calling and the innermost ethical core of the personality—that is the decisive point—are here an unbroken unity. Any number of individual attempts to create a practical ethic of the calling of this kind in the Middle Ages—and I have stated that I plan to deal with this matter in due course [25]—do not alter the fact that such a “spiritual bond” was simply lacking at the time.
In the present, where we operate so much with the concept of “life,” “experience,” etc., as a specific value, the inner dissolution of that unity, the contempt for the “man of the calling,” is tangible. Modern capitalism, however, against whose mechanism, after all, that modern sentiment referred to above is in revolt, not only for reasons of social politics, but now even more strongly because of modern capitalism’s links with the spirit of the “man of the calling” [Berufsmenschentum], has long since ceased to have any need of such support. Even today, though, we find the remnants of the erstwhile significance for capitalist development of the religious elements in life, as I have shown repeatedly in my essays and elsewhere. Industry, for example, is still dependent upon those qualities of its staff which resulted from that style of life, which is apparent often enough in the denominational composition of its foremen and employees, who have risen from below, in contrast to the ordinary workers, and the same goes for the management [Unternehmertum]. All this is, of course, only reflected in the statistics when one eliminates chance factors that are introduced by the location (which is often clearly determined by the presence of indispensable raw material) and by the inclusion of craft businesses, which are not shown separately in the statistics.
On the whole, however, today’s capitalism, I repeat, is very largely emancipated from the effects of such factors. As far as the period of early modern capitalism is concerned, however, it had so far not occurred to anyone to doubt that the Huguenot movement was most closely linked with the French bourgeois [bürgerlich] capitalist development, and that the Huguenots, wherever they emigrated at the end of the eighteenth century after the revocation of the Edict of Nantes, took with them their typical business qualities not merely to countries where the economies were less developed, but precisely to Holland, where the capital investment, as I have already observed, was in part differently organized [instradiert] and in part, if only in certain strata, had lost its vigor in favor of living off one’s income, social ostentation, and a corresponding degree of consumption. The idea that the bourgeois [bürgerlich] capitalist development in the northern states of the United States did not rest in a quite specific manner on its similarly quite specifically Puritan-derived style of life had never before been voiced until R. did so in his “critique” (but not in his reply). In his customary imprecise manner, he himself conceded the existence of the same phenomenon in England. The English Romantics recognized the same connections in Scotland [25a], while Gothein had already established that the same thing applied to Germany, and I added some further examples myself. With regard to Holland, I have cited reasons why the forces of ascetic Protestantism, which (I repeat) were operating in exactly the same direction, were defeated by a cluster of factors. (I have mentioned some of these factors above, though I do not flatter myself that I have indicated anything like even the most essential of them.) The degree to which these forces were defeated [26] roughly corresponded to the remarkable extent, which was soon to become apparent, to which its capitalist expansion had stagnated (and I am not particularly referring to its colonial expansion). [27]
All this (visible in the economic qualities of certain sects from early as the Middle Ages) has been known about for a long time, mostly since the seventeenth century, and has hitherto never been doubted by anyone who has studied the subject at all. And, of course, there is nothing that can lead us to question it, least of all—for the reasons mentioned above—the existence in Frankfurt of Dutch Lutheran immigrants as well as the Calvinist ones, and similar facts, even though, of course, such facts may well, in themselves, be of real historical interest. This is why in my essays I have merely reminded the reader of these things. I remind the reader likewise that the Russian schismatics and sectarians whose innermost being is characterized by rational ascetic features (this does not apply to all the Russian sects, of course) display quite similar economic features as soon as they have grown out of their first otherworldly youth. The most extreme combination of business qualification and ethical “world rejection” is represented by the sect of the castrati.
I had to restrict myself to this illustrative reference to quite well-known matters (and despite Rachfahl’s pedantry, it will s
till have to suffice). Further research into the relative strength of the individual denominations is, no doubt, useful and necessary for specialized historical analysis of the development of the individual areas. Equally necessary (or rather considerably more necessary) is the comparison of the distinctive character [Eigenart] of the development of the individual countries influenced by ascetic Protestantism (which alone can explain the reasons for the emerging difference in their development). For me, however, the most urgent questions lie elsewhere. Firstly, of course, in the differentiation between the effects of Calvinist, Baptist, and Pietist ethics on the style of life. Additionally, in the detailed investigation of the beginnings of similar developments in the Middle Ages and in early Christianity, to the extent that the work of Troeltsch has not already dealt with these topics. For this, however, the closest possible collaboration with professional theologians is needed. [28] Urgent, too, is an investigation of how to explain, from the economic point of view, those elective affinities of the bourgeoisie [Bürgertum] with certain styles of life (affinities that reveal themselves repeatedly, in constantly varying but fundamentally similar manner), including (but not exclusively) affinities with certain individual components of religious stylizations of life offered most consistently by ascetic Protestantism. A great deal has already been said by many people about that more general problem, but a great deal, and, I believe, much of fundamental importance, still remains to be said.
I can at least give a brief answer to one question that R. seems hopelessly obsessed with, namely, the question of which personalities in the total picture of modern capitalism absolutely cannot and should not be understood from the angle of “innerworldly asceticism.” To this I say: the “adventurers” of the capitalist development—taking the concept of the “adventure” here in the sense in which G. Simmel recently defined it in a neat little essay.11 The importance in economic history of the “adventurers” is known to be extremely great in the history of early capitalism (and not only there). Yet in a certain sense, and if taken with a grain of salt, one can almost draw a comparison between the development toward the growing dominance of capitalism over the whole of economic life, and the development from economic casual profit to an economic system; and equally one can compare the genesis of the capitalist “spirit,” in my sense of the word, to the development from the Romanticism of the economic adventure to the rational economic method of life. [29]
Finally, if anyone should inquire of me what would have been the probable fate of the capitalist development (as an economic system) if the specifically modern elements of the capitalist “spirit” had not been present—it may be recalled that Rachfahl threw in a few (in my view) frivolous comments on the subject—one can in all conscience only reply that, all things considered, we just do not know. I may however perhaps be permitted to call to mind the main features of the development, for the benefit of those nonspecialists who usually cannot quite rid their minds of the popular fallacy that certain technical “achievements” were the unambiguous cause of the capitalist development. The capitalism of the ancient world developed without technical “progress”; indeed, it can almost be said that it developed simultaneously with the cessation of technical progress. The additional technical achievements of the continental Middle Ages are not without importance for the possibility of modern capitalist development, but they certainly do not constitute a decisive “incentive to development.” In the final analysis, the necessary historical preconditions include, firstly, certain objective factors such as climatic factors which influence both the conduct of life and labor costs, and, secondly, factors which were produced by the political and social organization of medieval society and the consequent specific character of the medieval, and especially the inland, city and its middle class [Bürgertum]. These latter factors were determined in the main by the inland culture which was characteristic of the Middle Ages, relative to antiquity (see my previously cited article in the Handwörterbuch der Staatswissenschaften). In addition, there is the specifically economic factor of new forms of organization in trade [Gewerbe] (domestic industry)—new, that is, in terms of structure, dissemination, and significance, even if not absolutely new when compared with antiquity.
The great development process, which lies between the late medieval, and still extremely unstable, capitalist development processes and the mechanization of technology which was decisive for the capitalism of today, consists of the creation of certain important objective political and economic preconditions for the latter. Above all, however, it consists of the preparation for and the creation of the rationalist and anti-traditionalist “spirit” and the whole new kind of human being [Menschentum], that in practice absorbed this whole process of development. The sources to which we must look for a greater understanding of this process are, on the one hand, the history of modern science and of its recently developed practical relationship to the economy, and, on the other hand, the history of the modern conduct of life in its practical significance for the economy.
In my essays I have discussed the latter component and intend to discuss it further. The development of the practical rational method of the conduct of life is, of course, something fundamentally different from the development of scientific rationalism, and not an automatic accompaniment of it: the first foundations of modern natural science originated from Catholic regions and Catholic minds, and it was only the methodical application of science for practical purposes that was primarily “Protestant,” just as certain principles of thought which were important for the method seem to have had an affinity with the Protestant manner of thinking (we cannot pursue this here).
The majority of the English heroes of science, from the seventeenth century to Faraday and Maxwell (one of whom is known to have preached in the church of his sect in the nineteenth century), are living proof that it would be quite mistaken to regard “religious faith” [Gläubigkeit] as such, whether at that period or later, as an obstacle to the development of the empirical sciences. The practical and methodical (not merely occasional) harnessing of the natural sciences to the service of the economy is one of the cornerstones of that whole development of the “methodical life,” to which certain Renaissance and Reformation influences, the latter especially in the manner I have described (albeit incompletely), have made a decisive contribution. If anyone were to ask me to say honestly how great I would estimate the significance of this latter factor in particular to be, I could only reply that, after repeatedly and conscientiously considering the matter, in my opinion it was very great. I can scarcely be blamed for the fact that there is no “statistical” distribution ratio for the attribution of historical phenomena.
Enough and more than enough. In the eyes of the mass of the “public,” faultfinding “critics” like Rachfahl (and I think I have at least demonstrated that this description of him is apt) are always in the right. The public cannot, after all, really be expected to read the “criticized” works thoroughly themselves simply because they have read a frankly incomprehensible and factually inaccurate “critique.” That a professor of history, particularly one with this degree of self-assurance, could, as a result of a grossly superficial reading based on his own preconceptions, so fundamentally misunderstand the whole question under discussion, and that he should then be unable to bring himself to admit this when it is pointed out to him—this will undoubtedly be difficult to believe for people without an exact knowledge of the subject. This does not alter the fact that it is unfortunately true, and that I have been able to prove it [30], regretfully at the expense of the space in this journal, which cannot be made as freely available to be filled to overflowing with necessarily sterile polemics (a sterility that is entirely the fault of the “critic”) as, apparently, that of the Internationale Wochenschrift.
WEBER’S NOTES
1) I should like to stress that the absolute worthlessness of R.’s “critical” efforts does not in the least prevent me from highly valuing other works of his in which he does not
stray on to territory that is frankly unsuitable for his particular temperament. “Unsuitable” not only because he is, quite frankly, poorly informed on matters of fact, but also because his love of academic “dueling” for its own sake is coupled with the persistent tendency to attempt thrusts that infringe dueling “etiquette”—the student jargon used to be “Sauhieben” [foul thrusts]. Moreover, love of dueling can in any case easily get out of hand, to the inevitable detriment of the “subject” under discussion. R. complains of the inconsiderate form of my reply to him. But when Troeltsch responded to him in a deliberately generous and accommodating style, in both form and content, it is clear that R. has merely attempted to profit “tactically” from this accommodation in a most unworthy manner, and that his attacks on Troeltsch are characterized by a degree of animosity that exceeds even that which he directs toward me. It seems that whenever he “criticizes,” he inevitably turns into a mere faultfinder, and if you talk to such people at all, it can only be in plain language. I hope I never again have to deal with a “critic” of this kind. A polemic with more integrity, even if it were sharp, would observe other considerations and, however fiercely I might still have to contest it in matters of substance, would not fill me with such—to speak plainly—disdain. What other than this, admittedly unpleasant, feeling can I have, though, toward a “critic” who, without having the slightest contribution to offer, felt the need to begin his “argument” by assuring me that I had set myself too “easy” a task, and who now thinks he can end it by issuing a warning that “the Weber findings” should be treated with caution?
