Thus, during the first three centuries of Christianity, there does not seem to have been, as far as we can now ascertain, any definite and general doctrine laid down on the subject of usury. In the year 305 or 306 a very important step forward was taken, when the Council of Elvira passed a decree against usury. This decree, as given by Ivo and Gratian, seems only to have applied to usury on the part of the clergy, but as given by Mansi it affected the clergy and laity alike. 'Should any cleric be found to have taken usury,' the latter version runs, 'let him be degraded and excommunicated. Moreover, if any layman shall be proved a usurer, and shall have promised, when corrected, to abstain from the practice, let him be pardoned. If, on the contrary, he perseveres in his evil-doing, he is to be excommunicated.'[1] Although the Council of Elvira was but a provincial Council, its decrees are important, as they provided a model for later legislation. Dr. Cleary thinks that Mansi's version of this decree is probably incorrect, and that, therefore, the Council only forbade usury on the part of the clergy. In any event, with this one possible and extremely doubtful exception, there was no conciliar legislation affecting the practice of usury on the part of the laity until the eighth century. Certain individual popes censured the taking of usury by laymen, and the Council of Nice expressed the opinion that such a practice was contrary to Christ's teaching, but there is nowhere to be found an imperative and definite prohibition of the taking of usury except by the clergy.[2] [Footnote 1: Cleary, _op. cit._, p. 43.] [Footnote 2: Cleary, _op. cit._, pp. 44-8.]