In the Table-Talk a friend, in 1542, raised an objection: If a man trades with the money lent him and makes 15 florins yearly, he must surely pay the lender something for this. Of this Luther, however, will not hear. “No, this is merely an accidental profit, and on accidentals no rule can be based.”[279] That the profit was “accidental” was, however, simply his theory. In spite of all this Luther did make exceptions, though, in view of his rigid theory and reading of the Bible, it is difficult to see how he could justify them. Thus, he is willing to allow usury in those cases where the charging of interest is “in reality a sort of work of mercy to the needy, who would otherwise have nothing, and where no great injury is done to another.” Thus, when “old people, poor widows or orphans, or other necessitous folk, who have learned no other way of making a living,” were only able to support themselves by lending out their money, in such cases the “lawyers might well seek to mitigate somewhat the severity of the law.” “Should an appeal be made to the ruler,” then the proverb “Necessity knows no law” might be quoted. “It might here serve to call to mind that the Emperor Justinian had permitted such mitigated usury [he had sanctioned the taking of 4, 6 or 8 per cent], and in such a case I am ready to agree and to answer for it before God, particularly in the case of needy persons and where usury is practised out of necessity or from charity. If, however, it was wanton, avaricious, unnecessary usury, merely for the purpose of trade and profit, then I would not agree”; even the Emperor himself could not make this legitimate; for it is not the laws of the Emperor which lead us to heaven, but the observance of the laws of God.[280] It follows from this that even the so-called “_titulus legis_” found no favour in his sight in the case of actual money loans, for it is of this, not of “purchasable interest,” that he speaks in the writing to the pastors. A real, honest purchase, so he there says quite truly, is no usury.[281] A remarkable deflection from his strict principles is to be found not only in the words just quoted but also in his letter to the town council of Erfurt sent in 1525 at the time of the rising in that town and the neighbourhood. The mutineers refused among other things to continue paying interest on the sums borrowed. For this refusal Luther censures them as rebels, and also refuses to hear of their “deducting the interest from the sum total” (i.e. the capital). He here vindicates the lenders as follows: “Did I wish yearly to spend some of the total amount I should naturally keep it by me. Why should I hand it over to another as though I were a child, and allow another to trade with it? Who can dispose of his money even at Erfurt in such a way that it shall be paid out to him yearly and bit by bit? This would really be asking too much.”[282]