Perhaps

people in earlier times
were wiser than we are,
maybe had greater foresight.
In Roman times moralists declared
the lending of money at interest

 

Moneylender, with moneybag, cocking a snook, 12th century.                                

to be one of the very worst sins,
a theme graphically stressed
by Christian monks at the dawn
of capitalism nearly a thousand years ago.

 

Moneylender, with moneybag, pulled by demons into the jaws of Hell, 12th century.