"...The really important and characteristic domain of the usurer however is the function of money as a means of payment. Every payment of money ground-rent tribute tax etc. which becomes due on a certain date carries with it the need to secure money for such a purpose. Hence from the days of ancient Rome to those of modern times wholesale usury relies upon tax-collectors fermiers gènèraux receveurs gènèraux. Then there develops with commerce and the generalization of commodity- production the separation in time of purchase and payment. The money has to be paid on a definite date. How this can lead to circumstances in which the money-capitalist and usurer even nowadays merge into one is shown by modern money crises. This same usury however becomes one of the principal means of further developing the necessity for money as a means of payment by driving the producer ever more deeply into debt and destroying his usual means of payment since the burden of interest alone makes his normal reproduction impossible. At this point usury sprouts up out of money as a means of payment and extends this function of money as its very own domain..."