# Quote — R. H. Tawney, Religion and the Rise of Capitalism

> Laborare est orare. [To work is to pray.] By the Puritan moralist the ancient maxim is repeated with a new and intenser significance. The labor which he idealizes is not simply a requirement imposed by nature, or a punishment for the sin of Adam. It is itself a kind of ascetic discipline, more rigorous than that demanded of any order of mendicants—a discipline imposed by the will of God, and to be undergone, not in solitude, but in the punctual discharge of secular duties. It is not merely an economic means, to be laid aside when physical needs have been satisfied. It is a spiritual end, for in it alone can the soul find health, and it must be continued as an ethical duty long after it has ceased to be a material necessity.

- Author: [R. H. Tawney](https://www.leafyquotes.com/r-h-tawney.md)
- Book: [Religion and the Rise of Capitalism](https://www.leafyquotes.com/r-h-tawney/religion-and-the-rise-of-capitalism.md)
- Source: [Wikiquote](https://en.wikiquote.org/wiki/R._H._Tawney#Religion_and_the_Rise_of_Capitalism_(1926)) ([CC BY-SA 4.0](https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0/))
- Quote page: https://www.leafyquotes.com/r-h-tawney/religion-and-the-rise-of-capitalism/laborare-est-orare

## More from this book

> A society which reverences the attainment of riches as the supreme felicity will naturally be disposed to regard the poor as damned in the next world, if only to justify itself for making their life a hell in this.

[Quote page](https://www.leafyquotes.com/r-h-tawney/religion-and-the-rise-of-capitalism/a-society-which.md)

> Mankind may wring her secrets from nature, and use their knowledge to destroy themselves.

[Quote page](https://www.leafyquotes.com/r-h-tawney/religion-and-the-rise-of-capitalism/mankind-may-wring.md)

> Too often, contemning the external order as unspiritual, [the Puritan] has made it, and ultimately himself, less spiritual by reason of his contempt.

[Quote page](https://www.leafyquotes.com/r-h-tawney/religion-and-the-rise-of-capitalism/too-often-contemning.md)