in the general, denotes a gain or profit which a person makes of his money, by lending the same; or it is an increase of the principal, exacted for the loan thereof; or the price a borrower gives for the use of a sum credited to him by the lender, called also interest.

The word usury is generally taken in an evil sense, viz. for an unlawful profit which a person makes of his money; in which sense it is, that usury is forbidden by the civil and ecclesiastical, and even by the law of nature. See Law, Tit. xxxiii. 37.