Max Weber exerts an effort to conduct researches on social and historical issues with an attitude of academic neutrality and avoid value judgements. His analyses of capitalism through scientific methodology do not induce him to evaluate modern Western society critically. He always felt that he was “a member of German bourgeois classes”, having been brought up to share their views and ideals and advocating economic and political policies advantageous to them. In The Protestant Ethic and the Spirit of Capitalism and in his other works, Weber gives industrial capitalism a rather optimistic assessment and interprets it as rational, progressive and indispensable to the self-preservation of nation states, while denouncing socialism as a threat to the destiny of modern Germany. Out of his empathy towards capitalism, Weber investigates various forms of capital, trade, finance and towns in ancient times, offering insightful views of Eastern and Western civilizations. Weber understands that the East and the West had many characteristics in common in their social and cultural development, but believes nevertheless that the conditions in medieval Europe were uniquely suitable for the rise of modern capitalism. His researches on ancient civilizations are mostly sociological and have stimulated researches conducted by historians, never pretending to be historical in the strict sense and not always providing us with accurate and meticulous historical details.