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Extracts from Adam Smith
Theory of Moral Sentiments
Part one: Of the Propriety of ActionConsisting of Three Sections
Section I
Of the Sense of Propriety
Chapter 1
Of Sympathy
How selfish soever man may be supposed, there are evidently some principles
in his nature, which interest him in the fortune of others, and render
their happiness necessary to him, though he derives nothing from it except
the pleasure of seeing it. Of this kind is pity or compassion, the emotion
which we feel for the misery of others, when we either see it, or are made
to conceive it in a very lively manner. That we often derive sorrow from
the sorrow of others, is a matter of fact too obvious to require any
instances to prove it; for this sentiment, like all the other original
passions of human nature, is by no means confined to the virtuous and
humane, though they perhaps may feel it with the most exquisite
sensibility. The greatest ruffian, the most hardened violator of the laws
of society, is not altogether without it.
...
Part Four: Of the Effect of Utility upon the Sentiment of Approbation
Consisting of One Section
Chapter 1: Of the beauty which the appearance of Utility bestows upon all
the productions of art, and of the extensive influence of this
species of Beauty
We are ... charmed with the beauty of that accommodation which reigns in
the palaces and oeconomy of the great; and admire how every thing is
adapted to promote their ease, to prevent their wants, to gratify their
wishes, and to amuse and entertain their most frivolous desires. If we
consider the real satisfaction which all these things are capable of
affording, by itself and separated from the beauty of that arrangement
which is fitted to promote it, it will always appear in the highest degree
contemptible and trifling. But we rarely view it in this abstract and
philosophical light. We naturally confound it in our imagination with the
order, the regular and harmonious movement of the system, the machine or
oeconomy by means of which it is produced. The pleasures of wealth and
greatness, when considered in this complex view, strike the imagination as
something grand and beautiful and noble, of which the attainment is well
worth all the toil and anxiety which we are so apt to bestow upon it.
And it is well that nature imposes upon us in this manner. It is this
deception which rouses and keeps in continual motion the industry of
mankind. It is this which first prompted them to cultivate the ground, to
build houses, to found cities and commonwealths, and to invent and improve
all the sciences and arts, which ennoble and embellish human life; which
have entirely changed the whole face of the globe, have turned the rude
forests of nature into agreeable and fertile plains, and made the trackless
and barren ocean a new fund of subsistence, and the great high road of
communication to the different nations of the earth. The earth by these
labours of mankind has been obliged to redouble her natural fertility, and
to maintain a greater multitude of inhabitants. It is to no purpose, that
the proud and unfeeling landlord views his extensive fields, and without a
thought for the wants of his brethren, in imagination consumes himself the
whole harvest that grows upon them. The homely and vulgar proverb, that the
eye is larger than the belly, never was more fully verified than with
regard to him. The capacity of his stomach bears no proportion to the
immensity of his desires, and will receive no more than that of the meanest
peasant. The rest he is obliged to distribute among those, who prepare, in
the nicest manner, that little which he himself makes use of, among those
who fit up the palace in which this little is to be consumed, among those
who provide and keep in order all the different baubles and trinkets, which
are employed in the oeconomy of greatness; all of whom thus derive from his
luxury and caprice, that share of the necessaries of life, which they would
in vain have expected from his humanity or his justice. The produce of the
soil maintains at all times nearly that number of inhabitants which it is
capable of maintaining. The rich only select from the heap what is most
precious and agreeable. They consume little more than the poor, and in
spite of their natural selfishness and rapacity, though they mean only
their own conveniency, though the sole end which they propose from the
labours of all the thousands whom they employ, be the gratification of
their own vain and insatiable desires, they divide with the poor the
produce of all their improvements. They are led by an invisible hand to
make nearly the same distribution of the necessaries of life, which would
have been made, had the earth been divided into equal portions among all
its inhabitants, and thus without intending it, without knowing it, advance
the interest of the society, and afford means to the multiplication of the
species. When Providence divided the earth among a few lordly masters, it
neither forgot nor abandoned those who seemed to have been left out in the
partition. These last too enjoy their share of all that it produces. In
what constitutes the real happiness of human life, they are in no respect
inferior to those who would seem so much above them. In ease of body and
peace of mind, all the different ranks of life are nearly upon a level, and
the beggar, who suns himself by the side of the highway, possesses that
security which kings are fighting for.
...
Part Five: Of the Influence of Custom and Fashion upon the Sentiments of
Moral Approbation and Disapprobation
Consisting of One Section
Chapter 2: Of the Influence of Custom and Fashion upon Moral Sentiments
Fashion too will sometimes give reputation to a certain degree of disorder,
and, on the contrary, discountenance qualities which deserve esteem. In the
reign of
Charles II. a degree of licentiousness was deemed the
characteristic of a liberal education. It was connected, according to the
notions of those times, with generosity, sincerity, magnanimity, loyalty,
and proved that the person who acted in this manner, was a gentleman, and
not a puritan. Severity of manners, and regularity of conduct, on the other
hand, were altogether unfashionable, and were connected, in the imagination
of that age, with cant, cunning, hypocrisy, and low manners. To superficial
minds, the vices of the great seem at all times agreeable. They connect
them, not only with the splendour of fortune, but with many superior
virtues, which they ascribe to their superiors; with the spirit of freedom
and independency, with frankness, generosity, humanity, and politeness. The
virtues of the inferior ranks of people, on the contrary, their
parsimonious frugality, their painful industry, and rigid adherence to
rules, seem to them mean and disagreeable. They connect them, both with the
meanness of the station to which those qualities commonly belong, and with
many great vices, which, they suppose, usually accompany them; such as an
abject, cowardly, ill-natured, lying, pilfering disposition.
...
Introduction
When we consider the character of any individual, we
naturally view it under two different aspects; first, as it may
affect his own happiness; and secondly, as it may affect that of
other people.
Section 1
Of the Character of the Individual, so far as it affects his own
Happiness; or of Prudence
The preservation and healthful state of the body seem to be the objects
which Nature first recommends to the care of every individual. The
appetites of hunger and thirst, the agreeable or disagreeable sensations of
pleasure and pain, of heat and cold, etc. may be considered as lessons
delivered by the voice of Nature herself, directing him what he ought to
chuse, and what he ought to avoid, for this purpose. The first lessons
which he is taught by those to whom his childhood is entrusted, tend, the
greater part of them, to the same purpose. Their principal object is to
teach him how to keep out of harm's way.
...
Section 2: Of the Character of the Individual, so far as it can affect the
Happiness of other People
Chapter 1: Of the Order in which Individuals are recommended by Nature to
our care and attention
Every man, as the Stoics used to say, is first and
principally recommended to his own care; and every man is
certainly, in every respect, fitter and abler to take care of
himself than of any other person. Every man feels his own
pleasures and his own pains more sensibly than those of other
people. The former are the original sensations; the latter the
reflected or sympathetic images of those sensations. The former
may be said to be the substance; the latter the shadow.
After himself, the members of his own family, those who
usually live in the same house with him, his parents, his
children, his brothers and sisters, are naturally the objects of
his warmest affections. They are naturally and usually the
persons upon whose happiness or misery his conduct must have the
greatest influence. He is more habituated to sympathize with
them. He knows better how every thing is likely to affect them,
and his sympathy with them is more precise and determinate, than
it can be with the greater part of other people. It approaches
nearer, in short, to what he feels for himself.
...
Introduction and Plan of the
Work
(¶0.1)
The annual labour of every nation is the fund which originally supplies it
with all the necessaries and conveniences of life which it annually
consumes, and which consist always either in the immediate
produce of that labour, or in what is purchased with that produce from
other nations.
(¶0.2)
According therefore as this produce, or what is purchased with it, bears a
greater or smaller proportion to the number of those who are to consume it,
the nation will be better or worse supplied with all the necessaries and
conveniences for which it has occasion.
(¶0.3)
But this proportion must in every nation be regulated by two different
circumstances; first, by the skill, dexterity, and judgment with which its
labour is generally applied; and, secondly, by the proportion between the
number of those who are employed in useful labour, and that of those who
are not so employed...
(¶0.4)
The abundance or scantiness of this supply, too, seems to depend more upon
the former of those two circumstances than upon the latter. Among the
savage nations of hunters and fishers, every individual who is able to
work, is more or less employed in useful labour, and endeavours to provide,
as well as he can, the necessaries and conveniences of life, for himself,
or such of his family or tribe as are either too old, or too young, or too
infirm to go a hunting and fishing. Such nations, however, are so
miserably poor that, from mere want, they are frequently reduced, or, at
least, think themselves reduced, to the necessity sometimes of directly
destroying, and sometimes of abandoning their infants, their old people,
and those afflicted with lingering diseases, to perish with hunger, or to
be devoured by wild beasts. Among civilised and thriving nations, on the
contrary, though a great number of people do not labour at all, many of
whom consume the produce of ten times, frequently of a hundred times more
labour than the greater part of those who work; yet the produce of the
whole labour of the society is so great that all are often abundantly
supplied, and a workman, even of the lowest and poorest order, if he is
frugal and industrious, may enjoy a greater share of the necessaries and
conveniences of life than it is possible for any savage to acquire.
Chapter 1: Of the Division of
Labour
(¶1.1.1)
The greatest improvement in the productive powers of labour, and the
greater part of the skill, dexterity, and judgment with which it is
anywhere directed, or applied, seem to have been the effects of the
division of labour.
(¶1.1.3)
To take an example, therefore, from a very trifling manufacture; but one in
which the division of labour has been very often taken notice of, the trade
of the pin-maker; a workman not educated to this business (which the
division of labour has rendered a distinct trade), nor acquainted with the
use of the machinery employed in it (to the invention of which the same
division of labour has probably given occasion), could scarce, perhaps,
with his utmost industry, make one pin in a day, and certainly could not
make twenty. But in the way in which this business is now carried on, not
only the whole work is a peculiar trade, but it is divided into a number of
branches, of which the greater part are likewise peculiar trades. One man
draws out the wire, another straights it, a third cuts it, a fourth points
it, a fifth grinds it at the top for receiving the head; to make the head
requires two or three distinct operations; to put it on is a peculiar
business, to whiten the pins is another; it is even a trade by itself to
put them into the paper; and the important business of making a pin is, in
this manner, divided into about eighteen distinct operations, which, in
some manufactories, are all performed by distinct hands, though in others
the same man will sometimes perform two or three of them. I have seen a
small manufactory of this kind where ten men only were employed, and where
some of them consequently performed two or three distinct operations. But
though they were very poor, and therefore but indifferently accommodated
with the necessary machinery, they could, when they exerted themselves,
make among them about twelve pounds of pins in a day. [Smith calculates
that:] Each person... might be considered as making four thousand eight
hundred pins a day. But if they had all wrought separately and
independently, and without any of them having been educated to this
peculiar business, they certainly could not each of them have made twenty,
perhaps not one pin in a day...
(¶1.1.4)
In every other art and manufacture, the effects of the division of labour
are similar to what they are in this very trifling one; though, in many of
them, the labour can neither be so much subdivided, nor reduced to so great
a simplicity of operation. The division of labour, however, so far as it
can be introduced, occasions, in every art, a proportionable increase of
the productive powers of labour. The separation of different trades and
employments from one another seems to have taken place in consequence of
this advantage. This separation, too, is generally carried furthest in
those countries which enjoy the highest degree of industry and improvement;
what is the work of one man in a rude state of society being generally that
of several in an improved one. In every improved society, the farmer is
generally nothing but a farmer; the manufacturer, nothing but a
manufacturer. The labour, too, which is necessary to produce any one
complete manufacture is almost always divided among a great number of
hands.
...
(¶1.1.5)
This great increase of the quantity of work which, in consequence of the
division of labour, the same number of people are capable of performing, is
owing to three different circumstances; first, to the increase of dexterity
in every particular workman; secondly, to the saving of the time which is
commonly lost in passing from one species of work to another; and lastly,
to the invention of a great number of machines which facilitate and abridge
labour, and enable one man to do the work of many...
(¶1.1.10)
It is the great multiplication of the productions of all the different
arts, in consequence of the division of labour, which occasions, in a
well-governed society, that universal opulence which extends itself to the
lowest ranks of the people. Every workman has a great quantity of his own
work to dispose of beyond what he himself has occasion for; and every other
workman being exactly in the same situation, he is enabled to exchange a
great quantity of his own goods for a great quantity, or, what comes to the
same thing, for the price of a great quantity of theirs. He supplies them
abundantly with what they have occasion for, and they accommodate him as
amply with what he has occasion for, and a general plenty diffuses itself
through all the different ranks of the society.
(¶1.1.11)
Observe the accommodation of the most common artificer or day-labourer in a
civilised and thriving country, and you will perceive that the number of
people of whose industry a part, though but a small part, has been employed
in procuring him this accommodation, exceeds all computation. The woollen
coat, for example, which covers the day-labourer, as coarse and rough as it
may appear, is the produce of the joint labour of a great multitude of
workmen. The shepherd, the sorter of the wool, the wool-comber or carder,
the dyer, the scribbler, the spinner, the weaver, the fuller, the dresser,
with many others, must all join their different arts in order to complete
even this homely production. How many merchants and carriers, besides, must
have been employed in transporting the materials from some of those workmen
to others who often live in a very distant part of the country! how much
commerce and navigation in particular, how many ship-builders, sailors,
sail-makers, rope-makers, must have been employed in order to bring
together the different drugs made use of by the dyer, which often come from
the remotest corners of the world! What a variety of labour, too, is
necessary in order to produce the tools of the meanest of those workmen! To
say nothing of such complicated machines as the ship of the sailor, the
mill of the fuller, or even the loom of the weaver, let us consider only
what a variety of labour is requisite in order to form that very simple
machine, the shears with which the shepherd clips the wool. The miner, the
builder of the furnace for smelting the ore, the seller of the timber, the
burner of the charcoal to be made use of in the smelting-house, the
brick-maker, the brick-layer, the workmen who attend the furnace, the
mill-wright, the forger, the smith, must all of them join their different
arts in order to produce them.
The rest of the worker's
belongings
Were we to examine, in the same manner, all the different parts of his
dress and household furniture, the coarse linen shirt which he wears next
his skin, the shoes which cover his feet, the bed which he lies on, and all
the different parts which compose it, the kitchen-grate at which he
prepares his victuals, the coals which he makes use of for that purpose,
dug from the bowels of the earth, and brought to him perhaps by a long sea
and a long land carriage, all the other utensils of his kitchen, all the
furniture of his table, the knives and forks, the earthen or pewter plates
upon which he serves up and divides his victuals, the different hands
employed in preparing his bread and his beer, the glass window which lets
in the heat and the light, and keeps out the wind and the rain, with all
the knowledge and art requisite for preparing that beautiful and happy
invention, without which these northern parts of the world would scarce
have afforded a very comfortable habitation, together with the tools of all
the different workmen employed in producing those different conveniences;
if we examine, I say, all these things, and consider what a variety of
labour is employed about each of them, we shall be sensible that, without
the assistance and co-operation of many thousands, the very meanest person
in a civilised country could not be provided, even according to what we
very falsely imagine the easy and simple manner in which he is commonly
accommodated. Compared, indeed, with the more extravagant luxury of the
great, his accommodation must no doubt appear extremely simple and easy;
and yet it may be true, perhaps, that the accommodation of a European
prince does not always so much exceed that of an industrious and frugal
peasant as the accommodation of the latter exceeds that of many an African
king, the absolute master of the lives and liberties of ten thousand naked
savages.
Book One, Chapter 2: Of the Principle which
Gives Occasion to the Division of Labour
(¶1.2.1)
This division of labour, from which so many advantages are derived,
is not originally the effect of any human wisdom, which foresees and
intends that general opulence to which it gives occasion. It is the
necessary, though very slow and gradual consequence of a certain propensity
in human nature which has in view no such extensive utility; the propensity
to truck, barter, and exchange on thing for another.
(¶1.2.2) ...
A puppy fawns upon its dam, and a spaniel endeavours by a thousand
attractions to engage the attention of its master who is at dinner, when it
wants to be fed by him. Man sometimes uses the same arts with his brethren,
and when he has no other means of engaging them to act according to his
inclinations, endeavours by every servile and fawning attention to obtain
their good will. He has not time, however, to do this upon every occasion.
In civilised society he stands at all times in need of the cooperation and
assistance of great multitudes, while his whole life is scarce sufficient
to gain the friendship of a few persons. In almost every other race of
animals each individual, when it is grown up to maturity, is entirely
independent, and in its natural state has occasion for the assistance of no
other living creature. But man has almost constant occasion for the help of
his brethren, and it is in vain for him to expect it from their benevolence
only. He will be more likely to prevail if he can interest their self-love
in his favour, and show them that it is for their own advantage to do for
him what he requires of them. Whoever offers to another a bargain of any
kind, proposes to do this. Give me that which I want, and you shall have
this which you want, is the meaning of every such offer; and it is in this
manner that we obtain from one another the far greater part of those good
offices which we stand in need of. It is not from the benevolence of the
butcher, the brewer, or the baker that we expect our dinner, but from their
regard to their own interest. We address ourselves, not to their humanity
but to their self-love, and never talk to them of our own necessities but
of their advantages.
Nobody but a beggar chooses to depend chiefly upon the benevolence of his
fellow-citizens. Even a beggar does not depend upon it entirely. The
charity of well-disposed people, indeed, supplies him with the whole fund
of his subsistence. But though this principle ultimately provides him with
all the necessaries of life which he has occasion for, it neither does nor
can provide him with them as he has occasion for them. The greater part of
his occasional wants are supplied in the same manner as those of other
people, by treaty, by barter, and by purchase. With the money which one man
gives him he purchases food. The old clothes which another bestows upon him
he exchanges for other old clothes which suit him better, or for lodging,
or for food, or for money, with which he can buy either food, clothes, or
lodging, as he has occasion.
(¶1.2.3) ...
As it is by treaty, by barter, and by purchase that we obtain from one
another the greater part of those mutual good offices which we stand in
need of, so it is this same trucking disposition which originally gives
occasion to the division of labour. In a tribe of hunters or shepherds a
particular person makes bows and arrows, for example, with more readiness
and dexterity than any other. He frequently exchanges them for cattle or
for venison with his companions; and he finds at last that he can in this
manner get more cattle and venison than if he himself went to the field to
catch them. From a regard to his own interest, therefore, the making of
bows and arrows grows to be his chief business, and he becomes a sort of
armourer. Another excels in making the frames and covers of their little
huts or movable houses. He is accustomed to be of use in this way to his
neighbours, who reward him in the same manner with cattle and with venison,
till at last he finds it his interest to dedicate himself entirely to this
employment, and to become a sort of house-carpenter. In the same manner a
third becomes a smith or a brazier, a fourth a tanner or dresser of hides
or skins, the principal part of the nothing of savages. And thus the
certainty of being able to exchange all that surplus part of the produce of
his own labour, which is over and above his own consumption, for such parts
of the produce of other men's labour as he may have occasion for,
encourages every man to apply himself to a particular occupation, and to
cultivate and bring to perfection whatever talent or genius he may possess
for that particular species of business.
(¶1.2.4) ...
The difference of natural talents in different men is, in reality,
much less than we are aware of; and the very different genius which
appears to distinguish men of different professions, when grown up
to maturity, is not upon many occasions so much the cause as the
effect of the division of labour. The difference between the most
dissimilar characters, between a philosopher and a common street
porter, for example, seems to arise not so much from nature as from
habit, custom, and education. When they came into the world, and for
the first six or eight years of their existence, they were perhaps
very much alike, and neither their parents nor playfellows could
perceive any remarkable difference. About that age, or soon after,
they come to be employed in very different occupations. The difference
of talents comes then to be taken notice of, and widens by degrees,
till at last the vanity of the philosopher is willing to acknowledge
scarce any resemblance. But without the disposition to truck,
barter, and exchange, every man must have procured to himself every
necessary and conveniency of life which he wanted. All must have had
the same duties to perform, and the same work to do, and there could
have been no such difference of employment as could alone give
occasion to any great difference of talents.
(¶1.2.5) ...
As it is this disposition which forms that difference of
talents, so remarkable among men of different professions, so it is
this same disposition which renders that difference useful. Many
tribes of animals acknowledged to be all of the same species derive
from nature a much more remarkable distinction of genius, than what,
antecedent to custom and education, appears to take place among men.
By nature a philosopher is not in genius and disposition half so
different from a street porter, as a mastiff is from a greyhound, or a
greyhound from a spaniel, or this last from a shepherd's dog. Those
different tribes of animals, however, though all of the same
species, are of scarce any use to one another. The strength of the
mastiff is not, in the least, supported either by the swiftness of the
greyhound, or by the sagacity of the spaniel, or by the docility of
the shepherd's dog. The effects of those different geniuses and
talents, for want of the power or disposition to barter and
exchange, cannot be brought into a common stock, and do not in the
least contribute to the better accommodation ind conveniency of the
species. Each animal is still obliged to support and defend itself,
separately and independently, and derives no sort of advantage from
that variety of talents with which nature has distinguished its
fellows. Among men, on the contrary, the most dissimilar geniuses
are of use to one another; the different produces of their
respective talents, by the general disposition to truck, barter, and
exchange, being brought, as it were, into a common stock, where
every man may purchase whatever part of the produce of other men's
talents he has occasion for.
Chapter 3:
That the Division of Labour is Limited by the Extent of the
Market
(¶1.3.1)
As it is the power of exchanging that gives occasion to the division of
labour, so the extent of this division must always be limited by the extent
of that power, or, in other words, by the extent of the market. When the
market is very small, no person can have any encouragement to dedicate
himself entirely to one employment, for want of the power to exchange all
that surplus part of the produce of his own labour, which is over and above
his own consumption, for such parts of the produce of other men's labour as
he has occasion for.
(¶1.3.2)
There are some sorts of industry, even of the lowest kind, which
can be carried on nowhere but in a great town. A porter, for
example, can find employment and subsistence in no other place. A
village is by much too narrow a sphere for him; even an ordinary
market town is scarce large enough to afford him constant
occupation. In the lone houses and very small villages which are
scattered about in so desert a country as the Highlands of Scotland,
every farmer must be butcher, baker and brewer for his own family.
In such situations we can scarce expect to find even a smith, a
carpenter, or a mason, within less than twenty miles of another of the
same trade. The scattered families that live at eight or ten miles
distance from the nearest of them must learn to perform themselves a
great number of little pieces of work, for which, in more populous
countries, they would call in the assistance of those workmen. Country
workmen are almost everywhere obliged to apply themselves to all the
different branches of industry that have so much affinity to one
another as to be employed about the same sort of materials. A
country carpenter deals in every sort of work that is made of wood:
a country smith in every sort of work that is made of iron. The former
is not only a carpenter, but a joiner, a cabinet-maker, and even a
carver in wood, as well as a wheel-wright, a plough-wright, a cart and
waggon maker. The employments of the latter are still more various. It
is impossible there should be such a trade as even that of a nailer in
the remote and inland parts of the Highlands of Scotland. Such a
workman at the rate of a thousand nails a day, and three hundred
working days in the year, will make three hundred thousand nails in
the year. But in such a situation it would be impossible to dispose of
one thousand, that is, of one day's work in the year.
Chapter 4: Of the Origin and Use of
Money
(¶1.4.11)
...money has become in all civilised nations the universal instrument of
commerce, by the intervention of which goods of all kinds are bought and
sold, or exchanged for one another.
(¶1.4.12)
What are the rules which men naturally observe in exchanging them either
for money or for one another, I shall now proceed to examine. These rules
determine what may be called the relative or exchangeable value of goods.
(¶1.4.13)
The word value, it is to be observed, has two different meanings, and
sometimes expresses the utility of some particular object, and sometimes
the power of purchasing other goods which the possession of that object
conveys. The one may be called "value in use"; the other, "value in
exchange". The things which have the greatest value in use have frequently
little or no value in exchange; and, on the contrary, those which have the
greatest value in exchange have frequently little or no value in use.
Nothing is more useful than water: but it will purchase scarce anything;
scarce anything can be had in exchange for it. A diamond, on the contrary,
has scarce any value in use; but a very great quantity of other goods may
frequently be had in exchange for it.
Book One, Chapter 5: Of the Real and
Nominal Price of Commodities, or Their Price in
Labour, and their Price in Money
Labour, The real measure of exchange
value
(¶1.5.1)
Every man is rich or poor according to the degree in which he can
afford to enjoy the necessaries, conveniences, and amusements of human
life. But after the division of labour has once thoroughly taken place, it
is but a very small part of these with which a man's own labour can supply
him. The far greater part of them he must derive from the labour of other
people, and he must be rich or poor according to the quantity of that
labour which he can command. or which he can afford to purchase. The value
of any commodity, therefore, to the person who possesses it, and who means
not to use or consume it himself, but to exchange it for other commodities,
is equal to the quantity of labour which it enables him to purchase or
command. Labour, therefore, is the real measure of the exchangeable value
of all commodities.
(¶1.5.2)
The real price of everything, what everything really costs to the man
who wants to acquire it, is the toil and trouble of acquiring it. What
everything is really worth to the man who has acquired it, and who wants to
dispose of it or exchange it for something else, is the toil and trouble
which it can save to himself, and which it can impose upon other people.
What is bought with money or with goods is purchased by labour as much as
what we acquire by the toil of our own body. That money or those goods
indeed save us this toil. They contain the value of a certain quantity of
labour which we exchange for what is supposed at the time to contain the
value of an equal quantity. Labour was the first price, the original
purchase-money that was paid for all things. It was not by gold or by
silver, but by labour, that all the wealth of the world was originally
purchased; and its value, to those who possess it, and who want to exchange
it for some new productions, is precisely equal to the quantity of labour
which it can enable them to purchase or command.
Book One Chapter 8 Of the Wages of
Labour
(¶1.8.31)
The real recompense of labour, ... has, during the course of the
present century, increased perhaps in a still greater proportion than its
money price. Not only grain has become somewhat cheaper, but many other
things from which
the industrious poor derive an agreeable and wholesome variety of food
have become a great deal cheaper. Potatoes, for example, do not at
present, through the greater part of the kingdom, cost half the
price which they used to do thirty or forty years ago. The same
thing may be said of turnips, carrots, cabbages; things which were
formerly never raised but by the spade, but which are now commonly
raised by the plough. ... The great improvements in the coarser
manufactures of both
linen and woollen cloth furnish the labourers with cheaper and
better clothing; and those in the manufactures of the coarser
metals, with cheaper and better instruments of trade, as well as
with many agreeable and convenient pieces of household furniture...
The common complaint that luxury extends
itself even to the lowest ranks of the people, and that the
labouring poor will not now be contented with the same food, clothing,
and lodging which satisfied them in former times, may convince us that
it is not the money price of labour only, but its real recompense,
which has augmented.
(¶1.8.32)
Is this improvement in the circumstances of the lower ranks of the people
to be regarded as an advantage or as an inconveniency to the society? The
answer seems at first sight abundantly plain. Servants, labourers, and
workmen of different kinds, make up the far greater part of every great
political society. But what improves the circumstances of the greater part
can never be regarded as an inconveniency to the whole.
No society can
surely be flourishing and happy, of which the far greater part of the
members are poor and miserable. It is but equity, besides, that they who
feed, clothe, and lodge the whole body of the people, should have such a
share of the produce of their own labour as to be themselves tolerably well
fed, clothed, and lodged.
(¶1.10.2.27)
People of the same trade seldom meet together, even for merriment and
diversion, but the conversation ends in a conspiracy against the public, or
in some contrivance to raise prices. It is impossible indeed to prevent
such meetings, by any law which either could be executed, or would be
consistent with liberty and justice. But though the law cannot hinder
people of the same trade from sometimes assembling together, it ought to do
nothing to facilitate such assemblies, much less to render them necessary.
(¶1.10.2.28)
A regulation which obliges all those of the same trade in a particular town
to enter their names and places of abode in a public register, facilitates
such assemblies. It connects individuals who might never otherwise be known
to one another, and gives every man of the trade a direction where to find
every other man of it.
(¶1.10.2.29)
A regulation which enables those of the same trade to tax themselves in
order to provide for their poor, their sick, their widows and orphans, by
giving them a common interest to manage, renders such assemblies necessary.
(¶1.10.2.45)
The obstruction which corporation laws give to the free circulation of
labour is common, I believe, to every part of Europe. That which is given
to it by the Poor Laws is, so far as I know, peculiar to England. It
consists in the difficulty which a poor man finds in obtaining a
settlement, or even in being allowed to exercise his industry in any parish
but that to which he belongs. ... The difficulty of obtaining settlements
obstructs even that of common labour. It may be worth while to give some
account of the rise, progress, and present state of this disorder, the
greatest perhaps of any in the police of England.
(¶1.10.2.46)
When by the destruction of monasteries the poor had been deprived of the
charity of those religious houses, after some other ineffectual attempts
for their relief, it was enacted by the
43rd of Elizabeth, c. 2, that every parish
should be bound to provide for its own poor; and that overseers of the poor
should be annually appointed, who, with the churchwardens, should raise by
a parish rate competent sums for this purpose.
(¶1.10.2.47)
By this statute the necessity of providing for their own poor was
indispensably imposed upon every parish. Who were to be considered as the
poor of each parish became, therefore, a question of some importance. This
question, after some variation, was at last determined by the
13th and 14th of Charles 2
when it was enacted, that forty days' undisturbed residence should gain any
person a settlement in any parish; but that within that time it should be
lawful for two justices of the peace, upon complaint made by the
churchwardens or overseers of the poor, to remove any new inhabitant to the
parish where he was last legally settled; unless he either rented a
tenement of ten pounds a year, or could give such security for the
discharge of the parish where he was then living, as those justices should
judge sufficient.
Book Four, Chapter 2: Of Restraints Upon
the Importation from Foreign Countries of Such Goods as Can be Produced at
Home
(¶4.2.8) The produce of industry is what it adds to the subject or
materials
upon which it is employed. In proportion as the value of this produce is
great or small, so will likewise be the profits of the employer. But it is
only for the sake of profit that any man employs a capital in the support
of industry; and he will always, therefore, endeavour to employ it in the
support of that industry of which the produce is likely to be of the
greatest value, or to exchange for the greatest quantity either of money or
of other goods.
(¶4.2.9) But the annual revenue of every society is always precisely
equal to the
exchangeable value of the whole annual produce of its industry, or rather
is precisely the same thing with that exchangeable value. As every
individual, therefore, endeavours as much as he can both to employ his
capital in the support of domestic industry, and so to direct that industry
that its produce may be of the greatest value; every individual necessarily
labours to render the annual revenue of the society as great as he can.
He generally, indeed, neither intends to promote the public interest, nor
knows how much he is promoting it. By preferring the support of domestic to
that of foreign industry, he intends only his own security; and by
directing that industry in such a manner as its produce may be of the
greatest value, he intends only his own gain, and he is in this, as in many
other cases, led by an invisible hand to promote an end which was no part
of his intention. Nor is it always the worse for the society that it was no
part of it. By pursuing his own interest he frequently promotes that of the
society more effectually than when he really intends to promote it. I have
never known much good done by those who affected to trade for the public
good. It is an affectation, indeed, not very common among merchants, and
very few words need be employed in dissuading them from it.
Private enterprise and the state
(¶4.2.10)
What... species of domestic industry... his capital can employ, and...
which... produce is likely to be of the greatest value, every individual...
can ... judge much better than any statesman or lawgiver can do for him.
The statesman who should attempt to direct private people in what manner
they ought to employ their capitals would not only load himself with a most
unnecessary attention, but assume an authority which could safely be
trusted, not only to no single person, but to no council or senate
whatever, and which would nowhere be so dangerous as in the hands of a man
who had folly and presumption enough to fancy himself fit to exercise it.
Book Four, Chapter 9 Of the Agricultural
Systems, or of Those Systems of
Political Economy which Represent the Produce of Land as Either the Sole or
the Principal Source of the Revenue and Wealth Every Country
(¶4.9.50)
... The inhabitants of the town draw from the country the rude produce
which constitutes both the materials of their work and the fund of their
subsistence; and they pay for this rude produce by sending back to the
country a certain portion of it manufactured and prepared for immediate
use. The trade which is carried on between those two different sets of
people, consists ultimately in a certain quantity of rude produce exchanged
for a certain quantity of manufactured produce. The dearer the latter,
therefore, the cheaper the former; and whatever tends in any country to
raise the price of manufactured produce, tends to lower that of the rude
produce of the land, and thereby to discourage agriculture...
Whatever... tends to diminish in any country the number of artificers and
manufacturers, tends to diminish the home market, the most important of all
markets for the rude produce of the land, and thereby still further to
discourage agriculture.
(¶4.9.51)
Those systems, therefore, which preferring agriculture to all other
employments, in order to promote it, impose restraints upon manufactures
and foreign trade, act contrary to the very end which they propose, and
indirectly discourage that very species of industry which they mean to
promote...
[According to Smith, the system of natural liberty leaves the sovereign
only three duties: the defence of the country, the administration of
justice, and the maintenance of certain public works.]
(¶4.9.53)
All systems either of preference or of restraint, ...being ... completely
taken away, the obvious and simple system of natural liberty establishes
itself of its own accord. Every man, as long as he does not violate the
laws of justice, is left perfectly free to pursue his own interest his own
way, and to bring both his industry and capital into competition with those
of any other man, or order of men. The sovereign is completely discharged
from a duty, in the attempting to perform which he must always be exposed
to innumerable delusions, and for the proper performance of which no human
wisdom or knowledge could ever be sufficient; the duty of superintending
the industry of private people, and of directing it towards the employments
most suitable to the interest of the society. According to the system of
natural liberty, the sovereign has only three duties to attend to; three
duties of great importance, indeed, but plain and intelligible to common
understandings: first, the duty of protecting the society from the violence
and invasion of other independent societies; secondly, the duty of
protecting, as far as possible, every member of the society from the
injustice or oppression of every other member of it, or the duty of
establishing an exact administration of justice; and, thirdly, the duty of
erecting and maintaining certain public works and certain public
institutions, which it can never be for the interest of any individual, or
small number of individuals, to erect and maintain; because the profit
could never repay the expense to any individual or small number of
individuals, though it may frequently do much more than repay it to a great
society.
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Part Six: Of the Character of Virtue
Consisting of Three Sections
An Inquiry into The Nature and Causes of
The Wealth of Nations has four books, each divided into chapters.
the Wealth of
Nations
(1776)
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Headings
Chapter 1: Of the Division of Labour
The rest of the worker's belongings
Book One, Chapter 2: Principle..[of] .. Division of Labour
Chapter 5: ... Price in Labour, and ... Price in Money
Labour, The real measure of exchange value
Book One Chapter 8 Of the Wages of Labour
Book Four, Chapter 2: Of Restraints Upon .. Importation
Private enterprise and the state