An Inquiry into the Nature and Causes of the Wealth of Nations | Page 5

of those funds, which, in different ages and nations, have supplied their

annual consumption, is the object of these four first books. The fifth and last book treats
of the revenue of the sovereign, or commonwealth. In this book I have endeavoured to
shew, first, what are the necessary expenses of the sovereign, or commonwealth ; which
of those expenses ought to be defrayed by the general contribution of the whole society,
and which of them, by that of some particular part only, or of some particular members of
it: secondly, what are the different methods in which the whole society may be made to
contribute towards defraying the expenses incumbent on the whole society, and what are
the principal advantages and inconveniencies of each of those methods ; and, thirdly and
lastly, what are the reasons and causes which have induced almost all modern
governments to mortgage some part of this revenue, or to contract debts; and what have
been the effects of those debts upon the real wealth, the annual produce of the land and
labour of the society.

BOOK I.
OF THE CAUSES OF IMPROVEMENT IN THE PRODUCTIVE POWERS OF
LABOUR, AND OF THE ORDER ACCORDING TO WHICH ITS PRODUCE IS
NATURALLY DISTRlBUTED AMONG THE DIFFERENT RANKS OF THE
PEOPLE.

CHAPTER I
.
OF THE DIVISlON OF LABOUR.
The greatest improvements 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. The effects of the division of labour, in the
general business of society, will be more easily understood, by considering in what
manner it operates in some particular manufactures. It is commonly supposed to be
carried furthest in some very trifling ones ; not perhaps that it really is carried further in
them than in others of more importance: but in those trifling manufactures which are
destined to supply the small wants of but a small number of people, the whole number of
workmen must necessarily be small ; and those employed in every different branch of the
work can often be collected into the same workhouse, and placed at once under the view
of the spectator.
In those great manufactures, on the contrary. which are destined to supply the great wants
of the great body of the people, every different branch of the work employs so great a
number of workmen, that it is impossible to collect them all into the same workhouse.
We can seldom see more, at one time, than those employed in one single branch. Though
in such manufactures, therefore, the work may really be divided into a much greater
number of parts, than in those of a more trifling nature, the division is not near so obvious,
and has accordingly been much less observed.
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 a 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.
There are in a pound upwards of four thousand pins of a middling size. Those ten persons,
therefore, could make among them upwards