An inquiry into the nature and causes of the wealth of

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The Wealth of Nations

them. But the law has, upon many occasions, attempted to raise

the wages of curates, and, for the dignity of the church, to oblige

the rectors of parishes to give them more than the wretched main-

tenance which they themselves might be willing to accept of. And,

in both cases, the law seems to have been equally ineffectual, and

has never either been able to raise the wages of curates, or to sink

those of labourers to the degree that was intended; because it has

never been able to hinder either the one from being willing to

accept of less than the legal allowance, on account of the indi-

gence of their situation and the multitude of their competitors, or

the other from receiving more, on account of the contrary compe-

tition of those who expected to derive either profit or pleasure

from employing them.

The great benefices and other ecclesiastical dignities support the

honour of the church, notwithstanding the mean circumstances

of some of its inferior members. The respect paid to the profes-

sion, too, makes some compensation even to them for the mean-

ness of their pecuniary recompence. In England, and in all Ro-

man catholic countries, the lottery of the church is in reality much

more advantageous than is necessary. The example of the churches

of Scotland, of Geneva, and of several other protestant churches,

may satisfy us, that in so creditable a profession, in which educa-

tion is so easily procured, the hopes of much more moderate ben-

efices will draw a sufficient number of learned, decent, and re-

spectable men into holy orders.

In professions in which there are no benefices, such as law and

physic, if an equal proportion of people were educated at the pub-

lic expense, the competition would soon be so great as to sink very

much their pecuniary reward. It might then not be worth any

man’s while to educate his son to either of those professions at his

own expense. They would be entirely abandoned to such as had

been educated by those public charities, whose numbers and ne-

cessities would oblige them in general to content themselves with

a very miserable recompence, to the entire degradation of the now

respectable professions of law and physic.

That unprosperous race of men, commonly called men of let-

ters, are pretty much in the situation which lawyers and physi-

cians probably would be in, upon the foregoing supposition. In

every part of Europe, the greater part of them have been educated

for the church, but have been hindered by different reasons from

entering into holy orders. They have generally, therefore, been edu-

cated at the public expense; and their numbers are everywhere so

great, as commonly to reduce the price of their labour to a very

paltry recompence.

Before the invention of the art of printing, the only employ-

ment by which a man of letters could make any thing by his tal-

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Adam Smith

ents, was that of a public or private teacher, or by communicating

to other people the curious and useful knowledge which he had

acquired himself; and this is still surely a more honourable, a more

useful, and, in general, even a more profitable employment than

that other of writing for a bookseller, to which the art of printing

has given occasion. The time and study, the genius, knowledge,

and application requisite to qualify an eminent teacher of the sci-

ences, are at least equal to what is necessary for the greatest practi-

tioners in law and physic. But the usual reward of the eminent

teacher bears no proportion to that of the lawyer or physician,

because the trade of the one is crowded with indigent people, who

have been brought up to it at the public expense; whereas those of

the other two are encumbered with very few who have not been

educated at their own. The usual recompence, however, of public

and private teachers, small as it may appear, would undoubtedly

be less than it is, if the competition of those yet more indigent

men of letters, who write for bread, was not taken out of the mar-

ket. Before the invention of the art of printing, a scholar and a

beggar seem to have been terms very nearly synonymous. The dif-

ferent governors of the universities, before that time, appear to

have often granted licences to their scholars to beg.

In ancient times, before any charities of this kind had been es-

tablished for the education of indigent people to the learned pro-

fessions, the rewards of eminent teachers appear to have been much

more considerable. Isocrates, in what is called his discourse against

the sophists, reproaches the teachers of his own times with incon-

sistency. “They make the most magnificent promises to their schol-

ars,” says he, “and undertake to teach them to be wise, to be happy,

and to be just; and, in return for so important a service, they stipu-

late the paltry reward of four or five minae.” “They who teach

wisdom,” continues he, “ought certainly to be wise themselves;

but if any man were to sell such a bargain for such a price, he

would be convicted of the most evident folly.” He certainly does

not mean here to exaggerate the reward, and we may be assured

that it was not less than he represents it. Four minae were equal to

thirteen pounds six shillings and eightpence; five minae to sixteen

pounds thirteen shillings and fourpence. Something not less than

the largest of those two sums, therefore, must at that time have

been usually paid to the most eminent teachers at Athens. Isocrates

himself demanded ten minae, or £ 33:6:8 from each scholar. When

he taught at Athens, he is said to have had a hundred scholars. I

understand this to be the number whom he taught at one time, or

who attended what we would call one course of lectures; a num-

ber which will not appear extraordinary from so great a city to so

famous a teacher, who taught, too, what was at that time the most

fashionable of all sciences, rhetoric. He must have made, there-

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