13
Adam Smith
upon them, produce more in proportion to the extent and natural
fertility of the ground. But this superiority of produce is seldom
much more than in proportion to the superiority of labour and
expense. In agriculture, the labour of the rich country is not al-
ways much more productive than that of the poor; or, at least, it is
never so much more productive, as it commonly is in manufac-
tures. The corn of the rich country, therefore, will not always, in
the same degree of goodness, come cheaper to market than that of
the poor. The corn of Poland, in the same degree of goodness, is as
cheap as that of France, notwithstanding the superior opulence
and improvement of the latter country. The corn of France is, in
the corn-provinces, fully as good, and in most years nearly about
the same price with the corn of England, though, in opulence and
improvement, France is perhaps inferior to England. The corn-
lands of England, however, are better cultivated than those of
France, and the corn-lands of France are said to be much better
cultivated than those of Poland. But though the poor country,
notwithstanding the inferiority of its cultivation, can, in some
measure, rival the rich in the cheapness and goodness of its corn,
it can pretend to no such competition in its manufactures, at least
if those manufactures suit the soil, climate, and situation, of the
rich country. The silks of France are better and cheaper than those
of England, because the silk manufacture, at least under the present
high duties upon the importation of raw silk, does not so well suit
the climate of England as that of France. But the hardware and
the coarse woollens of England are beyond all comparison supe-
rior to those of France, and much cheaper, too, in the same degree
of goodness. In Poland there are said to be scarce any manufac-
tures of any kind, a few of those coarser household manufactures
excepted, without which no country can well subsist.
This great increase in the quantity of work, which, in conse-
quence 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; sec-
ondly, 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.
First, the improvement of the dexterity of the workmen, neces-
sarily increases the quantity of the work he can perform; and the
division of labour, by reducing every man’s business to some one
simple operation, and by making this operation the sole employ-
ment of his life, necessarily increases very much the dexterity of
the workman. A common smith, who, though accustomed to
handle the hammer, has never been used to make nails, if, upon
some particular occasion, he is obliged to attempt it, will scarce, I
14
The Wealth of Nations
am assured, be able to make above two or three hundred nails in a
day, and those, too, very bad ones. A smith who has been accus-
tomed to make nails, but whose sole or principal business has not
been that of a nailer, can seldom, with his utmost diligence, make
more than eight hundred or a thousand nails in a day. I have seen
several boys, under twenty years of age, who had never exercised
any other trade but that of making nails, and who, when they
exerted themselves, could make, each of them, upwards of two
thousand three hundred nails in a day. The making of a nail, how-
ever, is by no means one of the simplest operations. The same
person blows the bellows, stirs or mends the fire as there is occa-
sion, heats the iron, and forges every part of the nail: in forging
the head, too, he is obliged to change his tools. The different op-
erations into which the making of a pin, or of a metal button, is
subdivided, are all of them much more simple, and the dexterity
of the person, of whose life it has been the sole business to per-
form them, is usually much greater. The rapidity with which some
of the operations of those manufactures are performed, exceeds
what the human hand could, by those who had never seen them,
he supposed capable of acquiring.
Secondly, The advantage which is gained by saving the time
commonly lost in passing from one sort of work to another, is
much greater than we should at first view be apt to imagine it. It is
impossible to pass very quickly from one kind of work to another,
that is carried on in a different place, and with quite different
tools. A country weaver, who cultivates a small farm, must loose a
good deal of time in passing from his loom to the field, and from
the field to his loom. When the two trades can be carried on in the
same workhouse, the loss of time is, no doubt, much less. It is,
even in this case, however, very considerable. A man commonly
saunters a little in turning his hand from one sort of employment
to another. When he first begins the new work, he is seldom very
keen and hearty; his mind, as they say, does not go to it, and for
some time he rather trifles than applies to good purpose. The habit
of sauntering, and of indolent careless application, which is natu-
rally, or rather necessarily, acquired by every country workman
who is obliged to change his work and his tools every half hour,
and to apply his hand in twenty different ways almost every day of
his life, renders him almost always slothful and lazy, and incapable
of any vigorous application, even on the most pressing occasions.
Independent, therefore, of his deficiency in point of dexterity, this
cause alone must always reduce considerably the quantity of work
which he is capable of performing.
Thirdly, and lastly, everybody must be sensible how much labour
is facilitated and abridged by the application of proper machinery.
It is unnecessary to give any example. I shall only observe, there-