208 ADAM SMITH. 



labour, embraces the subject of its division and its price; 

 the former is treated of in the three first chapters ; the 

 latter in the fifth and eighth, but also occasionally in 

 the sixth, seventh, and tenth. 



1. The division of labour, both increases its produc- 

 tive powers, and increases the excellence of its produce. 

 Men will work more when their attention is confined 

 to a single operation, than when it is distracted by 

 several, because time is saved by not passing from one 

 thing to another, and because the power or skill of the 

 workman is increased when he has but one thing to 

 occupy him. But independent of his increased skill 

 making him do more work, it makes him perform 

 better the work which he does, and hence both the 

 quantity is augmented, and the quality is improved of 

 what his labour produces. The origin of this division 

 is the principle which makes men exchange or barter 

 their different possessions, and among these their dif- 

 ferent powers. Either one differs from another in his 

 capacity, or each by confining his attention to a single 

 pursuit, acquires a peculiar capacity for that pursuit. 

 In either case, they who are differently qualified will 

 employ themselves differently, and one will exchange 

 the produce of his labour with the other for the pro- 

 duce of his ; or, which is the same thing, each will 

 work for the other, and both will thus be better served. 

 The extent of the market will always fix a limit to the 

 division of labour, which can have no great range in 

 confined situations ; but where it is much divided, a 

 vast multitude of workmen will concur in producing a 

 single article of exchange. Dr. Smith mentions the 

 case of eighteen persons being employed in making a 

 pin, and being thus enabled to make 86,000 pins in a 

 day, or 4,800 each person ; whereas had they worked 

 alone, perhaps they might not have been able to make 

 one a-piece. He adds, that the meanest individual of 

 a civilized country uses, or commands, in some small 

 portion at least, the labour of many thousands, and is 



