272 ADAM SMITH. 



in the same way ; in both distributed among the same 

 classes. 



Let us, however, take an example or two, for the purpose 

 of comparing more closely the productive with the unpro- 

 ductive kinds of labour. The person who makes a plough 

 is, according to the Economists, an unproductive labourer, 

 but he who drives it is a productive labourer. In what pre- 

 dicament, then, is the labourer who makes a hedge round a 

 field for its protection, or a ditch for draining it ? This 

 operation, because it is called farm-work, is admitted by the 

 Economists to be productive. But wherein does it differ 

 from the plough manufacture ? Both are alike subservient 

 and necessary to the operations of ploughing and reaping ; 

 both are alike performed by persons who do not raise the 

 produce that feeds them ; and both are alike performed 

 upon some materials produced from the earth by other 

 labour. If the plough were made in a bungling manner by 

 farm-servants in the out-houses of the farm, we imagine the 

 manufacture would of necessity fall under the head of pro- 

 ductive labour, as well as the work of hedging and ditching. 

 Again Capital employed by the corn-merchant in collect- 

 ing and circulating grain, is most unproductively employed, 

 according to the Economists. But the capital employed in 

 collecting seed in a barn, carrying it from thence to the 

 field, and returning the crop at harvest, is employed in the 

 most productive manner possible. Can it be maintained 

 that there is any difference whatever between these two 

 cases, necessarily placed by the theory of the Economists 

 at the opposite extremes of their scale ? If the corn- 

 merchant lived on the ground of the farmer, and if the 

 farmer, from this convenient circumstance, were enabled to 

 sell all his grain without having any barns or granaries, 

 certain of supplying himself at his own door next seed-time, 

 the Economist would be forced to allow that the capital of 

 the corn merchant, in so far as it assisted the farmer, was 

 productively employed. Wherein lies the difference ? 

 And these observations are applicable to every case of every 

 manufacture, aud every species of commerce whatever. 

 They apply to those kinds of employment which are sub- 

 servient to the purposes of comfort and enjoyment, as well 

 as to those which administer to our necessary wants; for 



