204 ADAM SMITH. 



ductive labourer who should manufacture bolts and bars for 

 the defence of property. Is not he also, then, a productive 

 labourer, who protects property in the mass, and adds to 

 every portion of it the quality of being secure? In like 

 manner, those who increase the enjoyments of society, add a 

 value to the stock previously existing; they furnish new equi- 

 valents for which it may be exchanged; they render the stock 

 worth more, i. e., exchangeable for more capable of com- 

 manding more enjoyments than it formerly could command. 

 The stock of the community is either that part which is con- 

 sumed by the producer, or that part which he exchanges for 

 some object of desire. Were there nothing for which to 

 exchange the latter portion, it would soon cease to be pro- 

 duced. Hence the labour that augments the sum of the 

 enjoyments and objects of desire for which this portion may 

 be exchanged, is indirectly beneficial to production. But if 

 this portion destined to be exchanged, is already in existence, 

 the labour which is supported by it, and which returns an 

 equivalent to the former owner, by the new enjoyments that 

 it yields him, must be allowed to add a value directly to the 

 exchangeable part of the stock. 



It appears peculiarly inconsistent in Dr. Smith to deny 

 that labour can add to value by its general operation on the 

 stock of the community, and on the fund of equivalents, when 

 we find him frequently reckoning things by other than phy- 

 sical means, measuring them by other standards than actual 

 bulk and quantity nay, counting their price in money when 

 no money can be exchanged for them. He approaches often 

 nearer than any assignable distance to the doctrines which I 

 have been explaining. Thus he more than once, but parti- 

 cularly in the inquiry concerning taxation, (Book vi. chap. 2,) 

 when mentioning the trouble or annoyance which certain 

 things occasion, says they may be estimated at the sum any 

 one would willingly give to be rid of them, and he considers 

 the impost which is levied by means so vexatious as increased 

 in its amount by that sum. Why not consider the sum also 

 which any one would give to secure his property from the 

 risk of an invasion, or of pillage in a riot, as increasing the 

 value of that property? Now the obtaining this security, is 



