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CHAP. XIII. 



Of increasing Wealth, as it affects the Cojtditicn of the 



Poor. 



The professed object of Adam Smith's Incjuiry is 

 the Nature and Causes of the Wealth of Nations. 

 There is another, however, still more interesting, 

 which he occasionally mixes with it — the causes 

 which affect the happiness and comfort of the 

 lower orders of society, which in every nation 

 form the most numerous class. These two sub- 

 jects are, no doubt, nearly connected; but the 

 nature and extent of this connexion, and the mode 

 in which increasing wealth operates on the condi- 

 tion of the poor, have not been stated with suffi- 

 cient correctness and precision. 



Adam Smith, in his chapter on the wages of la- 

 bour, considers every increase in the stock or re- 

 venue of the society as an increase in the funds 

 for the maintenance of labour ; and having before 

 laid down the position that the demand for those 

 who live by wages can only increase in proportion 

 to the increase of the funds for the payment of 

 wages, the conclusion naturally follows, that every 

 increase of wealth tends to increase the demand 

 for labour and to improve the condition of the lower 

 classes of society.* 



* Vol. i. book i. c. 8. 

 p 2 



