372 THE REIGN OF LAW. 



The labour of a poor man was his capital. He 

 had a natural right to employ it as he liked. And 

 as for protecting the community from bad or im- 

 perfect work, that would be best secured by un- 

 restricted competition. The natural instincts and 

 respective interests of producers and consumers 

 would secure mutual adaptation. Perfect free- 

 dom of exchange in goods, the products of 

 labour, and perfect freedom in the application of 

 labour itself — this was the rule to follow. Natural 

 Law was the best regulator of both. Such were 

 the doctrines of Adam Smith, then new in the 

 world. 



It is not a little remarkable that, during the 

 same years in which Adam Smith was working 

 out his memorable Inquiry, other minds, working 

 in a very different department of human thought, 

 were preparing events which were to bring to a 

 speedy test how far these doctrines of Natural Law 

 were true absolutely, or true only under limita- 

 tions, which he did not foresee. When Adam 

 Smith was lecturing with applause in Glasgow 

 from the chair of Moral Philosophy, James Watt 

 was selling mathematical instruments in an ob- 



