Wealth Of Nations Quotes

• It is not from the benevolence of the butcher, the brewer, or the baker that we expect our dinner, but from their regard to their own interest.

  Adam Smith

  Business, Invisible Hand, Government

  An Inquiry into the Nature and Causes of the Wealth of Nations vol. 1, bk. 1, ch. 2 (1776)

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• Consumption is the sole end and purpose of all production; and the interest of the producer ought to be attended to, only so far as it may be necessary for promoting that of the consumer.

  Adam Smith

  Purpose, May, Ends

  'Wealth of Nations' (1776) bk. 4, ch. 8

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• No society can surely be flourishing and happy, of which the far greater part of the members are poor and miserable.

  Adam Smith

  Happiness, Equality, Society

  Adam Smith (1827). “An Inquiry Into the Nature and Causes of the Wealth of Nations”, p.33

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• Every individual is continually exerting himself to find out the most advantageous employment for whatever capital he can command. It is his own advantage, indeed, and not that of the society which he has in view. But the study of his own advantage naturally, or rather necessarily, leads him to prefer that employment which is most advantageous to society... He intends only his own gain, and he is in this, as in many other cases, led by an invisible hand to promote an end which was not part of his intention

  Adam Smith

  Views, Hands, Invisible Hand

  Adam Smith (2017). “The Wealth of Nations (illustrated)”, p.330, Clap Publishing, LLC.

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• No society can surely be flourishing and happy, of which the far greater part of the members are poor and miserable. It is but equity, besides, that they who feed, clothe and lodge the whole body of the people, should have such a share of the produce of their own labour as to be themselves tolerably well fed, clothed and lodged.

  Adam Smith

  Should Have, People, Body

  Adam Smith (1827). “An Inquiry Into the Nature and Causes of the Wealth of Nations”, p.33

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• The statesman who should attempt to direct private people in what manner they ought to employ their capitals would not only load himself with most unnecessary attention but assume an authority which could safely be trusted to no council and senate whatever, and which would nowhere be so dangerous as in the hands of man who have folly and presumption enough to fancy himself fit to exercise it.

  Adam Smith

  Exercise, Men, Hands

  Adam Smith, Bruce Mazlish (2003). “The Wealth of Nations: Representative Selections”, p.167, Courier Corporation

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• Civil government, so far as it is instituted for the security of property, is in reality instituted for the defense of the rich against the poor, or of those who have some property against those who have none at all.

  Adam Smith

  Reality, Government, Libertarian

  Adam Smith (1827). “An Inquiry Into the Nature and Causes of the Wealth of Nations”, p.299

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• All for ourselves, and nothing for other people, seems, in every age of the world, to have been the vile maxim of the masters of mankind.

  Adam Smith

  People, Age, Libertarian

  Adam Smith (1827). “An Inquiry Into the Nature and Causes of the Wealth of Nations”, p.169

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• By pursuing his own interest (the individual) frequently promotes that of the society more effectually than when he really intends to promote it. I have never known much good done by those who affected to trade for the public good.

  Adam Smith

  Invisible Hand, Done, Individual

  1776 An Inquiry into the Nature and Causes of the Wealth of Nations, bk.4, ch.3.

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• Consumption is the sole end and purpose of all production.

  Adam Smith

  Purpose, Ends, Sole

  1776 An Inquiry into the Nature and Causes of the Wealth of Nations, bk.4, ch.8.

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• The interest of [businessmen] is always in some respects different from, and even opposite to, that of the public ... The proposal of any new law or regulation of commerce which comes from this order ... ought never to be adopted, till after having been long and carefully examined ... with the most suspicious attention. It comes from an order of men ... who have generally an interest to deceive and even oppress the public.

  Adam Smith

  Men, Order, Law

  "The Wealth of Nations" by Adam Smith, Chapter XI, Part III, Conclusion of the Chapter, (p. 292), 1776.

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• How selfish soever man may be supposed, there are evidently some principles in his nature, which interest him in the fortune of others, and render their happiness necessary to him, though he derives nothing from it, except the pleasure of seeing it.

  Adam Smith

  Happiness, Selfish, Men

  Adam Smith (2016). “Delphi Complete Works of Adam Smith (Illustrated)”, p.19, Delphi Classics

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• The health of nations is more important than the wealth of nations.

  Will Durant

  Health, Exercise, Important

  Will Durant (1929). “The Mansions of Philosophy: A Survey of Human Life and Destiny”, Garden City, N.Y. : Garden City Publishing Company

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• Wherever there is great property, there is great inequality.

  Adam Smith

  Affluence, Economics, Inequality

  Adam Smith (2016). “The Wealth of Nations”, Xist Publishing

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• He is led by an invisible hand to promote an end which was no part of his intention

  Adam Smith

  Ignorance, Invisible Hand, Hands

  An Inquiry into the Nature and Causes of the Wealth of Nations vol. 2, bk. 4, ch. 2 (1776) See Adam Smith 1

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• A man must always live by his work, and his wages must at least be sufficient to maintain him. They must even upon most occasions be somewhat more; otherwise it would be impossible for him to bring up a family, and the race of such workmen could not last beyond the first generation.

  Adam Smith

  Men, Race, Would Be

  Adam Smith (1827). “An Inquiry Into the Nature and Causes of the Wealth of Nations”, p.28

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• Whenever the legislature attempts to regulate differences between masters and their workmen, its counsellors are always the masters. When the regulation, therefore, is in favor of the workmen, it is always just and equitable; but it is sometimes otherwise when in favor of the masters.

  Adam Smith

  Differences, Favors, Regulation

  Adam Smith (2016). “The Wealth of Nations: the Great Master”, p.167, VM eBooks

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• The man of system, on the contrary, is apt to be very wise in his own conceit; and is often so enamoured with the supposed beauty of his own ideal plan of government, that he cannot suffer the smallest deviation from any part of it... He seems to imagine that he can arrange the different members of a great society with as much ease as the hand arranges the different pieces upon a chess-board. He does not consider that...in the great chess-board of human society, every single piece has a principle of motion of its own, altogether different from that which the legislature might choose to impress upon it.

  Adam Smith

  Wise, Men, Hands

  "The Theory of Moral Sentiments" by Adam Smith, (Section II, Chap. II), 1759.

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• China is a much richer country than any part of Europe.

  Adam Smith

  Country, Europe, China

  Adam Smith (1819). “An Inquiry into the Nature and Causes of the Wealth of Nations”, p.262

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• The key insight of Adam Smith's Wealth of Nations is misleadingly simple: if an exchange between two parties is voluntary, it will not take place unless both believe they will benefit from it. Most economic fallacies derive from the neglect of this simple insight, from the tendency to assume that there is a fixed pie, that one party can gain only at the expense of another.

  Milton Friedman

  Party, Believe, Simple

  Milton Friedman, Rose Friedman (1990). “Free to Choose: A Personal Statement”, p.31, Houghton Mifflin Harcourt

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• Man is an animal that makes bargains: no other animal does this - no dog exchanges bones with another.

  Adam Smith

  Funny, Dog, Animal

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• The man whose whole life is spent in performing a few simple operations, of which the effects are perhaps always the same, or very nearly the same, has no occasion to exert his understanding or to exercise his invention in finding out expedients for removing difficulties which never occur. He naturally loses, therefore, the habit of such exertion, and generally becomes as stupid and ignorant as it is possible for a human creature to become.

  Adam Smith

  Stupid, Exercise, Simple

  Adam Smith (2017). “The Wealth of Nations (illustrated)”, p.590, Clap Publishing, LLC.

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• I have never known much good done by those who affected to trade for the public good.

  Adam Smith

  Government, Invisible Hand, Economic Order

  1776 An Inquiry into the Nature and Causes of the Wealth of Nations, bk.4, ch.3.

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• Nobody but a beggar chooses to depend chiefly upon the benevolence of his fellow-citizens.

  Adam Smith

  Government, Liberty, Citizens

  Adam Smith, James R. Otteson (2004). “Adam Smith: Selected Philosophical Writings”, p.100, Imprint Academic

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• Nobody ever saw a dog make a fair and deliberate exchange of one bone for another with another dog.

  Adam Smith

  Dog, Saws, Bones

  Adam Smith, Laurence Dickey (1993). “Wealth of Nations (Abridged)”, p.11, Hackett Publishing

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