The Online Library of Liberty

A project of Liberty Fund, Inc.

• Preface.
• Conversation I.: Introduction.
• Conversation II.: Introduction — Continued.
• Conversation III.: On Property.
• Conversation IV.: On Property— Continued.
• Conversation V.: On the Division of Labour.
• Conversation VI.: On Capital.
• Conversation VII.: On Capital — Continued.
• Conversation VIII.: On Wages and Population.
• Conversation IX.: On Wages and Population. Continued.
• Conversation X.: On the Condition of the Poor.
• Conversation XI.: On Revenue.
• Conversation XII.: On Revenue Derived From Property In Land.
• Conversation XIII.: On Revenue Derived From the Cultivation of Land.
• Conversation XIV.: On the Revenue of Those Who Do Not Employ Their Capital Themselves.
• Conversation XV.: On Value and Price.
• Conversation XVI.: On Money.
• Conversation XVII.: Subject of Money Continued.
• Conversation XVIII.: On Commerce.
• Conversation XIX.: On Foreign Trade.
• Conversation XX.: Continuation of Foreign Trade.
• Conversation XXI.: Subject of Foreign Trade Continued.
• Conversation XXII.: On Expenditure.

CONVERSATION V.

ON THE DIVISION OF LABOUR.

mrs. b.

We have ascertained that the establishment and security of property were the chief causes of the emancipation of mankind from the shackles of sloth and ignorance; but there are other subordinate causes which tend greatly to promote the progress of industry and civilisation. The first of these is the introduction of exchange or barter.

We observed, that when men found they could place a reliance on the security of their possessions, they laboured with redoubled activity, and, far from being satisfied with a scanty and temporary maintenance, they provide for the future, they accumulate a little store not only of the necessaries, but of the comforts and conveniences of life. The one has a stock of arrows for the chase, another of provisions for the winter, a third of clothes or ornaments for his person. They will remain in undisturbed possession of this litle property; but those who can no longer obtain it by force or fraud will endeavour to procure it by other means. In the hunting season, they will apply to the fabricator of arrows; but they will not go to him with empty hands; they must be provided with something to offer in exchange for the arrows, something which they think will tempt him to part with them: whilst those who have nothing to give in return will wish in vain to obtain them.

Here, then, is a new incitement to a spirit of industry. Whoever has accumulated more than he wants of any commodity, may find means of exchanging the surplus for something that will gratify other desires. As objects of desire increase, the wish to possess and the effort to obtain them increase also; and the industry of man is exerted either in producing them himself, or in producing something by means of which he may obtain them. Thus the torpid apathy and languid indolence of a savage yields to the curiosity, the admiration, the desire, the activity, and industry of a civilised being.

The man, for instance, who first cultivates a little spot of ground, may be said to produce in time a general harvest; not only by introducing the art of tillage, but by the powerful impulse which it gives to industry in general. He cannot himself consume the whole produce of his little garden, but he exchanges the surplus for other things of which he stands in need.

caroline.

Besides, he would not have had sufficient time to bestow on the cultivation of his garden, if he had been, at the same time, obliged to provide for all his other wants.

mrs. b.

Very true; those therefore who mean to partake of the fruits of his garden must contribute towards the supply of those other wants; some will bring him fish from the river, others game from the woods: when his immediate necessities are supplied, he will be induced to exchange his vegetables for articles of conveniency, such as baskets to contain his fruit, or some of the rude implements of husbandry; or he may finally be tempted to part with some for mere luxuries, such as rare shells, feathers, and other personal ornaments. His neighbours will therefore be eager to produce or procure articles, which, either from necessity, conveniency, or merely from pleasure, will induce the gardener to part with the produce of his garden: for this purpose invention will be stimulated, new commodities will be fabricated, skill will be acquired, and a general spirit of industry developed.

caroline.

So far the introduction of barter seems to answer a very useful purpose; but when once industry is roused, why should not every one exert his abilities to supply his own wants, and gratify his desires, without the intervention of barter? If a man happens to be possessed of a superfluous quantity of any commodity, it is no doubt desirable to exchange it for something more wanted: but it seems to me to be an unnatural and circuitous mode of proceeding, to produce something which we do not want, in order afterwards to exchange it for something which we do want.

mrs. b.

Would you then have the baker kill his own meat as well as bake his own bread, brew his own beer, build his own house, and make his own clothes, instead of procuring these various articles in exchange through the sale of his bread?

caroline.

Oh no; it would be impossible to undertake so many occupations; and then he can do one thing better than he can do many: but this separation of trades and employments cannot take place in a savage state.

mrs. b.

No, but it begins to operate as soon as barter is introduced; and it is to this circuitous mode that we owe all our improvements in skill and dexterity; the advantages of which are much more important than you imagine.

When barter became common, it was soon discovered that the more a man confined himself to any one single branch of industry, to the fabrication of bows and arrows for instance, the greater the skill and dexterity he acquired in that particular art; so that he could make bows and arrows not only quicker, but of better workmanship, than another man who followed a variety of pursuits.

caroline.

Now I begin to understand the advantage that results from barter, independently of its inspiring a spirit of industry and a taste for a variety of enjoyments. The artist who has acquired a superior degree of excellence in the fabrication of bows and arrows, would gain more, by confining himself entirely to that occupation, and exchanging his merchandise for whatever else he was desirous of obtaining, than by turning his attention to a variety of pursuits.

mrs. b.

No doubt he would, provided he were sure of being able to dispose of all the bows and arrows he could make: for it would be useless to fabricate more than he could sell or exchange; and as no one could become a purchaser unless he had something to offer in return, a long period of time must elapse before the progress of industry would create a sufficient number of purchasers to enable an individual to earn a livelihood by the fabrication of bows and arrows.

It is therefore only in a more advanced stage of society that the demand for commodities is so great that men find it advantageous to devote themselves wholly to one particular art.

Adam Smith observes, that “in lone houses and very small villages, which are scattered about in so desert a country as the Highlands of Scotland, every farmer must be butcher, baker, and brewer for his own family. In such situations we can scarcely expect to find even a smith, a carpenter, or a mason within less than twenty miles of another of the same trade. The scattered families that live eight or ten miles distant from the nearest of them, must learn to perform for themselves a great number of little pieces of work, for which, in more populous countries, they call in the assistance of these workmen.”

This separation of employments, which, in political economy, is called the division of labour, can take place only in civilised countries. In the flourishing states of Europe we find men not only exclusively engaged in the exercises of one particular art, but that art subdivided into numerous branches, each of which forms a distinct occupation for different workmen.

Here is a beautiful passage in Adam Smith, the merits of which you will now be able to appreciate.

“Observe the accommodation of the most common artificer or day-labourer in a civilised and thriving country, and you will perceive that the number of people of whose industry a part, though but a small part, has been employed in procuring him this accommodation, exceeds all computation. The woollen coat, for example, which covers the day-labourer, coarse and rough as it may appear, is the produce of the joint labour of a great multitude of workmen. The shepherd, the sorter of the wool, the wool-comber or carder, the dyer, the scribbler, the spinner, the weaver, the fuller, the dresser, with many others, must all join their different arts in order to complete even this homely production. How many merchants and carriers, besides, must have been employed in transporting the materials from some of those workmen to others who often live in a very distant part of the country! How much commerce and navigation in particular, how many ship-builders, sailors, sail-makers, rope-makers, must have been employed in order to bring together the different drugs made use of by the dyer, which often come from the remotest corners of the world! What a variety of labour too is necessary in order to produce the tools of the meanest of those workmen! To say nothing of such complicated machines as the ship of the sailor, the mill of the fuller, or even the loom of the weaver, let us consider only what a variety of labour is requisite in order to form that very simple machine, the shears with which the shepherd clips the wool. The miner, the builder of the furnace for heating the ore, the feller of the timber, the burner of the charcoal to be made use of in the smelting-house, the brickmaker, the bricklayer, the workmen who attend the furnace, the millwright, the forger, the smith, must all of them join their different arts in order to produce them. Were we to examine, in the same manner, all the different parts of his dress and household furniture, the coarse linen shirt which he wears next his skin, the shoes which cover his feet, the bed which he lies on, and all the different parts which compose it, the kitchen-grate at which he prepares his victuals, the coals which he makes use of for that purpose, dug from the bowels of the earth, and brought to him by a long sea and a long land carriage, all the other utensils of his kitchen, all the furniture of his table, the knives and forks, the earthen or pewter plates upon which he serves up and divides his victuals, the different hands employed in preparing his bread and his beer, the glass window which lets in the heat and the light, and keeps out the wind and rain, with all the knowledge and art requisite for preparing that beautiful and happy invention, without which these northern parts of the world could scarce have afforded a very comfortable habitation, together with the tools of all the different workmen employed in producing those different conveniences; if we examine, I say, all these things, and consider what a variety of labour is employed about each of them, we shall be sensible that without the assistance and cooperation of many thousands, the very meanest person in a civilised country could not be provided, even according to what we very falsely imagine the easy and simple manner in which he is commonly accommodated. Compared, indeed, with the more extravagant luxury of the great, his accommodation must no doubt appear extremely simple and easy; and yet it may be true, perhaps, that the accommodation of an European prince does not always so much exceed that of an industrious and frugal peasant, as the accommodation of the latter exceeds that of many an African king, the absolute master of the lives and liberties of ten thousand naked savages.”

caroline.

It is very true, certainly; and it reminds me of an observation of Dr. Johnson in the Rambler, “That not a washerwoman sits down to breakfast without tea from the East Indies, and sugar from the West.”

I now comprehend your reference to the little story of the cherry-orchard: it was by dividing amongst the children the different parts of the process of plaiting straw, that they succeeded so much better than the boy who was left to perform the whole of his plait alone.

mrs. b.

I will now point out to you some examples remarked by Adam Smith in illustration of the benefits derived from the division of labour. That of the pin manufactory I shall give you in his own words. He observes, that “a workman not educated to this business, nor acquainted with the use of the machinery employed in it, could scarce, perhaps, with his utmost industry, make one pin in a day, and certainly could not make twenty. But in the way in which this business is now carried on, not only the whole work is a peculiar trade, but it is divided into a number of branches, of which the greater part are likewise peculiar trades. One man draws out the wire, another straightens it, a third cuts it, a fourth points it, a fifth grinds it at the top for receiving the head. To make the head requires two or three distinct operations; to put it on is a peculiar business, to whiten the pins is another; it is even a trade by itself to put them into the paper; and the important business of making a pin is, in this manner, divided into about eighteen distinct operations, which, in some manufactories, are all performed by distinct hands, though in others the same man will sometimes perform two or three of them. I have seen a small manufactury of this kind where ten men only were employed, and where some of them consequently performed two or three distinct operations: but though they were very poor, and therefore but indifferently accommodated with the necessary machinery, they could, when they exerted themselves, make among them about twelve pounds of pins in a day. There are in a pound upwards of four thousand pins of a middling size. Those ten persons, therefore, could make among them upwards of forty-eight thousand pins in a day. Each person, therefore, making a tenth part of forty-eight thousand pins, might be considered as making four thousand eight hundred pins in a day. But if they had all wrought separately and independently, and without any of them having been educated to this peculiar business, they certainly could not each of them have made twenty, perhaps not one pin in a day; that is, certainly, not the two hundred and fortieth, perhaps not the four thousand eight hundredth part of what they are at present capable of performing, in consequence of a proper division and combination of their different operations.”

caroline.

These effects of the division of labour are really wonderful!

mrs. b.

The instance which Adam Smith quotes in proof of the dexterity acquired by men, whose labour is reduced to one simple operation, is also very remarkable. After observing that a man unaccustomed to a blacksmith’s forge can with difficulty make three hundred nails in a day, he says that a common blacksmith can forge one thousand; but that he has seen boys who have been brought up to the art of nail-making exclusively, acquire such a degree of dexterity as to complete two thousand three hundred in a day.

caroline.

The difference is prodigious: but I can conceive it when I observe with what awkwardness a man handles the tools of an art with which he is unacquainted, whilst they are used with ease and dexterity by those who are accustomed to them.

mrs. b.

Then we must consider that when a man’s whole attention and talents are turned to one particular object, there is a much greater probability of his discovering means of improving his workmanship, or facilitating and abridging his labour, than if his mind were engaged in a variety of pursuits. It is most frequently to workmen, that we are indebted for improvements in the process and instruments of labour.

Another advantage derived from the division of labour is the regular and uninterrupted manner in which it enables the work to proceed. A labourer who has many diversified occupations not only loses time in going from one to another, but also in settling himself to his different employments: and, to use a common expression, as soon as his hand is in, he must quit his work to take up another totally different. Thus he must go from his plough to his loom, from his loom to his forge, from his forge to his mill, — but no — there could be neither plough, nor loom, nor forge, nor mill, before a division of labour had taken place; for no man could either find time or acquire skill to construct such machines, unless they could bestow the whole of their labour and attention upon them.

The construction of machines, therefore, we may consider as a refined branch of the division of labour. Their effect in facilitating and abridging labour is almost incredible. How easy, for instance, the operation of grinding corn is rendered by so simple a machine as a wind-mill, or a water-mill! Were this to be done by manual labour, by bruising it between stones, it would be almost an endless task: the hand-mill, which is still in general use in India and many other countries, requires both time and labour; whilst in the wind-mill, or the water-mill, the natural motion of the air, or water, performs nearly the whole of the work.

caroline.

But the cotton-mills we have lately seen are a much more wonderful example of the effect of machinery. In these a steam-engine sets all the wheels and spindles in motion, and performs the work of hundreds of people.

mrs. b.

The great efficacy of machinery in the hands of man depends upon the art of compelling natural agents, such as wind, steam, and water, to perform the task which he would otherwise be obliged to execute himself; by which means labour is very much abridged, a great deal of human effort is saved, and the work is often accomplished in a more uniform and accurate manner.

We noticed the skill that could be acquired in the art of forging nails: but the utmost efforts of manual labour fall far short of machinery. A machine has been invented in the United States of America for the purpose of cutting nails out of iron, the operation of which is so rapid that it forms 250 perfect nails in the space of one minute, or 15,000 in an hour.

caroline.

The metals, I suppose, could not have been brought into use, till a considerable progress had been made in the division of labour?

mrs. b.

Certainly not; for it requires the exclusive labour of a great number of men to work a mine. The Mexicans and Peruvians in America, though they had made some progress towards civilisation, had never sought for gold in the bowels of the earth, but contented themselves with what they could pick up in the beds of rivers. In Britain, the Cornish mines were worked in very ancient times; and it is even supposed that the Phœnicians had introduced this art among the ancient Britons, with whom they are said to have trafficked for tin and other metals.

caroline.

I am perfectly satisfied that the division of labour is a necessary step towards the accumulation of national wealth: but may it not have an injurious effect on the mental faculties of individuals? A man who is confined to one simple mechanical operation, however great the facility and perfection he may acquire in the performance of it, is shut out from all other improvement; his mind will never be roused to exertion by difficulty, interested by variety, or enlightened by comparison. His ideas will be confined within the narrow limits of his monotonous employment, and his rational powers will become so degraded as to render him scarcely superior to the machinery at which he works. Whilst a common husbandman, whose occupations are diversified, and but little aided by machinery, acquires knowledge by experience in his various employments, and, having a much wider range of observation, enjoys a corresponding developement of intellect.

mrs. b.

The knowledge of a ploughman is often remarkably distinct in his limited sphere: but yet I have usually found, that in conversing upon general topics with a ploughman and with a mechanic, the latter has discovered more intelligence, and that his mind has appeared more active and accustomed to reflection. I conceive this to be owing to the facility which the arts afford of bringing men together in society. They are carried on in towns, where neighbourhood renders social intercourse much more easy than in scattered hamlets in the country. When they meet together they talk over each other’s concerns, read the newspapers, and discuss the politics of the parish, or of the state. This observation is particularly applicable to manufactories, where a number of persons generally work together in the same room, and their employment seldom prevents conversation. Social intercourse, in whatever class of the community it takes place, cannot fail to promote the diffusion of knowledge; the lower orders of people become acquainted with the comforts and conveniences which have been acquired by the more skilful and industrious; they learn to appreciate the value, and are stimulated to acquire the means of obtaining them; a mode of instruction which we have observed to be the most essential step towards dispelling ignorance, and exciting industry.

caroline.

But is there not some danger that the advantages obtained in the improvement of the mind by this state of constant intercourse amongst the lower classes in manufacturing towns will be more than counterbalanced by the corruption of morals? How much more vice appears to prevail amongst the poor in crowded cities, than in the cottages of the peasantry!

mrs. b.

You should consider the difference of the population; there are often a greater number of people collected together in a manufacturing town than there are scattered over a space of thirty square miles of country: were their morals, therefore, the same, vice would appear much more conspicuous in the town than in the country. The comparative amount of crimes among a given number of people is, however, generally admitted, by those who have the best opportunity for information, to be greater among the agricultural than the manufacturing classes. If a peasant be viciously inclined, his coarse and uncultivated feelings do not shrink from the commission of open violence, robbery, and murder. The more developed mind of the vicious townsman revolts from such brutality: the address and skill he has acquired by constant intercourse with his fellow-species addicts him more to petty frauds and thefts. It has been observed, both in France and Italy, that the most heinous crimes have been perpetrated by the peasantry; and by a comparative view, lately taken in England between a manufacturing and an agricultural district of equal population, the amount of crimes in the latter greatly preponderated.

caroline.

You astonish me! and yet we are taught to consider a pastoral life as a picture of simplicity and innocence.

mrs. b.

But this picture is drawn by the poet, who paints it, not from the life, but from the enchanting yet delusive image formed by his imagination. There is more simplicity in the country, I doubt not; but that a superior state both of talent and of virtue should accompany a superior state of civilisation is equally to be expected and desired.

caroline.

Yet you must allow that we hear much more of the vices than of the virtues of manufacturing towns and great cities.

mrs. b.

Because crimes, from being amenable to the laws, are necessarily made known, whilst virtue seldom receives any public testimony of approbation. Every act of fraud or violence is sounded in our ears, whilst the humanity, the sympathy for sufferings, the sacrifices which the poor make to relieve each other’s distresses, are known only to those who enter into their domestic concerns. This has been frequently noticed by medical men who have attended the lower classes of people in sickness at their own houses.

caroline.

Yet, upon the whole, do you not think that the situation of the poor in the country is better than it is in towns?

mrs. b.

They have each their advantages and disadvantages, and I should imagine that good and evil are pretty equally balanced between them. If the inhabitants of towns are better informed, and can more easily acquire some of the comforts of life, the inhabitants of the country are more vigorous and healthy, more cleanly, and they have the advantage of a more constant and regular demand for the produce of their labour, which is not so liable to be affected by the casualties of war, fashion, and other causes, which often occasion great distress to manufacturers.

But should you still entertain any apprehension that the division of labour may check and repress the intellectual improvement of the lower classes, I should consider this as amply compensated by its prodigious effect in the multiplication of wealth; a circumstance which not only increases the comforts of the poor, but by facilitating the means of acquiring knowledge, ultimately promotes its diffusion among all classes of men. It is to the division of labour that we are indebted for improvements in the processes of art, and amongst others for the invention of printing, which has proved such wonderful means of extending knowledge of every description.

We have now, I think, brought our savages to a considerable degree of advancement in civilisation; I would wish you briefly to recapitulate the causes which have produced this happy change, and at our next interview we will continue to trace their progress.

caroline.

Labour seems to be the natural and immediate cause of wealth: but it will produce little more than the necessaries of life until its benefits are extended by the establishment of such a government as can give security to property. The spirit of industry will then be rapidly developed. The surplus produce of one individual will be exchanged for that of another. The facilities thus offered to barter will naturally introduce the division of labour or of employment; and will soon give rise to the invention of machinery, the merits of which we have just discussed.

mrs. b.

Extremely well, Caroline. We shall now take leave of this improved state of society for the present, with a conviction, I hope, that we leave mankind much happier than we found it.