BOOK II.
OF THE NATURE, ACCUMULATION, AND EMPLOYMENT OF STOCK.
INTRODUCTION.
In that rude state of society, in which there
is no division of labour, in which exchanges
are seldom made, and in which every man
provides every thing for himself, it is not necessary
that any stock should be accumulated,
or stored up before-hand, in order to carry on
the business of the society. Every man endeavours
to supply, by his own industry, his
own occasional wants, as they occur. When
he is hungry, he goes to the forest to hunt;
when his coat is worn out, he clothes himself
with the skin of the first large animal he
kills; and when his hut begins to go to ruin,
he repairs it, as well as he can, with the trees
and the turf that are nearest it.
But when the division of labour has once
been thoroughly introduced, the produce of a
man's own labour can supply but a very small
part of his occasional wants. The far greater
part of them are supplied by the produce of
other men's labour, which he purchases with
the produce, or, what is the same thing, with
the price of the produce, of his own. But
this purchase cannot be made till such time
as the produce of his own labour has not only
been completed, but sold. A stock of goods
of different kinds, therefore, must be stored
up somewhere, sufficient to maintain him, and
to supply him with the materials and tools of
his work, till such time at least as both these
events can be brought about. A weaver cannot
apply himself entirely to his peculiar business,
unless there is before-hand stored up
somewhere, either in his own possession, or
in that of some other person, a stock sufficient
to maintain him, and to supply him with the
materials and tools of his work, till he has not
only completed, but sold his web. This accumulation
must evidently be previous to his
applying his industry for so long a time to
such a peculiar business.
As the accumulation of stock must, in the
nature of things, be previous to the division
of labour, so labour can be more and more
subdivided in proportion only as stock is previously
more and more accumulated. The
quantity of materials which the same number
of people can work up, increases in a great
proportion as labour comes to be more and
more subdivided; and as the operations of
each workman are gradually reduced to a
greater degree of simplicity, a variety of new
machines come to be invented for facilitating
and abridging these operations. As the division
of labour advances, therefore, in order
to give constant employment to an equal number
of workman, an equal stock of provisions,
and a greater stock of materials and tools
than what would have been necessary in a
ruder state of things, must be accumulated
before-hand. But the number of workmen in
every branch of business generally increases
with the division of labour in that branch; or
rather it is the increase of their number which
enables them to class and subdivide themselves
in this manner.
As the accumulation of stock is previously
necessary for carrying on this great improvement
in the productive powers of labour, so
that accumulation naturally leads to this improvement.
The person who employs his stock
in maintaining labour, necessarily wishes to
employ it in such a manner as to produce as
great a quantity of work as possible. He endeavours,
therefore, both to make among his
workmen the most proper distribution of employment,
and to furnish them with the best
machines which he can either invent or afford
to purchase. His abilities, in both these respects,
are generally in proportion to the extent
of his stock, or to the number of people
whom it can employ. The quantity of industry,
therefore, not only increases in every
country with the increase of the stock which
employs it, but, in consequence of that increase,
the same quantity of industry produces
a much greater quantity of work.
Such are in general the effects of the increase
of stock upon industry and its productive
powers.