ciple by which the nature and effects of labour in general are regulated; and it would be improper to dwell any longer upon it.

The nature and effects of labour in general being fixed and known, let us see which means the different systems recommend to increase its force, develope its faculties, and extend its power, and what obstacies oppose its progress, paralyse its efforts, and impede its success.

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CHAP. IV.

Of the Causes which invigorate Labour, improve its
Powers, and ameliorate its Produce.

ADAM Smith, who first assigned to labour such important functions, demonstrated its powerful influence upon wealth, and rendered it so interesting in economical respects, is also the first who bestowed particular attention upon the causes which invigorate labour, improve its faculties, and augment and ameliorate its produce. He ascribes all its improvements to the division of its parts, or the confiding to several hands the different branches of the same labour, which gives each labourer more dexterity, avoids the loss of time occasioned by the change of labour, and is conducive to the invention of machines which shorten and facilitate labour, and enable one individual to perform the labour of many.

This fruitful principle, on which Adam Smith reared his system of political economy, to which he

bent his theory, and which exercises a sort of domination over the science, had hitherto been considered as one of the facts which have most accelerated the progress of political economy and most contributed to the celebrity of its author.

But this title to glory has not been respected by the Earl of Lauderdale; and it is, no doubt, interesting to behold the efforts of the Noble Author to overturn the main pillar of political economy.

Lord Lauderdale begins by observing, " that the idea of the effects of the division of labour is not

new; that the dexterity which man acquires in "performing labour, by confining himself to one par"ticular branch, has been dwelt upon from the times "of Xenophon to the present day; and that, on this principle, professions in ancient times had been "made hereditary; as was the case in Egypt, in some parts of India, and in Peru.”

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..

To this rather critical than instructive observation, the noble Earl adds, that "the great number of dis"tinct operations that contribute towards the forma"tion of some of the most trifling manufactures, "such as the trade of pin-making, is not derived "from any degree of habitual dexterity, or from the saving of time, as results of the division of labour; 66 but from the circumstance of supplanting and performing labour by capital. Without the machinery, which the faculty that man possesses of supplanting labour by capital introduces, no great progress could have been made in the rapidity with "which pins are formed; and one man, with the use "of this machinery, though he goes through and per

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"forms all the operations himself, must, obviously, "manufacture more pins in an hour, than would be "formed in a month, even in a year, by any number

of men amongst whom the labour could be divided, "if unaided by the circumstance of part of their "labour being supplanted and performed by capital. "The progress made of late years in Scotland, in "the art of distilling spirits, affords a strong illustra"tion and example of the vast resources of human ingenuity in abridging labour by mechanical con

"trivances."

"In the year 1785, a proposal was made to collect the duty on the manufacture of spirits in "Scotland by way of licence, to be paid annually for every still, according to its size, at a fixed rate per gallon, in lieu of all other duties."

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"The London distillers, men the most experienced "in their profession, who agreed to the rate of the "licence on the gallon, supposed to be equivalent to "the former duties, declared themselves, from expe"rience, satisfied, that the time of working stills with "benefit was limited to an extent perfectly well known; and that whoever exceeded these limits "would infallibly lose upon his materials and the quality of the goods what he gained in point of "time; and in conformity to their opinion, the duty was in the year 1786 settled, upon the supposition "that stills could be discharged about seven times in a week."

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"Two years after this, in a memorial presented to "the Lords Commissioners of the Treasury, the same men alleged, that the Scotch distillers had, by the

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ingenuity of their contrivances, found means to discharge their stills upwards of forty times a "week; and we since know, from a report made to "the Lords Commissioners of the Treasury, in the "year 1799, that a forty-three-gallon still was brought to such a degree of perfection, as to be discharged at the rate of once in two minutes and "three quarters; which is almost twenty-two times in an hour. It appears also from this report, that the operation of distillation was capable of being performed in a still shorter time, and that the quality of the spirit was no wise injured by the rapidity of the operation."

From this fact Lord Lauderdale concludes, that it is to the introduction of some sort of machinery, to the effect of the application of chemistry to manufactures, and to the increase or command of capital cnabling the manufacturers to reduce the price of manufactured commodities, that we are indebted for the wealth and comforts generally enjoyed by civilized society.

"In the annals," adds the noble author, "of the "transactions and negociations that have taken place between different nations on the subject of commercial arrangements, the danger of admitting a country to a commercial competition, because the "division of labour was there carried farther than in

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any other, is a thing unheard of; whilst the con"stant and uniform ground of objection, urged by men whose prejudices led them to think that commerce may be conducted in a manner injurious to

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a nation, is the superiority that the one country has

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over the other, derived from dexterity in supplanting and performing labour by capital."

"Adam Smith has vainly laboured to impress the "belief that the introduction of machinery is originally owing to the division of labour, of which it ❝is considered as a mere consequence.”

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But, in truth, the history of man shews us, "that the simplest and most efficacious machines "for supplanting labour-(instruments with which "habit has so familiarized us, that we hardly dig

nify them with the name of Lachinery)-are "introduced, at an early period of society, when "the division of labour is comparatively unpractised "and unknown, for the purpose of supplanting the "personal labour of man in the conduct of agricul "tural industry;-an ait which. rough its re"eminence in the production of wealth, is acknow"ledged (even by those who wish to establish that "the division of labour is the great source of the "increased opulence of mankind), is in n veriod of

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society distinguished by reaping bench from the "division of labour."

"The eagerness and anxiety of the author of the "Wealth of Nations to enforce his favourite opinion, "has made him assert, that a great part of the "machines employed in those manufactures in "which labour is most subdivided, were originally "the inventions of common workinen, who, being "each of them employed in some very simple ope"ration, naturally turned their thoughts towards finding out easier and readier methods of performing it.