An Inquiry into the Nature and Causes of the Wealth of Nations

The book opens with

We get our dinner from traders by appealing to their self-interest, not to their kindness

Their wordsIt 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. We address ourselves, not to their humanity, but to their self-love, and never talk to them of our own necessities, but of their advantages.

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Adam Smith did not write this page.

Every claim below was made in this book, quoted word for word and numbered in the order the piece makes them, so you can read it there rather than take our word for it. The book prints chapter headings its extracted text does not preserve, so the claims below are in the book's order but not grouped. The sentence above each quote is our reading of the claim, not their wording. Each quote was checked against a stored copy of the page at build time; where the two differ, the quote is the fact.

Our reading
We get our dinner from traders by appealing to their self-interest, not to their kindness

Their wordsIt 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. We address ourselves, not to their humanity, but to their self-love, and never talk to them of our own necessities, but of their advantages.
Our reading
Every person is rich or poor according to how far they can afford the necessities, conveniences and pleasures of life

Their wordsEvery man is rich or poor according to the degree in which he can afford to enjoy the necessaries, conveniencies, and amusements of human life.
Our reading
High wages are both the effect and the natural sign of a nation growing richer

Their wordsThe liberal reward of labour, therefore, as it is the necessary effect, so it is the natural symptom of increasing national wealth.
Our reading
No society can flourish when most of its members are poor, and those who feed and house everyone deserve to be decently fed and housed

Their wordsNo 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.
Our reading
When people in the same trade meet, the talk usually turns to conspiring against the public or raising prices

Their wordsPeople of the same trade seldom meet together, even for merriment and diversion, but the conversation ends in a conspiracy against the public, or in some contrivance to raise prices.
Our reading
By pursuing their own interest, people frequently serve society better than when they set out to serve it

Their wordsBy pursuing his own interest, he 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.
Our reading
A worker who spends a whole life on a few simple, repetitive tasks generally loses the habit of thinking

Their wordsThe man whose whole life is spent in performing a few simple operations, of which the effects, too, 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.

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