---
id: book-1-chapter-02
title: "OF THE PRINCIPLE WHICH GIVES OCCASION TO THE DIVISION OF LABOUR."
book: "1"
chapter: 2
artifact_type: content
---

CHAPTER II.
OF THE PRINCIPLE WHICH GIVES OCCASION
TO THE DIVISION OF LABOUR.



      This division of labour, from which so many advantages are derived, is not
      originally the effect of any human wisdom, which foresees and intends that
      general opulence to which it gives occasion. It is the necessary, though
      very slow and gradual, consequence of a certain propensity in human
      nature, which has in view no such extensive utility; the propensity to
      truck, barter, and exchange one thing for another.

      Whether this propensity be one of those original principles in human
      nature, of which no further account can be given, or whether, as seems
      more probable, it be the necessary consequence of the faculties of reason
      and speech, it belongs not to our present subject to inquire. It is common
      to all men, and to be found in no other race of animals, which seem to
      know neither this nor any other species of contracts. Two greyhounds, in
      running down the same hare, have sometimes the appearance of acting in
      some sort of concert. Each turns her towards his companion, or endeavours
      to intercept her when his companion turns her towards himself. This,
      however, is not the effect of any contract, but of the accidental
      concurrence of their passions in the same object at that particular time.
      Nobody ever saw a dog make a fair and deliberate exchange of one bone for
      another with another dog. Nobody ever saw one animal, by its gestures and
      natural cries signify to another, this is mine, that yours; I am willing
      to give this for that. When an animal wants to obtain something either of
      a man, or of another animal, it has no other means of persuasion, but to
      gain the favour of those whose service it requires. A puppy fawns upon its
      dam, and a spaniel endeavours, by a thousand attractions, to engage the
      attention of its master who is at dinner, when it wants to be fed by him.
      Man sometimes uses the same arts with his brethren, and when he has no
      other means of engaging them to act according to his inclinations,
      endeavours by every servile and fawning attention to obtain their good
      will. He has not time, however, to do this upon every occasion. In
      civilized society he stands at all times in need of the co-operation and
      assistance of great multitudes, while his whole life is scarce sufficient
      to gain the friendship of a few persons. In almost every other race of
      animals, each individual, when it is grown up to maturity, is entirely
      independent, and in its natural state has occasion for the assistance of
      no other living creature. But man has almost constant occasion for the
      help of his brethren, and it is in vain for him to expect it from their
      benevolence only. He will be more likely to prevail if he can interest
      their self-love in his favour, and shew them that it is for their own
      advantage to do for him what he requires of them. Whoever offers to
      another a bargain of any kind, proposes to do this. Give me that which I
      want, and you shall have this which you want, is the meaning of every such
      offer; and it is in this manner that we obtain from one another the far
      greater part of those good offices which we stand in need of. 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. 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. Nobody but a
      beggar chooses to depend chiefly upon the benevolence of his
      fellow-citizens. Even a beggar does not depend upon it entirely. The
      charity of well-disposed people, indeed, supplies him with the whole fund
      of his subsistence. But though this principle ultimately provides him with
      all the necessaries of life which he has occasion for, it neither does nor
      can provide him with them as he has occasion for them. The greater part of
      his occasional wants are supplied in the same manner as those of other
      people, by treaty, by barter, and by purchase. With the money which one
      man gives him he purchases food. The old clothes which another bestows
      upon him he exchanges for other clothes which suit him better, or for
      lodging, or for food, or for money, with which he can buy either food,
      clothes, or lodging, as he has occasion.

      As it is by treaty, by barter, and by purchase, that we obtain from one
      another the greater part of those mutual good offices which we stand in
      need of, so it is this same trucking disposition which originally gives
      occasion to the division of labour. In a tribe of hunters or shepherds, a
      particular person makes bows and arrows, for example, with more readiness
      and dexterity than any other. He frequently exchanges them for cattle or
      for venison, with his companions; and he finds at last that he can, in
      this manner, get more cattle and venison, than if he himself went to the
      field to catch them. From a regard to his own interest, therefore, the
      making of bows and arrows grows to be his chief business, and he becomes a
      sort of armourer. Another excels in making the frames and covers of their
      little huts or moveable houses. He is accustomed to be of use in this way
      to his neighbours, who reward him in the same manner with cattle and with
      venison, till at last he finds it his interest to dedicate himself
      entirely to this employment, and to become a sort of house-carpenter. In
      the same manner a third becomes a smith or a brazier; a fourth, a tanner
      or dresser of hides or skins, the principal part of the clothing of
      savages. And thus the certainty of being able to exchange all that surplus
      part of the produce of his own labour, which is over and above his own
      consumption, for such parts of the produce of other men’s labour as he may
      have occasion for, encourages every man to apply himself to a particular
      occupation, and to cultivate and bring to perfection whatever talent or
      genius he may possess for that particular species of business.

      The difference of natural talents in different men, is, in reality, much
      less than we are aware of; and the very different genius which appears to
      distinguish men of different professions, when grown up to maturity, is
      not upon many occasions so much the cause, as the effect of the division
      of labour. The difference between the most dissimilar characters, between
      a philosopher and a common street porter, for example, seems to arise not
      so much from nature, as from habit, custom, and education. When they came
      in to the world, and for the first six or eight years of their existence,
      they were, perhaps, very much alike, and neither their parents nor
      play-fellows could perceive any remarkable difference. About that age, or
      soon after, they come to be employed in very different occupations. The
      difference of talents comes then to be taken notice of, and widens by
      degrees, till at last the vanity of the philosopher is willing to
      acknowledge scarce any resemblance. But without the disposition to truck,
      barter, and exchange, every man must have procured to himself every
      necessary and conveniency of life which he wanted. All must have had the
      same duties to perform, and the same work to do, and there could have been
      no such difference of employment as could alone give occasion to any great
      difference of talents.

      As it is this disposition which forms that difference of talents, so
      remarkable among men of different professions, so it is this same
      disposition which renders that difference useful. Many tribes of animals,
      acknowledged to be all of the same species, derive from nature a much more
      remarkable distinction of genius, than what, antecedent to custom and
      education, appears to take place among men. By nature a philosopher is not
      in genius and disposition half so different from a street porter, as a
      mastiff is from a grey-hound, or a grey-hound from a spaniel, or this last
      from a shepherd’s dog. Those different tribes of animals, however, though
      all of the same species are of scarce any use to one another. The strength
      of the mastiff is not in the least supported either by the swiftness of
      the greyhound, or by the sagacity of the spaniel, or by the docility of
      the shepherd’s dog. The effects of those different geniuses and talents,
      for want of the power or disposition to barter and exchange, cannot be
      brought into a common stock, and do not in the least contribute to the
      better accommodation and conveniency of the species. Each animal is still
      obliged to support and defend itself, separately and independently, and
      derives no sort of advantage from that variety of talents with which
      nature has distinguished its fellows. Among men, on the contrary, the most
      dissimilar geniuses are of use to one another; the different produces of
      their respective talents, by the general disposition to truck, barter, and
      exchange, being brought, as it were, into a common stock, where every man
      may purchase whatever part of the produce of other men’s talents he has
      occasion for.
