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When profit diminishes, merchants are very apt to complain that trade decays; though the diminution of profit is the natural effect of its prosperity, or of a greater stock being employed in it than before.

Adam Smith

The real and effectual discipline which is exercised over a workman is that of his customers. It is the fear of losing their employment which restrains his frauds and corrects his negligence.
ADAM SMITH

Customer Discipline Employment Exercise Fear Lose Man Mistake Reality Work
Science is the great antidote to the poison of enthusiasm and superstition.
ADAM SMITH

Belief Enthusiasm Medicine Poison Science Superstition
It is not by augmenting the capital of the country, but by rendering a greater part of that capital active and productive than would otherwise be so, that the most judicious operations of banking can increase the industry of the country.
ADAM SMITH

Active Country Greatness Production
The real price of everything, what everything really costs to the man who wants to acquire it, is the toil and trouble of acquiring it.
ADAM SMITH

Cost Man Price Reality Trouble
Every tax ought to be so contrived as both to take out and to keep out of the pockets of the people as little as possible, over and above what it brings into the public treasury of the State.
ADAM SMITH

People Possible Tax Treasure
Virtue is more to be feared than vice, because its excesses are not subject to the regulation of conscience.
ADAM SMITH

Consience Fear Vice Virtue
No complaint is more common than that of a scarcity of money.
ADAM SMITH

Complaint Money
Whatever work he does, beyond what is sufficient to purchase his own maintenance, can be squeezed out of him by violence only, and not by any interest of his own.
ADAM SMITH

Beyond Himself Maintain Violence Work
A nation is not made wealthy by the childish accumulation of shiny metals, but it enriched by the economic prosperity of it’s people.
ADAM SMITH

Children Material Nation People Prosperity Wealth
The first thing you have to know is yourself. A man who knows himself can step outside himself and watch his own reactions like an observer.
ADAM SMITH

Character Deep Himself Man Reaction Yourself
Happiness never lays its finger on its pulse.
ADAM SMITH

Fingers Happiness Wisdom
Wherever there is great property, there is great inequality.
ADAM SMITH

Equality Greatness Injustice Material Property
Mercy to the guilty is cruelty to the innocent.
ADAM SMITH

Cruelty Guilty Innocent Justice Mercy
The world neither ever saw, nor ever will see, a perfectly fair lottery.
ADAM SMITH

Fair Perfection Right See World
As soon as the land of any country has all become private property, the landlords, like all other men, love to reap where they never sowed, and demand a rent even for its natural produce.
ADAM SMITH

Country Demand Land Love Man Natural Privacy Produce Property
The propensity to truck, barter and exchange one thing for another is common to all men, and to be found in no other race of animals.
ADAM SMITH

Animal Man Race

When profit diminishes, merchants are very apt to complain that trade decays; though the diminution of profit is the natural effect of its prosperity, or of a greater stock being employed in it than before.

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When profit diminishes, merchants are very apt to complain that trade decays; though the diminution of profit is the natural effect of its prosperity, or of a greater stock being employed in it than before.

Related Topics

Popular Authors

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