That a joint stock company should be able to carry on successfully any branch of foreign trade, when private adventurers can come into any sort of open and fair competition with them, seems contrary to all experience. — Adam Smith Copy Share Image
Poor David Hume is dying fast, but with more real cheerfulness and good humor and with more real resignation to the necessary course of… — Adam Smith Copy Share Image
“The effects of the division of labour, in the general business of society, will be more easily understood by considering in what manner it… — Adam Smith Copy Share Image
“The profligacy of a man of fashion is looked upon with much less contempt and aversion, than that of a man of meaner condition.” — Adam Smith Copy Share Image
Great ambition, the desire of real superiority, of leading and directing, seems to be altogether peculiar to man, and speech is the great instrument… — Adam Smith Copy Share Image
People of the same trade seldom meet together, even for merriment and diversion, but the conversation ends in a conspiracy against the public, or… — Adam Smith Copy Share Image
Nobody but a beggar chooses to depend chiefly upon the benevolence of his fellow-citizens. — Adam Smith Copy Share Image
How selfish soever man may be supposed, there are evidently some principles in his nature, which interest him in the fortune of others, and… — Adam Smith Copy Share Image
The liberal reward of labour, therefore, as it is the affect of increasing wealth, so it is the cause of increasing population. To complain… — Adam Smith Copy Share Image
What can be added to the happiness of a man who is in health, out of debt, and has a clear conscience? — Adam Smith Copy Share Image
It is not from the benevolence of the butcher, the brewer, or the baker that we expect our dinner, but from their regard to… — Adam Smith Copy Share Image
When we have read a book or poem so often that we can no longer find any amusement in reading it by ourselves, we… — Adam Smith Copy Share Image
We are but one of the multitude, in no respect better than any other in it. — Adam Smith Copy Share Image
