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Man, an animal that makes bargains.

Adam Smith

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Adam Smith
Age: 67 †
Born: 1723
Born: June 16
Died: 1790
Died: July 17
Economist
Non-Fiction Writer
Philosopher
University Teacher
Writer
Lang Toun
Bargains
Agreement
Animal
Makes
Men

More quotes by Adam Smith

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It is not for its own sake that men desire money, but for the sake of what they can purchase with it.
Adam Smith
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How selfish soever man may be supposed, there are evidently some principles in his nature, which interest him in the fortune of others, and render their happiness necessary to him, though he derives nothing from it, except the pleasure of seeing it.
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It seldom happens, however, that a great proprietor is a great improver.
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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.
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Great nations are never impoverished by private, though they sometimes are by public prodigality and misconduct.
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Man naturally desires, not only to be loved, but to be lovely or to be that thing which is the natural and proper object of love.
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As we have no immediate experience of what other men feel, we can form no idea of the manner in which they are affected, but by conceiving what we ourselves should feel in the like situation.
Adam Smith
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Men desire to have some share in the management of public affairs chiefly on account of the importance which it gives them.
Adam Smith
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The rate of profit... is naturally low in rich and high in poor countries, and it is always highest in the countries which are going fastest to ruin.
Adam Smith
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Wonder... and not any expectation of advantage from its discoveries, is the first principle which prompts mankind to the study of Philosophy, of that science which pretends to lay open the concealed connections that unite the various appearances of nature.
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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
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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
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The great affair, we always find, is to get money.
Adam Smith
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A merchant, it has been said very properly, is not necessarily the citizen of any particular country.
Adam Smith
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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
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To expect, indeed, that the freedom of trade should ever be entirely restored in Great Britain, is as absurd as to expect that an Oceana or Utopia should never be established in it.
Adam Smith
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The liberal reward of labour, therefore, as it is the affect of increasing wealth, so it is the cause of increasing population. To complain of it, is to lament over the necessary effect and cause of the greatest public prosperity.
Adam Smith
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I am a beau in nothing but my books.
Adam Smith
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It is unjust that the whole of society should contribute towards an expence of which the benefit is confined to a part of the society.
Adam Smith
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I have no faith in political arithmetic.
Adam Smith