Quote

By pursuing his own interest (the individual) 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.

Adam Smith

Change background

T
T
T

Change font

TAGS & TOPICS

Adam Smith
Age: 67 †
Born: 1723
Born: June 16
Died: 1790
Died: July 17
Economist
Non-Fiction Writer
Philosopher
University Teacher
Writer
Lang Toun
Individual
Frequently
Done
Affected
Much
Capitalism
Really
Trade
Effectually
Good
Public
Intends
Never
Known
Promotes
Interest
Pursuing
Society
Promote

More quotes by Adam Smith

Image
Men, like animals, naturally multiply in proportion to the means of their subsistence.
Adam Smith
Image
The emotions of the spectator will still be very apt to fall short of the violence of what is felt by the sufferer. Mankind, though naturally sympathetic, never conceive, for what has befallen another, that degree of passion which naturally animates the person principally concerned.
Adam Smith
Image
This is one of those cases in which the imagination is baffled by the facts.
Adam Smith
Image
It is not for its own sake that men desire money, but for the sake of what they can purchase with it.
Adam Smith
Image
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
Image
Problems worthy of attacks, prove their worth by hitting back
Adam Smith
Image
Nobody ever saw a dog make a fair and deliberate exchange of one bone for another with another dog.
Adam Smith
Image
A man must always live by his work, and his wages must at least be sufficient to maintain him. They must even upon most occasions be somewhat more otherwise it would be impossible for him to bring up a family, and the race of such workmen could not last beyond the first generation.
Adam Smith
Image
Goods can serve many other purposes besides purchasing money, but money can serve no other purpose besides purchasing goods.
Adam Smith
Image
I have never known much good done by those who affected to trade for the public good.
Adam Smith
Image
The cheapness of wine seems to be a cause, not of drunkenness, but of sobriety. ...People are seldom guilty of excess in what is their daily fare... On the contrary, in the countries which, either from excessive heat or cold, produce no grapes, and where wine consequently is dear and a rarity, drunkenness is a common vice.
Adam Smith
Image
As soon as government management begins it upsets the natural equilibrium of industrial relations, and each interference only requires further bureaucratic control until the end is the tyranny of the totalitarian state.
Adam Smith
Image
All for ourselves, and nothing for other people, seems, in every age of the world, to have been the vile maxim of the masters of mankind.
Adam Smith
Image
The division of labour was limited by the extent of the market
Adam Smith
Image
All registers which, it is acknowledged, ought to be kept secret, ought certainly never to exist.
Adam Smith
Image
Now many such things may be done without intitling the people to rise in arms. A gross, flagrant, and palpable abuse no doubt will do it, as if they should be required to pay a tax equal to half or third of their substance.
Adam Smith
Image
In public, as well as in private expences, great wealth may, perhaps, frequently be admitted as an apology for great folly.
Adam Smith
Image
Mercy to the guilty is cruelty to the innocent.
Adam Smith
Image
No 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.
Adam Smith
Image
Wherever there is great property there is great inequality. For one very rich man there must be at least five hundred poor, and the affluence of the few supposes the indigence of the many. The affluence of the rich excites the indignation of the poor, who are often both driven by want, and prompted by envy, to invade his possessions.
Adam Smith