THE WEALTH OF NATIONS.

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modities, is equal to the quantity of labour which it enableshim to purchase or command. Labour, therefore, is the realmeasure of the exchangeable value of all commodities.

The real price of every thing, what every thing reallycosts to the man who wants to acquire it, is the toil and troubleof acquiring it. What every thing is really worth to the manwho has acquired it, and who wants to dispose of it or ex-change it for something else, is the toil and trouble which itcan save to himself, and which it can impose upon otherpeople. What is bought with money or with goods is pur-chased by labour, as much as what we acquire by the toil ofour own body. That money or those goods indeed save usthis toil. They contain the value of a certain quantity of la-bour which we exchange for what is supposed at the time tocontain the value of an equal quantity. Labour was the firstprice, theoriginal purchase-money that was paid forallthings.It was not by gold or by silver, but by labour, that all thev wealth of the world was originally purchased; and its value,

' to those who possess it, and who want to exchange it for somenew productions, is precisely equal to the quantity of labourwhich it can enable them to purchase or command.

Wealth, as Mr. Hobbes says, is power. But the personwho either acquires, or succeeds to a great fortune, does notnecessarily acquire or succeed to any political power, eithercivil or military. His fortune may, perhaps, afford him themeans of acquiring both, but the mere possession of that for-tune does not necessarily convey to him either. The powerwhich that possession immediately and directly conveys tohim is the power of purchasing a certain command over allthe labour, or over all the produce of labour which is thenin the market. His fortune is greater or less, precisely inproportion to the extent of this power; or to the quantityeither of other men’s labour, or, what is the same thing, ofthe produce of other men’s labour, which it enables him topurchase or command. The exchangeable value of everything must always be precisely equal to the extent of thispower which it conveys to its owner.

But though labour be the real measure of the exchange-able value of all commodities, it is not that by which theirvalue is commonly estimated. It is often difficult to ascertainthe proportion between two different quantities of labour.The time spent in two different sorts of work will not alwaysalone determine this proportion. The different degrees of