THE WEALTH OF NATIONS.

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increasing or declining state of the wealth of the society;but those causes affect the one and the other very differently.

The increase of stock, which raises wages, tends to lowerprofit. When the stocks of many rich merchants are turnedinto the same trade, their mutual competition naturally tendsto lower its profit; and when there is a like increase of stockin all the different trades carried on in the same society, thesame competition must produce the same effect in them all.

It is not easy, it has already been observed, to ascertainwhat arc the average wages of labour, even in a particularplace, and at a particular time. We can, even in this case,seldom determine more than what are the most usual wages.But even this can seldom be done with regard to the profitsof stock. Profit is so very fluctuating, that the person whocarries on a particular trade cannot always tell you himselfwhat is the average of his annual profit. It is affected, notonly by every variation of price in the commodities which hedeals in, but by the good or bad fortune both of his rivals andof his customers, and by a thousand other accidents to whichgoods when carried either by sea or by land, or even whenstored in a warehouse, are liable. It varies, therefore, notonly from year to year, but from day to day, and almost fromhour to hour. To ascertain what is the average profit of allthe different trades carried on in a great kingdom, must bemuch more difficult; and to judge of what it may have beenformerly, or in remote periods of time, with any degree ofprecision, must be altogether impossible.

But though it may be impossible to determine with anydegree of precision, what are or were the average profits ofstock, either in the present, or in ancient times, some notionmay be formed of them from the interest of money. It maybe laid down as a maxim, that wherever a great deal can bemade by the use of money, a great deal will commonly begiven for the use of it; and that wherever little can be madeby it, less will commonly be given lor it. According, there-fore, as the usual market rate of interest varies in any country,we may be assured that the ordinary profits of stock mustvary with it, must sink as it sinks, and rise as it rises. Theprogress of interest, therefore, may lead us to form some no-tion of the progress of profit.

By the 37th of Henry VIII . all interest above ten per cent,was declared unlawful. More, it seems, had sometimes beentaken before that. In the reign of Edward VI . religious zeal

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