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Though pecuniary wages and profit are very different in the

different employments of labour and stock; yet a certain

proportion seems commonly to take place between both the

pecuniary wages in all the different employments of labour, and

the pecuniary profits in all the different employments of stock.

This proportion, it will appear hereafter, depends partly upon

the nature of the different employments, and partly upon the

different laws and policy of the society in which they are

carried on. But though in many respects dependent upon the laws

and policy, this proportion seems to be little affected by the

riches or poverty of that society, by its advancing, stationary,

or declining condition, but to remain the same, or very nearly

the same, in all those different states. I shall, in the third

place, endeavour to explain all the different circumstances which

regulate this proportion.