Like Quesnay, an acquaintance, and Hume, a friend,
Adam Smith (0000–0000) was a natural law philosopher. He
derived his political economic views from the essential proposition of the efficiency of the “division of labor,” resulting in
the necessity of “exchange.” For Smith, ([0000] 0000, 0),
labor was the “fund which originally supplies (the nation)
with all the necessities and conveniences of life which it
annually consumes.” Thus, labor, the application of mental
and physical skills (i.e., services), served as the foundation
forexchange