 Chapter 14, Section 3 of Capital Volume 1. This is the LibriVox recording. All LibriVox recordings are in the public domain. For more information or to volunteer, please visit LibriVox.org. Capital. A Critical Analysis of Capitalist Production, Volume 1, by Karl Marx. Translated from the 3rd German edition by Samuel Moore and Edward Aveling, and edited by Friedrich Engels. Part 4, Production of Relative Surplus Value. Chapter 14, Division of Labor and Manufacture. Section 3, The Two Fundamental Forms of Manufacture. Heterogeneous Manufacture, Serial Manufacture. The organization of manufacture has two fundamental forms, which, in spite of occasional blending, are essentially different in kind, and, moreover, play very distinct parts in the subsequent transformation of manufacture into modern industry carried on by machinery. This double character arises from the nature of the article produced. This article either results from the mere mechanical fitting together of partial products made independently, or owes its completed shape to a series of connected processes and manipulations. A locomotive, for instance, consists of more than 5,000 independent parts. It cannot, however, serve as an example of the first kind of genuine manufacture, for it is a structure produced by modern mechanical industry. But a watch can, and William Petty used it to illustrate the division of labor in manufacture. Formally, the individual work of a Nuremberg artificer, the watch has been transformed into the social product of an immense number of detail laborers, such as mainspring makers, dial makers, spiral spring makers, jeweled hole makers, ruby lever makers, hand makers, case makers, screw makers, guilders, with numerous subdivisions, such as wheel makers, brass and steel separate, pin makers, movement makers, achievure de pignon, fixes the wheels on the axles, polishes the facets, etc., pivot makers, planters de finissage, puts the wheels and springs in the works, finisseur de perriers, cuts teeth in the wheels, makes the holes of the right size, etc., escapement makers, cylinder makers for cylinder escapements, escapement wheel makers, balance wheel makers, racket makers, apparatus for regulating the watch, the planter des chapements, escapement maker, proper, then the rapasseur de perriers, finishes the box for the spring, etc., steel polishers, wheel polishers, screw polishers, figure painters, dial enamelers, melt the enamel on the copper, fabricant des pendants, makes the ring by which the case is hung, finisseur de chaniers, puts the brass hinge in the cover, etc., fais-aux des secrets, puts in the springs that open the case, gravure, chiselure, polisseur de bois, etc., etc., and last of all, the rapasseur who fits together the whole watch and hands it over in a going state. Only a few parts of the watch pass through several hands, and all of these membra disjecta come together for the first time in the hand that binds them into one mechanical hole. This external relation between the finished product and its various and diverse elements makes it, as well in this case, as in the case of all similar finished articles, a matter of chance, whether the detail laborers are brought together in one workshop or not. The detail operations may further be carried on like so many independent handicrafts, as they are in the cantons of Vaud and Neufchâtel, while in Geneva there exist large watch manufacturers where the detail laborers directly cooperate under the control of a single capitalist. And even in the latter case, the dial, the springs, and the case are seldom made in the factory itself. To carry on the trade as a manufacturer, with concentration of workmen, is in the watch trade profitable only under exceptional conditions, because competition is greater between the laborers who desire to work at home, and because the splitting up of the work into a number of heterogeneous processes permits but little use of the instruments of labor in common, and the capitalist, by scattering the work, saves the outlay on workshops, etc. Footnote In the year 1854, Geneva produced 80,000 watches, which is not one-fifth of the production in the cantons of Neufchâtel. La Chaux-de-Fonds, alone, which we may look upon as a huge watch manufacturer, produces yearly twice as many as Geneva. From 1850 to 1861, Geneva produced 720,000 watches. See report from Geneva on the watch trade in reports by H's secretaries of embassy and legislation on the manufacturer commerce, etc. Number 6, 1863. The want of connection alone between the processes into which the production of articles that merely consist of parts fitted together is split up, makes it very difficult to convert such a manufacturer into a branch of modern industry carried on by machinery, but in the case of a watch, there are two other impediments in addition. The minuteness and delicacy of its parts and its character as an article of luxury. Hence their variety, which is such that in the best London houses, scarcely a dozen watches are made alike in the course of a year. The watch manufactory of Messieurs Vacheron and Constantine, in which machinery has been employed with success, produces at the most three or four different varieties of size and form. End footnote. Nevertheless, the position of this detail laborer who, though he works at home, does so for a capitalist manufacturer, is very different from that of the independent artificer who works for his own customers. Footnote. In watchmaking, that classical example of heterogeneous manufacture, we might study with great accuracy the above mentioned differentiation and specialization of the instruments of labor caused by the subdivision of handicrafts. End footnote. The second kind of manufacture, its perfected form, produces articles that go through connected phases of development through a series of processes step by step, like the wire and the manufacture of needles, which passes through the hands of 72 and sometimes even 92 different detail workmen. Insofar as such a manufacture, when first started, combines scattered handicrafts. It lessens the space by which the various phases of production are separated from each other. The time taken and passing from one stage to another is shortened. So is the labor that effectuates this passage. Footnote. Quote. In so close a cohabitation of the people, the carriage must needs be less. Quote. The advantages of the East India trade, page 106. End footnote. In comparison with a handicraft, productive power is gained, and this gain is owing to the general cooperative character of manufacture. On the other hand, division of labor, which is the distinguishing principle of manufacture, requires the isolation of the various stages of production and their independence of each other. The establishment and maintenance of a connection between the isolated functions necessitates the incessant transport of the article from one hand to another, and from one process to another. From the standpoint of modern mechanical industry, this necessity stands forth as a characteristic and costly disadvantage, and one that is imminent in the principle of manufacture. Footnote. Quote. The isolation of the different stages of manufacture, consequent upon the employment of manual labor, adds immensely to the cost of production, the loss mainly arising from the mere removals from one process to another. Quote. The industry of nations, London 1855, Part 2, Page 200. End footnote. If we can find our attention to some particular lot of raw materials, of rags, for instance, in paper manufacture or of wire in needle manufacture, we perceive that it passes in succession through a series of stages in the hands of the various detail workmen until completion. On the other hand, if we look at the workshop as a whole, we see the raw material in all the stages of its production at the same time. The collective laborer with one set of his many hands armed with one kind of tools draws the wire. With another set, armed with different tools, he at the same time straightens it. With another, he cuts it. With another, points it, and so on. The different detail processes which were successive in time have become simultaneous, go on side by side in space. Hence, production of a greater quantum of finished commodities in a given time. Footnote. Quote. It, the division of labor, produces also an economy of time by separating the work into its different branches, all of which may be carried on into execution at the same moment. By carrying on all the different processes at once, which an individual must have executed separately, it becomes possible to produce a multitude of pins completely finished in the same time as a single pin might have been either cut or pointed. Quote. To Gold Stewart, page 319. And footnote. This simultaneity, it is true, is due to the general cooperative form of the process as a whole. But manufacture not only finds the conditions for cooperation ready to hand, it also, to some extent, creates them by the subdivision of handicraft labor. On the other hand, it accomplishes this social organization of the labor process only by riveting each laborer to a single fractional detail. Since the fractional product of each detail laborer is, at the same time, only a particular stage in the development of one and the same finished article, each laborer, or each group of laborers, prepares the raw material for another laborer or group. The result of the labor of the one is the starting point for the labor of the other. The one workman, therefore, gives occupation directly to the other. The labor time necessary in each partial process for attaining the desired effect is learned by experience. And the mechanism of manufacture as a whole is based on the assumption that a given result will be obtained in a given time. It is only on this assumption that the various supplementary labor processes can proceed uninterruptedly, simultaneously, and side by side. It is clear that this direct dependence of the operations and therefore of the laborers on each other compels each one of them to spend on his work no more than the necessary time, and thus a continuity, uniformity, regularity, order, and even intensity of labor of quite a different kind is begotten than is to be found in an independent handicraft or even in simple cooperation. The more variety of artists to each manufacture, the greater the order and regularity of every work. The same must needs be done in less time. The labor must be less. The advantages, etc. The rule that the labor time expended on a commodity should not exceed that which is socially necessary for its production appears in the production of commodities generally to be established by the mere effect of competition since, to express ourselves superficially, each single producer is obliged to sell his commodity at its market price. In manufacture, on the contrary, the turning out of a given quantum of product in a given time is a technical law of the process of production itself. Nevertheless, the manufacturing system in many branches of industry attains this result but very imperfectly because it knows not how to control with certainty the general chemical and physical conditions of the process of production. Different operations take, however, unequal periods and yield, therefore, in equal times unequal quantities of fractional products. If, therefore, the same laborer has, day after day, to perform the same operation, there must be a different number of laborers for each operation. For instance, in type manufacture, there are four founders and two breakers to one rubber. The founder casts two thousand type an hour. The breaker breaks up four thousand and the rubber polishes eight thousand. Here we have again the principle of cooperation in its simplest form, the simultaneous employment of many doing the same thing. Only now, this principle is the expression of an organic relation. The division of labor as carried out in manufacture not only simplifies and multiplies the qualitatively different parts of the social collective laborer, but also creates a fixed mathematical relation or ratio which regulates the quantitative extent of those parts, that is, the relative number of laborers or the relative size of the group of laborers for each detail operation. It develops, along with the qualitative subdivision of the social labor process, a quantitative rule and proportionality for that process. One once the most fitting proportion has been experimentally established in the numbers of the detail laborers in the various groups when producing on a given scale, that scale can be extended only by employing a multiple of each particular group. Footnote. When, from the peculiar nature of the produce of each manufacturer, the number of processes into which it is most advantageous to divide it is ascertained, as well as the number of individuals to be employed. Then all other manufacturers which do not employ a direct multiple of this number will produce the article at a greater cost, hence arises one of the causes of the great size of manufacturing establishments. Unquote. C. Babbage. On the Economy of Machinery. First edition, London, 1832, Chapter 21, Pages 172 to 73. And Footnote. There is this to boot, that the same individual can do certain kinds of work just as well on a large as on a small scale. For instance, the labor of superintendents, the carriage of the fractional product from one stage to the next, etc. The isolation of such functions, their allotment to a particular laborer, does not become advantageous till after an increase in the number of laborers employed. But this increase must affect every group proportionally. The isolated group of laborers to whom any particular detail function is assigned is made up of homogeneous elements and is one of the constituent parts of the total mechanism. In many manufacturers, however, the group itself is an organized body of labor, the total mechanism being a repetition or multiplication of these elementary organisms. Take for instance, the manufacture of glass bottles. It may be resolved into three essentially different stages. First, the preliminary stage, consisting of the preparation of the components of the glass, mixing the sand and lime, etc. and melting them into a fluid mass of glass. Footnote. In England, the melting furnace is distinct from the glass furnace, in which the glass is manipulated. In Belgium, one and the same furnace serves for both processes. And footnote. Various detail laborers are employed in this first stage, as also in the final one of removing the bottles from the drying furnace, sorting and packing them, etc. In the middle, between these two stages, comes the glass melting proper, the manipulation of the fluid mass. At each mouth of the furnace, there works a group called the hole, consisting of one bottle maker or finisher, one blower, one gatherer, one putter up or wetter off, and one taker in. These five detail workers are so many special organs of a single working organism that acts only as a whole, and therefore can operate only by the direct cooperation of the hole five. The whole body is paralyzed, if but one of its members be wanting. But a glass furnace has several openings, in England, from four to six, each of which contains an earthenware melting pot full of molten glass, and employs a similar five-membered group of workers. The organization of each group is based on division of labor, but the bond between the different groups is simple cooperation, which, by using in common one of the means of production, the furnace, causes it to be more economically consumed. Such a furnace, with its four to six groups, constitutes a glass house, and a glass manufacturing comprises a number of such glass houses, together with the apparatus and workmen requisite for the preparatory and final stages. Finally, just as manufacture arises in part from the combination of various handicrafts, so too it develops into a combination of various manufacturers. The larger English glass manufacturers, for instance, make their own earthenware melting pots, because on the quality of these depends, to a great extent, the success or failure of the process. The manufacture of one of the means of production is here united with that of the product. On the other hand, the manufacture of the product may be united with other manufacturers, of which that product is the raw material, or with the products of which it is itself subsequently mixed. Thus, we find the manufacture of flint glass combined with that of glass cutting and brass founding, the latter for the metal settings of various articles of glass. The various manufacturers, so combined, form more or less separate departments of a larger manufacturer, but are at the same time independent processes, each with its own division of labor. In spite of the many advantages offered by this combination of manufacturers, it never grows into a complete technical system on its own foundation. That happens only on its transformation into an industry carried on by machinery. Early in the manufacturing period, the principle of lessening the necessary labor time in the production of commodities was accepted and formulated. And the use of machines, especially for certain simple first processes that have to be conducted on a very large scale and with the application of great force, sprang up here and there. Footnote. This can be seen from W. Petty, John Bellers, Andrew Yerenton, the advantages of the East India trade, and J. van der Lent, not to mention others. And footnote. Thus, at an early period in paper manufacture, the tearing up of the rags was done by paper mills, and in metal works, the pounding of the oars was affected by stamping mills. Footnote. Towards the end of the 16th century, mortars and sieves were still used in France for pounding and washing oars. And footnote. The Roman Empire had handed down the elementary form of all machinery in the water wheel. Footnote. The whole history of the development of machinery can be traced in the history of the corn mill. The factory in English is still a quote, mill, unquote. In German technological works of the first decade of this century, the term Mühle is still found in use, not only for all machinery driven by the forces of nature, but also for all manufacturers where apparatus in the nature of machinery is applied. And footnote. The handicraft period bequeathed to us the great inventions of the compass, of gunpowder, of type printing, and of the automatic clock. But on the whole, machinery played that subordinate part which Adam Smith assigns to it in comparison with division of labor. Footnote. As will be seen in more detail in the fourth book of this work, Adam Smith has not established a single new proposition relating to the division of labor. What, however, characterizes him as the political economist par excellence of the period of manufacture is the stress he lays on division of labor. The subordinate part, which he assigns to machinery, gave occasion in the early days of modern mechanical industry to the polemic of Lauderdale and, at a later period, to that of Ure. Adam Smith also confounds differentiation in the instruments of labor in which the detail laborers themselves took an active part with the invention of machinery. In this latter, it is not the workmen but learned men, handicraftsmen and even peasants, according to Brindley, who play a part. End footnote. The sporadic use of machinery in the 17th century was of the greatest importance because it supplied the great mathematicians of that time with a practical basis and stimulant to the creation of the science of mechanics. The collective laborer, formed by the combination of detail laborers, is the machinery specially characteristic of the manufacturing period. The various operations that are performed in turns by the producer of a commodity and coalesce one with another during the progress of production lay claim to him in various ways. In one operation, he must exert more strength in another more skill in another more attention. And the same individual does not possess all these qualities in an equal degree. After manufacture has once separated, made independent, and isolated the various operations, the laborers are divided, classified and grouped according to their predominating qualities. If their natural endowments are on the one hand the foundation on which the division of labor is built up, on the other hand, the factory factor once introduced develops in them new powers that are by nature fitted only for limited and special functions. The collective laborer now possesses in an equal degree of excellence all the qualities requisite for production and expends them in the most economical manner by exclusively employing all his organs consisting of particular laborers or groups of laborers in performing their special functions. Footnote The master manufacturer by dividing the work to be executed into different processes each requiring different degrees of skill or of force can purchase exactly that precise quantity of both which is necessary for each process. Whereas if the whole work were executed by one workman that person must possess sufficient skill to perform the most difficult and sufficient strength to execute the most laborious of the operations into which the article is divided. Unquote Charles Babbage Chapter 19 End Footnote The one-sidedness and the deficiencies of the detailed laborer become perfections when he is part of the collective laborer. Footnote For instance, abnormal development of some muscles curvature of bones, etc. End Footnote The habit of doing only one thing converts him into a never-failing instrument while his connection with the whole mechanism compels him to work with the regularity of the parts of a machine. Footnote The question put by one of the inquiry commissioners how the young persons are kept steadily to their work is very correctly answered by Mr. William Marshall, the general manager of a glass manufacturer. Quote They cannot well neglect their work. When they once begin they must go on. They are just the same as parts of a machine. Unquote Children's Employment Commission Fourth Report 1865 Page 247 End Footnote Since the collective laborer has functions both simple and complex both high and low his members, the individual labor powers require different degrees of training and must therefore have different values. Manufacture therefore develops a hierarchy of labor powers to which there corresponds a scale of wages. If on the one hand the individual laborers are appropriated and annexed for life by a limited function on the other hand the various operations of the hierarchy are puzzled out among the laborers according to both their natural and their acquired capabilities. Footnote Dr. Ure in his apotheosis of modern mechanical industry brings out the peculiar character of manufacture more sharply than previous economists who had not his polemical interest in the matter and more sharply even than his contemporaries Babbage, for example who, though much as superior as a mathematician and mechanician treated mechanical industry from the standpoint of manufacture alone Ure says quote this appropriation to each a workman of appropriate value and cost was naturally assigned forms the very essence of division of labor unquote on the other hand he describes this division as quote adaptation of labor to the different talents of men unquote and lastly characterizes the whole manufacturing system as quote a system for the division or gradation of labor unquote as quote the division of labor into degrees and skills unquote et cetera Ure pages 19 to 23 pasine and footnote every process of production however requires certain simple manipulations which every man is capable of doing they too are now severed from their connection with the more pregnant moments of activity and ossified into exclusive functions of specially appointed laborers hence manufacture baguettes in every handicraft that it seizes upon a class of so-called unskilled laborers a class which handicraft industry strictly excluded if it develops a one sided speciality into a perfection at the expense of the whole of a man's working capacity it also begins to make a speciality of the absence of all development alongside of the hierarchy gradation there steps the simple separation of the laborers into skilled and unskilled for the latter the cost of apprenticeship vanishes for the former it diminishes compared with that of artificers in consequence of the functions being simplified in both cases the value of labor power falls footnote quote each handicraftsman being enabled to perfect himself by practice in one point became a cheaper workman quote ure page 19 and footnote an exception to this law holds good whenever the decomposition of the labor process begets new and comprehensive functions that either had no place at all or only a very modest one in handicrafts the fall in the value of labor power caused by the disappearance or diminution of the expenses of apprenticeship implies a direct increase of surplus value for the benefit of capital for everything that shortens the necessary labor time required for the reproduction of labor power extends the domain of surplus labor end of part four production of relative surplus value chapter 14 division of labor and manufacture section three the two fundamental forms of manufacture heterogeneous manufacture serial manufacture chapter 14 section four of capital volume one this is a LibriVox recording all LibriVox recordings are in the public domain for more information or to volunteer please visit LibriVox.org capital a critical analysis of capitalist production volume one by Karl Marx translated from the third German edition by Samuel Moore and Edward Aveling and edited by Friedrich Engels part four production of relative surplus value chapter 14 division of labor and manufacture section four division of labor in manufacture and division of labor in society we first considered the origin of manufacture then its simple elements then the detail laborer and his implements and finally the totality of the mechanism we shall now lightly touch upon the relation between the division of labor and manufacture and the social division of labor which forms the foundation of all production of commodities if we keep labor alone in view we may designate the separation of social production into its main divisions or genera namely agriculture, industries, etc. as division of labor in general and the splitting up of these families into species and subspecies as division of labor in particular and the division of labor within the workshop as division of labor in singular or in detail footnote division of labor proceeds from the separation of professions the most widely different to that division where several laborers divide between them the preparation of one and the same product as in manufacture one quote storage que d'économie politique Paris page 173 quote three main branches of national industry the second which would be special and the division of each day of industry a species the third division of industry which would be considered the real quality of the division of needs we work properly and the one which is established in the arts and industries which is established in the most part of the manufacturer and the satellite unquote starback pages 84 to 85 and footnote division of labor in a society and the corresponding tying down of individuals to a particular calling develops itself just as it does the division of labor and manufacture from opposite starting points within a family and after further development within a tribe there springs up naturally a division of labor caused by differences of sex and age a division that is consequently based on a purely physiological foundation which division enlarges its materials by the expansion of the community by the increase of population and more especially by the conflicts between different tribes and the subjugation of one tribe by another footnote note to the third edition subsequent very searching study of the primitive condition of man that the author to the conclusion that it was not the family that originally developed into the tribe but that on the contrary the tribe was the primitive and spontaneously developed form of human association on the basis of blood relationship and that out of the first incipient loosening of the tribal bonds the many and various forms of the family were afterwards developed Frederick Engels and footnote on the other hand as I have before remarked the exchange of products springs up at the points where different families, tribes, communities come in contact for in the beginning of civilization it is not private individuals but families, tribes, etc. that meet on an independent footing different communities find different means of production and different means of subsistence in their natural environment hence their modes of production and of living and their products are different it is this spontaneously developed difference which when different communities come in contact calls forth the mutual exchange of products and the consequent gradual conversion of those products into commodities exchange does not create the differences between the spheres of production but brings what are already different into relation and thus converts them into more or less interdependent branches of the collective production of an enlarged society in the latter case the social division of labor arises from the exchange between spheres of production that are originally distinct and independent of one another in the former where the physiological division of labor is the starting point the particular organs of a compact whole grow loose and break off principally owing to the exchange of commodities with foreign communities and then isolate themselves so far that the soul bonds still connecting the various kinds of work is the exchange of the products as commodities in the one case it is the making dependent what was before independent in the other case the making independent what was before dependent the foundation of every division of labor that is well developed and brought about by the exchange of commodities is the separation between town and country footnote Sir James Stewart is the economist who has handled this subject best how little his book which appeared ten years before the wealth of nations is known even at the present time may be judged from the fact that the admirers of Malthus do not even know that the first edition of the latter's work on population contains except in the purely declamatory part very little but extracts from Stewart and in a less degree from Wallace and Townsend and footnote it may be said that the whole economic history of society is summed up in the movement of this antithesis we pass it over however for the present just as a certain number of simultaneously employed laborers are the material prerequisites for the division of labor and manufacture so are the number and density of the population which here correspond to the agglomeration in one workshop but a necessary condition for the division of labor in society footnote quote there is a certain density of population which is convenient both for social intercourse and for that combination of powers by which the produce of labor is increased unquote James Mill page 50 quote as the number of laborers increases the productive power of society augments in the compound ratio of that increase multiplied by the effects of the division of labor unquote Thomas Hogskin pages 125, 126 and footnote nevertheless this density is more or less relative a relatively thinly populated country with well developed means of communication has a denser population than a more numerously populated country with badly developed means of communication and in this sense the northern states of the American Union for instance are more thickly populated than India footnote in consequence of the great demand for cotton after 1861 the production of cotton in some thickly populated districts of India was extended at the expense of rice cultivation in consequence there arose local famines the defective means of communication not permitting the failure of rice in one district to be compensated by importation from another and footnote since the production and circulation of commodities are the general prerequisites of the capitalist mode of production division of labor and manufacture demands that division of labor and society at large should previously have attained a certain degree of development inversely the former division reacts upon and develops and multiplies the latter simultaneously with the differentiation of the instruments of labor the industries that produce these instruments become more and more differentiated footnote thus the fabrication of shuttles formed as early as the 17th century a special branch of industry in Holland and footnote if the manufacturing system sees upon an industry which previously was carried on in connection with others either as a chief or as a subordinate industry and by one producer these industries immediately separate their connection and become independent if it sees upon a particular stage in the production of a commodity the other stages of its production become converted into so many independent industries it has already been stated that where the finished article consists merely of a number of parts fitted together the detail operations may re-establish themselves as genuine and separate handicrafts in order to carry out more perfectly the division of labor and manufacture a single branch of production is, according to the varieties of its raw material or the various forms that one in the same raw material may assume split up into numerous and to some extent entirely new manufacturers accordingly in France alone in the first half of the 18th century over 100 different kinds of silk stuffs were woven and in Avignon it was law that quote every apprentice should devote himself to only one sort of fabrication and should not learn the preparation of several kinds of stuff at once unquote the territorial division of labor which confines special branches of production to special districts of a country acquires fresh stimulus from the manufacturing system which exploits every special advantage footnote quote whether the woolen manufacture of England is not divided into several parts or branches appropriated to particular places where they are only or principally manufactured fine cloths in Somerseture coarse in Yorkshire long L's at Exeter soys at Sudsbury crepes at Norwich lenses at Kendall blankets at Whitney and so forth unquote Barkley the Quarist 1751 subsection 520 end footnote the colonial system and the opening out of the markets of the world both of which are included in the general conditions of existence of the manufacturing period furnish rich material for developing the division of labor in society it is not the place here to go on to show how division of labor ceases upon not only the economic but every other sphere of society and everywhere lays the foundation of that all engrossing system of specializing in sorting men that development in a man of one single faculty at the expense of all other faculties which caused A. Ferguson the master of Adam Smith to exclaim quote we make a nation of hellots and have no free citizens unquote footnote A. Ferguson history of civil society Edinburgh 1767 part 4 section 2 page 285 end footnote but in spite of the numerous analogies and links connecting them division of labor in the interior of a society and that in the interior of a workshop differ not only in degree but also in kind the analogy appears most indisputable where there is an invisible bond uniting the various branches of trade for instance the cattle breeder produces hides the Tanner makes the hides into leather and the shoemaker the leather into boots here the thing produced by each of them is but a step towards the final form which is the product of all their labor is combined there are besides all the various industries that supply the cattle breeder the Tanner and the shoemaker with the means of production now it is quite possible to imagine with Adam Smith that the difference between the above social division of labor and the division in manufacture is merely subjective exists merely for the observer who in a manufacture can see with one glance all the numerous operations being performed on one spot while in the instance given above the spreading out of the work over great areas and the great number of people employed in each branch of labor obscure the connection footnote in manufacture proper he says the division of labor appears to be greater because quote those employed in every different branch of the work can often be collected into the same workhouse and placed at once under the view of the spectator in those great manufacturers on the contrary which are destined to supply the great wants of the great body of the people every different branch of their work employs so great a number of workmen that it is impossible to collect them all into the same workhouse the division is not near so obvious unquote Adam Smith wealth of nations book one chapter one the celebrated passage in the same chapter that begins with the words quote observe the accommodation of the most common artificer or day laborer in a civilized and thriving society unquote et cetera and then proceeds to depict what an enormous number and variety of industries contribute to the satisfaction of the wants of an ordinary laborer is copied almost word for word from demand of bills remarks in his fable of the bees or private vices public benefits and footnote but what is it that forms the bond between the independent laborers of the cattle breeder the Tanner and the shoemaker it is the fact that their respective products are commodities what on the other hand characterizes division of labor in manufacturers the fact that the detail laborer produces no commodities footnote quote there is no longer anything which we can call the natural reward of individual labor each laborer produces only some part of a whole and each part having no value or utility in itself there is nothing on which the laborer can seize and say it is my product this I will keep to myself unquote labor defended against the claims of capital London 1825 page 25 the author of this admirable work is the Thomas Hodgkin I have already cited and footnote it is only the common product of all the detail laborers that becomes a commodity footnote this distinction between division of labor in society and in manufacture was practically illustrated to the Yankees one of the new taxes devised at Washington during the Civil War was the duty of 6% quote on all industrial products unquote question what is an industrial product answer the legislature a thing produced quote when it is made unquote and it is made when it is ready for sale now for one example out of many the new york and philadelphia manufacturers had previously been in the habit of quote making unquote umbrellas with all their belongings but since an umbrella is a mixtem compositum of very heterogeneous parts by degrees these parts became the products of various separate industries carried on independently in different places they entered as separate commodities into the umbrella manufacturing where they were fitted together the Yankees have given to articles thus fitted together the name of quote assembled articles unquote a name they deserve for being an assemblage of taxes thus the umbrella quote assembles unquote first 6% on the price of each of its elements and a further 6% on its own total price and footnote division of labor in society is brought about by the purchase and sale of the products of different branches of industry while the connection between the detail operations in a workshop is due to the sale of the labor power of several workmen to one capitalist who applies it as combined labor power division of labor in the workshop implies concentration of the means of production in the hands of one capitalist the division of labor in society implies their dispersion among many independent producers of commodities while within the workshop the iron law of proportionality subjects definite numbers of workmen to definite functions in society outside the workshop chance and caprice have full play in distributing the producers and their means of production among the various branches of industry the different spheres of production it is true constantly tend to an equilibrium for on the one hand while each producer of a commodity is bound to produce a use value to satisfy a particular social want and while the extent of these wants differs quantitatively there will exist an inner relation which settles their proportions into a regular system and that system one of spontaneous growth and on the other hand the law of the value of commodities ultimately determines how much of its disposable working time society can expend on each particular class of commodities but this constant tendency to equilibrium of the various spheres of production is exercised only in the shape of a reaction against the constant upsetting of this equilibrium the a priori system on which the division of labor within the workshop is regularly carried out becomes in the division of labor within the society an up posteriori nature imposed necessity controlling the lawless caprice of the producers and perceptible in the barometrical fluctuations of the market prices division of labor within the workshop implies the undisputed authority of the capitalist over men that are but parts of a mechanism that belongs to him the division of labor within the society brings into contact independent commodity producers who acknowledge no other authority but that of competition of the coercion exerted by the pressure of their mutual interests just as in the animal kingdom the bellum omnium contra omnis more or less preserves the conditions of existence of every species the same bourgeois mind which praises division of labor in the workshop lifelong annexation of the laborer to a partial operation and his complete subjugation to capital as being an organization of labor that increases its productiveness that same bourgeois mind denounces with equal vigor every conscious attempt to socially control and regulate the process of production as an inroad upon such sacred things as the rights of property freedom and unrestricted play for the bent of the individual capitalist it is very characteristic that the enthusiastic apologists of the factory system have nothing more damning to urge against a general organization of the labor of society than that it would turn all society into one immense factory if in a society with capitalist production anarchy in the social division of labor and despotism in that of the workshop are mutual conditions the one of the other we find on the contrary in those earlier forms of society in which the separation of trades has been spontaneously developed then crystallized and finally made permanent by law on the one hand a specimen of the organization of labor in society in accordance with an approved and authoritative plan and on the other the entire exclusion of division of labor in the workshop or at all events a mere dwarf like or sporadic and accidental development of the same footnote quote par rapport à la division du travail sont et raison inverse l'une de l'autre unquote Karl Marx, Miseret, etc. Pages 130 to 131 end footnote those small and extremely ancient Indian communities some of which have continued down to this day are based on possession in common of the land on the blending of agriculture and handicrafts and on an unalterable division of labor which serves whenever a new community is started as a plan and scheme ready cut and dried occupying areas from 100 up to several thousand acres each forms a compact whole producing all it requires the chief part of the products is destined for direct use by the community itself and does not take the form of a commodity hence production here is independent of that division of labor brought about in Indian society as a whole by means of the exchange of commodities it is the surplus alone that becomes a commodity and a portion of even that not until it has reached the hands of the state into whose hands from time immemorial a certain quantity of these products has found its way in the shape of rent in kind the constitution of these communities varies in different parts of India in those of the simplest form the land is tilled in common and the produce divided among the members at the same time spinning and weaving are carried on in each family as subsidiary industries side by side with the masses thus occupied with one in the same work we find the chief inhabitant who is judge police and tax gatherer in one the bookkeeper who keeps the accounts of the tillage and registers everything relating there to another official who prosecutes criminals protects strangers traveling through and escorts them to the next village the boundary man who guards the boundaries against neighboring communities the water overseer who distributes the water from the common tanks for irrigation the brahmin who conducts the religious services the school master who on the sand teaches the children reading and writing the calendar brahmin or astrologer who makes known the lucky or unlucky days for seed time and harvest and for every other kind of agricultural work a smith and a carpenter who make and repair all the agricultural implements the potter who makes all the pottery of the village the barber the washerman who washes clothes the silver smith here and there the poet when some communities replaces the silver smith in others the school master this dozen of individuals is maintained at the expense of the whole community if the population increases a new community is founded on the pattern of the old one on unoccupied land the whole mechanism discloses a systematic division of labor but a division like that in manufacturers is impossible since the smith and the carpenter etc. find an unchanging market and at the most there occur according to the sizes of the villages two or three of each instead of one footnote Lieutenant Colonel Mark Wilkes historical sketches of the south of India London 1810 to 17 volume 1 pages 118 to 20 a good description of the various forms of the Indian communities is to be found in George Campbell's Modern India London 1852 and footnote the law that regulates the division of labor and the community acts with the irresistible authority of a law of nature at the same time that each individual artificer the smith the carpenter and so on conducts in his workshop all the operations of his handicraft in the traditional way but independently and without recognizing any authority over him the simplicity of the organization for production in these self-sufficing communities that constantly reproduce themselves in the same form and when accidentally destroyed spring up again on the spot and with the same name the simplicity supplies the key to the secret of the unchangeableness of Asiatic societies and unchangeableness in such striking contrast with the constant dissolution and refounding of Asiatic states and the never ceasing changes of dynasty footnote quote under this simple form the inhabitants of the country have lived from time immemorial the boundaries of the villages have been but seldom altered and though the villages themselves have been sometimes injured and even desolated by war, famine and disease the same name, the same limits, the same interests and even the same families have continued for ages the inhabitants give themselves no trouble about breaking up and division of kingdoms while the village remains entire they care not to what power it is transferred or to what sovereign it devolves its internal economy remains unchanged quote Thomas Stamford Raffles, late lieutenant governor of Java the history of Java, London, 1817, volume 1, page 285 and footnote the structure of the economic elements of society remains untouched by the storm clouds of the political sky the rules of the guilds, as I have said before by limiting most strictly the number of apprentices and journeymen that a single master could employ prevented him from becoming a capitalist moreover, he could not employ his journeymen in many other handicrafts than the one in which he was a master the guilds zealously repelled every encroachment by the capital of merchants the only form of free capital with which they came in contact a merchant could buy every kind of commodity but labor as a commodity he could not buy he existed only on sufferance as a dealer in the products of the handicrafts if circumstances called for a further division of labor the existing guilds split themselves up into varieties or founded new guilds by the side of the old ones all this however they weren't concentrating various handicrafts in a single workshop hence the guild organization however much it may have contributed by separating, isolating and perfecting the handicrafts to create the material conditions for the existence of manufacture excluded division of labor in the workshop on the whole, the laborer and his means of production remained closely united like the snail with its shell thus there was wanting the principal basis of manufacture the separation of the laborer from his means of production and the conversion of these means into capital while division of labor in society at large whether such division be brought about or not by exchange of commodities is common to economic formations of society the most diverse division of labor in the workshop as practiced by manufacture is a special creation of the capitalist mode of production alone end of part 4 chapter 14 section 4 chapter 14 section 5 of capital volume 1 this is a LibriVox recording all LibriVox recordings are in the public domain for more information or to volunteer please visit LibriVox.org a critical analysis of capitalist production volume 1 by Karl Marx translated from the 3rd German edition by Samuel Moore and Edward Eveling and edited by Frederick Engels part 4 chapter 14 division of labor and manufacture section 5 the capitalistic character of manufacture an increased number of laborers under the control of one capitalist is the natural starting point as well of cooperation generally as of manufacture in particular but the division of labor and manufacture makes this increase in number of workmen a technical necessity the minimum number that any given capitalist is bound to employ is here prescribed by the previously established division of labor on the one hand the advantages of further division are obtainable only by adding to the number of workmen and this can be done only by adding multiples of the various detail groups but an increase in the variable component of the capital employed necessitates an increase in its constant component too in the workshops, implements, etc. and in particular in the raw material the call for which grows quicker than the number of workmen the quantity of it consumed in a given time by a given amount of labor increases in the same ratio as does the productive power of that labor in consequence of its division hence it is a law based on the very nature of manufacture that the minimum amount of capital which is bound to be in the hands of each capitalist must keep increasing in other words that the transformation into capital of the social means of production and subsistence must keep extending footnote 39 quote it is not sufficient that the capital end quote perenn the writer should have said the necessary means of subsistence and of production close perenn quote required for the subdivision of handicrafts should be in readiness in the society it must also be accumulated in the hands of the employers in sufficiently large quantities to enable them to conduct their operations on a large scale the more the division increases the more does the constant employment of a given number of laborers require a greater outlay of capital in tools, raw materials, etc. Storch, Cour d'économie politique Paris edition volume 1 pages 250 to 251 quote la concentration des instruments de production et la division du travail sont aussi inséparables l'une de l'autre que le sont dans la régime politique la concentration des pouvoirs publics et la division des intérêts privés end quote the concentration of the instruments of production and the division of labor are as inseparable one from the other as are in the political sphere the concentration of public powers and the division of private interests Karl Marx location cited page 134 end of footnote 39 in manufacture as well as in simple cooperation the collective working organism is a form of existence of capital the mechanism that is made up of numerous individual detail laborers belongs to the capitalist hence the productive power resulting from a combination of laborers appears to be the productive power of capital manufacture proper not only subjects the previously independent workmen to the discipline and command of capital but in addition creates a hierarchy gradation of the workmen themselves while simple cooperation leaves the motive working by the individual for the most part unchanged manufacture thoroughly revolutionizes it and seizes labor power by its very roots it converts the laborer into a crippled monstrosity by forcing his detailed dexterity at the expense of a world of productive capabilities and instincts just as in the states of La Plata put your whole beast for the sake of his hide or his tallow not only is the detail work distributed to the different individuals but the individual himself is made the automatic motor of a fractional operation and the absurd fable of Meninius Agrippa which makes man a mere fragment of his own body becomes realized footnote 40 Dougal Stewart calls manufacturing laborers quote living automatons employed in the details of the work end of quote location site at page 318 and the footnote 40 footnote 41 in corals each individual is in fact the stomach of the whole group but it supplies the group with nourishment instead of like the Roman patrician withdrawing it and the footnote 41 if at first the workmen sells his labor power to capital because the material means of producing a commodity fail him now his very labor power refuses its services unless it has been sold to capital its functions can be exercised only in an environment that exists in the workshop of the capitalist after the sale by nature unfitted to make anything independently the manufacturing laborer develops productive activity as a mere appendage of the capitalist's workshop footnote 42 quote the worker who carries in his arms all a job can go everywhere exercising his industry and find ways to subsist the other, the manufacturing laborer only an accessory that separates his brothers from the most unique capacity or independence and which is forced to accept the law that we judge appropriately about imposing on him end of quote the worker who is the master of a whole craft can work and find the means of subsistence anywhere the other, the manufacturing laborer is only an appendage who, when he is separated from his fellows possesses neither capability nor independence and finds himself forced to accept any law it is thought fit to impose Storch, location cited, Petersburg edition 1815 volume 1, page 204 end of footnote 42 as the chosen people bore in their features the signed manual of Jehovah so division of labor brands the manufacturing workmen as the property of capital the knowledge, the judgment and the will which though in ever so small a degree are practiced by the independent peasant or handicraftsmen in the same way as the savage makes the whole art of war consistent the exercise of his personal cunning these faculties are now required only for the workshop as a whole intelligence and production expands in one direction because it vanishes in many others what is lost by the detailed laborers is concentrated in the capital that employs them footnote 43 a Ferguson location cited page 281 the former may have gained what the other has lost end of quote and the footnote 43 it is a result of the division of labor and manufacturers that the laborers brought face to face with the intellectual potencies of the material process of production as the property of another and as a ruling power this separation begins in simple cooperation where the capitalist represents to the single workman the oneness and the will of the associated labor it is developed in manufacture which cuts down the laborer into a detailed laborer it is completed in modern industry which makes science a productive force distinct from labor and presses it into the service of capital footnote 44 quote the man of knowledge and the productive laborer come to be widely divided from each other and knowledge instead of remaining the hand made of labor in the hand of the laborer to increase his productive powers has almost everywhere arrayed itself against labor systematically deluding and leading them, the laborers astray in order to render their muscular powers entirely mechanical and obedient end of quote W. Thompson an inquiry into the principles of the distribution of wealth London 1824 page 274 end of footnote 44 in manufacture in order to make the collective laborer and through him capital rich in social productive power each laborer must be made poor in individual productive powers quote ignorance is a mother of industry as well as of superstition reflection and fancy are subject to error but a habit of moving the hand of the foot is independent of either manufacturers accordingly prosper most where the mind is least consulted and where the workshop may be considered as an engine the parts of which are men end of quote footnote 45 a Ferguson location cited page 280 end of footnote 45 as a matter of fact some few manufacturers in the middle of the 18th century preferred for certain operations that were trade secrets to employ half idiotic persons footnote 46 JD Tuckett history of the past and present state of the laboring population London 1846 end of footnote 46 quote the understandings of the greater part of men says Adam Smith are necessarily formed by their ordinary employments the man whose whole life is spent in performing a few simple operations has no occasion to exert his understanding he generally becomes as stupid and ignorant as it is possible for a human creature to become end of quote after describing the stupidity of the detail laborer he goes on quote the uniformity of his stationary life naturally corrupts the courage of his mind it corrupts even the activity of his body and renders him incapable of exerting his strength with vigor and perseverance in any other employments than that to which he has been bred his dexterity at his own particular trade seems in this manner to be acquired at the expense of his intellectual, social and martial virtues but in every improved and civilized society this is the state into which the laboring poor that is the great body of the people must necessarily fall end of quote footnote 47 Adam Smith wealth of nations book 5 chapter 1 article 2 being a pupil of A. Ferguson who showed the disadvantageous effects of division of labor Adam Smith was perfectly clear on this point in the introduction to his work where he ex-professor praises division of labor he indicates only in a cursory manner that it is the source of social inequalities it is not till the fifth book on the revenue of the state that he reproduces Ferguson in my misère de la philosophie I have sufficiently explained the historical connection between Ferguson, A. Smith, Lamonté and Sey as regards their criticisms of division of labor and have shown for the first time that division of labor as practiced in manufacturers is a specific form of the capitalist mode of production end of footnote 47 for preventing the complete deterioration of the great mass of the people by division of labor A. Smith recommends education of the people by the state but prudently and in homeopathic doses G. Garnier his French translator and commentator who under the first French empire quite naturally developed into a senator quite as naturally opposes him on this point education of the masses he urges violates the first law of the division of labor and with it quote our whole social system would be proscribed like all other division of labor he says that between hand labor and head labor is more pronounced and decided in proportion as society he rightly uses this word for capital landed property in their state becomes richer end of quote footnote 48 Ferguson had already said location side of page 281 quote and thinking itself in this age of separations may become a peculiar craft end of quote end of footnote 48 quote this division of labor like every other is an effect of past and a cause of future progress ought the government then to work in opposition to this division of labor and to hinder its natural course ought it to expend the part of the public money in the attempt to confound and blend together two classes of labor which are striving after division and separation end of quote footnote 49 G. Garnier, volume 5 of his translation of Adam Smith pages 4 and 5 end of footnote 49 some crippling of body and mind is inseparable even from division of labor and society as a whole since however manufacture carries this social separation of branches of labor much further and also by its peculiar division a taxi individual at the very roots of his life it is the first to afford the materials for and to give a start to industrial pathology footnote 50 Ramacini, professor of practical medicine at Padua published in 1713 his work The Morbis Artificum which was translated into French 1781 reprinted 1841 in the encyclopédie de la science médical, 7e dix auteur classique the period of modern mechanical industry has of course very much enlarged his catalogue of labor's diseases si hygiène physique et moral de l'ouvrier dans les grandes villes en général et dans la ville de Lyon en particulier par le docteur Isle-Fonterais Paris 1858 and die Krankheiten welche verschiedenen stenden altern und geschlechtern eigentümlich sind six volumes Ulm 1860 and others in 1854 the Society of Arts appointed a commission of inquiry into industrial pathology the list of documents collected by this commission is to be seen in the catalogue of the Twickenham Economic Museum very important are the official reports on public health see also Edward Reich, MD über die Entartung des Menschen erlang in 1868 in the footnote 50 quote to subdivide a man is to execute him if he deserves the sentence to assassinate him if he does not the subdivision of labor is the assassination of a people and the quote footnote 51 the Urquhart familiar words London 1855 page 119 Hegel held very heretical views on division of labor in his right philosophy he says quote by well educated men we understand in the first instance those who can do everything that others do end of quote end of footnote 51 cooperation based on division of labor in other words manufacture commences as a spontaneous formation so soon as it attains some consistency and extension it becomes a recognized methodical and systematic form of capitalist production history shows how the division of labor peculiar to manufacture strictly so-called acquires the best adapted form at first by experience as it were behind the backs of the actors and then like the guild handicrafts strives to hold fast to that form when once found and here and there succeeds in keeping it for centuries any alteration in this form except in trivial matters is solely owing to a revolution in the instruments of labor and the structure wherever it arises I do not here allude to modern industry based on machinery either finds the disject a member a poi tai ready to hand and only waiting to be collected together as is the case in the manufacture of clothes and large towns or it can easily apply the principle of division simply by exclusively assigning the various operations of handicrafts such as book binding to particular men in such cases a weeks experience determine the proportion between the numbers of the hands necessary for the various functions footnote 52 the simple belief in the inventive genius exercised a priori by the individual capitalist in division of labor exists nowadays only among German professors of the stamp of her Russia who to recompense the capitalist from whose jovian head division of labor sprang ready formed dedicates to him quote and the quote diverse the more or less extensive application of division of labor depends on length of purse not on greatness of genius and the footnote 52 by decomposition of handicrafts by specialization of the instruments of labor by the formation of detail laborers and by grouping and combining the latter into a single mechanism division of labor in manufacture creates a qualitative gradation and a quantitative proportion in the social process of production it consequently creates a definite organization of the labor of society and thereby develops at the same time new productive forces in the society in a specific capitalist form and under the given conditions it could take no other form than a capitalistic one manufacturer is but a particular method of beginning relative surplus value or augmenting at the expense of the labor or the self expansion of capital usually called social wealth conditions end quote etc it increases the social productive power of labor not only for the benefit of the capitalist instead of for that of the laborer but it does this by crippling the individual laborers it creates new conditions for the lordship of capital over labor if therefore on the one hand it presents itself historically as a progress and as a necessary phase in the economic development of society on the other hand it is a refined and civilized method of exploitation political economy which as an independent science first sprang into being during the period of manufacture views the social division of labor only from the standpoint of manufacture and sees in it only the means of producing more commodities with a given quantity of labor and consequently of cheapening commodities and hurrying on the accumulation of capital footnote 53 the older writers like petty and the anonymous author of advantages of the East India trade bring out the capitalist character of division of labor as applied in manufacture more than Adam Smith does and the fit note 53 in most striking contrast with this accentuation of quantity and exchange value is the attitude of the writers of classical antiquity will hold exclusively by quality and use value footnote 54 amongst the moderns may be excerpted a few writers of the 18th century like Becariah and James Harris who with regard to division of labor almost entirely follow the ancient thus Becariah quote quote quote quote quote quote quote quote quote quote quote quote quote quote quote quote quote quote quote quote quote quote quote quote to their own advantage and to that of the commodity. Cesare Beccaria, Elemente di Economia Pubblica, Edizione Custodia, Parte Moderna, volume 11, page 29. James Harris, afterward Earl of Momsbury, celebrated for the diaries of his embassy at St. Petersburg, says in a note to his dialogue concerning happiness, London 1741, reprinted afterwards in three treatises Third Edition London 1772, quote, the whole argument to prove society natural, i.e. by division of employments, is taken from the second book of Plato's Republic, end of quote, end of footnote 54. In consequence of the separation of the social branches of production, commodities are better made, the various bents and talents of men select a suitable field, and without some restraint, certain results can be obtained anywhere. Footnote 55. Thus in the Odyssey, 14 to 28, allos gar taloi sin aner epiterpitae ergois. For different men take joy in different works, and archilicus and sexis empiricus, allos allo epe ergo cardin i ainetai. Men differ as to things cheer their hearts. End of footnote 55. Footnote 56. Poil epistato ergo c'axos epistato banta. He could do many works, but all of them badly, homer. Every Athenian considered himself superior as a producer of commodities to a Spartan. For the latter in time of war had meant enough at his disposal, but could not command money, as Thucydides makes pericles say in the speech inciting the Athenians to the Peloponnesian war. Samasi te etoi motoroi oi auton ergoi ton anthropon i cremasi polemaine. People producing for their own consumption will rather let war have their bodies and their money. Thucydides I, I, C-41. Nevertheless, even with regard to material production, autarkia or self-sufficiency, as opposed to division of labor, remain their ideal. Paron gar tooi partuton cai to autares. For with the latter there is well-being, but with the former there is independence. It should be mentioned here that at the date of the fall of the Thirty Tyrants there were still not 5,000 Athenians without landed property. End of footnote 56. Hence both product and producer are improved by division of labor. If the growth of the quantity produced is occasionally mentioned, this is only done with reference to the greater abundance of use-values. There is not a word alluding to exchange-value or to the cheapening of commodities. This aspect from the standpoint of use-value alone is taken as well by Plato, who treats division of labor as a foundation on which the division of society and the classes is based, as by Xenophon, who with characteristic bourgeois instinct approaches more nearly to division of labor within the workshop. Footnote 57. Also division of labor within the community is a development from the multifarious requirements and the limited capacities of individuals. The main point with him is that the laborer must adapt himself to the work, not the work to the laborer, which latter is unavoidable if he carries on several trades at once, thus making one or the other of them subordinate. Part ten. For the workman must wait upon the work. It will not wait upon his leisure not wait upon his leisure and allow itself to be done in a spare moment. Yes, he must. So the conclusion is that more will be produced of everything, and the work will be more easily and better done, when every man is set free from all other occupations to do at the right time the one thing for which he is naturally fitted. Republic 1-2, Edition Bader, Aurelian Company. So, in Thucydides' location cited, C-142, C-faring is an art like any other, and cannot, as circumstances require, be carried on as a subsidiary occupation. Nay, other subsidiary occupations cannot be carried on alongside of this one. If the work says Plato has to wait for the laborer, the critical point in the process is missed and the article is spoiled. Ergau Chiron diolutai. If someone lets slip. The same platonic ideas found recurring in the protest of the English bleachers against the clause in the factory act that provides fixed mealtimes for all operatives. Their business cannot wait the convenience of the workmen for, quote, in the various operations of singeing, washing, bleaching, mangling, calendaring, and dying, none of them can be stopped at a given moment without risk of damage. To enforce the same dinner hour for all the work people might occasionally subject valuable goods to the risk of danger by incomplete operations, end of, quote, le platonisme où va-t-il se nicher, where will Platonism be found next, end of, footnote 57. Footnote 58. Xenophon says, it is not only an honor to receive food from the table of the king of Persia, but such food is much more tasty than other food, quote. And there is nothing wonderful in this, for as the other arts are brought to special perfection in the great towns, so the royal food is prepared in a special way. For in the small towns the same man makes bedsteads, doors, plows, and tables, often too he builds houses into the bargain, and is quite content if he finds custom sufficient for his sustenance. It is altogether impossible for a man who does so many things to do them all well. But in the great towns where each can find many buyers, one trade is sufficient to maintain the man who carries it on. Nay, there is often not even need of one complete trade, but one man makes shoes for men and other for women. Here and there one man gets a living by sewing, another by cutting out shoes. One does nothing but cut out clothes, another nothing but sew the pieces together. It follows necessarily then that he who does the simplest kind of work undoubtedly does it better than anyone else, so it is with the art of cooking, end of, quote. Xenophon Syrup 1, 8, C2. Xenophon here lays stress exclusively upon the excellence to be attained in use value, although he well knows that the gradations of the division of labor depend on the extent of the market. End of footnote 58. Plato's Republic, in so far as division of labor is treated in it as the formative principle of the state, is merely the Athenian idealization of the Egyptian system of castes, Egypt having served as the model of an industrial country to many of his contemporaries also, amongst others to isocrates, and it continued to have this importance to the Greeks of the Roman Empire. Footnote 59. He, Bucyrus, divided them all into special castes, commanded that the same individuals should always carry on the same trade, for he knew that they who change their occupations become skilled in none, but that those who constantly stick to one occupation bring it to the highest perfection. In truth we shall also find that in relation to the arts and handicrafts they have outstripped their rivals more than a master does a bungler, and the contrivances from maintaining the monarchy and the other institutions of their state are so admirable that the most celebrated philosophers who treat of the subject praise the constitution of the Egyptian state above all others. Isocrates, Bucyrus, chapter 8. End of Footnote 59. Footnote 60. See, Diodorus Seculus. End of Footnote 60. During the manufacturing period proper, i.e. the period during which manufacture is the predominant form taken by capitalist production, many obstacles are opposed to the full development of the purely tendencies of manufacture. Although manufacture creates as we have already seen a simple separation of the laborers into skilled and unskilled simultaneously with their hierarchical arrangement in classes, yet the number of the unskilled laborers owing to the preponderating influence of the skilled remains very limited. Although it adapts the detailed operations to the various degrees of maturity, strength and development of the living instruments of labor, thus conducing to exploitation of women and children, yet this tendency as a whole is wrecked on the habits and the resistance of the male laborers. Although the splitting up of handicrafts lowers the cost of forming the workmen and thereby lowers his value, yet for the more difficult detailed work a longer apprenticeship is necessary and even where it would be superfluous is jealously insisted upon by the workmen. In England, for instance, we find the laws of apprenticeship with their seven years probation in full force down to the end of the manufacturing period, and they are not thrown on one side till the advent of modern industry. Since handicraft skill is the foundation of manufacture, and since the mechanism of manufacture as a whole possesses no framework apart from the laborers themselves, capital is constantly compelled to wrestle with the insubordination of the workmen. Quote, by the infirmity of human nature, end quote, says friend Eure, quote, it happens that the more skillful the workmen, the more self-willed and intractable he is apt to become, and of course the less fit a component of a mechanical system in which he may do great damage to the whole. End of quote. Footnote 61, Eure, location cited page 20, end of footnote 61. Hence throughout the whole manufacturing period, there runs the complaint of want of discipline among the workmen. Footnote 62, this is more the case in England than in France, and more in France than in Holland. End of footnote 62. And had we not the testimony of contemporary writers, the simple fact that during the period between the 16th century in the epoch of modern industry, capital failed to become the master of the whole disposable working time of the manufacturing laborers, that manufacturers are short-lived and change their locality from one country to another with the emigrating or immigrating workmen, these facts would speak volumes. Quote, order must in one way or another be established, end of quote, exclaims in 1770, the oft cited author of the essay on trade and commerce. Order re-echoes Dr. Andrew Eure 66 years later, order was wanting in manufacture based on quote, the scholastic dogma of division of labor, end of quote, and quote, Arkwright created order, end of quote. At the same time, manufacturer was unable either to seize upon the production of society to its full extent, or to revolutionize that production to its very core. It towered up as an economic work of art on the broad foundation of the town handicrafts and of the rural domestic industries. At a given stage in its development, the narrow technical basis on which manufacturer rested came into conflict with requirements of production that were created by manufacturer itself. One of its most finished creations was the workshop for the production of the instruments of labor themselves, including especially the complicated mechanical apparatus then already employed. A machine factory says your quote, displayed the division of labor in manifold gradations, the file, the drill, the lathe, having each its different workmen in the order of skill, end of quote, page 21. This workshop, the product of the division of labor and manufacture produced in its term machines. It is they that sweep away the handicraftsman's work as the regulating principle of social production. Thus, on the one hand, the technical reason for the lifelong annexation of the workmen to a detail function is removed. On the other hand, the fetters that the same principle laid on the dominion of capital fall away. End of part four, chapter 14, section five.