164 ON THE DISTINCTION 
of commodities. It is evidently used in a col- 
lective sense ; it is a term expressive of aggre- 
gation, if not of plenty. The adjective rich 
is never applied but to denote the possession of 
abundance, or the means of commanding it, 
and it may be doubted whether the sub- 
stantive riches is ever used without an im- 
plication of the same idea. If it were merely 
a general expression for commodities, without 
any accessory idea, it might be discarded from 
our speculations, and the latter word substituted 
in its stead. But such an experiment would 
not answer. We could not with any propriety 
change the title of Adam Smith’s great work 
into “ An Inquiry into the Nature and Causes 
of the Commodities of Nations.” We should 
approximate more nearly to the meaning of the 
original, were we to translate it, “ An Inquiry 
into the Nature and Causes of the greater or 
smaller abundance of Commodities possessed 
by Nations.” 
Whether the idea of abundance, however, 
is involved in the meaning of riches or not,