Editing Division of labour (section)

=== Augustine of Hippo ===
A simile used by [[Augustine of Hippo]] shows that the division of labour was practised and understood in late Imperial Rome. In a brief passage of his ''[[The City of God]]'', Augustine seems to be aware of the role of different social layers in the production of goods, like household ([[Pater familias#Roman familia|''familiae'']]), corporations (''collegia'') and the state.<ref>{{Cite book |last=Burns |first=Anthony |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=7sb2DwAAQBAJ&dq=augustine+Hippo+%22division+of+labour%22&pg=PA127 |title=Social Institutions and the Politics of Recognition: From the Ancient Greeks to the Reformation |date=2020-07-16 |publisher=Rowman & Littlefield |isbn=978-1-78348-880-3 |pages=127 |language=en}}</ref>

{{blockquote|…like workmen in the street of the silversmiths, where one vessel, in order that it may go out perfect, passes through the hands of many, when it might have been finished by one perfect workman.  But the only reason why the combined skill of many workmen was thought necessary, was, that it is better that each part of an art should be learned by a special workman, which can be done speedily and easily, than that they should all be compelled to be perfect in one art throughout all its parts, which they could only attain slowly and with difficulty.|title=''The City of God'' (tr. [[Marcus Dods (theologian born 1834)|Marcus Dods]])|source=[https://en.wikisource.org/wiki/Nicene_and_Post-Nicene_Fathers:_Series_I/Volume_II/City_of_God/Book_VII/Chapter_4 VII.4]}}