Download or read book The Fable of the Bees written by Bernard Mandeville and published by Penguin UK. This book was released on 2007-04-26 with total page 431 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: A physician with a particular interest in psychological disorders and satirist, Mandeville published versions of his notorious Fable of the Bees from 1714 to 1732. Each was a defence and elaboration of his short satirical poem The Angry Hive, 1705. The version of the Fable of 1723 and 1732 are the fullest defences of his early paradox that social benefit is the unintended consequence of personal vice. It is an argument that is generally held to lie behind Adam Smith's doctrine of the 'hidden hand' of economic development.