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Smith (ADAM a Scotch political)

ADAM, a Scotch political economist; born in Kirkcaldy, Fifeshire, Scotland, June 5, 1723. He studied at Oxford, and was appointed Professor of Moral Philosophy at Glasgow University in 1752. Toward the close of 1763 he accepted an invitation to travel with the Duke of Buccleuch, and having resigned his chair, made a long tour in France becoming acquainted at Paris with some of the most eminent philosophers and economists. Returning in 1766, he spent the next 10 years in retirement at Kirkcaldy, engaged in the composition of his great work, the "Inquiry into the Nature and Causes of the Wealth of Nations' (1776). It has a high rank among the successful books of the world. Its main principle is that labor, not money or land SMITH is the real source of wealth. The means of making labor most fruitful, the division sion of labor, what wealth consists in, the of legislative interference with industry and commerce, the necessity of freedom of trade, are admirably discussed and expounded. The book may be regarded as the basis of modern political economy.

In 1778 Smith settled in Edinburgh, where he had the appointment of a commissioner of customs for Scotland.

He was the friend of David Hume, of whose last days and death he wrote an account, with a warm panegyric on his character, which was published with autobiography. He was also author of a "Theory of thor of a "Theory of Moral Sentiments" (1759). Smith was chosen lord-rector of the University of Glasgow in 1787. He died in Edinburgh, July 17, 1790.