Adam Smith

EARLY LIFE 

Adam Smith was born in Kirkcaldy, in the County of Fife, Scotland on June 16, 1723.

His father, also Adam Smith, was a Scottish Writer to the Signet (senior solicitor), advocate and prosecutor (Judge Advocate) who also served as comptroller of the Customs in Kirkcaldy.

Adam's mother was Margaret Douglas, daughter of the landed Robert Douglas of Strathendry.

Adam's father died two months after he was born, leaving his mother a widow.

At around the age of 4, Adam was kidnapped by a band of gypsies, but he was quickly rescued by his uncle and returned to his mother. Smith's biographer, John Rae, commented wryly that he feared Smith would have made "a poor gypsy."

Adam attended the Burgh School of Kirkcaldy from 1729 to 1737, where he learned Latin, mathematics, history, and writing.

Adam Smith. The Muir portrait

He entered the University of Glasgow at the age of fourteen and studied moral philosophy under "the never-to-be-forgotten" (as Smith called him) Francis Hutcheson. It was at Glasgow that Adam developed his passion for liberty, reason and free speech.

In 1740, Adam won an exhibition to Balliol College of the University of Oxford, where he took the opportunity to teach himself several subjects by reading many books from the shelves of the large Bodleian Library.  He also translated several famous French books.

His time at Oxford was not a happy one. Adam found the teaching there to be intellectually stifling and he left the University in 1746, before his scholarship ended.

CAREER

 In 1751 Smith was appointed professor on logic at the University of Glasgow, transferring in 1752 to the chair of moral philosophy. His lectures covered the fields of ethics, rhetoric, jurisprudence, political economy, and "police and revenue." His forceful argumentative style of lecturing made him popular with students.

At the end of 1763, Smith resigned from his professorship after he obtained an offer from Charles Townshend to tutor his stepson, Henry Scott, the young Duke of Buccleuch.

He was paid £300 per year (plus expenses) along with a £300 per year pension; roughly twice his former income as a teacher. The two and half years Smith spent as tutor to the Duke of Buccleuch set him up financially.

Smith's tutoring job entailed touring Europe with Scott, which gave him the opportunity to meet other intellectual leaders of his day. The highlight was the meeting with leading French thinkers in Paris.

In 1766, the duke's younger brother died in Paris, and Smith's tour as a tutor ended shortly thereafter.
Smith returned home in 1766 to Kirkcaldy, where he concentrated on writing including his magnum opus Wealth of Nations.

In 1778, Smith was appointed to the well paid post of commissioner of customs in Scotland.

From 1787 to 1789 Smith occupied the honorary position of Lord Rector of the University of Glasgow.

WORKS

Smith published his first great work, The Theory of Moral Sentiments, in 1759. The book explains how human morality depends on empathy between agent and spectator, or the individual and other members of society. For Smith, empathy was like "putting yourself in someone else's shoes". The work was well received.

Smith's Wealth of Nations was first published on March 9, 1776. The work, which took him ten years to write, heralded the birth of modern economics with its avocation of free trade (or Laissez Faire) rather than duties on imports.

The Wealth of Nations was an instant success, selling out its first edition in only six months.

Smith's writing style were often satirized by Tory writers in the moralizing tradition of William Hogarth and Jonathan Swift.

BELIEFS 

Adam Smith advocated the necessity of individual enterprise rather than the old fashioned mercantile system. He theorized economies are built on individual self-interest and the state shouldn't interfere. Countries should concentrate on making goods they were best at and import those other countries could make more cheaply. He was the greatest exponent of free enterprise economics until Friedman.

Smith wrote in Wealth of Nations that slavery was uneconomical because the plantation system was a wasteful use of land and slaves cost more to maintain than free laborers.

Adam Smith was a liberal minded Protestant, suspicious of evangelical Christianity. He wrote in Wealth of Nations. "Science is the great antidote to the poison of enthusiasm and superstition."

Smith famously asked, “What can be added to the happiness of a man who is in health, out of debt, and has a clean conscience?”

APPEARANCE AND CHARACTER 

Smith was not a looker. He was described as someone who "had a large nose, bulging eyes, a protruding lower lip, a nervous twitch, and a speech impediment". He is said to have acknowledged his unattractive looks at one point, saying, "I am a beau in nothing but my books."

Portrait of Smith by John Kay, 1790

Smith devoted a considerable part of his income to numerous secret acts of charity.

Adam Smith was notoriously absent-minded. On one occasion falling into discourse with a certain Mr Damer during breakfast, Smith took a piece of bread and butter, and after rolling it round and round put in into the teapot and poured the water to brew it. Shortly after he poured out a cup, and on tasting it declared it was the worst tea he had ever met with.

LAST YEARS AND DEATH 

Adam Smith never married. He spent his last years living with his mother and after she passed away his cousin Miss Jane Douglas at Panmure House, Cannongate, Edinburgh.

Portrait of Smith's mother, Margaret Douglas

Smith died in the northern wing of Panmure House on July 17, 1790 after a painful illness. On his death bed, Smith expressed disappointment that he had not achieved more. His last words were "I believe we must adjourn the meeting to some other place."

His body was buried in the Canongate Kirkyard.

The father of modern economics, Smith's thinking on mutual trading was influential on William Pitt and other prime ministers. By 1860 Great Britain was a free trade country.