Adam Smith: An Enlightened LifeThis fascinating intellectual biography of Adam Smith dramatically rewrites the economist’s life and offers new insight into his iconic concepts The great eighteenth-century British economist Adam Smith (1723–90) is celebrated as the founder of modern economics. Yet Smith saw himself primarily as a philosopher rather than an economist and would never have predicted that the ideas for which he is now best known were his most important. This biography shows the extent to which Smith's great works, The Wealth of Nations and The Theory of Moral Sentiments, were part of one of the most ambitious projects of the Euruopean Enlightenment, a grand “Science of Man" that would encompass law, history, and aesthetics as well as economics and ethics, and which was only half complete on Smith’s death in 1790.Nick Phillipson reconstructs Smith’s intellectual ancestry and shows what Smith took from, and what he gave to, in the rapidly changing intellectual and commercial cultures of Glasgow and Edinburgh as they entered the great years of the Scottish Enlightenment. Above all he explains how far Smith’s ideas developed in dialogue with those of his closest friend, the other titan of the age, David Hume. |
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Page 1730
... citizens and the deity. They taught them how to square their private interests with those of the public. They taught them how to understand and enjoy the peace of mind and sense of self-respect that comes from knowing that one is able ...
... citizens and the deity. They taught them how to square their private interests with those of the public. They taught them how to understand and enjoy the peace of mind and sense of self-respect that comes from knowing that one is able ...
Page 1733
... citizens of the Roman Republic. Cicero did not share Epictetus' contempt for the world or his belief that the only path to virtue lay in contemplation. He was interested in the ethical value of leaming to perform the offices of ordinary ...
... citizens of the Roman Republic. Cicero did not share Epictetus' contempt for the world or his belief that the only path to virtue lay in contemplation. He was interested in the ethical value of leaming to perform the offices of ordinary ...
Page 1734
... citizens had little control, a world from which they would have to distance themselves if they were ever to aspire to a life of virtue and peace of mind, a world which was in need of moral reform. Like Cicero, Addison had little time ...
... citizens had little control, a world from which they would have to distance themselves if they were ever to aspire to a life of virtue and peace of mind, a world which was in need of moral reform. Like Cicero, Addison had little time ...
Page 1735
... citizen thought, would encourage religious and political moderation and active Christian citizenship. These ancient and modern classics provided Smith with a simple but sophisticated way of looking at the social world. They gave him a ...
... citizen thought, would encourage religious and political moderation and active Christian citizenship. These ancient and modern classics provided Smith with a simple but sophisticated way of looking at the social world. They gave him a ...
Page
... citizens were commerce and religion, the chief means of acquiring importance among them were wealth and piety'.7 This pietism had deep tap-roots which have never been properly studied. Before the Reformation, when Glasgow was merely a ...
... citizens were commerce and religion, the chief means of acquiring importance among them were wealth and piety'.7 This pietism had deep tap-roots which have never been properly studied. Before the Reformation, when Glasgow was merely a ...
Contents
1699 | |
1703 | |
1707 | |
1717 | |
1737 | |
4Edinburghs Early Enlightenment | |
a Conjectural History | |
9Smith and the Duke of Buccleuchin Europe 17646 | |
10London Kirkcaldy and the Making of theWealth of Nations 176676 | |
11The Wealth of Nations andSmiths Very violent attack upon the whole commercialsystem of Great Britain | |
12Humes Death | |
13Last Years in Edinburgh 177890 | |
Epilogue | |
Notes and Sources | |
Bibliography of Works Cited | |
6Professor of Moral Philosophyat Glasgow 1 17519 | |
7The Theory of Moral Sentimentsand the Civilizing Powersof Commerce | |
8Professor of Moral Philosophyat Glasgow 2 175963 | |
Index | |
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Common terms and phrases
Adam Smith agriculture Boswell Bridgeman Art Library Buccleuch Cambridge career century citizens city’s commerce contemporary Corr culture curriculum David Hume depended develop discussion division of labour Dugald Stewart Duke économistes Edinburgh edition Epictetus Essays ethical finance find first France Francis Hutcheson friends Glasgow govemment Henry Home human nature Hume’s Humean impartial spectator important improvement influence intellectual interest James Boswell jurisprudence justice Kirkcaldy language leamed lectures on rhetoric letter liberty literary live London Lord Mandeville manufactures merchants modem Montesquieu moral philosophy Moral Sentiments ofthe Oswald Oxford passions political economy Presbyterian principles Professor progress of opulence published Pufendorf Quesnay Quesnay’s reflect Ross Rousseau Scotland Scots Scottish Enlightenment sense significant sociability society teaching Theory of Moral thinking thought Tobacco Lords town Townshend trade understanding Union virtue Wealth of Nations William writing