Adam Smith: An Enlightened LifeAdam Smith is celebrated all over the world as the author of The Wealth of Nations and the founder of modern economics. A few of his ideas - that of the 'Invisible Hand' of the market and that 'It is not from the benevolence of the butcher, the brewer, or the baker that we expect our dinner, but from their regard to their own interest' - have become icons of the modern world. 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 book, by one of the leading scholars of the Scottish Enlightenment, shows the extent to which The Wealth of Nations and Smith's other great work, The Theory of Moral Sentiments, were part of a larger scheme to establish a grand 'Science of Man', one of the most ambitious projects of the European Enlightenment, which was to encompass law, history and aesthetics as well as economics and ethics. |
From inside the book
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... In 1705 , at the age of twenty - six , Smith became secretary to the new Secretary of State , the Earl of Loudon , a leading member of the Presbyterian nobility . Two years later he was appointed Clerk of A Kirkcaldy Upbringing.
... appointed Controller of Customs at Kirkcaldy , the most important port in Fife and a significant source of customs revenue . By 1723 he was earning around £ 300 per annum , a fairly substantial income by contemporary standards , and was ...
... appointment of a new master, David Miller. Miller was the highly successful master of the burgh school at Cupar and he had at first been reluctant to move.18 What made him change his mind is not clear, though the formidable Lady Oswald ...
... appointment of professors who would teach a moderate Presbyterianism that stressed the need for a more consensual ... appointed to the Divinity chair in 1708. By 1715 he had become notorious among the radical clergy of the west of ...
... appointment to the Moral Philosophy chair in 1729 , and for Smith's to the Logic and Metaphysics chair in 1751 , was crucial ; so was his opposition to David Hume's bid for the Logic and Metaphysics chair in 1752 following Smith's move ...
Contents
1695 | |
1699 | |
1709 | |
1719 | |
1741 | |
Oxford and David Hume | |
Edinburghs Early Enlightenment | |
a Conjectural History | |
Smith and the Duke of Buccleuch in Europe 17646 | |
London Kirkcaldy and the Making of the Wealth of Nations 176676 | |
The Wealth of Nations and Smiths Very violent attack upon the whole commercial system of Great Britain | |
Humes Death | |
Last Years in Edinburgh 177890 | |
Epilogue | |
Notes and Sources | |
Bibliography of Works Cited | |
Professor of Moral Philosophy at Glasgow 1 17519 | |
The Theory of Moral Sentiments and the Civilizing Powers of Commerce | |
Professor of Moral Philosophy at Glasgow 2 175963 | |
Index | |