that any answer has yet been attempted; and which a late writer, eminently acquainted with the operations of commerce, has pronounced (and, in my opinion, with great truth) to be "perfectly unanswerable." It is a remarkable circumstance, that Mr. Smith should, in this solitary instance, have adopted on such slight grounds, a conclusion so strikingly contrasted with the general spirit of his political discussions, and so manifestly at variance with the fundamental principles which, on other occasions, he has so boldly followed out through all their practical applications. This is the more surprising, as the French Economists had, a few years before, obviated the most plausible objections which are apt to present themselves against this extension of the doctrine of Commercial Freedom. See, in particular, some observations in M. Turgot's Reflections on the Formation and Distribution of Riches; and a separate Essay, by the same author, entitled, Mémoire sur le Prêt à Intérêt, et sur le Commerce des Fers.2 Upon this particular question, however, as well as upon those mentioned in the preceding Note, I must be allowed to assert the prior claims of our own countrymen to those of the Economists. From a Memoir presented by the celebrated Mr. Law, (before his elevation to the ministry,) to the Regent Duke of Orleans, that very ingenious writer appears to have held the same opinion with M. Turgot; and the arguments he employs in support of it are expressed with that clearness and conciseness which, in general, distinguish his compositions. The Memoir to which I refer is to be found in a French work entitled, Recherches et Considérations sur les Finances de France, depuis 1595 jusqu'en 1721.3 In the same volume, this doctrine is ascribed by the editor to Mr. Law as its author, or, at least, as its first broacher in France. "Une opinion apportée en France pour la première fois par M. Law, c'est que l'état ne doit jamais donner de réglemens sur le taux de l'intérêt."4 To this opinion Law appears evidently to have been led by Locke, whose reasonings (although he himself declares in favour of a legal rate of interest) seem, all of them, to point at the opposite conclusion. Indeed, the apology he suggests for the existing regulations is so trifling and so slightly urged, that one would almost suppose he was prevented merely by a respect for established prejudices, from pushing his argument to its full extent. The passage I allude to, considering the period when it was written, does no small credit to Locke's sagacity." I would not have entered here into the historical details contained in the two last Notes, if I had not been anxious to obviate the effect of that weak but invete 1 Sir Francis Baring. Pamphlet On the Bank of England. 2 In an Essay read before a literary society in Glasgow, some years before the publication of the Wealth of Nations, Dr. Reid disputed the expediency of legal restrictions on the rate of interest, founding his opinion on some of the same considerations which were afterwards so forcibly stated by Mr. Bentham. His attention had probably been attracted to this question by a very weak defence of these restrictions in Sir James Steuart's Political Economy, a book which had then been recently 3 See Vol. VI. p. 181, edit. printed at Liege, 1758. 4 P. 64. 5 See the folio edition of his Works, Vol. II. p. 31, et seq. rate prejudice which shuts the eyes of so many against the most manifest and important truths, when they are supposed to proceed from an obnoxious quarter. The leading opinions which the French Economists embodied and systematized were, in fact, all of British origin; and most of them follow as necessary consequences, from a maxim of natural law, which (according to Lord Coke) is identified with the first principles of English jurisprudence. "La loi de la liberté entière de tout commerce est un corollaire du droit de propriété.” The truly exceptionable part of the Economical system (as I have elsewhere remarked) is that which relates to the power of the Sovereign. Its original authors and patrons were the decided opposers of political liberty, and, in their zeal for the right of property and the freedom of commerce, lost sight of the only means by which either the one or the other can be effectually protected. NOTE L, p. 73. In the early part of Mr. Smith's life, it is well known to his friends that he was for several years attached to a young lady of great beauty and accomplishment. How far his addresses were favourably received, or what the circumstances were which prevented their union, I have not been able to learn; but I believe it is pretty certain that, after this disappointment, he laid aside all thoughts of marriage. The lady to whom I allude died also unmarried. She survived Mr. Smith for a considerable number of years, and was alive long after the publication of the first edition of this Memoir. I had the pleasure of seeing her when she was turned of eighty, and when she still retained evident traces of her former beauty. The powers of her understanding and the gaiety of her temper seemed to have suffered nothing from the hand of time. P.S.-Soon after the foregoing account of Mr. Smith was read before the Royal Society, a volume of his Posthumous Essays was published by his executors and friends, Dr. Black and Dr. Hutton. In this volume are contained three Essays on the Principles which lead and direct Philosophical Inquiries:-illustrated, in the first place, by the History of Astronomy; in the second, by the History of the Ancient Physics; in the third, by the History of the Ancient Logics and Metaphysics. To these are subjoined three other Essays-on the Imitative Arts; on the Affinity between certain English and Italian Verses; and on the External Senses. “The greater part of them appear" (as is observed in an advertisement subscribed by the Editors) "to be parts of a plan the Author had once formed, for giving a connected history of the liberal sciences and elegant arts.”—“ This plan" (we are informed by the same authority)" he had long abandoned as far too extensive, and these parts of it lay beside him neglected till his death." As this posthumous volume did not appear till after the publication of the foregoing Memoir, it would be foreign to the design of these Notes to offer any observations on the different Essays which it contains. Their merits were certainly not overrated by the two illustrious editors, when they expressed their VOL. X. Ꮐ hopes, "that the reader would find in them that happy connexion, that full and accurate expression, and that clear illustration which are conspicuous in the rest of the author's works; and that, though it is difficult to add much to the great fame he so justly acquired by his other writings, these would be read with satisfaction and pleasure." The three first Essays, more particularly the fragment on the History of Astronomy, are perhaps as strongly marked as any of his most finished compositions, with the peculiar characteristics of his rich, original, and comprehensive mind. In order to obviate a cavil which may possibly occur to some of those readers who were not personally acquainted with Mr. Smith, I shall take this opportunity of mentioning, that in suppressing, through the course of the foregoing narrative, his honorary title of LL.D., (which was conferred on him by the University of Glasgow a very short time before he resigned his professorship,) I have complied not only with his own taste, but with the uniform practice of that circle in which I had the happiness of enjoying his society. To have given him, so soon after his death, a designation which he never assumed but on the title-pages of his books, and by which he is never mentioned in the letters of Mr. Hume and of his other most intimate friends, would have subjected me justly to the charge of affectation from the audience before whom my paper was read; but the truth is, (so little was my ear then accustomed to the name of Doctor Smith,) that I was altogether unconscious of the omission till it was pointed out to me, several years afterwards, as a circumstance which, however trifling, had been magnified by more than one critic, into a subject of grave animadversion. ACCOUNT OF THE LIFE AND WRITINGS OF WILLIAM ROBERTSON, D.D. LATE PRINCIPAL OF THE UNIVERSITY OF EDINBURGH, AND HISTORIOGRAPHER TO HIS MAJESTY FOR SCOTLAND. [READ BEFORE THE ROYAL SOCIETY OF Edinburgh, MARCH 21, 1796.] |