Adam Smith Biography

Adam Smith biography - His Life and Times

One of the greatest works in the history of philosophy, and the book that laid the foundation for modern economics, happened simply because its writer, Adam Smith, was bored.

Charles Townsend

Charles Townsend and Adam Smith Adam Smith was 43 years old when a British statesman named Charles Townsend hired him to tutor his stepson, a young Duke and son of the woman Townsend had just married. Townsend was, in an indirect way, one of the causes of the American Revolution. He was the Chancellor of the Exchequer.

As the Chancellor of the Exchequer, Charles Townsend was responsible for the taxations that ultimately provoked the colonies to revolt. Townsend had seen some of Adam Smith's writings and knew the eminent Scottish philosopher David Hume held Adam Smith in high regard. Charles Townsend thought his stepson would be in good hands with Smith, so he offered him:

• 300 pounds, plus
• traveling expenses, plus
• a pension of 300 pounds a year thereafter.

This was a big increase over the salary Adam Smith was currently receiving as a professor in Glasgow, so he readily accepted Charles Townsend's offer.

Adam Smith Wealth of Nations

Adam Smith's The Wealth of Nations

In 1763 he headed off with the 18 year old Duke, to France, where they settled into a house in Toulouse. It was there that Smith, who had spent most of his time in the dynamic cities of Scotland, began to realize he wasn't cut out for life in the French provinces. During the eighteen months of excruciating boredom that followed he thought he might as well write a book to entertain himself. He wrote to his friend Hume: "The life which I led at Glasgow was a pleasurable dissipated life in comparison of that which I lead here at present. I have begun to write a book in order to pass away the time." The book Adam Smith wrote was called An Inquiry into the Nature and Causes of the Wealth of Nations but it's known today simply as Adam Smith 's The Wealth of Nations. Adam Smith 's Wealth of Nations may have been the product of one man's boredom - but The Wealth of Nations has stimulating influence on later economists has never been surpassed.

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