Adam Smith was born in on June 5th, 1723 in the town of Kirkcaldy on the eastern coast of Scotland and died on July 17th, 1790 in Edinburgh, Scotland. Very little is known of Smith’s childhood other than the fact that he was the son of a comptroller and attended elementary school in Kirkcaldy. Most of what we know about Smith today is derived from his works in Social Philosophy and Political Economics, particularly through The Theory of Moral Sentiments and The Wealth of Nations, as well as during his time as a professor and tutor.
He went to University of Glasgow when he was 14 where he was heavily influenced by the Scottish Enlightenment period, as well as moral philosopher Francis Hutcheson. After graduating in 1740, Smith went to Oxford on a scholarship where he studied mostly independently with a focus on contemporary philosophy. While in search of employment, Smith returned back to Edinburgh and through family connections, as well as personal connections with Lord Henry Home Kames, he found employment as a public lecturer. After spending time lecturing on large variety of subjects, Smith was appointed a Professor of Logic at Glasgow in 1751 and soon after became a Professor of Moral Philosophy in 1752.
In 1759, Smith published his first major work, The Theory of Moral Sentiments, which focused heavily on moral judgement in human behavior. This work also introduced for the first time Smith’s famous concept of the “invisible hand”, which is the idea that even when people seek their own financial gain, they in turn act in a way that helps the rest of society. Smith would soon begin to gain widespread attention and was offered a much better paying job as a tutor for Charles Townshend’s stepson. It was during this period of his life that he began his most famous work, The Wealth of Nations, which would later be published in 1776. This is perhaps the most famous work in the subject of political economics and is by far his most studied and critiqued work.
Details of Smith’s personal life have been widely lost to time. He never married or had children, published nothing of his personal life, and much of his personal items and unfinished works were destroyed after his death (as that was common practice in his time). His legacy lives on through his philosophical and economic works and it is likely that his ideas will continue to be studied for years to come.
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