Smith's Last Days

The new edition of the Theory was Smith’s last published work. A French newspaper, the Moniteur Universelle of Paris, announced on March 11, 1790 that Smith would do a critical examination of Montesquieu’s Esprit des Lois.

It speculated that the work would make an epoch in the history of politics and of philosophy.

But there is no evidence that he intended to publish a separate work on Montesquieu. Before March 1790, his strength seems to have been much wasted. The Earl of Buchan was in town in February and visited him. Upon leaving Smith, the Earl said=

But Smith squeezed his earl’s hand and replied=

“My dear Lord Buchan, I may be alive then and perhaps half a dozen Februaries, but you never will see your old friend any more. I find that the machine is breaking down, so that I shall be little better than a mummy”

The Earl says that he wanted to visit Smith in his last illness, but the mummy stared me in the face and I was intimidated.

During the spring months, Smith got worse and weaker.

He bore his long and painful illness with patience and a serene and even cheerful resignation.

On June 21, Henry Mackenzie wrote his brother-in-law, Sir J. Grant, that Edinburgh had just lost its finest woman, the beautiful Miss Burnet of Monboddo. Burns called her “the most heavenly of all God’s works.”

In a few weeks, it would in all probability lose its greatest man, Adam Smith. “He is now past all hopes of recovery, with which about three weeks ago we had flattered ourselves.” (Mackenzie)

A week later, Smellie the printer, wrote Smith’s young friend, Patrick Clason, in London=

“Poor Smith! we must soon lose him. The moment he leaves will give a heart-pang to thousands. Mr. Smith’s spirits are flat. I am afraid his exertions to please his friends do him no good. His intellect and senses are clear and distinct. He wishes to be cheerful, but nature is omnipotent. His body is extremely emaciated. His stomach cannot admit of sufficient nourishment. But, like a man, he is perfectly patient and resigned.”[367]

In all his weakness, he was still thoughtful of the care of his friends. One of his last acts was to commend [Pg 433] the good offices of the Duke of Buccleugh, the children of his old friend and physician, Cullen. Cullen died only a few months before Smith. “In many respects, Adam Smith was a chaste disciple of Epicurus. Smith’s last act resembled that of Epicurus leaving as a legacy to his friend and patron the children of his Metrodorus, the excellent Cullen.”[368] (Lord Buchan)

Smith’s old friend Adam Ferguson had been apparently estranged from Smith for some time. When it became evident that the sickness was mortal, he immediately forgot their coolness, whatever it was about. He came and waited on him with the old affection. On July 31, 1790, Ferguson writes the death to Sir John Macpherson. Macpherson was Warren Hastings’ successor as Governor-General of India. “Your old friend Smith is no more.” We knew he was dying for some months. Matters were a little awkward when he was in health. After seeing him, I went to him immediately and continued my attentions to the last.”[369]

Dr. Carlyle mentions that= the Edinburgh literary circle’s harmony of the 18th century was often ruffled by little tifts, and Dr. Carlyle and John Home were generally called in to compose them. the usual source of the trouble was Ferguson’s “great jealousy of rivals,” and especially of Hume, Smith, and Robertson. But it would not be right to ascribe the fault to Ferguson merely on that account, for Carlyle hints that Smith too had “a little jealousy in his nature,” although he admits him to have been a man of “unbounded benevolence.” But whatever had come between them, it is pleasant to find Ferguson= dismissing it so unreservedly, and forgetting his own infirmities too— He had been long [Pg 434]paralysed. He went about buried in furs “like a philosopher from Lapland”—in order to cheer the last days of the friend of his youth. (Cockburn)

When Smith felt his end to be approaching, he evinced great anxiety to have all his papers destroyed except the few which he judged to be ready for publication. Too feeble to do it himself, he repeatedly begged his friends Black and Hutton to destroy them for him. A third friend, Mr. Riddell, was present on one of the occasions when this request was made. He mentions that Smith regretted that= “he had done so little.” “But I meant to have done more. There are materials in my papers of which I could have made a great deal, but that is now out of the question.”[370] Black and Hutton always put off complying with Smith’s requests in the hope of his recovering his health or perhaps changing his mind. But a week before his death, he expressly sent for them. He asked them then and there to burn 16 volumes of manuscript to which he directed them. This they did without knowing or asking what they contained. 17 years before, he went to London with the manuscript of the Wealth of Nations. He made Hume his literary executor. He left instructions with Hume to= destroy all his loose papers and 18 thin paper folio books “without any examination,” and spare nothing but his fragment on the history of astronomy. When the 16 volumes of manuscript were burnt, Smith’s mind seemed to be greatly relieved. It appears to have been on a Sunday. His friends came on the evening to supper. They seem to have mustered strongly on this particular evening. He was able to receive them with something of his usual cheerfulness. He would even have stayed up and sat with them had they allowed him. But they pressed [Pg 435]him not to do so, and he retired to bed about 9= 30. As he left the room, he turned and said= “I love your company, gentlemen. But I believe I must leave you to go to another world.” These are the words as reported by Henry Mackenzie, who was present. He gave Samuel Rogers an account of Smith’s death during his visit to London in the following year.[371] Hutton gave a slightly different expression in his account to Stewart= “I believe we must adjourn this meeting to some other place.” Possibly both sentences were used by Smith. For both are needed for the complete expression of the parting consolation he obviously meant to convey—that death is not a final separation, but only an adjournment of the meeting.

That was his last meeting with them in the earthly meeting-place. He had gone to the other world before the next Sunday came. He died on Saturday July 17, 1790. He was buried in the Canongate churchyard= near the simple stone which Burns placed on Fergusson’s grave, and not far from the statelier tomb which later on received the remains of Dugald Stewart. The grave is marked by an unpretending monument. It states that Adam Smith, the author of the Wealth of Nations, lies buried there.

His death made less stir or rumour in the world than many of his admirers expected. For example, Sir Samuel Romilly wrote on August 20 to a French lady who had wanted a copy of the new edition of the Theory of Moral Sentiments. He says= “I have been surprised and am a little indignant how little impression his death has made here. It has been scarcely noticed. While for more than a year after Dr. Johnson’s death, only panegyrics of him was to be heard= lives, letters, and anecdotes. Even at this moment, there are two more lives of him to start into existence. [Pg 436] One should not be very much surprised that the public does not do justice to Smith’s works, since he did not do justice to them himself. He always considered his Theory of Moral Sentiments a much superior work to his Wealth of Nations.”[372] Even in Edinburgh, it seemed to make less impression than the death of a bustling divine. It was certainly less than the death of the excellent but far less illustrious Dugald Stewart a generation later. The newspapers had his obituary in two small paragraphs. The only facts the writers were able to find were= his early abduction by the gypsies, and The Mercury and the Advertiser give a circumstantial account of this that “Dr. Smith in private life was distinguished for philanthropy, benevolence, humanity, and charity.” (the Advertiser) Lord Cockburn was then beginning to read and think, was struck with the general ignorance of Smith’s merits which his fellow-citizens exhibited shortly after his death. “The middle-aged seemed to me to know little about the founder of the science (political economy) except that he had recently= been a Commissioner of Customs and written a sensible book. The Liberal young of Edinburgh lived upon him.”[373] Stewart was no sooner dead than a monument was raised to him on one of the best sites in the city. The greater name of Smith has to this day no public monument in the city he so long adorned.

Black and Hutton were his literary executors. In 1795, they published the literary fragments which had been spared from the flames. His will was dated February 6, 1790. He left his whole property to his cousin, David Douglas, afterwards Lord Reston. It is subject to the condition that= the legatee should follow the instructions of Black and Hutton in disposing of the MSS. and writings, and [Pg 437] pay an annuity of £20 a year to Mrs. Janet Douglas, and after her death, £400 to Professor Hugh Cleghorn of St. Andrews and his wife.[374] However, the property Smith left was very moderate. His friends were surprised that it should have been so little. Because he only maintained a moderate establishment. But they had not known that he gave away large sums in secret charity. William Playfair says that Smith’s friends suspected him of doing this. They sometimes formed special juries to discovering evidences of it during his lifetime. But Smith was “so ingenious in concealing his charity” that they never could discover it from witnesses, Though they often found the strongest circumstantial evidence of it.[375] Dugald Stewart was more fortunate. Miss Ross was the daughter of the late Patrick Ross, Esq., of Innernethy. Patrick Ross was one of Smith’s most confidential friends. Miss Ross mentioned to Stewart of Smith’s beneficence when he could not hide his generosity. His generosity was much beyond what would have been expected from his fortune. It was combined with circumstances equally honourable to= the delicacy of his feelings and the liberality of his heart. Sir James Mackintosh was a student of Cullen and Black’s in Smith’s closing years. He used to meet Smith in private society occasionally. Many years after this, he said to Empson= “I have known Adam Smith slightly, Ricardo well, and Malthus intimately. Is it not something to say for a science that its three greatest masters were about the three best men I ever knew?”[376] [Pg 438]

Smith never sat for his picture. Nevertheless, has has two excellent portraits by two very talented artists who had many opportunities of seeing and sketching him. Tassie was a student at Foulis’s Academy of Design in Glasgow College when Smith was there. He might have even modeled Smith then. For we hear of Smith’s models being in all the booksellers’ windows in Glasgow at that time. These models would have been made in the Academy of Design. Tassie created two different medallions of Smith in later days. Raspe wrote a catalogue of Tassie’s enamels. It has the same date as the former. It appears never to have been engraved. Raspe mentions a third medallion of Smith [Pg 439]of Tassie’s= “an enamel bust in chalcedony colour, engraved by F. Warner, after a model by J. Tassie.” But this appears from Mr. Gray’s account to be a reduced version of the first of the two just mentioned. He describes one of the largest as being modelled and cast by Tassie in his hard white enamel paste. It resembles a cameo. From this model J. Jackson, R.A., made a drawing. It was engraved in stipple by C. Picart. It was published in 1811 by Cadell and Davies. Line engravings of the same model were subsequently made by John Horsburgh and R.C. Bell for successive editions of the Wealth of Nations. It is accordingly Smith’s best portrait and the best known . It is a profile bust showing handsome features= full forehead, prominent eyeballs, well curved eyebrows, slightly aquiline nose, and firm mouth and chin. It is inscribed, “Adam Smith in his 64th year, 1787. Tassie F.” In this medallion, Smith wears a wig. Mr. J.M. Gray tells us that= Tassie executed another in “the antique manner= ” without the wig, and with neck and breast bare. “It shows the rounded form of the head, covered with curling hair and curving upwards from the brow to a point above the large ear, which is hidden in the other version.”[377] (Mr. Gray) Kay made two portraits of Smith. The first was done in 1787. It represents him as he walked in the street. The second was issued in 1790. It represented him as he has entered an office, probably the Custom House. There is a painting by T. Collopy in the National Museum of Antiquities at Edinburgh. It is thought to be Adam Smith’s portrait because the title Wealth of Nations appears on the back of a book on the table in the picture. But Stewart very explicitly says that Smith never sat for his portrait, so it is very doubtful. All other likenesses of Smith are founded on those of Tassie and Kay.

Smith was:

• of middle height,
• full but not corpulent,
• with erect figure,
• well-set head, and
• large gray or light blue eyes.

They beamed with “inexpressible benignity.”

He dressed so well that nobody seems to have remarked it.

While we hear of:

• Hume’s black-spotted yellow coat,
• Gibbon’s flowered velvet,
• Hutton’s battered attire,
• Henry Erskine’s gray hat with the torn rim.

But there is no allusion to Smith’s dress for fault or merit.

Smith’s books which went to his heir, Lord Reston, were divided. On Lord Reston’s death, they were divided between his two daughters. The economic books went to Mrs. Bannerman, the wife of the late Professor Bannerman of Edinburgh. The works on other subjects went to Mrs. Cunningham, wife of the Rev. Mr. Cunningham of Prestonpans. Both portions still exist.

The former in the Library of the New College, Edinburgh, to which they have been presented by Dr. D. Douglas Bannerman of Perth.

The latter is with Professor Cunningham of[Pg 440] Queen’s College, Belfast, except:

• a few which were sold in Edinburgh in 1878, and
• a section, consisting almost exclusively of Greek and Latin classics, which Professor Cunningham has presented to the library of the college of which he is a member.

Among other relics of Smith that are still extant are four medallions by Tassie, which very probably hung in his library. They are medallions of his personal friends= Black, the chemist; Hutton, the geologist; Dr. Thomas Reid, the metaphysician; and Andrew Lumisden, the Pretender’s old secretary, and author of the work on Roman antiquities.