An Inquiry into the Nature and Causes of the Wealth of Nations
“The first and greatest classic of modern economic thought” (PMM).
Very rare second octavo edition, and fourth edition overall, of The Wealth of Nations by Adam Smith (1723-1790).
Fine copy printed on thick, very pure paper, preserved in its period binding.
2 volumes in 2 octavo books: I/ XIII and 498 pp.; II/ (4) ff., 489 pp., (30) ff.
Speckled calf, smooth spines decorated with gilt fillets, red morocco title labels, green morocco volume numbering labels, blind-tooled roll on the edges, discreet old restorations. Contemporary binding.
205 x 125 mm.
Smith, Adam. An inquiry into the nature and causes of the wealth of Nations. The fourth edition, with additions.
Dublin, printed for Mssrs. W. Colles, R. Moncrieffe, G. Burnet, W. Wilson…, 1785.
Very rare second octavo edition, the fourth overall of the greatest classic of modern economic thought.
Very rare second octavo edition, the fourth overall of the "first and greatest classic of modern economic thought" (PMM).
Kress, B967 ; PMM, 221 (for the 1776 edition).
Adam Smith's masterpiece, first published in 1776, is the foundation of modern economic thought and remains the single most important account of the rise of, and the principles behind, modern capitalism. In his Wealth of Nations, Smith "begins with the thought that labour is the source from which a nation derives what is necessary to it. The improvement of the division of labour is the measure of productivity and in it lies the human propensity to barter and exchange " (PMM).
"The Wealth of Nations had no rival in scope or depth when published and is still one of the few works in its field to have achieved classic status, meaning simply that it has sustained yet survived repeated reading, critical and adulatory, long after the circumstances which prompted it have become the object of historical enquiry" (ODNB).
"This treatise by Smith is one of the most profound and useful works that this century has produced" (Beuchot)
«The Wealth of Nations, coming at a point when “natural liberty” was being widely debated, had a decisive influence on the study of national economy and on the freeing of economic policy from the artificial restraint of the mercantilist system. Where the political aspects of human rights had taken two centuries to explore, Smith’s achievement was to bring the study of economic aspects to the same point in a single work. The certainty of The Wealth of Nations’ criticism and its grasp of human nature have made it the first and greatest classic of modern economic thought» (PMM).
"Adam Smith. This name is the greatest in political economy; he had the unique fortune of leaving an indelible mark on both the intellectual world and the world of facts. When the work appeared, Hume, who congratulated him, only anticipated the judgment of posterity, which has associated Smith’s name with those of Grotius and Montesquieu. Everything in his work is treated with the sovereign calm of a superior reason and unchanging common sense, which, pushed to this limit, is genius itself. No one before Smith had more clearly and explicitly demonstrated the advantages of economic freedom" (Ch. Coquelin).
Beautiful copy of the first and greatest classic of modern economic thought, printed on thick, very clean paper, with wide margins, preserved in its original period binding.
Eighteenth century editions of Smith’s magnum opus are becoming very scarce; even more when published in the author’s lifetime and kept in its original binding.
