What I have dubbed "The Adam Smith Error" is his acceptance of the appointment as Commissioner of Customs - and I insist it is a Very Great Error on his part because it is precisely this job that prevented him from doing something he had promised his readers in the very first edition of The Wealth of Nations: and that is, he would shortly be presenting before them a Treatise on Government and Law. This solemn promise was never fulfilled - much to the loss of humanity. If Smith's Lectures on Jurisprudence are available today - these are only because the "lecture notes" of two students who attended these were made available for the purpose. Smith himself BURNT all his unpublished papers, shortly before his death. Not surprisingly, the First Chapter of these lectures on jurisprudence is titled "Property"!
So we can only imagine what the WORLDWIDE IMPACT of a full-scale Treatise on Government & Law by the author of The Wealth of Nations would have been. And then, we can only DEEPLY REGRET the unfulfilled promise. And finally conclude that his acceptance of the above appointment was a Very Great Error on his part.
Which is why I have taken the FIRM DECISION to focus all my energies, for the rest of my working life, on PRODUCING KNOWLEDGE - in what Bastiat called The Only Solution in 1850: "The Progressive Enlightenment of Mankind."
I prefer to call it RE-EDUCATION.
I have already provided my readers with the outline of a new book I have in mind.
I also have ideas - ideas I shall pursue actively only after the book is over and done with - of a television documentary series designed to TEACH - or RE-EDUCATE - all these ideas that have come down from us from the philosophers of the Scottish Enlightenment to the subjectivist economists of Hapsburg Vienna. Much has changed - and even been "perfected" - since those early times, which is why they say, "To read Adam Smith today to learn Economics is like reading Euclid in order to learn Geometry." But much remains the same - of course.
They say "economists get interested in epistemological issues after the age of 65" - but I did so less that 50. And I have "developed" upon these ideas since - for it does take Time, and much Thought, and Reflection, in order to be able to do so. Some of these ideas on the "ultimate foundations" of not only the True Science of Economics, but also the True Sociology, have been explored in this post of a few months ago.
I also have ideas on many things I wish to STUDY as well.
So, I have so much GOOD WORK to do - work that does not require any "appointment," no "job," NOTHING. Just books - and peace of mind.
Do read John Rae's biography of Adam Smith sometime - for it offers us much to reflect upon, not only about the man and his times, but also about those who have written about him, like Galbraith, for example, who writes, in his history of economic thought, that Smith accepted this appointment for the MONEY, that he was "too practical a man to refuse."
NONSENSE! - of course. Typical of Galbraith.
Rae reveals Smith to be the MOST IMPRACTICAL man ever born! The stereotypical "absent-minded professor."
Rae reveals Smith gave away almost all his money - in "secrets acts of charity."
There is also the interesting bit about the offer the Honourable East India Company made to Smith - to visit India leading a Commission to look into the "coinage." Parliament it was that put an end to that - and we must wonder why. For had Smith gone to India - for one, he would never have accepted that appointment as Customs Commissioner; and second, he would surely have come to APPRECIATE all that the Honourable Company had accomplished in India. For he was among their most severe CRITICS - which is surely why the Honourable Court of Directors wanted him to see India for himself.
We can also only wonder at what would have happened in India - from then right down till today - had Smith come here, lectured here and there, and then WRITTEN about what he saw, whom he met, and all that.
Smith's tenure as Customs Commissioner in Edinburgh was interesting in many other ways: for example, when he received the appointment, there were over 200 different duties levied, while by the time he retired, there were only a dozen or so.
When he took up office, scarcely a single boat sailed up the River Clyde.
By the time he died, "even the CHILDREN of Glasgow were BUSY"!
The Clyde - it was full up with Big Ships - from America, carrying TOBACCO, which the local merchants would process, and then send onwards to HOLLAND!
Read about Glasgow today - and CRY!
Young and Old - on the DOLE!
PUBLIC SCHOOLS - miseducating ALL.
POVERTY.
MISERY.
When Smith died, he seemed to be supremely confident that the ideas of the Scottish Enlightenment would prevail forever - and that Universal Opulence would surely result as his System of Natural Liberty came to rule humanity.
This optimism was surely confirmed when he met the then British Prime Minister - Pitt the Younger - and his entire Cabinet, about which I have this old post, quoting from Rae's biography.
What Rae omits mentioning is the ENORMOUS INFLUENCE Smith had, not too long after his death, on the conduct of the East India Company, who not only established Haileybury College in order to teach "political economy" to their recruits, but also gave up all their "trade monopolies," seeing that their "rightly understood interests" could only be attained through free, competitive trade.
Smith had a huge impact in Europe; Jean-Baptiste Say was known as the "Adam Smith of France." Smith was very popular in Germany, too - particularly in Hanover, for obvious reasons - but in Imperial Austria as well, where the Empress Catherine was a "classical liberal" - the Emperor Franz Josef was "conservative" - which is why the young Carl Menger was specially chosen by her to teach political economy to Crown Prince Rudolf. The "lecture notes" of Rudolf - see posts under the label "Carl Menger" - indicate it was the Wealth of Nations that was followed during this instruction.
But classical liberalism did NOT prevail. Mises' biography is therefore titled The Last Knight of Liberalism. And Mises died in 1973!
There are many, many reasons for this failure - reasons of events that occurred - but we cannot imagine what might have happened had Smith indeed penned the book he had promised his readers: The One Great Error of his life I have been referring to.
The Real Battle - is the War of Ideas.
It is NOT "practical politics" and such.
It is NOT "bums on seats" - this kissa kursi ka BULLSHIT!
I shall remain firmly a WARRIOR in this Great Battle of Ideas - till the very end, hoping to finish it, for the sake of posterity.
The Very Long Run.
LIBERTY!
From Here to ETERNITY!
