Account of 
Dr Smith. 
132 HISTORY of the SOCIETY. 
In a letter addreffed, in the year 1787, to the Principal of 
the Univerfity of Glafgow, in confequence of his being elected 
Reétor of that learned body, a pleafing memorial remains of 
the fatisfaétion with which he always recolleéted that period of 
his literary career, which had been more peculiarly confecrated 
to thefe important ftudies. ‘‘ No preferment (fays he) could have 
“* given me fo much real fatisfaction. No man can owe greater 
obligations to a fociety than I do to the Univerfity of Glaf- 
gow. They educated me; they fent me to Oxford. Soon 
after my return to Scotland, they elected me one of their 
own members; and afterwards preferred me to another of- 
fice, to which the abilities and virtues of the never to be for- 
gotten Dr Hurcueson had given a fuperior degree of illu- 
“* (tration. 
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Tuar the idea of deftroying fuch unfinifhed works as might be in his pof-~ 
feffion at the time of his death, was not the effeét of any fudden or hafty refolution, 
appears from the following letter to Mr Hume, written by Mr Situ in 1773, 
at a time when he was preparing himfelf for a journey to London, with the profpeét 
of a pretty long abfence from Scotland. 
My DEAR FRIEND, Edinburgh, 16th April 1773. 
As I have left the care of all my literary papers to you, I muft tell you, that ex- 
cept thofe which I carry along with me, there are none worth the publication, but 
a fragment of a great work, which contains a hiftory of the aftronomical fyftems 
that were fuccellively in fafhion down to the time of Des Cartes. Whether that 
might not be publifhed as a fragment of an intended juvenile work, I leave entire- 
ly to your judgment, though I begin to fufpeét myfelf that there is more refinement 
than folidity in fome parts of it. This little work you will find in a thin folio pa- 
per book in my back room. All the other loofe papers which you will find in 
that defk, or within the glafs folding doors of a bureau which ftands in my bed- 
* room, together with about eighteen thin paper folio books, which you will likewife 
find within the fame glafs folding doors, I defire may be deftroyed without any exa- 
mination. Unlefs I die very fuddenly, I fhall take care that the papersI carry _ 
with me fhall be carefully fent to you. 
I ever am, my dear Friend, moft faithfully your’s, 
ADAM SMITH: 
To Davin Home, Efq; 
St Andrew’s Square. 
