l66 OK DR. ADAM SMITH. June 8, 



ihe February that preceded his death. I faid, in tak- 

 ing leave of him; " My dear Do£lor, I hope to fee you of- 

 teiier when I come to town next February." He fqueez- 

 ■ed my hand, and faid, " My dear Afcanius, I may be 

 alive then, and perhaps half-a-dozen of Februaries; but 

 yon never will Le your old friend any more. I find 

 that tlie machine is breaking down"; fo that I Ihall be 

 little better than a mummy." 



I found a great inclination to vifit the Doftor, when 

 I hi^ard of his lafl; illnefs ; but the mummy ftared me 

 in tiie face, and I was intimidated. 



Smith's well placed afteftion for Hume, as a man, 

 hindered him from being a Chriftian, from the fame 

 foible I have already defcribed. 



He had no ear for mufic, nor any perception of the 

 fublime or beautiful in compafition, either in poetry or 

 language of any kind. 



He was too much of a geometrician to have much 

 tafte, though he had the jufteft perception of moral beau- 

 ty and excellence. 



With refpedi to his works, his theory of moral fen- 

 timents is, in all its eflential parts, ji*ft, founded on 

 truth and nature. He points out the foundation of the 

 juft, the fit, the decenc, in our mod common and al- 

 lowable paffions, making approbation and difapproba- 

 tion as fixed by our inllinfts, the tells of virtue and 

 vice ; and fiiewing that thofe are founded on fympathy; 

 railing from this fimple and obvious truth, a mod beau- 

 tiful intelleftual fabric. 



His elVay concerning the caufes of the wealth of na- 

 tions, is a complete analyhs of fociety, beginning with 

 the firfl rudiments of the fimpleft manual labour, and 

 rifing by an eafy and natural gradation to the highell 

 attainment of mental powers. In this book, not only 

 arts and commerce, but finance, juffice, public police, 

 the economy of armies, and the fyfiem of education, 

 are confidered and argued upon, often profoundly, al- 

 ways plaufiuly and clearly, and with refpecf to wars 



