186 ADAM SMITH. 



country. It was soon translated into French, and the 

 publisher sought to give it more attraction by adding 

 an absurd title to the original one he called it * Meta- 

 physique de 1'Ame.' Grimm commends this as ex- 

 tremely clever ; but adds that it had failed to obtain for 

 the book any attention, and that it had entirely failed at 

 Paris, which, however, he observes, proved nothing 

 against its merits.* 



After the 'Theory of Moral Sentiments' was pub- 

 lished, Dr. Smith naturally made considerable changes 

 in his course of lectures during the four years that he 

 remained in Glasgow College. He greatly curtailed 

 the second branch, having incorporated so large a 

 portion of it in his book ; and he extended the third 

 and fourth heads those parts which related to juris- 

 prudence and political economy giving more copious 

 illustrations of the principles on which these important 

 sciences are grounded. In particular, his discussions 

 of commercial policy were more elaborately conducted; 

 and he profited by his intimacy with merchants and 

 manufacturers of eminence in the great trading city in 

 which he resided to obtain practical information which 

 might illustrate, if not guide, his speculative views 

 possibly also correcting those views by bringing them 

 to the test of experience by free discussion. 



The progress of his opinions in making converts to 

 the modern doctrines concerning trade is represented 

 as having been considerable, even among those whose 

 prejudices in favour of the older maxims were of long 

 standing ; but of course his philosophy was more readily 

 adopted, and more extensively diffused by the pupils, 

 who came to the consideration of the subject w r ith no 



* " On a traduit depuis quelque terns la ' Theorie des Sentimens Mo- 

 raux,' de M. Adam Smith, Professeur a Glasgow, en deux volumes in 8vo. 

 Le traducteur ou le libraire, pour lui donner un titre plus piquant, Fa 

 nomine spirituellement ' Metaphysique de TAme ;' cet ouvrage a beau- 

 coup de reputation en Angleterre, et n'a eu aucun succeS a Paris. Cela 

 ne decide rien contre son merite." (Corr. IV., 291.) 



