106 ADAM SMITH. 



action. The third division of his course was, properly 

 speaking, a branch of the second ; it embodied general 

 jurisprudence, the structure of government, and the theory 

 of legislation. In the fourth and last branch he treated 

 of the principles upon which the wealth, power, and 

 generally the prosperity of communities depend, and of 

 the institutions relating to commerce, finance, instruction, 

 and defined, in a word, the functions of government as 

 contradistinguished from its structure. Of the second 

 and fourth divisions he afterwards gave the substance in 

 his published works ; unhappily, the' whole of his papers 

 containing the first and the third series of Lectures, were 

 destroyed by himself some time before he died, together 

 with the Lectures on Rhetoric, which are described by Mr. 

 Millar as having been composed with extraordinary care, 

 and as having contained critical discussions of great deli- 

 cacy of taste, as well as extensive learning. I cannot 

 help regarding it as a circumstance however unfortunate 

 for the world, peculiarly happy for his executors, that 

 these invaluable manuscripts were not left in their hands, 

 with the injunction which his will contained to burn 

 them, for if ever men can be conceived to lie under a 

 temptation to strain at placing their public duty in 

 opposition to their private obligations, it certainly would 

 have been those eminent persons, Dr. Black and Dr. 

 Hutton, shrinking from the painful office of performing 

 the trusts of their friend's will. 



While Dr. Smith was engaged in the duties of his 

 Professorship at Glasgow, he published the first works 

 which he gave to the world. In 1755 he contributed 

 to the ' Edinburgh Review/ of which I have spoken in 

 the ' Life of Robertson/ a paper of great merit, being a 



