Archæologia of the Antiquarian Society, of which he was a member. The Gentleman's Magazine also contains several of his contributions, besides

those already specified; and an anonymous Essay concerning the Nature of Being, and A Treatise on Old Age, has been likewise attributed to him.

THIS eminent moral, political, and mathematical writer, was born at Tynton, Glamorganshire, on the 22nd of February, 1723. He was the son of a dissenting minister, and was educated with a view to that profession himself, first at the grammar-school of Neath, and afterwards at two private academies, in Wales, and a third, in London, where the learned Mr. Eames was principal tutor. To this last he was removed by his uncle, in 1740, in which year his father's recent death was succeeded by that of his mother. He was left with a very slender provision, in consequence, it is supposed, of having given his father offence, by differing from him respecting the principles of Calvinism, of which old Mr. Price was a strict follower. His attempts to instil them into the nind of his son produced doubts and inquiries in reply; and finding, one day, the subject of our memoir poring over a volume of Clarke's Sermons, the incensed parent snatched it away, and threw it into the fire. As might be expected, this only had the effect of stimulating the curiosity it was intended to check, and a more ardent course of study and inquiry, on the part of Richard, was the consequence.

On leaving the seminary last-named, where he remained about four years, Mr. Price became domestic chaplain to a gentleman of the name of Streatfield, at Stoke Newington. In this situation he remained nearly thirteen years, in the course of which period, he frequently officiated for Dr. Samuel Chandler, and other eminent dissenting ministers, in London and its neighbourhood. In 1757, he married a Miss Blundel, with whom he settled at Hackney: but, in the following year, removed to Newington Green, as pastor of a congregation there. About the same time, he made his first appearance as an author, in A Review of the prin

cipal Questions and Difficulties in Morals; particularly those relating to the Original of our Ideas of Virtue, its Nature, Foundation, Reference to the Deity, Obligation, Subject Matter, and Sanctions. In this work, he contends that our perceiving and determining powers, concerning actions, is referrible to the understanding; and not, as Dr. Hutcheson has maintained, to a moral sense; and argues the necessity of adopting his theory, in order to establish the important corollary, that morality is eternal and immutable, not the arbitrary production of any power, human or divine, but equally everlasting and necessary with all truth and reason. It was altogether a very masterly production, and such as to obtain the admiration of the most eminent philosophers of the day.

In 1763, he was chosen afternoon preacher to the congregation in Poor Jewry Street, London; and, about the same time, was elected a fellow of the Royal Society. In 1767, he considerably added to his fame, both as a divine and philosopher, by his Four Dissertations: 1. On Providence; 2. On Prayer; 3. On the Reasons for expecting that Virtuous Men shall meet after Death in a state of Happiness; 4. On the Importance of Christianity, the Nature of Historical Evidence and Miracles. In the last dissertation, he has taken a very masterly and argumentative view of the nature and grounds of the regard due to experience and to the evidence of testimony, in answer to what Mr. Hume has advanced on this subject, in his Essay on Miracles. The whole has been frequently printed, and ranks among the most popular of his works. In 1769, the University of Aberdeen spontaneously created him D.D.; and, in the following year, he was chosen pastor of the congregation at the GravelPit Meeting, Hackney; and, at the

same time, transferred his afternoon services from Jewry Street to Newington Green. In 1771, he published his Observations on Reversionary Payments; on Schemes for Providing Annuities for Widows, and for Persons in Old Age; on the Method of calculating the Values of Assurances on Lives; and on the National Debt, &c. The last was written with a view of exposing the ruinous tendency of the numerous societies that were in existence at the time, for the benefit of age and widows. It had the effect of checking the system to a great extent, and became so popular, that, in twelve years, it reached a fourth edition, which the author published in two volumes, with much additional matter. Some of his statements gave rise to much controversy, and those intended to support his hypothesis of the decreasing population of the kingdom, have been proved to be erroneous; but, in other respects, the work is regarded as one of the most complete extant in political arithmetic. In 1772, he published An Appeal to the Public, on the subject of the National Debt, which very speedily reached a third impression.

One of his most famous political performances appeared in 1776, entitled Observations on the Nature of Civil Liberty, the Principles of Government, and the Justice and Policy of the War with America. It was considered the best work, in exposition of the injurious policy pursued by this country towards America, that had appeared; and, within less than two years, eight editions were printed. The author had the further satisfaction of receiving, from the common-council of London, in testimony of their approbation of his observations, the freedom of the city in a gold box. The work was not, however, without opponents, of whom the chief part deserved no answer; but, as a few seemed to have rather mistaken, than perverted, his sentiments, he thought fit to reply to them, in 1778, under the title of Additional Observations, &c., and, at the same time, he published a general introduction to both pieces, and a supplement. In 1778, appeared A Free Discussion of the Doctrines of Materialism and Philosophical Necessity, in a correspondence between Dr. Price and Dr. Priestley; great meta

physical acuteness and skill were employed on each side of the question, and it is to the honour of the disputants, in a point upon which they held the most opposite views, that both displayed an uncommon complacency and candour to the end of the controversy.

In 1779, Dr. Price wrote an introduction to The Doctrine of Annuities, by his nephew, Mr. Morgan, and, in the course of it, addressed some observations to the Society for Equitable Assurance on Lives and Survivorships. Of these, the Society subsequently availed itself, and it was also indebted to the subject of our memoir for a variety of valuable suggestions which he made to it, and particularly a new method of keeping accounts. His next publication was An Account of the Progress from the Revolution, and the Present State, of Population in England and Wales, with an appendix, containing remarks on Mr. Eden's account of the population, &c. in his letter to Lord Carlisle. It appeared in 1780; and, on Lord Shelburne's becoming prime minister, our author was consulted by him in the formation of a scheme for discharging the national debt, which was introduced to the house of lords, but abandoned on a change of ministry. An account of it was published by Dr. Price, in 1783, in a treatise, entitled The State of the Public Debt, &c., in which he lays it down as a fundamental principle, that, in paying off debts with any given surplus appropriated to that purpose, their bearing a high, rather than a low, interest is a particular advantage. Price was also consulted by Mr. Pitt upon the subject of the national debt; and out of three plans, which he submitted for its reduction, that minister adopted the one which formed the foundation of that established by the legislature, in 1786, though no acknowledgment was made of its origin.

Dr.

In 1784, he published Observations on the Importance of the American Revolution, and the Means of making it useful to the World; in which, among other advice, he recommends the Americans to refrain from engaging in foreign commerce. It was diffusely circulated in America, and much read at the time, both there and at home. In 1786, in which year he removed to

Hackney, in consequence of the death of his wife, he published a volume of sermons on the Christian doctrine, as received by the different denominations of Christians, &c. The Semi-Arian doctrine is that adopted by himself; but a spirit of toleration to all sects breathed throughout the volume, in the concluding part of which are some sermons in counteraction to Hume's posthumous dialogues, equally admirable for their Christian temper and masterly arguments. In his discourse on the love of our country, delivered on the 4th of November, 1789, at the meetinghouse, in the Old Jewry, to the society for commemorating the revolution in Great Britain, &c. Dr. Price, made some remarks on the French revolution, which procured him many oppugners among those opposed to that event.

The most

able and the most virulent of them was the celebrated Edmund Burke, who, in his Reflections, treated our author with ridicule and contempt, and accused him of exulting in the sanguinary outrages of the French populace. Dr. Price made his defence in a preface to an edition of the above discourse, in 1790, which was, upon the whole, satisfactory.

Dr. Price was, for several years, one of the managers of the estates devised to charitable purposes, by Daniel Williams; and during the application of the dissenters to parliament, from 1772 to 1779, for relief from subscription, he was chosen one of their committee. He was one of the few who would not consent to a declaration of faith in the Scriptures, as the means of obtaining their desired object, on the ground of its implying an acknowledgment of the authority of the civil magistrate in matters of conscience. In 1783, the degree of LL.D. was conferred upon him by Yale College, in Connecticut, and he was subsequently elected a fellow of the Philosophical Societies at Philadelphia and Boston. He died, from the effects of a disorder which caused him the most acute suffering, on the 19th of March, 1791; and was followed to the grave by many distinguished public characters, with every testimony of respect and regret.

As a political and moral philosopher, Dr. Price must ever rank among the most candid and perspicuous, as well as

the most distinguished, of his day. In private life, it is impossible to conceive a more amiable character. To almost every one who knew him, his conduct was marked by some particular trait of kindness and generosity. The small portion which his father left him he divided between his two sisters, with the exception of a few pounds to pay the expenses of his journey to London. "As in early life," says a writer in The Encyclopædia Britannica," he was an affectionate and generous brother, in old age he was a loving and attentive husband." His wife, who, for a long time before her death, was almost wholly helpless, found, during the last years of her life, hardly any enjoyment, except in a game of whist; and, though our doctor disliked cards as a waste of time, and never touched them on any other occasion, to amuse her he would sit down every evening to a cardtable, and play till it was late, with a cheerfulness and good-humour, which charmed every person who had the happiness of viewing him in that endearing situation.

He suffered himself to be interrupted at all hours by any one who required his assistance or advice, which was frequently sought in matters relating to annuities and life assurances, and for which he would never accept remuneration. He regularly devoted a fifth part of his annual income to charitable purposes, and disposed of it in a manner equally unostentatious and judicious. Unconscious of his own excellences, and almost of his celebrity, he carried about him a modest dignity of manner approaching to humility. His countenance was pleasing and intelligent, his person short and slender, but muscular, and generally marked by a stoop, which had grown upon him from a habit of deep thought. Mrs. Chapone, who has drawn his character, in her Miscellanies, under the name of Simplicius, concludes with the following sentence : person ungraceful, and with manners unpolished by the world, his behaviour is always proper, easy, and respectable; as free from constraint and servility in the highest company, as from haughtiness and insolence in the lowest. dignity arises from his humility; and the sweetness, gentleness, and frankness of his manners, from the real

"with a

His

goodness and rectitude of his heart, which is open to inspection, in all the fearlessness of truth, without any need of disguise or ornament."

Besides the works already mentioned,

Dr. Price published several sermons on particular occasions, and contributed a variety of papers to The Philosophical Transactions, from the year 1763 to 1786.

ADAM SMITH, the son of the comptroller of the customs at Kirkaldy, in Scotland, was born there on the 5th of June, 1723, a few months subsequent to his father's decease. When about three years old, he was carried off from his uncle's house by a party of vagrant tinkers, from whom, however, he was soon recovered. He received the rudiments of education at the grammar-school of his native place, where he displayed an extraordinary passion for books, and great powers of memory. He was sent to the University of Glasgow, in 1737; and, in 1740, to Baliol College, Oxford, where he remained seven years. He then resided, for some time, with his mother, but without any fixed plan of life, having abandoned the church of England, for which he had been destined, when placed at Oxford. In 1748, he removed to Edinburgh, and, during that and the following year, read lectures on rhetoric and the belles lettres, under the patronage of Lord Kames. In 1751, he was elected professor of logic in the University of Glasgow; but, in the following year, he was removed to the chair of moral philosophy, which he held thirteen years, and used, it is said, to look back upon that period, as the happiest and most useful one of his life. His lectures, in both these professorships, were of the most masterly kind; but no part of them has been preserved, except what he himself published in his two principal works, the first of which, entitled, The Theory of Moral Sentiments, appeared in 1759, and met with general approbation. To this, he afterwards added, A Dissertation on the Origin of Languages, and on the Different Genius of those which are Original and Compounded. The reputation which these works acquired him, and his

popularity as a professor, induced Mr. Charles Townshend to engage him, in 1763, to become travelling tutor to the young Duke of Buccleugh, whose mother Mr. Townshend had lately married. This opportunity of extending the ideas he had already formed respecting political economy, was gladly seized by Mr. Smith, who resigned his professorship, and, in 1764, left England, with his pupil, for the continent. Before quitting Glasgow, he called to gether his former pupils, and returned the fees he had received from each; observing, that, as he had not completely fulfilled his engagement, he was resolved that his class should be taught that year gratis; and, at his departure, he left the remainder of his lectures, to be read for their benefit by one of the upper students.

After remaining abroad three years, in the course of which he became acquainted with Necker, D'Alembert, and other eminent writers, he returned to Scotland, and passed the next ten years of his life in almost uninterrupted retirement, with his mother, at Kirkaldy. How well his time had been employed, during his retreat, he gave a proof, in 1776, by the publication of his celebrated Inquiry into the Nature and Causes of the Wealth of Nations, a work recognised, throughout Europe, as the most profound and perspicuous dissertation of the kind that has ever been produced. "His illustrations," says a writer in The European Magazine, "are chiefly borrowed from the valuable French collection, Sur les Arts et Metiers; but the arrangement is his own; and as he has both carried his doctrines to a greater length, and fortified them with stronger proofs, than any of his predecessors, he deserves the chief praise, or chief blame, of propagating a system, which tends to

confound national wealth with national prosperity." About two years after the publication of this work, he was appointed a commissioner of the customs for Scotland, having passed much of the intermediate period amid the first society in London. In 1778, however, he returned, in consequence of the above appointment, to Edinburgh; and, in 1787, he was chosen lecturer of the University of Glasgow. He was indebted for the situation first mentioned to the influence of the Duke of Buccleugh; and, on his obtaining it, he offered to resign the annuity of £300 per annum, which had been granted him by his noble pupil, who, however, refused to discontinue the allowance. The death of Dr. Smith's mother, in 1784, and that of his cousin, in 1788, contributed, with the infirmities of age, to frustrate his subsequent literary projects; and he died, broken in health and spirits, in July, 1790. A few days before his decease, he gave orders to destroy all his manuscripts, with the exception of some detached essays, which were left to the care of his executors, and were published, in 1795, in one volume, quarto.

Of his intellectual gifts and attainments, of the originality and comprehensiveness of his views, the extent, variety, and correctness of his information, the fertility of his invention, and the ornaments which his rich imagination had borrowed from classical culture, Dr. A. Smith has left behind him lasting monuments. With all his

talents, however, he is acknowledged not to have been fitted for the general commerce of the world, or the business of active life. His habitual abstraction of thought rendered him inattentive to common objects; and he frequently exhibited instances of absence, which have scarcely been surpassed by the fancy of Addison or La Bruyère. It is related of him, that, whilst conducting his patron, Charles Townshend, to see the different manufactures of Glasgow, particularly a flourishing tanyard, he stopped on a plank placed across the tanning-pit, to discuss his favourite topic, the division of labour, when he suddenly fell headlong into the nauseous pool; an accident which, for some time, threatened fatal consequences.

Dr. Smith was a man of benevolent disposition and simplicity of character, which, however, was not free from the imputation of infidelity. Among other causes for this, has been assigned his intimacy with Hume; his publication of whose life was accompanied by such remarks on the opinions of the deceased, as made it apparent his own were similar, with respect to revealed religion. Bishop Horne addressed an anonymous letter to him in quence; and whether this circumstance, observes Dr. Aikin, had any effect in suppressing any further desire to appear in print, can only be conjectured, but he sent nothing afterwards to the press, except some additions to his Theory of Moral Sentiments.

conse

THIS eminent writer on moral philosophy, and moral and political science, was born at Logierait, in the Highlands of Perthshire, on the 20th of June, 1723. He was the son of a presbyterian clergyman, and received his education at the grammar-school of Perth, or, rather, under the master of that seminary; and at the University of St. Andrew's, which he entered in the autumn of 1738. He soon obtained a bursary, and took his degree of M. A. in May, 1742, without having added

much to his previous acquirements, in consequence of the indifferent abilities of the university professors, and of the little emulation that existed among the students. Being intended for the church, he was sent to the Divinity Hall at St. Andrew's, in the November of the year last-mentioned; and he afterwards studied theology, for about eighteen months, under Professors Gowdie and Cuming.

In 1745, he was selected by Lord John Murray, colonel of the forty