The Wealth of Nations

Through the greater part of the Book, therefore, whenever the present state of things is mentioned, it is to be understood of the state they were in, either about that time, or at some earlier period, during the time I was employed in writing the Book. To this10 third Edition, however, I have made several additions, particularly to the chapter upon Drawbacks, and to that upon Bounties; likewise a new chapter entitled, ‘The Conclusion of the Mercantile System;’ and a new article to the chapter upon the expenses of the sovereign. In all these additions, the present state of things means always the state in which they were during the year 1783 and the beginning of the present11 year 1784.”

Comparing the second and the third editions we find that the additions to the third are considerable. As the Preface or “Advertisement” just quoted remarks, the chapter entitled “Conclusion of the Mercantile System” (vol. ii, pp. 141⁠–⁠60) is entirely new, and so is the section “Of the Public Works and Institutions which are necessary for facilitating particular Branches of Commerce” (vol. ii, pp. 223⁠–⁠48). Certain passages in Book IV, chapter iii, on the absurdity of the restrictions on trade with France (vol. i, pp. 437⁠–⁠8 and 459⁠–⁠60), the three pages near the beginning of Book IV, chapter iv, upon the details of various drawbacks (vol. ii, pp. 2⁠–⁠5), the ten paragraphs on the herring fishery bounty (vol. ii, pp. 20⁠–⁠4) with the appendix on the same subject (pp. 435⁠–⁠7), and a portion of the discussion of the effects of the corn bounty (vol. ii, pp. 10⁠–⁠11) also appear first in the third edition. With several other additions and corrections of smaller size these passages were printed separately in quarto under the title of “Additions and Corrections to the First and Second Editions of Dr. Adam Smith’s Inquiry into the Nature and Causes of the Wealth of Nations.”12 Writing to Cadell in December, 1782, Smith says:⁠—

“I hope in two or three months to send you up the second edition corrected in many places, with three or four very considerable additions, chiefly to the second volume. Among the rest is a short but, I flatter myself, a complete history of all the trading companies in Great Britain. These additions I mean not only to be inserted at their proper places into the new edition, but to be printed separately and to be sold for a shilling or half a crown to the purchasers of the old edition. The price must depend on the bulk of the additions when they are all written out.”13

Besides the separately printed additions there are many minor alterations between the second and third editions, such as the complacent note on the adoption of the house tax (vol. ii, p. 328), the correction of the estimate of possible receipts from the turnpikes (vol. ii, p. 218, note), and the reference to the expense of the American war (vol. ii, p. 409), but none of these is of much consequence. More important is the addition of the lengthy index surmounted by the rather quaint superscription “N.B. The Roman numerals refer to the Volume, and the figures to the Page.” We should not expect a man of Adam Smith’s character to make his own index, and we may be quite certain that he did not do so when we find the misprint “tallie” in vol. ii, p. 320, reappearing in index (s.v. Montauban) although “taille” has also a place there. But the index is far from suggesting the work of an unintelligent back, and the fact that the “Ayr bank” is named in it (s.v. Banks), though nameless in the text, shows either that the index-maker had a certain knowledge of Scotch banking history or that Smith corrected his work in places. That Smith received a packet from Strahan “containing some part of the index” on 17th November, 1784, we know from his letter to Cadell, published in the Economic Journal for September, 1898. Strahan had inquired whether the index was to be printed in quarto along with the Additions and Corrections, and Smith reminded him that the numbers of the pages would all have to be altered to “accommodate them to either of the two former editions, of which the pages do not in many places correspond.” There is therefore no reason for not treating the index as an integral part of the book.

The fourth edition, published in 1786, is printed in the same style and with exactly the same pagination as the third. It reprints the advertisement to the third edition, altering, however, the phrase “this third Edition,” into “the third Edition,” and “the present year 1784” into “the year 1784,” and adds the following “Advertisement to the Fourth Edition”:⁠—

“In this fourth Edition I have made no alterations of any kind. I now, however, find myself at liberty to acknowledge my very great obligations to Mr. Henery Hop14 of Amsterdam. To that Gentleman I owe the most distinct, as well as liberal information, concerning a very interesting and important subject, the Bank of Amsterdam; of which no printed account had ever appeared to me satisfactory, or even intelligible. The name of that Gentleman is so well known in Europe, the information which comes from him must do so much honour to whoever has been favoured with it, and my vanity is so much interested in making this acknowledgment, that I can no longer refuse myself the pleasure of prefixing this Advertisement to this new Edition of my Book.”

In spite of his statement that he had made no alterations of any kind, Smith either made or permitted a few trifling alterations between the third and fourth editions. The subjunctive is very frequently substituted for the indicative after “if,” the phrase “if it was” in particular being constantly