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4.: To his Mother - Adam Smith, Glasgow Edition of the Works and Correspondence Vol. 6 Correspondence of Adam Smith [1740]

Edition used:

Correspondence of Adam Smith, ed. E. C. Mossner and I. S. Ross, vol. VI of the Glasgow Edition of the Works and Correspondence of Adam Smith (Indianapolis: Liberty Fund, 1987).

Part of: The Glasgow Edition of the Works and Correspondence of Adam Smith, 7 vols.

About Liberty Fund:

Liberty Fund, Inc. is a private, educational foundation established to encourage the study of the ideal of a society of free and responsible individuals.


4.

To his Mother

  • Address: To Mrs Smith at Kirkaldy

MS., GUL Gen. 1035/128; Scott 233.

[Oxford,] 12 May [1742]1

Dear Mother

I take this opportunity of writing to you, by a Gentleman of my acquaintance who sets out for Scotland tomorrow. The Certificate of my age which I mentioned in my last Letter’s, will not be necessary so soon as I then expected; if you have not sent it already, it will come in full time if you give it to Mr Smith2 when he returns from Scotland. I told you in my last to inform Mr Smith that one of the £40 Exhibitions3 would shortly be vacant, in case that he intended to make interest for any of his friends: ’Twill not however be vacant so soon as I expected. The Gentleman who carry’s this to Edinburgh (one Mr Preston)4 I have been very much oblig’d to; he will probably be at Kirkaldy and will wait upon you before he leaves Scotland.

I am Dear Mother, Yours etc.

A S

[1 ]The date is indicated by the fact that the ‘Mr Preston’ referred to it in the letter did not resign his Snell Exhibition until 1743.

[2 ]Very likely the William Smith of Letter 1.

[3 ]On the Snell Foundation.

[4 ]John Preston (c. 1718–81), ygr. son of Sir George Preston, Bt., of Valleyfield, who resigned his Snell Exhibition in 1743 and entered the Church of England. The next vacancy occurred in 1747.