Econlib

The Library

Other Sites

 Front Page arrow Titles (by Subject) arrow 161.: To DAVID HUME - Glasgow Edition of the Works and Correspondence Vol. 6 Correspondence of Adam Smith

Return to Title Page for Glasgow Edition of the Works and Correspondence Vol. 6 Correspondence of Adam Smith

Search this Title:

161.: To DAVID HUME - 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.


161.

To DAVID HUME

  • Address: To David Hume Esqr

MS., GUL Gen. 1035/132; Scott 271–2.

Kirkcaldy, 16 June 1776

My Dear Friend

I am very sorry to Learn by Mr Strahan that the Bath Waters have not agreed with you for some time, so well as they appeared to do at first. You have found one Medicine which has agreed with you; travelling and change of air. I would continue, if I was you, during the continuance of the fine Season the constant application of that medicine without troubling myself with any other, and would spend the summer in Sauntering thro all the different corners of England without halting above two or three nights in any one place. If before the month of October you do not find yourself thoroughly re’established, you may then think of changing this cold climate for a better, and of visiting the venerable remains of antient and modern arts that are to be seen about Rome and the Kingdom of Naples. A mineral water is as much a drug as any that comes out of the Apothecaries Shop. It produces the same violent effects upon the Body. It occasions a real disease, tho’ a transitory one, over and above that which nature occasions. If the new disease is not so hostile to the old one as to contribute to expell it, it necessarily weakens the Power which nature might otherwise have to expell it. Change of air and moderate exercise occasion no new disease: they only moderate the hurtful effects of any lingering disease which may be lurking in the constitution; and thereby preserve the body in as good order as it is capable of being during the continuance of that morbid state. They do not weaken, but invigorate, the power of Nature to expel the disease. I reckon it probable that the Bath Waters had never agreed with you, but that the good effects of your journey not being spent when you began to use them, you continued for some time to recover, not by means of them, but in spite of them. Is it probable that the Buxton waters will do you more good? The Prescription supposed most likely to do good is always given first. If it fails, which it does nine times in ten, the second is surely likely to fail ninety nine time in a hundred. The journey to Buxton, however, may be of great service to you; but I would be sparing in the use of the water.

I am greatly obliged to you for your letter1 and for the unlimited confidence which you repose in me. If I should have the misfortune to survive you, you may depend upon my taking every possible measure which may prevent anything from being lost which you wish should be preserved. I ever am my Dearest friend

Most faithfully and affectionately yours

Adam Smith

I go to Edinburgh the day after tomorrow and it will be some weeks before I return to this town. I will therefore beg of you to direct to me to the care of Mr John Balfour, Bookseller.

[1 ]See Letters 156 and 157 from David Hume, both dated 3 May 1776, with directions about Dialogues concerning Natural Religion and My Own Life.