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273.: From JOHN LOGAN - 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.


273.

From JOHN LOGAN

MS., GUL Gen. 1035/171; Scott 304–5.

London, 20 Aug. 1787

Dear Sir

I am happy to hear from Mr Mackenzie1 that you have got down to Edinburgh in good health. There is an old acquaintance of mine, Dr Rutherford, a Dissenting Clergyman and Master of an Academy at Ux–bridge, who is publishing ‘A View of antient History’ by Subscription. He is a good natured friendly man and there is something interesting in his Situation. Soon after he began the business of teaching he was called to visit one of his former pupils who was in a fever; the boy died in his arms, and at the same time the Father was arrested for the Sum of fifteen hundred pounds and would have been carried to prison if Dr Rutherford had not been Security for him, who had the whole to pay. This was probably a London trick, but embarrassed Rutherford very much. Independent of this consideration, the book will not only be a good one but the very best on the Subject.2 May I therefor hope that you will do him the honour to be one of his Subscribers? The book is to be published in three Volumes large Octavo, but I only ask the favour of you to subscribe for the first. If you could interest the family of Buccleugh in this affair, I would look upon it as a great favour, their names would be of great Service to the keeper of an Academy.

The King of Prussia and our Court seem determined to support the Prince of Orange, at the same time I have no apprehension of a war.3 The Duke of York is figuring away here at present, and is very popular, which is not wonderful when we consider the Character of the Royal Competitors he has to struggle with.4

Lord George Gordon has returned to London and what is more extraordinary has become a Jew. He lodges at the house of my Taylor, goes to the Synagogue on Saturdays and eats no meat but what is killed by the Jews. He is said to be making love to a rich Jewess but I suspect his plans are deeper, and that he intends to set up as Messiah, a trade which has never been very successful. He set up a hideous and horrid roar when he was circumcised.5

I set off to the country this day to remain for a fortnight which makes me Shorten my letter. Believe me to be ever,

Sir, Your faithful humble Servant

J: Logan

[1 ]Henry Mackenzie the novelist.

[2 ]Robert Chambers states that the View of Antient History was written by Logan, though published over the name of Rutherford (Dictionary of Eminent Scotsmen iii. 492). The View was published in 2 vols. 1788, 1791, and reached ed. 3 in 1809. Similar letters to engage sympathy for ‘Rutherford’ and float the book went elsewhere, e.g., to the Revd. Alexander Carlyle (Scott 304).

[3 ]See Letter 270, n. 3.

[4 ]Frederick Augustus (1763–1827) 2nd s. of George III, cr. Duke of York 1784. He made his career in the Army, and indifferent success in the Flanders campaign of 1793–5 brought him immortality in the nursery rhyme, ‘The Grand Old Duke of York’. He became C.–in–C. in 1798, but lost his position in 1809 as a result of a storm in Parliament over the corrupt practices of his mistress, Mrs. Mary Anne Clarke. In 1811 he was reinstated in his command. Save for the eccentric Duke of Cambridge, all of George III’s sons led irregular lives.

[5 ]Lord George Gordon (1751–93) 3rd s. of the 3rd Duke of Gordon, focus of the anti–Catholic riots of June 1780 in which 458 people were killed or wounded. Following his conversation to judaism, Gordon was imprisoned in 1788 for a libel on the Queen of France and died in jail five years later.