The rare second edition of “the first and greatest classic of modern economic thought” (PMM); one of 500 copies, the only other edition to be published in quarto format after the first edition of 1776.
“Where the political aspects of human rights had taken two centuries to explore, Smith’s achievement was to bring the study of economic aspects to the same point in a single work. The Wealth of Nations is not a system, but as a provisional analysis it is completely convincing” (PMM). “It had no rival in scope or depth when published and is still one of the few works in its field to have achieved classic status, meaning simply that it has sustained yet survived repeated reading, critical and adulatory, long after the circumstances which prompted it have become the object of historical enquiry” (ODNB).
For some time considered a straight reprint, the second edition in fact contains “a number of alterations large and small, some providing new information, some correcting matters of fact, some perfecting the idiom, and a large number now documenting references in footnotes” (Todd, p. 62).
Provenance: recently deaccessioned by Stirling Libraries and sold by Thomson Roddick Auctioneers in their 03/06/2025 Antiquarian Book Sale (Lot 50). Both volumes with residue from old Stirling Libraries bookplates removed from front pastedowns, partially erased small circular stamps to title pages, and purple classmark stamps to versos of terminal leaves. The book is accompanied by a letter of provenance confirming the deaccession.
Goldsmiths’ 11663; Kress B.154; Tribe 15; Vanderblue, p. 3; Printing and the Mind of Man, 221 (first edition); William B. Todd, ‘The Text and Apparatus’, in Vol. 1 of the 1976 edition of the Wealth of Nations.
