Adam Smith was a great Scottish philosopher and economist best known for The Wealth of Nations, his pioneering book on free trade and market economics. Smith was born in Kirkcaldy, Fife. The exact date of his birth is unknown, however he was baptized at Kirkcaldy on June 5, 1723. Unfortunately Smith's father died approximately six months before his baptism occurred. At the age of fifteen, Smith enrolled in Glasgow University. There he studied moral philosophy under Francis Hutcheson. In 1740 he entered Balliol college, Oxford where continued his studies until 1746.
             In 1751 Smith was appointed Professor of Logic at Glasgow University, transferring in 1752 to the chair of moral philosophy. While working there Smith wrote his Theory of Moral Sentiments. This work, which established Smith's reputation in his own day, is concerned with the explanation of moral approval and disapproval in which he based his explanation on sympathy. During this time, Smith's ideas on political economy began to develop, and he gave less attention in his lectures to his theories of morals and more to the political economy.
             At the end of 1763 Smith obtained a job as tutor to the young duke of Buccleuch and resigned from Glasgow. From 1764 until 1766 he traveled with his pupil, mostly in France, where he came to know such intellectual leaders as Turgot, D'Alembert, André Morellet, Helvétius and, in particular, Francois Quesnay, the head of the Physiocratic school whose work he much respected. On returning home to Kirkcaldy Smith began to write An Inquiry into the Nature and Causes of the Wealth of Nations, finally published in 1776.
             In The Wealth of Nations Smith proposed his theory of the division of labor in which he emphasized that value arises from the labor put forth in the process of production. The basic doctrine of The Wealth of Nations was that labor is the only source of a nation's wealth. He was led by the rational...