Preface
Adam Smith's Wealth of Nations was originally published in 1776. The present manuscript was printed in 1904, edited by Edwin Cannan.
The editor remarks that the present manuscript is cleaned, in a very basic sense. He corrected what he thought to be obvious typographical errors and period-specific conventions that might confuse the contemporary reader, but otherwise refrained from updating the language - "to dress up an eighteenth-century classic entirely in twentieth-century costume." In particular, he addressed mechanical issues, such as the random use of italics and setting certain passages in all-capitals. Inserted page breaks between chapters, rewrote the index, expunged frivolous footnotes, etc.
There is some history of the original editions: the first in 1776, the second in 1778, a third in 1784, a fourth in 1786, and a fifth in 1789 from which the present book was taken. The author considers the changes that were made to the manuscript during that time, then moves on to the evolution of Adam Smith's ideas during the period in which he lived. (EN: It's very interesting in a biographical and bibliophilial sense, but something of a red herring to my own study approach.)
A quick overview of the topics covered in each of the "books."
- Book 1: The division of labor, money, exchanges, and pricing.
- Book 2: The nature and divisions of stock, the accumulation of capital, interest rates, and methods of employing capital.
- Book 3:The "natural progress of opulence" from agriculture, then manufacturing, then foreign commerce.
- Book 4: Political economic systems - commerce versus agriculture, mercantilism, and colonialism.
- Book 5: The physiocratic and commercial systems and the finances of the government
More biographical information is given, with suggestions of how events, both economic and personal to the author, resulted in revisions to specific sections of the manuscript, and to events in earlier life that shaped his general perspective on the topic.