The Wealth of Nations

　　亞當．斯密在封建歐洲解體之末，近代世界開始之時進行《國富論》的寫作，在這個世界中，封建制度仍以既得利益集團而寫作的。結果，這本書出過許多版，翻譯成幾乎每種文字，讀這本書的人主要是會從它的世界觀獲益的人，包括正在興起的工商業者階級，他們在世界各國議會中的政治執行委員會，他們在學術機關的思想執行委員會。通過所有這些人，這本書對下層人民產生了深刻影響。

Published in 1776, in the same year as the Declaration of Independence, The Wealth of Nations has had an equally great impact on the course of modern history. Adam Smith's celebrated defense of free market economies was written with such expressive power and clarity that the first edition sold out in six months. While its most remarkable and enduring innovation was to see the whole of economic life as a unified system, it is notable also as one of the Enlightenment's most eloquent testaments to the sanctity of the individual in his relation to the state.

Adam Smith was born in a small village in Kirkcaldy, Scotland in 1723. He entered the University of Glasgow at age fourteen, and later attended Balliol College at Oxford. After lecturing for a period, he held several teaching positions at Glasgow University. His greatest achievement was writing The Wealth of Nations (1776), a five-book series that sought to expose the true causes of prosperity, and installed him as the father of contemporary economic thought. He died in Edinburgh on July 19, 1790.