TRACKING A UNICORN IN ADAM SMITH'S EDINBURGH

SET AMONG CRAGS, hills, and Gothic spires, Edinburgh—also known as “Auld Reekie” or “Old Smokey”—was an unlikely center of progress in the 18th century: congested and smelly, with a sordid underground at the edge of an empire. Yet it was there that Adam Smith first published his Theory of Moral Sentiments in 1759.

- Amanda France and Kent Lassman

Three decades later, Smith finished the sixth and final edition after having returned to Edinburgh, shortly before his death in 1790, making it both his first and last major work. Since then, the book has served as a grounding for the practice of living well and peacefully with empathy for one another. As Smith wrote, “Man naturally desires, not only to be loved, but to be lovely.”

There is nowhere better to get re-acquainted with Smith than Edinburgh. Its past remains visible in the soot-covered buildings of Old Town. Beyond the cobbled wynds and imposing cliffside fortress, the city is now integrated with the surrounding New Town and its many gated private gardens. The place has stunning medieval, Georgian, and Victorian architecture, a rich history, and an evocative art scene. It’s little wonder it was named “Europe's Leading Cultural City Destination 2024” by the World Travel Awards.

In Smith’s day, Edinburgh was the epicenter of the Scottish Enlightenment—the vital beating heart of liberal advances in science, medicine, mathematics, literature, legal reform, architecture, and moral philosophy. Scottish novelist, surgeon, and playwright Tobias Smollett described the burgeoning city as a “hot bed of genius.” John Amyatt, the king’s chemist, remarked that “Edinburgh enjoyed a noble privilege not possessed by any other city in Europe....Here stand I, at what is called the Cross of Edinburgh, and can in a few minutes take fifty men of genius by the hand.”