The anniversary of the publication of the Wealth of Nations gives us cause to pause and consider what Adam Smith achieved in writing that book. He is, as the commonplace goes, the founding father of economics, and the fact that we are marking the publication of his great book, and in doing so acknowledging its impact on the development of that discipline, is a concrete symbol of his lasting achievement.

In our times it seems that there are two common responses to the anniversary of a ‘great’ book.