Author’s note: the next part of my revised paper “Adam Smith in the City of Lights” revisits Smith’s return to Paris in 1766. Below is an excerpt, where I explains how Smith once again found himself in Paris in 1766:

Request to relocate

After taking up residence in the tranquil French town of Toulouse, Smith and Duke Henry were subsequently joined by Henry’s younger brother, Hew Campbell Scott. As a result, the Scottish philosopher now had two teenage boys under his care: Duke Henry, who was 17 when he began his grand tour in Paris in 1764, and Hew, who was just a year younger than Henry.

At some point in time, however, perhaps after the arrival of his brother Hew, Duke Henry wrote a letter to his stepfather, the British politician Charles Townshend (pictured below), requesting permission to relocate to Paris. (As an aside, according to Alain Alcouffe and Philippe Massot-Bordenave, it was Smith–not his teenage pupils Henry and Hew–who wanted to relocate from Toulouse to Paris. Alcouffe and Massot-Bordenave also speculate that Smith was becoming “impatient” to relocate to the French capital. See Alcouffe & Massot-Bordenave 2020, p. 283.)

For his part, Townshend granted the request to relocate in a letter addressed to Duke Henry dated April 22, 1765. (For reference, Lord Townshend’s reply to his stepson is reprinted in full in Alcouffe & Massot-Bordenave 2020, pp. 284–285; Fay 1956, p. 152; and Ross 1974, pp. 182–184.) For some unknown reason, though, Smith was in no hurry to leave Toulouse, after all, for Smith and his teenage pupils remained in the south of France until the fall of 1765 before travelling to Geneva and then to Paris. (See timeline in Alcouffe & Massot-Bordenave 2020, pp. xiii-xiv.) In addition, when Townshend finally granted Duke Henry’s request to relocate to Paris, he also warns his stepson “against any female attachment” (Alcouffe & Massot-Bordenave 2020, p. 284; Ross 1974, p. 184). The relevant (and juiciest) part of Townsend’s letter contains the following injunction:

If you go much into mixed company, as I suppose you will, let me warn you against any female attachment. Your rank & fortune will put women of subtle characters upon projects which you should not be the dupe of, for such connexions make a young man both ridiculous & unhappy. Gallantry is one thing; attachment is another; a young man should manifest spirit & decorum even in this part of his character, & preserve his mind entire & free in lesser as well as greater things.

Could Townsend’s dire admonition “against any female attachment” have also been meant for Adam Smith? (See, e.g., Guerra-Pujol 2021.) Either way, Townsend’s warning may not have been an academic or abstract one, for an aristocratic female contemporary with direct knowledge of Lord Townsend’s habits and dispositions, Lady Louisa Stuart (1827, p. 38), once described Duke Henry’s stepfather as “a man of pleasure, a libertine.” In any case, Smith eventually returned to the City of Light sometime in February 1766, almost two years to the day of his first visit to Paris in 1764.

To be continued …