eve of the election, Stuart suddenly retired from the field, in consequence apparently of some personal considerations arising between himself and the Duke of Hamilton.  He was extremely anxious to have his reasons for this unexpected step immediately and fully explained to his personal friends in Edinburgh, and on the 22nd of April—­the day before he wrote his resignation—­he sent his whole correspondence with the Duke of Hamilton about the matter through to John Davidson, W.S., for their perusal, and especially, it would appear, for the perusal of Smith, the only one he names.  “There is particularly,” he says, “one friend, Mr. Adam Smith, whom I wish to be fully informed of everything.”  Being the only friend specifically named in the letter, Smith seems to have been consulted by Davidson as to any other “particular friends” to whom the correspondence should be submitted, and he wrote Davidson on the 7th of May 1784 advising him to show it to Campbell of Stonefield, one of the Lords of Session, and a brother-in-law of Lord Bute.  He says—­

My Lord Stonefield is an old attached and faithful friend of A. Stuart.  The papers relative to the County of Lanark may safely be communicated to him.  He is perfectly convinced of the propriety of what you and I agreed upon, that the subject ought to be talked of as little as possible, and never but among his most intimate and cordial friends.

     A. SMITH.

     Friday, 7th May.[334]

After being brightened by the agreeable visit of Burke, Smith was presently cast into the deepest sadness by what seems to have been the first trouble of his singularly serene and smooth life—­the death of his mother.  She died on the 23rd of May, in her ninetieth year.  The three avenues to Smith, says the Earl of Buchan, were always his mother, his books, and his political opinions—­his mother apparently first of all.  They had lived together, off and on, for sixty years, and being most tenderly attached to her, he is said, after her death, never to have seemed the same again.  According to Ramsay of Ochtertyre, he was so disconsolate that people in general could find no explanation except in his supposed unbelief in the resurrection.  He sorrowed, they said, as those who have no hope.  People in general would seem to have little belief in the natural affections; but while they extracted from Smith’s filial love a proof of his infidelity, Archdeacon John Sinclair seeks to extract from it a demonstration of his religious faith.  It appears that when Mrs. Smith was visited on her deathbed by her minister, her famous son always remained in the room and joined in the prayers, though they were made in the name and for the sake of Christ; and the worthy Archdeacon thinks no infidel would have done that.

The depression Smith showed after his mother’s death, however, was unfortunately due in part to the fact that his own health was beginning to fail.  He was now sixty-one; as Stewart tells us, he aged very rapidly, and in two years more he was in the toils of the malady that carried him off.  The shock of his mother’s death could not help therefore telling severely upon him in his declining bodily condition.