to connect Smith in any more special way than the other professors
with the University's timely hospitality to James Watt; but as that
act was a direct protest on behalf of industrial liberty against the
tyrannical spirit of the trade guilds so strongly condemned in the
_Wealth of Nations_, it is at least interesting to remember that Smith
had a part in it. Watt, it may be recollected, was then a lad of
twenty, who had come back from London to Glasgow to set up as
mathematical instrument maker, but though there was no other
mathematical instrument maker in the city, the corporation of
hammermen refused to permit his settlement because he was not the son
or son-in-law of a burgess, and had not served his apprenticeship to
the craft within the burgh. But in those days of privilege the
universities also had their privileges. The professors of Glasgow
enjoyed an absolute and independent authority over the area within
college bounds, and they defeated the oppression of Watt by making him
mathematical instrument maker to the University, and giving him a room
in the College buildings for his workshop and another at the College
gates for the sale of his instruments. In these proceedings Smith
joined, and joined, we may be sure, with the warmest approval. For we
know the strong light in which he regarded the oppressions of the
corporation laws. "The property which every man has in his labour," he
says, "as it is the original foundation of all other property, so it
is the most sacred and inviolable. The patrimony of the poor man lies
in the strength and dexterity of his hands, and to hinder him from
employing this strength and dexterity in what manner he thinks proper
without injury to his neighbour is a plain violation of this most
sacred property. It is a manifest encroachment upon the just liberty
both of the workman and of those who might be disposed to employ
him."[57] Watt's workshop was a favourite resort of Smith's during his
residence at Glasgow College, for Watt's conversation, young though he
was, was fresh and original, and had great attractions for the
stronger spirits about him. Watt on his side retained always the
deepest respect for Smith, and when he was amusing the leisure of his
old age in 1809 with his new invention of the sculpture machine, and
presenting his works to his friends as "the productions of a young
artist just entering his eighty-third year," one of the first works he
executed with the machine wa