Adam Smith on colonial trade and the “epic poem of the birth of commerce”

Some of the contemporary readers of Adam Smith did not accept his view of the harmful role played by company monopolies in the organisation of colonial trade. The Scottish poet William J. Mickle made one of the most incisive criticisms of Smith’s views on this subject. One of Mickle’s most important works was the English translation of Os Lusíadas, an epic poem written by the Portuguese poet Luís de Camões in 1572. In the 1778 edition of the introduction to the history of Portuguese trade in East Asia, Mickle used this historical experience as an instrument to criticise Smith’s work.