What was David Hume’s friendship with Adam Smith like?

David Hume and the Scottish economist Adam Smith shared a close and enduring friendship. Their relationship was characterized by mutual respect and intellectual camaraderie, with Smith eventually serving as Hume’s literary executor.1

Following Hume’s death, Smith wrote a letter reflecting on his friend’s character, in which he famously judged Hume as "approaching as nearly to the idea of a perfectly wise and virtuous man as perhaps the nature of human frailty will permit".1

Their connection extended into their professional lives as well. While the extent of Hume’s direct influence on Smith’s economic theories remains a subject of historical uncertainty, the two men held broadly similar principles and both utilized historical examples to support their arguments. Earlier in their careers, there was even an attempt to have Hume appointed as Smith’s successor to the chair of logic at the University of Glasgow, though the appointment was blocked by rumors of atheism.21