Mark Koyama of George Mason University writes to correct a mischaracterization of Adam Smith in Free Market: The History of an Idea by Jacob Soll:

A small amount of digging establishes that Soll’s version of Smith is mistaken. Soll’s physiocratic Smith is drawn from book 4, chapter 11 of the Wealth of Nations. There Smith describes the physiocratic system and contrasts it to the mercantile system that he associates with Colbert. Smith is very clear, however, that he is summarizing the views of François Quesnay, a French physiocratic economist, not his own views. Indeed, Smith says (only a few paragraphs down from the lines that Soll quotes): “The capital error of this system, however, seems to lie in its representing the class of artificers, manufacturers, and merchants as altogether barren and unproductive. The following observations may serve to show the impropriety of this representation.”
Smith was pointing out the flaws in both the mercantile system of Colbert and the agrarian-centered analysis of Quesnay, not endorsing their conclusions.

Read the whole thing here.