Samuel Smiles

Samuel Smiles (December 23, 1812 – April 16, 1904), was a Scottish author and reformer.

Smiles's writings

Smiles is best known today as the writer of books extolling virtues of self help, and biographies lauding the achievements of 'heroic' engineers. Most of these biographies were contained in the four volume work, The Lives of Engineers, but he also wrote many other biographies. He selected the topics of his biographies as a means of emphasising his thesis of self help. These works have come to exemplify Victorian values for the modern reader. He received some criticism in his own time from socialist because of his emphasis on individual achievement.

Related Topics:
Self help - Biographies - Engineer - Victorian values

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He was a prolific author of books and articles. The following is an incomplete list of his most important work. See Jarvis, below, for a full listing of his writings.

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Self help topics

• Self-Help, London, 1859
• Character, London, 1871
• Thrift, London, 1875
• Duty, London, 1880
• Life and Labour, London 1887

Biographical works

• The Life of George Stephenson, London, 1857
• The Story of The Life of George Stephenson, London, 1859 (abridgement of the above)
• Brief biographies, Boston, 1860 (articles reprinted from periodicals such as the Quarterly Review)
• Lives of the Engineers, 3 vol, London 1862
• Vol 1, Early engineers - James Brindley, Sir Cornelius Vermuyden, Sir Hugh Myddleton, Capt John Perry
• Vol 2, Harbours, Lighthouses and Bridges - John Smeaton and John Rennie, (1761-1821)
• Vol 3, History of Roads - John Metcalfe and Thomas Telford
• Industrial Biography, London, 1863

:: Includes lives of Andrew Yarranton, Dud Dudley, Henry Maudslay, Joseph Clement, etc..

Related Topics:
Andrew Yarranton - Dud Dudley - Henry Maudslay - Joseph Clement

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• Boulton and Watt, London, 1865
• The Huguenots: Their Settlements, Churches and Industries in England and Ireland, London, 1867
• Lives of the Engineers, new ed. in 5 vols, London, 1874

:: (includes the lives of Stephenson and Boulton and Watt)

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• Life of a Scotch Naturalist: Thomas Edward, London, 1875
• George Moore, Merchant and Philanthropist, London & New York, 1878
• Robert Dick, Baker of Thurso, Geologist and Botanist, London, 1878
• Men of Invention and Industry, London, 1884

:: Phineas Pett, Francis Petit Smith, John Harrison, John Lombe, William Murdock, Frederic Koenig,The Walter family of The Times, William Clowes, Charles Bianconi, and chapters on Industry in Ireland, Shipbuilding in Belfast, Astronomers and students in humble life

Related Topics:
Phineas Pett - Francis Petit Smith - John Harrison - John Lombe - William Murdock - Frederic Koenig - William Clowes - Charles Bianconi - Industry in Ireland - Shipbuilding in Belfast

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• James Nasmyth, engineer, an autobiography, ed. Samuel Smiles, London, 1885
• A Publisher and his Friends. Memoir and Correspondence of the Late John Murray, London, 1891
• Jasmin. Barber, Poet, Philanthropist, London, 1891
• Josiah Wedgwood, his Personal History, London, 1894
• The Autobiography of Samuel Smiles, LLD, ed. T. Mackey, London, 1905

The growth of industrial archaeology in Britain from the 1960s caused a number of these titles to be reprinted, and a number are available on the Web from such sources as Project Gutenberg, noted below.

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