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The first part of the article puts Ferguson’s Essay in the context of the Scottish Enlightenment, the intellectual current comprising David Hume, Adam Smith and many other eminent men of letters and science. This movement was part of a wider cultural renaissance, in turn related to the rapid social transformation which the country underwent at the time. Particular attention is paid to the three institutions that succeeded in maintaining a relative autonomy after the Union with England in 1707: law, church, and education. Some of the ideas that were shared by the Scottish Enlightenment are explained with the help of an example: David Hume. The second part of the article begins by providing information on the origin of Ferguson’s text which goes back to a “Treatise on refinement,” a manuscript that circulated in 1759 among the author’s friends. Some methodological characteristics of the Essay are explained by showing the similarities with Buffon’s Histoire naturelle. From a final synopsis of Ferguson’s work emerge some of its central features: the social nature of man, a topic on which special attention is paid to the relationship of Ferguson to Montesquieu, the distinctive conception of “progress” as a result of “unintended consequences,” and the analysis of the ambiguous results of the division of labour.