J. D.'s Reviews > The Theory of Moral Sentiments

The "Theory of Moral Sentiments" is based on Smith's assertion that we are both social ("mutally sympathetic") and self-interested beings, and that social order must be based on these two fundamental classes of moral sentiments.

On this foundation, Smith derives three virtues that promote social order. The first is propriety, which is self-command over the passions. This virtue is based on Smith's observation that, as individuals seek their own freedom, the freedom of one is not more important than the other's. Self-command therefore generates admiration ("approbation") and its lack generates disapproval. Smith writes at considerable length about the "the manhood of self-command," admiring in particular the Stoics (and the North American "savage") who, in Taoist fashion, control what is in their own power and accept what is not. The central thrust of self-command is the negative form of justice, which is to do no harm (i.e., to respect the freedom of others). Given the length Smith spends on this virtue, he may regard it as the most important of the three. The second virtue is prudence. Here, Smith acknowledges with the Epicureans that we seek pleasure and avoid pain, and that prudence involves accepting pain now for greater pleasure later or foregoing pleasure now to avoid pain later, which is in essence the same thing. We also avoid, for example, ostentatious displays so that we don't incite envy. The third virtue is benefice which is - and this is not so clear in Smith - promoting the generic happiness of humankind because god is said to command it (not because we are especially inclined to do so). This involves the positive form of justice which is to actively promote the happiness of others. Our task (and that of our leaders) is "to produce the greatest quantity of happiness." These three virtues work together as too much of one detracts from the other. Too much self-command neglects our softer side; too much self-love ignores the "amiable" side'; too much benefice lacks the discipline to protect one's self-interest.

Although tedious and difficult to read, Smith is better than other classical writers about identifying who we are and how we operate. At times, writing 100 years before Darwin's Origin, he sounds as though he is a modern NeoDarwinan as our most basic life impulse is not just survival but replication ("...self-preservation, and the propagation of the species, are the great ends which nature seems to have proposed in the formation of all animals.") Freedom to pursue self-interest serves as the means to these life ends. When we each pursue our self-interest, we conflict with others who do the same, thereby necessitating the three Smithian virtues to preserve order. Overseeing our application of these virtues is the fictitious impartial spectator who in conscience-like fashion reminds us that our freedom is, in the grand cosmic scheme, not more important than another's. That self-control is a challenge, Smith is well aware. Unlike most other writers, but like Veblen later, Smith identifies the prevalence of rank and reputation as driving forces because these have a direct bearing on our ability to command resources to survive, including garnering the assistance of others. Also, unlike most other theorists, Smith discusses throughout this long book the importance of looking good to one's community. This conformist tendency, which foreshadows Darwin's assertion about our tribal nature, has survival value as we receive benefits and avoid harm when we maintain ourselves as group members in good standing.

Also better than most theorists, Smith identifies the role of imagination in magnifying pleasure and pain. The body, he says, experiences both in an immediate way. With mind and imagination, we can hold vast amounts of past pain and we can entertain vast hopes for future pleasure. Interestingly, Smith gives us a beginning theory of boredom when he writes that "Our imagination, which in pain and sorrow seems to be confined and cooped up within our own persons, in times of ease and prosperity expands itself to every thing around us." This hope for "the pleasures of wealth and greatness" is a "deception which rouses and keeps in continual motion the industry of mankind."

Smith, like most other theorists, lodges "motive" in the external world so that we react to stimuli. He refers seamlessly to "objects of fear" and to "objects of self-interest" but this somewhat misrepresents the dialectical exchange between the self and the world. Why do objects create fear if we do not first have the capacity for fear inside? Is the motive - that which moves us - inside or outside? It is the same question with the more general notion of self-interest. Why do we seek food, sexual mates, conformity to the group, and rank and reputation unless we have an internal need for such things because they serve our self-interest? After all, Smith does say that the passions of pride and resentment and "ambition, animosity, the love of honour and the dread of shame, the desire of victory, superiority, and revenge" all "defend us against injuries," and that the passions "founded in love of pleasure" all "provide for the support and necessities of the body."

Smith takes human nature as it is in all its flaws (e.g., we live for the opinions of others, to be loved and admired; we admire the rich and indulge them in their excesses and sins because they are industrious as compared to those good-natured people who are slothful or to "the effeminate man") and Smith builds on that weak foundation by specifying what we ought to be (follow the three virtues). Where Smith's theory breaks down is in his assumption that we are all the same. That is at odds with the variability of human nature that lies at the heart of Darwinian evolution. We are not all the same. Self-regard and other-regard both serve self-interest, but we all have more of one than the other. That's particularly true of self-interest, which is relatively void of other-regardedness, particularly for those who are not of our group. If the rich and powerful, or Joe Blow, can screw others and get away with it, what do they care about benefice or what the impartial spectator thinks? And that's the problem with free markets and unfettered capitalism.