The Theory of Moral Sentiments (1759)

The best self-improvement book I've ever read. ( )

Addler claims this is a must read to understand "The Wealth Of The Nations"

Like many great thinkers who are scorned by the disciples of collectivism, Adam Smith (1723-1790) displays a depth of understanding that is rather alien to the white noise that too often passes for our intellectual life. Anyone familiar with his work knows that his precision and the organization of his arguments border on perfection.

Another aspect of his writing that stands out is his acknowledgement of reality. This is not to be taken for granted; not long after his death, the flirtation with Socialism began, forever scarring the cultural landscape.

Smith was not interested in fantasies, but rather in improving the lot of real people, via a truly scientific analysis of human society. His legacy was inherited by thinkers such as Tocqueville and Hayek, but unfortunately it did not make deep inroads into the dominant strains of 20th century social science.

Smith is best known for his magnum opus, "The Wealth of Nations." His other writing should not be neglected. This includes, of course, "The Theory of Moral Sentiments." Different in tone, it is thoroughly Smithian in its depth and its approach to reality. Here, his grasp of the entire range of the human condition shines forth in all its brilliance.

Typical is his juxtaposition of "beneficence" (love, kindness, and mercy) with justice. Justice, says Smith, must be ranked as a higher priority. His reasoning is as follows. Man, being the social animal that he is, "can subsist only in society." And that society can survive only if its members extend to one another mutual assistance. The preferable scenario:

"Where the necessary assistance is reciprocally afforded from love, from gratitude, from friendship, and esteem, the society flourishes and is happy. All the different members of it are bound together by the agreeable bands of love and affection, and are, as it were, drawn to one common centre of mutual good offices."

If this should prove impossible, society can still function adequately by recognizing the utility and necessity of mutual assistance:

"Society may subsist among different men, as among different merchants, from a sense of its utility, without any mutual love or affection; and though no man in it should owe any obligation, or be bound in gratitude to any other, it may still be upheld by a mercenary exchange of good offices according to an agreed valuation."

But if this arrangement is eroded, society will find itself in dire straits:

"Society, however, cannot subsist among those who are at all times ready to hurt and injure one another. The moment that injury begins, the moment that mutual resentment and animosity take place, all the bands of it are broken asunder, and the different members of which it consisted are, as it were, dissipated and scattered abroad by the violence and opposition of their discordant affections. If there is any society among robbers and murderers, they must at least, according to the trite observation, abstain from robbing and murdering each other. Beneficence, therefore, is less essential to the existence of society than justice. Society may subsist, though not in the most comfortable state, without beneficence; but the prevalence of injustice must utterly destroy it."

What a chilling premonition of our own flirtation with over-inflated beneficence--such as victim worship--at the expense of justice.

It is a measure of his intellectual honesty that Smith can point to the futility, from the standpoint of the individual, of the obsession with wealth and power. In a passage reminiscent of Ecclesiastes, he writes:

"In the langour of disease and the weariness of old age, the pleasures of the vain and empty distinctions of greatness disappear...In this miserable aspect does greatness appear to every man when reduced, either by spleen or disease, to observe with attention his own situation, and to consider what it is that is really wanting to his happiness. Power and riches appear then to be, what they are, enormous and operose machines contrived to produce a few trifling conveniences to the body, consisting of springs the most nice and delicate, which must be kept in order with the most anxious attention, and which, in spite of all our care, are ready every moment to burst into pieces, and to crush in their ruins their unfortunate possessor."

Despite this sober view of human foibles, Smith once again rises to his role as the consummate social scientist, separating personal behavior and motivation from its effect on the whole:

"And it is well that nature imposes upon us in this manner. It is this deception [of wealth and power] which rouses and keeps in continual motion the industry of mankind. It is this which first prompted them to cultivate the ground, to build houses, to found cities and commonwealths, and to invent and improve all the sciences and arts, which ennoble and embellish human life..."

There is much to learn from this genius of Western civilization. ( )