The Theory of Moral Sentiments

by Adam Smith

Nature, for the wisest purposes, has rendered, in most men, perhaps in all men, parental tenderness a much stronger affection than filial piety.

THey have sometimes been suspected of displaying their piety to their parents with too much ostentation.

Sometimes affection for parents maybe exaggerated to hide our contempt from the years of a contentious relationship with them, especially in later years.

The ostentatious sorrow of widows has, for a like reason, been suspected of insincerity.

which we naturally feel for the misfortunes of our nearest connections, is always much more offended by the defect,

There is universal condemnation for child neglect but none for spoiling a child and giving no discipline.

who accommodate themselves with the greatest ease to their new situation, who seem to feel no humiliation from the change, but to rest their rank in the society, not upon their fortune,

The medicines of the physician are often the greatest torment of the incurable patient.

The man who feels the most for the joys and sorrows of others, is best fitted for acquiring the most complete control of his own joys and sorrows.

For his own ease, he is too apt to learn to make light of the misfortunes

the world men of great humanity who have little self-command,

who are indolent and irresolute, and easily disheartened,

on the contrary men of the most perfect self-command, whom no difficulty can disc...

but who, at the same time, seem to be hardened against all sense either o...

justice. In the most unjust war, however, it is commonly the sovereign or the rulers only who are guilty.

A true party-man hates and despises candour;

Of all the corrupters of moral sentiments, therefore, faction and fanaticism have always been by far the greatest.

when we are about to act;

after we have acted.

but they are apt to be most partial when it is of most importance that they should be otherwise.

We lack critical thinking, many times, when it is most important.

the eagerness of passion will seldom allow us to consider what we are doing,

Look at a situation, dispassionately.

Whatever gratifies the taste is sweet, whatever pleases the eye is beautiful, whatever soothes the ear is harmonious.

The very essence of each of those qualities consists in its being fitted to please the sense to which it is addressed.

The happiness of mankind, as well as of all other rational creatures, seems to have been the original purpose intended by the Author of nature,

But by acting according to the dictates of our moral faculties,

pursue the most effectual means for promoting the happiness of mankind,

What reward is most proper for promoting the practice of truth, justice, and humanity?

The confidence, the esteem, and love of those we live with.

Humanity does not desire to be great, but...

A person may be very easily misrepresented with regard to a particular action; but it is scarce possible that he should be so with regard to the general tenor of his conduct.

And wherever the natural principles of religion are not corrupted by the factious and party zeal of some worthless cabal; wherever the first duty which it requires, is to fulfil all the obligations of morality;

I. First, I say, it will depend upon the natural

agreeableness or deformity of the affection itself,

how far our actions ought to ar...

This spirit and keenness constitutes the difference between the man of enterprise and the man of dull regularity.

Secondly, I say, it will depend partly upon the precision and exactness, or the looseness and inaccuracy of the general rules themselves,

justice: the man who in that refines the least, and adheres with the most obstinate stedfastness to the general rules themselves, is the most commendable,

A man often becomes a villain the moment he begins, even in his own heart, to chicane in this manner.

the tragedy of Mahomet,

Mr Voltaire's,

It appears in his fancy like the life of some superior rank of beings, and, in order to arrive at it, he devotes himself for ever to the pursuit of wealth and greatness.

The produce of the soil maintains at all times nearly that number of inhabitants which it is capable of maintaining.

They are led by an invisible hand to make nearly the same distribution of the necessaries of life, which would have been made, had the earth been divided into equal portions

The invisible hand forces equality of the distribution of resources.

All constitutions of government, however, are valued only in proportion as they tend to promote the happiness of those who live under them.

The qualities most useful to ourselves are, first of all, superior reason and understanding, by which we are capable of discerning the remote consequences of all our actions,

Self-awareness about the quality of our actions is primacy.

It is in the abstruser sciences, particularly in the higher parts of mathematics, that the greatest and most admired exertions of human reason have been displayed.

Math often requires the application of many ideas to have utility.

That self-command, in the same manner, by which we restrain our present appetites, in order to gratify them more fully upon another occasion,

Humanity is the virtue of a woman, generosity of a man.

To him his own life is of infinitely more value than the conquest of a whole kingdom for the state which he serves.

the beauty of every object consists in that form and colour, which is most usual among things of that particular sort

Those, on the contrary, who have had the misfortune to be brought up amidst violence, licentiousness, falsehood, and injustice; lose,

conduct, yet all sense of its dreadful enormity, or of the vengeance and punishment due to