The Final Word on Moral Judgment — The Theory of Moral Sentiments

Smith classifies sentimentalist theories into those positing a peculiar moral sense and those deriving approbation from sympathy. Dr. Hutcheson, having excluded self-love and reason, assigned approval to a reflex faculty analogous to sight, by which affections appear virtuous or vicious. Smith grants the ingenuity of the doctrine yet presses consequences Hutcheson acknowledged. Qualities belong to objects of a sense, not to the sense itself; yet we condemn the man who applauds tyrannical cruelty as morally evil in the highest degree, not merely strange. Correct moral sentiment, by contrast, appears laudable.

A fallback treats approbation as a peculiar emotion named a sense of right and wrong. Smith answers that emotions preserve their general character across variations, but approbation of humane tenderness and of daring magnanimity are utterly unlike: we are softened by one and elevated by the other. On his theory this must be so because we sympathize with opposite passions in the agent. The same holds for disapprobation: horror at cruelty is not contempt for meanness.

We also approve or disapprove another's approbation according to whether it coincides with our own sentiments; sympathy, not a new faculty, does that work universally. The term moral sense is recent; conscience signifies consciousness of agreement with duty, not the faculty itself. When we approve a character, Smith argues, sentiments arise from sympathy with motives, with beneficiaries' gratitude, with general rules, and with utility; he challenges anyone to name what remains for a moral sense after these are deducted.