tions and actions with the eyes of other people; and according as we are sensible that we are objects of praise or of blame to them, do we become objects of praise or of blame to ourselves. We enter into the feelings of others towards us, and according as we perceive or believe these feelings to be fraught with sympathy or laden with antipathy, do we view ourselves with complacency or the reverse. Thus, in the power of sympathy, conscience has its origin. Such, stated very briefly, is Smith's theory of the process through which we form a moral estimate of ourselves. In regard to the other great question of moral philosophy—What is virtue? Smith's answer may be gathered from what has been already said. Virtue consists in propriety. And by propriety, he means a harmony between the circumstances in which a man is placed, the affection which he harbours, and the actions which he performs in these circumstances. For instance, when a man is slightly injured, he should be only slightly angry, and should only slightly retaliate. In such a case the anger would be suitable to the occasion, and the act would be suitable to the anger; it would be an instance of propriety of conduct, and the agent might be said to have acted virtuously, albeit in a very small matter. More important illustrations might be given, and will readily suggest themselves. One word of criticism may be added. This theory of morality, although defective, has scarcely met with the acceptance to which it seems entitled. The literary merits of the work, embellished as it is by the most apposite illustrations drawn from life, from history, and from the deepest recesses of the human heart, have been universally acknowledged; but its scientific claims, and the value of the principle on which it rests, have had but scant justice meted out to them. Perhaps the following considerations will exhibit the system in a fairer point of view. It will be admitted on all hands that the selfish principle is that which originally leads us to form an erroneous estimate both of ourselves and others. It exaggerates the importance of each man's own interests, and underrates in a corresponding degree those of his neighbour. This estimate, therefore, requires to be corrected; and it can be corrected only by a principle the opposite of selfishness. But sympathy is the opposite of selfishness; and this, therefore, is the principle which corrects our mistaken judgments, and changes them from false into true. Selfishness is partial and self-seeking; sympathy is impartial, and embraces others in its regard. From the selfish point of view we see ourselves in magnified proportions, while other people occupy but a small space on our moral retina: from the sympathetic point of view we see ourselves on a diminished scale, while the magnitude of our neighbours has increased. If we view sympathy (as we fairly may) as a principle of impartiality, by which the judgments of our original selfishness are suspended or put right, we cannot but attach a high scientific value to the system of Dr. Smith. We may hold his theory to be true to this extent, that sympathy, if it be not the source and origin of our moral sentiments, is at any rate their purifier and corrector.
The "Inquiry into the Nature and Causes of the Wealth of Nations" is not written with the fervent eloquence which distinguishes so many pages of the "Theory of Moral Sentiments;" yet the style of this work is in admirable harmony with the topics of which it treats. It is at once popular and precise; homely, yet dignified; idiomatic, graphic, and unconventional, yet everywhere a model of propriety and good taste. The "Wealth of Nations," although not directly controversial, has the merit of correcting many serious errors, as well as of establishing many important truths in economical science. Before Smith's time two theories of wealth had prevailed, both of which exercised a pernicious influence on the nations of the world. These were the "mercantile system," as it is called; and the system of the French economists, of whom Quesnay was the chief. The first of these systems had its origin in the popular but mistaken notion, that money was the true wealth of nations. It was generally thought that a people was rich and prosperous in proportion to the abundance in which they possessed the precious metals, gold and silver—an error which seems to have originated partly in the conception that a nation whose coffers were well filled with coins was best fitted to wage war with energy and success, and partly in our proneness to mistake the sign for the thing signified. But whatever was the source of the error, it prevailed not only among the vulgar, but formed the foundation-stone of the political science generally in vogue previous to the time of Smith. Its consequences were very hurtful. It led the governments of different nations to hamper commerce with unwise restrictions; and thus, by repressing industry, to cut off their subjects from the enjoyment of many comforts and luxuries. The fate of Spain, in particular, may be pointed to in illustration of the foolish policy which supposes that the national wealth consists of gold and silver, rather than of the various commodities which gold and silver help to circulate, but which labour alone can produce. When the discovery of America poured into the coffers of that country an abundant supply of the precious metals—mistaking for wealth itself the mere instrument by which wealth is exchanged, abandoning her industrial pursuits, and realizing to her bitter cost the fable of King Midas, who prayed that whatever he touched might be turned into gold—Spain, hitherto one of the most powerful nations in the world, became gradually impoverished in the midst of her accumulated treasures. According to the policy inculcated by the mercantile system, a nation ought to deal as much as possible in exports, and as little as possible in imports, for then the balance would require to he paid in gold and silver; as if exports could be paid for ultimately by anything except imports; and as if the precious metals, and not the good things which these metals purchase, were the sources of the prosperity of a people! Although this system had begun to lose ground before Smith's time, he was the first who distinctly and effectually subverted it, by showing that the true policy of nations was to put forth industry, and not to accumulate coins; and that an industrious people could at all times command as much gold and silver as they required. The other theory which was destined to fall before the new doctrines of Smith was the "agricultural system" propounded by Quesnay and the French economists. According to this system, the only labour which is truly productive is that which is bestowed on the cultivation of the land. All other industry—that of artificers, manufacturers, and merchants, however useful—is barren and unproductive. The ground on which this strange doctrine rests is twofold:—First, the earth is the quarter from which all the materials in use among mankind are produced, therefore the cultivation of the earth is the only productive species of industry; and secondly, agricultural labour not only replaces with a profit the capital employed in carrying it on, but yields moreover a "nett produce" or surplus, which is rent, and which belongs to the proprietor of the land; whereas manufacturing labour merely replaces the capital expended, together with its ordinary profits, but without any nett produce or surplus analogous to rent. This twofold ground involves a twofold mistake, and the answer to it is:—First, although all the materials which man uses come originally from the earth, they are, in their rude and unprepared state, for the most part quite useless. The labour, therefore, which renders them subservient to human purposes adds greatly to their value, and is as well entitled to be called "productive" as the other species of labour is which elicits them from the bosom of the earth. If agricultural industry is productive of materials, manufacturing industry is certainly productive of utilities; and the one form of production is no less important than the other. But secondly, it is not the fact that agricultural labour has in itself any advantage over manufacturing labour in the way of realizing a nett surplus which is the proprietor's rent. It is no doubt true that when the price of farm produce rises under the demands of an increasing population, and inferior soils are taken (as they now must be) into cultivation, a rent arises on the better soils; but it does so, not because the labour is agricultural, but because the land is of different degrees of fertility. Rent is simply the difference between the produce of the better soils in comparison with the produce of the worst, the farming expenses being the same. Labour, therefore, as applied to the land, has no peculiar title to be called "productive" on account of the nett surplus which it realizes; for this surplus or rent is owing neither to the labour nor to the land (considered as land), but to the circumstance that some lands are more fertile than others, or better situated in regard to their command of a market. The true theory of rent, by which alone the delusions of the French economists are dispelled, was not known to Adam Smith; and therefore, though he impugned their doctrines, he failed to indicate exactly where their error lay. The theory was first broached by Dr. James Anderson in 1777. It seems to have been understood by David Hume, who, in a letter to Smith, controverts rightly the opinion of the great economist
