Adam Smith's Moral Philosophy Book contents
- Frontmatter
- Contents
- Preface
- Adam Smith's Moral Philosophy
- PART ONE ON ADAM SMITH'S MORAL PHILOSOPHICAL VISION
- 1 Adam Smith's Vision
- 2 On Human Nature, Social Norms, Co-Evolution, Natural Selection, and the Human Prospect
- 3 On the Role of Positive Law in Humankind's Evolution
- 4 On the Role of Religion in Humankind's Evolution
- PART TWO ON THE PLACE OF THE WEALTH OF NATIONS IN ADAM SMITH'S MORAL PHILOSOPHICAL VISION
- PART THREE ON ADAM SMITH'S MORAL PHILOSOPHICAL VISION AND THE MODERN DISCOURSE
- Epilogue: On the Human Prospect
- References
- Index
3 - On the Role of Positive Law in Humankind's Evolution
Published online by Cambridge University Press: 11 November 2009
- Frontmatter
- Contents
- Preface
- Adam Smith's Moral Philosophy
- PART ONE ON ADAM SMITH'S MORAL PHILOSOPHICAL VISION
- 1 Adam Smith's Vision
- 2 On Human Nature, Social Norms, Co-Evolution, Natural Selection, and the Human Prospect
- 3 On the Role of Positive Law in Humankind's Evolution
- 4 On the Role of Religion in Humankind's Evolution
- PART TWO ON THE PLACE OF THE WEALTH OF NATIONS IN ADAM SMITH'S MORAL PHILOSOPHICAL VISION
- PART THREE ON ADAM SMITH'S MORAL PHILOSOPHICAL VISION AND THE MODERN DISCOURSE
- Epilogue: On the Human Prospect
- References
- Index
Summary
ON JUSTICE
Justice … is the main pillar that upholds the whole edifice … of human society.
(TMS, 86)In the first lecture we have from Adam Smith's 1762–63 series of Lectures on Jurisprudence (28 January 1762), he begins by asserting that “[t]he first and chief design of every system of government is to maintain justice …” (LJA, 5, emphasis added).
In an ideal world, perfectly virtuous citizens know and enforce perfect standards of justice upon themselves. But absent perfect virtue, if society is to cohere, it is essential that government emerge to define and enforce standards of justice. According to Smith, without government's enforcement of justice there would be chaos, and without government's instrumental role in the refinement of justice there would be no progress.
Smith's analysis of the emergence of government and of the instrumental role government plays in the refinement of justice as humankind evolves is not a story of the genius of human reason, but rather of the ingenious, benevolent design of the deity.
The very existence of society requires that unmerited and unprovoked malice should be restrained by proper punishments; and consequently, that to inflict those punishments should be regarded as a proper and laudable action… . [Y]et the Author of nature has not entrusted it to his [man's] reason to find out that a certain application of punishments is the proper means of attaining this end; but has endowed him with an immediate and instinctive approbation of that very application which is most proper to attain it. […]
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- Information
- Adam Smith's Moral PhilosophyA Historical and Contemporary Perspective on Markets, Law, Ethics, and Culture, pp. 59 - 84Publisher: Cambridge University PressPrint publication year: 2005