Not long after Adam Smith ’s resignation from the University of Glasgow, his successor, Thomas Reid, summarized Smith’s philosophy in a series of lectures as “selflove variously modified.” Thus began a long tradition of grossly oversimplifying Smith. Today undergraduates learn that he shaped classical economic theory, which is outlined in the first section of his second book, “The Wealth of Nations” (1776). In this standard narrative, Smith’s thinking is mostly about capitalism, the invisible hand of the free market, natural and market prices, and the division of labor.
In “Our Great Purpose,” Ryan Patrick Hanley argues that Smith’s larger moral system—first set out in “The Theory of Moral Sentiments” (1759)—transcends such stereotypes and offers contemporary society a workable model of virtue ethics. The pity is that we do not see it, in part because of Smith’s brilliant criticism of mercantile economies, which has cast the rest of his philosophy into shadow.
