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Published by EH.NET (September 2002)  
 
Emma Rothschild, _Economic Sentiments: Adam Smith, Condorcet, and the Enlightenment_.
Cambridge, MA and London: Harvard University Press, 2001. ix + 353 pp. $50 (hardcover),
ISBN: 0-674-00489-2; $18.95 (paper), ISBN: 0-674-00837-5.
 
Reviewed for EH.NET by Glenn Hueckel, Department of Economics, Pomona College.
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This is a book that will itself provoke in its readers a number of "sentiments," chief of
which will be, no doubt, what Smith would have described as a "sense of wonder" at the
breathtaking range of the author's learning. Her exposition carries us beyond the works of
the two authors in the staring roles, beyond even those of the two chief supporting actors
(Hume for Smith; Turgot for Condorcet), to commentaries on Greek tragedies, studies of
medieval British labor markets, comments on a modern French philosophical critique of
"bourgeois society," and much more. Indeed, since few English-speaking readers will be
able to measure up to Rothschild's linguistic skills, her commentary on a vast French
literature, supplemented with occasional German sources, cannot fail to prompt new lines
of thought. The argument is lavishly documented; her endnotes alone could provide the
diligent scholar with a rich syllabus for a long and highly instructive course of reading.
 
The text, however, is a rather different matter. That initial reaction of "wonder" will
be, I fear, quickly tempered by a growing sense of aggravation and disappointment as
readers contemplate the interpretative structure the author constructs from her sources,
particularly as that structure concerns Smith. Frequently, the reading advanced seems to
be conditioned by the needs of Rothschild's argument rather than by the content of her
sources.  This is, without question, a difficult book. The exposition is highly allusive,
carried along by hundreds of fragmentary quotations that are more tantalizing than
instructive. Not infrequently one longs for a series of simple declarative sentences where
one can get one's bearings. Nevertheless, "enlightenment" eventually arrives in the last
chapter, where the author finally makes explicit her organizing structure.
 
That structure is best described as comprising three layers of varying degrees of
complexity.  At the simplest, most descriptive level, the author seeks to "cast light" on
her notion of eighteenth-century enlightenment.  For this purpose, the object of our
attention is to be understood as "a universal, or potentially universal disposition; ...
not a characteristic only of philosophers," but "a particular disposition of everyone."
This is a disposition to "a discursive, disputatious, theorizing way of life" which
infuses all areas of existence, particularly the political and commercial spheres (which,
as the author is at pains to point out, are themselves interrelated) (pp. 16, 31, 39, 49).
It is at this level that the argument is most instructive.  The ideas of her authorities
fit easily into this scheme, and the arrangement reveals a number of fascinating insights
that will enrich our understanding of those authorities.
 
It will be evident from the book's title that our attention is to be directed at those
enlightenment authors who were roughly a generation younger than Quesnay and his
physiocratic contemporaries. This is an important distinction since that earlier
generation has been criticized for the authoritarian stance of their political views, a
sort of "compulsory enlightenment" in which the state was to shape the spirit of its
people in the philosophers' image of the "laws of nature." Indeed, our authors --
Condorcet and Turgot; Smith and Hume -- were among those critics. The failure to maintain
this important distinction in the post-Revolutionary world led, we are told, to the false
portrayal of Smith and Condorcet as expressing that same "cold, rational, and reflective
calculation" associated with the previous generation of Enlightenment writers in contrast
to that "warmth" of sentiment said to characterize post-Napoleonic thought (pp. 25-28; 34-
39).
 
The author's first objective is to rescue the reputations of Condorcet and Smith from this
frigid characterization. The task is accomplished for Condorcet in chapters 6 and 7, the
latter of which is slightly revised from its earlier version appearing in the _Historical
Journal_, 39.3 (September 1996): 677-701. These demonstrate quite satisfactorily that his
"principles ... are strikingly different from the cold, unfeeling, all-summing 'mechanical
philosophy' which is supposed to be characteristic of the French enlightenment" (p. 212).
His world not only permitted diversity of opinion but encouraged it. Indeed that diversity
is to be seen as "of central importance" to the analysis of voting procedures that led to
his famous conclusion that aggregation of individual choices by majority vote will, under
certain circumstances, produce intransitive outcomes. Condorcet's solution to the problem
was to envision constitutional procedures to manage that "political dissonance" by
encouraging "deliberation, delay, and the prospect of reversibility." His citizens would
"vote interminably" on "everything from property rights in ponds to the future
constitution of representative government" (pp. 188-89; 198-99; 204-05; 219-20).
 
In Smith's case, the rescue occurs in chapter 2, which, like chapters 3 and 7, is very
slightly revised from an earlier publication (in the _Economic History Review_, 1992,
45.2: 74-96). Here the problem is to explain how Smith's expansive views on "natural
liberty" could come, within a decade of his death, to be compressed in the minds of his
countrymen to no more than a narrow call for commercial freedom. Here the argument
introduces us to the oppressive social atmosphere in Britain of the 1790s, when widespread
fear that the terrors of the Revolution might be exported across the Channel made very
unpopular any discussion of reform, or even expressions of anything less than wholehearted
support for the war with France. We are reminded that Stewart, Smith's first biographer,
read his "Account" of Smith's life to the Royal Society of Edinburgh at just the time when
several of his countrymen were on trial in the same city for sedition, for which they were
eventually convicted and transported.  Some even appealed in their defense to the views
expressed in _The Wealth of Nations_, which, no doubt, made Smith's less reckless readers
very nervous. Indeed, Stewart himself fell afoul of the contemporary sensibilities a year
later and was constrained to repudiate what seems to modern eyes a very mild quotation
from Condorcet included in an earlier work. No wonder Stewart was at pains in his
"Account" to distinguish commercial freedom alone as conducive to national wealth,
assuring his hearers that the freedom of widespread political participation is not, in all
cases, necessary to the "happiness of mankind" (Smith, 1980, p. 310). It is, of course,
obvious that the reception and interpretation of an author's work will be influenced by
the political and social environment of the time. Rothschild has here given us a
fascinating picture of how that environment influenced the reception of Smith's work in
the 1790s. A similar story is told in chapter 4, which contrasts Smith's criticism of
apprenticeship with the argu!
ments advanced in the debates leading to the 1814 repeal of the apprenticeship clauses of
the Elizabethan statute of artificers. Here too we see in detail how the participants in
those debates carefully chose from among Smith's broader arguments to support their own
narrower purposes. These and the intervening chapter 3 may well be the best in the book.
 
That intervening chapter (appearing in a shorter version in the _Economic Journal_, 1992,
102.414: 1197-1210), completes the effort to rescue Condorcet and Smith from that "cold"
and "unfeeling" version of the Enlightenment.  Here we are concerned with the teachings of
our authorities regarding the grain trade because, we are told, "The political economy of
food has been an emblem, at least since the 1760s, of the heartlessness of the liberal
system" (p. 72; the like point is made with particular reference to Smith on p. 61).
Rothschild, however, is at pains to convince her readers that Condorcet, Turgot, and Smith
all "argued that free trade in corn is the best means to avoid famine" (pp. 73-74). This
will come as no surprise to economists; but her brief survey of the arguments contained in
Turgot's "Lettres" and Condorcet's _Réflexions_ on the grain trade (which, apart from some
brief excerpts from Turgot translated by Groenewegen, are not available in English) will
be of considerable help to scholars interested in understanding how societies (and
economic theory) respond to subsistence crises.
 
It should by now be evident that Rothschild's effort to describe the positions advanced by
her second-generation Enlightenment authors and to trace out how the perception of those
positions changed in the decades immediately following the Revolutionary period does
indeed cast new and revealing light on the position of those authors in the pre-
Revolutionary intellectual firmament. About midway through the book, however, the argument
shifts away from this descriptive stance and turns ever greater attention to an evaluation
of that "liberal economic thought" associated with those authors.  By the end of the fifth
chapter we are confronted with what Rothschild insists are the two "shortcoming[s] of the
liberal economic order."  The first is its alleged failure to acknowledge "that
individuals seek, on occasion, to pursue their own (economic) interests by political
means." The second is the "inconstancy" of that "liberal order."  The institutions
comprising the world described by Condorcet and Smith, being "the outcome of innumerable,
unruly judgments, ... may or may not be good."  In this respect that structure "is very
unlike a divine providence ... in which individuals should have confidence."  Or, as the
point is expressed in the last chapter, this "more insidious shortcoming of the liberal
orders ... is that they do not contain within themselves the sources of their own improved
orderliness." If, in their intellectual systems, our authors deny the existence of a
"divine providence" looking after things, then they can have no certainty that those
"innumerable, unruly judgments" will lead to "improved orderliness" (pp. 157-58; 219-20).
This uncertainty provides the third facet of Rothschild's organizational structure.  As
she puts it on the penultimate page of her text, she "has been concerned in this book with
an economic thought in which uncertainty is the overwhelming condition of commercial
society."
 
It must be admitted that this theme of "uncertainty" appears frequently in various brief
_obiter dicta_ throughout the book, but the precise nature of the "uncertainty" that is
supposed to be at issue is not made explicit until the last chapter. There it takes
several forms, ranging from the trivial to the profound. At its most mundane level, it is
no more than normal market risk: "The world of eighteenth-century commerce was insecure,
or risky, in the sense that it was full of new investments and new economic relationships"
(pp. 239-40). Yes, replies the reader, and the same could be said for any other century.
To some degree, the uncertainty that is supposed to be at the heart of "liberal economic
thought" arises from capricious changes in the rules of the game: "The new world of
commerce was insecure, too, because it was subject to frequent and often sudden changes in
laws, regulations, and the jurisprudence of property" (p. 240). But the key role in the
argument
is played by those sources of uncertainty that correspond to Rothschild's two
"shortcomings" of the "liberal order."  That enlightened disposition to "a discursive,
uneasy, self-conscious way of life" that produced the "political dissonance" that so
occupied Condorcet spills over into commercial life as well: "The eighteenth-century
system of commerce ... was subject to continuing flux not only in events, and in rules,
but also in the dispositions of the individuals ... of whom the system is composed."  This
"flux in the condition of men is the essential circumstance of modern commerce, in
Smith's, Turgot's, and Condorcet's description" (p. 241). The individuals who populate the
world envisioned by these authors are said to "have opinions about their own interests,
about the interests of the society, and about the policies which are likely to promote
those interests," and they recognize that they can promote their private interests through
efforts to influence those policies:  "They are buying and selling, buying and selling; in
the end, they are buying and selling rules, and customs, and their own dispositions."
Apparently this flaw in the "liberal economic system" is to be understood as a fundamental
internal contradiction and is, consequently, the source of "the system's own insecurity":
"The system of economic freedom is founded on the equality of all individuals, and it is
at the same time subversive of equality," that subversion arising from "the endless circle
in which individuals become rich, and use their money to buy power, to buy other
individuals, and to influence the ways in which other individuals think" (pp. 239; 245;
251-52).  Here, obviously, we have come to Rothschild's first "shortcoming."  The
connection to the second is obvious: without the presumption of a benevolent, divine
creator, there can be no certainty that those shifting "dispositions of the individuals"
in the system will lead to a socially desirable outcome.  But, Rothschild insists, the
system to which Smith, Hume, Condor!
cet, and Turgot all subscribed "is not the sort of order which is directed, like the
'movements of nature,' by an 'all-wise Being,' or by a single, unified theory" (p. 230).
 
Here then is the evaluative framework that Rothschild would have us adopt. It portrays the
social systems envisioned by Condorcet and Smith as infused by uncertainty in various
forms, all arising from the "continuing flux" in the "dispositions" of a "discursive,
disputatious" populace, that perpetual social "dissonance" operating with no hope of a
divine, guiding hand and, consequently, plagued by the "shortcoming" that its agents might
pursue their private interest through anti-social means. But what of the supporting
argument?  Can such a reading be shown to be consistent with the texts under review? With
respect to Condorcet, Rothschild's evidence is extensive and largely persuasive. Smith,
however, simply will not permit himself to be forced into this template for it attributes
to his work positions that, in several cases, are directly opposed to those which he
actually advanced.  At nearly every point, the argument rests on selective omissions and
misrepresentations of the Smith texts.  Consider, as illustration, just those bearing on
Rothschild's two "shortcomings of the liberal order."
 
If, as alleged by that first "shortcoming," we fail to acknowledge that those intelligent,
"discursive," "self-conscious," agents in our enlightened world will recognize the
incentives to pursue their private interests through the political system, then our only
hope for future social improvement is to take refuge in the hope that those agents will
grow in social awareness and form their own interests to those of society. As Rothschild
puts it, the Enlightenment's "late eighteenth-century exponents" looked forward to "a
universe of small proprietors, most of whom are sufficiently foresighted to understand
that their own lasting self-interest, which coincides with the interest of the society,
consists in competing by economic means ... and not through political influence" (p. 158).
Now, this seems a fair portrayal of Condorcet's position, at least as it was near the end
of his life. Quoting from her translation of one of his last texts, Rothschild observes
that Condorcet put his faith in reform.  With "better laws, ... 'the interest in acquiring
things by illegitimate means will present itself less often, to a smaller number of
individuals, and in less diverse and less seductive forms'" (p. 166).  Here, no doubt, is
the source of Rothschild's claim of "uncertainty."  There is nothing in this rendition of
Condorcet's vision to inspire confidence in future improvement. It is, as Rothschild puts
it, no more than "a probabilistic judgment," an "expression of confidence in the
disposition of individuals to discuss and to live by principles of morality; to be mild
and moderate, and to feel an increase of humanity, from the very habit of conversing
together" (p. 232). "The only source of certainty in such a society," we are told, "is to
be found ... in domestic virtues and domestic conversations ....  Condorcet ... is
prepared to defend the softness or sweetness of modern life; to look forward to the 'easy
virtues' of a world in which improvements in education and laws would have made 'the
courage of virtue alm!
ost useless.'"  But, and here we see evidence of that second "shortcoming," Condorcet
"also recognizes the frightening insecurity of such a world, in which there is no
foundation of political order, either in reverence for divine right, or in fear, or in
political virtue"  (p. 235).  Now, to make her case, Rothschild must demonstrate the
existence of Smithian parallels to this rather bland, but insecure, Condorcevian society.
Hence we are told that Smith "was confident that there would be very little opportunity
for violence in a free, civilized, commercial society, and little advantage to be derived
from fraud" (p. 244).  We are to take it that Condorcet's "mild and moderate" agents
populate Smith's world too.  At any rate, we read that "Smith's political philosophy ...
is a description of a world without violent conflicts over political principles, without
revolutions, and without certainty" (p. 232).  Presumably to echo Condorcet's praise of
the "softness or sweetness of modern life," we are assured that, for Smith, the "political
virtues are the virtues of humanity, and they are even, in some circumstances, the virtues
of women"; and we are offered a brief quotation in support:  "'Humanity is the virtue of a
woman,' Smith wrote in the _Theory of Moral Sentiments_, and it ... requires 'no self-
denial, no self-command, no great exertion of the sense of propriety'" (p. 234).
 
By now, those familiar with Smith's thought will be writhing in agony. Anyone who is aware
of Smith's praise for the virtue of self-command (that from which "all the other virtues
seem to derive their principal luster") will be suspicious of any suggestion that it can
be excluded from the "political virtues."  The suspicion is confirmed when we take the
trouble to check the citation.  Rothschild fails to warn us that the fragment concerning
"humanity" as "the virtue of a woman," appears as the other half of a contrast with the
character of "generosity." The meaning of the passage changes dramatically when we return
the fragment to its context: "Generosity is different from humanity. ... Humanity is the
virtue of a woman, generosity of a man."  While it is true that "[t]he most humane actions
require no self-denial, no self-command, no great exertion of the sense of propriety, ...
it is otherwise with
generosity." This "masculine" virtue requires the "sacrifice [of] some great and important
interest of our own to an equal interest of a friend or of a superior."  It is, in other
words, the opposite of "humanity" in that it does require "self-denial."  Now, perhaps
Rothschild's selective omission of the other half of Smith's rhetorical contrast could be
excused if the omitted concept was, in Smith's system, excluded from the "political
virtues," but no such defense is possible here.  In the very next sentence, Smith takes
his illustrations from the fields of political and military conflict:  "The man who gives
up his pretensions to an office that was the great object of his ambition because he
imagines that the services of another are better entitled to it; the man who exposes his
life to defend that of his friend, which he judges to be of more importance; neither of
them act from humanity;" rather, they both exhibit the "self-denial" of "generosity"
(Smith 1976b, p. 190-91).
 
Apparently Smith's vision does include "conflicts over political principles" and even
battlefield sacrifice.  His system contemplates revolution too, but here that "divine
order" supposedly missing from that system interposes impediments to such violent
disruption. As we will see shortly, Rothschild's peculiar refusal to acknowledge the role
of a divine creator in Smith's system is the most puzzling aspect of her argument.  The
benevolent care of that deity pervades his _Theory of Moral Sentiments_.  "[T]o raise and
support ... the great, the immense fabric of human society," Smith wrote there, "seems in
this world, if I may say so, to have been the peculiar and darling care of Nature."  To
preserve that social fabric, "Nature" implants in us a disposition to acquiesce in our
rulers even when reason would have it otherwise: "That kings are the servants of the
people, to be obeyed, resisted, deposed, or punished, as the public conveniency may
require, is the doctrine of reason and philosophy; but it is not the doctrine of Nature."
On the contrary, "Nature would teach us to submit to them for their own sake." This
disposition to submit to unjust rulers can apply even in the case "of the most brutal and
savage barbarians, of an Attila, a Gengis, or a Tamerlane."  This is not a particularly
noble characteristic. It arises from our disposition to admire success and to despise
failure even when those outcomes are the product of chance or force. Nevertheless, even
this "great disorder in our moral sentiments" serves to preserve human society,
particularly in the worst of times.  Consequently, "we may on this, as well as on many
other occasions, admire the wisdom of God even in the weakness and folly of man."  It may
be a "foolish admiration," but by this tendency to admire those who, whether by chance, by
force, or by merit, succeed in achieving positions of political leadership, the populace
"are taught to acquiesce with less reluctance under that government which an irresistible
force imposes upon them, and f!
rom which no reluctance could deliver them."  Where in passages such as these are we to
find any hint of Rothschild's reading of Smith as envisioning "a world without violent
conflicts over political principles, without revolutions"? At best, Smith's world is one
in which, by virtue of "the wisdom of God," only "the most furious passions, fear, hatred,
and resentment ... excited [to] the highest degree" can rouse "the bulk of the people ...
to oppose [their leaders] with violence"  (Smith 1976b, pp. 53, 86, 252-53).
 
Nor does Smith's vision of social order rest on a naïve "confidence in the disposition of
individuals to live by principles of morality." The agents who populate Smith's world
exhibit all the faults we have come to know in fallible humans. It is true that Smith's
ethics -- his "theory of moral sentiments" -- rest on a presumed human capacity and desire
to, through our imaginations, "enter into" the situation of our fellows and to experience
to a muted degree their emotions. But it is also true that Smith was ready to acknowledge
that "self-deceit" -- that "fatal weakness of mankind" -- that too often prevents us from
checking and condemning behavior in ourselves that we would condemn in others. Yet the
"fabric of human society" requires that we all meet certain accepted standards of decorum.
Once again "Nature ...  has not left this weakness ... altogether without a remedy; nor
has she abandoned us entirely to the delusions of self-love."  Through our normal social
interactions, we form "certain general rules concerning what is fit and proper either to
be done or to be avoided."  These "general rules of conduct" become "fixed in our mind" by
training and "habitual reflection."  Although "ultimately founded upon experience of what
... our moral faculties ... approve, or disapprove of," their application does not require
that all agents exhibit a finely-tuned capacity for sympathy in all circumstances.  A good
thing too since "[t]he coarse clay of which the bulk of mankind are formed, cannot be
wrought up to such perfection."  It is these general rules or duties that are the
proximate foundation of social order: "upon the tolerable observance of these duties
depends the very existence of human society, which would crumble into nothing if mankind
were not generally impressed with a reverence for those important rules of conduct."
Finally, lest there be any remaining doubts as to the role of a benevolent deity in
Smith's system, we are told in the next sentence, "This reverence is still further
enhanced by a!
n opinion which is first impressed by nature, and afterwards confirmed by reasoning and
philosophy, that those important rules of morality are the commands and laws of the
Deity," a position which is elaborated on the subsequent pages (Smith, 1976b, pp. 158-63).
 
We find in chapter 5 Rothschild's defense of her claim that Smith's system exhibits those
two "shortcomings" that she perceives in "liberal economic thought."  The chapter advances
the remarkable position that Smith's "image of the invisible hand is best interpreted as a
mildly ironic joke" (p. 116; a very brief summary of the argument appeared earlier in the
_American Economic Review_, 1994, 84.2: 319-22). This must be the case because "if it were
taken seriously," the concept expressed by that metaphor "would have been in conflict with
several of Smith's most profound convictions" (p. 136).  What is at issue here is not
simply the metaphor itself but the concept which it is taken to convey, that concept
being, for Rothschild, that the individual pursuit of private interest can produce an
orderly aggregate outcome which can, under some identifiable circumstances, be socially
desirable (p. 121).  It is Smith's expression of this concept that we are to take as
intended as "an ironic joke ... on himself ... [and] on his immense posterity as well" (p.
138).
 
Among those of "Smith's most profound convictions" with which this concept is supposed to
conflict is his well-known principle that merchants often pursue their interest through
political influence.  By Rothschild's argument, we may take it that the notion of a
spontaneous order conveyed by the invisible hand metaphor was "un-Smithian and unimportant
to his theory" because "Smith's criticisms of government and of established institutions
are essential to his economic thought; it is most unlikely that he would simply forget
them in a grand theory of the social good" (p. 128).  But this bespeaks a remarkably
narrow reading. Smith did not "forget" his "criticisms" of public and private institutions
in his "grand theory"; they were part of his theory. Rosenberg (1960) pointed out long ago
that those "criticisms" were in fact original and perceptive investigations of the
incentive structures embedded in those institutions, and the point has only been
elaborated since.  Rothschild is quite right (p. 244) that Smith suggested in his
jurisprudence lectures that commercial relationships could improve the character of the
participants, at least with respect to their "probity and punctuality."  But as Rosenberg
again has elsewhere (1990) reminded us, Smith did not stop there.  In his vision,
commercial society served to improve not only the character of the people but also the
legal structures that guide their actions and establish their security of property right.
The same philosopher who took account in his ethics of the "coarse clay of which the bulk
of mankind are formed" could not fail to recognize in his investigation of market behavior
that "such, it seems, is the natural insolence of man, that he almost always disdains to
use the good instrument, except when he cannot or dare not use the bad one" (Smith, 1976a,
p. 799).  He was quite aware that the individual pursuit of private interest must be
channeled by properly constructed incentive structures (which include, of course, not only
legal restraints but c!
ompetitive markets as well) to prevent recourse to the "bad instrument."  Only when
operating within such structures can we speak of an "invisible hand" directing individual
actions to a socially desirable outcome.
 
Yet Rothschild insists that there is "something oddly ingenuous in Smith's sudden
invocation of the timid, virtuous merchant, led by the invisible hand to pursue only
harmonious interests" (p. 128).  In violation of her own injunction to understand the
invisible hand reference in its broad, conceptual sense, she here limits attention to "the
invisible hand passage" in _The Wealth of Nations_, where the merchant "does not, for
example, seek to collect together with other merchants to obtain special privileges for
home production."  No, not in this passage; but Smith was, no doubt, writing under the
reasonable presumption that his readers can be expected to recall the countless other
passages that warn of such collusion and propose incentive structures designed to impede
it.
 
Adding further to her portrayal of Smith as playing a sly joke on posterity with his
invisible hand metaphor, Rothschild would have us find it "interesting ... that in a
chapter mainly concerned with British restrictions on imports, Smith's ingenuous merchant
is described as a resident of Amsterdam, trading in corn from Königsberg and fruit from
Lisbon; he is a cosmopolitan figure, far less tempted than any English merchant to pursue
his own advantage through political influence" (p. 128; the point recurs on p. 144).  Now,
any reader who takes the trouble to review the reference in its context will find this to
be a particularly egregious mischaracterization.  While it is not commonly mentioned, the
particular social benefit supposed to be achieved by the _Wealth of Nations_ appearance of
the invisible hand is a preference for home over foreign investment, a principle that will
seem peculiar to modern readers accustomed to decisionmaking at the margin. Nevertheless,
the principle arises from Smith's eighteenth-century view of capital as "setting to work
productive labor." Capital employed domestically "in purchasing in one part of the country
in order to sell in another ... generally replaces by every such operation two distinct
capitals."  But in foreign trade, where one of the transactions occurs abroad, "the
capital employed ... will give but one-half the encouragement to the industry or
productive labour of the country." Hence, that famous invisible hand, which Rothschild
would have us believe is slyly applied by Smith to an Amsterdam merchant "far less
tempted" to pursue his interest through influence in the British political arena, applies
in fact to the domestic merchant who, in "preferring the support of domestick to that of
foreign industry, ... intends only his own security," and is "in this, as in many other
cases, led by an invisible hand to promote an end which was no part of his intention,"
that end being, in this case, the support of more domestic labor than would have been
accomplished ha!
d he traded abroad. That Amsterdam merchant trading between Prussia and Portugal enters
Smith's story only as illustration of the lower risk associated with domestic trade by
providing the contrast of the greater "unease" felt by the merchant engaged in foreign
trade, where he is "separated so far from his capital" (Smith, 1976a, pp. 368; 454-56).
 
This alleged "ingenuous" character of Smith's invisible hand expression recurs throughout
the rest of the argument and is central to Rothschild's case for her first "shortcoming."
Upon its introduction, that "first conflict or shortcoming of economic thought" is
described as having to do with "the transformation of money into political power" and is
illustrated by the claim that "[i]n Smith's description of the invisible hand in the
_Wealth of Nations_, the circumstance that individuals pursue their economic objectives by
political means is largely ignored" (p. 154). It also provides a spurious point of
contrast between Smith and Condorcet, who is described as "admirably explicit in
addressing one shortcoming of liberal economic orders, to do with the transformation of
money into political power, and of political power into the power to influence markets"
(p. 166). All this is no more than a figment of Rothschild's misreading of Smith.
 
The foundation of Rothschild's second "shortcoming" of "liberal economic thought" is also
to be found in chapter five. There is no denying the "conception of providential order"
long associated with Smith's invisible hand metaphor. That association provides Rothschild
with one more reason to dismiss that metaphor as "un-Smithian" -- namely the conviction
that Smith would have found "very serious problems" in such a "theology of the invisible
hand" (p. 129). However, her argument on this point, for all its lavish citations, is
nearly devoid of textual evidence from Smith himself, apart from the remark that he
frequently made known "his differences with Christian doctrines." This, of course, is no
more than a red herring. That Smith had little patience with the positions and practices
of the established Christian denominations of his time is obvious. But it is equally
obvious that a deistic faith in a benevolent creator does not rest on Christian doctrine.
In support of her claim, Rothschild can offer us little more than the statement of her
"own view ... that ... Smith's and Hume's religious opinions were indeed quite close," a
view that no doubt explains why her case so frequently rests on appeals to Hume rather
than to Smith (e.g. pp. 120, 130, 134-35, 139). One could, of course, argue (and
Rothschild does, in passing) that Smith's frequent references to the "all-wise Author of
Nature" (some of which we have already noticed) were no more than a smokescreen intended
to avoid the kind of conflict with contemporary sensibilities that so dogged his friend.
But the frequency and apparent sincerity of those references are far greater than the
minimum necessary to satisfy the local keepers of the public morals. Certainly
Rothschild's claim that Smith denied "the conception of providential order," or employed
it as no more than "an ironic joke," is directly opposed to recent scholarship on the
matter. One wishes that in all her footnotes, she had taken notice of those studies that,
with a good deal more relevan!
t documentation, manage to advance an opposing view (e.g. Evensky 1998; although it
appeared too late to help Rothschild, interested readers will want to consult Hill 2001 as
well).
 
To be sure, Rothschild does acknowledge the common view that Smith professed the existence
of a benevolent creator and that his position on this matter derived from the natural
theology of Stoic philosophy. But she offers little in rebuttal beyond the unsupported
declaration that he "was influenced by different Stoic doctrines"; that "[w]ithin the
overall Stoic system, ... it was the idea of a providential order ... to which Smith was
most opposed" (p. 132)  As to that, I will simply leave it to those interested to read for
themselves Smith's own assessment of that "Stoical" system, where he assures us that, even
in our greatest extremity, when, in spite of our best efforts, events "turn out the most
unfortunate and disastrous, Nature has by no means left us without consolation," that
consolation being drawn "from a firm reliance upon, and reverential submission to, that
benevolent wisdom which directs all the events of human life, and which, we may be
assured, would never have suffered those misfortunes to happen had they not been
indispensably necessary for the good of the whole" (Smith 1976b, p. 292). Is this an
author who opposed the idea of a providential order?
 
In spite of its flaws, we can learn a great deal from Rothschild's work here.  Her command
of a vast and complex literature is awesome.  She has been scrupulous in identifying her
authorities, and she has opened a number of new and promising lines for further work. She
has reminded us that the forces unleashed by the French Revolution left their mark not
only on the political and social structures of the period but also on the intellectual
structures that conditioned the discourse of the nineteenth century and, at a remove, of
our own time.  She has prompted us to look again at the intellectual influences running in
both directions across the Channel in the immediate pre-Revolutionary period, and she has
identified the sources to do so. No doubt it is that great promise that heightens the
disappointment we feel when we encounter her efforts to turn those sources to purposes
which they simply will not support.
 
 
References 
 
Evensky, Jerry. 1998. "Adam Smith's Moral Philosophy: The Role of Religion and Its
Relationship to Philosophy and Ethics in the Evolution of Society." _History of Political
Economy_ 30.1: 17-42.
 
Hill, Lisa. 2001. "The Hidden Theology of Adam Smith." _European Journal of the History of
Economic Thought_ 8.1:1-29.
 
Rosenberg, Nathan. 1960. "Some Institutional Aspects of the Wealth of Nations." _Journal
of Political Economy_ 68.6: 557-70.
 
_______. 1990. "Adam Smith and the Stock of Moral Capital."  _History of Political
Economy_ 22.1: 1-18.
 
Smith, Adam. 1976a. _An Inquiry into the Nature and Causes of the Wealth of Nations_.
Edited by R. H. Campbell and A. S. Skinner. Oxford: Oxford University Press.
 
_______. 1976b. _The Theory of Moral Sentiments_.  Edited by D. D. 
Raphael and A. L. Macfie. Oxford: Oxford University Press. 
 
_______. 1980. _Essays on Philosophical Subjects_.  Edited by W. P. D. 
Wightman and J. C. Bryce. Oxford: Oxford University Press.  
 
 
Emma Rothschild is a Fellow of King's College, Cambridge and Director of the Center for
History and Economics, King's College.
 
Glenn Hueckel is the author of various articles on the history of economic thought in the
seventeenth to the nineteenth centuries.
 
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