At any rate, I cannot allow myself to believe that such men as Zeno or Cleanthes, men, it is said, of the most simple as well as of the most sublime eloquence, could be the authors, either of these, or of the greater part of the other Stoical paradoxes, which are in general mere impertinent quibbles, and do so little honour to their system that I shall give no further account of them. I am disposed to impute them rather to Chrysippus, the disciple and follower, indeed, of Zeno and Cleanthes, but who, from all that has been delivered down to us concerning him, seems to have been a mere dialectical pedant, without taste or elegance of any kind. He may have been the first who reduced their doctrines into a scholastic or technical system of artificial definitions, divisions, and subdivisions; one of the most effectual expedients, perhaps, for extinguishing whatever degree of good sense there may be in any moral or metaphysical doctrine. Such a man may very easily be supposed to have understood too literally some animated expressions of his masters in describing the happiness of the man of perfect vurtue, and the unhappiness of whoever fell short of that character.--Adam Smith, The Theory of Moral Sentiments, 7.2.1.41
Adam Smith deliberately left us an enigmatic, brief History of the "Ancient Logics and Metaphysics" (in his posthumous, Essays on Philosophical Subjects). Moreover, his more polished essay on the origin of language -- attached to the the third edition of The Theory of Moral Sentiments (hereafter TMS) and well known in the 19th century -- is, in part, a conjectural-naturalistic account of the development of the human, cognitive capacity for “metaphysical analysis.” So Smith's interest in metaphysics is well-attested.
Even so, one may well think that Smith is no fan of metaphysics. In Wealth of Nations (hereafter WN), he writes about the Scholastics, "if subtleties and sophisms composed the greater part of the Metaphysicks or Pneumaticks of the schools, they composed the whole of this cobweb science of Ontology, which was likewise sometimes called Metaphysicks." (WN 5.1.f.29) Moreover, in TMS he writes, in a passage critical of the stoics, "The stoical apathy is, in such cases, never agreeable, and all the metaphysical sophisms by which it is supported can seldom serve any other purpose than to blow up the hard insensibility of a coxcomb to ten times its native impertinence." (TMS 3.3.14) Other than the fact that Smith is using 'sophisms' as a pejorative, it's not obvious why he would dislike metaphysics in these passages and in the passage quoted at the top of this post. Even so, if we look at the three passages (TMS 3.3.14 & 7.2.1.41 and WN 5.1.f.29) in light of each other and in context, a clear pattern of thought develops.
The WN passage is offered in the midst of a much larger treatment of the role of government in and financing of education. In immediate context, the argument is part of a broader (Spinozistic) Enlightenment attack on philosophical "subservience" to "theology" and neglect of the duties appropriate to this life. He blames the ascetic philosophy produced by Scholasticism and its casuistry for the corruption of moral philosophy--"by far the most important of all the different branches of philosophy" (WN 5.1.f.30) Here scholasticism is criticized (somewhat unfairly) due to its effects. In particular, "liberal, generous, and spirited conduct of a man" was rejected because it does not secure entry into heaven. (Smith echoes Hume's attack on the Monkish virtues, although Smith's embrace of thumos is noteworthy.) The Scholastic curriculum is said to be improper for the "education of gentlemen or men of the world," and unable "either to improve the understanding, or to mend the heart."
Now, the Wealth of Nations passage makes it seem that Smith rejects Scholastic metaphysics because he does not like its orientation (toward the after-life) and (life-denying/ascetic) conclusions. Something similar may be thought of Smith's rejection of Stoic metaphysics because he takes apathy to be an absurdly foolish orientation toward life. (I have polemically criticized the idea that Smith is some kind of Stoic here.) Here, too, Smith attacks a species of metaphysics for the conclusions its supports.
As an aside, Smith is a fierce critic of casuistry (see also TMS 7.4.30). As I have argued elsewhere, his indictment against casuistry concerns the way in which experts for hire and their skill commercially facilitate moral-psychological escapism and so prevent the embrace of our proper reactive attitudes. In contrast to many of his modern admirers, Smith does not think that all free markets are always just. Smith is especially suspicious of the manner in which the market for (moral) expertise operates. That is to say, Smith thinks casuistry is always wrong because it prevents even undermines the proper functioning of our moral dispositions. The question is, is Smith's critique of metaphysics akin to his critique of casuistry?
The critique of Chryssipus (here I ignore its veracity) suggests that Smith's attitude toward metaphysics is more complicated. He does not object to metaphysical doctrine as such. But he certainly thinks that a certain amount of technical sophistication backfires on the status of doctrine. He does not fully explain his reasoning. But he clearly thinks of philosophical doctrine as animating and guiding/informing behavior. In the context of Stoicism, a school that proposed a whole way of life, this is by no means anachronistic. In fact, Smith clearly thinks that one very important criterion for the evaluation of philosophical practices and systems as such (so past and present) is its likely effect on behavior. In my forthcoming book <grin>,* I analyze this in terms Smith's commitment to responsible speech or inductive risk. (It is no surprise then that Smith treats moral philosophy as the most important branch of philosophy.)
In particular, Smith's objection is not to metaphysics but to technicality.*** His objection is, I think, two-fold: first, it removes us cognitively from our valuable, practiced dispositions and, thereby, second, is likely to move us away from how we ought to behave. That is to say, here technical philosophy is treated as corruption of the ordinary soul.+ How it does so is not entirely explained, but presumably Smith thinks that certain, fine-grained distinctions distance us from the proper objects of moral evaluation (people, motives, effects, institutions, etc.) or, at least, from the proper comportment toward these.
Obviously, one may claim that some technical, sophisticated (moral) philosophy is truth-tracking. But Smith would respond that such philosophy would not be needed (outside the seminar room***)! Smith makes it a bit easy for himself by not investigating the ways in which technicality may well be fruitful in some areas of philosophical expertise. (This is especially surprising because at the start of WN, Smith is very clear that the intellectual of division of labor takes place within philosophy and so facilitates technical specialization.) But, it's clear that Smith thinks that all technical philosophy has an ever-present danger of certain forms of escapism from reality built into their practice (see Astronomy 4.14). So, it's easy to distance oneself from Smith's critique of technicality (especially if one lacks fondness for gentlemen) until one starts reflecting (with nudges from Ruth Chang (recall), Audrey Yap (recall), or Michael Rea [recall]) on the ways that our sophisticated, philosophical practices may corrupt our dispositions.++.
*I wish I had seen all the issues of this post before I turned in final draft of my book!
**Smith was unwilling to publish Hume's Dialogues, but willing to circulate among the select few.
+All of this helps explain why Smith often comes across (see Sam Fleischacker's Wittgensteinian interpretation) as an anti-theoretical philosopher, a briljant phenomenologist of common life who embraces immanent critique.
***Smith is not against system as such (he describes his own philosophy as a system)
It does not follow, of course, that embrace of technicality is the (main) source of our present disciplinary problems.
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