Adam Smith

Adam Smith was a moral philosopher and author who connected questions of human judgment with the organization of economic life. An Inquiry Into the Nature and Causes of the Wealth of Nations studies labor, exchange, prices, public revenue, and the institutions that shape prosperity. The Theory of Moral Sentiments turns to sympathy, conscience, and the imagined perspective from which people judge their own conduct. The Theory of Moral Sentiments: To Which Is Added a Dissertation on the Origin of Languages pairs that inquiry with a related essay on language. Readers focused on economics can choose The Wealth of Nations for Smith's broad account of commercial society. The Theory of Moral Sentiments reveals the moral psychology beside it, making the two works more useful together than either becomes when reduced to a slogan about markets or self-interest.