Econlib

The Library

Other Sites

 Front Page arrow Titles (by Subject) arrow | Monday Febry. 7th 1763 - Glasgow Edition of the Works and Correspondence Vol. 5 Lectures On Jurisprudence

Return to Title Page for Glasgow Edition of the Works and Correspondence Vol. 5 Lectures On Jurisprudence

Search this Title:

| Monday Febry. 7th 1763 - Adam Smith, Glasgow Edition of the Works and Correspondence Vol. 5 Lectures On Jurisprudence [1762]

Edition used:

Lectures On Jurisprudence, ed. R.. L. Meek, D. D. Raphael and P. G. Stein, vol. V of the Glasgow Edition of the Works and Correspondence of Adam Smith (Indianapolis: Liberty Fund, 1982).

Part of: The Glasgow Edition of the Works and Correspondence of Adam Smith, 7 vols.

About Liberty Fund:

Liberty Fund, Inc. is a private, educational foundation established to encourage the study of the ideal of a society of free and responsible individuals.


| Monday Febry. 7th 1763

I proposed in treating of justice to consider the rights of men on which it is founded under three heads: 1st, those which belong to a man as a man; 2d, those which belong to a man as a member of a family; and thirdly, those that belong to a man as a member of a society. I have now said all that I think necessary concerning the first branch of rights, under the 3 different classes of the right one has to his person, to his character, and property, and the injuries which may be done one in each of these respects.

I come now to consider the rights which belong to a man and the correspondent injuries which may be done a man as

A Member of a Family.

There are 3 different relations in which the members of a family may stand [in] to one an other. They may be either in the relation ofl Husband and Wife; or of Father and Son; or of Master and Servant.28 Correspondently to these | a (man) or person may <be> injured in as many different ways when con<si>dered as a member of a family. One may be injured either as a husband or wife; as a father or son; or as a master or servant. In order to proceed the more regularly I shall begin with the relation of husband and wife, as it is the foundation of all the rest. In considering of this there are three things to be chiefly attended to, viz 1st, the manner in which this union is entered into and the origin of it; 2dly, the obligation or rights that are thereby acquired and the injuries corresponding to these; and 3dly, the manner in which it is dissolved. Of these in order. We may observe that in all the species of animalls the inclination of the sexes towards each other is precisely proportionable to the exigencies of the young and the difficulty of their maintenance. In all quadrupeds the inclination of the sexes ceases as soon as the female is impregnated. For in them the female is of herself sufficiently qualified to provide sustenance for the young. For after the birth of the young and sometimes before it the greatest part of the | food of the mother turns into milch, the proper food of the young one. So that in this case the ordinary labour of the female in providing food for herself is sufficient to provide for the maintenance of the young. In birds again who have no milch, the whole labour that is necessary to provide for the safety and maintenance of the young is an additionall one to that which the parents before required for their own support, and is such that the female would be altogether unable and unqualified to undergo. That this connection therefore may still continue, it is wisely provided that the inclination of the sexes should still continue.29 It is this inclination that is the bond of their union; they have not probably in view the maintenance and support of the young. In the quadrupeds, as soon as the female is impregnated the male ceases to be an object of desire to the female and he to her; but here on the contrary this still continues as long as the young require their assistance. In the human species, the maintenance of the young is provided | for in the same manner. The female (the woman) indeed is furnished with milch which might perhaps enable her to support the child for some time of its infancy; but then it often happens that by the time the 1st child is weaned the woman has a 2d, and so on. So that long before the 1st child is any way qualified to provide for itself there is a 2, a 3d, or a 4th child born. This necessarily requires a degree of labour to which the woman would be altogether unequall. That therefore this additionall labour may be sustain’d, and the children supported in their helpless state, it is [was] necessary that union of the parents should be of a very long continuance. The affection of the sexes is therefore constant and does not cease on any particular occasion; and as the children, at least some of them, require the attendance of the parents pretty far in their life, this affection and love betwixt them which is the foundation of their union generally continues the greatest part of their lives (And as Mr. Smith else where observed30 is supplied in the latter part by the habitual affection and esteem that is then continuedm ). | The long time that children are dependent on their parents and unable to subsist by themselves, whichn is much longer than in any other species of animalls, is likewise productive of the most salutary effects. During all this time the child being dependent on the parents is obliged in many instances to yield its will to theirs, to bring down its passions and curb its desires to such a pitch as theyo can go along with,31 and by this means learns in its very infancy a chief and most essentiall part of education, without which being first implanted it would be in vain to attempt the instilling of any others. This is one of the most necessary lessons one can acquire. Unless one can so bring down his passions and restrain his will and sop accomodate it to that of others as that they can go along with him, it is impossible for him to have any peace or enjoyment in society. This lesson is learned by all children, even by those of the most profligate and wicked parents32

Gap of one page in MS.

[l]‘father and s’ deleted

[28 ]Hutcheson, M.P., III.1–3; System, II.149 ff.

[29 ]Locke, Civil Government, § 79.

[30 ]The reference is perhaps to TMS I.ii.4.2: ‘With what pleasure do we look upon a family, through the whole of which reign mutual love and esteem, where the parents and children are companions for one another, without any other difference than what is made by respectful affection on the one side, and kind indulgence on the other.’ But neither here nor elsewhere in TMS does Smith say directly that sexual attraction is succeeded by habitual affection and esteem. In TMS VI.ii.1.7, writing of family affection generally, Smith says: ‘What is called affection, is in reality nothing but habitual sympathy.’ This passage, however, was written for edition 6, published in 1790.

[m]Reading doubtful

[n]Reading doubtful

[o]‘are’ deleted

[31 ]Cf. TMS I.i.4.7: ‘The person principally concerned . . . can only hope to obtain [sympathetic affection] by lowering his passion to that pitch, in which the spectators are capable of going along with him.’

[p]Replaces an illegible word

[32 ]The word ‘parents’ falls at the beginning of the last line of 5. There is no full point after it, and the remainder of the line is left blank. There is evidently a lacuna in the MS. here.