Abstract

Charles Griswold

Tales of the Self:  Smith’s Response to Rousseau

Commentators have remarked that Smith's reading of Rousseau's Discourse on Inequality had a profound effect on his thinking.  The TMS may even be viewed as a response to Rousseau's argument.  I focus on two issues Smith picks up in his 1756 review of the Discourse: the nature of "pitié," and the striking rhetoric of Rousseau's writing.  I argue, first, that Rousseau's notion of pity or compassion represents a genuine challenge for Smith's theory of sympathy.  Second, I argue that the rhetorical form of the Discourse is connected to the notion of pitié and is part of the challenge to the sort of sympathy-theory that Smith advocates.