Adam Smith Quote on the Impartial Spectator: Spectators of Our Own Behaviour

Quote

"We suppose ourselves the spectators of our own behaviour." — Adam Smith, The Theory of Moral Sentiments (1759)

Author

Adam Smith (1723–1790) was a Scottish moral philosopher and economist, best known for The Wealth of Nations but author of the moral theory in the Theory of Moral Sentiments.

Source

The idea of the impartial spectator appears throughout the Theory of Moral Sentiments, where Smith develops the concept of the conscience as the "man within the breast" who judges our conduct from an impartial point of view.

Context

The quotation captures the mechanism by which, on Smith's view, we come to judge ourselves. Smith begins with sympathy: we approve or disapprove of others by entering into their situation and imagining how we would feel. To judge our own conduct, we must take the reverse step — we must imagine how an impartial and well informed spectator would view us. We step outside ourselves, as it were, and suppose ourselves the spectators of our own behaviour. This imagined spectator is the conscience, and it is from this standpoint that we approve or disapprove of our own actions. The theory grounds moral judgment in sentiment and sympathy rather than in abstract deontology or merely in self-interest.

Meaning

The quotation is the hinge of Smith's moral psychology. Its point is that self-judgment is a matter of taking up an external standpoint: to know whether our conduct is right, we must set aside our own partiality and see ourselves as a fair observer would. The "impartial spectator" is thus the standard of impartiality and justice that moral judgment requires. Because the spectator is impartial, it corrects for the self-love that otherwise distorts our view of our own actions. The more we internalize this standpoint, the more we develop self-command and genuine morality. Smith's spectator is one of the classic sources of the wisdom-tradition ideal of stepping back from ourselves to judge fairly, central to the Ethics & Wisdom collection.

Related Wisdom

The quotation grounds Smith's account of impartiality, justice, and morality, and it connects to the wider wisdom tradition's teaching on self-command and the value of viewing our own conduct as others would.