_A Dissertation on the Origin of Languages._ BY ADAM SMITH, LL.D. F.R.B. FIRST AMERICAN FROM THE TWELFTH EDINBURGH EDITION. * * * * * _Extract from "An Account of the Life and Writings of Dr. Adam Smith, by Dugald Stewart, F.R.S. Edinburgh."_ (Speaking of Dr. S.'s Theory of Moral Sentiments, he says) "No work, undoubtedly, can be mentioned, ancient or modern, which exhibits so complete a view of those facts, with respect to our moral perception, which it is one great object of this branch of science to refer to their general laws; and upon this account, it well deserves the careful study of all whose taste leads them to prosecute similar inquiries. These facts are indeed frequently expressed in a language which involves the author's peculiar theories; but they are always presented in the most happy and beautiful light; and it is easy for an attentive reader, by stripping them of hypothetical terms, to state them to himself with that logical precision, which, in such very difficult disquisitions, can alone conduct us with certainty to the truth. "It is proper to observe, farther, that, with the theoretical doctrines of the book, there are every where interwoven, with singular taste and address, the purest and most elevated maxims concerning the practical conduct of life; and that it abounds throughout with interesting and instructive delineations of characters and manners. A considerable part of it too is employed in collateral inquiries, which, upon every hypothesis that can be formed concerning the foundation of morals, are of equal importance. Of this kind is the speculation with respect to the influence of fortune on our moral sentiments; and another speculation no less valuable, with respect to the influence of custom and fashion on the same part of our constitution. "When the subject of this work leads the author to address the imagination and the heart: the variety and felicity of his illustrations--the richness and fluency of his eloquence--and the skill with which he wins the attention and commands the passions of his readers, leave him, among our English moralists, without a rival." TABLE OF CONTENTS. PART I. _Of the Propriety of Action_. Section I. _Of the Sense of Propriety_. Chap. I. Of Sympathy. Chap. II. Of the Pleasure of Mutual Sympathy. Chap. III. Of the manner in which we judge of the Propriety or Impropriety of the Affections of other Men, by their concord or dissonance with our own. Chap. IV. The same subject continued. Chap. V. Of the Amiable and Respectable Virtues. Section II. _Of the Degrees of the different Passions which are consistent with Propriety_. Introduction. Chap. I. Of the Passions which take their origin from the body. Chap. II. Of those Passions which take their origin from a particular turn or habit of the Imagination. Chap. III. Of the unsocial Passions. Chap. IV. Of the social Passions. Chap. V. Of the selfish Passions.