ALLAN SILVER
old. Surely, sir, a blot or two of a warm aiternoon is not to be severely
urged against grey hairs . Old age-even if it blot the page-is
honorable. With submission, sir, we
both
are gelling old."
This appeal to my fellow-feeling was hardly
to
be res isted. At all
events , I saw that go he would nol. So I made up my mind
to
let him
stay, resolving, nevertheless,
to
see to it, that during th e afternoon he
had
to
do with my less important papers.
419
The lawyer 's disposition to tol erate faults and relieve difficulty, a
mixture of calcu lation and kindliness, his belief that efficiency and
humaneness are compatible, his inability to impose his will on an
employee who refuses to depart, his readiness
to
adopt practical
compromise, and his quick sympathy-all anticipate the coming of
Bartleby in miniature and mundane terms. Unlike Turkey's refusal ,
Bartleby 's carries him far past the point of continuing to be a depen–
dent or inferior. Yet the lawyer clearly persists in deepening moral
implication, even after Bartleby ceases to be a hired scrivener who
refuses to do anything, even after th e lawyer has left him behind in
empty chambers. Why does the lawyer persist, beyond the limits both
of station and employment?
The author of market theory's seminal classic, Adam Smith,
remarked on the growing formlessness of social obligation in
The
Theory of Moral Sentiments,
published in 1759 and extensively revised
for an edition of 1790:
The general rul es which determin e what are th e offices of prudence,
of charity, of generosity, of gratitude, of friendship, are in so many
respects loose and inaccurate, admit of so many exceptions, and
require so many modifications, that it is scarce possible
to
regulate
our conduct entirely by a regard to th em .... The actions required
by fri endship , humanity , hospitality, generosity are ... vague and
indeterm in a te.
Smith's treatise-obviously more
progressive
than Paley's–
formulated an ethic based on an essentially deistic social psychology,
meant to accompany the new economic relations of commercial
society. Central to this ethic were the "moral sentiments," of which
"sympathy" was the most important. "Sympathy" forms moral con–
nections among individuated persons, through which social acts–
among them aid, compassion, charity, commiseration, sharing, empa–
thy, congeniality-flow in daily life.
In
Smith's view, however, sympa–
thy is not a moral imperative nor an irrepressible "passion." Nor is it
the capacity for cooperative responsiveness , the product of moralizing
