《道德情操论·卷六·论德性的品质·二之二·论天性推荐给我们行善的社会次序》第5节
Every independent state is divided into many different orders and societies, each of which has its own particular powers, privileges, and immunities. Every individual is naturally more attached to his own particular order or society, than to any other. His own interest, his own vanity, the interest and vanity of many of his friends and companions, are commonly a good deal connected with it. He is ambitious to extend its privileges and immunities. He is zealous to defend them against the encroachments of every other order of society. Upon the manner in which any state is divided into the different orders and societies which compose it, and upon the particular distribution which has been made of their respective powers, privileges, and immunities, depends, what is called, the constitution of that particular state. {205} Upon the ability of each particular order or society to maintain its own powers, privileges, and immunities, against the encroachments of every other, depends the stability of that particular constitution. That particular constitution is necessarily more or less altered, whenever any of its subordinate parts is either raised above or depressed below whatever had been its former rank and condition. All those different orders and societies are dependent upon the state to which they owe their security and protection. That they are all subordinate to that state, and established only in subserviency to its prosperity and preservation, is a truth acknowledged by the most partial member of every one of them. It may often, however, be hard to convince him that the prosperity and preservation of the state requires any diminution of the powers, privileges, and immunities of his own particular order of society. This partiality, though it may sometimes be unjust, may not, upon that account, be useless. It checks the spirit of innovation. It tends to preserve whatever is the established balance among the different orders and societies into which the state is divided; and while it sometimes appears to obstruct some alterations of government which may be fashionable and popular at the time, it contributes in reality to the stability and permanency of the whole system.
注释摘要
在这一段里，斯密把视线从国家之间的情感关系转向了国家内部的秩序结构。他观察到，每一个独立国家都不是铁板一块，而是由许多等级和团体拼合而成的，比如贵族、行会、自治市镇，乃至教会和大学这类拥有各种特定权力、特权和豁免的社群。权力在此指的是某个等级能够合法行使的支配范围，特权是法律或习俗赋予的特殊待遇，豁免则是免于某些普遍义务的自由。这三个词加在一起，刻画的是十…