Profit-Motive, Descriptive, Normative

As has been previously discussed, the concept of Capitalism has varied over the centuries.  Still, common to them is the principle of Profit-seeking individual behavior.  However, unresolved, and not even addressed, is whether that principle is descriptive, or is normative.  Now, in contemporary Capitalism, that it is descriptive seems to be taken for granted.  Likewise, Smith seems to treat it as a natural instinct in Wealth of Nations.  However, in the absence of an explanation of his previous recognition of Sympathy as a natural instinct in the context of his later model, e. g. that he now repudiates that position, Profit-seeking cannot be accepted as descriptive, i. e. as a sufficient explanation for all behavior, and, hence, as a given fundamental behavioral drive.  For, if both Profit-seeking and Sympathy are natural instincts, then only a Normative principle can elevate one over the other.  Accordingly, as is, the status remains uncertain, at best. In contrast, an analysis that is independent of the status of Sympathy, internal to Wealth of Nations, is more decisive.  For, there, Smith recognizes the Labor theory of Value, which entails that Labor is the source of Surplus-Value, and, hence, of any Profit.  Thus, Profit is sufficiently explained as an integral feature of his system independent of its being derived from a Profit-motive, e. g. Profit is a by-product of any motive to transform raw material, whether a Will to Survive or a Will to Power.  Accordingly, an explicit Profit-motive, i. e. seeking it for its own sake, is not a natural instinct, and, so, can be promoted only as a Normative principle.  That conclusion is of significance in not only a scholarly context: it exposes the taking for granted in contemporary politics, e. g. American, of the Profit-motive as a natural instinct as dogmatic, and, hence, as a potential weapon of repression.