326 ADAPTATION AND PROGRESS 



efficiency, moreover, requires that each should find his place in 

 the various organizations to which he belongs, increase his effi- 

 ciency for that place to the highest degree (with due regard to 

 conflicting interests), and use his influence to strengthen the 

 organization in its task of survival, growth and social utility, and 

 in its attempt to form and attain the group-ideal of functioning 

 in a larger social unity. 1 



III. The responsibility of society for the character of every per- 

 sonality. Every member of a group is now very largely a social 

 product. A society can have the kind of members it really 

 wants. Social conscience, then, should be made to feel that it is 

 responsible for the character of every individual. 



IV. The general ideal for every social quasi-personality (or unity) 

 of social exemplij 'action; i. e., to work out such an organized life 

 and one so fruitful in securing the highest possible well-being of 

 its members and of humanity as a whole, that it will spread by 

 reflective imitation 2 on the part of other social unities. 



V. The social goal of functioning in a more inclusive unity 

 (mentioned in II); but this goal is not to be confined to the 

 national group as in the theories of Pearson, Carver and many 

 German writers, but moves on in ever widening circles with the 

 extension of co-operation and the expansion of the self-regarding 

 sentiment until it embraces all humanity. 



The social philosophy briefly outlined, the outcome of a survey 

 of many social philosophies written under greatly diverse condi- 

 tions of thought and life, fused on a principle that seems to per- 

 vade all forms of cosmic development, that of adaptation, 

 suggests answers to the problems propounded in the Introduction 

 concerning the what, the how, the whence, the whither and the 



1 The goal of exemplifaction has not been applied to the individual for such a 

 goal might possibly lead to a narrow self -consciousness, pride, and arrogance, though 

 this is not probable if balanced with emphasis on social efficiency. Indeed this ideal 

 of exemplifaction furnishes a principle of judging conduct that is more practicable 

 than Kant's " Act as if the maxim of thy action were to become by thy will a univer- 

 sal law of nature." It is better for it makes place for the relativity which we have 

 found is characteristic of all morality. An act might well be worthy of reflective 

 imitation by others similarly situated and yet not such as could be used as the basis 

 for a universal principle. 



2 See note 4, p. 324. 



