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500 R. R. MARETT : does and must do to the end of our finite existence, but remaining necessarily asymptotic with absolute Perfection, is so far from being equivalent to unqualified Best (as, for instance, formulated by Kant) that its very essence is com- posed of qualifications. In other words, it is compounded of mutually conditioning elements that whilst continually altering in their relations to one another yet display a rela- tive stability of association in face of all the supplementary conditions represented by the rest of the universe that entitles the cohering mass to the rank of a so-called ' indi- vidual ' Fact or Thing. Let us grant, therefore, that it is the function of ethical science as such to represent this ' thinghood ' of our Best as concretely as possible by induc- tively establishing its essential conditions in contradistinction to those which fall naturally without the concept. Further, let us remember that for the purposes of a general formu- lation ' our ' means ' human '. My Norm and that of my great-grandson will necessarily be more diverse in some features than in others ; and it is the relatively constant features that the Formal Part of Ethics in proportion as it deserves the name will seek exclusively to define. The 'Normal Self,' then, is a suggestion in the shape of a definitory, that is, generally descriptive, formula, which I venture to think is needed by the Evolutionary Ethics of to-day. I believe some such notion and term to be required to fix to give a relatively stable and consistent shape to a mode of thinking that now largely prevails, but, owing to lack of form, has hitherto failed effectually to supplant a rival piece of inadequate and therefore misleading doctrine which some years ago received classic designation at the hands of a no less brilliant writer than the late W. K. Clifford. I refer to his ' Tribal Self,' a specious concept that still figures conspicuously at any rate in the more popular ' evolutionary ' text-books. Let me say at once, however, that the fault I have to find is not with his use of the term ' Self ' in this connexion, but solely with the one-sided and unhistorical view of the Moral End that is introduced under the cover of the qualifying expression ' tribal '. However much the notion of such ' a self within a self ' may cut across the tripartite division of mental factors commonly accepted by Psychology as its ground-plan of research, there can be no doubt that in Ethics it is highly convenient to work round, and as it were concentrate upon, some concept which by the very breadth of its framing draws attention to the organic complexity and inclusiveness of the inward moral life as objectified by us in the shape of a Norm for our pos-